Belike, some noble gentleman, that means, Re-enter a Servant. How now? who is it? Serv. An it please your honor, Players that offer service to your lords ip. Enter Players. Now, fellows, you are welcome 1 Play. We thank your honor. Lord. Do you intend to stay with me to-night? 2 Play. So please your lordship to accept our duty.1 Lord. With all my heart. This fellow I re member, Since once he played a farmer's eldest son ;— 1 Play. I think 'twas Soto that your honor means. If you should smile, he grows impatient. 1 It was in old times customary for players to travel in companies, and offer their service at great houses. 2 The old copy prefixes the name of Sincklo to this line, who was an actor in the same company with Shakspeare. Soto is a character in Beaumont and Fletcher's Woman Pleased; he is a farmer's eldest son, but he does not woo any gentlewoman. 1 Play. Fear not, my lord; we can contain our selves, Were he the veriest antic in the world.1 Lord. Go, sirrah, take them to the buttery,2 [Exeunt Servants and Players. Sirrah, go you to Bartholomew my page, [To a Servant. And see him dressed in all suits like a lady: May show her duty, and make known her love? Bid him shed tears, as being overjoyed To see her noble lord restored to health, Who, for twice3 seven years, hath esteemed him* No better than a poor and loathsome beggar. And if the boy have not a woman's gift, 1 In the old play the dialogue is thus continued: "San. [To the other.] Go get a dishclout to make cleyne your shooes, and Ile speak for the properties. [Exit Player.] My lord, we must have a shoulder of mutton for a property, and a little vinegre to make our divell roar." 2 Pope remarks, in his preface to Shakspeare, that "the top o the profession were then mere players, not gentlemen of the stage; they were led into the buttery, not placed at the lord's table, or the lady's toilet." 3 The old copy reads this. The emendation is Theobald's. 4 Him is used for himself, as in Chapman's Banquet of Sense, 1595;— "The sense wherewith he feels him deified." Shal in despite enforce a watery eye. [Exit Servant. I know the boy will well usurp the grace, I long to hear him call the drunkard husband; Which otherwise would grow into extremes. [Exeunt. SCENE II. A Bedchamber in the Lord's House. SLY is discovered in a rich night-gown, with Attendants; some with apparel, others with basin, ewer, and other appurtenances. . Enter Lord, dressed like a Servant.1 Sly. For God's sake, a pot of small ale. 1 Serv. Will't please your lordship drink a cup of sack? 2 Serv. Will't please your honor taste of these conserves? 3 Serv. What raiment will your honor wear to-day? Sly. I am Christophero Sly; call not me-honor, nor lordship; I never drank sack in my life; and if you give me any conserves, give me conserves of beef. Ne'er ask me what raiment I'll wear; for I have no more doublets than backs, no more stockings than legs, nor no more shoes than feet; nay, sometimes, more feet than shoes, or such shoes as my toes look through the over-leather. Lord. Heaven cease this idle humor in your honor! 1 From the original stage direction in the first folio, it appears that Sly and the other persons mentioned in the Induction were intended to be exhibited here, and during the representation of the comedy, in a balconv above the stage. O, that a mighty man of such descent, Sly. What, would you make me mad? Am not I Christopher Sly, old Sly's son of Burton-heath; by birth a pedler, by education a card-maker, by transmutation a bear-herd, and now by present profession a tinker? Ask Marian Hacket, the fat ale-wife of Wincot, if she know me not: if she say I am not fourteen pence on the score for sheer ale, score me up for the lyingest knave in Christendom. What, I am not bestraught. Here's 3 2 1 Serv. O, this it is that makes your lady mourn. 2 Serv. O, this it is that makes your servants droop. Lord. Hence comes it that your kindred shun your house, As beaten hence by your strange lunacy. O noble lord, bethink thee of thy birth; Call home thy ancient thoughts from banishment, Wilt thou have music? Hark! Apollo plays, And twenty caged nightingales do sing. [Music. Or wilt thou sleep? We'll have thee to a couch, Say, thou wilt walk? we will bestrew the ground. I Wilnecotte, says Warton, is a village in Warwickshire, with which Shakspeare was well acquainted, near Stratford. The house kept by our genial hostess still remains, but is at present a mill. There is a village also called Barton on the heath in Warwickshire. 2 Sheer ale has puzzled the commentators; but none of the conjectures offered appear satisfactory. Sheer ale may mean nothing more than ale unmixed, mere ale, or pure ale. The word sheer is still used for mere, pure. 3 i. e. distraught, distracted. VOL. II. 52 Thy hounds shall make the welkin answer them, 1 Serv. Say, thou wilt course; thy greyhounds are. as swift As breathed stags; ay, fleeter than the roe. 2 Serv. Dost thou love pictures? We will fetch thee straight Adonis, painted by a running brook ; Which seem to move and wanton with her breath, Even as the waving sedges play with wind. Lord. We'll show thee Io, as she was a maid; And how she was beguiled and surprised, As lively painted as the deed was done. 3 Serv. Or, Daphne roaming through a thorny wood, Scratching her legs that one shall swear she bleeds; And at that sight shall sad Apollo weep, So workmanly the blood and tears are drawn. Than any woman in this waning age. 1 Serv. And, till the tears that she hath shed for thee, Like envious floods, o'erran her lovely face, She was the fairest creature in the world; And yet she is inferior to none. Sly. Am I a lord, and have I such a lady? I smell sweet savors, and I feel soft things:- And not a tinker, nor Christophero Sly.- 2 Serv. Will't please your mightiness to wash your hands? [Servants present a ewer, basin, and napkin O, how we joy to see your wit restored! are! O, that once more you knew but what you |