Enter Onion, Juniper, Valentine, Sebastian,
Balthasar, Martino.
Oni.
Come on, i'faith, let's to some exer-
cise or other, my hearts.
Fetch the hilts; fellow Juniper, wilt thou
play?
[ Exit Martino.
Junip.
I cannot resolve you; 'tis as I am
fitted with the ingenuity, quantity, or qua-
lity of the cudgel.
Val.
How dost thou bastinado the poor
cudgel with terms!
Junip.
O Ingle, I have the phrases, man,
and the anagrams, and the epitaphs, fitting
the mystery of the noble science.
Oni.
I'll be hang'd an' he were not misbe-
gotten of some fencer.
Seb.
Sirrah, Valentine, you can resolve
me now, have they their masters of defence
in other countries, as we have here in Italy?
Val.
O lord, I; especially they in Utopia:
there they perform their prizes and chal-
lenges with as great ceremony as the Italian,
or any nation else.
Balt.
Indeed! how is the manner of it,
for god's love, good Valentine?
Junip.
Ingle, I prithee make recourse
unto us; we are thy friends and familiars,
sweet Ingle.
Val.
Why thus, sir.
Oni.
God a mercy, good Valentine; nay,
go on.
Junip.
Silentium bonus socius Onionus,
good fellow Onion, be not so ingenious and
turbulent. So, sir; and how? how, sweet
Ingle?
Val.
Marry, first they are brought to the
public theatre.
Junip.
What! ha' they theatres there?
Val.
Theatres! I, and plays too, both
tragedy and comedy, and set forth with as
much state as can be imagined.
Junip.
By god's so, a man is nobody till
he has travell'd.
Seb.
And how are their plays? as ours
are? extemporal?
Val.
O no; all premeditated things, and
some of them very good, i' faith; my
master used to visit them often when he
was there.
Balt.
Why how, are they in a place where
any man may see them?
Val.
I, in the common theatres, I tell
you. But the sport is at a new play, to ob-
serve the sway and variety of opinion that
passeth it. A man shall have such a con-
fus'd mixture of judgment, pour'd out in
the throng there, as ridiculous as laughter
itself. One says he likes not the writing,
another likes not the plot, another not the
playing: and sometimes a fellow, that
comes not there past once in five years, at a
parliament time, or so, will be as deep mired
in censuring as the best, and swear by god's
foot he would never stir his foot to see a
hundred such as that is.
Oni.
I must travel to see these things, I
shall never think well of myself else.
Junip.
Fellow Onion, I'll bear thy charges,
and thou wilt but pilgrimize it along with
me to the land of Utopia.
Seb.
Why but methinks such rooks as
these should be ashamed to judge.
Val.
Not a whit; the rankest stinkard of
them all will take upon him as peremptory,
as if he had writ himself in artibus magister.
Seb.
And do they stand to a popular cen-
sure for any thing they present?
Val.
I, ever, ever; and the people gene-
rally are very acceptive, and apt to applaud
any meritable work; but there are two sorts
of persons that most commonly are infectious
to a whole auditory.
Balt.
What be they?
Junip.
I, come, let's know them.
Oni.
It were good they were noted.
Val.
Marry, one is the rude barbarous
crew, a people that have no brains, and yet
grounded judgments; these will hiss any
thing that mounts above their grounded ca-
pacities; but the other are worth the obser-
vation, i' faith.
Omnes.
Where be they? where be they?
Val.
Faith, a few capricious gallants.
Junip.
Capricious! stay, that word's for
me.
Val.
And they have taken such a habit of
dislike in all things, that they will approve
nothing, be it never so conceited or elabo-
rate; but sit dispersed, making faces and
spitting, wagging their upright ears, and cry,
filthy, filthy; simply uttering their own con-
dition, and 2 using their wryed countenances
instead of a vice, to turn the good aspects of
all that shall sit near them, from what they
behold.
Enter Martino with cudgels.
Oni.
O that's well said; lay them down;
come, sirs,
Who plays, fellow Juniper, Sebastian, Balthasar?
Somebody take them up, come.
Junip.
Ingle, Valentine?
Val.
Not I, sir, I profess it not.
Junip.
Sebastian.
Seb.
Balthasar.
Balt.
Who? I?
Oni.
Come, but one bout; I'll give 'em
thee, i' faith.
Balt.
Why here's Martino.
Oni.
Foh, he! alas! he cannot play a
whit, man.
Junip.
That's all one; no more could
you in statu quo prius.
Martino, play with him; every man has his
beginning and conduction.
Mart.
Will you not hurt me, fellow
Onion?
Oni.
Hurt thee? no; and I do, put me
among pot-herbs,
And chop me to pieces. Come on.
Junip.
By your favour, sweet bullies, give
them room, back, so.
Martino, do not look so thin upon the matter.
Oni.
Ha! well play'd, fall over to my
leg now: so, to your guard again: excel-
lent! to my head now: make home your
blow: spare not me, make it home, good,
good again.
Seb.
Why how now, Peter!
Val.
Godso, Onion has caught a bruise.
Junip.
Couragio! be not capricious;
what!
Oni.
Capricious! not I, I scorn to be ca-
pricious for a scratch,
Martino must have another bout; come.
Val. Seb. Balt. No, no, play no more,
play no more.
Oni.
Foh, 'tis nothing, a fillip, a devise;
fellow Juniper, prithee get me a plantan; I
had rather play with one that had skill by
half.
Mart.
By my troth, fellow Onion, 'twas
against my will.
Oni.
Nay, that's not so, 'twas against my
head;
But come, we'll ha' one bout more.
Junip.
Not a bout, not a stroke.
Omnes.
No more, no more.
Junip.
Why I'll give you demonstration
how it came,
Thou openedst thy dagger to falsify over
with the backsword trick, and he interrupt-
ed before he could fall to the close.
Oni.
No, no, I know best how it was,
better than any man here. I felt his play
presently; for look you, I gathered upon
him thus, thus, do you see? for the double
lock, and took it single on the head.
Val.
He says very true, he took it single
on the head.
Seb.
Come, let's go.
Enter Martino with a cobweb.
Mart.
Here, fellow Onion, here's a cob-
web.
2 Using their wryed countenances instead of a vice.] We have this sentiment again, expressed in the same words, in the induction to Every man out of his humour:
"Using his wryed looks,
"In nature of a vice, to wrest and turn
"The good aspect of those that shall sit near him."
And this shews The case is altered to have been in the number of Jonson's earliest productions; for we often find him repeating a thought or expression in his later plays, which he had before made use of, in some former piece.
Oni.
How! a cobweb, Martino! I will
have another bout with you. 'Swounds, do
you first break my head, and then give me
a plaster in scorn? Come, to it, I will have
a bout.
Mart.
God's my witness.
Oni.
Tut, your witness cannot serve.
Junip.
'Sblood, why what! thou art not
lunatic, art thou? and thou be'st, avoid,
Mephostophilus. Say the sign should be in
Aries now, as it may be for all us, where
were your life? answer me that?
Seb.
He says well, Onion.
Val.
Indeed does he.
Junip.
Come, come, you are a foolish na-
turalist; go, get a white of an egg, and a
little flax, and close the breach of the head,
it is the most conducible thing that can be.
Martino,
do not insinuate upon your good
fortune, but play an honest part, and bear
away the bucklers.
[ Exeunt.