He asked in a surly sort of a way--it seems brother Val is gone mad,
and so that put'n into a
passion; but what did I know that? what's
that to me?--so he asked in a surly sort of manner, and gad I
answered 'n as surlily. What thof he be my father, I an't bound
prentice to 'n; so faith I told 'n in plain terms, if I were minded
to marry, I'd marry to please myself, not him. And for the young
woman that he provided for me, I thought it more
fitting for her to
learn her sampler and make dirt-pies than to look after a husband;
for my part I was none of her man. I had another
voyage to make,
let him take it as he will.
MRS FRAIL. So, then, you intend to go to sea again?
BEN. Nay, nay, my mind run upon you, but I would not tell him so
much. So he said he'd make my heart ache; and if so be that he
could get a woman to his mind, he'd marry himself. Gad, says I, an
you play the fool and marry at these years, there's more danger of
your head's aching than my heart. He was woundy angry when I gave'n
that wipe. He hadn't a word to say, and so I left'n, and the green
girl together; mayhap the bee may bite, and he'll marry her himself,
with all my heart.
MRS FRAIL. And were you this undutiful and graceless
wretch to your
father?
BEN. Then why was he graceless first? If I am undutiful and
graceless, why did he beget me so? I did not get myself.
MRS FRAIL. O impiety! How have I been mistaken! What an inhuman,
merciless creature have I set my heart upon? Oh, I am happy to have
discovered the
shelves and quicksands that lurk beneath that
faithless, smiling face.
BEN. Hey toss! What's the matter now? Why, you ben't angry, be
you?
MRS FRAIL. Oh, see me no more,--for thou wert born
amongst rocks,
suckled by whales, cradled in a
tempest, and whistled to by winds;
and thou art come forth with fins and scales, and three rows of
teeth, a most
outrageous fish of prey.
BEN. O Lord, O Lord, she's mad, poor young woman: love has turned
her senses, her brain is quite overset. Well-a-day, how shall I do
to set her to rights?
MRS FRAIL. No, no, I am not mad,
monster; I am wise enough to find
you out. Hadst thou the impudence to
aspire at being a husband with
that
stubborn and disobedient
temper? You that know not how to
submit to a father,
presume to have a sufficient stock of duty to
undergo a wife? I should have been
finely fobbed indeed, very
finely fobbed.
BEN. Harkee, forsooth; if so be that you are in your right senses,
d'ye see, for ought as I
perceive I'm like to be
finely fobbed,--if
I have got anger here upon your
account, and you are tacked about
already. What d'ye mean, after all your fair speeches, and stroking
my cheeks, and kissing and hugging, what would you sheer off so?
Would you, and leave me aground?
MRS FRAIL. No, I'll leave you adrift, and go which way you will.
BEN. What, are you false-hearted, then?
MRS FRAIL. Only the wind's changed.
BEN. More shame for you,--the wind's changed? It's an ill wind
blows nobody good,--mayhap I have a good riddance on you, if these
be your tricks. What, did you mean all this while to make a fool of
me?
MRS FRAIL. Any fool but a husband.
BEN. Husband! Gad, I would not be your husband if you would have
me, now I know your mind: thof you had your weight in gold and
jewels, and thof I loved you never so well.
MRS FRAIL. Why, can'st thou love, Porpuss?
BEN. No matter what I can do; don't call names. I don't love you
so well as to bear that,
whatever I did. I'm glad you show
yourself,
mistress. Let them marry you as don't know you. Gad, I
know you too well, by sad experience; I believe he that marries you
will go to sea in a hen-pecked frigate--I believe that, young woman-
-and mayhap may come to an
anchor at Cuckolds-Point; so there's a
dash for you, take it as you will: mayhap you may holla after me
when I won't come to.
MRS FRAIL. Ha, ha, ha, no doubt on't.--MY TRUE LOVE IS GONE TO SEA.
[Sings]
SCENE XIV.
MRS FRAIL, MRS FORESIGHT.
MRS FRAIL. O sister, had you come a minute sooner, you would have
seen the
resolution of a lover: --honest Tar and I are parted;--and
with the same
indifference that we met. O' my life I am half vexed
at the insensibility of a brute that I despised.
MRS FORE. What then, he bore it most heroically?
MRS FRAIL. Most tyrannically; for you see he has got the start of
me, and I, the poor
forsaken maid, am left complaining on the shore.
But I'll tell you a hint that he has given me: Sir Sampson is
enraged, and talks
desperately of committing matrimony himself. If
he has a mind to throw himself away, he can't do it more effectually
than upon me, if we could bring it about.
MRS FORE. Oh, hang him, old fox, he's too
cunning; besides, he
hates both you and me. But I have a
project in my head for you, and
I have gone a good way towards it. I have almost made a bargain
with Jeremy, Valentine's man, to sell his master to us.
MRS FRAIL. Sell him? How?
MRS FORE. Valentine raves upon Angelica, and took me for her, and
Jeremy says will take anybody for her that he imposes on him. Now,
I have promised him mountains, if in one of his mad fits he will
bring you to him in her stead, and get you married together and put
to bed together; and after consummation, girl, there's no revoking.
And if he should recover his senses, he'll be glad at least to make
you a good settlement. Here they come: stand aside a little, and
tell me how you like the design.
SCENE XV.
MRS FORESIGHT, MRS FRAIL, VALENTINE, SCANDAL, FORESIGHT, and JEREMY.
SCAN. And have you given your master a hint of their plot upon him?
[To JEREMY.]
JERE. Yes, sir; he says he'll favour it, and mistake her for
Angelica.
SCAN. It may make us sport.
FORE. Mercy on us!
VAL. Husht--interrupt me not--I'll
whisperprediction to thee, and
thou shalt
prophesy. I am Truth, and can teach thy tongue a new
trick. I have told thee what's past,--now I'll tell what's to come.
Dost thou know what will happen to-morrow?--Answer me not--for I
will tell thee. To-morrow, knaves will
thrive through craft, and
fools through fortune, and
honesty will go as it did, frost-nipt in
a summer suit. Ask me questions
concerning to-morrow.
SCAN. Ask him, Mr Foresight.
FORE. Pray what will be done at court?
VAL. Scandal will tell you. I am Truth; I never come there.
FORE. In the city?
VAL. Oh, prayers will be said in empty churches at the usual hours.
Yet you will see such
zealous faces behind counters, as if religion
were to be sold in every shop. Oh, things will go methodically in
the city: the clocks will strike twelve at noon, and the horned
herd buzz in the exchange at two. Wives and husbands will drive
distinct trades, and care and pleasure
separately occupy the family.
Coffee-houses will be full of smoke and
stratagem. And the cropt
prentice, that sweeps his master's shop in the morning, may ten to
one dirty his sheets before night. But there are two things that
you will see very strange: which are
wanton wives with their legs
at liberty, and tame cuckolds with chains about their necks. But
hold, I must examine you before I go further. You look
suspiciously. Are you a husband?
FORE. I am married.
VAL. Poor creature! Is your wife of Covent Garden parish?
FORE. No; St. Martin's-in-the-Fields.
VAL. Alas, poor man; his eyes are sunk, and his hands shrivelled;
his legs dwindled, and his back bowed: pray, pray, for a
metamorphosis. Change thy shape and shake off age; get thee Medea's
kettle and be boiled anew; come forth with lab'ring callous hands, a
chine of steel, and Atlas shoulders. Let Taliacotius trim the
calves of twenty chairmen, and make thee pedestals to stand erect
upon, and look matrimony in the face. Ha, ha, ha! That a man
should have a
stomach to a
wedding supper, when the pigeons ought
rather to be laid to his feet, ha, ha, ha!
FORE. His
frenzy is very high now, Mr Scandal.
SCAN. I believe it is a spring tide.
FORE. Very likely, truly. You understand these matters. Mr
Scandal, I shall be very glad to confer with you about these things
which he has uttered. His sayings are very
mysterious and
hieroglyphical.
VAL. Oh, why would Angelica be
absent from my eyes so long?
JERE. She's here, sir.
MRS FORE. Now, sister.
MRS FRAIL. O Lord, what must I say?
SCAN. Humour him, madam, by all means.
VAL. Where is she? Oh, I see her--she comes, like
riches, health,
and liberty at once, to a
despairing, starving, and abandoned
wretch. Oh,
welcome,
welcome.
MRS FRAIL. How d'ye, sir? Can I serve you?
VAL. Harkee; I have a secret to tell you: Endymion and the moon
shall meet us upon Mount Latmos, and we'll be married in the dead of
night. But say not a word. Hymen shall put his torch into a dark
lanthorn, that it may be secret; and Juno shall give her peacock
poppy-water, that he may fold his ogling tail, and Argus's hundred
eyes be shut, ha! Nobody shall know but Jeremy.
MRS FRAIL. No, no, we'll keep it secret, it shall be done
presently.
VAL. The sooner the better. Jeremy, come hither--closer--that none
may
overhear us. Jeremy, I can tell you news: Angelica is turned
nun, and I am turning friar, and yet we'll marry one another in
spite of the pope. Get me a cowl and beads, that I may play my
part,--for she'll meet me two hours hence in black and white, and a
long veil to cover the
project, and we won't see one another's
faces, till we have done something to be
ashamed of; and then we'll
blush once for all.
SCENE XVI.
[To them] TATTLE and ANGELICA.
JERE. I'll take care, and -
VAL. Whisper.
ANG. Nay, Mr Tattle, if you make love to me, you spoil my design,
for I intend to make you my confidant.
TATT. But, madam, to throw away your person--such a person!--and
such a fortune on a madman!
ANG. I never loved him till he was mad; but don't tell anybody so.
SCAN. How's this! Tattle making love to Angelica!
TATT. Tell, madam? Alas, you don't know me. I have much ado to
tell your ladyship how long I have been in love with you--but
encouraged by the
impossibility of Valentine's making any more
addresses to you, I have ventured to declare the very inmost
passionof my heart. O madam, look upon us both. There you see the ruins
of a poor decayed creature--here, a complete and
lively figure, with
youth and health, and all his five senses in
perfection, madam, and
to all this, the most
passionate lover -
ANG. O fie, for shame, hold your tongue. A
passionate lover, and
five senses in
perfection! When you are as mad as Valentine, I'll
believe you love me, and the maddest shall take me.
VAL. It is enough. Ha! Who's here?
FRAIL. O Lord, her coming will spoil all. [To JEREMY.]
JERE. No, no, madam, he won't know her; if he should, I can
persuade him.
VAL. Scandal, who are these? Foreigners? If they are, I'll tell
you what I think,--get away all the company but Angelica, that I may
discover my design to her. [Whisper.]
SCAN. I will--I have discovered something of Tattle that is of a
piece with Mrs Frail. He courts Angelica; if we could
contrive to