"My sweet life,--Now that I have declared to you my mind
for the settling of your estate, I suppose that it were
best for me to bethink what allowance were best for me;
for, considering what care I have ever had of your
estate, and how respectfully I dealt with those which
both by the laws of God, nature, and civil policy, wit,
religion, government, and honesty, you, my dear, are
bound to, I pray and beseech you to grant to me, your
most kind and loving wife, the sum of one thousand pounds
per an., quarterly to be paid.
"Also, I would, besides that allowance for my apparel,
have six hundred pounds added yearly for the performance
of charitable works; these I would not neither be
accountable for. Also, I will have three horses for my
own saddle, that none shall dare to lend or borrow; none
lend but I, none borrow but you. Also, I would have two
gentlewomen, lest one should be sick; also, believe that
it would be an indecent thing for a gentlewoman to stand
mumping alone, when God has blest their Lord and Lady
with a great estate. Also, when I ride hunting or
hawking, or travel from one house to another, I will have
them attending, so for each of those said women I must
have a horse. Also, I will have six or eight gentlemen,
and will have two coaches; one lined with velvet to
myself, with four very fair horses; and a coach for my
women lined with sweet cloth, orelaid with gold; the
other with scarlet, and laced with watchet lace and
silver, with four good horses. Also, I will have two
coachmen, one for myself, the other for my women. Also,
whenever I travel, I will be allowed not only carroches
and spare horses for me and my women, but such carriages
as shall be fitting for all, orderly, not pestering my
things with my women's, nor theirs with chambermaids, nor
theirs with washmaids.
"Also, laundresses, when I travel; I will have them sent
away with the carriages to see all safe, and the
chambermaids shall go before with the grooms, that the
chambers may be ready, sweet, and clean.
"Also, for that it is indecent for me to croud myself
with my gentleman-usher in my coach, I will have him have
a convenient horse to attend me either in city or
country; and I must have four footmen; and my desire is
that you will defray the charges for me.
"And for myself, besides my yerely allowance, I would
have twenty gowns apparel, six of them excellent good
ones, eight of them for the country, and six others of
them excellent good ones. Also, I would have to put in my
purse two thousand and two hundred pounds, and so you to
pay my debts. Also, I would have eight thousand pounds to
buy me jewels, and six thousand pounds for a pearl chain.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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