A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume Xi Part 101

SCENE XII.

LELIO, CRICCA.

LEL. In, Armellina; lock up Trincalo.

ARM. I will, sir. [_Exit._

LEL. Cricca, for this thy counsel, if't succeed, Fear not thy master's anger: I'll prefer thee, And count thee as my genius or good fortune.

CRI. It cannot choose but take. I know his humour; And can at pleasure feather him with hopes, Making him fly what pitch I wish, and stoop,[342]

When I show fowl.

LEL. But for the suit of clothes?

CRI. I'll throw them o'er your garden-wall. Away.

Haste to Eugenio and Sulpitia, Acquaint them with the business.

LEL. I go.

SCENE XIII.

LELIO, SULPITIA.

LEL. The hopeful issue of thy counsel, Cricca, Brightens this ev'ning, and makes it more excel The clearest day, than a grey morning doth The blindest midnight, raising my amorous thoughts To such a pitch of joy, that riches, honour, And other pleasures, to Sulpitia's love Appear like mole-hills to the moon.

SUL. Lelio!

LEL. O, there's the voice that in one note contains All chords of music: how gladly she'll embrace The news I give her and the messenger!

SUL. Soft, soft, y' are much mistaken; for in earnest, I am angry, Lelio, and with you.

LEL. Sweetest, those flames Rise from the fire of love, and soon will quench I' th' welcome news I bring you.

SUL. Stand still, I charge you By th' virtue of my lips; speak not a syllable, As you expect a kiss should close my choler; For I must chide you.

LEL. O my Sulpitia!

Were every speech a pistol charg'd with death, I'd stand them all in hope of that condition.

SUL. First, sir, I hear you teach Eugenio Too grave a wariness in your sister's love, And kill his honest forwardness of affection With your far-fet[343] respects, suspicions, fears: You have your maybes--"This is dangerous: That course were better; for if so, and yet Who knows? the event is doubtful; be advis'd, 'Tis a young rashness: your father is your father; Take leisure to consider." Thus y' have consider'd Poor Flavia almost to her grave. Fie, Lelio!

Had this my smallness undertook the business, And done no more in four short winter's days Than you in four months, I'd have vowed my maidenhead To th' living tomb of a sad nunnery; Which for your sake I loathe.

LEL. Sweet, by your favour----

SUL. Peace, peace: now y' are so wise, as if ye had eaten Nothing but brains and marrow of Machiavel: You tip your speeches with Italian _motti_,[344]

Spanish _refranes_,[345] and English _quoth he's_. Believe me, There's not a proverb salts your tongue, but plants Whole colonies of white hairs. O, what a business These hands must have when you have married me, To pick out sentences that over-year you!

LEL. Give me but leave.

SUL. Have I a lip? and you Made sonnets on't? 'tis your fault, for otherwise Your sister and Eugenio had been sure Long time ere this.

LEL. But----

SUL. Stay, your cue's not come yet.

I hate as perfectly this grey-green of yours, As Old Antonio's green-grey. Fie! wise lovers Are most absurd. Were I not full resolved, I should begin to cool mine own affection.

For shame, consider well your sister's temper.

Her melancholy may much hurt her. Respect her, Or, spite of mine own love, I'll make you stay Six months before you marry me. [LELIO _whispers_.

This your so happy news? return'd, and safe?

Antonio yet alive? [LELIO _whispers_.

And what then? [LELIO _whispers_.

Well; all your business must be compa.s.sed With winding plots and cunning stratagems.

Look to't; for if we be not married ere next morning, By the great love that's hid in this small compa.s.s, Flavia and myself will steal you both away, To your eternal shame and foul discredit. [_Exit._

LEL. How prettily this lovely littleness In one breath pleads her own cause and my sister's!

Chides me, and loves. This is that pleasing temper I more admire than a continued sweetness That over-satisfies: 'tis salt I love, not sugar. [_Exit._

FOOTNOTES:

[327] _Threatens_ in both the editions. Pegge suggested _sweetens_.

[328] See note to "The Spanish Tragedy," [v. 95.]

[329] The quartos read _this word_.

[330] The whole of what follows, to the word _away_, is given in the 4 of 1615 as part of the speech of Antonio.--_Collier._

[331] A parody on the speech of the Ghost of Andrea, in "The Spanish Tragedy."

[332] _i.e._, Owns. See note to "Cornelia," [v. 232.]

[333] [Edits., _Of_.]

[334] It appears from Segar ("Honour, Military and Civil," fol. 1602, p. 122), that a person of superior birth might not be challenged by an inferior, or, if challenged, might refuse the combat. Alluding to this circ.u.mstance, Cleopatra says--

"These hands do lack n.o.bility, that they strike A meaner than myself."

--Act ii. sc. 5.

[335] This seems intended to ridicule some of the punctilios of duelling, and probably the author had in his mind the following pa.s.sage in Ferne's "Blazon of Gentrie," 1586, p. 319: "But if it so happen that the defendour is lame of a legge, or of an arme, or that hee bee blinde of an eye, he may take such armes and weapons, as be most fitte for his owne bodye; and he shall offer such to the approover as shall impeache the like member, or part of the approovers bodye from his dutye and office in the combate, so that he shall be deprived of the use of that member in the combate, even as wel as the defender is through his infirmity of lamenes, or other defect of nature."

[336] Duellists being punished by law in England, it has been usual for them to go over to _Calais_, as one of the nearest ports of France, to decide their quarrel out of the reach of justice. Trincalo is pleasant on this subject.--_Steevens._

This custom is mentioned in an epigram in Samuel Rowlands's "Good Newes and Bad Newes," 1622, sig. F 2--

"Gilbert, this glove I send thee from my hand, And challenge thee to meet on _Callis sand:_ On this day moneth resolve I will be there, Where thou shalt finde my flesh I will not feare.

My cutler is at work," &c.