No More Learning

_ Yes, a mistress, sir. I'll be his voucher, he has a mistress,
and a fair one too.

_Limb. _ Do you know it, father Aldo.

_Aldo. _ Know it! I know the match is as good as made already: old
Woodall and I are all one. You, son, were sent for over on purpose;
the articles for her jointure are all concluded, and a friend of mine
drew them.

_Limb. _ Nay, if father Aldo knows it, I am satisfied.

_Aldo. _ But how came you by this letter, son Woodall? let me examine
you.

_Wood. _ Came by it! (pox, he has _non-plus'd_ me! ) How do you say I
came by it, father Aldo?

_Aldo. _ Why, there's it, now. This morning I met your mistress's
father, Mr you know who--

_Wood. _ Mr who, sir?

_Aldo. _ Nay, you shall excuse me for that; but we are intimate: his
name begins with some vowel or consonant, no matter which: Well, her
father gave me this very numerical letter, subscribed, for Mr.
Woodall.

_Limb. _ Before George, and so it is.

_Aldo. _ Carry me this letter, quoth he, to your son Woodall; 'tis from
my daughter such a one, and then whispered me her name.

_Wood. _ Let me see; I'll read it once again.

_Limb. _ What, are you not acquainted with the contents of it?

_Wood. _ O, your true lover will read you over a letter from his
mistress, a thousand times.

_Trick. _ Ay, two thousand, if he be in the humour.

_Wood. _ Two thousand! then it must be hers. [_Reads to himself. _]
"Away to your chamber immediately, and I'll give my fool the
slip. "--The fool! that may be either the keeper, or the husband; but
commonly the keeper is the greater. Humh! without subscription! it
must be Tricksy. --Father Aldo, pr'ythee rid me of this coxcomb.

_Aldo. _ Come, son Limberham, we let our friend Brainsick walk too long
alone: Shall we follow him? we must make haste; for I expect a whole
bevy of whores, a chamber-full of temptation this afternoon: 'tis my
day of audience.

_Limb. _ Mr Woodall, we leave you here--you remember?
[_Exeunt_ LIMB. _and_ ALDO.

_Wood. _ Let me alone. --Ladies, your servant; I have a little private
business with a friend of mine.

_Mrs Brain. _ Meaning me. --Well, sir, your servant.

_Trick. _ Your servant, till we meet again. [_Exeunt severally. _


SCENE II. --_Mr_ WOODALL'S _Chamber. _

_Mrs_ BRAINSICK _alone. _

_Mrs Brain. _ My note has taken, as I wished: he will be here
immediately. If I could but resolve to lose no time, out of modesty;
but it is his part to be violent, for both our credits. Never so
little force and ruffling, and a poor weak woman is excused.
[_Noise. _] Hark, I hear him coming. --Ah me! the steps beat double: He
comes not alone. If it should be my husband with him! where shall I
hide myself? I see no other place, but under his bed: I must lie as
silently as my fear will suffer me. Heaven send me safe again to my
own chamber! [_Creeps under the Bed. _

_Enter_ WOODALL _and_ TRICKSY.

_Wood. _ Well, fortune at the last is favourable, and now you are my
prisoner.

_Trick. _ After a quarter of an hour, I suppose, I shall have my
liberty upon easy terms. But pray let us parley a little first.

_Wood. _ Let it be upon the bed then. Please you to sit?

_Trick. _ No matter where; I am never the nearer to your wicked
purpose. But you men are commonly great comedians in love-matters;
therefore you must swear, in the first place--

_Wood. _ Nay, no conditions: The fortress is reduced to extremity; and
you must yield upon discretion, or I storm.

_Trick. _ Never to love any other woman.

_Wood. _ I kiss the book upon it. [_Kisses her. Mrs_ BRAIN. _pinches
him from underneath the Bed. _] Oh, are you at your love-tricks
already? If you pinch me thus, I shall bite your lip.

_Trick. _ I did not pinch you: But you are apt, I see, to take any
occasion of gathering up more close to me. --Next, you shall not so
much as look on Mrs Brainsick.

_Wood. _ Have you done? these covenants are so tedious!

_Trick. _ Nay, but swear then.

_Wood. _ I do promise, I do swear, I do any thing. [_Mrs_ BRAIN. _runs
a pin into him. _] Oh, the devil! what do you mean to run pins into me?
this is perfect caterwauling.

_Trick. _ You fancy all this; I would not hurt you for the world. Come,
you shall see how well I love you. [_Kisses him: Mrs_ BRAIN. _pricks
her. _] Oh! I think you have needles growing in your bed.
[_Both rise up. _

_Wood. _ I will see what is the matter in it.

_Saint. _ [_Within. _] Mr Woodall, where are you, verily?

_Wood. _ Pox verily her! it is my landlady: Here, hide yourself behind
the curtains, while I run to the door, to stop her entry.

_Trick. _ Necessity has no law; I must be patient.
[_She gets into the Bed, and draws the clothes over her. _

_Enter_ SAINTLY.

_Saint. _ In sadness, gentleman, I can hold no longer: I will not keep
your wicked counsel, how you were locked up in the chest; for it lies
heavy upon my conscience, and out it must, and shall.

_Wood. _ You may tell, but who will believe you? where's your witness?

_Saint. _ Verily, heaven is my witness.

_Wood. _ That's your witness too, that you would have allured me to
lewdness, have seduced a hopeful young man, as I am; you would have
enticed youth: Mark that, beldam.

_Saint. _ I care not; my single evidence is enough to Mr Limberham; he
will believe me, that thou burnest in unlawful lust to his beloved: So
thou shalt be an outcast from my family.

_Wood. _ Then will I go to the elders of thy church, and lay thee open
before them, that thou didst feloniously unlock that chest, with
wicked intentions of purloining: So thou shalt be excommunicated from
the congregation, thou Jezebel, and delivered over to Satan.

_Saint. _ Verily, our teacher will not excommunicate me, for taking the
spoils of the ungodly, to clothe him; for it is a judged case amongst
us, that a married woman may steal from her husband, to relieve a
brother. But yet them mayest atone this difference betwixt us; verily,
thou mayest.

_Wood. _ Now thou art tempting me again. Well, if I had not the gift of
continency, what might become of me?

_Saint. _ The means have been offered thee, and thou hast kicked with
the heel. I will go immediately to the tabernacle of Mr Limberham, and
discover thee, O thou serpent, in thy crooked paths. [_Going. _

_Wood. _ Hold, good landlady, not so fast; let me have time to consider
on't; I may mollify, for flesh is frail. An hour or two hence we will
confer together upon the premises.

_Saint. _ Oh, on the sudden, I feel myself exceeding sick! Oh! oh!

_Wood. _ Get you quickly to your closet, and fall to your _mirabilis_;
this is no place for sick people. Begone, begone!

_Saint. _ Verily, I can go no farther.

_Wood. _ But you shall, verily. I will thrust you down, out of pure
pity.

_Saint. _ Oh, my eyes grow dim! my heart quops, and my back acheth!
here I will lay me down, and rest me.
[_Throws herself suddenly down upon the Bed;_
TRICKSY _shrieks, and rises; Mrs_ BRAIN.
_rises from under the Bed in a fright. _

_Wood. _ So! here's a fine business! my whole seraglio up in arms!

_Saint. _ So, so; if Providence had not sent me hither, what folly had
been this day committed!

_Trick. _ Oh the old woman in the oven! we both overheard your pious
documents: Did we not, Mrs Brainsick?

_Mrs Brain. _ Yes, we did overhear her; and we will both testify
against her.

_Wood. _ I have nothing to say for her. Nay, I told her her own; you
can both bear me witness. If a sober man cannot be quiet in his own
chamber for her--

_Trick. _ For, you know, sir, when Mrs Brainsick and I over-heard her
coming, having been before acquainted with her wicked purpose, we both
agreed to trap her in it.

_Mrs Brain. _ And now she would 'scape herself, by accusing us! but let
us both conclude to cast an infamy upon her house, and leave it.

_Saint.
_ Sweet Mr Woodall, intercede for me, or I shall be ruined.

_Wood. _ Well, for once I'll be good-natured, and try my interest. --
Pray, ladies, for my sake, let this business go no farther.

_Trick. and Mrs Brain. _ You may command us.

_Wood. _ For, look you, the offence was properly to my person; and
charity has taught me to forgive my enemies. I hope, Mrs Saintly, this
will be a warning to you, to amend your life: I speak like a
Christian, as one that tenders the welfare of your soul.

_Saint. _ Verily, I will consider.

_Wood. _ Why, that is well said. --[_Aside. _] Gad, and so must I too;
for my people is dissatisfied, and my government in danger: But this
is no place for meditation. --Ladies, I wait on you. [_Exeunt. _


ACT IV. --SCENE I.

_Enter_ ALDO _and_ GEOFFERY.

_Aldo. _ Despatch, Geoffery, despatch: The outlying punks will be upon
us, ere I am in a readiness to give audience. Is the office well
provided?

_Geoff. _ The stores are very low, sir: Some dolly petticoats, and
manteaus we have; and half a dozen pair of laced shoes, bought from
court at second hand.

_Aldo. _ Before George, there is not enough to rig out a mournival of
whores: They'll think me grown a mere curmudgeon. Mercy on me, how
will this glorious trade be carried on, with such a miserable stock!

_Geoff. _ I hear a coach already stopping at the door.

_Aldo. _ Well, somewhat in ornament for the body, somewhat in counsel
for the mind; one thing must help out another, in this bad world:
Whoring must go on.

_Enter Mrs_ OVERDON, _and her Daughter_ PRUE.

_Mrs Over. _ Ask blessing, Prue: He is the best father you ever had.

_Aldo. _ Bless thee, and make thee a substantial, thriving whore. Have
your mother in your eye, Prue; it is good to follow good example. How
old are you, Prue? Hold up your head, child.

_Pru. _ Going o'my sixteen, father Aldo.

_Aldo. _ And you have been initiated but these two years: Loss of time,
loss of precious time! Mrs Overdon, how much have you made of Prue,
since she has been man's meat?

_Mrs Over. _ A very small matter, by my troth; considering the charges
I have been at in her education: Poor Prue was born under an unlucky
planet; I despair of a coach for her. Her first maiden-head brought me
in but little, the weather-beaten old knight, that bought her of me,
beat down the price so low. I held her at an hundred guineas, and he
bid ten; and higher than thirty would not rise.

_Aldo. _ A pox of his unlucky handsel! He can but fumble, and will not
pay neither.

_Pru. _ Hang him; I could never endure him, father: He is the filthiest
old goat; and then he comes every day to our house, and eats out his
thirty guineas; and at three months end, he threw me off.

_Mrs Over. _ And since then, the poor child has dwindled, and dwindled
away. Her next maiden-head brought me but ten; and from ten she fell
to five; and at last to a single guinea: She has no luck to keeping;
they all leave her, the more my sorrow.

_Aldo. _ We must get her a husband then in the city; they bite rarely
at a stale whore at this end of the town, new furbished up in a tawdry
manteau.

_Mrs Over. _ No: Pray let her try her fortune a little longer in the
world first: By my troth, I should be loth to be at all this cost, in
her French, and her singing, to have her thrown away upon a husband.

_Aldo. _ Before George, there can come no good of your swearing, Mrs
Overdon: Say your prayers, Prue, and go duly to church o'Sundays,
you'll thrive the better all the week. Come, have a good heart, child;
I will keep thee myself: Thou shalt do my little business; and I'll
find thee an able young fellow to do thine.

_Enter Mrs_ PAD.

Daughter Pad, you are welcome: What, you have performed the last
Christian office to your keeper; I saw you follow him up the heavy
hill to Tyburn. Have you had never a business since his death?

_Mrs Pad. _ No indeed, father; never since execution-day. The night
before, we lay together most lovingly in Newgate; and the next morning
he lift up his eyes, and prepared his soul with a prayer, while one
might tell twenty; and then mounted the cart as merrily, as if he had
been going for a purse.

_Aldo. _ You are a sorrowful widow, daughter Pad; but I'll take care of
you. --Geoffery, see her rigged out immediately for a new voyage: Look
in figure 9, in the upper drawer, and give her out the flowered
justacorps, with the petticoat belonging to it.

_Mrs Pad. _ Could you not help to prefer me, father?

_Aldo. _ Let me see--let me see:--Before George, I have it, and it
comes as pat too! Go me to the very judge that sate upon him; it is an
amorous, impotent old magistrate, and keeps admirably. I saw him leer
upon you from the bench: He will tell you what is sweeter than
strawberries and cream, before you part.

_Enter Mrs_ TERMAGANT.

_Mrs Term. _ O father, I think I shall go mad.

_Aldo. _ You are of the violentest temper, daughter Termagant! When had
you a business last?

_Mrs Term. _ The last I had was with young Caster, that son-of-a-whore
gamester: he brought me to taverns, to draw in young cullies, while he
bubbled them at play; and, when he had picked up a considerable sum,
and should divide, the cheating dog would sink my share, and
swear,--Damn him, he won nothing.

_Aldo. _ Unconscionable villain, to cozen you in your own calling!

_Mrs Term. _ When he loses upon the square, he comes home zoundsing and
blooding; first beats me unmercifully, and then squeezes me to the
last penny. He has used me so, that, Gad forgive me, I could almost
forswear my trade. The rogue starves me too: He made me keep Lent last
year till Whitsuntide, and out-faced me with oaths it was but Easter.
And what mads me most, I carry a bastard of the rogue's in my belly;
and now he turns me off, and will not own it.

_Mrs Over. _ Lord, how it quops! you are half a year gone, madam. --
[_Laying her hand on her belly. _

_Mrs Term. _ I feel the young rascal kicking already, like his
father. --Oh, there is an elbow thrusting out: I think, in my
conscience, he is palming and topping in my belly; and practising for
a livelihood, before he comes into the world.

_Aldo. _ Geoffery, set her down in the register, that I may provide her
a mid-wife, and a dry and wet nurse: When you are up again, as heaven
send you a good hour, we will pay him off at law, i'faith. You have
him under black and white, I hope?

_Mrs Term. _ Yes, I have a note under his hand for two hundred pounds.

_Aldo. _ A note under his hand! that is a chip in porridge; it is just
nothing. --Look, Geoffery, to the figure 12, for old half-shirts for
childbed linen.

_Enter Mrs_ HACKNEY.

_Hack. _ O, madam Termagant, are you here? Justice, father Aldo,
justice!

_Aldo. _ Why, what is the matter, daughter Hackney?

_Hack. _ She has violated the law of nations; for yesterday she
inveigled my own natural cully from me, a married lord, and made him
false to my bed, father.

_Term. _ Come, you are an illiterate whore. He is my lord now; and,
though you call him fool, it is well known he is a critic,
gentlewoman. You never read a play in all your life; and I gained him
by my wit, and so I'll keep him.

_Hack. _ My comfort is, I have had the best of him; he can take up no
more, till his father dies: And so, much good may do you with my
cully, and my clap into the bargain.

_Aldo. _ Then there is a father for your child, my lord's son and heir
by Mr Caster. But henceforward, to preserve peace betwixt you, I
ordain, that you shall ply no more in my daughter Hackney's quarters:
You shall have the city, from White-Chapel to Temple-Bar, and she
shall have to Covent-Garden downwards: At the play-houses, she shall
ply the boxes, because she has the better face; and you shall have the
pit, because you can prattle best out of a vizor mask.

_Mrs Pad. _ Then all friends, and confederates. Now let us have father
Aldo's delight, and so adjourn the house.

_Aldo. _ Well said, daughter. --Lift up your voices, and sing like
nightingales, you tory rory jades. Courage, I say; as long as the
merry pence hold out, you shall none of you die in Shoreditch.

_Enter_ WOODALL.

A hey, boys, a hey! here he comes, that will swinge you all! down, you
little jades, and worship him; it is the genius of whoring.

_Wood. _ And down went chairs and table, and out went every candle. Ho,
brave old patriarch in the middle of the church militant! whores of
all sorts; forkers and ruin-tailed: Now come I gingling in with my
bells, and fly at the whole covey.

_Aldo. _ A hey, a hey, boys! the town's thy own; burn, ravish, and
destroy!

_Wood. _ We will have a night of it, like Alexander, when he burnt
Persepolis: _tuez, tuez, tuez! point de quartier. _
[_He runs in amongst them, and they scuttle about the room. _

_Enter_ SAINTLY, PLEASANCE, JUDITH, _with Broom-sticks. _

_Saint. _ What, in the midst of Sodom! O thou lewd young man! my
indignation boils over against these harlots; and thus I sweep them
from out my family.

_Pleas. _ Down with the Suburbians, down with them.

_Aldo. _ O spare my daughters, Mrs Saintly! Sweet Mrs Pleasance, spare
my flesh and blood!

_Wood. _ Keep the door open, and help to secure the retreat, father:
There is no pity to be expected. [_The Whores run out, followed by_
SAINTLY, PLEASANCE, _and_ JUDITH.

_Aldo. _ Welladay, welladay! one of my daughters is big with bastard,
and she laid at her gascoins most unmercifully! every stripe she had,
I felt it: The first fruit of whoredom is irrecoverably lost!

_Wood. _ Make haste, and comfort her.

_Aldo. _ I will, I will; and yet I have a vexatious business, which
calls me first another way. The rogue, my son, is certainly come over;
he has been seen in town four days ago.

_Wood. _ It is impossible: I'll not believe it.

_Aldo. _ A friend of mine met his old man, Giles, this very morning, in
quest of me; and Giles assured him, his master is lodged in this very
street.

_Wood. _ In this very street! how knows he that?

_Aldo. _ He dogged him to the corner of it; and then my son turned
back, and threatened him. But I'll find out Giles, and then I'll make
such an example of my reprobate! [_Exit. _

_Wood. _ If Giles be discovered, I am undone! --Why, Gervase, where are
you, sirrah! Hey, hey!

_Enter_ GERVASE.

Run quickly to that betraying rascal Giles, a rogue, who would take
Judas's bargain out of his hands, and undersell him. Command him
strictly to mew himself up in his lodgings, till farther orders: and
in case he be refractory, let him know, I have not forgot to kick and
cudgel. That _memento_ would do well for you too, sirrah.

_Gerv. _ Thank your worship; you have always been liberal of your hands
to me.

_Wood. _ And you have richly deserved it.

_Gerv. _ I will not say, who has better deserved it of my old master.

_Wood. _ Away, old Epictetus, about your business, and leave your musty
morals, or I shall--

_Gerv. _ Nay, I won't forfeit my own wisdom so far as to suffer for it.
Rest you merry: I'll do my best, and heaven mend all.