Hus. Nay I protest, (and take that for an earnest) [Spurns her. I will for ever hold thee in contempt, Wife. Sir, do but turn a gentle eye on me, Hus. Look it be done. Shall I want dust, And, like a slave, wear nothing in my pockets [Holds his hands in his Pockets. But my bare hands, to fill them up with nails? O much against my blood! Let it be done; I was never made to be a looker on, A bawd to dice; I'll shake the drabs myself, And make them yield: I say, look it be done. Wife. I take my leave it shall. Hus. Speedily, speedily. I hate the very hour I chose a wife : [Exit. A trouble, trouble! Three children, like three evils, Hang on me. Fie, fie, fie! Strumpet and bastards! Enter three Gentlemen. Strumpet and bastards ! Gent. No, thou shalt hear me further. The spring-time of thy youth did fairly promise Such dearth should hang upon thee, We that see it, Are sorry to believe it. In thy change, 1 Gent. Still do these loathsome thoughts jar This voice into all places will be hurl'd on your tongue? Yourself to stain the honour of your wife, Nobly descended? Those whom men call mad, Endangers others; but he's more than mad That wounds himself; whose own words do proclaim Scandals unjust, to soil his better name. 2 Gent. Good sir, let modesty reprove you. Thou and the devil have deceived the world. Gent. But of all the worst, Thy virtuous wife, right honourably allied, Hus. Nay, then, I know thee; Gent. O ignoble thought! I am past my patient blood. Shall I stand idle, To lay thy hate upon the fruitful honour [They fight, and the Husband is hurt, Hus. Oh! Gent. Wilt thou yield it yet? Hus. Sir, sir, I have not done with you. 10 Exit. Between this scene and the next, the lady has travelled from Calverly, in Yorkshire, to London, and from London back again to Calverly; in all about three hundred and eighty-six miles. Gent. I hope, nor ne'er shall do. not now be kind to you, and love you, and che[They fight again.rish you up, I should think the devil himself kept open house in him. Hus. Have you got tricks? Are you in cunning with me? Gent. No, plain and right: He needs no cunning that for truth doth fight. Hus. Hard fortune! am I levelled with the Gent. Now, sir, you lie at mercy. Gent. Alas, that hate should bring us to our You see, my sword's not thirsty for your life: [Exit. Hus. Has the dog left me then, Vanquished? got down? unable even to speak? SCENE III.-Another Room in the same. Enter Wife and a Servant. Wife. I doubt not but he will. Now pr'ythee leave me; I think I hear him coming. Ser. I am gone. [Exit. Wife. By this good means I shall preserve my And free my husband out of usurers' hands. Enter Husband. Hus. Now, are you come? Where's the money? Let's see the money. Is the rubbish sold? those wise-acres, your lands?—Why when? The money? Where is it? Pour it down; down with it, down with it: I say pour't on the ground; let's see it, let's see it. Wife. Good sir, keep but in patience, and I hope my words shall like you well. I bring you better comfort than the sale of my dowry. Hus. Ha! what's that? Wife. Pray do not fright me, sir, but vouchsafe me hearing. My uncle, glad of your kindness to me and mild usage, (for so I made it to him,) hath, in pity of your declining fortunes, provided a place for you at court, of worth and credit; which so much overjoyed me-- Hus. Out on thee, filth! over and overjoyed, when I am in torment? [Spurns her.] Thou politic whore, subtiler than nine devils, was this thy journey to nunck? to set down the history of me, of my state and fortunes? Shall I, that dedicated myself to pleasure, be now confined in service? to crouch and stand like an old man i'the hams, Ser. 'Faith, mistress, if it might not be pre- my hat off? I that could never abide to uncover. sumption In me to tell you so, for his excuse You had small reason, knowing his abuse. Wife. I grant I had; but alas, Why should our faults at home be spread abroad? my head 'the church? Base slut! this fruit bear thy complaints. Wife. O, heaven knows That my complaints were praises, and best words sessed Of every accident before I came. Enter a Servant, hastily. To all his stooping fortunes. Twill be a means, I What the devil! How now! thy hasty news? hope, To make new league between us, and redeem His virtues with his lands. Ser. May it please you, sir- Hus. What! may I not look upon my dagger? Speak, villain, or I will execute the point on thee: Ser. I should think so, mistress. If he should Quick, short. Ser. Why, sir, a gentleman from the university | feel you in my soul: you are your art's master. I stays below to speak with you. [Exit.never had sense till now; your syllables have cleft Hus. From the university? so; university :--- me. Both for your words and pains I thank you. that long word runs through me. I cannot but acknowledge grievous wrongs done to my brother; mighty, mighty, mighty, mighty wrongs.Within, there. [Erit. Wife. Was ever wife so wretchedly beset? Had not this news stepp'd in between, the point Had offered violence unto my breast. That which some women call great misery, Would show but little here; would scarce be seen Among my miseries. I may compare For wretched fortunes, with all wives that are. A place of credit, a base servitude. me. [Exit. SCENE IV.---Another Apartment in the same. Enter Husband, and the Master of a College. Hus. Please you draw near, sir; you're exceeding welcome. Mast. That's my doubt; I fear I come not to be welcome. Hus. Yes, howsoever. Mast. 'Tis not my fashion, sir, to dwell in long circumstance, but to be plain and effectual; therefore to the purpose. The cause of my setting forth was piteous and lamentable. That hopeful young gentleman, your brother, whose virtues we all love dearly, through your default and unnatural negligence lies in bond executed for your debt, a prisoner; all his studies amazed, his hope struck dead, and the pride of his youth muffled in these dark clouds of oppression. Hus. Umph, umph, umph! Mast. O you have killed the towardest hope of all our university: wherefore, without repentance and amends, expect ponderous and sudden judgements to fall grievously upon you. Your brother, a man who profited in his divine employments, and might have made ten thousand souls fit for heaven, is now, by your careless courses, cast into prison, which you must answer for; and assure your spirit it will come home at length. Hus. O God! oh! Mast. Wise men think ill of you; others speak ill of you; no man loves you; nay, even those whom honesty condemns, condemn you: And take this from the virtuous affection I bear your brother; never look for prosperous hour, good thoughts, quiet sleep, contented walks, nor any thing that makes man perfect, till you redeem him. What is your answer? How will you bestow him? Upon desperate misery, or better hopes?--I suffer till I hear your answer. Hus. Sir, you have such wrought with me; I Enter Servant. Hus. Fill me a bowl of wine. [Exit Servant.] Alas, poor brother, bruised with an execution for my sake! Mast. A bruise indeed makes many a mortal sore, Till the grave cure them. Re-enter Servant with Wine. Hus. Sir, I begin to you; you've chid your welcome. Mast. I could have wished it better for your sake. I pledge you, sir :-To the kind man in prison. Hus. Let it be so. Now, sir, if you please to spend but a few minutes in a walk about my grounds below, my man here shall attend you. I doubt not but by that time to be furnished of a sufficient answer, and therein my brother fully satisfied. Mast. Good sir, in that the angels would be pleased, And the world's murmurs calmed; and I should say, I set forth then upon a lucky day. [Exeunt Master and Servant. Hus. O thou confused man! Thy pleasant sins have undone thee; thy damnation has beggared thee. That heaven should say we must not sin, and yet made women! give our senses way to find pleasure, which, being found, confounds us! Why should we know those things so much misuse us? O, would virtue had been forbidden! We should then have proved all virtuous; for 'tis our blood to love what we are forbidden. Had not drunkenness been forbidden, what man would have been fool to a beast, and zany to a swine,--to show tricks in the mire? What is there in three dice, to make a man draw thrice three thousand acres into the compass of a little round table, and, with the gentleman's palsy in the hand, shake out his posterity thieves or beggars? Tis done; I have don't i'faith: terrible, horrible misery!---How well was I left! Very well, very well. My lands show'd like a full moon about me; but now the moon's in the last quarter---waning, waning; and I am mad to think that moon was mine; mine and my father's, and my fore-fathers'; generations, generations.---Down goes the house of us; down, down it sinks. Now is the name a beggar; begs in me. That name, which hundreds of years has made this shire famous, in me and my posterity, runs out. In my seed five are made miserable besides myself: my riot is now my brother's gaoler, my wife's sighing, my three boys' penury, and mine own confusion. Why sit my hairs upon my cursed head? [Tears his hair. Will not this poison scatter them " O, my brother's In execution among devils that Good your honour, by a coach; no, nor your brother: 'Tis charity to brain you. Son. How shall I learn, now my head's broke? [Stabs him. Stretch him and make him give; 12 and I in want, Rather than beg. Be not thy name's disgrace: But in my heart her several torments dwell; 13 Enter a little Boy, with a Top and a Scourge. 15 [He takes up the Child by the skirts of his long Coat with one hand, and draws his Dagger with the other. Hus. Up, sir, for here thou hast no inheritance left.16 Son. O, what will you do, father? I am your white boy. Hus. Thou shalt be my red boy; take that. Son. O, you hurt me, father. Hus. My eldest beggar, Thou shalt not live to ask an usurer bread; Spurn thou thy fortunes first; if they be base, SCENE V.-A Maid discovered with a Child in her arms; the Mother on a Couch by her, asleep. Maid. Sleep, sweet babe; sorrow makes thy mother sleep: It bodes small good when heaviness falls so deep. 'Tis lost at dice, what ancient honour won : Enter Husband, with his Son, bleeding. [Strives with her for the Child. Maid. O help, help! Out alas! murder, mur der! Hus. Are you gossiping, you prating, sturdy quean? 11 Why sit my hairs upon my cursed head? Will not this poison scatter them?-Alluding to the effects of some kinds of poison. So in Leicester's Commonwealth: “ yet was he like to have lost his life, but escaped in the end (being yong) with the losse onely of his haire." The author is here speaking of a page who had tasted a potion prepared by Leicester for the earl of Essex.--- STEEVENS. 12 And make him give.—Leather when stretched is said to give.-MALONE. 13 Divines and dying men may talk of hell, But in my heart her several torments dwell.—Thus in Rowe's Tamerlane: For me to want exceeds the throes of hell.-The same aggravation of the mise ries occasioned by unexpected poverty, is introduced in Timon: "That never knew but better, is some sufferance."-STEEVENS. 15 I fear no vizards nor bugbears. This is a natural circumstance. The child mistakes the distortions of real passion, for grimaces exhibited only with a'sportive intention to fright him.-STEEVENS. 16 Up, sir, for here thou hast no inheritance left. He means, I believe, that his child having nothing left on earth, he will send him to heaven.---MALONE. 17 Nothing but Misery serves in this hous‹.—In K. Henry VIII. we have a similar personification : "And Danger serves among them."-STEEVENS. 18 To charm a woman's tongue.—To silence her.-MALONE. 19 Break her neck: a politician did it.—The satire in this passage is undoubtedly personal. The politician alluded to was queen Elizabeth's favourite, the earl of Leicester, the death of whose first wife is thus described in the celebrated libel entitled his Commonwealth. This work is attributed to Parsons the Jesuit, though sir William Cecil, lord Burleigh, is suspected of having furnished his materials. It was first printed abroad in the year 1584, and was circulated with malicious industry by means of multiplied editions, throughout our kingdom, and through others by repeated translations into various languages. "The death of Leicester's first lady and wife." "For first his lordship hath a speciall fortune, that when he desireth any woman's favour, then what person so ever standeth in his way, bath the luck to dye quickly for the finishing of his desire. As for example, when his lordship was in full hope to marry her majesty, and his owne wife stood in his light, as he supposed; he did but send her aside to the house of his servant Forster of Cumner by Oxford, where shortly after she had the chance to fall from a paire of staires, and so to breake her neck, but yet without hurting of her hood that stood upon her head. But sir Richard Varney, who by commandment remained with her that day alone, with one man onely, and had sent away perforce all her servants from her to a market two miles off, he (I say) with his man, can tell how she died, which man being taken afterward for a felony in the marches of Wales, and offering to publish the manner of the said murder, was made away privily in the prison: and sir Richard himself dying about the same time in London, cried pitiously and blasphemed God, and said to a gentleman of worship of mine acquaintance, not long before his death, that all the devils in hell did teare him in pieces. The wife also of Bald Butler, kinsman to my lord, gave out the whole fact a little before her death. But to return unto my purpose, this was my lord's good fortune to have his wife dye, at that time when it was like to turne most to his profit." When this book was republished for reasons of policy, in 1641, a metrical monologue, called Leicester's Ghost, was appended to it, and there likewise the same fact is recorded. The following quotation is from a more perfect and ample MS. copy of the same poem. "My first wife she fell downe a paire of staires "This dismall happ did to my wife betyde: Lest it should be objected to the probability of Shakespeare's having written the Yorkshire Tragedy, that he would not, on account of his intimacy with the friend of Essex, have treated the memory of Leicester with so much freedom, let me add, that the former was executed in 1600, and our author was therefore left at full liberty to adopt the common sentiments relative to this great but profligate states31 man. VOL. I. |