Which, by the loss of a good aged friend, Had. Then I'll have witness on't: my lord, and gentlemen, Please you draw near, to be here witnesses Hog. Then, in the presence of you all, I give my daughter freely to this gentleman as wife; and, to shew how much I stand affected to him, for dowry with her, I do back restore his mortgaged lands; and, for their loves, I vow ever hereafter to detest, renounce, loath, and abhor | all slavish avarice : Which doth ascend from hell, sent by the devil, To be, 'mongst men, the actor of all evil. Weal. sen. A good, far unexpected. And now, gentlemen, I do invite you all to feast with me In sports and shews, with gladsome merriment. Hog. Heaven grant we may! Car. Come, my Maria, and repentant friend, We three have tasted worst of misery, Which now adds joy to our felicity. Had. We three are happy we have gain'd much wealth, And tho' we have done it by a trick of stealth, Yet all, I trust, are pleas'd; and will our ill acquit, Since it hath sav'd a soul was hell's by right. Weal. jun. To follow after, then, our lot doth fall; Now rhime it, Peter. P. Serv. A good-night to all. [Exeunt omnes. Now expectation hath at full receiv'd EPILOGUE. What we late promised; if in aught we've pleas'd, If it hath pleased the judicial ear, We have our author's wish; and, void of fear, Dare ignorant men to shew their worst of hate, We'll rest applauded in their derogation, EDITION. "The Hogge hath lost his Pearle: A Comedy. Divers times publikely acted by certaine London Prentices. By Robert Tailor. London, Printed for Richard Redmer, and are to be solde at the West-dore of Paules, at the signe of the Starre. 1614. 4to. THE FOURE PRENTISES OF LONDON. WITH THE CONQUEST OF JERUSALEM. AS IT HAS BENE DIVERSE TIMES ACTED AT THE RED BULL BY THE WRITTEN BY THOMAS HEYWOOD. TO THE HONEST AND HIGH SPIRITED PRENTICES, THE READERS. None but to you (as whom this play most especially concerns) I thought good to dedicate this labour; which though written many years since, in my infancy of judgment, in this kind of poetry, and my first practice; yet understanding (by what means I know not) it was in these more exquisite and refined times, to come to the press in a such a forwardness ere it came to my knowledge, that it was past prevention, and then knowing withal, that it comes short of that accurateness both in plot and stile, that these more censorious days with greater curiosity acquire, I must thus excuse. That as plays were then some fifteen or sixteen years ago it was in the fashion. Nor could it have found a more seasonable and fit publication than at this time, when to the glory of our nation, the security of the kingdom, and the honour of this renown'd city, they have begun again the commendable practice of long forgotten arms, the continuance of which I wish, the discipline approve, and the encouragement thereof even with my soul applaud. In which great and hoped good they deserve not the least attribute of approbation, who, in the dull and sleepy time of peace, first wakened the remembrance of these arms in the Artillery Garden, which, begun out of their voluntary affections, prosecuted by their private industries, and continued at their own proper cost and charge, deserves, in my opinion, not only respect and regard, but recompence and reward. But to return again to you, my brave spirited Prentices, upon whom I have freely bestowed these Four, I wish you all, that have their courages and forwardness, their noble fates and fortunes. Yours, THOMAS HEYWOOD. PROLOGUE. Enter three in black cloaks, at three doors. 1. What mean you, my masters, to appear thus before your times? Do you not know that I am the Prologue? Do you not see this long black velvet cloak upon my back? Have you not sounded thrice? Do I not look pale as fearing to be out in my speech? Nay, have I not all the signs of a Prologue about me? Then, to what end come you to interrupt me? 2. I have a Prologue to speak too. 1. O superfluous, and more than ever I heard of! three Prologues to one play! 2. Have you not seen three ropes to toll one bell? three doors to one house? three ways to one town? 1. I grant you: but I never heard of any that had three heads to one body, but Cerberus. But what doth your Prologue mean? 2. I come to excuse the name of the Play? 3. I the errors in the Play. 1. And I the Author that made the Play. Touching the name, why is it called, True and Strange; or, The Four Prentices of London? A gentleman that heard the subject discoursed, said it was not possible to be true; and none here are bound to believe it. 2. It is true, that Alexander, at thirty-two years of age, conquered the whole world; but strange he should do so. If we should not believe things recorded in former ages, we were not worthy that succeeding times should believe things done in these our times. 1. But what authority have you for your History? I am one of those that will believe nothing that is not in the Chronicle. 2. Our authority is a Manuscript, a book writ in parchment, which not being publick, nor general in the world, we rather thought fit to exemplify to the public censure things concealed and obscured, such as are not common with every one, than such Historical Tales as every one can tell by the fire in winter. Had not ye rather, for novelties sake, see Jerusalem ye never saw, than London that ye see hourly? So much touching the name of our History. 1. You have satisfied me; and, I hope, all that hear me. Now what have you to speak concerning the errors in the Play? 3. We acknowledge none: for the errors we could find, we would willingly amend; but if these clear-sighted gentlemen, with the eyes of their judgments, looking exactly into us, find any imperfections which are hid from ourselves, our request is, you would rather look over them than through them, not with a troubled eye, that makes one object to seem two, but with a favourable eye, which hath power in itself to make many to seem none at all. 1. Oh now I understand you. Three Prologues to our Play! pardon me, y'ave need of three hundred, methinks, and all little enough. But to end our beginning in a word. Thus much by the patience of these gentlemen. Spectators, should you oppose your judgments against us: where we are three, which some would think too many; were we three thousand, we think ourselves too few. Our Author submits his labour to you as the Authors of all the content he hath within this circumference: But for your sakes, this only we dare say, Three in black cloaks.-From this description, it appears, that it was the custom formerly for the Speaker of a prologue to be dressed in a black cloak; and thence seems to have been derived the practice of delivering those introductory parts of our Dramatick Entertainments in a suit of the same colour. See also the Introduction to Cynthia's Revels, and the Prologue to The Woman Hater. SCENA PRIMA. ACTUS PRIMUS. Enter the Old Earl of BOLOIGN, and his daughter BELLA FRANCA. Planting another, and supplanting me. B. Fran. If for King William's sake now con- O. E. Bol. Daughter, thou seest how Fortune You lost your birth-right and inheritance; turns her wheel. How comes it that he sees you in this state, O. E. Bol. A conquered kingdom is not easily kept; He hath so much ado to guard his own, K O. E. Bol. Godfrey, Guy, Charles, young Divide a father's blessing in four parts, How canst thou brook to be as thou art now? To serve my master truly for seven years, | And, were I now to be create anew, It should not grieve me to have spent my time Making thy mind conformed to thy state. Which God, and fate, and you, have tied me in, O. E. Bol. What says my youngest boy? O. E. Bol. Eustace, I know it is: but to my How canst thou brook to be a prentice, boy? years, Did not my master keep me in too much. 5 Nor in a May-day morning fetch in May. 2 My tankard to guard the conduit.-Charles, the speaker, was bound to a haberdasher; but he here alludes to the office of a water-bearer. See the character of Cob, in Ben Jonson's Every Man in his Humour. S. It might be the duty of apprentices formerly to fetch water from the conduits for the use of those families in which they lived, in the same manner as it even yet is part of their employment to perform offices as servile as that mentioned in the text. 3 Die the death. See Note to God's Promises, Dodsley's Old Plays, Vol. I. p. 13, edit. 1780. 4 I say I-i e. Ay. 5 Nor in a May-day morning fetch in May.-Stow says, that "in the month of May, namely on Mayday in the morning, every man, except impediment, would walk into the sweet meadows and green woods, there to rejoice their spirits with the beauty and savour of sweet flowers, and with the noise (i. e. concert) of birds, praising God in their kind." Again, " I find, also, that in the month of May, the citizens of London (of all estates) lightly in every parish, or sometimes two or three parishes join |