SCENE III.
The Country.
Enter Autolicus singing.
When daffadils begin to peere
With heigh the doxy over the dale,
Why then comes in the sweet o' th' year:
For the red blood reigns in the winter's pale.
The white sheet bleaching on the hedge,
With hey the sweet birds, O how they sing:
Doth set my pugging tooth an edge,
For a quart of ale is a dish for a King.
The lark with tirra lyra chaunts,
With hey, with hey the thrush and the jay:
Are summer songs for me and my aunts,
While we lye tumbling in the hay.
I have served prince Florizel, and in my time wore three pile,
but now I am out of service.
But shall I go mourn for that, my dear?
The pale moon shines by night:
And when I wander here and there,
I then do go most right.
-- 605 --
If tinkers may have leave to live,
And bear the sow-skin budget,
Then my account I well may give,
And in the stocks avouch it.
My traffick is sheets; when the kite builds, look to lesser linnen.
My father nam'd me Autolicus, who being, as I am,
litter'd under Mercury, was likewise a snapper-up of unconsider'd
trifles: with die and drab, I purchas'd this caparison, and my
revenue is the silly cheat. Gallows and knock, are too powerful
on the high-way, beating and hanging are terrors to
me: for the life to come, I sleep out the thought of it. A
prize! a prize!
Enter Clown.
Clo.
Let me see, every eleven weather tods, every tod yields
pound and odd shilling; fifteen hundred shorn, what comes
the wooll to?
Aut.
If the sprindge hold, the cock's mine.
[Aside.
Clo.
I cannot do't without compters. Let me see, what am
I to buy for our sheep-shearing feast? three pound of sugar, five
pound of currants, rice—what will this sister of mine do with
rice? but my father hath made her mistress of the feast, and
she lays it on. She hath made me four and twenty nose-gays
for the shearers; three-man song-men all, and very good
ones, but they are most of them means and bases; but one
puritan among them, and he sings psalms to horn-pipes. I
must have saffron to colour the warden-pies, mace—dates—
none—that's out of my note: nutmegs, seven; a race or two
of ginger, but that I may beg; four pound of prunes, and as
many raisins o'th' sun.
Aut.
Oh, that ever I was born.
[Groveling on the ground.
Clo.
I' th' name of me—
-- 606 --
Aut.
Oh help me, help me: pluck but off these rags, and
then death, death—
Clo.
Alack, poor soul, thou hast need of more rags to lay on
thee, rather than have these off.
Aut.
Oh, Sir, the loathsomness of them offends me, more
than the stripes I have receiv'd, which are mighty ones, and
millions.
Clo.
Alas, poor man! a million of beating may come to a
great matter.
Aut.
I am robb'd, Sir, and beaten; my mony and apparel
ta'en from me, and these detestable things put upon me.
Clo.
What, by a horse-man, or a foot-man?
Aut.
A foot-man, sweet Sir, a foot-man.
Clo.
Indeed, he should be a foot-man, by the garments he
has left with thee; if this be a horse-man's coat, it hath seen very
hot service. Lend me thy hand, I'll help thee. Come, lend
me thy hand.
[Helping him up.
Aut.
Oh! good Sir, tenderly, oh!
Clo.
Alas, poor soul.
Aut.
O good Sir, softly, good Sir: I fear, Sir, my shoulder-blade
is out.
Clo.
How now? canst stand?
Aut.
Softly, dear Sir; good Sir, softly; you ha' done me a
charitable office.
Clo.
Dost lack any mony? I have a little mony for thee.
Aut.
No, good sweet Sir: no, I beseech you, Sir; I have a
kinsman not past three quarters of a mile hence, unto whom I
was going; I shall there have mony, or any thing I want: offer
me no mony, I pray you, that kills my heart.
Clo.
What manner of fellow was he that robb'd you?
Aut.
A fellow, Sir, that I have known to go about with trolmy-dames:
I knew him once a servant of the prince; I cannot tell,
-- 607 --
good Sir, for which of his virtues it was, but he was certainly
whipp'd out of the court.
Clo.
His vices, you would say; there's no virtue whipp'd out
of the court; they cherish it to make it stay there, and yet it
will no more but abide.
Aut.
Vices I would say, Sir. I know this man well, he hath
been since an ape-bearer, then a process-server, a bailiff; then
he compast a motion of the prodigal son, and married a tinker's
wife within a mile where my land and living lyes; and having
flown over many knavish professions, he settled only in rogue;
some call him Autolicus.
Clo.
Out upon him, prig! for my life prig; he haunts wakes,
fairs, and bear-baitings.
Aut.
Very true, Sir; he, Sir, he; that's the rogue that put
me into his apparel.
Clo.
Not a more cowardly rogue in all Bohemia; if you had
but look'd big, and spit at him, he'd have run.
Aut.
I must confess to you, Sir, I am no fighter; I am false
of heart that way, and that he knew I warrant him.
Clo.
How do you do now?
Aut.
Sweet Sir, much better than I was; I can stand, and
walk; I will even take my leave of you, and pace softly towards
my kinsman's.
Clo.
Shall I bring thee on thy way?
Aut.
No, good fac'd Sir; no, sweet Sir.
Clo.
Then farewel, I must go to buy spices for our sheep-shearing.
[Exit.
Aut.
Prosper you, sweet Sir. Your purse is not hot enough
to purchase your spice. I'll be with you at your sheep-shearing
too: if I make not this cheat bring out another, and the shearers
prove sheep, let me be unrol'd, and my name put into the
book of virtue.
-- 608 --
SONG.
Jog on, jog on, the foot-path way,
And merrily hent the stile-a.
A merry heart goes all the day,
Your sad tires in a mile-a.
[Exit.
George Sewell [1723–5], The works of Shakespear in six [seven] volumes. Collated and Corrected by the former Editions, By Mr. Pope ([Vol. 7] Printed by J. Darby, for A. Bettesworth [and] F. Fayram [etc.], London) [word count] [S11101].
