Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 3.djvu/418

 342

NOTES AND QUERIES. [io* s. m. MAY 6, igos.

<CAPT. THOMAS STUKELEY.'

(See ante, p. 301.)

I GIVE in extenso the scene to which I have referred, premising that in it Fletcher was evidently working on an older scene, scraps of which probably remain in Old Stukeley's ninth speech and elsewhere. In Simpson, as doubtless in the quarto, which 1 have no means of consulting, some verse is printed as prose, and the divisions of the lines are not always correct. These errors I have ventured to remedy. The Page's seventh speech, which perhaps contains some older work, may be prose, as in Simpson. I give it as verse. The speakers are Stukeley's Page ( = P), Stukeley ( = S), and his father ( = F), another character, Newton, who accompanied Old Stukeley to the door of his son's chamber, having been unceremoniously dropped or forgotten by either the original writer or the reviser, or by both. I have italicized the instances of the obviously deliberate over-syllable so characteristic of Fletcher, and also every case of more than one syllable following the final accented syllable.

P. Who calls there?

Gods me, my master's father ! Now, my master, He's at the tabling-house, too ! What the devil Makes this old crack-breech here now ? How the

pox Stumbled he hither ! God save your worship !

F. How now, boy ?

Where's your master?

P. He is not come from dinner, sir.

F. How ! not from dinner? 'Tis past dinner-time I' th' hall an hour ago. Hark ye, sirrah, tell me true : Is he in commonds ? Tell me not a lie now.

P. What shall I do ? 1 'm in a pitiful case. A pox on him for an old scand-pouch ! If he take

me with a lie note, By this flesh and blood, he'll whip me most

\ierniciously i If I should say he is in commonds, and he prove it

not so,

By this light, he '11 pepper me ! Faith, I '11 tell truth.

F. Sirrah, why speak you not ?

P. I think he be not

In commonds, air.

F. Where dines he?

P. At Palmer's ordinary.

F. Your master is an ordinary student !

P. Indeed, sir, he studies very extraordinarily.

F. And you the rope ripe ordinarily. I sent him money to provide him books.

P. See, see ! the devil ought (owed) my master

a shame,

And now he has paid him ! He had ne'er so much Grace as to buy him a key to his study door. If he have e'er a book there but old hacked swords, As foxes, bilboes, and horn-buckles, I am an infidel! I cannot tell what to do. 1 '11 devise some 'scuse.

F. Sirrah, hear ye me : give me the key of his study.

P. Sir, he ever carries it about him.

F. How ! let me see : methinks the door stands-

open. P. A plague on 't ! he hath found it ! I was not

'ware, sir. Belike He'd thought he had locked it, and turned the key

too short.

Now we shall see this old cutter play his part ; For in faith he's furnished with all kindsof weapons. F. What! be these my son's books? I promise-

you,

A study richly furnished ! Well said (=done), Tom Stukeley !

Here, gallows-clapper ! here. Be these your mas- ter s books ?

For Littleton, Stamford, and Burke, here's long- sword, short-sword, and buckler ;

But all 's for the bar ; yet I had meant to have my son

A barrister, not a barrator ; but I see

He means not to trouble the law. I pray God the- law

Trouble not him. Sirrah Halter-sack ! P. Sir?

F. Where is this towardly youth, your master ?

This lawyer, this lawyer, 1 would fain see him :

His learned mastership, where is he? P. It will not belong before he comes, sir.

If he be not curst in 's mother's belly,

He'll keep him out of the way. 1 would I were with .him too ;

For I shall have a baiting worse than a hanging. F. If he have so much as a candstick, I am a traitor,

But an old hilt of a broken sword to set his light in I"

Not a standish, as I am a man, but the bottom

Of a Temple pot, with a little old sarsnet in it !

Here's a fellow like to prove a lawyer,

If sword and buckler hold !

Enter STUKELEY. S. Boy, has Dick Blackstone sent home my new

buckler? Rogue, why stirs thou not ? What a gaping keep

you? P. A pox on 't ! my old master is here. Y"ou '11

ha 't, f faith.

S. How long has he been here, rogue ? P. This two hours.

S. Zounds ! he has been taking an inventory of

my household stuff: All my bravery lies about the floor. F. O, thou graceless boy ! how dost thou bestow

thy time ?

S. Your blessing, good father. [Kneels.

F. 0, thou blessed boy ! thou vild, lewd unthrift t S. How does my mother, sir, and all in

Hampshire?

F. The worse to hear of thy demeanor here. S. I am glad to hear of their good health. God'

continue it!

F. Thou graceless rake-hell ! and is all my cost This five years' space here for thy maintenance Spent in this sort, thou lewd, misordered villain?

S. Sir, I am glad to see you look so well. I promise you, it joys me at the heart. Boy, bring the chair, and let my father sit ; And, if old Master Provye be within, I'll call him, sir, to bear you company. F. Ay, ay : thou carest not how thou stop'st my

mouth,

So that thou hear'st not of thy villainy. It is no marvel, though, you write so oft