Beaumont and Fletcher's Works, Vol. 09 of 10Fletcher, John
General
Beaumont and Fletcher's Works, Vol. 09 of 10
Fletcher, John
English drama
_Host._ I shall gentlemen; I would fain be rid
Of these rascalls, but that they raise profit
To my wine cellar.
When I have made use of them sufficiently,
I will intreat the conjurer to tye crackers to their tails,
And send them packing.
_Enter Forobosco as in his Study._ (A paper)
_Foro._ Come hither mine Host, look here.
_Host._ What's that?
_Foro._ A challenge from my man.
_Host._ For breaking's pate?
_Foro._ He writes here if I meet him not
I'th' Feild within this half hour,
I shall hear more from him.
_Host._ O sir, minde your profit,
Ne'er think of the rascall, here are the gentlemen.
_Foro._ 'Morrow my worthy clients,
What are you all prepar'd of your questions;
That I may give my resolution upon them?
_Omnes._ We are Sir.
_Pedant._ And have brought our mony.
_Foro._ Each then in order,
And differ not for precedency.
_Dan._ I am buying of an office Sir,
And to that purpose I would fain learn
To dissemble cunningly.
_Foro._ Doe you come to me for that? you should rather
Have gone to a cunning woman.
_Danc._ I sir but their Instructions are but like wom[e]n,
Pretty well but not to the depth, as I'd have it:
You are a conjurer, the devils Master,
And I would learn it from you so exactly.
_Foro._ That the devill himself
Might not go beyond you.
_Dane._ You are i'th' right Sir.
_Foro._ And so your mony for your purchase
Might come in again within a 12 month.
_Danc._ I would be a Graduate sir, no freshman.
_F[e]ro._ Here's my hand sir,
I will make you dissemble so methodically,
As if the divell should be sent from the great Turk,
In the shape of an Embassador
To set all the Christian princes at variance.
_Danc._ I cannot with any modesty desire any more.
There's your mony sir.
_Foro._ For the art of dissembling.
_Cox._ My suit sir will be news to you when I tell it.
_Foro._ Pray on.
_Cox._ I would set up a press here in Italy,
To write all the Corantos for Christendome.
_Foro._ That's news indeed,
And how would you imploy me in't?
_Cox._ Marry sir, from you
I would gain my intelligence.
_Foro._ I conceive you, you would have me furnish you
With a spirit to informe you.
_Cox._ But as quiet a Divell as the woman,
The first day and a half after she's married,
I can by no means indure a terrible one.
_Foro._ No, no, I'll qualifie him,
He shall not fright you,
It shall be the ghost of some lying Stationer,
A Spirit shall look as if butter would not melt in his
mouth. A new _Mercurius Gallo-belgicus_.
_Cox._ O there was a captain was rare at it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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