Sirrah, go hie you home, and bid your fellows Get all their flails ready again I come.

HIND. I will, sir.

[EXIT.

SORD. I'll instantly set all my hinds to thrashing Of a whole rick of corn, which I will hide Under the ground; and with the straw thereof I'll stuff the outsides of my other mows: That done, I'll have them empty all my garners, And in the friendly earth bury my store, That, when the searchers come, they may suppose All's spent, and that my fortunes were belied.

And to lend more opinion to my want, And stop that many-mouthed vulgar dog, Which else would still be baying at my door, Each market-day I will be seen to buy Part of the purest wheat, as for my household; Where when it comes, it shall increase my heaps: 'Twill yield me treble gain at this dear time, Promised in this dear book: I have cast all.

Till then I will not sell an ear, I'll hang first.

O, I shall make my prices as I list; My house and I can feed on peas and barley.

What though a world of wretches starve the while; He that will thrive must think no courses vile.

[EXIT.

COR. Now, signior, how approve you this? have the humourists exprest themselves truly or no?

MIT. Yes, if it be well prosecuted, 'tis. .h.i.therto happy enough: but methinks Macilente went hence too soon; he might have been made to stay, and speak somewhat in reproof of Sordido's wretchedness now at the last.

COR. O, no, that had been extremely improper; besides, he had continued the scene too long with him, as 'twas, being in no more action.

MIT. You may inforce the length as a necessary reason; but for propriety, the scene wou'd very well have borne it, in my judgment.

COR. O, worst of both; why, you mistake his humour utterly then.

MIT. How do I mistake it? Is it not envy?

COR. Yes, but you must understand, signior, he envies him not as he is a villain, a wolf in the commonwealth, but as he is rich and fortunate; for the true condition of envy is, 'dolor alienae felicitatis', to have our eyes continually fixed upon another man's prosperity that is, his chief happiness, and to grieve at that. Whereas, if we make his monstrous and abhorr'd actions our object, the grief we take then comes nearer the nature of hate than envy, as being bred out of a kind of contempt and loathing in ourselves.

MIT. So you'll infer it had been hate, not envy in him, to reprehend the humour of Sordido?

COR. Right, for what a man truly envies in another, he could always love and cherish in himself; but no man truly reprehends in another, what he loves in himself; therefore reprehension is out of his hate. And this distinction hath he himself made in a speech there, if you marked it, where he says, "I envy not this Buffone, but I hate him." Why might he not as well have hated Sordido as him?

COR. No, sir, there was subject for his envy in Sordido, his wealth: so was there not in the other. He stood possest of no one eminent gift, but a most odious and fiend-like disposition, that would turn charity itself into hate, much more envy, for the present.

MIT. You have satisfied me, sir. O, here comes the fool, and the jester again, methinks.

COR. 'Twere pity they should be parted, sir.

MIT. What bright-shining gallant's that with them? the knight they went to?

COR. No, sir, this is one monsieur Fastidious Brisk, otherwise called the fresh Frenchified courtier.

MIT. A humourist too?

COR. As humorous as quicksilver; do but observe him; the scene is the country still, remember.

ACT II

SCENE I. -- THE COUNTRY; BEFORE PUNTARVOLO'S HOUSE.

ENTER FASTIDIOUS BRISK, CINEDO, CARLO BUFFONE, AND SOGLIARDO.

FAST. Cinedo, watch when the knight comes, and give us word.

CIN. I will, sir.

[EXIT.

FAST. How lik'st thou my boy, Carlo?

CAR. O, well, well. He looks like a colonel of the Pigmies horse, or one of these motions in a great antique clock; he would shew well upon a haberdasher's stall, at a corner shop, rarely.

FAST. 'Sheart, what a d.a.m.n'd witty rogue's this! How he confounds with his similes!

CAR. Better with similes than smiles: and whither were you riding now, signior?

FAST. Who, I? What a silly jest's that! Whither should I ride but to the court?

CAR. O, pardon me, sir, twenty places more; your hot-house, or your wh.o.r.e-house --

FAST. By the virtue of my soul, this knight dwells in Elysium here.

CAR. He's gone now, I thought he would fly out presently. These be our nimble-spirited catsos, that have their evasions at pleasure, will run over a bog like your wild Irish; no sooner started, but they'll leap from one thing to another, like a squirrel, heigh! dance and do tricks in their discourse, from fire to water, from water to air, from air to earth, as if their tongues did but e'en lick the four elements over, and away.

FAST. Sirrah, Carlo, thou never saw'st my gray hobby yet, didst thou?

CAR. No; have you such a one?

FAST. The best in Europe, my good villain, thou'lt say when thou seest him.

CAR. But when shall I see him?

FAST. There was a n.o.bleman in the court offered me a hundred pound for him, by this light: a fine little fiery slave, he runs like a -- oh, excellent, excellent! -- with the very sound of the spur.

CAR. How! the sound of the spur?

FAST. O, it's your only humour now extant, sir; a good gingle, a good gingle.

CAR. S'blood! you shall see him turn morrice-dancer, he has got him bells, a good suit, and a hobby-horse.

SIG. Signior, now you talk of a hobby-horse, I know where one is will not be given for a brace of angels.

FAST. How is that, sir?

SOG. Marry, sir, I am telling this gentleman of a hobby-horse; it was my father's indeed, and though I say it --

CAR. That should not say it -- on, on.

SOG. He did dance in it, with as good humour and as good regard as any man of his degree whatsoever, being no gentleman: I have danc'd in it myself too.