Yellowhammer’s house.
Enter Tim and Tutor.
TIM
Negatur argumentum, tutor.
TUTOR
Probo tibi, pupil, stultus non est animal rationale.
TIM
Falleris sane.
TUTOR
Quaeso ut taceas; probo tibi.
TIM
Quomodo probas, domine?
TUTOR
Stultus non habet rationem, ergo non est animal rationale.
TIM
Sic argumentaris, domine: stultus non habet rationem, ergo non est animal rationale. Negatur argumentum again, tutor.
TUTOR
Argumentum iterum probo tibi, domine: qui non participat de ratione nullo modo potest vocari rationalibus, but stultus non participat de ratione, ergo stultus nullo modo potest dicere rationali.
TIM
Participat.
TUTOR
Sic disputus, qui participat quomodo participate.
TIM
Ut homo; probabo tibi in syllogismo.
TUTOR
Hunc proba.
TIM
Sic probo, domine: stultus est homo sicut tu et ego sum; homo est animal rationale, sicut stultus est animal rationale.
Enter Maudlin.
MAUDLIN
Here’s nothing but disputing all the day long with ‘em.
TUTOR
Sic disputus, stultus est homo sicut tu et ego sum; homo est animal rationale, sicut stultus est animal rationale.
MAUDLIN
Your reasons are both good, whate’er they be;
Pray give them o’er, faith, you’ll tire yourselves,
What’s the matter between you?
TIM
Nothing but reasoning about a fool, mother.
MAUDLIN
About a fool, son? Alas, what need you trouble your heads about that, none of us all but knows what a fool is.
TIM
Why, what’s a fool, mother? I come to you now.
MAUDLIN
Why, one that’s married before he has wit.
TIM
’Tis pretty, i’faith, and well guessed of a woman never brought up at the university: but bring forth what fool you will, mother, I’ll prove him to be as reasonable a creature, as myself or my tutor here.
MAUDLIN
Fie, ’tis impossible.
TUTOR
Nay, he shall do’t, forsooth.
TIM
’Tis the easiest thing to prove a fool by logic,
By logic I’ll prove anything.
MAUDLIN
What thou wilt not?
TIM
I’ll prove a whore to be an honest woman.
MAUDLIN
Nay, by my faith, she must prove that herself,
Or logic will never do’t.
TIM
‘Twill do’t, I tell you.
MAUDLIN
Some in this street would give a thousand pounds
That you could prove their wives so.
TIM
Faith, I can,
And all their daughters, too, though they had three bastards.
When comes your tailor hither?
MAUDLIN
Why, what of him?
TIM
By logic I’ll prove him to be a man,
Let him come when he will.
MAUDLIN
How hard at first was learning to him? Truly, sir, I thought he would never a took the Latin tongue. How many accidences do you think he wore out ere he came to his grammar?
TUTOR
Some three or four.
MAUDLIN
Believe me, sir, some four and thirty.
TIM
Pish, I made haberdins of ‘em in church porches.
MAUDLIN
He was eight years in his grammar, and stuck horribly at a foolish place there called as in presenti.
TIM
Pox, I have it here now.
MAUDLIN
He so shamed me once before an honest gentleman that knew me when I was a maid.
TIM
These women must have all out.
MAUDLIN
Quid est grammatica? says the gentleman to him — I shall remember by a sweet, sweet token — but nothing could he answer.
TUTOR
How now, pupil, ha, quid est grammatica?
TIM
Grammatica? Ha, ha, ha.
MAUDLIN
Nay, do not laugh, son, but let me hear you say it now: there was one word went so prettily off the gentleman’s tongue, I shall remember it the longest day of my life.
TUTOR
Come, quid est grammatica?
TIM
Are you not ashamed, tutor? Grammatica? Why, recte scribendi atque loquendi ars, sir-reverence of my mother.
MAUDLIN
That was it, i’faith: why now, son, I see you are a deep scholar; and master tutor, a word, I pray, let us withdraw a little into my husband’s chamber. I’ll send in the North Wales gentlewoman to him, she looks for wooing: I’ll put together both, and lock the door.
TUTOR
I give great approbation to your conclusion.
Exit [with Maudlin].
TIM
I mar’l what this gentlewoman should be
That I should have in marriage, she’s a stranger to me:
I wonder what my parents mean, i’faith,
To match me with a stranger so:
A maid that’s neither kiff nor kin to me:
Life, do they think I have no more care of my body,
Than to lie with one that I ne’er knew,
A mere stranger,
One that ne’er went to school with me neither,
Nor ever playfellows together;
They’re mightily o’erseen in’t methinks;
They say she has mountains to her marriage,
She’s full of cattle, some two thousand runts;
Now what the meaning of these runts should be,
My tutor cannot tell me;
I have looked in Rider’s dictionary for the letter R,
And there I can hear no tidings of these runts neither;
Unless they should be Rumford hogs,
I know them not,
Enter Welsh Gentlewoman.
And here she comes.
If I know what to say to her now
In the way of marriage, I’m no graduate;
Methinks, i’faith, ’tis boldly done of her
To come into my chamber being but a stranger;
She shall not say I’m so proud yet, but I’ll speak to her:
Marry, as I will order it,
She shall take no hold of my words I’ll warrant her;
She looks and makes a curtsey —
[To her] Salve tu quoque puella pulcherrima,
Quid vis nescio nec sane curo —
Tully’s own phrase to a heart.
WELSH GENTLEWOMAN
[Aside] I know not what he means; a suitor, quotha?
I hold my life he understands no English.
TIM
Ferter me hercule tu virgo,
Wallia ut opibus abundis maximis.
WELSH GENTLEWOMAN
[Aside] What’s this ferter and abundundis?
He mocks me sure, and calls me a bundle of farts.
TIM
[Aside] I have no Latin word now for their runts; I’ll make some shift or other. — Iterum, dico opibus abundat maximis montibus et fontibus et, ut ita dicam, rontibus; attamen, vero, homanculus ego sum natura, simule arte bachalarius, lecto profecto non parata.
WELSH GENTLEWOMAN
[Aside] This is most strange; may be he can speak Welsh —
Avedera whee comrage? Derdue cog foginis?
TIM
[Aside] Cog foggin? I scorn to cog with her, I’ll tell her so, too, in a word near her own language. — Ego non cogo.
WELSH GENTLEWOMAN
Rhegosin a whiggin harle ron corid ambre.
TIM
[Aside] By my faith, she’s a good scholar, I see that already;
She has the tongues plain, I hold my life she has travelled;
What will folks say? There goes the learned couple;
Faith, if the truth were known, she hath proceeded.
Enter Maudlin.
MAUDLIN
How now, how speeds your business?
TIM
I’m glad my mother’s come to part us.
MAUDLIN
How do you agree, forsooth?
WELSH GENTLEWOMAN
As well as e’er we did before we met.
MAUDLIN
How’s that?
WELSH GENTLEWOMAN
You put me to a man I understand not;
Your son’s no English man methinks.
MAUDLIN
No English man, bless my boy,
And born i’ the heart of London?
WELSH GENTLEWOMAN
I ha’ been long enough in the chamber with him,
And I find neither Welsh nor English in him.
MAUDLIN
Why, Tim, how have you used the gentlewoman?
TIM
As well as a man might do, mother, in modest Latin.
MAUDLIN
Latin, fool?
TIM
And she recoiled in Hebrew.
MAUDLIN
In Hebrew, fool? ’Tis Welsh.
TIM
All comes to one, mother.
MAUDLIN
She can speak English, too.
TIM
Who told me so much?
Heart, and she can speak English, I’ll clap to her,
I thought you’d marry me to a stranger.
MAUDLIN
You must forgive him, he’s so inured to Latin,
He and his tutor, that he hath quite forgot
To use the Protestant tongue.
WELSH GENTLEWOMAN
’Tis quickly pardoned, forsooth.
MAUDLIN
Tim, make amends and kiss her,
He makes towards you, forsooth.
[He kisses her.]
TIM
O, delicious, one may discover her country by her kissing. ’Tis a true saying, there’s nothing tastes so sweet as your Welsh mutton: it was reported you could sing.
MAUDLIN
O, rarely, Tim, the sweetest British songs.
TIM
And ’tis my mind, I swear, before I marry
I would see all my wife’s good parts at once,
To view how rich I were.
MAUDLIN
Thou shalt hear sweet music, Tim. Pray, forsooth.
Music and Welsh song.
[WELSH GENTLEWOMAN]
Cupid is Venus’ only joy,
But he is a wanton boy,
A very, very wanton boy,
He shoots at ladies’ naked breasts,
He is the cause of most men’s crests,
I mean upon the forehead,
Invisible but horrid;
’Twas he first taught upon the way
To keep a lady’s lips in play.
Why should not Venus chide her son,
For the pranks that he hath done,
The wanton pranks that he hath done?
He shoots his fiery darts so thick,
They hurt poor ladies to the quick,
Ah me, with cruel wounding;
His darts are so confounding,
That life and sense would soon decay,
But that he keeps their lips in play.
Can there be any part of bliss,
In a quickly fleeting kiss,
A quickly fleeting kiss?
To one’s pleasure, leisures are but waste,
The slowest kiss makes too much haste,
And lose it ere we find it,
The pleasing sport they only know,
That close above and close below.
TIM
I would not change my wife for a kingdom;
I can do somewhat, too, in my own lodging.
Enter Yellowhammer and Allwit [in disguise].
YELLOWHAMMER
Why, well said, Tim, the bells go merrily,
I love such peals, a’ life; wife, lead them in a while,
Here’s a strange gentleman desires private conference.
[Exeunt Maudlin, Tim and Welsh Gentlewoman.]
You’re welcome, sir, the more for your name’s sake.
Good Master Yellowhammer, I love my name well,
And which o’ the Yellowhammers take you descent from,
If I may be so bold with you, which, I pray?
ALLWIT
The Yellowhammers in Oxfordshire, near Abbington.
YELLOWHAMMER
And those are the best Yellowhammers, and truest bred: I came from thence myself, though now a citizen. I’ll be bold with you: you are most welcome.
ALLWIT
I hope the zeal I bring with me shall deserve it.
YELLOWHAMMER
I hope no less; what is your will, sir?
ALLWIT
I understand by rumours, you have a daughter,
Which my bold love shall henceforth title “cousin.”
YELLOWHAMMER
I thank you for her, sir.
ALLWIT
I heard of her virtues,
And other confirmed graces.
YELLOWHAMMER
A plaguy girl, sir.
ALLWIT
Fame sets her out with richer ornaments
Than you are pleased to boast of; ’tis done modestly;
I hear she’s towards marriage.
YELLOWHAMMER
You hear truth, sir.
ALLWIT
And with a knight in town, Sir Walter Whorehound.
YELLOWHAMMER
The very same, sir.
ALLWIT
I am the sorrier for’t.
YELLOWHAMMER
The sorrier? Why, cousin?
ALLWIT
’Tis not too far past, is’t? It may be yet recalled?
YELLOWHAMMER
Recalled? Why, good sir?
ALLWIT
Resolve me in that point, ye shall hear from me.
YELLOWHAMMER
There’s no contract passed.
ALLWIT
I am very joyful, sir.
YELLOWHAMMER
But he’s the man must bed her.
ALLWIT
By no means, coz, she’s quite undone then,
And you’ll curse the time that e’er you made the match;
He’s an arrant whoremaster, consumes his time and state —
Whom in my knowledge he hath kept this seven years,
Nay, coz, another man’s wife, too.
YELLOWHAMMER
O, abominable!
ALLWIT
Maintains the whole house, apparels the husband,
Pays servants’ wages, not so much, but —
YELLOWHAMMER
Worse and worse, and doth the husband know this?
ALLWIT
Knows? Ay, and glad he may too, ’tis his living;
As other trades thrive, butchers by selling flesh,
Poulters by venting conies, or the like, coz.
YELLOWHAMMER
What an incomparable wittol’s this?
ALLWIT
Tush, what cares he for that, believe me, coz,
No more than I do.
YELLOWHAMMER
What a base slave is that?
ALLWIT
All’s one to him; he feeds and takes his ease,
Was ne’er the man that ever broke his sleep
To get a child yet by his own confession,
And yet his wife has seven.
YELLOWHAMMER
What, by Sir Walter?
ALLWIT
Sir Walter’s like to keep ‘em, and maintain ‘em,
In excellent fashion, he dares do no less, sir.
YELLOWHAMMER
Life, has he children too?
ALLWIT
Children? Boys thus high,
In their Cato and Cordelius.
YELLOWHAMMER
What, you jest, sir!
ALLWIT
Why, one can make a verse,
And is now at Eton College.
YELLOWHAMMER
O, this news has cut into my heart, coz.
ALLWIT
It had eaten nearer if it had not been prevented.
One Allwit’s wife.
YELLOWHAMMER
Allwit? Foot, I have heard of him,
He had a girl kursened lately?
ALLWIT
Ay, that work did cost the knight above a hundred mark.
YELLOWHAMMER
I’ll mark him for a knave and villain for’t,
A thousand thanks and blessings, I have done with him.
ALLWIT
[Aside] Ha, ha, ha, this knight will stick by my ribs still,
I shall not lose him yet, no wife will come,
Where’er he woos, I find him still at home, ha, ha!
Exit.
YELLOWHAMMER
Well, grant all this, say now his deeds are black,
Pray, what serves marriage, but to call him back;
I have kept a whore myself, and had a bastard,
By Mistress Anne, in Anno [ ].
I care not who knows it; he’s now a jolly fellow,
H’as been twice warden, so may his fruit be,
They were but base begot, and so was he;
The knight is rich, he shall be my son-in-law,
No matter so the whore he keeps be wholesome,
My daughter takes no hurt then, so let them wed,
I’ll have him sweat well e’er they go to bed.
Enter Maudlin.
MAUDLIN
O husband, husband.
YELLOWHAMMER
How now, Maudlin?
MAUDLIN
We are all undone, she’s gone, she’s gone.
YELLOWHAMMER
Again? Death, which way?
MAUDLIN
Over the houses:
Lay the waterside, she’s gone forever else.
YELLOWHAMMER
O venturous baggage!
Exit [with Maudlin]. Enter Tim and Tutor.
TIM
Thieves, thieves, my sister’s stolen, some thief hath got her:
O, how miraculously did my father’s plate ‘scape,
’Twas all left out, tutor.
TUTOR
Is’t possible?
TIM
Besides three chains of pearl and a box of coral.
My sister’s gone, let’s look at Trig stairs for her;
My mother’s gone to lay the Common stairs
At Puddle wharf, and at the dock below
Stands my poor silly father. Run, sweet tutor, run.
Exit [with Tutor].