Allwit’s house.
Enter Davy and Allwit severally.
DAVY
Honesty wash my eyes, I have spied a wittol.
ALLWIT
What, Davy [Dahumma]? Welcome from North Wales,
I’faith, and is Sir Walter come?
DAVY
New come to town, sir.
ALLWIT
Into the maids, sweet Davy, and give order his chamber be made ready instantly; my wife’s as great as she can wallow, Davy, and longs for nothing but pickled cucumbers, and his coming, and now she shall ha’t, boy.
DAVY
She’s sure of them, sir.
ALLWIT
Thy very [sight] will hold my wife in pleasure, till the knight come himself. Go in, in, in, Davy.
Exit [Davy].
The founder’s come to town; I am like a man
Finding a table furnished to his hand,
As mine is still to me, prays for the founder;
Bless the right worshipful, the good founder’s life.
I thank him, h’as maintained my house this ten years,
Not only keeps my wife, but ‘a keeps me,
And all my family; I am at his table,
He gets me all my children, and pays the nurse,
Monthly, or weekly, puts me to nothing,
Rent, nor church duties, not so much as the scavenger:
The happiest state that ever man was born to.
I walk out in a morning, come to breakfast,
Find excellent cheer, a good fire in winter,
Look in my coal house about midsummer eve,
That’s full, five or six chaldron, new laid up;
Look in my back yard, I shall find a steeple
Made up with Kentish faggots, which o’erlooks
The waterhouse and the windmills; I say nothing
But smile, and pin the door. When she lies in,
As now she’s even upon the point of grunting,
A lady lies not in like her; there’s her embossings,
Embroiderings, spanglings, and I know not what,
As if she lay with all the gaudy shops
In Gresham’s Burse about her; then her restoratives,
Able to set up a young ‘pothecary,
And richly stock the foreman of a drug shop;
Her sugar by whole loaves, her wines by rundlets.
I see these things, but like a happy man,
I pay for none at all, yet fools think’s mine;
I have the name, and in his gold I shine.
And where some merchants would in soul kiss hell,
To buy a paradise for their wives, and dye
Their conscience in the bloods of prodigal heirs
To deck their night-piece, yet all this being done,
Eaten with jealousy to the inmost bone —
As what affliction nature more constrains,
Than feed the wife plump for another’s veins? —
These torments stand I freed of, I am as clear
From jealousy of a wife as from the charge.
O, two miraculous blessings; ’tis the knight
Hath took that labour all out of my hands;
I may sit still and play; he’s jealous for me —
Watches her steps, sets spies — I live at ease;
He has both the cost and torment; when the strings
Of his heart [fret], I feed, laugh, or sing,
“La dildo, dildo la dildo, la dildo dildo de dildo.”
Enter two Servants.
FIRST SERVANT
What has he got a-singing in his head now?
SECOND SERVANT
Now he’s out of work he falls to making dildoes.
ALLWIT
Now, sirs, Sir Walter’s come.
FIRST SERVANT
Is our master come?
ALLWIT
Your master? What am I?
FIRST SERVANT
Do not you know, sir?
ALLWIT
Pray, am not I your master?
FIRST SERVANT
O, you are but our mistress’s husband.
Enter Sir Walter and Davy.
ALLWIT
Ergo, knave, your master.
FIRST SERVANT
Negatur argumentum. Here comes Sir Walter.
[Allwit takes off his hat.]
[Aside to Second Servant] Now ‘a stands bare as well as we; make the most of him, he’s but one peep above a serving-man, and so much his horns make him.
SIR WALTER
How dost, Jack?
ALLWIT
Proud of your worship’s health, sir.
SIR WALTER
How does your wife?
ALLWIT
E’en after your own making, sir,
She’s a tumbler, i’faith, the nose and belly meets.
SIR WALTER
They’ll part in time again.
ALLWIT
At the good hour, they will, and please your worship.
SIR WALTER
Here, sirrah, pull off my boots. Put on, put on, Jack.
ALLWIT
I thank your kind worship, sir.
SIR WALTER
Slippers! Heart, you are sleepy.
ALLWIT
[Aside] The game begins already.
SIR WALTER
Pish, put on, Jack.
ALLWIT
[Aside] Now I must do it, or he’ll be as angry now as if I had put it on at first bidding; ’tis but observing, ’tis but observing a man’s humour once, and he may ha’ him by the nose all his life. [Puts his hat back on]
SIR WALTER
What entertainment has lain open here?
No strangers in my absence?
FIRST SERVANT
Sure, sir, not any.
ALLWIT
[Aside] His jealousy begins, am not I happy now
That can laugh inward whilst his marrow melts?
SIR WALTER
How do you satisfy me?
FIRST SERVANT
Good sir, be patient.
SIR WALTER
For two months’ absence I’ll be satisfied.
FIRST SERVANT
No living creature entered —
SIR WALTER
Entered? Come, swear —
FIRST SERVANT
You will not hear me out, sir —
SIR WALTER
Yes, I’ll hear’t out, sir.
FIRST SERVANT
Sir, he can tell himself.
SIR WALTER
Heart, he can tell!
Do you think I’ll trust him? As a usurer
With forfeited lordships. Him? O monstrous injury!
Believe him? Can the devil speak ill of darkness?
What can you say, sir?
ALLWIT
Of my soul and conscience,
Sir, she’s a wife as honest of her body
To me as any lord’s proud lady can be.
SIR WALTER
Yet, by your leave, I heard you were once offering
To go to bed to her.
ALLWIT
No, I protest, sir.
SIR WALTER
Heart, if you do, you shall take all — I’ll marry.
ALLWIT
O, I beseech you, sir —
SIR WALTER
That wakes the slave,
And keeps his flesh in awe.
ALLWIT
[Aside] I’ll stop that gap
Where’er I find it open; I have poisoned
His hopes in marriage already —
Some old rich widows, and some landed virgins —
Enter two children[, Wat and Nick].
And I’ll fall to work still before I’ll lose him,
He’s yet too sweet to part from.
[WAT]
God-den, father.
ALLWIT
Ha, villain, peace.
[NICK]
God-den, father.
ALLWIT
Peace, bastard.
[Aside] Should he hear ‘em! These are two foolish children,
They do not know the gentleman that sits there.
SIR WALTER
Oh Wat, how dost, Nick? Go to school,
Ply your books, boys, ha?
[Exeunt Wat and Nick.]
ALLWIT
[Aside] Where’s your legs, whoresons?
They should kneel indeed if they could say their prayers.
SIR WALTER
[Aside] Let me see, stay,
How shall I dispose of these two brats now
When I am married, for they must not mingle
Amongst my children that I get in wedlock,
‘Twill make foul work that, and raise many storms.
I’ll bind Wat prentice to a goldsmith, my father Yellowhammer;
As fit as can be. Nick with some vintner; good, goldsmith
And vintner; there will be wine in bowls, i’faith.
Enter Allwit’s Wife.
[MISTRESS ALLWIT]
Sweet knight,
Welcome; I have all my longings now in town,
Now well-come the good hour.
SIR WALTER
How cheers my mistress?
[MISTRESS ALLWIT]
Made lightsome, e’en by him that made me heavy.
SIR WALTER
Methinks she shows gallantly, like a moon at full, sir.
ALLWIT
True, and if she bear a male child, there’s the man in the moon, sir.
SIR WALTER
’Tis but the boy in the moon yet, goodman calf.
ALLWIT
There was a man; the boy had never been there else.
SIR WALTER
It shall be yours, sir.
[Exeunt Mistress Allwit and Sir Walter.]
ALLWIT
No, by my troth,
I’ll swear it’s none of mine, let him that got it
Keep it. Thus do I rid myself of fear,
Lie soft, sleep hard, drink wine, and eat good cheer.
[Exit.]