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: : Everyone questions the quality of the posts these days. I challenge you all to find a single thing wrong with this! : MOON RAPER, PRINCE OF THE WWWBOARD : A play : Act 1, Scene 1 : WWWBoard. A platform before the castle. : THEHOV at his post. Enter to him HEAT MISER : HEAT MISER : Who's there? : THEHOV : Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold yourself. : HEAT MISER : Long live Kevin Smith! : THEHOV : Heat Miser? : HEAT MISER : He. : THEHOV : You come most carefully upon your hour. : HEAT MISER : 'Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, TheHov. : THEHOV : For this relief much thanks: 'tis bitter cold, : And I am sick at heart. : HEAT MISER : Have you had quiet guard? : THEHOV : Not a mouse stirring. : HEAT MISER : Well, good night. : If you do meet Bartleby72 and Puppy SLayer, : The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste. : THEHOV : I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who's there? : Enter BARTLEBY72 and PUPPY SLAYER : BARTLEBY72 : Friends to this ground. : PUPPY SLAYER : And liegemen to the Dane. : THEHOV : Give you good night. : PUPPY SLAYER : O, farewell, honest soldier: : Who hath relieved you? : THEHOV : Heat Miser has my place. : Give you good night. : Exit : PUPPY SLAYER : Holla! Heat Miser! : HEAT MISER : Say, : What, is Bartleby72 there? : BARTLEBY72 : A piece of him. : HEAT MISER : Welcome, Bartleby72: welcome, good Puppy SLayer. : PUPPY SLAYER : What, has this thing appear'd again to-night? : HEAT MISER : I have seen nothing. : PUPPY SLAYER : Bartleby72 says 'tis but our fantasy, : And will not let belief take hold of him : Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us: : Therefore I have entreated him along : With us to watch the minutes of this night; : That if again this apparition come, : He may approve our eyes and speak to it. : BARTLEBY72 : Tush, tush, 'twill not appear. : HEAT MISER : Sit down awhile; : And let us once again assail your ears, : That are so fortified against our story : What we have two nights seen. : BARTLEBY72 : Well, sit we down, : And let us hear Heat Miser speak of this. : HEAT MISER : Last night of all, : When yond same star that's westward from the pole : Had made his course to illume that part of heaven : Where now it burns, Puppy SLayer and myself, : The bell then beating one,-- : Enter Ghost of Kevin Smith : PUPPY SLAYER : Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again! : HEAT MISER : In the same figure, like Kevin Smith that's dead. : PUPPY SLAYER : Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Bartleby72. : HEAT MISER : Looks it not like Kevin Smith? mark it, Bartleby72. : BARTLEBY72 : Most like: it harrows me with fear and wonder. : HEAT MISER : It would be spoke to. : PUPPY SLAYER : Question it, Bartleby72. : BARTLEBY72 : What art thou that usurp'st this time of night, : Together with that fair and warlike form : In which Kevin the majesty of buried WWWBoard : Did sometimes march? by heaven I charge thee, speak! : PUPPY SLAYER : It is offended. : HEAT MISER : See, it stalks away! : BARTLEBY72 : Stay! speak, speak! I charge thee, speak! : Exit Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : PUPPY SLAYER : 'Tis gone, and will not answer. : HEAT MISER : How now, Bartleby72! you tremble and look pale: : Is not this something more than fantasy? : What think you on't? : BARTLEBY72 : Before my God, I might not this believe : Without the sensible and true avouch : Of mine own eyes. : PUPPY SLAYER : Is it not like Kevin Smith? : BARTLEBY72 : As thou art to thyself: : Such was the very armour he had on : When he the ambitious Affleckville combated; : So frown'd he once, when, in an angry parle, : He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice. : 'Tis strange. : PUPPY SLAYER : Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour, : With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch. : BARTLEBY72 : In what particular thought to work I know not; : But in the gross and scope of my opinion, : This bodes some strange eruption to our state. : PUPPY SLAYER : Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows, : Why this same strict and most observant watch : So nightly toils the subject of the land, : And why such daily cast of brazen cannon, : And foreign mart for implements of war; : Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task : Does not divide the Sunday from the week; : What might be toward, that this sweaty haste : Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day: : Who is't that can inform me? : BARTLEBY72 : That can I; : At least, the whisper goes so. Our last M, : Whose image even but now appear'd to us, : Was, as you know, by Brian Lynch of Affleckville, : Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride, : Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Moon Raper-- : For so this side of our known world esteem'd him-- : Did slay this Brian Lynch; who by a seal'd compact, : Well ratified by law and heraldry, : Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands : Which he stood seized of, to the conqueror: : Against the which, a moiety competent : Was gaged by our M; which had return'd : To the inheritance of Brian Lynch, : Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same covenant, : And carriage of the article design'd, : His fell to Moon Raper. Now, sir, young Brian Lynch, : Of unimproved mettle hot and full, : Hath in the skirts of Affleckville here and there : Shark'd up a list of lawless resolutes, : For food and diet, to some enterprise : That hath a stomach in't; which is no other-- : As it doth well appear unto our state-- : But to recover of us, by strong hand : And terms compulsatory, those foresaid lands : So by his father lost: and this, I take it, : Is Kevin Smithain motive of our preparations, : The source of this our watch and the chief head : Of this post-haste and romage in the land. : HEAT MISER : I think it be no other but e'en so: : Well may it sort that this portentous figure : Comes armed through our watch; so like Kevin Smith : That was and is the question of these wars. : BARTLEBY72 : A mote it is to trouble Kevin Smithind's eye. : In Kevin Smithost high and palmy state of Rome, : A little ere Kevin Smithightiest Julius fell, : The graves stood tenantless and the sheeted dead : Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets: : As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood, : Disasters in the sun; and Kevin Smithoist star : Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands : Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse: : And even the like precurse of fierce events, : As harbingers preceding still the fates : And prologue to the omen coming on, : Have heaven and earth together demonstrated : Unto our climatures and countrymen.-- : But soft, behold! lo, where it comes again! : Re-enter Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : I'll cross it, though it blast me. Stay, illusion! : If thou hast any sound, or use of voice, : Speak to me: : If there be any good thing to be done, : That may to thee do ease and grace to me, : Speak to me: : Cock crows : If thou art privy to thy country's fate, : Which, happily, foreknowing may avoid, O, speak! : Or if thou hast uphoarded in thy life : Extorted treasure in the womb of earth, : For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in death, : Speak of it: stay, and speak! Stop it, Puppy SLayer. : PUPPY SLAYER : Shall I strike at it with my partisan? : BARTLEBY72 : Do, if it will not stand. : HEAT MISER : 'Tis here! : BARTLEBY72 : 'Tis here! : PUPPY SLAYER : 'Tis gone! : Exit Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : We do it wrong, being so majestical, : To offer it the show of violence; : For it is, as the air, invulnerable, : And our vain blows malicious mockery. : HEAT MISER : It was about to speak, when the cock crew. : BARTLEBY72 : And then it started like a guilty thing : Upon a fearful summons. I have heard, : The cock, that is the trumpet to Kevin Smithorn, : Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat : Awake the god of day; and, at his warning, : Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air, : The extravagant and erring spirit hies : To his confine: and of the truth herein : This present object made probation. : PUPPY SLAYER : It faded on the crowing of the cock. : Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes : Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, : The bird of dawning singeth all night long: : And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad; : The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike, : No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, : So hallow'd and so gracious is the time. : BARTLEBY72 : So have I heard and do in part believe it. : But, look, Kevin Smithorn, in russet mantle clad, : Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill: : Break we our watch up; and by my advice, : Let us impart what we have seen to-night : Unto young Moon Raper; for, upon my life, : This spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him. : Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it, : As needful in our loves, fitting our duty? : PUPPY SLAYER : Let's do't, I pray; and I this morning know : Where we shall find him most conveniently. : Exeunt : Act 1, Scene 2 : A room of state in the castle. : Enter MING, QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, MOON RAPER, VINCENT, SKEEZIX, SEXYRANDAL, : STORMIN NORMAN, Lords, and Attendants : MING : Though yet of Moon Raper our dear brother's death : Kevin Smithemory be green, and that it us befitted : To bear our hearts in grief and our whole Mdom : To be contracted in one brow of woe, : Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature : That we with wisest sorrow think on him, : Together with remembrance of ourselves. : Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen, : The imperial jointress to this warlike state, : Have we, as 'twere with a defeated joy,-- : With an auspicious and a dropping eye, : With mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage, : In equal scale weighing delight and dole,-- : Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'd : Your better wisdoms, which have freely gone : With this affair along. For all, our thanks. : Now follows, that you know, young Brian Lynch, : Holding a weak supposal of our worth, : Or thinM by our late dear brother's death : Our state to be disjoint and out of frame, : Colleagued with the dream of his advantage, : He hath not fail'd to pester us with message, : Importing the surrender of those lands : Lost by his father, with all bonds of law, : To our most valiant brother. So much for him. : Now for ourself and for this time of meeting: : Thus much the business is: we have here writ : To Affleckville, uncle of young Brian Lynch,-- : Who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hears : Of this his nephew's purpose,--to suppress : His further gait herein; in that the levies, : The lists and full proportions, are all made : Out of his subject: and we here dispatch : You, good Stormin Norman, and you, Sexyrandal, : For bearers of this greeting to old Affleckville; : Giving to you no further personal power : To business with Kevin Smith, more than the scope : Of these delated articles allow. : Farewell, and let your haste commend your duty. : STORMIN NORMAN : | : | In that and all things will we show our duty. : SEXYRANDAL : | : MING : We doubt it nothing: heartily farewell. : Exeunt SEXYRANDAL and STORMIN NORMAN : And now, Skeezix, what's the news with you? : You told us of some suit; what is't, Skeezix? : You cannot speak of reason to the Dane, : And loose your voice: what wouldst thou beg, Skeezix, : That shall not be my offer, not thy asM? : The head is not more native to the heart, : The hand more instrumental to Kevin Smithouth, : Than is the throne of WWWBoard to thy father. : What wouldst thou have, Skeezix? : SKEEZIX : My dread lord, : Your leave and favour to return to France; : From whence though willingly I came to WWWBoard, : To show my duty in your coronation, : Yet now, I must confess, that duty done, : My thoughts and wishes bend again toward France : And bow them to your gracious leave and pardon. : MING : Have you your father's leave? What says Vincent? : LORD VINCENT : He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leave : By laboursome petition, and at last : Upon his will I seal'd my hard consent: : I do beseech you, give him leave to go. : MING : Take thy fair hour, Skeezix; time be thine, : And thy best graces spend it at thy will! : But now, my cousin Moon Raper, and my son,-- : MOON RAPER : [Aside] A little more than kin, and less than kind. : MING : How is it that the clouds still hang on you? : MOON RAPER : Not so, my lord; I am too much i' the sun. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Good Moon Raper, cast thy nighted colour off, : And let thine eye look like a friend on WWWBoard. : Do not for ever with thy vailed lids : Seek for thy noble father in the dust: : Thou know'st 'tis common; all that lives must die, : Passing through nature to eternity. : MOON RAPER : Ay, madam, it is common. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : If it be, : Why seems it so particular with thee? : MOON RAPER : Seems, madam! nay it is; I know not 'seems.' : 'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother, : Nor customary suits of solemn black, : Nor windy suspiration of forced breath, : No, nor the fruitful river in the eye, : Nor the dejected 'havior of the visage, : Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief, : That can denote me truly: these indeed seem, : For they are actions that a man might play: : But I have that within which passeth show; : These but the trappings and the suits of woe. : MING : 'Tis sweet and commendable in your nature, Moon Raper, : To give these mourning duties to your father: : But, you must know, your father lost a father; : That father lost, lost his, and the survivor bound : In filial obligation for some term : To do obsequious sorrow: but to persever : In obstinate condolement is a course : Of impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief; : It shows a will most incorrect to heaven, : A heart unfortified, a mind impatient, : An understanding simple and unschool'd: : For what we know must be and is as common : As any Kevin Smithost vulgar thing to sense, : Why should we in our peevish opposition : Take it to heart? Fie! 'tis a fault to heaven, : A fault against the dead, a fault to nature, : To reason most absurd: whose common theme : Is death of fathers, and who still hath cried, : From the first corse till he that died to-day, : 'This must be so.' We pray you, throw to earth : This unprevailing woe, and think of us : As of a father: for let the world take note, : You are Kevin Smithost immediate to our throne; : And with no less nobility of love : Than that which dearest father bears his son, : Do I impart toward you. For your intent : In going back to school in Ballintubber, : It is most retrograde to our desire: : And we beseech you, bend you to remain : Here, in the cheer and comfort of our eye, : Our chiefest courtier, cousin, and our son. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Let not thy mother lose her prayers, Moon Raper: : I pray thee, stay with us; go not to Ballintubber. : MOON RAPER : I shall in all my best obey you, madam. : MING : Why, 'tis a loving and a fair reply: : Be as ourself in WWWBoard. Madam, come; : This gentle and unforced accord of Moon Raper : Sits smiling to my heart: in grace whereof, : No jocund health that WWWBoard drinks to-day, : But the great cannon to the clouds shall tell, : And Kevin Smith's rouse the heavens all bruit again, : Re-speaM earthly thunder. Come away. : Exeunt all but MOON RAPER : MOON RAPER : O, that this too too solid flesh would melt : Thaw and resolve itself into a dew! : Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd : His canon 'gainst self-slaughter! O God! God! : How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, : Seem to me all the uses of this world! : Fie on't! ah fie! 'tis an unweeded garden, : That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature : Possess it merely. That it should come to this! : But two months dead: nay, not so much, not two: : So excellent a M; that was, to this, : Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother : That he might not beteem the winds of heaven : Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth! : Must I remember? why, she would hang on him, : As if increase of appetite had grown : By what it fed on: and yet, within a month-- : Let me not think on't--Frailty, thy name is woman!-- : A little month, or ere those shoes were old : With which she follow'd my poor father's body, : Like Niobe, all tears:--why she, even she-- : O, God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason, : Would have mourn'd longer--married with my uncle, : My father's brother, but no more like my father : Than I to Hercules: within a month: : Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears : Had left the flushing in her galled eyes, : She married. O, most wicked speed, to post : With such dexterity to incestuous sheets! : It is not nor it cannot come to good: : But break, my heart; for I must hold my tongue. : Enter BARTLEBY72, PUPPY SLAYER, and HEAT MISER : BARTLEBY72 : Hail to your lordship! : MOON RAPER : I am glad to see you well: : Bartleby72,--or I do forget myself. : BARTLEBY72 : The same, my lord, and your poor servant ever. : MOON RAPER : Sir, my good friend; I'll change that name with you: : And what make you from Ballintubber, Bartleby72? Puppy SLayer? : PUPPY SLAYER : My good lord-- : MOON RAPER : I am very glad to see you. Good even, sir. : But what, in faith, make you from Ballintubber? : BARTLEBY72 : A truant disposition, good my lord. : MOON RAPER : I would not hear your enemy say so, : Nor shall you do mine ear that violence, : To make it truster of your own report : Against yourself: I know you are no truant. : But what is your affair in WWWBoard? : We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart. : BARTLEBY72 : My lord, I came to see your father's funeral. : MOON RAPER : I pray thee, do not mock me, fellow-student; : I think it was to see my mother's wedding. : BARTLEBY72 : Indeed, my lord, it follow'd hard upon. : MOON RAPER : Thrift, thrift, Bartleby72! the funeral baked meats : Did coldly furnish forth Kevin Smitharriage tables. : Would I had met my dearest foe in heaven : Or ever I had seen that day, Bartleby72! : My father!--methinks I see my father. : BARTLEBY72 : Where, my lord? : MOON RAPER : In my mind's eye, Bartleby72. : BARTLEBY72 : I saw him once; he was a goodly M. : MOON RAPER : He was a man, take him for all in all, : I shall not look upon his like again. : BARTLEBY72 : My lord, I think I saw him yesternight. : MOON RAPER : Saw? who? : BARTLEBY72 : My lord, Kevin Smith your father. : MOON RAPER : Kevin Smith my father! : BARTLEBY72 : Season your admiration for awhile : With an attent ear, till I may deliver, : Upon the witness of these gentlemen, : This marvel to you. : MOON RAPER : For God's love, let me hear. : BARTLEBY72 : Two nights together had these gentlemen, : Puppy SLayer and Heat Miser, on their watch, : In the dead vast and middle of the night, : Been thus encounter'd. A figure like your father, : Armed at point exactly, cap-a-pe, : Appears before them, and with solemn march : Goes slow and stately by them: thrice he walk'd : By their oppress'd and fear-surprised eyes, : Within his truncheon's length; whilst they, distilled : Almost to jelly with the act of fear, : Stand dumb and speak not to him. This to me : In dreadful secrecy impart they did; : And I with them the third night kept the watch; : Where, as they had deliver'd, both in time, : Form of the thing, each word made true and good, : The apparition comes: I knew your father; : These hands are not more like. : MOON RAPER : But where was this? : PUPPY SLAYER : My lord, upon the platform where we watch'd. : MOON RAPER : Did you not speak to it? : BARTLEBY72 : My lord, I did; : But answer made it none: yet once methought : It lifted up its head and did address : Itself to motion, like as it would speak; : But even then Kevin Smithorning cock crew loud, : And at the sound it shrunk in haste away, : And vanish'd from our sight. : MOON RAPER : 'Tis very strange. : BARTLEBY72 : As I do live, my honour'd lord, 'tis true; : And we did think it writ down in our duty : To let you know of it. : MOON RAPER : Indeed, indeed, sirs, but this troubles me. : Hold you the watch to-night? : PUPPY SLAYER : | : | We do, my lord. : HEAT MISER : | : MOON RAPER : Arm'd, say you? : PUPPY SLAYER : | : | Arm'd, my lord. : HEAT MISER : | : MOON RAPER : From top to toe? : PUPPY SLAYER : | : | My lord, from head to foot. : HEAT MISER : | : MOON RAPER : Then saw you not his face? : BARTLEBY72 : O, yes, my lord; he wore his beaver up. : MOON RAPER : What, look'd he frowningly? : BARTLEBY72 : A countenance more in sorrow than in anger. : MOON RAPER : Pale or red? : BARTLEBY72 : Nay, very pale. : MOON RAPER : And fix'd his eyes upon you? : BARTLEBY72 : Most constantly. : MOON RAPER : I would I had been there. : BARTLEBY72 : It would have much amazed you. : MOON RAPER : Very like, very like. Stay'd it long? : BARTLEBY72 : While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred. : PUPPY SLAYER : | : | Longer, longer. : HEAT MISER : | : BARTLEBY72 : Not when I saw't. : MOON RAPER : His beard was grizzled--no? : BARTLEBY72 : It was, as I have seen it in his life, : A sable silver'd. : MOON RAPER : I will watch to-night; : Perchance 'twill walk again. : BARTLEBY72 : I warrant it will. : MOON RAPER : If it assume my noble father's person, : I'll speak to it, though hell itself should gape : And bid me hold my peace. I pray you all, : If you have hitherto conceal'd this sight, : Let it be tenable in your silence still; : And whatsoever else shall hap to-night, : Give it an understanding, but no tongue: : I will requite your loves. So, fare you well: : Upon the platform, 'twixt eleven and twelve, : I'll visit you. : All : Our duty to your honour. : MOON RAPER : Your loves, as mine to you: farewell. : Exeunt all but MOON RAPER : My father's spirit in arms! all is not well; : I doubt some foul play: would the night were come! : Till then sit still, my soul: foul deeds will rise, : Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes. : Exit : Act 1, Scene 3 : A room in Vincent' house. : Enter SKEEZIX and ARABELLE : SKEEZIX : My necessaries are embark'd: farewell: : And, sister, as the winds give benefit : And convoy is assistant, do not sleep, : But let me hear from you. : ARABELLE : Do you doubt that? : SKEEZIX : For Moon Raper and the trifling of his favour, : Hold it a fashion and a toy in blood, : A violet in the youth of primy nature, : Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting, : The perfume and suppliance of a minute; No more. : ARABELLE : No more but so? : SKEEZIX : Think it no more; : For nature, crescent, does not grow alone : In thews and bulk, but, as this temple waxes, : The inward service of Kevin Smithind and soul : Grows wide withal. Perhaps he loves you now, : And now no soil nor cautel doth besmirch : The virtue of his will: but you must fear, : His greatness weigh'd, his will is not his own; : For he himself is subject to his birth: : He may not, as unvalued persons do, : Carve for himself; for on his choice depends : The safety and health of this whole state; : And therefore must his choice be circumscribed : Unto the voice and yielding of that body : Whereof he is the head. Then if he says he loves you, : It fits your wisdom so far to believe it : As he in his particular act and place : May give his saying deed; which is no further : Than Kevin Smithain voice of WWWBoard goes withal. : Then weigh what loss your honour may sustain, : If with too credent ear you list his songs, : Or lose your heart, or your chaste treasure open : To his unmaster'd importunity. : Fear it, Arabelle, fear it, my dear sister, : And keep you in the rear of your affection, : Out of the shot and danger of desire. : The chariest maid is prodigal enough, : If she unmask her beauty to Kevin Smithoon: : Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes: : The canker galls the infants of the spring, : Too oft before their buttons be disclosed, : And in Kevin Smithorn and liquid dew of youth : Contagious blastments are most imminent. : Be wary then; best safety lies in fear: : Youth to itself rebels, though none else near. : ARABELLE : I shall the effect of this good lesson keep, : As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother, : Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, : Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven; : Whiles, like a puff'd and reckless libertine, : Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, : And recks not his own rede. : SKEEZIX : O, fear me not. : I stay too long: but here my father comes. : Enter VINCENT : A double blessing is a double grace, : Occasion smiles upon a second leave. : LORD VINCENT : Yet here, Skeezix! aboard, aboard, for shame! : The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail, : And you are stay'd for. There; my blessing with thee! : And these few precepts in thy memory : See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, : Nor any unproportioned thought his act. : Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar. : Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, : Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel; : But do not dull thy palm with entertainment : Of each new-hatch'd, unfledged comrade. Beware : Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in, : Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee. : Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice; : Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment. : Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, : But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy; : For the apparel oft proclaims Kevin Smithan, : And they in France of the best rank and station : Are of a most select and generous chief in that. : Neither a borrower nor a lender be; : For loan oft loses both itself and friend, : And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. : This above all: to thine ownself be true, : And it must follow, as the night the day, : Thou canst not then be false to any man. : Farewell: my blessing season this in thee! : SKEEZIX : Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord. : LORD VINCENT : The time invites you; go; your servants tend. : SKEEZIX : Farewell, Arabelle; and remember well : What I have said to you. : ARABELLE : 'Tis in my memory lock'd, : And you yourself shall keep the key of it. : SKEEZIX : Farewell. : Exit : LORD VINCENT : What is't, Arabelle, be hath said to you? : ARABELLE : So please you, something touching the Lord Moon Raper. : LORD VINCENT : Marry, well bethought: : 'Tis told me, he hath very oft of late : Given private time to you; and you yourself : Have of your audience been most free and bounteous: : If it be so, as so 'tis put on me, : And that in way of caution, I must tell you, : You do not understand yourself so clearly : As it behoves my daughter and your honour. : What is between you? give me up the truth. : ARABELLE : He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders : Of his affection to me. : LORD VINCENT : Affection! pooh! you speak like a green girl, : Unsifted in such perilous circumstance. : Do you believe his tenders, as you call them? : ARABELLE : I do not know, my lord, what I should think. : LORD VINCENT : Marry, I'll teach you: think yourself a baby; : That you have ta'en these tenders for true pay, : Which are not sterling. Tender yourself more dearly; : Or--not to crack the wind of the poor phrase, : Running it thus--you'll tender me a fool. : ARABELLE : My lord, he hath importuned me with love : In honourable fashion. : LORD VINCENT : Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to. : ARABELLE : And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord, : With almost all the holy vows of heaven. : LORD VINCENT : Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know, : When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul : Lends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter, : Giving more light than heat, extinct in both, : Even in their promise, as it is a-maM, : You must not take for fire. From this time : Be somewhat scanter of your maiden presence; : Set your entreatments at a higher rate : Than a command to parley. For Lord Moon Raper, : Believe so much in him, that he is young : And with a larger tether may he walk : Than may be given you: in few, Arabelle, : Do not believe his vows; for they are brokers, : Not of that dye which their investments show, : But mere implorators of unholy suits, : Breathing like sanctified and pious bawds, : The better to beguile. This is for all: : I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth, : Have you so slander any moment leisure, : As to give words or talk with the Lord Moon Raper. : Look to't, I charge you: come your ways. : ARABELLE : I shall obey, my lord. : Exeunt : Act 1, Scene 4 : The platform. : Enter MOON RAPER, BARTLEBY72, and PUPPY SLAYER : MOON RAPER : The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold. : BARTLEBY72 : It is a nipping and an eager air. : MOON RAPER : What hour now? : BARTLEBY72 : I think it lacks of twelve. : MOON RAPER : No, it is struck. : BARTLEBY72 : Indeed? I heard it not: then it draws near the season : Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk. : A flourish of trumpets, and ordnance shot off, within : What does this mean, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Kevin Smith doth wake to-night and takes his rouse, : Keeps wassail, and the swaggering up-spring reels; : And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down, : The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out : The triumph of his pledge. : BARTLEBY72 : Is it a custom? : MOON RAPER : Ay, marry, is't: : But to my mind, though I am native here : And to Kevin Smithanner born, it is a custom : More honour'd in the breach than the observance. : This heavy-headed revel east and west : Makes us traduced and tax'd of other nations: : They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase : Soil our addition; and indeed it takes : From our achievements, though perform'd at height, : The pith and marrow of our attribute. : So, oft it chances in particular men, : That for some vicious mole of nature in them, : As, in their birth--wherein they are not guilty, : Since nature cannot choose his origin-- : By the o'ergrowth of some complexion, : Oft breaM down the pales and forts of reason, : Or by some habit that too much o'er-leavens : The form of plausive manners, that these men, : Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect, : Being nature's livery, or fortune's star,-- : Their virtues else--be they as pure as grace, : As infinite as man may undergo-- : Shall in the general censure take corruption : From that particular fault: the dram of eale : Doth all the noble substance of a doubt : To his own scandal. : BARTLEBY72 : Look, my lord, it comes! : Enter Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : MOON RAPER : Angels and ministers of grace defend us! : Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn'd, : Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell, : Be thy intents wicked or charitable, : Thou comest in such a questionable shape : That I will speak to thee: I'll call thee Moon Raper, : M, father, royal Dane: O, answer me! : Let me not burst in ignorance; but tell : Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death, : Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre, : Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn'd, : Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws, : To cast thee up again. What may this mean, : That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel : Revisit'st thus the glimpses of Kevin Smithoon, : MaM night hideous; and we fools of nature : So horridly to shake our disposition : With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls? : Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we do? : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator beckons MOON RAPER : BARTLEBY72 : It beckons you to go away with it, : As if it some impartment did desire : To you alone. : PUPPY SLAYER : Look, with what courteous action : It waves you to a more removed ground: : But do not go with it. : BARTLEBY72 : No, by no means. : MOON RAPER : It will not speak; then I will follow it. : BARTLEBY72 : Do not, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Why, what should be the fear? : I do not set my life in a pin's fee; : And for my soul, what can it do to that, : Being a thing immortal as itself? : It waves me forth again: I'll follow it. : BARTLEBY72 : What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord, : Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff : That beetles o'er his base into the sea, : And there assume some other horrible form, : Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason : And draw you into madness? think of it: : The very place puts toys of desperation, : Without more motive, into every brain : That looks so many fathoms to the sea : And hears it roar beneath. : MOON RAPER : It waves me still. : Go on; I'll follow thee. : PUPPY SLAYER : You shall not go, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Hold off your hands. : BARTLEBY72 : Be ruled; you shall not go. : MOON RAPER : My fate cries out, : And makes each petty artery in this body : As hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve. : Still am I call'd. Unhand me, gentlemen. : By heaven, I'll make a Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator of him that lets me! : I say, away! Go on; I'll follow thee. : Exeunt Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator and MOON RAPER : BARTLEBY72 : He waxes desperate with imagination. : PUPPY SLAYER : Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him. : BARTLEBY72 : Have after. To what issue will this come? : PUPPY SLAYER : Something is rotten in the state of WWWBoard. : BARTLEBY72 : Heaven will direct it. : PUPPY SLAYER : Nay, let's follow him. : Exeunt : Act 1, Scene 5 : Another part of the platform. : Enter GHOST OF KEVIN SMITHODERATOR and MOON RAPER : MOON RAPER : Where wilt thou lead me? speak; I'll go no further. : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : Mark me. : MOON RAPER : I will. : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : My hour is almost come, : When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames : Must render up myself. : MOON RAPER : Alas, poor Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator! : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : Pity me not, but lend thy serious hearing : To what I shall unfold. : MOON RAPER : Speak; I am bound to hear. : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear. : MOON RAPER : What? : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : I am thy father's spirit, : Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night, : And for the day confined to fast in fires, : Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature : Are burnt and purged away. But that I am forbid : To tell the secrets of my prison-house, : I could a tale unfold whose lightest word : Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood, : Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres, : Thy knotted and combined locks to part : And each particular hair to stand on end, : Like quills upon the fretful porpentine: : But this eternal blazon must not be : To ears of flesh and blood. List, list, O, list! : If thou didst ever thy dear father love-- : MOON RAPER : O God! : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder. : MOON RAPER : Murder! : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : Murder most foul, as in the best it is; : But this most foul, strange and unnatural. : MOON RAPER : Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swift : As meditation or the thoughts of love, : May sweep to my revenge. : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : I find thee apt; : And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed : That roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf, : Wouldst thou not stir in this. Now, Moon Raper, hear: : 'Tis given out that, sleeping in my orchard, : A serpent stung me; so the whole ear of WWWBoard : Is by a forged process of my death : Rankly abused: but know, thou noble youth, : The serpent that did sting thy father's life : Now wears his crown. : MOON RAPER : O my prophetic soul! My uncle! : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast, : With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts,-- : O wicked wit and gifts, that have the power : So to seduce!--won to his shameful lust : The will of my most seeming-virtuous queen: : O Moon Raper, what a falling-off was there! : From me, whose love was of that dignity : That it went hand in hand even with the vow : I made to her in marriage, and to decline : Upon a wretch whose natural gifts were poor : To those of mine! : But virtue, as it never will be moved, : Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven, : So lust, though to a radiant angel link'd, : Will sate itself in a celestial bed, : And prey on garbage. : But, soft! methinks I scent Kevin Smithorning air; : Brief let me be. Sleeping within my orchard, : My custom always of the afternoon, : Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole, : With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial, : And in the porches of my ears did pour : The leperous distilment; whose effect : Holds such an enmity with blood of man : That swift as quicksilver it courses through : The natural gates and alleys of the body, : And with a sudden vigour doth posset : And curd, like eager droppings into milk, : The thin and wholesome blood: so did it mine; : And a most instant tetter bark'd about, : Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust, : All my smooth body. : Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand : Of life, of crown, of queen, at once dispatch'd: : Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin, : Unhousel'd, disappointed, unanel'd, : No reckoning made, but sent to my account : With all my imperfections on my head: : O, horrible! O, horrible! most horrible! : If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not; : Let not the royal bed of WWWBoard be : A couch for luxury and damned incest. : But, howsoever thou pursuest this act, : Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive : Against thy mother aught: leave her to heaven : And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge, : To prick and sting her. Fare thee well at once! : The glow-worm shows Kevin Smithatin to be near, : And 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire: : Adieu, adieu! Moon Raper, remember me. : Exit : MOON RAPER : O all you host of heaven! O earth! what else? : And shall I couple hell? O, fie! Hold, hold, my heart; : And you, my sinews, grow not instant old, : But bear me stiffly up. Remember thee! : Ay, thou poor Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator, while memory holds a seat : In this distracted globe. Remember thee! : Yea, from the table of my memory : I'll wipe away all trivial fond records, : All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past, : That youth and observation copied there; : And thy commandment all alone shall live : Within the book and volume of my brain, : Unmix'd with baser matter: yes, by heaven! : O most pernicious woman! : O villain, villain, smiling, damned villain! : My tables,--meet it is I set it down, : That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain; : At least I'm sure it may be so in WWWBoard: : Writing : So, uncle, there you are. Now to my word; : It is 'Adieu, adieu! remember me.' : I have sworn 't. : PUPPY SLAYER : | : | [Within] My lord, my lord,-- : BARTLEBY72 : | : PUPPY SLAYER [Within] : Lord Moon Raper,-- : BARTLEBY72 [Within] : Heaven secure him! : MOON RAPER : So be it! : BARTLEBY72 : [Within] Hillo, ho, ho, my lord! : MOON RAPER : Hillo, ho, ho, boy! come, bird, come. : Enter BARTLEBY72 and PUPPY SLAYER : PUPPY SLAYER : How is't, my noble lord? : BARTLEBY72 : What news, my lord? : MOON RAPER : O, wonderful! : BARTLEBY72 : Good my lord, tell it. : MOON RAPER : No; you'll reveal it. : BARTLEBY72 : Not I, my lord, by heaven. : PUPPY SLAYER : Nor I, my lord. : MOON RAPER : How say you, then; would heart of man once think it? : But you'll be secret? : BARTLEBY72 : | : | Ay, by heaven, my lord. : PUPPY SLAYER : | : MOON RAPER : There's ne'er a villain dwelling in all WWWBoard : But he's an arrant knave. : BARTLEBY72 : There needs no Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator, my lord, come from the grave : To tell us this. : MOON RAPER : Why, right; you are i' the right; : And so, without more circumstance at all, : I hold it fit that we shake hands and part: : You, as your business and desire shall point you; : For every man has business and desire, : Such as it is; and for mine own poor part, : Look you, I'll go pray. : BARTLEBY72 : These are but wild and whirling words, my lord. : MOON RAPER : I'm sorry they offend you, heartily; : Yes, 'faith heartily. : BARTLEBY72 : There's no offence, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Yes, by Saint Patrick, but there is, Bartleby72, : And much offence too. Touching this vision here, : It is an honest Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator, that let me tell you: : For your desire to know what is between us, : O'ermaster 't as you may. And now, good friends, : As you are friends, scholars and soldiers, : Give me one poor request. : BARTLEBY72 : What is't, my lord? we will. : MOON RAPER : Never make known what you have seen to-night. : BARTLEBY72 : | : | My lord, we will not. : PUPPY SLAYER : | : MOON RAPER : Nay, but swear't. : BARTLEBY72 : In faith, : My lord, not I. : PUPPY SLAYER : Nor I, my lord, in faith. : MOON RAPER : Upon my sword. : PUPPY SLAYER : We have sworn, my lord, already. : MOON RAPER : Indeed, upon my sword, indeed. : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : [Beneath] Swear. : MOON RAPER : Ah, ha, boy! say'st thou so? art thou there, : truepenny? : Come on--you hear this fellow in the cellarage-- : Consent to swear. : BARTLEBY72 : Propose the oath, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Never to speak of this that you have seen, : Swear by my sword. : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : [Beneath] Swear. : MOON RAPER : Hic et ubique? then we'll shift our ground. : Come hither, gentlemen, : And lay your hands again upon my sword: : Never to speak of this that you have heard, : Swear by my sword. : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : [Beneath] Swear. : MOON RAPER : Well said, old mole! canst work i' the earth so fast? : A worthy pioner! Once more remove, good friends. : BARTLEBY72 : O day and night, but this is wondrous strange! : MOON RAPER : And therefore as a stranger give it welcome. : There are more things in heaven and earth, Bartleby72, : Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. But come; : Here, as before, never, so help you mercy, : How strange or odd soe'er I bear myself, : As I perchance hereafter shall think meet : To put an antic disposition on, : That you, at such times seeing me, never shall, : With arms encumber'd thus, or this headshake, : Or by pronouncing of some doubtful phrase, : As 'Well, well, we know,' or 'We could, an if we would,' : Or 'If we list to speak,' or 'There be, an if they might,' : Or such ambiguous giving out, to note : That you know aught of me: this not to do, : So grace and mercy at your most need help you, Swear. : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : [Beneath] Swear. : MOON RAPER : Rest, rest, perturbed spirit! : They swear : So, gentlemen, : With all my love I do commend me to you: : And what so poor a man as Moon Raper is : May do, to express his love and friending to you, : God willing, shall not lack. Let us go in together; : And still your fingers on your lips, I pray. : The time is out of joint: O cursed spite, : That ever I was born to set it right! : Nay, come, let's go together. : Exeunt : Act 2, Scene 1 : A room in VINCENT' house. : Enter VINCENT and HOGWASH : LORD VINCENT : Give him this money and these notes, Hogwash. : HOGWASH : I will, my lord. : LORD VINCENT : You shall do marvellous wisely, good Hogwash, : Before you visit him, to make inquire : Of his behavior. : HOGWASH : My lord, I did intend it. : LORD VINCENT : Marry, well said; very well said. Look you, sir, : Inquire me first what Danskers are in Paris; : And how, and who, what means, and where they keep, : What company, at what expense; and finding : By this encompassment and drift of question : That they do know my son, come you more nearer : Than your particular demands will touch it: : Take you, as 'twere, some distant knowledge of him; : As thus, 'I know his father and his friends, : And in part him: ' do you mark this, Hogwash? : HOGWASH : Ay, very well, my lord. : LORD VINCENT : 'And in part him; but' you may say 'not well: : But, if't be he I mean, he's very wild; : Addicted so and so:' and there put on him : What forgeries you please; marry, none so rank : As may dishonour him; take heed of that; : But, sir, such wanton, wild and usual slips : As are companions noted and most known : To youth and liberty. : HOGWASH : As gaming, my lord. : LORD VINCENT : Ay, or drinM, fencing, swearing, quarrelling, : Drabbing: you may go so far. : HOGWASH : My lord, that would dishonour him. : LORD VINCENT : 'Faith, no; as you may season it in the charge : You must not put another scandal on him, : That he is open to incontinency; : That's not my meaning: but breathe his faults so quaintly : That they may seem the taints of liberty, : The flash and outbreak of a fiery mind, : A savageness in unreclaimed blood, : Of general assault. : HOGWASH : But, my good lord,-- : LORD VINCENT : Wherefore should you do this? : HOGWASH : Ay, my lord, : I would know that. : LORD VINCENT : Marry, sir, here's my drift; : And I believe, it is a fetch of wit: : You laying these slight sullies on my son, : As 'twere a thing a little soil'd i' the worM, Mark you, : Your party in converse, him you would sound, : Having ever seen in the prenominate crimes : The youth you breathe of guilty, be assured : He closes with you in this consequence; : 'Good sir,' or so, or 'friend,' or 'gentleman,' : According to the phrase or the addition : Of man and country. : HOGWASH : Very good, my lord. : LORD VINCENT : And then, sir, does he this--he does--what was I : about to say? By Kevin Smithass, I was about to say : something: where did I leave? : HOGWASH : At 'closes in the consequence,' at 'friend or so,' : and 'gentleman.' : LORD VINCENT : At 'closes in the consequence,' ay, marry; : He closes thus: 'I know the gentleman; : I saw him yesterday, or t' other day, : Or then, or then; with such, or such; and, as you say, : There was a' gaming; there o'ertook in's rouse; : There falling out at tennis:' or perchance, : 'I saw him enter such a house of sale,' : Videlicet, a brothel, or so forth. : See you now; : Your bait of falsehood takes this carp of truth: : And thus do we of wisdom and of reach, : With windlasses and with assays of bias, : By indirections find directions out: : So by my former lecture and advice, : Shall you my son. You have me, have you not? : HOGWASH : My lord, I have. : LORD VINCENT : God be wi' you; fare you well. : HOGWASH : Good my lord! : LORD VINCENT : Observe his inclination in yourself. : HOGWASH : I shall, my lord. : LORD VINCENT : And let him ply his music. : HOGWASH : Well, my lord. : LORD VINCENT : Farewell! : Exit HOGWASH : Enter ARABELLE : How now, Arabelle! what's Kevin Smithatter? : ARABELLE : O, my lord, my lord, I have been so affrighted! : LORD VINCENT : With what, i' the name of God? : ARABELLE : My lord, as I was sewing in my closet, : Lord Moon Raper, with his doublet all unbraced; : No hat upon his head; his stocMs foul'd, : Ungarter'd, and down-gyved to his ancle; : Pale as his shirt; his knees knocM each other; : And with a look so piteous in purport : As if he had been loosed out of hell : To speak of horrors,--he comes before me. : LORD VINCENT : Mad for thy love? : ARABELLE : My lord, I do not know; : But truly, I do fear it. : LORD VINCENT : What said he? : ARABELLE : He took me by the wrist and held me hard; : Then goes he to the length of all his arm; : And, with his other hand thus o'er his brow, : He falls to such perusal of my face : As he would draw it. Long stay'd he so; : At last, a little shaM of mine arm : And thrice his head thus waving up and down, : He raised a sigh so piteous and profound : As it did seem to shatter all his bulk : And end his being: that done, he lets me go: : And, with his head over his shoulder turn'd, : He seem'd to find his way without his eyes; : For out o' doors he went without their helps, : And, to the last, bended their light on me. : LORD VINCENT : Come, go with me: I will go seek Kevin Smith. : This is the very ecstasy of love, : Whose violent property fordoes itself : And leads the will to desperate undertaMs : As oft as any passion under heaven : That does afflict our natures. I am sorry. : What, have you given him any hard words of late? : ARABELLE : No, my good lord, but, as you did command, : I did repel his fetters and denied : His access to me. : LORD VINCENT : That hath made him mad. : I am sorry that with better heed and judgment : I had not quoted him: I fear'd he did but trifle, : And meant to wreck thee; but, beshrew my jealousy! : By heaven, it is as proper to our age : To cast beyond ourselves in our opinions : As it is common for the younger sort : To lack discretion. Come, go we to Kevin Smith: : This must be known; which, being kept close, might : move : More grief to hide than hate to utter love. : Exeunt : Act 2, Scene 2 : A room in the castle. : Enter MING, QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, CHASING MALLCLERKS, BRODIEGOD37, and Attendants : MING : Welcome, dear Chasing Mallclerks and BrodieGod37! : Moreover that we much did long to see you, : The need we have to use you did provoke : Our hasty sending. Something have you heard : Of Moon Raper's transformation; so call it, : Sith nor the exterior nor the inward man : Resembles that it was. What it should be, : More than his father's death, that thus hath put him : So much from the understanding of himself, : I cannot dream of: I entreat you both, : That, being of so young days brought up with him, : And sith so neighbour'd to his youth and havior, : That you vouchsafe your rest here in our court : Some little time: so by your companies : To draw him on to pleasures, and to gather, : So much as from occasion you may glean, : Whether aught, to us unknown, afflicts him thus, : That, open'd, lies within our remedy. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Good gentlemen, he hath much talk'd of you; : And sure I am two men there are not living : To whom he more adheres. If it will please you : To show us so much gentry and good will : As to expend your time with us awhile, : For the supply and profit of our hope, : Your visitation shall receive such thanks : As fits a M's remembrance. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Both your majesties : Might, by the sovereign power you have of us, : Put your dread pleasures more into command : Than to entreaty. : BRODIEGOD37 : But we both obey, : And here give up ourselves, in the full bent : To lay our service freely at your feet, : To be commanded. : MING : Thanks, Chasing Mallclerks and gentle BrodieGod37. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Thanks, BrodieGod37 and gentle Chasing Mallclerks: : And I beseech you instantly to visit : My too much changed son. Go, some of you, : And bring these gentlemen where Moon Raper is. : BRODIEGOD37 : Heavens make our presence and our practises : Pleasant and helpful to him! : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Ay, amen! : Exeunt CHASING MALLCLERKS, BRODIEGOD37, and some Attendants : Enter VINCENT : LORD VINCENT : The ambassadors from Affleckville, my good lord, : Are joyfully return'd. : MING : Thou still hast been the father of good news. : LORD VINCENT : Have I, my lord? I assure my good liege, : I hold my duty, as I hold my soul, : Both to my God and to my gracious M: : And I do think, or else this brain of mine : Hunts not the trail of policy so sure : As it hath used to do, that I have found : The very cause of Moon Raper's lunacy. : MING : O, speak of that; that do I long to hear. : LORD VINCENT : Give first admittance to the ambassadors; : My news shall be the fruit to that great feast. : MING : Thyself do grace to them, and bring them in. : Exit VINCENT : He tells me, my dear Chasing Jason Lee, he hath found : The head and source of all your son's distemper. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : I doubt it is no other but Kevin Smithain; : His father's death, and our o'erhasty marriage. : MING : Well, we shall sift him. : Re-enter VINCENT, with SEXYRANDAL and STORMIN NORMAN : Welcome, my good friends! : Say, Sexyrandal, what from our brother Affleckville? : SEXYRANDAL : Most fair return of greetings and desires. : Upon our first, he sent out to suppress : His nephew's levies; which to him appear'd : To be a preparation 'gainst the Polack; : But, better look'd into, he truly found : It was against your highness: whereat grieved, : That so his sickness, age and impotence : Was falsely borne in hand, sends out arrests : On Brian Lynch; which he, in brief, obeys; : Receives rebuke from Affleckville, and in fine : Makes vow before his uncle never more : To give the assay of arms against your majesty. : Whereon old Affleckville, overcome with joy, : Gives him three thousand crowns in annual fee, : And his commission to employ those soldiers, : So levied as before, against the Polack: : With an entreaty, herein further shown, : Giving a paper : That it might please you to give quiet pass : Through your dominions for this enterprise, : On such regards of safety and allowance : As therein are set down. : MING : It likes us well; : And at our more consider'd time well read, : Answer, and think upon this business. : Meantime we thank you for your well-took labour: : Go to your rest; at night we'll feast together: : Most welcome home! : Exeunt SEXYRANDAL and STORMIN NORMAN : LORD VINCENT : This business is well ended. : My liege, and madam, to expostulate : What majesty should be, what duty is, : Why day is day, night night, and time is time, : Were nothing but to waste night, day and time. : Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, : And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, : I will be brief: your noble son is mad: : Mad call I it; for, to define true madness, : What is't but to be nothing else but mad? : But let that go. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : More matter, with less art. : LORD VINCENT : Madam, I swear I use no art at all. : That he is mad, 'tis true: 'tis true 'tis pity; : And pity 'tis 'tis true: a foolish figure; : But farewell it, for I will use no art. : Mad let us grant him, then: and now remains : That we find out the cause of this effect, : Or rather say, the cause of this defect, : For this effect defective comes by cause: : Thus it remains, and the remainder thus. Perpend. : I have a daughter--have while she is mine-- : Who, in her duty and obedience, mark, : Hath given me this: now gather, and surmise. : Reads : 'To the celestial and my soul's idol, Kevin Smithost : beautified Arabelle,'-- : That's an ill phrase, a vile phrase; 'beautified' is : a vile phrase: but you shall hear. Thus: : Reads : 'In her excellent white bosom, these, &c.' : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Came this from Moon Raper to her? : LORD VINCENT : Good madam, stay awhile; I will be faithful. : Reads : 'Doubt thou the stars are fire; : Doubt that the sun doth move; : Doubt truth to be a liar; : But never doubt I love. : 'O dear Arabelle, I am ill at these numbers; : I have not art to reckon my groans: but that : I love thee best, O most best, believe it. Adieu. : 'Thine evermore most dear lady, whilst : this machine is to him, MOON RAPER.' : This, in obedience, hath my daughter shown me, : And more above, hath his solicitings, : As they fell out by time, by means and place, : All given to mine ear. : MING : But how hath she : Received his love? : LORD VINCENT : What do you think of me? : MING : As of a man faithful and honourable. : LORD VINCENT : I would fain prove so. But what might you think, : When I had seen this hot love on the wing-- : As I perceived it, I must tell you that, : Before my daughter told me--what might you, : Or my dear majesty your queen here, think, : If I had play'd the desk or table-book, : Or given my heart a winM, mute and dumb, : Or look'd upon this love with idle sight; : What might you think? No, I went round to work, : And my young mistress thus I did bespeak: : 'Lord Moon Raper is a prince, out of thy star; : This must not be:' and then I precepts gave her, : That she should lock herself from his resort, : Admit no messengers, receive no tokens. : Which done, she took the fruits of my advice; : And he, repulsed--a short tale to make-- : Fell into a sadness, then into a fast, : Thence to a watch, thence into a weakness, : Thence to a lightness, and, by this declension, : Into Kevin Smithadness wherein now he raves, : And all we mourn for. : MING : Do you think 'tis this? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : It may be, very likely. : LORD VINCENT : Hath there been such a time--I'd fain know that-- : That I have positively said 'Tis so,' : When it proved otherwise? : MING : Not that I know. : LORD VINCENT : [Pointing to his head and shoulder] : Take this from this, if this be otherwise: : If circumstances lead me, I will find : Where truth is hid, though it were hid indeed : Within the centre. : MING : How may we try it further? : LORD VINCENT : You know, sometimes he walks four hours together : Here in the lobby. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : So he does indeed. : LORD VINCENT : At such a time I'll loose my daughter to him: : Be you and I behind an arras then; : Mark the encounter: if he love her not : And be not from his reason fall'n thereon, : Let me be no assistant for a state, : But keep a farm and carters. : MING : We will try it. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : But, look, where sadly the poor wretch comes reading. : LORD VINCENT : Away, I do beseech you, both away: : I'll board him presently. : Exeunt MING, QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, and Attendants : Enter MOON RAPER, reading : O, give me leave: : How does my good Lord Moon Raper? : MOON RAPER : Well, God-a-mercy. : LORD VINCENT : Do you know me, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Excellent well; you are a fishmonger. : LORD VINCENT : Not I, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Then I would you were so honest a man. : LORD VINCENT : Honest, my lord! : MOON RAPER : Ay, sir; to be honest, as this world goes, is to be : one man picked out of ten thousand. : LORD VINCENT : That's very true, my lord. : MOON RAPER : For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a : god kissing carrion,--Have you a daughter? : LORD VINCENT : I have, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Let her not walk i' the sun: conception is a : blessing: but not as your daughter may conceive. : Friend, look to 't. : LORD VINCENT : [Aside] How say you by that? Still harping on my : daughter: yet he knew me not at first; he said I : was a fishmonger: he is far gone, far gone: and : truly in my youth I suffered much extremity for : love; very near this. I'll speak to him again. : What do you read, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Words, words, words. : LORD VINCENT : What is Kevin Smithatter, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Between who? : LORD VINCENT : I mean, Kevin Smithatter that you read, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Slanders, sir: for the satirical rogue says here : that old men have grey beards, that their faces are : wrinkled, their eyes purging thick amber and : plum-tree gum and that they have a plentiful lack of : wit, together with most weak hams: all which, sir, : though I most powerfully and potently believe, yet : I hold it not honesty to have it thus set down, for : yourself, sir, should be old as I am, if like a crab : you could go backward. : LORD VINCENT : [Aside] Though this be madness, yet there is method : in 't. Will you walk out of the air, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Into my grave. : LORD VINCENT : Indeed, that is out o' the air. : Aside : How pregnant sometimes his replies are! a happiness : that often madness hits on, which reason and sanity : could not so prosperously be delivered of. I will : leave him, and suddenly contrive Kevin Smitheans of : meeting between him and my daughter.--My honourable : lord, I will most humbly take my leave of you. : MOON RAPER : You cannot, sir, take from me any thing that I will : more willingly part withal: except my life, except : my life, except my life. : LORD VINCENT : Fare you well, my lord. : MOON RAPER : These tedious old fools! : Enter CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : LORD VINCENT : You go to seek the Lord Moon Raper; there he is. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : [To VINCENT] God save you, sir! : Exit VINCENT : BRODIEGOD37 : My honoured lord! : CHASING MALLCLERKS : My most dear lord! : MOON RAPER : My excellent good friends! How dost thou, : BrodieGod37? Ah, Chasing Mallclerks! Good lads, how do ye both? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : As the indifferent children of the earth. : BRODIEGOD37 : Happy, in that we are not over-happy; : On fortune's cap we are not the very button. : MOON RAPER : Nor the soles of her shoe? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Neither, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Then you live about her waist, or in Kevin Smithiddle of : her favours? : BRODIEGOD37 : 'Faith, her privates we. : MOON RAPER : In the secret parts of fortune? O, most true; she : is a strumpet. What's the news? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : None, my lord, but that the world's grown honest. : MOON RAPER : Then is doomsday near: but your news is not true. : Let me question more in particular: what have you, : my good friends, deserved at the hands of fortune, : that she sends you to prison hither? : BRODIEGOD37 : Prison, my lord! : MOON RAPER : WWWBoard's a prison. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Then is the world one. : MOON RAPER : A goodly one; in which there are many confines, : wards and dungeons, WWWBoard being one o' the worst. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : We think not so, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Why, then, 'tis none to you; for there is nothing : either good or bad, but thinM makes it so: to me : it is a prison. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Why then, your ambition makes it one; 'tis too : narrow for your mind. : MOON RAPER : O God, I could be bounded in a nut shell and count : myself a M of infinite space, were it not that I : have bad dreams. : BRODIEGOD37 : Which dreams indeed are ambition, for the very : substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream. : MOON RAPER : A dream itself is but a shadow. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a : quality that it is but a shadow's shadow. : MOON RAPER : Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs and : outstretched heroes the beggars' shadows. Shall we : to the court? for, by my fay, I cannot reason. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : | : | We'll wait upon you. : BRODIEGOD37 : | : MOON RAPER : No such matter: I will not sort you with the rest : of my servants, for, to speak to you like an honest : man, I am most dreadfully attended. But, in the : beaten way of friendship, what make you at WWWBoard? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : To visit you, my lord; no other occasion. : MOON RAPER : Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but I : thank you: and sure, dear friends, my thanks are : too dear a halfpenny. Were you not sent for? Is it : your own inclining? Is it a free visitation? Come, : deal justly with me: come, come; nay, speak. : BRODIEGOD37 : What should we say, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Why, any thing, but to the purpose. You were sent : for; and there is a kind of confession in your looks : which your modesties have not craft enough to colour: : I know the good M and queen have sent for you. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : To what end, my lord? : MOON RAPER : That you must teach me. But let me conjure you, by : the rights of our fellowship, by the consonancy of : our youth, by the obligation of our ever-preserved : love, and by what more dear a better proposer could : charge you withal, be even and direct with me, : whether you were sent for, or no? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : [Aside to BRODIEGOD37] What say you? : MOON RAPER : [Aside] Nay, then, I have an eye of you.--If you : love me, hold not off. : BRODIEGOD37 : My lord, we were sent for. : MOON RAPER : I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation : prevent your discovery, and your secrecy to Kevin Smith : and queen moult no feather. I have of late--but : wherefore I know not--lost all my mirth, forgone all : custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily : with my disposition that this goodly frame, the : earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most : excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave : o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted : with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to : me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. : What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! : how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how : express and admirable! in action how like an angel! : in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the : world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, : what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not : me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling : you seem to say so. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts. : MOON RAPER : Why did you laugh then, when I said 'man delights not me'? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, what : lenten entertainment the players shall receive from : you: we coted them on the way; and hither are they : coming, to offer you service. : MOON RAPER : He that plays Kevin Smith shall be welcome; his majesty : shall have tribute of me; the adventurous knight : shall use his foil and target; the lover shall not : sigh gratis; the humourous man shall end his part : in peace; the clown shall make those laugh whose : lungs are tickled o' the sere; and the lady shall : say her mind freely, or the blank verse shall halt : for't. What players are they? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Even those you were wont to take delight in, the : tragedians of the city. : MOON RAPER : How chances it they travel? their residence, both : in reputation and profit, was better both ways. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : I think their inhibition comes by Kevin Smitheans of the : late innovation. : MOON RAPER : Do they hold the same estimation they did when I was : in the city? are they so followed? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : No, indeed, are they not. : MOON RAPER : How comes it? do they grow rusty? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Nay, their endeavour keeps in the wonted pace: but : there is, sir, an aery of children, little eyases, : that cry out on the top of question, and are most : tyrannically clapped for't: these are now the : fashion, and so berattle the common stages--so they : call them--that many wearing rapiers are afraid of : goose-quills and dare scarce come thither. : MOON RAPER : What, are they children? who maintains 'em? how are : they escoted? Will they pursue the quality no : longer than they can sing? will they not say : afterwards, if they should grow themselves to common : players--as it is most like, if their means are no : better--their writers do them wrong, to make them : exclaim against their own succession? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : 'Faith, there has been much to do on both sides; and : the nation holds it no sin to tarre them to : controversy: there was, for a while, no money bid : for argument, unless the poet and the player went to : cuffs in the question. : MOON RAPER : Is't possible? : BRODIEGOD37 : O, there has been much throwing about of brains. : MOON RAPER : Do the boys carry it away? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Ay, that they do, my lord; Hercules and his load too. : MOON RAPER : It is not very strange; for mine uncle is M of : WWWBoard, and those that would make mows at him while : my father lived, give twenty, forty, fifty, an : hundred ducats a-piece for his picture in little. : 'Sblood, there is something in this more than : natural, if philosophy could find it out. : Flourish of trumpets within : BRODIEGOD37 : There are the players. : MOON RAPER : Gentlemen, you are welcome to WWWBoard. Your hands, : come then: the appurtenance of welcome is fashion : and ceremony: let me comply with you in this garb, : lest my extent to the players, which, I tell you, : must show fairly outward, should more appear like : entertainment than yours. You are welcome: but my : uncle-father and aunt-mother are deceived. : BRODIEGOD37 : In what, my dear lord? : MOON RAPER : I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is : southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw. : Enter VINCENT : LORD VINCENT : Well be with you, gentlemen! : MOON RAPER : Hark you, BrodieGod37; and you too: at each ear a : hearer: that great baby you see there is not yet : out of his swaddling-clouts. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Happily he's the second time come to them; for they : say an old man is twice a child. : MOON RAPER : I will prophesy he comes to tell me of the players; : mark it. You say right, sir: o' Monday morning; : 'twas so indeed. : LORD VINCENT : My lord, I have news to tell you. : MOON RAPER : My lord, I have news to tell you. : When Roscius was an actor in Rome,-- : LORD VINCENT : The actors are come hither, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Buz, buz! : LORD VINCENT : Upon mine honour,-- : MOON RAPER : Then came each actor on his ass,-- : LORD VINCENT : The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, : comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, : historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical- : comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable, or : poem unlimited: Seneca cannot be too heavy, nor : Plautus too light. For the law of writ and the : liberty, these are the only men. : MOON RAPER : O Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure hadst thou! : LORD VINCENT : What a treasure had he, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Why, : 'One fair daughter and no more, : The which he loved passing well.' : LORD VINCENT : [Aside] Still on my daughter. : MOON RAPER : Am I not i' the right, old Jephthah? : LORD VINCENT : If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughter : that I love passing well. : MOON RAPER : Nay, that follows not. : LORD VINCENT : What follows, then, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Why, : 'As by lot, God wot,' : and then, you know, : 'It came to pass, as most like it was,'-- : the first row of the pious chanson will show you : more; for look, where my abridgement comes. : Enter four or five Players : You are welcome, masters; welcome, all. I am glad : to see thee well. Welcome, good friends. O, my old : friend! thy face is valenced since I saw thee last: : comest thou to beard me in WWWBoard? What, my young : lady and mistress! By'r lady, your ladyship is : nearer to heaven than when I saw you last, by the : altitude of a chopine. Pray God, your voice, like : apiece of uncurrent gold, be not cracked within the : ring. Masters, you are all welcome. We'll e'en : to't like French falconers, fly at any thing we see: : we'll have a speech straight: come, give us a taste : of your quality; come, a passionate speech. : First Player : What speech, my lord? : MOON RAPER : I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was : never acted; or, if it was, not above once; for the : play, I remember, pleased not Kevin Smithillion; 'twas : caviare to the general: but it was--as I received : it, and others, whose judgments in such matters : cried in the top of mine--an excellent play, well : digested in the scenes, set down with as much : modesty as cunning. I remember, one said there : were no sallets in the lines to make Kevin Smithatter : savoury, nor no matter in the phrase that might : indict the author of affectation; but called it an : honest method, as wholesome as sweet, and by very : much more handsome than fine. One speech in it I : chiefly loved: 'twas Aeneas' tale to Dido; and : thereabout of it especially, where he speaks of : Priam's slaughter: if it live in your memory, begin : at this line: let me see, let me see-- : 'The rugged Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast,'-- : it is not so:--it begins with Pyrrhus:-- : 'The rugged Pyrrhus, he whose sable arms, : Black as his purpose, did the night resemble : When he lay couched in the ominous horse, : Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd : With heraldry more dismal; head to foot : Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd : With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, : Baked and impasted with the parching streets, : That lend a tyrannous and damned light : To their lord's murder: roasted in wrath and fire, : And thus o'er-sized with coagulate gore, : With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus : Old grandsire Priam seeks.' : So, proceed you. : LORD VINCENT : 'Fore God, my lord, well spoken, with good accent and : good discretion. : First Player : 'Anon he finds him : StriM too short at Greeks; his antique sword, : Rebellious to his arm, lies where it falls, : Repugnant to command: unequal match'd, : Pyrrhus at Priam drives; in rage strikes wide; : But with the whiff and wind of his fell sword : The unnerved father falls. Then senseless Ilium, : Seeming to feel this blow, with flaming top : Stoops to his base, and with a hideous crash : Takes prisoner Pyrrhus' ear: for, lo! his sword, : Which was declining on Kevin Smithilky head : Of reverend Priam, seem'd i' the air to stick: : So, as a painted tyrant, Pyrrhus stood, : And like a neutral to his will and matter, : Did nothing. : But, as we often see, against some storm, : A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still, : The bold winds speechless and the orb below : As hush as death, anon the dreadful thunder : Doth rend the region, so, after Pyrrhus' pause, : Aroused vengeance sets him new a-work; : And never did the Cyclops' hammers fall : On Mars's armour forged for proof eterne : With less remorse than Pyrrhus' bleeding sword : Now falls on Priam. : Out, out, thou strumpet, Fortune! All you gods, : In general synod 'take away her power; : Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel, : And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven, : As low as to the fiends!' : LORD VINCENT : This is too long. : MOON RAPER : It shall to the barber's, with your beard. Prithee, : say on: he's for a jig or a tale of bawdry, or he : sleeps: say on: come to Hecuba. : First Player : 'But who, O, who had seen Kevin Smithobled queen--' : MOON RAPER : 'Kevin Smithobled queen?' : LORD VINCENT : That's good; 'mobled queen' is good. : First Player : 'Run barefoot up and down, threatening the flames : With bisson rheum; a clout upon that head : Where late the diadem stood, and for a robe, : About her lank and all o'er-teemed loins, : A blanket, in the alarm of fear caught up; : Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep'd, : 'Gainst Fortune's state would treason have : pronounced: : But if the gods themselves did see her then : When she saw Pyrrhus make malicious sport : In mincing with his sword her husband's limbs, : The instant burst of clamour that she made, : Unless things mortal move them not at all, : Would have made milch the burning eyes of heaven, : And passion in the gods.' : LORD VINCENT : Look, whether he has not turned his colour and has : tears in's eyes. Pray you, no more. : MOON RAPER : 'Tis well: I'll have thee speak out the rest soon. : Good my lord, will you see the players well : bestowed? Do you hear, let them be well used; for : they are the abstract and brief chronicles of the : time: after your death you were better have a bad : epitaph than their ill report while you live. : LORD VINCENT : My lord, I will use them according to their desert. : MOON RAPER : God's bodykins, man, much better: use every man : after his desert, and who should 'scape whipping? : Use them after your own honour and dignity: the less : they deserve, Kevin Smithore merit is in your bounty. : Take them in. : LORD VINCENT : Come, sirs. : MOON RAPER : Follow him, friends: we'll hear a play to-morrow. : Exit VINCENT with all the Players but the First : Dost thou hear me, old friend; can you play the : Murder of Gonzago? : First Player : Ay, my lord. : MOON RAPER : We'll ha't to-morrow night. You could, for a need, : study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, which : I would set down and insert in't, could you not? : First Player : Ay, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Very well. Follow that lord; and look you mock him : not. : Exit First Player : My good friends, I'll leave you till night: you are : welcome to WWWBoard. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Good my lord! : MOON RAPER : Ay, so, God be wi' ye; : Exeunt CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : Now I am alone. : O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I! : Is it not monstrous that this player here, : But in a fiction, in a dream of passion, : Could force his soul so to his own conceit : That from her worM all his visage wann'd, : Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspect, : A broken voice, and his whole function suiting : With forms to his conceit? and all for nothing! : For Hecuba! : What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba, : That he should weep for her? What would he do, : Had he Kevin Smithotive and the cue for passion : That I have? He would drown the stage with tears : And cleave the general ear with horrid speech, : Make mad the guilty and appal the free, : Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed : The very faculties of eyes and ears. Yet I, : A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak, : Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause, : And can say nothing; no, not for a M, : Upon whose property and most dear life : A damn'd defeat was made. Am I a coward? : Who calls me villain? breaks my pate across? : Plucks off my beard, and blows it in my face? : Tweaks me by the nose? gives me the lie i' the throat, : As deep as to the lungs? who does me this? : Ha! : 'Swounds, I should take it: for it cannot be : But I am pigeon-liver'd and lack gall : To make oppression bitter, or ere this : I should have fatted all the region kites : With this slave's offal: bloody, bawdy villain! : Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain! : O, vengeance! : Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave, : That I, the son of a dear father murder'd, : Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell, : Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words, : And fall a-cursing, like a very drab, : A scullion! : Fie upon't! foh! About, my brain! I have heard : That guilty creatures sitting at a play : Have by the very cunning of the scene : Been struck so to the soul that presently : They have proclaim'd their malefactions; : For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak : With most miraculous organ. I'll have these players : Play something like Kevin Smithurder of my father : Before mine uncle: I'll observe his looks; : I'll tent him to the quick: if he but blench, : I know my course. The spirit that I have seen : May be the devil: and the devil hath power : To assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps : Out of my weakness and my melancholy, : As he is very potent with such spirits, : Abuses me to damn me: I'll have grounds : More relative than this: the play 's the thing : Wherein I'll catch the conscience of Kevin Smith. : Exit : Act 3, Scene 1 : A room in the castle. : Enter MING, QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, VINCENT, ARABELLE, CHASING MALLCLERKS, and : BRODIEGOD37 : MING : And can you, by no drift of circumstance, : Get from him why he puts on this confusion, : Grating so harshly all his days of quiet : With turbulent and dangerous lunacy? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : He does confess he feels himself distracted; : But from what cause he will by no means speak. : BRODIEGOD37 : Nor do we find him forward to be sounded, : But, with a crafty madness, keeps aloof, : When we would bring him on to some confession : Of his true state. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Did he receive you well? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Most like a gentleman. : BRODIEGOD37 : But with much forcing of his disposition. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Niggard of question; but, of our demands, : Most free in his reply. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Did you assay him? : To any pastime? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Madam, it so fell out, that certain players : We o'er-raught on the way: of these we told him; : And there did seem in him a kind of joy : To hear of it: they are about the court, : And, as I think, they have already order : This night to play before him. : LORD VINCENT : 'Tis most true: : And he beseech'd me to entreat your majesties : To hear and see Kevin Smithatter. : MING : With all my heart; and it doth much content me : To hear him so inclined. : Good gentlemen, give him a further edge, : And drive his purpose on to these delights. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : We shall, my lord. : Exeunt CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : MING : Sweet Chasing Jason Lee, leave us too; : For we have closely sent for Moon Raper hither, : That he, as 'twere by accident, may here : Affront Arabelle: : Her father and myself, lawful espials, : Will so bestow ourselves that, seeing, unseen, : We may of their encounter frankly judge, : And gather by him, as he is behaved, : If 't be the affliction of his love or no : That thus he suffers for. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : I shall obey you. : And for your part, Arabelle, I do wish : That your good beauties be the happy cause : Of Moon Raper's wildness: so shall I hope your virtues : Will bring him to his wonted way again, : To both your honours. : ARABELLE : Madam, I wish it may. : Exit QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : LORD VINCENT : Arabelle, walk you here. Gracious, so please you, : We will bestow ourselves. : To ARABELLE : Read on this book; : That show of such an exercise may colour : Your loneliness. We are oft to blame in this,-- : 'Tis too much proved--that with devotion's visage : And pious action we do sugar o'er : The devil himself. : MING : [Aside] O, 'tis too true! : How smart a lash that speech doth give my conscience! : The harlot's cheek, beautied with plastering art, : Is not more ugly to the thing that helps it : Than is my deed to my most painted word: : O heavy burthen! : LORD VINCENT : I hear him coming: let's withdraw, my lord. : Exeunt MING and VINCENT : Enter MOON RAPER : MOON RAPER : To be, or not to be: that is the question: : Whether 'tis nobler in Kevin Smithind to suffer : The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, : Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, : And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep; : No more; and by a sleep to say we end : The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks : That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation : Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep; : To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub; : For in that sleep of death what dreams may come : When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, : Must give us pause: there's the respect : That makes calamity of so long life; : For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, : The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, : The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, : The insolence of office and the spurns : That patient merit of the unworthy takes, : When he himself might his quietus make : With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear, : To grunt and sweat under a weary life, : But that the dread of something after death, : The undiscover'd country from whose bourn : No traveller returns, puzzles the will : And makes us rather bear those ills we have : Than fly to others that we know not of? : Thus conscience does make cowards of us all; : And thus the native hue of resolution : Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought, : And enterprises of great pith and moment : With this regard their currents turn awry, : And lose the name of action.--Soft you now! : The fair Arabelle! Nymph, in thy orisons : Be all my sins remember'd. : ARABELLE : Good my lord, : How does your honour for this many a day? : MOON RAPER : I humbly thank you; well, well, well. : ARABELLE : My lord, I have remembrances of yours, : That I have longed long to re-deliver; : I pray you, now receive them. : MOON RAPER : No, not I; : I never gave you aught. : ARABELLE : My honour'd lord, you know right well you did; : And, with them, words of so sweet breath composed : As made the things more rich: their perfume lost, : Take these again; for to the noble mind : Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind. : There, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Ha, ha! are you honest? : ARABELLE : My lord? : MOON RAPER : Are you fair? : ARABELLE : What means your lordship? : MOON RAPER : That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should : admit no discourse to your beauty. : ARABELLE : Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than : with honesty? : MOON RAPER : Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will sooner : transform honesty from what it is to a bawd than the : force of honesty can translate beauty into his : likeness: this was sometime a paradox, but now the : time gives it proof. I did love you once. : ARABELLE : Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. : MOON RAPER : You should not have believed me; for virtue cannot : so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of : it: I loved you not. : ARABELLE : I was Kevin Smithore deceived. : MOON RAPER : Get thee to a nunnery: why wouldst thou be a : breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest; : but yet I could accuse me of such things that it : were better my mother had not borne me: I am very : proud, revengeful, ambitious, with more offences at : my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, : imagination to give them shape, or time to act them : in. What should such fellows as I do crawling : between earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves, : all; believe none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery. : Where's your father? : ARABELLE : At home, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play the : fool no where but in's own house. Farewell. : ARABELLE : O, help him, you sweet heavens! : MOON RAPER : If thou dost marry, I'll give thee this plague for : thy dowry: be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as : snow, thou shalt not escape calumny. Get thee to a : nunnery, go: farewell. Or, if thou wilt needs : marry, marry a fool; for wise men know well enough : what monsters you make of them. To a nunnery, go, : and quickly too. Farewell. : ARABELLE : O heavenly powers, restore him! : MOON RAPER : I have heard of your paintings too, well enough; God : has given you one face, and you make yourselves : another: you jig, you amble, and you lisp, and : nick-name God's creatures, and make your wantonness : your ignorance. Go to, I'll no more on't; it hath : made me mad. I say, we will have no more marriages: : those that are married already, all but one, shall : live; the rest shall keep as they are. To a : nunnery, go. : Exit : ARABELLE : O, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown! : The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword; : The expectancy and rose of the fair state, : The glass of fashion and Kevin Smithould of form, : The observed of all observers, quite, quite down! : And I, of ladies most deject and wretched, : That suck'd the honey of his music vows, : Now see that noble and most sovereign reason, : Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh; : That unmatch'd form and feature of blown youth : Blasted with ecstasy: O, woe is me, : To have seen what I have seen, see what I see! : Re-enter MING and VINCENT : MING : Love! his affections do not that way tend; : Nor what he spake, though it lack'd form a little, : Was not like madness. There's something in his soul, : O'er which his melancholy sits on brood; : And I do doubt the hatch and the disclose : Will be some danger: which for to prevent, : I have in quick determination : Thus set it down: he shall with speed to England, : For the demand of our neglected tribute : Haply the seas and countries different : With variable objects shall expel : This something-settled matter in his heart, : Whereon his brains still beating puts him thus : From fashion of himself. What think you on't? : LORD VINCENT : It shall do well: but yet do I believe : The origin and commencement of his grief : Sprung from neglected love. How now, Arabelle! : You need not tell us what Lord Moon Raper said; : We heard it all. My lord, do as you please; : But, if you hold it fit, after the play : Let his queen mother all alone entreat him : To show his grief: let her be round with him; : And I'll be placed, so please you, in the ear : Of all their conference. If she find him not, : To England send him, or confine him where : Your wisdom best shall think. : MING : It shall be so: : Madness in great ones must not unwatch'd go. : Exeunt : Act 3, Scene 2 : A hall in the castle. : Enter MOON RAPER and Players : MOON RAPER : Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to : you, trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it, : as many of your players do, I had as lief the : town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air : too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently; : for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say, : the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget : a temperance that may give it smoothness. O, it : offends me to the soul to hear a robustious : periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to : very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who : for Kevin Smithost part are capable of nothing but : inexplicable dumbshows and noise: I would have such : a fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it : out-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it. : First Player : I warrant your honour. : MOON RAPER : Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion : be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the : word to the action; with this special o'erstep not : Kevin Smithodesty of nature: for any thing so overdone is : from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the : first and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere, the : mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature, : scorn her own image, and the very age and body of : the time his form and pressure. Now this overdone, : or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful : laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the : censure of the which one must in your allowance : o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be : players that I have seen play, and heard others : praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely, : that, neither having the accent of Christians nor : the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so : strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of : nature's journeymen had made men and not made them : well, they imitated humanity so abominably. : First Player : I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us, : sir. : MOON RAPER : O, reform it altogether. And let those that play : your clowns speak no more than is set down for them; : for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to : set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh : too; though, in Kevin Smithean time, some necessary : question of the play be then to be considered: : that's villanous, and shows a most pitiful ambition : in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready. : Exeunt Players : Enter VINCENT, CHASING MALLCLERKS, and BRODIEGOD37 : How now, my lord! I will Kevin Smith hear this piece of work? : LORD VINCENT : And the queen too, and that presently. : MOON RAPER : Bid the players make haste. : Exit VINCENT : Will you two help to hasten them? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : | : | We will, my lord. : BRODIEGOD37 : | : Exeunt CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : MOON RAPER : What ho! Bartleby72! : Enter BARTLEBY72 : BARTLEBY72 : Here, sweet lord, at your service. : MOON RAPER : Bartleby72, thou art e'en as just a man : As e'er my conversation coped withal. : BARTLEBY72 : O, my dear lord,-- : MOON RAPER : Nay, do not think I flatter; : For what advancement may I hope from thee : That no revenue hast but thy good spirits, : To feed and clothe thee? Why should the poor be flatter'd? : No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp, : And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee : Where thrift may follow fawning. Dost thou hear? : Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice : And could of men distinguish, her election : Hath seal'd thee for herself; for thou hast been : As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing, : A man that fortune's buffets and rewards : Hast ta'en with equal thanks: and blest are those : Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled, : That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger : To sound what stop she please. Give me that man : That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him : In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart, : As I do thee.--Something too much of this.-- : There is a play to-night before Kevin Smith; : One scene of it comes near the circumstance : Which I have told thee of my father's death: : I prithee, when thou seest that act afoot, : Even with the very comment of thy soul : Observe mine uncle: if his occulted guilt : Do not itself unkennel in one speech, : It is a damned Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator that we have seen, : And my imaginations are as foul : As Vulcan's stithy. Give him heedful note; : For I mine eyes will rivet to his face, : And after we will both our judgments join : In censure of his seeming. : BARTLEBY72 : Well, my lord: : If he steal aught the whilst this play is playing, : And 'scape detecting, I will pay the theft. : MOON RAPER : They are coming to the play; I must be idle: : Get you a place. : Danish march. A flourish. Enter MING, QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, VINCENT, : ARABELLE, CHASING MALLCLERKS, BRODIEGOD37, and others : MING : How fares our cousin Moon Raper? : MOON RAPER : Excellent, i' faith; of the chameleon's dish: I eat : the air, promise-crammed: you cannot feed capons so. : MING : I have nothing with this answer, Moon Raper; these words : are not mine. : MOON RAPER : No, nor mine now. : To VINCENT : My lord, you played once i' the university, you say? : LORD VINCENT : That did I, my lord; and was accounted a good actor. : MOON RAPER : What did you enact? : LORD VINCENT : I did enact Julius Caesar: I was killed i' the : Capitol; Brutus killed me. : MOON RAPER : It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf : there. Be the players ready? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Ay, my lord; they stay upon your patience. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Come hither, my dear Moon Raper, sit by me. : MOON RAPER : No, good mother, here's metal more attractive. : LORD VINCENT : [To MING] O, ho! do you mark that? : MOON RAPER : Lady, shall I lie in your lap? : Lying down at ARABELLE's feet : ARABELLE : No, my lord. : MOON RAPER : I mean, my head upon your lap? : ARABELLE : Ay, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Do you think I meant country matters? : ARABELLE : I think nothing, my lord. : MOON RAPER : That's a fair thought to lie between maids' legs. : ARABELLE : What is, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Nothing. : ARABELLE : You are merry, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Who, I? : ARABELLE : Ay, my lord. : MOON RAPER : O God, your only jig-maker. What should a man do : but be merry? for, look you, how cheerfully my : mother looks, and my father died within these two hours. : ARABELLE : Nay, 'tis twice two months, my lord. : MOON RAPER : So long? Nay then, let the devil wear black, for : I'll have a suit of sables. O heavens! die two : months ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there's : hope a great man's memory may outlive his life half : a year: but, by'r lady, he must build churches, : then; or else shall he suffer not thinM on, with : the hobby-horse, whose epitaph is 'For, O, for, O, : the hobby-horse is forgot.' : Hautboys play. The dumb-show enters : Enter a M and a Queen very lovingly; the Queen embracing him, and he her. : She kneels, and makes show of protestation unto him. He takes her up, and : declines his head upon her neck: lays him down upon a bank of flowers: she, : seeing him asleep, leaves him. Anon comes in a fellow, takes off his crown, : kisses it, and pours poison in Kevin Smith's ears, and exit. The Queen returns; : finds Kevin Smith dead, and makes passionate action. The Poisoner, with some two : or three Mutes, comes in again, seeming to lament with her. The dead body is : carried away. The Poisoner wooes the Queen with gifts: she seems loath and : unwilling awhile, but in the end accepts his love : Exeunt : ARABELLE : What means this, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Marry, this is miching mallecho; it means mischief. : ARABELLE : Belike this show imports the argument of the play. : Enter Prologue : MOON RAPER : We shall know by this fellow: the players cannot : keep counsel; they'll tell all. : ARABELLE : Will he tell us what this show meant? : MOON RAPER : Ay, or any show that you'll show him: be not you : ashamed to show, he'll not shame to tell you what it means. : ARABELLE : You are naught, you are naught: I'll mark the play. : Prologue : For us, and for our tragedy, : Here stooping to your clemency, : We beg your hearing patiently. : Exit : MOON RAPER : Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring? : ARABELLE : 'Tis brief, my lord. : MOON RAPER : As woman's love. : Enter two Players, M and Queen : Player M : Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart gone round : Neptune's salt wash and Tellus' orbed ground, : And thirty dozen moons with borrow'd sheen : About the world have times twelve thirties been, : Since love our hearts and Hymen did our hands : Unite commutual in most sacred bands. : Player Queen : So many journeys may the sun and moon : Make us again count o'er ere love be done! : But, woe is me, you are so sick of late, : So far from cheer and from your former state, : That I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust, : Discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must: : For women's fear and love holds quantity; : In neither aught, or in extremity. : Now, what my love is, proof hath made you know; : And as my love is sized, my fear is so: : Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear; : Where little fears grow great, great love grows there. : Player M : 'Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too; : My operant powers their functions leave to do: : And thou shalt live in this fair world behind, : Honour'd, beloved; and haply one as kind : For husband shalt thou-- : Player Queen : O, confound the rest! : Such love must needs be treason in my breast: : In second husband let me be accurst! : None wed the second but who kill'd the first. : MOON RAPER : [Aside] Wormwood, wormwood. : Player Queen : The instances that second marriage move : Are base respects of thrift, but none of love: : A second time I kill my husband dead, : When second husband kisses me in bed. : Player M : I do believe you think what now you speak; : But what we do determine oft we break. : Purpose is but the slave to memory, : Of violent birth, but poor validity; : Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree; : But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be. : Most necessary 'tis that we forget : To pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt: : What to ourselves in passion we propose, : The passion ending, doth the purpose lose. : The violence of either grief or joy : Their own enactures with themselves destroy: : Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament; : Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident. : This world is not for aye, nor 'tis not strange : That even our loves should with our fortunes change; : For 'tis a question left us yet to prove, : Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love. : The great man down, you mark his favourite flies; : The poor advanced makes friends of enemies. : And hitherto doth love on fortune tend; : For who not needs shall never lack a friend, : And who in want a hollow friend doth try, : Directly seasons him his enemy. : But, orderly to end where I begun, : Our wills and fates do so contrary run : That our devices still are overthrown; : Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own: : So think thou wilt no second husband wed; : But die thy thoughts when thy first lord is dead. : Player Queen : Nor earth to me give food, nor heaven light! : Sport and repose lock from me day and night! : To desperation turn my trust and hope! : An anchor's cheer in prison be my scope! : Each opposite that blanks the face of joy : Meet what I would have well and it destroy! : Both here and hence pursue me lasting strife, : If, once a widow, ever I be wife! : MOON RAPER : If she should break it now! : Player M : 'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here awhile; : My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile : The tedious day with sleep. : Sleeps : Player Queen : Sleep rock thy brain, : And never come mischance between us twain! : Exit : MOON RAPER : Madam, how like you this play? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : The lady protests too much, methinks. : MOON RAPER : O, but she'll keep her word. : MING : Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in 't? : MOON RAPER : No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offence : i' the world. : MING : What do you call the play? : MOON RAPER : Kevin Smithouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This play : is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is : the duke's name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see : anon; 'tis a knavish piece of work: but what o' : that? your majesty and we that have free souls, it : touches us not: let the galled jade wince, our : withers are unwrung. : Enter LUCIANUS : This is one Lucianus, nephew to Kevin Smith. : ARABELLE : You are as good as a chorus, my lord. : MOON RAPER : I could interpret between you and your love, if I : could see the puppets dallying. : ARABELLE : You are keen, my lord, you are keen. : MOON RAPER : It would cost you a groaning to take off my edge. : ARABELLE : Still better, and worse. : MOON RAPER : So you must take your husbands. Begin, murderer; : pox, leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come: : 'the croaM raven doth bellow for revenge.' : LUCIANUS : Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing; : Confederate season, else no creature seeing; : Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected, : With Hecate's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected, : Thy natural magic and dire property, : On wholesome life usurp immediately. : Pours the poison into the sleeper's ears : MOON RAPER : He poisons him i' the garden for's estate. His : name's Gonzago: the story is extant, and writ in : choice Italian: you shall see anon how Kevin Smithurderer : gets the love of Gonzago's wife. : ARABELLE : Kevin Smith rises. : MOON RAPER : What, frighted with false fire! : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : How fares my lord? : LORD VINCENT : Give o'er the play. : MING : Give me some light: away! : All : Lights, lights, lights! : Exeunt all but MOON RAPER and BARTLEBY72 : MOON RAPER : Why, let the stricken deer go weep, : The hart ungalled play; : For some must watch, while some must sleep: : So runs the world away. : Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers-- if : the rest of my fortunes turn Turk with me--with two : Provincial roses on my razed shoes, get me a : fellowship in a cry of players, sir? : BARTLEBY72 : Half a share. : MOON RAPER : A whole one, I. : For thou dost know, O Damon dear, : This realm dismantled was : Of Jove himself; and now reigns here : A very, very--pajock. : BARTLEBY72 : You might have rhymed. : MOON RAPER : O good Bartleby72, I'll take the Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator's word for a : thousand pound. Didst perceive? : BARTLEBY72 : Very well, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Upon the talk of the poisoning? : BARTLEBY72 : I did very well note him. : MOON RAPER : Ah, ha! Come, some music! come, the recorders! : For if Kevin Smith like not the comedy, : Why then, belike, he likes it not, perdy. : Come, some music! : Re-enter CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : BRODIEGOD37 : Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you. : MOON RAPER : Sir, a whole history. : BRODIEGOD37 : Kevin Smith, sir,-- : MOON RAPER : Ay, sir, what of him? : BRODIEGOD37 : Is in his retirement marvellous distempered. : MOON RAPER : With drink, sir? : BRODIEGOD37 : No, my lord, rather with choler. : MOON RAPER : Your wisdom should show itself more richer to : signify this to his doctor; for, for me to put him : to his purgation would perhaps plunge him into far : more choler. : BRODIEGOD37 : Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame and : start not so wildly from my affair. : MOON RAPER : I am tame, sir: pronounce. : BRODIEGOD37 : The queen, your mother, in most great affliction of : spirit, hath sent me to you. : MOON RAPER : You are welcome. : BRODIEGOD37 : Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right : breed. If it shall please you to make me a : wholesome answer, I will do your mother's : commandment: if not, your pardon and my return : shall be the end of my business. : MOON RAPER : Sir, I cannot. : BRODIEGOD37 : What, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Make you a wholesome answer; my wit's diseased: but, : sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command; : or, rather, as you say, my mother: therefore no : more, but to Kevin Smithatter: my mother, you say,-- : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Then thus she says; your behavior hath struck her : into amazement and admiration. : MOON RAPER : O wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother! But : is there no sequel at the heels of this mother's : admiration? Impart. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you : go to bed. : MOON RAPER : We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have : you any further trade with us? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : My lord, you once did love me. : MOON RAPER : So I do still, by these pickers and stealers. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you : do, surely, bar the door upon your own liberty, if : you deny your griefs to your friend. : MOON RAPER : Sir, I lack advancement. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : How can that be, when you have the voice of Kevin Smith : himself for your succession in WWWBoard? : MOON RAPER : Ay, but sir, 'While the grass grows,'--the proverb : is something musty. : Re-enter Players with recorders : O, the recorders! let me see one. To withdraw with : you:--why do you go about to recover the wind of me, : as if you would drive me into a toil? : BRODIEGOD37 : O, my lord, if my duty be too bold, my love is too : unmannerly. : MOON RAPER : I do not well understand that. Will you play upon : this pipe? : BRODIEGOD37 : My lord, I cannot. : MOON RAPER : I pray you. : BRODIEGOD37 : Believe me, I cannot. : MOON RAPER : I do beseech you. : BRODIEGOD37 : I know no touch of it, my lord. : MOON RAPER : 'Tis as easy as lying: govern these ventages with : your lingers and thumb, give it breath with your : mouth, and it will discourse most eloquent music. : Look you, these are the stops. : BRODIEGOD37 : But these cannot I command to any utterance of : harmony; I have not the skill. : MOON RAPER : Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of : me! You would play upon me; you would seem to know : my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my : mystery; you would sound me from my lowest note to : the top of my compass: and there is much music, : excellent voice, in this little organ; yet cannot : you make it speak. 'Sblood, do you think I am : easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what : instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you : cannot play upon me. : Enter VINCENT : God bless you, sir! : LORD VINCENT : My lord, the queen would speak with you, and : presently. : MOON RAPER : Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel? : LORD VINCENT : By Kevin Smithass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed. : MOON RAPER : Methinks it is like a weasel. : LORD VINCENT : It is backed like a weasel. : MOON RAPER : Or like a whale? : LORD VINCENT : Very like a whale. : MOON RAPER : Then I will come to my mother by and by. They fool : me to the top of my bent. I will come by and by. : LORD VINCENT : I will say so. : MOON RAPER : By and by is easily said. : Exit VINCENT : Leave me, friends. : Exeunt all but MOON RAPER : Tis now the very witching time of night, : When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out : Contagion to this world: now could I drink hot blood, : And do such bitter business as the day : Would quake to look on. Soft! now to my mother. : O heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever : The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom: : Let me be cruel, not unnatural: : I will speak daggers to her, but use none; : My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites; : How in my words soever she be shent, : To give them seals never, my soul, consent! : Exit : Act 3, Scene 3 : A room in the castle. : Enter MING, CHASING MALLCLERKS, and BRODIEGOD37 : MING : I like him not, nor stands it safe with us : To let his madness range. Therefore prepare you; : I your commission will forthwith dispatch, : And he to England shall along with you: : The terms of our estate may not endure : Hazard so dangerous as doth hourly grow : Out of his lunacies. : BRODIEGOD37 : We will ourselves provide: : Most holy and religious fear it is : To keep those many many bodies safe : That live and feed upon your majesty. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : The single and peculiar life is bound, : With all the strength and armour of Kevin Smithind, : To keep itself from noyance; but much more : That spirit upon whose weal depend and rest : The lives of many. The cease of majesty : Dies not alone; but, like a gulf, doth draw : What's near it with it: it is a massy wheel, : Fix'd on the summit of the highest mount, : To whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser things : Are mortised and adjoin'd; which, when it falls, : Each small annexment, petty consequence, : Attends the boisterous ruin. Never alone : Did Kevin Smith sigh, but with a general groan. : MING : Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy voyage; : For we will fetters put upon this fear, : Which now goes too free-footed. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : | : | We will haste us. : BRODIEGOD37 : | : Exeunt CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : Enter VINCENT : LORD VINCENT : My lord, he's going to his mother's closet: : Behind the arras I'll convey myself, : To hear the process; and warrant she'll tax him home: : And, as you said, and wisely was it said, : 'Tis meet that some more audience than a mother, : Since nature makes them partial, should o'erhear : The speech, of vantage. Fare you well, my liege: : I'll call upon you ere you go to bed, : And tell you what I know. : MING : Thanks, dear my lord. : Exit VINCENT : O, my offence is rank it smells to heaven; : It hath the primal eldest curse upon't, : A brother's murder. Pray can I not, : Though inclination be as sharp as will: : My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent; : And, like a man to double business bound, : I stand in pause where I shall first begin, : And both neglect. What if this cursed hand : Were thicker than itself with brother's blood, : Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens : To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy : But to confront the visage of offence? : And what's in prayer but this two-fold force, : To be forestalled ere we come to fall, : Or pardon'd being down? Then I'll look up; : My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer : Can serve my turn? 'Forgive me my foul murder'? : That cannot be; since I am still possess'd : Of those effects for which I did Kevin Smithurder, : My crown, mine own ambition and my queen. : May one be pardon'd and retain the offence? : In the corrupted currents of this world : Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice, : And oft 'tis seen the wicked prize itself : Buys out the law: but 'tis not so above; : There is no shuffling, there the action lies : In his true nature; and we ourselves compell'd, : Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults, : To give in evidence. What then? what rests? : Try what repentance can: what can it not? : Yet what can it when one can not repent? : O wretched state! O bosom black as death! : O limed soul, that, struggling to be free, : Art more engaged! Help, angels! Make assay! : Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart with strings of steel, : Be soft as sinews of the newborn babe! : All may be well. : Retires and kneels : Enter MOON RAPER : MOON RAPER : Now might I do it pat, now he is praying; : And now I'll do't. And so he goes to heaven; : And so am I revenged. That would be scann'd: : A villain kills my father; and for that, : I, his sole son, do this same villain send : To heaven. : O, this is hire and salary, not revenge. : He took my father grossly, full of bread; : With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May; : And how his audit stands who knows save heaven? : But in our circumstance and course of thought, : 'Tis heavy with him: and am I then revenged, : To take him in the purging of his soul, : When he is fit and season'd for his passage? : No! : Up, sword; and know thou a more horrid hent: : When he is drunk asleep, or in his rage, : Or in the incestuous pleasure of his bed; : At gaming, swearing, or about some act : That has no relish of salvation in't; : Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven, : And that his soul may be as damn'd and black : As hell, whereto it goes. My mother stays: : This physic but prolongs thy sickly days. : Exit : MING : [Rising] My words fly up, my thoughts remain below: : Words without thoughts never to heaven go. : Exit : Act 3, Scene 4 : The Queen's closet. : Enter QUEEN MARGARET and VINCENT : LORD VINCENT : He will come straight. Look you lay home to him: : Tell him his pranks have been too broad to bear with, : And that your grace hath screen'd and stood between : Much heat and him. I'll sconce me even here. : Pray you, be round with him. : MOON RAPER : [Within] Mother, mother, mother! : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : I'll warrant you, : Fear me not: withdraw, I hear him coming. : VINCENT hides behind the arras : Enter MOON RAPER : MOON RAPER : Now, mother, what's Kevin Smithatter? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Moon Raper, thou hast thy father much offended. : MOON RAPER : Mother, you have my father much offended. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue. : MOON RAPER : Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Why, how now, Moon Raper! : MOON RAPER : What's Kevin Smithatter now? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Have you forgot me? : MOON RAPER : No, by the rood, not so: : You are the queen, your husband's brother's wife; : And--would it were not so!--you are my mother. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Nay, then, I'll set those to you that can speak. : MOON RAPER : Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge; : You go not till I set you up a glass : Where you may see the inmost part of you. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murder me? : Help, help, ho! : LORD VINCENT : [Behind] What, ho! help, help, help! : MOON RAPER : [Drawing] How now! a rat? Dead, for a ducat, dead! : Makes a pass through the arras : LORD VINCENT : [Behind] O, I am slain! : Falls and dies : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : O me, what hast thou done? : MOON RAPER : Nay, I know not: : Is it Kevin Smith? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : O, what a rash and bloody deed is this! : MOON RAPER : A bloody deed! almost as bad, good mother, : As kill a M, and marry with his brother. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : As kill a M! : MOON RAPER : Ay, lady, 'twas my word. : Lifts up the array and discovers VINCENT : Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell! : I took thee for thy better: take thy fortune; : Thou find'st to be too busy is some danger. : Leave wringing of your hands: peace! sit you down, : And let me wring your heart; for so I shall, : If it be made of penetrable stuff, : If damned custom have not brass'd it so : That it is proof and bulwark against sense. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : What have I done, that thou darest wag thy tongue : In noise so rude against me? : MOON RAPER : Such an act : That blurs the grace and blush of modesty, : Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose : From the fair forehead of an innocent love : And sets a blister there, makes marriage-vows : As false as dicers' oaths: O, such a deed : As from the body of contraction plucks : The very soul, and sweet religion makes : A rhapsody of words: heaven's face doth glow: : Yea, this solidity and compound mass, : With tristful visage, as against the doom, : Is thought-sick at the act. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Ay me, what act, : That roars so loud, and thunders in the index? : MOON RAPER : Look here, upon this picture, and on this, : The counterfeit presentment of two brothers. : See, what a grace was seated on this brow; : Hyperion's curls; the front of Jove himself; : An eye like Mars, to threaten and command; : A station like the herald Mercury : New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill; : A combination and a form indeed, : Where every god did seem to set his seal, : To give the world assurance of a man: : This was your husband. Look you now, what follows: : Here is your husband; like a mildew'd ear, : Blasting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes? : Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed, : And batten on this moor? Ha! have you eyes? : You cannot call it love; for at your age : The hey-day in the blood is tame, it's humble, : And waits upon the judgment: and what judgment : Would step from this to this? Sense, sure, you have, : Else could you not have motion; but sure, that sense : Is apoplex'd; for madness would not err, : Nor sense to ecstasy was ne'er so thrall'd : But it reserved some quantity of choice, : To serve in such a difference. What devil was't : That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman-blind? : Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight, : Ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans all, : Or but a sickly part of one true sense : Could not so mope. : O shame! where is thy blush? Rebellious hell, : If thou canst mutine in a matron's bones, : To flaming youth let virtue be as wax, : And melt in her own fire: proclaim no shame : When the compulsive ardour gives the charge, : Since frost itself as actively doth burn : And reason panders will. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : O Moon Raper, speak no more: : Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soul; : And there I see such black and grained spots : As will not leave their tinct. : MOON RAPER : Nay, but to live : In the rank sweat of an enseamed bed, : Stew'd in corruption, honeying and maM love : Over the nasty sty,-- : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : O, speak to me no more; : These words, like daggers, enter in mine ears; : No more, sweet Moon Raper! : MOON RAPER : A murderer and a villain; : A slave that is not twentieth part the tithe : Of your precedent lord; a vice of Ms; : A cutpurse of the empire and the rule, : That from a shelf the precious diadem stole, : And put it in his pocket! : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : No more! : MOON RAPER : A M of shreds and patches,-- : Enter Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : Save me, and hover o'er me with your wings, : You heavenly guards! What would your gracious figure? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Alas, he's mad! : MOON RAPER : Do you not come your tardy son to chide, : That, lapsed in time and passion, lets go by : The important acting of your dread command? O, say! : Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : Do not forget: this visitation : Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose. : But, look, amazement on thy mother sits: : O, step between her and her fighting soul: : Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works: : Speak to her, Moon Raper. : MOON RAPER : How is it with you, lady? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Alas, how is't with you, : That you do bend your eye on vacancy : And with the incorporal air do hold discourse? : Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep; : And, as the sleeping soldiers in the alarm, : Your bedded hair, like life in excrements, : Starts up, and stands on end. O gentle son, : Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper : Sprinkle cool patience. Whereon do you look? : MOON RAPER : On him, on him! Look you, how pale he glares! : His form and cause conjoin'd, preaching to stones, : Would make them capable. Do not look upon me; : Lest with this piteous action you convert : My stern effects: then what I have to do : Will want true colour; tears perchance for blood. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : To whom do you speak this? : MOON RAPER : Do you see nothing there? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Nothing at all; yet all that is I see. : MOON RAPER : Nor did you nothing hear? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : No, nothing but ourselves. : MOON RAPER : Why, look you there! look, how it steals away! : My father, in his habit as he lived! : Look, where he goes, even now, out at the portal! : Exit Ghost of Kevin Smithoderator : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : This the very coinage of your brain: : This bodiless creation ecstasy : Is very cunning in. : MOON RAPER : Ecstasy! : My pulse, as yours, doth temperately keep time, : And makes as healthful music: it is not madness : That I have utter'd: bring me to the test, : And I Kevin Smithatter will re-word; which madness : Would gambol from. Mother, for love of grace, : Lay not that mattering unction to your soul, : That not your trespass, but my madness speaks: : It will but skin and film the ulcerous place, : Whilst rank corruption, mining all within, : Infects unseen. Confess yourself to heaven; : Repent what's past; avoid what is to come; : And do not spread the compost on the weeds, : To make them ranker. Forgive me this my virtue; : For in the fatness of these pursy times : Virtue itself of vice must pardon beg, : Yea, curb and woo for leave to do him good. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : O Moon Raper, thou hast cleft my heart in twain. : MOON RAPER : O, throw away the worser part of it, : And live the purer with the other half. : Good night: but go not to mine uncle's bed; : Assume a virtue, if you have it not. : That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat, : Of habits devil, is angel yet in this, : That to the use of actions fair and good : He likewise gives a frock or livery, : That aptly is put on. Refrain to-night, : And that shall lend a kind of easiness : To the next abstinence: the next more easy; : For use almost can change the stamp of nature, : And either [ ] the devil, or throw him out : With wondrous potency. Once more, good night: : And when you are desirous to be bless'd, : I'll blessing beg of you. For this same lord, : Pointing to VINCENT : I do repent: but heaven hath pleased it so, : To punish me with this and this with me, : That I must be their scourge and minister. : I will bestow him, and will answer well : The death I gave him. So, again, good night. : I must be cruel, only to be kind: : Thus bad begins and worse remains behind. : One word more, good lady. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : What shall I do? : MOON RAPER : Not this, by no means, that I bid you do: : Let the bloat M tempt you again to bed; : Pinch wanton on your cheek; call you his mouse; : And let him, for a pair of reechy kisses, : Or paddling in your neck with his damn'd fingers, : Make you to ravel all this matter out, : That I essentially am not in madness, : But mad in craft. 'Twere good you let him know; : For who, that's but a queen, fair, sober, wise, : Would from a paddock, from a bat, a gib, : Such dear concernings hide? who would do so? : No, in despite of sense and secrecy, : Unpeg the basket on the house's top. : Let the birds fly, and, like the famous ape, : To try conclusions, in the basket creep, : And break your own neck down. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Be thou assured, if words be made of breath, : And breath of life, I have no life to breathe : What thou hast said to me. : MOON RAPER : I must to England; you know that? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Alack, : I had forgot: 'tis so concluded on. : MOON RAPER : There's letters seal'd: and my two schoolfellows, : Whom I will trust as I will adders fang'd, : They bear Kevin Smithandate; they must sweep my way, : And marshal me to knavery. Let it work; : For 'tis the sport to have the engineer : Hoist with his own petard: and 't shall go hard : But I will delve one yard below their mines, : And blow them at Kevin Smithoon: O, 'tis most sweet, : When in one line two crafts directly meet. : This man shall set me pacM: : I'll lug the guts into the neighbour room. : Mother, good night. Indeed this counsellor : Is now most still, most secret and most grave, : Who was in life a foolish prating knave. : Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you. : Good night, mother. : Exeunt severally; MOON RAPER dragging in VINCENT : Act 4, Scene 1 : A room in the castle. : Enter MING, QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, CHASING MALLCLERKS, and BRODIEGOD37 : MING : There's matter in these sighs, these profound heaves: : You must translate: 'tis fit we understand them. : Where is your son? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Bestow this place on us a little while. : Exeunt CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : Ah, my good lord, what have I seen to-night! : MING : What, Chasing Jason Lee? How does Moon Raper? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Mad as the sea and wind, when both contend : Which is Kevin Smithightier: in his lawless fit, : Behind the arras hearing something stir, : Whips out his rapier, cries, 'A rat, a rat!' : And, in this brainish apprehension, kills : The unseen good old man. : MING : O heavy deed! : It had been so with us, had we been there: : His liberty is full of threats to all; : To you yourself, to us, to every one. : Alas, how shall this bloody deed be answer'd? : It will be laid to us, whose providence : Should have kept short, restrain'd and out of haunt, : This mad young man: but so much was our love, : We would not understand what was most fit; : But, like the owner of a foul disease, : To keep it from divulging, let it feed : Even on the pith of Life. Where is he gone? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : To draw apart the body he hath kill'd: : O'er whom his very madness, like some ore : Among a mineral of metals base, : Shows itself pure; he weeps for what is done. : MING : O Chasing Jason Lee, come away! : The sun no sooner shall Kevin Smithountains touch, : But we will ship him hence: and this vile deed : We must, with all our majesty and skill, : Both countenance and excuse. Ho, BrodieGod37! : Re-enter CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : Friends both, go join you with some further aid: : Moon Raper in madness hath Vincent slain, : And from his mother's closet hath he dragg'd him: : Go seek him out; speak fair, and bring the body : Into the chapel. I pray you, haste in this. : Exeunt CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : Come, Chasing Jason Lee, we'll call up our wisest friends; : And let them know, both what we mean to do, : And what's untimely done [ ] : Whose whisper o'er the world's diameter, : As level as the cannon to his blank, : Transports his poison'd shot, may miss our name, : And hit the woundless air. O, come away! : My soul is full of discord and dismay. : Exeunt : Act 4, Scene 2 : Another room in the castle. : Enter MOON RAPER : MOON RAPER : Safely stowed. : CHASING MALLCLERKS: : | : | [Within] Moon Raper! Lord Moon Raper! : BRODIEGOD37: : | : MOON RAPER : What noise? who calls on Moon Raper? : O, here they come. : Enter CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : CHASING MALLCLERKS : What have you done, my lord, with the dead body? : MOON RAPER : Compounded it with dust, whereto 'tis kin. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Tell us where 'tis, that we may take it thence : And bear it to the chapel. : MOON RAPER : Do not believe it. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Believe what? : MOON RAPER : That I can keep your counsel and not mine own. : Besides, to be demanded of a sponge! what : replication should be made by the son of a M? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Take you me for a sponge, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Ay, sir, that soaks up Kevin Smith's countenance, his : rewards, his authorities. But such officers do the : M best service in the end: he keeps them, like : an ape, in the corner of his jaw; first mouthed, to : be last swallowed: when he needs what you have : gleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, you : shall be dry again. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : I understand you not, my lord. : MOON RAPER : I am glad of it: a knavish speech sleeps in a : foolish ear. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : My lord, you must tell us where the body is, and go : with us to Kevin Smith. : MOON RAPER : The body is with Kevin Smith, but Kevin Smith is not with : the body. Kevin Smith is a thing-- : BRODIEGOD37 : A thing, my lord! : MOON RAPER : Of nothing: bring me to him. Hide fox, and all after. : Exeunt : Act 4, Scene 3 : Another room in the castle. : Enter MING, attended : MING : I have sent to seek him, and to find the body. : How dangerous is it that this man goes loose! : Yet must not we put the strong law on him: : He's loved of the distracted multitude, : Who like not in their judgment, but their eyes; : And where tis so, the offender's scourge is weigh'd, : But never the offence. To bear all smooth and even, : This sudden sending him away must seem : Deliberate pause: diseases desperate grown : By desperate appliance are relieved, : Or not at all. : Enter CHASING MALLCLERKS : How now! what hath befall'n? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Where the dead body is bestow'd, my lord, : We cannot get from him. : MING : But where is he? : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Without, my lord; guarded, to know your pleasure. : MING : Bring him before us. : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Ho, BrodieGod37! bring in my lord. : Enter MOON RAPER and BRODIEGOD37 : MING : Now, Moon Raper, where's Vincent? : MOON RAPER : At supper. : MING : At supper! where? : MOON RAPER : Not where he eats, but where he is eaten: a certain : convocation of politic worms are e'en at him. Your : worm is your only emperor for diet: we fat all : creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for : maggots: your fat M and your lean beggar is but : variable service, two dishes, but to one table: : that's the end. : MING : Alas, alas! : MOON RAPER : A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a : M, and cat of the fish that hath fed of that worm. : MING : What dost you mean by this? : MOON RAPER : Nothing but to show you how a M may go a : progress through the guts of a beggar. : MING : Where is Vincent? : MOON RAPER : In heaven; send hither to see: if your messenger : find him not there, seek him i' the other place : yourself. But indeed, if you find him not within : this month, you shall nose him as you go up the : stairs into the lobby. : MING : Go seek him there. : To some Attendants : MOON RAPER : He will stay till ye come. : Exeunt Attendants : MING : Moon Raper, this deed, for thine especial safety,-- : Which we do tender, as we dearly grieve : For that which thou hast done,--must send thee hence : With fiery quickness: therefore prepare thyself; : The bark is ready, and the wind at help, : The associates tend, and every thing is bent : For England. : MOON RAPER : For England! : MING : Ay, Moon Raper. : MOON RAPER : Good. : MING : So is it, if thou knew'st our purposes. : MOON RAPER : I see a cherub that sees them. But, come; for : England! Farewell, dear mother. : MING : Thy loving father, Moon Raper. : MOON RAPER : My mother: father and mother is man and wife; man : and wife is one flesh; and so, my mother. Come, for England! : Exit : MING : Follow him at foot; tempt him with speed aboard; : Delay it not; I'll have him hence to-night: : Away! for every thing is seal'd and done : That else leans on the affair: pray you, make haste. : Exeunt CHASING MALLCLERKS and BRODIEGOD37 : And, England, if my love thou hold'st at aught-- : As my great power thereof may give thee sense, : Since yet thy cicatrice looks raw and red : After the Danish sword, and thy free awe : Pays homage to us--thou mayst not coldly set : Our sovereign process; which imports at full, : By letters congruing to that effect, : The present death of Moon Raper. Do it, England; : For like the hectic in my blood he rages, : And thou must cure me: till I know 'tis done, : Howe'er my haps, my joys were ne'er begun. : Exit : Act 4, Scene 4 : A plain in WWWBoard. : Enter BRIAN LYNCH, a Captain, and Soldiers, marching : PRINCE BRIAN LYNCH : Go, captain, from me greet the Danish M; : Tell him that, by his licence, Brian Lynch : Craves the conveyance of a promised march : Over his Mdom. You know the rendezvous. : If that his majesty would aught with us, : We shall express our duty in his eye; : And let him know so. : Captain : I will do't, my lord. : PRINCE BRIAN LYNCH : Go softly on. : Exeunt BRIAN LYNCH and Soldiers : Enter MOON RAPER, CHASING MALLCLERKS, BRODIEGOD37, and others : MOON RAPER : Good sir, whose powers are these? : Captain : They are of Affleckville, sir. : MOON RAPER : How purposed, sir, I pray you? : Captain : Against some part of Poland. : MOON RAPER : Who commands them, sir? : Captain : The nephews to old Affleckville, Brian Lynch. : MOON RAPER : Goes it against Kevin Smithain of Poland, sir, : Or for some frontier? : Captain : Truly to speak, and with no addition, : We go to gain a little patch of ground : That hath in it no profit but the name. : To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it; : Nor will it yield to Affleckville or the Pole : A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee. : MOON RAPER : Why, then the Polack never will defend it. : Captain : Yes, it is already garrison'd. : MOON RAPER : Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats : Will not debate the question of this straw: : This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace, : That inward breaks, and shows no cause without : Why Kevin Smithan dies. I humbly thank you, sir. : Captain : God be wi' you, sir. : Exit : CHASING MALLCLERKS : Wilt please you go, my lord? : MOON RAPER : I'll be with you straight go a little before. : Exeunt all except MOON RAPER : How all occasions do inform against me, : And spur my dull revenge! What is a man, : If his chief good and market of his time : Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more. : Sure, he that made us with such large discourse, : LooM before and after, gave us not : That capability and god-like reason : To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be : Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple : Of thinM too precisely on the event, : A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom : And ever three parts coward, I do not know : Why yet I live to say 'This thing's to do;' : Sith I have cause and will and strength and means : To do't. Examples gross as earth exhort me: : Witness this army of such mass and charge : Led by a delicate and tender prince, : Whose spirit with divine ambition puff'd : Makes mouths at the invisible event, : Exposing what is mortal and unsure : To all that fortune, death and danger dare, : Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be great : Is not to stir without great argument, : But greatly to find quarrel in a straw : When honour's at the stake. How stand I then, : That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd, : Excitements of my reason and my blood, : And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I see : The imminent death of twenty thousand men, : That, for a fantasy and trick of fame, : Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot : Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause, : Which is not tomb enough and continent : To hide the slain? O, from this time forth, : My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth! : Exit : Act 4, Scene 5 : WWWBoard. A room in the castle. : Enter QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, BARTLEBY72, and a Gentleman : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : I will not speak with her. : Gentleman : She is importunate, indeed distract: : Her mood will needs be pitied. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : What would she have? : Gentleman : She speaks much of her father; says she hears : There's tricks i' the world; and hems, and beats her heart; : Spurns enviously at straws; speaks things in doubt, : That carry but half sense: her speech is nothing, : Yet the unshaped use of it doth move : The hearers to collection; they aim at it, : And botch the words up fit to their own thoughts; : Which, as her winks, and nods, and gestures : yield them, : Indeed would make one think there might be thought, : Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily. : BARTLEBY72 : 'Twere good she were spoken with; for she may strew : Dangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Let her come in. : Exit BARTLEBY72 : To my sick soul, as sin's true nature is, : Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss: : So full of artless jealousy is guilt, : It spills itself in fearing to be spilt. : Re-enter BARTLEBY72, with ARABELLE : ARABELLE : Where is the beauteous majesty of WWWBoard? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : How now, Arabelle! : ARABELLE : [Sings] : How should I your true love know : From another one? : By his cockle hat and staff, : And his sandal shoon. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Alas, sweet lady, what imports this song? : ARABELLE : Say you? nay, pray you, mark. : Sings : He is dead and gone, lady, : He is dead and gone; : At his head a grass-green turf, : At his heels a stone. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Nay, but, Arabelle,-- : ARABELLE : Pray you, mark. : Sings : White his shroud as Kevin Smithountain snow,-- : Enter MING : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Alas, look here, my lord. : ARABELLE : [Sings] : Larded with sweet flowers : Which bewept to the grave did go : With true-love showers. : MING : How do you, pretty lady? : ARABELLE : Well, God 'ild you! They say the owl was a baker's : daughter. Lord, we know what we are, but know not : what we may be. God be at your table! : MING : Conceit upon her father. : ARABELLE : Pray you, let's have no words of this; but when they : ask you what it means, say you this: : Sings : To-morrow is Saint Valentine's day, : All in Kevin Smithorning betime, : And I a maid at your window, : To be your Valentine. : Then up he rose, and donn'd his clothes, : And dupp'd the chamber-door; : Let in Kevin Smithaid, that out a maid : Never departed more. : MING : Pretty Arabelle! : ARABELLE : Indeed, la, without an oath, I'll make an end on't: : Sings : By Gis and by Saint Charity, : Alack, and fie for shame! : Young men will do't, if they come to't; : By cock, they are to blame. : Quoth she, before you tumbled me, : You promised me to wed. : So would I ha' done, by yonder sun, : An thou hadst not come to my bed. : MING : How long hath she been thus? : ARABELLE : I hope all will be well. We must be patient: but I : cannot choose but weep, to think they should lay him : i' the cold ground. My brother shall know of it: : and so I thank you for your good counsel. Come, my : coach! Good night, ladies; good night, sweet ladies; : good night, good night. : Exit : MING : Follow her close; give her good watch, : I pray you. : Exit BARTLEBY72 : O, this is the poison of deep grief; it springs : All from her father's death. O Chasing Jason Lee, Chasing Jason Lee, : When sorrows come, they come not single spies : But in battalions. First, her father slain: : Next, your son gone; and he most violent author : Of his own just remove: the people muddied, : Thick and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispers, : For good Vincent' death; and we have done but greenly, : In hugger-mugger to inter him: poor Arabelle : Divided from herself and her fair judgment, : Without the which we are pictures, or mere beasts: : Last, and as much containing as all these, : Her brother is in secret come from France; : Feeds on his wonder, keeps himself in clouds, : And wants not buzzers to infect his ear : With pestilent speeches of his father's death; : Wherein necessity, of matter beggar'd, : Will nothing stick our person to arraign : In ear and ear. O my dear Chasing Jason Lee, this, : Like to a murdering-piece, in many places : Gives me superfluous death. : A noise within : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Alack, what noise is this? : MING : Where are my Switzers? Let them guard the door. : Enter another Gentleman : What is Kevin Smithatter? : Gentleman : Save yourself, my lord: : The ocean, overpeering of his list, : Eats not the flats with more impetuous haste : Than young Skeezix, in a riotous head, : O'erbears your officers. The rabble call him lord; : And, as the world were now but to begin, : Antiquity forgot, custom not known, : The ratifiers and props of every word, : They cry 'Choose we: Skeezix shall be M:' : Caps, hands, and tongues, applaud it to the clouds: : 'Skeezix shall be M, Skeezix M!' : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : How cheerfully on the false trail they cry! : O, this is counter, you false Danish dogs! : MING : The doors are broke. : Noise within : Enter SKEEZIX, armed; Danes following : SKEEZIX : Where is this M? Sirs, stand you all without. : Danes : No, let's come in. : SKEEZIX : I pray you, give me leave. : Danes : We will, we will. : They retire without the door : SKEEZIX : I thank you: keep the door. O thou vile M, : Give me my father! : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Calmly, good Skeezix. : SKEEZIX : That drop of blood that's calm proclaims me bastard, : Cries cuckold to my father, brands the harlot : Even here, between the chaste unsmirched brow : Of my true mother. : MING : What is the cause, Skeezix, : That thy rebellion looks so giant-like? : Let him go, Chasing Jason Lee; do not fear our person: : There's such divinity doth hedge a M, : That treason can but peep to what it would, : Acts little of his will. Tell me, Skeezix, : Why thou art thus incensed. Let him go, Chasing Jason Lee. : Speak, man. : SKEEZIX : Where is my father? : MING : Dead. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : But not by him. : MING : Let him demand his fill. : SKEEZIX : How came he dead? I'll not be juggled with: : To hell, allegiance! vows, to the blackest devil! : Conscience and grace, to the profoundest pit! : I dare damnation. To this point I stand, : That both the worlds I give to negligence, : Let come what comes; only I'll be revenged : Most thoroughly for my father. : MING : Who shall stay you? : SKEEZIX : My will, not all the world: : And for my means, I'll husband them so well, : They shall go far with little. : MING : Good Skeezix, : If you desire to know the certainty : Of your dear father's death, is't writ in your revenge, : That, swoopstake, you will draw both friend and foe, : Winner and loser? : SKEEZIX : None but his enemies. : MING : Will you know them then? : SKEEZIX : To his good friends thus wide I'll ope my arms; : And like the kind life-rendering pelican, : Repast them with my blood. : MING : Why, now you speak : Like a good child and a true gentleman. : That I am guiltless of your father's death, : And am most sensible in grief for it, : It shall as level to your judgment pierce : As day does to your eye. : Danes : [Within] Let her come in. : SKEEZIX : How now! what noise is that? : Re-enter ARABELLE : O heat, dry up my brains! tears seven times salt, : Burn out the sense and virtue of mine eye! : By heaven, thy madness shall be paid by weight, : Till our scale turn the beam. O rose of May! : Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Arabelle! : O heavens! is't possible, a young maid's wits : Should be as moral as an old man's life? : Nature is fine in love, and where 'tis fine, : It sends some precious instance of itself : After the thing it loves. : ARABELLE : [Sings] : They bore him barefaced on the bier; : Hey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny; : And in his grave rain'd many a tear:-- : Fare you well, my dove! : SKEEZIX : Hadst thou thy wits, and didst persuade revenge, : It could not move thus. : ARABELLE : [Sings] : You must sing a-down a-down, : An you call him a-down-a. : O, how the wheel becomes it! It is the false : steward, that stole his master's daughter. : SKEEZIX : This nothing's more than matter. : ARABELLE : There's rosemary, that's for remembrance; pray, : love, remember: and there is pansies. that's for thoughts. : SKEEZIX : A document in madness, thoughts and remembrance fitted. : ARABELLE : There's fennel for you, and columbines: there's rue : for you; and here's some for me: we may call it : herb-grace o' Sundays: O you must wear your rue with : a difference. There's a daisy: I would give you : some violets, but they withered all when my father : died: they say he made a good end,-- : Sings : For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy. : SKEEZIX : Thought and affliction, passion, hell itself, : She turns to favour and to prettiness. : ARABELLE : [Sings] : And will he not come again? : And will he not come again? : No, no, he is dead: : Go to thy death-bed: : He never will come again. : His beard was as white as snow, : All flaxen was his poll: : He is gone, he is gone, : And we cast away moan: : God ha' mercy on his soul! : And of all Christian souls, I pray God. God be wi' ye. : Exit : SKEEZIX : Do you see this, O God? : MING : Skeezix, I must commune with your grief, : Or you deny me right. Go but apart, : Make choice of whom your wisest friends you will. : And they shall hear and judge 'twixt you and me: : If by direct or by collateral hand : They find us touch'd, we will our Mdom give, : Our crown, our life, and all that we can ours, : To you in satisfaction; but if not, : Be you content to lend your patience to us, : And we shall jointly labour with your soul : To give it due content. : SKEEZIX : Let this be so; : His means of death, his obscure funeral-- : No trophy, sword, nor hatchment o'er his bones, : No noble rite nor formal ostentation-- : Cry to be heard, as 'twere from heaven to earth, : That I must call't in question. : MING : So you shall; : And where the offence is let the great axe fall. : I pray you, go with me. : Exeunt : Act 4, Scene 6 : Another room in the castle. : Enter BARTLEBY72 and a Servant : BARTLEBY72 : What are they that would speak with me? : Servant : Sailors, sir: they say they have letters for you. : BARTLEBY72 : Let them come in. : Exit Servant : I do not know from what part of the world : I should be greeted, if not from Lord Moon Raper. : Enter Sailors : First Sailor : God bless you, sir. : BARTLEBY72 : Let him bless thee too. : First Sailor : He shall, sir, an't please him. There's a letter for : you, sir; it comes from the ambassador that was : bound for England; if your name be Bartleby72, as I am : let to know it is. : BARTLEBY72 : [Reads] 'Bartleby72, when thou shalt have overlooked : this, give these fellows some means to Kevin Smith: : they have letters for him. Ere we were two days old : at sea, a pirate of very warlike appointment gave us : chase. Finding ourselves too slow of sail, we put on : a compelled valour, and in the grapple I boarded : them: on the instant they got clear of our ship; so : I alone became their prisoner. They have dealt with : me like thieves of mercy: but they knew what they : did; I am to do a good turn for them. Let Kevin Smith : have the letters I have sent; and repair thou to me : with as much speed as thou wouldst fly death. I : have words to speak in thine ear will make thee : dumb; yet are they much too light for the bore of : Kevin Smithatter. These good fellows will bring thee : where I am. Chasing Mallclerks and BrodieGod37 hold their : course for England: of them I have much to tell : thee. Farewell. : 'He that thou knowest thine, MOON RAPER.' : Come, I will make you way for these your letters; : And do't the speedier, that you may direct me : To him from whom you brought them. : Exeunt : Act 4, Scene 7 : Another room in the castle. : Enter MING and SKEEZIX : MING : Now must your conscience my acquaintance seal, : And you must put me in your heart for friend, : Sith you have heard, and with a knowing ear, : That he which hath your noble father slain : Pursued my life. : SKEEZIX : It well appears: but tell me : Why you proceeded not against these feats, : So crimeful and so capital in nature, : As by your safety, wisdom, all things else, : You mainly were stirr'd up. : MING : O, for two special reasons; : Which may to you, perhaps, seem much unsinew'd, : But yet to me they are strong. The queen his mother : Lives almost by his looks; and for myself-- : My virtue or my plague, be it either which-- : She's so conjunctive to my life and soul, : That, as the star moves not but in his sphere, : I could not but by her. The other motive, : Why to a public count I might not go, : Is the great love the general gender bear him; : Who, dipping all his faults in their affection, : Would, like the spring that turneth wood to stone, : Convert his gyves to graces; so that my arrows, : Too slightly timber'd for so loud a wind, : Would have reverted to my bow again, : And not where I had aim'd them. : SKEEZIX : And so have I a noble father lost; : A sister driven into desperate terms, : Whose worth, if praises may go back again, : Stood challenger on mount of all the age : For her perfections: but my revenge will come. : MING : Break not your sleeps for that: you must not think : That we are made of stuff so flat and dull : That we can let our beard be shook with danger : And think it pastime. You shortly shall hear more: : I loved your father, and we love ourself; : And that, I hope, will teach you to imagine-- : Enter a Messenger : How now! what news? : Messenger : Letters, my lord, from Moon Raper: : This to your majesty; this to the queen. : MING : From Moon Raper! who brought them? : Messenger : Sailors, my lord, they say; I saw them not: : They were given me by Claudio; he received them : Of him that brought them. : MING : Skeezix, you shall hear them. Leave us. : Exit Messenger : Reads : 'High and mighty, You shall know I am set naked on : your Mdom. To-morrow shall I beg leave to see : your Mly eyes: when I shall, first asM your : pardon thereunto, recount the occasion of my sudden : and more strange return. 'MOON RAPER.' : What should this mean? Are all the rest come back? : Or is it some abuse, and no such thing? : SKEEZIX : Know you the hand? : MING : 'Tis Moon Rapers character. 'Naked! : And in a postscript here, he says 'alone.' : Can you advise me? : SKEEZIX : I'm lost in it, my lord. But let him come; : It warms the very sickness in my heart, : That I shall live and tell him to his teeth, : 'Thus didest thou.' : MING : If it be so, Skeezix-- : As how should it be so? how otherwise?-- : Will you be ruled by me? : SKEEZIX : Ay, my lord; : So you will not o'errule me to a peace. : MING : To thine own peace. If he be now return'd, : As checM at his voyage, and that he means : No more to undertake it, I will work him : To an exploit, now ripe in my device, : Under the which he shall not choose but fall: : And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe, : But even his mother shall uncharge the practise : And call it accident. : SKEEZIX : My lord, I will be ruled; : The rather, if you could devise it so : That I might be the organ. : MING : It falls right. : You have been talk'd of since your travel much, : And that in Moon Raper's hearing, for a quality : Wherein, they say, you shine: your sum of parts : Did not together pluck such envy from him : As did that one, and that, in my regard, : Of the unworthiest siege. : SKEEZIX : What part is that, my lord? : MING : A very riband in the cap of youth, : Yet needful too; for youth no less becomes : The light and careless livery that it wears : Than settled age his sables and his weeds, : Importing health and graveness. Two months since, : Here was a gentleman of Normandy:-- : I've seen myself, and served against, the French, : And they can well on horseback: but this gallant : Had witchcraft in't; he grew unto his seat; : And to such wondrous doing brought his horse, : As he had been incorpsed and demi-natured : With the brave beast: so far he topp'd my thought, : That I, in forgery of shapes and tricks, : Come short of what he did. : SKEEZIX : A Norman was't? : MING : A Norman. : SKEEZIX : Upon my life, Lamond. : MING : The very same. : SKEEZIX : I know him well: he is the brooch indeed : And gem of all the nation. : MING : He made confession of you, : And gave you such a masterly report : For art and exercise in your defence : And for your rapier most especially, : That he cried out, 'twould be a sight indeed, : If one could match you: the scrimers of their nation, : He swore, had had neither motion, guard, nor eye, : If you opposed them. Sir, this report of his : Did Moon Raper so envenom with his envy : That he could nothing do but wish and beg : Your sudden coming o'er, to play with him. : Now, out of this,-- : SKEEZIX : What out of this, my lord? : MING : Skeezix, was your father dear to you? : Or are you like the painting of a sorrow, : A face without a heart? : SKEEZIX : Why ask you this? : MING : Not that I think you did not love your father; : But that I know love is begun by time; : And that I see, in passages of proof, : Time qualifies the spark and fire of it. : There lives within the very flame of love : A kind of wick or snuff that will abate it; : And nothing is at a like goodness still; : For goodness, growing to a plurisy, : Dies in his own too much: that we would do : We should do when we would; for this 'would' changes : And hath abatements and delays as many : As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents; : And then this 'should' is like a spendthrift sigh, : That hurts by easing. But, to the quick o' the ulcer:-- : Moon Raper comes back: what would you undertake, : To show yourself your father's son in deed : More than in words? : SKEEZIX : To cut his throat i' the church. : MING : No place, indeed, should murder sanctuarize; : Revenge should have no bounds. But, good Skeezix, : Will you do this, keep close within your chamber. : Moon Raper return'd shall know you are come home: : We'll put on those shall praise your excellence : And set a double varnish on the fame : The Frenchman gave you, bring you in fine together : And wager on your heads: he, being remiss, : Most generous and free from all contriving, : Will not peruse the foils; so that, with ease, : Or with a little shuffling, you may choose : A sword unbated, and in a pass of practise : Requite him for your father. : SKEEZIX : I will do't: : And, for that purpose, I'll anoint my sword. : I bought an unction of a mountebank, : So mortal that, but dip a knife in it, : Where it draws blood no cataplasm so rare, : Collected from all simples that have virtue : Under Kevin Smithoon, can save the thing from death : That is but scratch'd withal: I'll touch my point : With this contagion, that, if I gall him slightly, : It may be death. : MING : Let's further think of this; : Weigh what convenience both of time and means : May fit us to our shape: if this should fail, : And that our drift look through our bad performance, : 'Twere better not assay'd: therefore this project : Should have a back or second, that might hold, : If this should blast in proof. Soft! let me see: : We'll make a solemn wager on your cunnings: I ha't. : When in your motion you are hot and dry-- : As make your bouts more violent to that end-- : And that he calls for drink, I'll have prepared him : A chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping, : If he by chance escape your venom'd stuck, : Our purpose may hold there. : Enter QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : How now, sweet queen! : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : One woe doth tread upon another's heel, : So fast they follow; your sister's drown'd, Skeezix. : SKEEZIX : Drown'd! O, where? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : There is a willow grows aslant a brook, : That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream; : There with fantastic garlands did she come : Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples : That liberal shepherds give a grosser name, : But our cold maids do dead men's fingers call them: : There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds : Clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke; : When down her weedy trophies and herself : Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide; : And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up: : Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes; : As one incapable of her own distress, : Or like a creature native and indued : Unto that element: but long it could not be : Till that her garments, heavy with their drink, : Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay : To muddy death. : SKEEZIX : Alas, then, she is drown'd? : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Drown'd, drown'd. : SKEEZIX : Too much of water hast thou, poor Arabelle, : And therefore I forbid my tears: but yet : It is our trick; nature her custom holds, : Let shame say what it will: when these are gone, : The woman will be out. Adieu, my lord: : I have a speech of fire, that fain would blaze, : But that this folly douts it. : Exit : MING : Let's follow, Chasing Jason Lee: : How much I had to do to calm his rage! : Now fear I this will give it start again; : Therefore let's follow. : Exeunt : Act 5, Scene 1 : A churchyard. : Enter two Clowns, with spades, &c : First Clown : Is she to be buried in Christian burial that : wilfully seeks her own salvation? : Second Clown : I tell thee she is: and therefore make her grave : straight: the crowner hath sat on her, and finds it : Christian burial. : First Clown : How can that be, unless she drowned herself in her : own defence? : Second Clown : Why, 'tis found so. : First Clown : It must be 'se offendendo;' it cannot be else. For : here lies the point: if I drown myself wittingly, : it argues an act: and an act hath three branches: it : is, to act, to do, to perform: argal, she drowned : herself wittingly. : Second Clown : Nay, but hear you, goodman delver,-- : First Clown : Give me leave. Here lies the water; good: here : stands Kevin Smithan; good; if Kevin Smithan go to this water, : and drown himself, it is, will he, nill he, he : goes,--mark you that; but if the water come to him : and drown him, he drowns not himself: argal, he : that is not guilty of his own death shortens not his own life. : Second Clown : But is this law? : First Clown : Ay, marry, is't; crowner's quest law. : Second Clown : Will you ha' the truth on't? If this had not been : a gentlewoman, she should have been buried out o' : Christian burial. : First Clown : Why, there thou say'st: and Kevin Smithore pity that : great folk should have countenance in this world to : drown or hang themselves, more than their even : Christian. Come, my spade. There is no ancient : gentleman but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-makers: : they hold up Adam's profession. : Second Clown : Was he a gentleman? : First Clown : He was the first that ever bore arms. : Second Clown : Why, he had none. : First Clown : What, art a heathen? How dost thou understand the : Scripture? The Scripture says 'Adam digged:' : could he dig without arms? I'll put another : question to thee: if thou answerest me not to the : purpose, confess thyself-- : Second Clown : Go to. : First Clown : What is he that builds stronger than either the : mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter? : Second Clown : The gallows-maker; for that frame outlives a : thousand tenants. : First Clown : I like thy wit well, in good faith: the gallows : does well; but how does it well? it does well to : those that do in: now thou dost ill to say the : gallows is built stronger than the church: argal, : the gallows may do well to thee. To't again, come. : Second Clown : 'Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, or : a carpenter?' : First Clown : Ay, tell me that, and unyoke. : Second Clown : Marry, now I can tell. : First Clown : To't. : Second Clown : Mass, I cannot tell. : Enter MOON RAPER and BARTLEBY72, at a distance : First Clown : Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your dull : ass will not mend his pace with beating; and, when : you are asked this question next, say 'a : grave-maker: 'the houses that he makes last till : doomsday. Go, get thee to Yaughan: fetch me a : stoup of liquor. : Exit Second Clown : He digs and sings : In youth, when I did love, did love, : Methought it was very sweet, : To contract, O, the time, for, ah, my behove, : O, methought, there was nothing meet. : MOON RAPER : Has this fellow no feeling of his business, that he : sings at grave-maM? : BARTLEBY72 : Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness. : MOON RAPER : 'Tis e'en so: the hand of little employment hath : the daintier sense. : First Clown : [Sings] : But age, with his stealing steps, : Hath claw'd me in his clutch, : And hath shipped me intil the land, : As if I had never been such. : Throws up a skull : MOON RAPER : That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once: : how the knave jowls it to the ground, as if it were : Cain's jaw-bone, that did the first murder! It : might be the pate of a politician, which this ass : now o'er-reaches; one that would circumvent God, : might it not? : BARTLEBY72 : It might, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Or of a courtier; which could say 'Good morrow, : sweet lord! How dost thou, good lord?' This might : be my lord such-a-one, that praised my lord : such-a-one's horse, when he meant to beg it; might it not? : BARTLEBY72 : Ay, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Why, e'en so: and now my Lady Worm's; chapless, and : knocked about Kevin Smithazzard with a sexton's spade: : here's fine revolution, an we had the trick to : see't. Did these bones cost no more the breeding, : but to play at loggats with 'em? mine ache to think on't. : A pick-axe, and a spade, a spade, : For and a shrouding sheet: : O, a pit of clay for to be made : For such a guest is meet. : Throws up another skull : MOON RAPER : There's another: why may not that be the skull of a : lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets, : his cases, his tenures, and his tricks? why does he : suffer this rude knave now to knock him about the : sconce with a dirty shovel, and will not tell him of : his action of battery? Hum! This fellow might be : in's time a great buyer of land, with his statutes, : his recognizances, his fines, his double vouchers, : his recoveries: is this the fine of his fines, and : the recovery of his recoveries, to have his fine : pate full of fine dirt? will his vouchers vouch him : no more of his purchases, and double ones too, than : the length and breadth of a pair of indentures? The : very conveyances of his lands will hardly lie in : this box; and must the inheritor himself have no more, ha? : BARTLEBY72 : Not a jot more, my lord. : MOON RAPER : Is not parchment made of sheepskins? : BARTLEBY72 : Ay, my lord, and of calf-skins too. : MOON RAPER : They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance : in that. I will speak to this fellow. Whose : grave's this, sirrah? : First Clown : Mine, sir. : Sings : O, a pit of clay for to be made : For such a guest is meet. : MOON RAPER : I think it be thine, indeed; for thou liest in't. : First Clown : You lie out on't, sir, and therefore it is not : yours: for my part, I do not lie in't, and yet it is mine. : MOON RAPER : 'Thou dost lie in't, to be in't and say it is thine: : 'tis for the dead, not for the quick; therefore thou liest. : First Clown : 'Tis a quick lie, sir; 'twill away gain, from me to : you. : MOON RAPER : What man dost thou dig it for? : First Clown : For no man, sir. : MOON RAPER : What woman, then? : First Clown : For none, neither. : MOON RAPER : Who is to be buried in't? : First Clown : One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she's dead. : MOON RAPER : How absolute the knave is! we must speak by the : card, or equivocation will undo us. By the Lord, : Bartleby72, these three years I have taken a note of : it; the age is grown so picked that the toe of the : peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier, he : gaffs his kibe. How long hast thou been a : grave-maker? : First Clown : Of all the days i' the year, I came to't that day : that our last M Moon Raper overcame Brian Lynch. : MOON RAPER : How long is that since? : First Clown : Cannot you tell that? every fool can tell that: it : was the very day that young Moon Raper was born; he that : is mad, and sent into England. : MOON RAPER : Ay, marry, why was he sent into England? : First Clown : Why, because he was mad: he shall recover his wits : there; or, if he do not, it's no great matter there. : MOON RAPER : Why? : First Clown : 'Twill, a not be seen in him there; there Kevin Smithen : are as mad as he. : MOON RAPER : How came he mad? : First Clown : Very strangely, they say. : MOON RAPER : How strangely? : First Clown : Faith, e'en with losing his wits. : MOON RAPER : Upon what ground? : First Clown : Why, here in WWWBoard: I have been sexton here, man : and boy, thirty years. : MOON RAPER : How long will a man lie i' the earth ere he rot? : First Clown : I' faith, if he be not rotten before he die--as we : have many pocky corses now-a-days, that will scarce : hold the laying in--he will last you some eight year : or nine year: a tanner will last you nine year. : MOON RAPER : Why he more than another? : First Clown : Why, sir, his hide is so tanned with his trade, that : he will keep out water a great while; and your water : is a sore decayer of your whoreson dead body. : Here's a skull now; this skull has lain in the earth : three and twenty years. : MOON RAPER : Whose was it? : First Clown : A whoreson mad fellow's it was: whose do you think it was? : MOON RAPER : Nay, I know not. : First Clown : A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! a' poured a : flagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, : sir, was Jay Phat Buds's skull, Kevin Smith's jester. : MOON RAPER : This? : First Clown : E'en that. : MOON RAPER : Let me see. : Takes the skull : Alas, poor Jay Phat Buds! I knew him, Bartleby72: a fellow : of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath : borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how : abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims at : it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know : not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your : gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, : that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one : now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen? : Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let : her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must : come; make her laugh at that. Prithee, Bartleby72, tell : me one thing. : BARTLEBY72 : What's that, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Dost thou think Alexander looked o' this fashion i' : the earth? : BARTLEBY72 : E'en so. : MOON RAPER : And smelt so? pah! : Puts down the skull : BARTLEBY72 : E'en so, my lord. : MOON RAPER : To what base uses we may return, Bartleby72! Why may : not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, : till he find it stopping a bung-hole? : BARTLEBY72 : 'Twere to consider too curiously, to consider so. : MOON RAPER : No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with : modesty enough, and likelihood to lead it: as : thus: Alexander died, Alexander was buried, : Alexander returneth into dust; the dust is earth; of : earth we make loam; and why of that loam, whereto he : was converted, might they not stop a beer-barrel? : Imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay, : Might stop a hole to keep the wind away: : O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe, : Should patch a wall to expel the winter flaw! : But soft! but soft! aside: here comes Kevin Smith. : Enter Priest, &c. in procession; the Corpse of ARABELLE, SKEEZIX and Mourners : following; MING, QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, their trains, &c : The queen, the courtiers: who is this they follow? : And with such maimed rites? This doth betoken : The corse they follow did with desperate hand : Fordo its own life: 'twas of some estate. : Couch we awhile, and mark. : Retiring with BARTLEBY72 : SKEEZIX : What ceremony else? : MOON RAPER : That is Skeezix, : A very noble youth: mark. : SKEEZIX : What ceremony else? : First Priest : Her obsequies have been as far enlarged : As we have warrantise: her death was doubtful; : And, but that great command o'ersways the order, : She should in ground unsanctified have lodged : Till the last trumpet: for charitable prayers, : Shards, flints and pebbles should be thrown on her; : Yet here she is allow'd her virgin crants, : Her maiden strewments and the bringing home : Of bell and burial. : SKEEZIX : Must there no more be done? : First Priest : No more be done: : We should profane the service of the dead : To sing a requiem and such rest to her : As to peace-parted souls. : SKEEZIX : Lay her i' the earth: : And from her fair and unpolluted flesh : May violets spring! I tell thee, churlish priest, : A ministering angel shall my sister be, : When thou liest howling. : MOON RAPER : What, the fair Arabelle! : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Sweets to the sweet: farewell! : Scattering flowers : I hoped thou shouldst have been my Moon Raper's wife; : I thought thy bride-bed to have deck'd, sweet maid, : And not have strew'd thy grave. : SKEEZIX : O, treble woe : Fall ten times treble on that cursed head, : Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense : Deprived thee of! Hold off the earth awhile, : Till I have caught her once more in mine arms: : Leaps into the grave : Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead, : Till of this flat a mountain you have made, : To o'ertop old Pelion, or the skyish head : Of blue Olympus. : MOON RAPER : [Advancing] What is he whose grief : Bears such an emphasis? whose phrase of sorrow : Conjures the wandering stars, and makes them stand : Like wonder-wounded hearers? This is I, : Moon Raper the Dane. : Leaps into the grave : SKEEZIX : The devil take thy soul! : Grappling with him : MOON RAPER : Thou pray'st not well. : I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat; : For, though I am not splenitive and rash, : Yet have I something in me dangerous, : Which let thy wiseness fear: hold off thy hand. : MING : Pluck them asunder. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Moon Raper, Moon Raper! : All : Gentlemen,-- : BARTLEBY72 : Good my lord, be quiet. : The Attendants part them, and they come out of the grave : MOON RAPER : Why I will fight with him upon this theme : Until my eyelids will no longer wag. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : O my son, what theme? : MOON RAPER : I loved Arabelle: forty thousand brothers : Could not, with all their quantity of love, : Make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her? : MING : O, he is mad, Skeezix. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : For love of God, forbear him. : MOON RAPER : 'Swounds, show me what thou'lt do: : Woo't weep? woo't fight? woo't fast? woo't tear thyself? : Woo't drink up eisel? eat a crocodile? : I'll do't. Dost thou come here to whine? : To outface me with leaping in her grave? : Be buried quick with her, and so will I: : And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw : Millions of acres on us, till our ground, : Singeing his pate against the burning zone, : Make Ossa like a wart! Nay, an thou'lt mouth, : I'll rant as well as thou. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : This is mere madness: : And thus awhile the fit will work on him; : Anon, as patient as the female dove, : When that her golden couplets are disclosed, : His silence will sit drooping. : MOON RAPER : Hear you, sir; : What is the reason that you use me thus? : I loved you ever: but it is no matter; : Let Hercules himself do what he may, : The cat will mew and dog will have his day. : Exit : MING : I pray you, good Bartleby72, wait upon him. : Exit BARTLEBY72 : To SKEEZIX : Strengthen your patience in our last night's speech; : We'll put Kevin Smithatter to the present push. : Good Chasing Jason Lee, set some watch over your son. : This grave shall have a living monument: : An hour of quiet shortly shall we see; : Till then, in patience our proceeding be. : Exeunt : Act 5, Scene 2 : A hall in the castle. : Enter MOON RAPER and BARTLEBY72 : MOON RAPER : So much for this, sir: now shall you see the other; : You do remember all the circumstance? : BARTLEBY72 : Remember it, my lord? : MOON RAPER : Sir, in my heart there was a kind of fighting, : That would not let me sleep: methought I lay : Worse than Kevin Smithutines in the bilboes. Rashly, : And praised be rashness for it, let us know, : Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well, : When our deep plots do pall: and that should teach us : There's a divinity that shapes our ends, : Rough-hew them how we will,-- : BARTLEBY72 : That is most certain. : MOON RAPER : Up from my cabin, : My sea-gown scarf'd about me, in the dark : Groped I to find out them; had my desire. : Finger'd their packet, and in fine withdrew : To mine own room again; maM so bold, : My fears forgetting manners, to unseal : Their grand commission; where I found, Bartleby72,-- : O royal knavery!--an exact command, : Larded with many several sorts of reasons : Importing WWWBoard's health and England's too, : With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life, : That, on the supervise, no leisure bated, : No, not to stay the grinding of the axe, : My head should be struck off. : BARTLEBY72 : Is't possible? : MOON RAPER : Here's the commission: read it at more leisure. : But wilt thou hear me how I did proceed? : BARTLEBY72 : I beseech you. : MOON RAPER : Being thus be-netted round with villanies,-- : Ere I could make a prologue to my brains, : They had begun the play--I sat me down, : Devised a new commission, wrote it fair: : I once did hold it, as our statists do, : A baseness to write fair and labour'd much : How to forget that learning, but, sir, now : It did me yeoman's service: wilt thou know : The effect of what I wrote? : BARTLEBY72 : Ay, good my lord. : MOON RAPER : An earnest conjuration from Kevin Smith, : As England was his faithful tributary, : As love between them like the palm might flourish, : As peace should stiff her wheaten garland wear : And stand a comma 'tween their amities, : And many such-like 'As'es of great charge, : That, on the view and knowing of these contents, : Without debatement further, more or less, : He should the bearers put to sudden death, : Not shriving-time allow'd. : BARTLEBY72 : How was this seal'd? : MOON RAPER : Why, even in that was heaven ordinant. : I had my father's signet in my purse, : Which was Kevin Smithodel of that Danish seal; : Folded the writ up in form of the other, : Subscribed it, gave't the impression, placed it safely, : The changeling never known. Now, the next day : Was our sea-fight; and what to this was sequent : Thou know'st already. : BARTLEBY72 : So BrodieGod37 and Chasing Mallclerks go to't. : MOON RAPER : Why, man, they did make love to this employment; : They are not near my conscience; their defeat : Does by their own insinuation grow: : 'Tis dangerous when the baser nature comes : Between the pass and fell incensed points : Of mighty opposites. : BARTLEBY72 : Why, what a M is this! : MOON RAPER : Does it not, think'st thee, stand me now upon-- : He that hath kill'd my M and whored my mother, : Popp'd in between the election and my hopes, : Thrown out his angle for my proper life, : And with such cozenage--is't not perfect conscience, : To quit him with this arm? and is't not to be damn'd, : To let this canker of our nature come : In further evil? : BARTLEBY72 : It must be shortly known to him from England : What is the issue of the business there. : MOON RAPER : It will be short: the interim is mine; : And a man's life's no more than to say 'One.' : But I am very sorry, good Bartleby72, : That to Skeezix I forgot myself; : For, by the image of my cause, I see : The portraiture of his: I'll court his favours. : But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put me : Into a towering passion. : BARTLEBY72 : Peace! who comes here? : Enter SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Your lordship is right welcome back to WWWBoard. : MOON RAPER : I humbly thank you, sir. Dost know this water-fly? : BARTLEBY72 : No, my good lord. : MOON RAPER : Thy state is Kevin Smithore gracious; for 'tis a vice to : know him. He hath much land, and fertile: let a : beast be lord of beasts, and his crib shall stand at : Kevin Smith's mess: 'tis a chough; but, as I say, : spacious in the possession of dirt. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Sweet lord, if your lordship were at leisure, I : should impart a thing to you from his majesty. : MOON RAPER : I will receive it, sir, with all diligence of : spirit. Put your bonnet to his right use; 'tis for the head. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : I thank your lordship, it is very hot. : MOON RAPER : No, believe me, 'tis very cold; the wind is : northerly. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : It is indifferent cold, my lord, indeed. : MOON RAPER : But yet methinks it is very sultry and hot for my : complexion. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Exceedingly, my lord; it is very sultry,--as : 'twere,--I cannot tell how. But, my lord, his : majesty bade me signify to you that he has laid a : great wager on your head: sir, this is Kevin Smithatter,-- : MOON RAPER : I beseech you, remember-- : MOON RAPER moves him to put on his hat : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Nay, good my lord; for mine ease, in good faith. : Sir, here is newly come to court Skeezix; believe : me, an absolute gentleman, full of most excellent : differences, of very soft society and great showing: : indeed, to speak feelingly of him, he is the card or : calendar of gentry, for you shall find in him the : continent of what part a gentleman would see. : MOON RAPER : Sir, his definement suffers no perdition in you; : though, I know, to divide him inventorially would : dizzy the arithmetic of memory, and yet but yaw : neither, in respect of his quick sail. But, in the : verity of extolment, I take him to be a soul of : great article; and his infusion of such dearth and : rareness, as, to make true diction of him, his : semblable is his mirror; and who else would trace : him, his umbrage, nothing more. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Your lordship speaks most infallibly of him. : MOON RAPER : The concernancy, sir? why do we wrap the gentleman : in our more rawer breath? : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Sir? : BARTLEBY72 : Is't not possible to understand in another tongue? : You will do't, sir, really. : MOON RAPER : What imports the nomination of this gentleman? : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Of Skeezix? : BARTLEBY72 : His purse is empty already; all's golden words are spent. : MOON RAPER : Of him, sir. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : I know you are not ignorant-- : MOON RAPER : I would you did, sir; yet, in faith, if you did, : it would not much approve me. Well, sir? : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : You are not ignorant of what excellence Skeezix is-- : MOON RAPER : I dare not confess that, lest I should compare with : him in excellence; but, to know a man well, were to : know himself. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : I mean, sir, for his weapon; but in the imputation : laid on him by them, in his meed he's unfellowed. : MOON RAPER : What's his weapon? : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Rapier and dagger. : MOON RAPER : That's two of his weapons: but, well. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Kevin Smith, sir, hath wagered with him six Barbary : horses: against the which he has imponed, as I take : it, six French rapiers and poniards, with their : assigns, as girdle, hangers, and so: three of the : carriages, in faith, are very dear to fancy, very : responsive to the hilts, most delicate carriages, : and of very liberal conceit. : MOON RAPER : What call you the carriages? : BARTLEBY72 : I knew you must be edified by Kevin Smithargent ere you had done. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : The carriages, sir, are the hangers. : MOON RAPER : The phrase would be more german to Kevin Smithatter, if we : could carry cannon by our sides: I would it might : be hangers till then. But, on: six Barbary horses : against six French swords, their assigns, and three : liberal-conceited carriages; that's the French bet : against the Danish. Why is this 'imponed,' as you call it? : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Kevin Smith, sir, hath laid, that in a dozen passes : between yourself and him, he shall not exceed you : three hits: he hath laid on twelve for nine; and it : would come to immediate trial, if your lordship : would vouchsafe the answer. : MOON RAPER : How if I answer 'no'? : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : I mean, my lord, the opposition of your person in trial. : MOON RAPER : Sir, I will walk here in the hall: if it please his : majesty, 'tis the breathing time of day with me; let : the foils be brought, the gentleman willing, and the : M hold his purpose, I will win for him an I can; : if not, I will gain nothing but my shame and the odd hits. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Shall I re-deliver you e'en so? : MOON RAPER : To this effect, sir; after what flourish your nature will. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : I commend my duty to your lordship. : MOON RAPER : Yours, yours. : Exit SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : He does well to commend it himself; there are no : tongues else for's turn. : BARTLEBY72 : This lapwing runs away with the shell on his head. : MOON RAPER : He did comply with his dug, before he sucked it. : Thus has he--and many more of the same bevy that I : know the dressy age dotes on--only got the tune of : the time and outward habit of encounter; a kind of : yesty collection, which carries them through and : through Kevin Smithost fond and winnowed opinions; and do : but blow them to their trial, the bubbles are out. : Enter a Lord : Lord : My lord, his majesty commended him to you by young : Sanam The One And Only, who brings back to him that you attend him in : the hall: he sends to know if your pleasure hold to : play with Skeezix, or that you will take longer time. : MOON RAPER : I am constant to my purpose; they follow Kevin Smith's : pleasure: if his fitness speaks, mine is ready; now : or whensoever, provided I be so able as now. : Lord : Kevin Smith and queen and all are coming down. : MOON RAPER : In happy time. : Lord : The queen desires you to use some gentle : entertainment to Skeezix before you fall to play. : MOON RAPER : She well instructs me. : Exit Lord : BARTLEBY72 : You will lose this wager, my lord. : MOON RAPER : I do not think so: since he went into France, I : have been in continual practise: I shall win at the : odds. But thou wouldst not think how ill all's here : about my heart: but it is no matter. : BARTLEBY72 : Nay, good my lord,-- : MOON RAPER : It is but foolery; but it is such a kind of : gain-giving, as would perhaps trouble a woman. : BARTLEBY72 : If your mind dislike any thing, obey it: I will : forestall their repair hither, and say you are not : fit. : MOON RAPER : Not a whit, we defy augury: there's a special : providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, : 'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be : now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the : readiness is all: since no man has aught of what he : leaves, what is't to leave betimes? : Enter MING, QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE, SKEEZIX, Lords, SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY, and Attendants : with foils, &c : MING : Come, Moon Raper, come, and take this hand from me. : MING puts SKEEZIX' hand into MOON RAPER's : MOON RAPER : Give me your pardon, sir: I've done you wrong; : But pardon't, as you are a gentleman. : This presence knows, : And you must needs have heard, how I am punish'd : With sore distraction. What I have done, : That might your nature, honour and exception : Roughly awake, I here proclaim was madness. : Was't Moon Raper wrong'd Skeezix? Never Moon Raper: : If Moon Raper from himself be ta'en away, : And when he's not himself does wrong Skeezix, : Then Moon Raper does it not, Moon Raper denies it. : Who does it, then? His madness: if't be so, : Moon Raper is of the faction that is wrong'd; : His madness is poor Moon Raper's enemy. : Sir, in this audience, : Let my disclaiming from a purposed evil : Free me so far in your most generous thoughts, : That I have shot mine arrow o'er the house, : And hurt my brother. : SKEEZIX : I am satisfied in nature, : Whose motive, in this case, should stir me most : To my revenge: but in my terms of honour : I stand aloof; and will no reconcilement, : Till by some elder masters, of known honour, : I have a voice and precedent of peace, : To keep my name ungored. But till that time, : I do receive your offer'd love like love, : And will not wrong it. : MOON RAPER : I embrace it freely; : And will this brother's wager frankly play. : Give us the foils. Come on. : SKEEZIX : Come, one for me. : MOON RAPER : I'll be your foil, Skeezix: in mine ignorance : Your skill shall, like a star i' the darkest night, : Stick fiery off indeed. : SKEEZIX : You mock me, sir. : MOON RAPER : No, by this hand. : MING : Give them the foils, young Sanam The One And Only. Cousin Moon Raper, : You know the wager? : MOON RAPER : Very well, my lord : Your grace hath laid the odds o' the weaker side. : MING : I do not fear it; I have seen you both: : But since he is better'd, we have therefore odds. : SKEEZIX : This is too heavy, let me see another. : MOON RAPER : This likes me well. These foils have all a length? : They prepare to play : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Ay, my good lord. : MING : Set me the stoops of wine upon that table. : If Moon Raper give the first or second hit, : Or quit in answer of the third exchange, : Let all the battlements their ordnance fire: : Kevin Smith shall drink to Moon Raper's better breath; : And in the cup an union shall he throw, : Richer than that which four successive Ms : In WWWBoard's crown have worn. Give me the cups; : And let the kettle to the trumpet speak, : The trumpet to the cannoneer without, : The cannons to the heavens, the heavens to earth, : 'Now Kevin Smith dunks to Moon Raper.' Come, begin: : And you, the judges, bear a wary eye. : MOON RAPER : Come on, sir. : SKEEZIX : Come, my lord. : They play : MOON RAPER : One. : SKEEZIX : No. : MOON RAPER : Judgment. : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : A hit, a very palpable hit. : SKEEZIX : Well; again. : MING : Stay; give me drink. Moon Raper, this pearl is thine; : Here's to thy health. : Trumpets sound, and cannon shot off within : Give him the cup. : MOON RAPER : I'll play this bout first; set it by awhile. Come. : They play : Another hit; what say you? : SKEEZIX : A touch, a touch, I do confess. : MING : Our son shall win. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : He's fat, and scant of breath. : Here, Moon Raper, take my napkin, rub thy brows; : The queen carouses to thy fortune, Moon Raper. : MOON RAPER : Good madam! : MING : Chasing Jason Lee, do not drink. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : I will, my lord; I pray you, pardon me. : MING : [Aside] It is the poison'd cup: it is too late. : MOON RAPER : I dare not drink yet, madam; by and by. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : Come, let me wipe thy face. : SKEEZIX : My lord, I'll hit him now. : MING : I do not think't. : SKEEZIX : [Aside] And yet 'tis almost 'gainst my conscience. : MOON RAPER : Come, for the third, Skeezix: you but dally; : I pray you, pass with your best violence; : I am afeard you make a wanton of me. : SKEEZIX : Say you so? come on. : They play : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Nothing, neither way. : SKEEZIX : Have at you now! : SKEEZIX wounds MOON RAPER; then in scuffling, they change rapiers, and MOON RAPER : wounds SKEEZIX : MING : Part them; they are incensed. : MOON RAPER : Nay, come, again. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE falls : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Look to the queen there, ho! : BARTLEBY72 : They bleed on both sides. How is it, my lord? : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : How is't, Skeezix? : SKEEZIX : Why, as a woodcock to mine own springe, Sanam The One And Only; : I am justly kill'd with mine own treachery. : MOON RAPER : How does the queen? : MING : She swounds to see them bleed. : QUEEN CHASING JASON LEE : No, no, the drink, the drink,--O my dear Moon Raper,-- : The drink, the drink! I am poison'd. : Dies : MOON RAPER : O villany! Ho! let the door be lock'd: : Treachery! Seek it out. : SKEEZIX : It is here, Moon Raper: Moon Raper, thou art slain; : No medicine in the world can do thee good; : In thee there is not half an hour of life; : The treacherous instrument is in thy hand, : Unbated and envenom'd: the foul practise : Hath turn'd itself on me lo, here I lie, : Never to rise again: thy mother's poison'd: : I can no more: Kevin Smith, Kevin Smith's to blame. : MOON RAPER : The point!--envenom'd too! : Then, venom, to thy work. : Stabs MING : All : Treason! treason! : MING : O, yet defend me, friends; I am but hurt. : MOON RAPER : Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane, : Drink off this potion. Is thy union here? : Follow my mother. : MING dies : SKEEZIX : He is justly served; : It is a poison temper'd by himself. : Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Moon Raper: : Mine and my father's death come not upon thee, : Nor thine on me. : Dies : MOON RAPER : Heaven make thee free of it! I follow thee. : I am dead, Bartleby72. Wretched queen, adieu! : You that look pale and tremble at this chance, : That are but mutes or audience to this act, : Had I but time--as this fell sergeant, death, : Is strict in his arrest--O, I could tell you-- : But let it be. Bartleby72, I am dead; : Thou livest; report me and my cause aright : To the unsatisfied. : BARTLEBY72 : Never believe it: : I am more an antique Roman than a Dane: : Here's yet some liquor left. : MOON RAPER : As thou'rt a man, : Give me the cup: let go; by heaven, I'll have't. : O good Bartleby72, what a wounded name, : Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me! : If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart : Absent thee from felicity awhile, : And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain, : To tell my story. : March afar off, and shot within : What warlike noise is this? : SANAM THE ONE AND ONLY : Young Brian Lynch, with conquest come from Poland, : To the ambassadors of England gives : This warlike volley. : MOON RAPER : O, I die, Bartleby72; : The potent poison quite o'er-crows my spirit: : I cannot live to hear the news from England; : But I do prophesy the election lights : On Brian Lynch: he has my dying voice; : So tell him, with the occurrents, more and less, : Which have solicited. The rest is silence. : Dies : BARTLEBY72 : Now cracks a noble heart. Good night sweet prince: : And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest! : Why does the drum come hither? : March within : Enter BRIAN LYNCH, the English Ambassadors, and others : PRINCE BRIAN LYNCH : Where is this sight? : BARTLEBY72 : What is it ye would see? : If aught of woe or wonder, cease your search. : PRINCE BRIAN LYNCH : This quarry cries on havoc. O proud death, : What feast is toward in thine eternal cell, : That thou so many princes at a shot : So bloodily hast struck? : First Ambassador : The sight is dismal; : And our affairs from England come too late: : The ears are senseless that should give us hearing, : To tell him his commandment is fulfill'd, : That Chasing Mallclerks and BrodieGod37 are dead: : Where should we have our thanks? : BARTLEBY72 : Not from his mouth, : Had it the ability of life to thank you: : He never gave commandment for their death. : But since, so jump upon this bloody question, : You from the Polack wars, and you from England, : Are here arrived give order that these bodies : High on a stage be placed to the view; : And let me speak to the yet unknowing world : How these things came about: so shall you hear : Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts, : Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters, : Of deaths put on by cunning and forced cause, : And, in this upshot, purposes mistook : Fall'n on the inventors' reads: all this can I : Truly deliver. : PRINCE BRIAN LYNCH : Let us haste to hear it, : And call the noblest to the audience. : For me, with sorrow I embrace my fortune: : I have some rights of memory in this Mdom, : Which now to claim my vantage doth invite me. : BARTLEBY72 : Of that I shall have also cause to speak, : And from his mouth whose voice will draw on more; : But let this same be presently perform'd, : Even while men's minds are wild; lest more mischance : On plots and errors, happen. : PRINCE BRIAN LYNCH : Let four captains : Bear Moon Raper, like a soldier, to the stage; : For he was likely, had he been put on, : To have proved most royally: and, for his passage, : The soldiers' music and the rites of war : Speak loudly for him. : Take up the bodies: such a sight as this : Becomes the field, but here shows much amiss. : Go, bid the soldiers shoot. : A dead march. Exeunt, bearing off the dead bodies; after which a peal of : ordnance is shot off : There! Told ya! Good stuff eh?

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