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SERVANT.

       An it please your honour, players

       That offer service to your lordship.

       LORD.

       Bid them come near.

       [Enter PLAYERS.]

       Now, fellows, you are welcome.

       PLAYERS.

       We thank your honour.

       LORD.

       Do you intend to stay with me tonight?

       PLAYER.

       So please your lordship to accept our duty.

       LORD.

       With all my heart. This fellow I remember

       Since once he play’d a farmer’s eldest son;

       ‘Twas where you woo’d the gentlewoman so well.

       I have forgot your name; but, sure, that part

       Was aptly fitted and naturally perform’d.

       PLAYER.

       I think ‘twas Soto that your honour means.

       LORD.

       ‘Tis very true; thou didst it excellent.

       Well, you are come to me in happy time,

       The rather for I have some sport in hand

       Wherein your cunning can assist me much.

       There is a lord will hear you play tonight;

       But I am doubtful of your modesties,

       Lest, over-eying of his odd behaviour,—

       For yet his honour never heard a play,—

       You break into some merry passion

       And so offend him; for I tell you, sirs,

       If you should smile, he grows impatient.

       PLAYER.

       Fear not, my lord; we can contain ourselves,

       Were he the veriest antick in the world.

       LORD.

       Go, sirrah, take them to the buttery,

       And give them friendly welcome every one:

       Let them want nothing that my house affords.

       [Exit one with the PLAYERS.]

       Sirrah, go you to Barthol’mew my page,

       And see him dress’d in all suits like a lady;

       That done, conduct him to the drunkard’s chamber,

       And call him ‘madam,’ do him obeisance.

       Tell him from me—as he will win my love,—

       He bear himself with honourable action,

       Such as he hath observ’d in noble ladies

       Unto their lords, by them accomplished;

       Such duty to the drunkard let him do,

       With soft low tongue and lowly courtesy,

       And say ‘What is’t your honour will command,

       Wherein your lady and your humble wife

       May show her duty and make known her love?’

       And then with kind embracements, tempting kisses,

       And with declining head into his bosom,

       Bid him shed tears, as being overjoy’d

       To see her noble lord restor’d to health,

       Who for this seven years hath esteemed him

       No better than a poor and loathsome beggar.

       And if the boy have not a woman’s gift

       To rain a shower of commanded tears,

       An onion will do well for such a shift,

       Which, in a napkin being close convey’d,

       Shall in despite enforce a watery eye.

       See this dispatch’d with all the haste thou canst;

       Anon I’ll give thee more instructions.

       [Exit SERVANT.]

       I know the boy will well usurp the grace,

       Voice, gait, and action, of a gentlewoman;

       I long to hear him call the drunkard husband;

       And how my men will stay themselves from laughter

       When they do homage to this simple peasant.

       I’ll in to counsel them; haply my presence

       May well abate the over-merry spleen,

       Which otherwise would grow into extremes.

       [Exeunt.]

       SCENE II. A bedchamber in the LORD’S house.

       [SLY is discovered in a rich nightgown, with ATTENDANTS: some with apparel, basin, ewer, and other appurtenances; and LORD, dressed like a servant.]

       SLY.

       For God’s sake! a pot of small ale.

       FIRST SERVANT.

       Will’t please your lordship drink a cup of sack?

       SECOND SERVANT.

       Will’t please your honour taste of these conserves?

       THIRD SERVANT.

       What raiment will your honour wear to-day?

       SLY. I am Christophero Sly; call not me honour nor lordship. I ne’er 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, sometime more feet than shoes, or such shoes as my toes look through the over-leather.

       LORD.

       Heaven cease this idle humour in your honour!

       O, that a mighty man of such descent,

       Of such possessions, and so high esteem,

       Should be infused with so foul a spirit!

       SLY. What! would you make me mad? Am not I Christopher Sly, old Sly’s son of Burtonheath; by birth a pedlar, by education a cardmaker, by transmutation a bear-herd, and now by present profession a tinker? Ask Marian Hacket, the fat alewife 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—

       THIRD SERVANT.

       O! this it is that makes your lady mourn.

       SECOND SERVANT.

       O! this is it that makes your servants droop.

       LORD.

       Hence comes it that your kindred shuns your house,

       As beaten hence by your strange lunacy.

       O noble lord, bethink thee of thy birth,

       Call home thy ancient thoughts from banishment,

       And banish hence these abject lowly dreams.

       Look how thy servants do attend on thee,

       Each in his office ready at thy beck:

       Wilt thou have music? Hark! Apollo plays,

       [Music]

       And twenty caged nightingales do sing:

       Or wilt thou sleep? We’ll have thee to a couch

       Softer and sweeter than the lustful bed

       On purpose trimm’d up for Semiramis.

       Say thou wilt walk: we will bestrew the ground:

       Or wilt thou ride? Thy horses shall be trapp’d,

      

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