The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Mermaid Series. Edited by H. Ellis. The best plays of the old dramatists. Thomas Dekker. Edited, with an introduction and notes by Ernest Rhys., by Thomas Dekker

Amp. The frosty hand of age now nips your blood,
And strews her snowy flowers upon your head,
And gives you warning that within few years,
Death needs must marry you: those short-lived minutes,
That dribble out your life, must needs be spent
In peace, not travel: rest in Cyprus then.
Could you survey ten worlds, yet you must die;
And bitter is the sweet that’s reaped thereby.

Fort. What pleasure, boy? I have revelled with kings, danced with queens, dallied with ladies, worn strange attires, seen fantasticos, conversed with humorists, been ravished with divine raptures of Doric, Lydian and Phrygian harmonies. I have spent the day in triumphs, and the night in banqueting.

Andel. He that would not be an Arabian phœnix to burn in these sweet fires, let him live like an owl for the world to wonder at.

Fort. Vanities? Ampedo, thy soul is made of lead, too dull, too ponderous to mount up to the incomprehensible glory that travel lifts men to.

Shad. My old master’s soul is cork and feathers, and being so light doth easily mount up.

Fort. When in the warmth of mine own country’s arms
We yawned like sluggards, when this small horizon
Imprisoned up my body, then mine eyes
Worshipped these clouds as brightest; but, my boys,
The glist’ring beams which do abroad appear
In other heavens,—fire is not half so clear.

Fort. For still in all the regions I have seen,
I scorned to crowd among the muddy throng
Of the rank multitude, whose thickened breath,
Like to condensèd fogs, do choke that beauty,
Which else would dwell in every kingdom’s cheek.
No, I still boldly stept into their courts,
For there to live ’tis rare, O ’tis divine;
There shall you see faces angelical,
There shall you see troops of chaste goddesses,
Whose star-like eyes have power, might they still shine,
To make night day, and day more crystalline.
Near these you shall behold great heroes,
White-headed counsellors and jovial spirits,
Standing like fiery cherubims to guard
The monarch, who in god-like glory sits
In midst of these, as if this deity
Had with a look created a new world,
The standers by being the fair workmanship.

Andel. Oh how my soul is rapt to a third heaven. I’ll travel sure, and live with none but kings.

Shad. Then Shadow must die among knaves; and yet why so? In a bunch of cards, knaves wait upon the kings.

Amp. But tell me, father, have you in all courts
Beheld such glory, so majestical
In all perfection, no way blemishèd?

Fort. In some courts shall you see ambition
Sit piercing Dedalus’ old waxen wings,
But being clapped on, and they about to fly,
Even when their hopes are busied in the clouds,
They melt against the sun of majesty,
And down they tumble to destruction:
For since the Heaven’s strong arms teach kings to stand,
Angels are placed about their glorious throne,
To guard it from the strokes of trait’rous hands.
By travel, boys, I have seen all these things.
Fantastic compliment stalks up and down,
Tricked in outlandish feathers, all his words,
His looks, his oaths, are all ridiculous,
All apish, childish, and Italianate.[375]

Enter Fortune in the background: after her The Three Destinies,[376] working.

Fort. In these two hands do I grip all the world.
This leather purse, and this bald woollen hat
Make me a monarch. Here’s my crown and sceptre!
In progress will I now go through the world.
I’ll crack your shoulders, boys, with bags of gold
Ere I depart; on Fortune’s wings I ride,
And now sit in the height of human pride.

Fortune. (Coming forward.) Now, fool, thou liest; where thy proud feet do tread,
These shall throw down thy cold and breathless head.

Fort. O sacred deity, what sin is done,
That Death’s iron fist should wrestle with thy son? [All kneel.

Fortune. Thou art no son of Fortune, but her slave:
Thy cedar hath aspired to his full height.
Thy sun-like glory hath advanced herself
Into the top of pride’s meridian,
And down amain it comes. From beggary
I plumed thee like an ostrich, like that ostrich
Thou hast eaten metals, and abused my gifts,
Hast played the ruffian, wasted that in riots
Which as a blessing I bestowed on thee.

Fort. Forgive me, I will be more provident.

Fortune. No, endless follies follow endless wealth.
Thou hadst thy fancy, I must have thy fate,
Which is, to die when th’art most fortunate.
This inky thread, thy ugly sins have spun,
Black life, black death; faster! that it were done.

Fort. Oh, let me live, but till I can redeem.

Fortune. The Destinies deny thee longer life.

Fort. I am but now lifted to happiness.

Fortune. And now I take most pride to cast thee down.
Hadst thou chosen wisdom, this black had been white,
And Death’s stern brow could not thy soul affright.

Fort. Take this again! (Offering the purse.) Give wisdom to my sons.

Fortune. No, fool, ’tis now too late: as death strikes thee,
So shall their ends sudden and wretched be.
Jove’s daughters—righteous Destinies—make haste!
His life hath wasteful been, and let it waste.

Shad. For anger to see any of God’s creatures have such filthy faces as these sempsters [377] had that went hence.

Shad. Indeed, if it be one’s destiny to have a filthy face, I know no remedy but to go masked and cry “Woe worth the Fates.”

Amp. Why droops my father? these are only shadows,
Raised by the malice of some enemy,
To fright your life, o’er which they have no power.

Shad. If that desperate Don Dego [378] Death hath ta’en up the cudgels once, here’s never a fencer in Cyprus dare take my old master’s part.

Fort. Let me shrink down, and die between your arms,
Help comes in vain. No hand can conquer fate,
This instant is the last of my life’s date.
This goddess, if at least she be a goddess,
Names herself Fortune: wand’ring in a wood,
Half famished, her I met. I have, quoth she,
Six gifts to spend upon mortality,
Wisdom, strength, health, beauty, long life and riches.
Out of my bounty one of these is thine.

Amp. What benefit did from your choice arise?

Fort. Listen, my sons! in this small compass lies
Infinite treasure: this she gave to me,
And gave to this, this virtue, Take, quoth she,
So often as from hence thou draw’st thy hand,
Ten golden pieces of that kingdom’s coin,
Where’er thou liv’st; which plenteous sure shall last,
After thy death, till thy sons’ lives do waste.

Andel. Father, your choice was rare, the gift divine.

Fort. It had been so, if riches had been mine.

Amp. But hath this golden virtue never failed?

Andel. O admirable: here’s a fire
Hath power to thaw the very heart of death,
And give stones life; by this most sacred breath,[379]
See brother, here’s all India in my hand.

Fort. Inherit you, my sons, that golden land.
This hat I brought away from Babylon,
I robbed the Soldan of it, ’tis a prize
Worth twenty empires in this jewel lies.

Andel. How, father? jewel? call you this a jewel? it’s coarse wool, a bald fashion, and greasy to the brim; I have bought a better felt for a French crown forty times: of what virtuous block is this hat, I pray?

Fort. Set it upon thy head, and wish a wish,
Thou in the moment, on the wind’s swift wings,
Shalt be transported into any place.

Andel. A wishing hat, and a golden mine?

Fort. O Andelocia, Ampedo, now Death
Sounds his third summons, I must hence! These jewels
To both I do bequeath; divide them not,
But use them equally: never bewray
What virtues are in them; for if you do,
Much shame, much grief, much danger follows you.
Peruse this book; farewell! behold in me
The rotten strength of proud mortality. [Dies.

Amp. His soul is wandering to the Elysian shades.

Andel. The flower that’s fresh at noon, at sunset fades.

Brother, close you down his eyes, because you were his eldest; and with them close up your tears, whilst I as all younger brothers do, shift for myself: let us mourn, because he’s dead, but mourn the less, because he cannot revive. The honour we can do him, is to bury him royally; let’s about it then, for I’ll not melt myself to death with scalding sighs, nor drop my soul out at mine eyes, were my father an emperor.

Amp. Hence, hence, thou stop’st the tide of my true tears.
True grief is dumb, though it hath open ears.

Andel. Yet God send my grief a tongue, that I may have good utterance for it: sob on, brother mine, whilst you sigh there, I’ll sit and read what story my father has written here.

[They both fall asleep: Fortune and a company of Satyrs enter with music, and playing about Fortunatus’ body, take it away. Afterwards Shadow enters running.

Shad. I can get none, I can find none: where are you, master? Have I ta’en you napping? and you too? I see sorrow’s eye-lids are made of a dormouse skin, they seldom open, or of a miser’s purse, that’s always shut. So ho, master.

Shad. Yes, sir: he scorned all Famagosta when he was in his huffing,[380] and now he lies puffing for wind, they say they scorn him.

Amp. The poison of their scorn infects not him;
He wants no help. See where he breathless lies:
Brother, to what place have you borne his body?

Shad. Whether it were lead or latten [381] that hasped down those winking casements, I know not, but I found you both snorting.

Amp. And in that sleep, methought, I heard the tunes
Of sullen passions apt for funerals,
And saw my father’s lifeless body borne
By Satyrs: O I fear that deity
Hath stolen him hence!—that snudge, his destiny.

Shad. I, sir? do you think this white and red durst have kissed my sweet cheeks, if they had seen a ghost? But, master, if the Destinies, or Fortune, or the Fates, or the Fairies have stolen him, never indict them for the felony: for by this means the charges of a tomb is saved, and you being his heirs, may do as many rich executors do, put that money in your purses, and give out that he died a beggar.

Andel. Away, you rogue, my father die a beggar!
I’ll build a tomb for him of massy gold.

Shad. Methinks, master, it were better to let the memory of him shine in his own virtues, if he had any, than in alabaster.

Andel. Brother, come, come, mourn not; our father is but stepped to agree with Charon for his boat hire to Elysium. See, here’s a story of all his travels; this book shall come out with a new addition: I’ll tread after my father’s steps; I’ll go measure the world, therefore let’s share these jewels, take this, or this!

Andel. A Puritan!—keep a dead man’s will? Indeed in the old time, when men were buried in soft church-yards, that their ghosts might rise, it was good: but, brother, now they are imprisoned in strong brick and marble, they are fast. Fear not: away, away, these are fooleries, gulleries, trumperies; here’s this or this, or I am gone with both!

Amp. Do you as you please, the sin shall not be mine. Fools call those things profane that are divine.

Andel. Are you content to wear the jewels by turns? I’ll have the purse for a year, you the hat, and as much gold as you’ll ask; and when my pursership ends, I’ll resign, and cap you.

Andel. I should serve this bearing ass rarely now, if I should load him, but I will not. Though conscience be like physic, seldom used, for so it does least hurt, yet I’ll take a dram of it. This for him, and some gold: this for me; for having this mint about me, I shall want no wishing cap. Gold is an eagle, that can fly to any place, and, like death, that dares enter all places. Shadow, wilt thou travel with me?

Shad. That’s a beastly disease: methinks it’s better staying in your own country.

Shad. Nothing? yes, you may see things enough, for what can you see abroad that is not at home? The same sun calls you up in the morning, and the same man in the moon lights you to bed at night; our fields are as green as theirs in summer, and their frosts will nip us more in winter: our birds sing as sweetly and our women are as fair: in other countries you shall have one drink to you; whilst you kiss your hand, and duck,[384] he’ll poison you: I confess you shall meet more fools, and asses, and knaves abroad than at home. Yet God be thanked we have pretty store of all. But for punks,[385] we put them down.

Andel. Prepare thy spirits, for thou shalt go with me.
To England shall our stars direct our course;
Thither the Prince of Cyprus, our king’s son,
Is gone to see the lovely Agripyne.
Shadow, we’ll gaze upon that English dame,
And try what virtue gold has to inflame.
First to my brother, then away let’s fly;
Shadow must be a courtier ere he die. [Exit.

Shad. If I must, the Fates shall be served: I have seen many clowns courtiers, then why not Shadow? Fortune, I am for thee. [Exit.

ACT THE THIRD.

SCENE I.—London. The Court of Athelstane.

Enter Orleans melancholy, Galloway with him; a Boy after them with a lute.

Orle. Begone: leave that with me, and leave me to myself; if the king ask for me, swear to him I am sick, and thou shalt not lie; pray thee leave me.

Orle. This music makes me but more out of tune.
O, Agripyne.

Gall. Gentle friend, no more.
Thou sayest love is a madness, hate it then,
Even for the name’s sake.

Orle. O, I love that madness,
Even for the name’s sake.

Gall. Let me tame this frenzy,
By telling thee thou art a prisoner here,
By telling thee she’s daughter to a king,
By telling thee the King of Cyprus’ son
Shines like a sun, between her looks and thine,
Whilst thou seem’st but a star to Agripyne:
He loves her.

Orle. If he do: why so do I.

Gall. Love is ambitious, and loves majesty.

Orle. Dear friend, thou art deceived, love’s voice doth sing
As sweetly in a beggar as a king.

Gall. Dear friend, thou art deceived: O bid thy soul
Lift up her intellectual eyes to Heaven,
And in this ample book of wonders read,
Of what celestial mould, what sacred essence,
Herself is formed, the search whereof will drive
Sounds musical among the jarring spirits,
And in sweet tune set that which none inherits.

Orle. I’ll gaze on Heaven if Agripyne be there:
If not: fa, la, la, sol, la, &c.

Gall. O, call this madness in; see, from the windows
Of every eye derision thrusts out cheeks,
Wrinkled with idiot laughter; every finger
Is like a dart shot from the hand of scorn,
By which thy name is hurt, thine honour torn.

Orle. Laugh they at me, sweet Galloway?

Gall. Even at thee.

Orle. Ha, ha, I laugh at them, are not they mad
That let my true true sorrow make them glad?
I dance and sing only to anger grief,
That in that anger, he might smite life down
With his iron fist. Good heart, it seemeth then,
They laugh to see grief kill me: O, fond men,
You laugh at others’ tears; when others smile,
You tear yourselves in pieces: vile, vile, vile!
Ha, ha, when I behold a swarm of fools,
Crowding together to be counted wise,
I laugh because sweet Agripyne’s not there,
But weep because she is not anywhere,
And weep because whether she be or not,
My love was ever, and is still, forgot: forgot, forgot, forgot.

Gall. Draw back this stream, why should my Orleans mourn?

Orle. Look yonder, Galloway, dost thou see that sun?
Nay, good friend, stare upon it, mark it well,
Ere he be two hours older, all that glory
Is banished Heaven, and then for grief this sky,
That’s now so jocund, will mourn all in black,
And shall not Orleans mourn? Alack, alack!
O what a savage tyranny it were
T’enforce care laugh, and woe not shed a tear!
Dead is my love, I am buried in her scorn,
That is my sunset, and shall I not mourn?
Yes, by my troth I will.

Gall. Dear friend, forbear,
Beauty, like sorrow, dwelleth everywhere.
Rase out this strong idea of her face,
As fair as hers shineth in any place.

Orle. Thou art a traitor to that white and red,
Which, sitting on her cheeks, being Cupid’s throne,
Is my heart’s sovereign: O, when she is dead,
This wonder, beauty, shall be found in none.
Now Agripyne’s not mine, I vow to be
In love with nothing but deformity.
O fair Deformity, I muse all eyes
Are not enamoured of thee: thou didst never
Murder men’s hearts, or let them pine like wax,
Melting against the sun of destiny;
Thou art a faithful nurse to chastity;
Thy beauty is not like to Agripyne’s,
For cares, and age, and sickness hers deface,
But thine’s eternal. O Deformity,
Thy fairness is not like to Agripyne’s,
For dead, her beauty will no beauty have,
But thy face looks most lovely in the grave.

Gall. See where they come together, hand in hand.

Orle. O watch, sweet Galloway, when their hands do part,
Between them shalt thou find my murdered heart.

Cypr. By this then it seems a thing impossible, to know when an English lady loves truly.

Agrip. Not so, for when her soul steals into her heart, and her heart leaps up to her eyes, and her eyes drop into her hands, then if she say, Here’s my hand! she’s your own,—else never.

Agrip. My kind prisoners, well encountered; the Prince of Cyprus here and myself have been wrangling about a question of love: my lord of Orleans, you look lean, and likest a lover—Whether is it more torment to love a lady and never enjoy her, or always to enjoy a lady whom you cannot choose but hate?

Orle. To hold her ever in mine arms whom I loath in my heart, were some plague, yet the punishment were no more than to be enjoined to keep poison in my hand, yet never to taste it.

Orle. Then a speedy death would end a speeding misery. But to love a lady and never enjoy her, oh it is not death, but worse than damnation; ’tis hell, ’tis——

Agrip. No more, no more, good Orleans; nay then, I see my prisoner is in love too.

Agrip. Methinks a soldier is the most faithful lover of all men else; for his affection stands not upon compliment. His wooing is plain home-spun stuff; there’s no outlandish thread in it, no rhetoric. A soldier casts no figures to get his mistress’ heart; his love is like his valour in the field, when he pays downright blows.

Agrip. Be it so, that goodness I like: for what lady can abide to love a spruce silken-face courtier, that stands every morning two or three hours learning how to look by his glass, how to speak by his glass, how to sigh by his glass, how to court his mistress by his glass? I would wish him no other plague, but to have a mistress as brittle as glass.

Agrip. What madmen are not possessed with this love? Yet by my troth, we poor women do but smile in our sleeves to see all this foppery: yet we all desire to see our lovers attired gallantly, to hear them sing sweetly, to behold them dance comely and such like. But this apish monkey fashion of effeminate niceness, out upon it! Oh, I hate it worse than to be counted a scold.

Orle. But is’t not a miserable tyranny, to see a lady triumph in the passions of a soul languishing through her cruelty?

Agrip. So think not I; for as there is no reason to hate any that love us, so it were madness to love all that do not hate us; women are created beautiful, only because men should woo them; for ’twere miserable tyranny to enjoin poor women to woo men: I would not hear of a woman in love, for my father’s kingdom.

Agrip. Nor I: but we had all rather die than confess we love; our glory is to hear men sigh whilst we smile, to kill them with a frown, to strike them dead with a sharp eye, to make you this day wear a feather, and to-morrow a sick nightcap. Oh, why this is rare, there’s a certain deity in this, when a lady by the magic of her looks, can turn a man into twenty shapes.

Agrip. Poor Orleans, how lamentably he looks: if he stay, he’ll make me surely love him for pure pity. I must send him hence, for of all sorts of love, I hate the French; I pray thee, sweet prisoner, entreat Lord Longaville to come to me presently.

Orle. I will, and esteem myself more than happy, that you will employ me. [Exit.

Agrip. Watch him, watch him for God’s sake, if he sigh not or look not back.

Agrip. Nay, no mystery, ’tis as plain as Cupid’s forehead: why this is as it should be.—“And esteem myself more than happy, that you will employ me.” My French prisoner is in love over head and ears.

Agrip. With his keeper, for a good wager: Ah, how glad is he to obey! And how proud am I to command in this empire of affection! Over him and such spongy-livered youths, that lie soaking in love, I triumph more with mine eye, than ever he did over a soldier with his sword. Is’t not a gallant victory for me to subdue my father’s enemy with a look? Prince of Cyprus, you were best take heed, how you encounter an English lady.

Agrip. No other service but this, that, as Orleans, you love me, for no other reason, but that I may torment you.

Agrip. You shall: conditionally, that you never beg for mercy. Come, my Lord of Galloway.

Cypr. The ruby-coloured portals of her speech
Were closed by mercy: but upon her eye,
Attired in frowns, sat murdering cruelty.

She’s angry, that I durst so high aspire.
O, she disdains that any stranger’s breast
Should be a temple for her deity:
She’s full of beauty, full of bitterness.
Till now, I did not dally with love’s fire:
And when I thought to try his flames indeed,
I burnt me even to cinders. O, my stars,
Why from my native shore did your beams guide me,
To make me dote on her that doth deride me?

Agrip. Hold him in this mind, sweet Cupid, I conjure thee. O, what music these hey-hos make! I was about to cast my little self into a great love trance for him, fearing his heart had been flint: but since I see ’tis pure virgin wax, he shall melt his bellyful: for now I know how to temper him. [Exit; as she departs Cyprus spies her.

Cypr. Never beg mercy? yet be my tormentor.
I hope she heard me not: doubtless she did,
And now will she insult upon my passions,
And vex my constant love with mockeries.
Nay, then I’ll be mine own physician,
And outface love, and make her think that I
Mourned thus, because I saw her standing by.
What news, my Lord of Cornwall?

Cornw. This fair prince,
One of your countrymen, is come to court,
A lusty gallant brave, in Cyprus’ isle,
With fifty bard [386] horses prancing at his heels,
Backed by as many strong-limbed Cypriots,
All whom he keeps in pay: whose offered service,
Our king with arms of gladness hath embraced.

ACT THE THIRD.

SCENE I.—London. The Court of Athelstane.