THE
COURT
BEGGAR.
Dramatis Personæ.
|
| Sir Andrew MENDICANT,gg6018an old Knight, turned a Projectorgg3780. |
| Mr. COURT-WIT, a Complimentern5610gg3776. |
| Mr. SWAIN-WITgg6019, a blunt Country Gentleman. |
| Mr. CIT-WIT, a Citizen'sgg3777 Son that supposes himself a wit. |
| Mr. DAINTY, a supposed Picture-drawer,gg3778 but a Pick-pocket. |
| Sir RAPHAEL, an old Knight that talks much and would be thought wise. |
| Sir FERDINAND, a Knight distractedgg2573 for love of the Lady Strangelove. |
| FREDERICK, in love with Charissa. |
| GABRIEL, servant to Mendicant. |
| DOCTOR of Physic.gg3779 |
| Three poor PROJECTORSgg4304. |
| A BOY. |
| A SERVANT. |
| A Sow-gelder.gg2258 |
Lady STRANGELOVE, a humorousgg150 widow, that loved to be courted. |
| PHILOMEL,n9747 her Chambermaid.gg3782 |
| CHARISSA,n9865 Mendicant's Daughter. |
Prologue.
2Prologue.We’ve cause to fear yours, or the Poet’s frown
For of late days (he knows not how) you’re grown,
Deeply in love with a new strain of wit
Which he condemns, at least disliketh it,
And solemnly protests you are to blame
If at his hands you do expect the same.
He’ll tread his usual way: no gaudygg3781 scene
Shall give instructions,gg3784 what his plot doth mean.n8336
Forcing your pity to a sigh or smile,n8335
But a slight piece of mirth; yet such were writ
By our great masters of the stage and wit,
Whom you approved. Let not your suffrage,gg3783 then,
Condemn’t in him, and praise’t in other men.
’Troth,gg257 gentlemen, let me advise you, spare
To vexgs700 the poet full of age and care,
How he might strive to please you and beguilegs1707
His humorousgs701 expectation with a smile,
As if you would be satisfied, although
His comedy contains no anticn5611 show.
Yet you to him your favour may express
As well as unto those whose forwardnessgg3785
Makes them your creaturesgg40 thought,n9715 who in a way
To purchase fame give money with their play.n5612
Yet you sometimes pay dear for’t, since they write
Less for your pleasure than their own delight,
Which if our poet fail in, may he be
A scene of mirth in their next comedy.n10119
ACT ONE
[Enter] MENDICANT [and] CHARISSA.
Heaven knows with my much sorrow. Such a lover,
So in all points deserving of true worth,
And best
endowmentsgg3789 to make up a man
That I shall never see——your pardon, sir,
Though you pulled back, by violence, my hand,
In which my heart was freely given to him,
It is not in your power or strength of art
To beat a sigh back, or restrain a tear
Which I must offer to his memory.
5MendicantSuch storms soon waste themselves in absent lovers
When light of reason and good counsel shall
Break forth and shine upon ’em; and for your part,
Daughter, I know it shall. And,
presently,gg103
I thus begin to
dissipategg3790 your errors:
You love this Frederick.
8CharissaMy love emboldens me to tell you he is.
Deficient in that only
absolutegs703 point
That must maintain a lady, an estate?
To take you with, than a
wildgg3834 head of hair;
Hung in his hatbands, might set up a peddlar?n5665
Can this maintain a lady?
Upon his outside, sir.
Been over
inwardlygs1708 acquainted with him.
14CharissaSir, he has valour, wit, and honour: you well know
He’s of a noble family
extracted.gg3799
15MendicantWhat’s that a year? Those parts may be acquired
In winning of a strumpet. But what
jointuregg1144
Can he
propoundgg5765 to you? or (in case he dies,
Your
dowrygs704 being spent) what personal estate
Is’t like he’ll leave you, but his powder
glass,gg4642
His comb and beard-brush, and perhaps a trunkful
No, let him go: discard him, and embrace
The hopes that I have for thee in the hopeful,
Scholar (and what not!) brave Sir Ferdinando:
There’s a man rising in the favour royal,
And may in thee, Charissa, make me happy.
16CharissaSir, you have given me liberty of speech
And may be pleased to let me tell you now:
You aim at your own fortune, not at mine.
All that I shall call mine must be thine own.
I be not thought too
loosegs1718 in my obedience.
Your state by
court-suits,gg3802 begging as some call it,
And for that end you left your country life,
And lands too, ever since my mother died,
Who while she lived with best of woman’s judgement
Which held you from that course of selling fair
Possessions to enable you with money
To purchase
witn5658 at court——n5659 You pardon me?
Large fruitful fields, rich meadows and sweet pastures
Well cropped with corn and stocked as well with cattle,
A park well stored with deer too, and fishponds in’t,
And
all this for a lodginggg4144 in the Strandn5660 now——
But do I not offend?
24CharissaYour own fed beeves and muttons, fowl and poultry
Loaded your
long boardsn9748 then; and you had then
Neighbours could boast your hospitality,
And poor, that for the remnants prayed for you.
Now all concludes upon a two-dished table.
And whereas then you had a numerous
familygg3804
Of servants and attendants, out of which
For profit or for pleasure you could call
Your
bailiff,gg3805 groom, your falconer, or your huntsman,
Now, sir, a
varletgg1100 coachman and footboy
Are all your retinue; and for the hounds
You kept, that made you sport and
music,n9868 now
None but your project
beagles,gg3806 that smell out
Where such a
forfeituregg3807 is to be begged;
Where one would purchase a reprieve, another
A pardon or a lease of life rope-free
For ready money; then where goods or lands
Are found of
men that make away themselves;n5661
And so of
fools and madmen.n5662 All to set
Your trade of begging up, and still you beg;
But
your own want of favourn9869 holds you back
From reaching any profit by’t, because
You beg by mediators’ tongues, which you
Call favourites, who reap the crop of all,
And leave you but the gleanings, some small pittance
To keep alive the itch of begging in you–
26CharissaStill wasting your own fortunes, till at last
You have no hopeful
projectgs707 left to thrive by
But to put me upon this supposed favourite
To beg for you when it is doubtful yet
Whether he’ll take me with the dowry which
Mine uncle left me, though you add your projects.
27MendicantThe noble gallant loves thee, girl, and holds
Thy person and thy virtues dowry enough.
And at this instant
singularlygg3809 devoted
Unto that
humorousgg150 lady, the young widow.
To draw all men's affections to her service,
And then abuses all by scorns or slightings,
And this (they say) has made him almost mad.
Married to him better than so.
How now!
Ha’ you seen the noble knight from me?
How did he entertain my message? ha!
Why speakst thou not? what answer has he sent?
32GabrielHe’s not, sir, to be spoken with or seen
To any purpose, but by his physicians.
Where are my hopes?
He is, nor can himself give any account
Of his condition, for he is mad, sir.
As you can think a courtier must be
That is more mad than all the rest.
The cause?
38GabrielThat, sir, has puzzled all the doctors
In weighing all his several wild
affections.gg2534
One finds he was ambitious of Court favour
And guesses he was crossed in some great suit.
Another takes him as he was a soldier
And losing cost and
travailgs1487 in the war
Must lose his wits for that. A third
collectsgs1709
He was a poet that drunk too deep of
Helicon,gg3359
And turned his brain in climbing of
Parnassus.gg5453
A fourth, considering that he was a gamester
Long and much favoured, and upraised by fortune
To mountainous heaps of gold, conjectures that
Some late unlucky hand or chance at play
Hath with his money swept his wit away.
Or shake his settled judgement or his temper.
40GabrielThen, sir, a fifth and youngest head among
The learned men (what call you him for a doctor?
He that affects gay clothes and
Flanders laces,n9749
Has known this noble patient to have been
An extreme
amorist,gg3811 desperately devoted
Unto the service of some threescore ladies,
And honoured every one the most in costly presents,
Banquets and verses, and thinks the disdain
Of one or all of them has turned his brain.
41CharissaI told you, sir, the cause before, and named
That humorous lady for it, whom in heart
I can no less than thank.
And stir not from my chamber,
ongg3812 my blessing,
Till my return, nor admit any one
Unto a conference with you.
Me little comfort, I am sure I shall
Afford them none. Now, sirs, your business?
Enter PROJECTORS 1, 2, and 3.
To crave the knowledge of what good success
Your honour finds in our late suits, my Lord.
In a short space of time: the world holds no
Proportion else, nor shall it more be said
That money can buy land, or great estates
In lands and
manor-housesgg3816 be called lordships.
52Gabriel [Aside] So now
the game’s afoot. They hunt in full cry.n9750
57Gabriel [Aside] Their lives and credits, ha, ha, ha!
Shall bring in fifty thousand pounds to us,
An hundred thousand to yourself, and to
The coffers royal for full seven years’ space
Sixty-four thousand seven hundred
eighty-three pounds, seven shillings, ninepence,
ha'penny farthing per annumgg5458n8345
[PROJECTOR proffers a scroll.]n9243 ’Tis here already
cast,gg5628 which to make good
We’ll venture lives and goods–
MENDICANT takes the scroll and peruses it.n9242
Your lives and goods, your wives and children, gentlemen!
That’s too deep set, and questions the King’s mercy:
Methinks it were enough, for non-performance
You would submit your bodies to perpetual
Imprisonment at the King’s
chargegg2323 and leave
Your wives and children to their several parishes.n9751
You are still faithless, sir, in all projects.
Daily brought in and be continually
Troubled with the receipts (if you may be trusted
That have so little faith), when you shall soil
Yet find the lickings of ’em sweet, you’ll then
Sing other notes.
To put you to some
teller’sgg6020 clerk to teach you
64GabrielDo you hear, sir? Can you give me two sixpences
For a shilling—or any single money?gg3820
And there you have the treasure of the
Indies,n9756
Of deeper value, could it be digged out,
Than all the Hollanders have waited for
These seven years out of the Spanish plate fleetsn8346.
68GabrielBut put mine eye out (now I dare you to’t)
With any single piece of
ready money.gg1245
With his old misbelief. But still we doubt not
Your honourable good opinion of us.
Nay, the whole
platformgg3822 of a stately city,
Or a design to conquer a whole nation!
But do you note the grounds, the rules and reasons,
First for the easiness of the several grants–
Both to the King and us–
First, this for
perukes:gg3823 the monopoly
Of making all the perukes male and female,
Through court and kingdom.
Of no diseased or infectious stuff, of dead or living,
No verminous or
sluttishgg3826 locks or combings,
But harmless and sound hair, of innocent
And wholesome people.
From gallows, nor hospitals, from whence
They have had great supplies.
Said very well, for here’s a reformation
Of that abuse intended in these words
‘Innocent’ and ‘wholesome’.
To wear a friend’s hair so departed, as
You his or your wife yours, may’t not be had?
Procure the hair and bring it from the gallows
To th’office, and it may be done accordingly.
84GabrielYou have in that said very well, sir, too.
Profit will rise i’th’ general use of ’em,
And multiplicity that will be worn
By people of all sorts, degrees and ages:
The old to hide their natural baldness, and
The young and middle-aged their artificial
Or accidental.
That none shall be esteemed so sound or wise
As public wearers of them: which to
effectuategg3824
’Tis requisite that you obtain a
mandategg3825
Unto all courtiers that would be thought wise
To wear false hair, because
clownsgs1322 have been noted
To talk like fools or madmen in their own.
Touching new fashions of apparel — suits,
Hats, boots, swords, belts, ribbons, et cetera—
Tuppence on every
severalgs1046 piece he sells
Of any such new fashion the first year?
Per annum?gg5458 Can you guess?
The father pay a
groat,gg75 to hearten men
To live soberly and get soldiers.
For building a new theatre or play-house
Upon the Thames, on barges or flat boatsn8347
To help the watermen out of the loss
They’ve suffered by
sedans,gg6024 under which project
The subject groans, when for the ease of one
Two abler men must suffer, and not the price
Or pride of horse-flesh or coach-hire abated.n8348
This shall bring floods of gain to th’ watermen
Of which they’ll give a fourth of every fare
They shall
boardgg6023 at the floating theatre,
Or set ashore from thence, the poets and actors
Half of their first year’s profits.
That may be freely given out of the
City,gg3452
To have but this assurance, that hereafter
They may
engrossgg3828 the getting of their own
Children, by order ta’en that
cavaliersgg3829
And courtiers may no more invade
Or mix with tradesmen’s wives, whereby ’tis thought
So many City prodigals have been gotten,
Only the thrifty country gentlemen
To be excepted, for by them ’tis guessed
So many citizens grow landed men.
103GabrielWere not they gotten by projectors, think you?
I do allow’t in him—
All that is put to me by way of project
To
put me bygs1715 all further hopes in ’em:
For (with heart’s grief I speak it) he by whom
I only hoped to climb (alas!) is fallen.
Is he now fallen besiden9716 himself?
In lieu of all your service but
begn5667 him?
Will prevent me.
My Lord, you shall disburse but twenty
pieces.gg80
So plain that you shall say all’s yours,
Before you stir a foot.
Till he has tired himself, he shall return,
And say all’s lost: is’t not so, gentlemen?
Off o’ his benefit, by disheart’ning him
In this small venture. [To MENDICANT] Will you then be pleased
To give us but ten pieces?gg80
And
stand no longer thus in your own light.n9758
128MendicantMy answers cannot please you.
[To GABRIEL] Answer ’em you.
129Gabriel [To PROJECTORS] I wonder how you, having stretched your throats
With the loud sounds of thousands, hundred thousands,
Can, after all, so faintly whisper forth
One piece, and that as much in vain, as all
The
massygg3827 sums, for all but brings you nothing.
It shows you gentlemen of resolute patience
And would take thankfully, I warrant you,
An odd
half-crowngg5426 amongst you; and what say you
To every man a kick
on the condition?n8305
What say you to one with t’other?
Shall lose your master a hundred thousand pound.
And come again. My master was
Your Lord even now, as he was lord of beggars.
133GabrielOut, hundreds, thousands, ten thousands, hundred thousands, millions, ten millions, millions upon millions!
Away! I’ll stamp your buttocks into coin else.
[GABRIEL kicks out at] PROJECTORS[, who] exit. n9244
The devil ride that hindmostn10117 of ’em, for
As th’art my servant and my loving kinsman–
135GabrielTo follow you in all things but in projects.
Nor any entrance be allowed to Frederick
To re-entangle her in his love. I know
Thy virtue and thy valour can make good
My trust imposedgg2799 in thee.
But, good sir, no more projects!
On which I’ll
set my rest.gg5435 Thou’lt say ’tis good.
It can be nothing.
By which I will advance my house and name.Exit [MENDICANT].
141GabrielThe beggar’s best is that he feels no shame:
’Sprecious,gg4751 what mean you? Ha’ you forgot so soon
Your father’s strict command, and he scarce gone yet?
I saw him at the window making this way.
A master, though you can neglect a father.
And need the pity of a friend.
And will do no more than you know how to ask
For your own good. I understand your cause
And can
relievegg5438 you, if you’ll yield to counsel.
Though you
observegg1525 my father, who, I fear,
Has not a father’s love towards me.
And all his
travailn10122 is for your advancement;
But he goes blindfold on unprosperous ways
Led by credulity. Projects! Pox o’ projects
The patron of his projects is (it seems)
Pepperedgg6027 with madness. ’Tis but justice on him;
And now I’ll give you a secret if you’ll promise
To be ruled by me.
Ne’er sought you for a wife, but to have whored you
(That is the English on’t); and to appear
A right great man in th’act, he would ha’ made
By hopes and promises your credulous father
The instrument of your prostitution,
Which to effect (though still he undertook
His hopeful projects) cunning lawyer-like
He
crossedgs1181 or lost him still in all, on purpose
That poverty at length might urge him to
Give you to his dispose.gg2130
153GabrielYou’ll never see him more, then. Go to your chamber.
A little patience and he shall be yours.
When cooling hopes are cast on hot desire.Exit [CHARISSA].
155GabrielPoor heart! I pity her and will labour for her.
Enter FREDERICK.
Thy master absent, whom I saw, in haste
Now passing towards the court. Where’s my Charissa?
159GabrielMay not! nay, must not, shall not, see her.
Warrants me speak it, sir.
[FREDERICK] draw[s his sword and then GABRIEL draws his].n9247
163GabrielI have a sword speaks other language for me.
164FrederickCan she whose thoughts are truth, and written here,
Here in this breast, giving me ample welcome,
Give thee a countermand to bar me from it?
Wouldst thou make her a double-hearted monster?
Or like another woman?
Repent thee of thy
trespassgg319 yet and live.
165GabrielSir, if you think to fight, talk not too much;
Or, if you needs must talk, then hear as well.
Than fits this place, since you are apt to quarrel
And this no ground to
bustlegs1716 on, nor indeed
Where I dare for my honesty and trust
Allow you longer stay. If therefore you
Will walk, I'll wait upon you and direct you
In a more ready way to find Charissa.
May come within his
arm's reach n5666of his money
In the
Exchequer,gg3835 but he must walk about
170Frederick [Aside] The fellow’s honest, valiant, and discreet:
Fullgs1717 man, in whom those three additions meet.
Because if thou dar’st fight, thou dar’st not lie.[FREDERICK and GABRIEL exit.]
Edited by Marion O'Connor
gg6018
MENDICANT,
person who lives by begging (OED n. 2)
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gg3780
Projector
person who forms a project; one who plans or designs an enterprise or undertaking; a proposer or founder of some venture (OED `project' n, 1a)
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gg3776
Complimenter
one who employs ceremony or formal courtesy in act or expression (OED `complimenter' & `compliment' vb 1: intrans)
[go to text]
n5610
Complimenter
] complementer
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gg6019
SWAIN-WIT
rustic (OED n. 4)
[go to text]
gg3777
Citizen's
Londoner with full municipal rights
[go to text]
gg3778
Picture-drawer,
painter, at this time usually of portraits (OED)
[go to text]
gg2573
distracted
maddened, deranged
[go to text]
gg3779
Physic.
medical science (OED n. 4)
[go to text]
gg4304
PROJECTORS
promoters of bogus or unsound business ventures; cheats, swindlers (OED n. 1b)
[go to text]
gg2258
Sow-gelder.
someone who makes a living by gelding or spaying sows (OED)
[go to text]
gg150
humorous
moody, whimsical
[go to text]
n9747
PHILOMEL,
In Greek and Roman classical mythology, Philomel was a maiden maltreated by her brother-in-law, Tereus, husband of her elder sister, Procne. In the version of the story which Ovid gives in Book 6 of his Metamorphoses, Tereus rapes Philomel, cuts out her tongue, rapes her again, imprisons her and tells Procne that her sister is dead. Philomel, however, contrives to communicate the truth by weaving it into a tapestry and sending this message to Procne. Reunited, the sisters punish Tereus by serving him his baby son for supper. On learning of their infanticide and his own cannibalism, Tereus pursues the sisters, but the gods transform them, and him, into birds. The respective species vary from one literary account to another, as do other details of the story of Philomel. Her name means `lover of song' in Greek, and English tradition usually turns her into a nightingale and associates her with violations of female chastity. Shakespeare invokes her story in Titus Andronicus (2.3) for the description of Lavinia immediately after her rape and mutilation; and he makes it bedtime reading for Imogen, the virtuous heroine of Cymbeline (2.2), immediately before Iachimo's intrusion into her bedchamber. Brome, however, requires his Philomel to laugh rather than sing, and he gives her no scruples about her sexuality.
[go to text]
gg3782
Chambermaid.
lady's maid
[go to text]
n9865
CHARISSA,
The heroine shares her name with a figure in Book I of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene: the daughters of the House of Holiness are Fidelia, Speranza and Charissa -- Faith, Hope and Charity. The word `charity' here translates the Latin word `caritas', which in Christian texts usually designates love, the greatest of virtues. However, the holiness of Charissa's etymological relations should not be over-emphasised: in classical Latin, the word `caritas' designates `costliness' and `affection'. And the English word `charity' carries senses (OED 4 and 5) related to alms-giving, appropriate for the daughter of a beggar, however genteel.
[go to text]
gg3781
gaudy
highly ornate, showy (OED `gaudy' adj 2, 3A)
[go to text]
n8336
no gaudy scene Shall give instructions, what his plot doth mean.
Scenes were painted hangings, slides, etc., set at the back and sides of stages for the performance of Jacobean and Caroline masques (OED 6a). In 1638 Sir John Suckling had initiated the use of such scenes for a play -- his own Aglaura. Looking back, John Aubrey acknowledged the novelty: `When his Aglaura was put on. . . . .he had some scaenes to it, which in those dayes were only used at Masques' (Brief Lives, ed. Oliver Lawson Dick [Penguin: Harmondsworth, 1949], 1949, 452). Aglaura was performed by the King's Men at the Blackfriars and then twice at court, to which the use of scenes may have been limited, quite possibly for only the second performance there, in April 1638. If so, then the scenes themselves may have been recycled from the Queen's masque in February of that year. (See John Freehafer, `The Italian Night Piece and Suckling's Aglaura', Journal of English & Germanic Philology, LXVIII.3 [Fall, 1968], 249-265.) However limited the innovation may have been in fact of thatrical history, it evidently offended Brome as a confusion of genres and, worse, a transgression of professional boundaries. Behind the incident and Brome's response, of course, lay an old quarrel between Ben Jonson and Inigo Jones, going back to their collaboration on Hymenaei in 1606, for creative dominance of masques and control of their meanings.
[go to text]
gg3784
instructions,
an account, a narrative (OED `instruction' 3)
[go to text]
gg5445
handsome
sizable, considerable, moderately large, good-sized (OED `handsome' a/adv, 4a)
[go to text]
gg5447
love-toy
amorous trifle, at this time usually a printed narrative
[go to text]
gs1706
beguile,
wile away (OED v. 5)
[go to text]
n8335
No handsome love-toy shall
your time beguile, Forcing your pity to a sigh or smile,
The oxymoron of a `handsome love-toy' -- an amorous trifle of considerable dimensions -- refers to the printed text of Sir John Suckling's Aglaura. The alternative responses to which empathy may be forced -- a sigh or smile -- correspond to the two versions of the play. Written and first performed as a tragedy in the winter of 1637/8, a few months later Aglaura was turned into a tragicomedy for its second court performance. The printed text, which includes both endings, may have been printed for presentation -- a sort of proto-programme -- at that revival in April 1638. Presenting a single playtext on 28 leaves, this folio imprint (by John Haviland for Thomas Walkley) was an expensive piece of printing, in which Suckling may have been personally involved. (See L.A.Beaurline's commentary on the transmission of the text in his and T.Clayton's edition of The Works of Sir John Suckling [Oxford: Clarendon, 1971], II.257, and references there cited.) Brome, in a posthumousely printed lampoon `Upon Aglaura in folio' ridiculed the pretentiousness of the imprint with its extravagantly wide margins: `Was ever Chamberlain so mad to dare / To lodge a child in the Great Bed of Ware?' (Musarum Deliciæ: or, The Muses Recreation [London: Henry Herringman, 1655], p. 51 / sig. E2v]).
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gg3783
suffrage,
opinion (OED `suffrage' n, 4)
[go to text]
gg257
Troth,
(in) truth
[go to text]
gs700
vex
To afflict with mental agitation or trouble; to make anxious or depressed; to distress deeply or seriously; to worry with anxiety or thought (OED `vex' v, 3)
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gs1707
beguile
foil, disappoint (OED v. 3)
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gs701
humorous
Moody, peevish, ill-humoured, out of humour (OED humorous a, 3a)
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n5611
antic
] antique, which OED entry gives as 17th-century form for `antic' a & n
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gg3785
forwardness
Over-readiness, presumptuous self-confidence; hence, lack of becoming modesty, boldness (OED `forwardness' 4)
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n9715
your creatures thought,
thought to be your creatures
[go to text]
gg40
creatures
one ready to do another's bidding, puppet (through patronage or devotion) (OED 5)
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n5612
who in a way To purchase fame give money with their play.
Sir John Suckling was known to have subsidised the 1638 production of his first finished play. According to Aubrey, `when his Aglaura was put on, he bought all the Cloathes himselfe, which were very rich; no tinsell, all the lace pure gold and silver, which cost him...I have now forgot' (Brief Lives, ed. Oliver Lawson Dick [Penguin: Harmondsworth, 1949], 1949, 452). In other words, and in violation of economic practice in the professional theatre of the time, instead of the playing company paying him a flat fee for his playtext, he paid them to stage it: the fact that payment had been in theatrical kind -- new costumes -- reduced neither the offence to Brome nor the expense to Suckling. Nearer the time, the figure for what the production had cost the playwright had been remembered and reported as `three or four hundred Pounds setting out, eight or ten Suit of new Cloaths he gave the Players; an unheard of Prodigality' (The Earl of Strafforde's Letters, ed. William Knowles [Dublin, 1740], quoted in John Freehafer, `Brome, Suckling, and Davenant's Theater Project of 1639', Texas Studies in Literature and Language, X.3 [Fall 1968], 373).
[go to text]
n10119
may he be A scene of mirth in their next comedy.
The challenge with which Brome here concludes his prologue anticipates the mockery which his own play will make of Sir John Suckling; and it perhaps also glances back at Suckling’s mockery of Ben Jonson in `The Wits: a Session of the Poets’ (1637). This critical account of the Caroline literary scene assembles named poets, each arguing before Apollo for his own pre-eminence. First to speak is `good old Ben', already drunk, who boasts of his dramatic triumphs in the Jacobean past: Volpone (1605), Epicoene (1609), and The Alchemist (1610). He is represented as so full of himself that when Apollo interrupts his boasting, Jonson starts to storm out of the session. At the insistence of those competitors who `thought it not fit / To discontent so ancient a wit’, however, Jonson is called back to be made `host of his own new Inne’. Nothing further is said of the agèd poet, and these last words are a cruel reminder that his time had passed: The New Inn (1629), one of Jonson’s last works for the commercial theatre, had failed there. For further discussion, see Introduction; and for texts and commentary, see The Works of Sir John Suckling: I, The Non-Dramatic Works , ed. Thomas Clayton (1971), 71-76, 266-278
[go to text]
n9616
1.1
Act 1 introduces a pair of young lovers (Charissa and Frederick) whose union meets opposition from her father (Sir Andrew Mendicant) but finds support from her father’s household dependant (Gabriel, a relative): this romantic configuration recurs across centuries of comedy. The dramatic situation, however, is full of circumstances which are specific to early Stuart London. The act begins with a father-daughter exchange in which Mendicant expounds his opposition to Frederick’s suit: although well-born, the young man has no estate with which to maintain a bride, and Mendicant has resolved that Charissa must marry a courtier (Ferdinand) whom he thinks to be on the rise in royal favour and therefore a good financial investment. Charissa counter-attacks by pointing out to her father that he himself has ruined the family fortunes. Abandoning the good life in the countryside for uncomfortably straitened circumstances in London, Mendicant has squandered his rural estates on buying the fraudulent services of brokers in speculative ventures. His only remaining resource is the hand of his daughter, who points out that Ferdinand, the courtier whom her father wants her to marry, is so interested in another woman (Lady Strangelove) that this young widow has reportedly driven to him almost to distraction by her teasing. When Gabriel enters and confirms the report of Ferdinand’s insanity, Mendicant sends Charissa off to her room and forbids her to receive visitors in his absence. Gabriel then announces the approach of the Projectors, upon whom the next section of the Act centres. Counterpointed by sceptical asides from Gabriel, this trio of con-artists present a series of investment proposals to Mendicant. The plans are ridiculous, as are the notional profits, and Mendicant for once resists the Projectors’ blandishments. Gabriel, having demonstrated that the schemers who promise fortunes to others are themselves flat broke and very hungry, kicks them out. Aiming to lay hold of Ferdinand’s estate, Mendicant leaves. His exit is almost immediately followed by Charissa’s re-entrance, which marks the beginning of the final section of the act. Gabriel confirms her fear that Ferdinand’s true intentions towards her were dishonourable and then, anticipating the arrival of her forbidden lover, sends her off to her room again. Ferdinand duly enters for an exchange which establishes Gabriel’s allegiance to the young lovers: their eventual happiness, and some intermediate complications, being thus assured, the act ends as faithful lover and trusty servant exit in tandem.
[go to text]
gg3789
endowments
‘gift’, power, capacity, or other advantage with which a person is endowed by nature or fortune (OED 4)
[go to text]
gg103
presently,
immediately (OED adv. 3); without delay
[go to text]
gg3790
dissipate
dispel. Brome here anticipates by half a century the earliest (1691) instance which the OED cites for usage as transitive verb in this figurative sense.
[go to text]
gg3833
points.
attributes, features, traits, or characteristics (OED n1. 13a)
[go to text]
n5664
take me with you.
explain yourself; make me understand you
[go to text]
gs703
absolute
unconditional
[go to text]
gg2484
weighs
consider
[go to text]
n9866
What can he show you
Mendicant's description of Frederick's hairstyle and outfit here in this speech, and then in [CB 1.1.speech15] his list of the lover's accessories, indicate that Frederick should be costumed as a fashionable young aristocrat. Examples abound among the portraits which Anthony Van Dyck painted during his second sojourn in London, from 1635 until his death late in 1641.
[go to text]
gg3834
wild
fantastic in appearance (OED adj. 13b)
[go to text]
gg3791
limebush
bush on which the twigs have been spread with a glutinous substance, derived from the bark of holly, by which birds may be caught and held fast; hence, a means of entanglement (OED bird-lime n, 1a; and `lime' n1, 5a)
[go to text]
gg3792
lady-birds?
(1) female sweetheart, with derogatory sense as `kept mistress'; (2) butterfly. For a third, now more familiar sense -- small, brightly coloured and spotted beetle of the family Coccinellidae -- the earliest usage given by the OED is 1674.
[go to text]
gg3793
tissue
rich cloth, often interwoven with gold or silver threads
[go to text]
n10123
ribbon
] riband
[go to text]
n5665
a ribbon shop Hung in his hatbands, might set up a peddlar?
That is: enough ribbons in his hat to furnish a peddlar. The only example which the OED gives for `shop' in this sense (n, 2c) as `the contents of a shop' dates from 1906.
[go to text]
gs1708
inwardly
closely, intimately
[go to text]
gg3799
extracted.
descended
[go to text]
gg1144
jointure
marriage settlement (usually the part of a husband’s wealth or property that he elected to assign to his wife in the event of his death)
[go to text]
gg5765
propound
put forward, propose (OED v. 1a)
[go to text]
gs704
dowry
the money or property which the wife brings to her husband; the portion given with the wife (OED dowry n, 2; dower n2, 2)
[go to text]
gg4642
glass,
mirror
[go to text]
gs705
elegies,
all the species of poetry for which Greek and Latin poets adopted the elegiac metre (OED 2)
[go to text]
gg3801
raptures,
the expression, in words or music, of intense delight or enthusiasm; a rhapsody
[go to text]
gs706
madrigals
A short lyrical love poem, usually one suitable for a musical setting such as is described above
[go to text]
gg3800
Exquisite
consummate, excellent, perfect
[go to text]
gg3829
cavalier,
gentlemen trained to arms, gallants
[go to text]
gs1718
loose
lax, negligent
[go to text]
gg3802
court-suits,
supplication or petition made to the monarch or prince in order to obtain a position or privilege which was in royal gift
[go to text]
n5658
wit
The word `wit' requires explanation, or emendation, here (where Octavo of 1653 italicises it: see [CB 1.1.line 93]). Its general sense as `understanding, intellect, reason' (OED n, 2) can be construed in tandem with `judgement' three lines above [CB 1.1.speech20]: pairing of these psychological faculties is common in the period and into the 18th century. However, opposing woman's judgement in the country to wit at court is clumsy and inexact; and Mendicant is not elsewhere characterised as interested in wit in any sense. The context might be better served by `wite', meaning `blame, reproach; blameworthiness, fault' (OED 2).
[go to text]
n5659
at court——
Here, and again in her next speech, Charissa breaks off her own sentence to check the effect which her words are having on her father: the self-interruptions may be cued by some visible response from Mendicant, or they could be prompted by apparent impassivity on his part.
[go to text]
gg3803
mansion-house—
chief residence of a rural landowner
[go to text]
n5660
all this for a lodging in the Strand
In the 16th century, the Strand, the London street linking Westminster and the City, gave place to a string of palatial houses built, or rebuilt, for aristocrats. Development of the area became more intensive in the next century, when some of the great houses were let and sublet, while the land around them was subdivided to return a profit. In 1640 a residential address in the Strand would have been fashionable albeit not so upmarket as half a century earlier, while a lodging there would have been neither so grand as the elite palaces of earlier generations nor so comfortable as the rural residences of the landed elite.
[go to text]
gg4144
lodging
accommodation, lodging-house
[go to text]
n9748
long boards
Charissa's phrase here designates large dining tables spread with food for a repast and, by extension, the meals thus served to many (OED `board' n, 6a and 7a). The image figures both the productivity of the rural estate which her father has squandered and the social virtue of liberality which he has abandoned.
[go to text]
gg3804
family
household
[go to text]
gg3805
bailiff,
the agent of the lord of a manor, who collects his rents, etc.; the steward of a landholder, who manages his estate; one who superintends the husbandry of a farm for its owner or tenant (OED 3)
[go to text]
gg1100
varlet
rogue, menial
[go to text]
n9868
music,
The notion of the baying of hounds as music will be familiar to any reader of Shakespeare's A Midsummer's Night's Dream (4.4). No mere figure of speech, it is developed at length by Gervase Markham in Countrey Contentments (1615), a book of household management which includes advice on the selection of hunting-dogs: the criteria depend upon the owner's priorities, including `sweetnesse, loudnesse, or deepenesse of crie'. To those who are principally concerned with `the musique of [the hounds'] voices' Markham offers advice which reads almost as if he were addressing a choirmaster.
[go to text]
gg3806
beagles,
small hound dog which relies upon its sense of smell to follow a trail
[go to text]
gg3807
forfeiture
loss or liability to deprivation (of an estate, goods, office, etc.) in consequence of a crime, offence, or breach of engagement (from OED 2). Project beagles smell out, and try to seize, other people's losses.
[go to text]
n5661
men that make away themselves;
Suicide was a crime, and the property of those who committed it was forfeit to the state.
[go to text]
n5662
fools and madmen.
The state also controlled the property of idiots and lunatics, who (along with minors) were considered to be incapable of looking their own affairs. Across a century from 1541, the estates of persons deemed mentally incompetent were administered by the Court of Wards and Liveries, which awarded guardianship for the duration of the ward's incapacity. See [NOTE n5667].
[go to text]
n9869
your own want of favour
Charissa is pointing out to her father that he is without position or influence at court: in order to secure the grants and permissions on which his various money-making projects depend, he needs the services of middle-men, who help themselves to almost all of any profits.
[go to text]
gg3814
home
effectively, to the heart of the matter (OED adv. 5a)
[go to text]
gs707
project
planned or proposed undertaking; a scheme, a proposal
[go to text]
gg3808
wanton
undisciplined, ill-governed
[go to text]
gg3809
singularly
specially, particularly, unusually
[go to text]
gg150
humorous
moody, whimsical
[go to text]
gg3810
ambitious
eager
[go to text]
n9248
Enter GABRIEL.
Octavo of 1653 puts this entrance -- `Enter Gabrel [sic]' -- three and a half lines further on, after the line [CB 1.1.line149] Mendicant's speech [CB 1.1.speech 31] ends. Once Mendicant draws attention to his approach, the sooner Gabriel enters and becomes visible, the more effective will be his silence as Mendicant rattles off questions.
[go to text]
gg2534
affections.
mental states, emotions; inclinations
[go to text]
gs1487
travail
effort, suffering (with a possible pun on ‘travel’)
[go to text]
gs1709
collects
infers, concludes (OED `collect' v, 5a)
[go to text]
gg3359
Helicon,
a mountain in Beotia, in myth the haunt of the Muses, and thus a figure for art, especially poetry
[go to text]
gg5453
Parnassus.
mountain in Phocia in Greece, sacred to Apollo (whose shrine of Delphos was at the base of Parnassus), to Dionysus and to the Muses, and thus a figure for art and literature
[go to text]
n9749
Flanders laces,
Flanders (now Belgium) had been noted for the manufacture of laces since the mid-sixteenth century.
[go to text]
n8344
That trim effeminate gentleman
The notion that fancy clothes unmaketh the man is articulated at length in the pair of pamphlets, published in 1620, on cross-dressing and other forms of gender-bending: Hic Mulier and Haec Vir. It also informs much of the anti-theatrical literature of the late Elizabethan and early Stuart periods.
[go to text]
gg5456
trim
elegantly or finely dressed (OED `trim' a and adv, 2)
[go to text]
gg5457
effeminate
womanish, enervated; self-indulgent, voluptuous (OED adj. 1a)
[go to text]
gg3811
amorist,
votary of sexual love
[go to text]
gg3812
on
at the risk of forfeiting (OED prep, 16)
[go to text]
gg1432
without,
outside
[go to text]
gg3813
Loden,
16/17th-century form of past participle `loaded'
[go to text]
gg2087
intelligences.
information
[go to text]
gg3816
manor-houses
mansion belonging to a lord, whom feudal law gave jurisdiction over his estate and, later, rights to fees and services from those who held land on it
[go to text]
n8180
Projector 1, Projector 2, Projector 3
] 1.2.3.
[go to text]
n9750
the game’s afoot. They hunt in full cry.
Gabriel imagines the projectors as a pack of hunting dogs in noisy pursuit of prey which has started up. The image elaborates Carissa's reference, earlier in the scene (Speech No. 24), to her father's `project beagles'.
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n8345
Sixty-four thousand seven hundred
eighty-three pounds, seven shillings, ninepence,
ha'penny farthing per annum
Octavo of 1653 reads `£64,783. 7s. 9d. ob. q. per annum'. The numbers, and the abbreviation ob. q., have been recast as words in order to advertise both the absurd exactitude of the sum and the impossibility of uttering it as verse, which it ludicrously disrupts. It is not known whether the figure has any significance beyond maniacal precision and great size: on 22 April 2009, the National Archives' online currency converter calculated that the spending power of £64,783.38 in 1640 would now be £5,558,414.65!
[go to text]
gg5458
per annum
annually, by the year
[go to text]
n9243
[PROJECTOR proffers a scroll.]
Octavo of 1653 gives no stage direction for the production of a scroll, but Projector 1's statement, `'Tis here already cast' requires that it be at, or in, hand by that point in the dialogue. The scroll could, however, appear earlier in Projector 1's speech --- perhaps as he progresses from broad estimates of annual income for the Projectors and Mendicant to the maniacally precise statement of income for the Crown.
[go to text]
gg5628
cast,
calculated, estimated (OED v. 38)
[go to text]
gg3817
engage
pledge
[go to text]
n9242
MENDICANT takes the scroll and peruses it.
In Octavo of 1653, this stage direction is printed, to the right of the dialogue, across three lines, of which the last ([CB 1.1.line230]) is Gabriel's first line in [C.B. 1.1.speech61].
[go to text]
gg2323
charge
(n) cost, expense
[go to text]
n9751
You would submit your bodies to perpetual Imprisonment at the King’s charge and leave Your wives and children to their several parishes.
The projectors have just asserted willingness to risk everything -- their own lives, goods, wives and children -- on realising their promise of huge profits. Mendicant retorts that a sufficient punishment for failure would be lifelong sentences to gaol: the projectors' survival would then be at royal expense; and their families, no longer supported by the projectors, would be dependent upon their charity of their respective parishes.
[go to text]
n11548
sums
] sonnes
[go to text]
gg3819
gall
make sore by chafing or rubbing
[go to text]
gg3818
telling
tallying, counting
[go to text]
gg6020
teller’s
money-counter(OED 2a, where this instance is cited)
[go to text]
gg6021
Ambidexterity
power of using both hands alike (OED 1, where this instance is the earliest example given for the word in any sense).
[go to text]
n10124
Ambidexterity
] Ambo-dexterity
[go to text]
gg3820
single money?
small change
[go to text]
gg3269
Pish!
an interjection 'expressing contempt, impatience, or disgust' (OED)
[go to text]
gg5350
Cry mercy,
beg pardon
[go to text]
gg5351
ready coin,
cash in hand
[go to text]
gg5349
bullion
gold or silver in the lump, as distinguished from coin or manufactured articles (OED bullion n2, II 2)
[go to text]
gs1711
brave
fine, famous (OED adj. 3)
[go to text]
n9756
Indies,
The reference could be to either the East or the West Indies. Gabriel goes on to mention an historical incident involving gold from the West Indies; but at this point in his speech, literal geography matters less than allusive metaphor, signifying `a region or place yielding great wealth or to which profitable voyages may be made' (OED `Indies' 2).
[go to text]
n8346
all the Hollanders have waited for These seven years out of the Spanish plate fleets
The Netherlands broke away from rule by Hapsburg Spain over eighty years of intermittent fighting. After 1621, when a twelve-year truce in the hostilities came to an end, fleets of Spanish ships bringing gold and silver from the Americas were preyed upon by fleets of privateers employed by the Dutch West India Company.
[go to text]
n5663
Pooh!
] Pugh.
[go to text]
gg1245
ready money.
cash
[go to text]
gs1712
perused
scrutinised, considered
[go to text]
n9757
weighty
Projector 2 here uses the word `weighty' to mean `highly important, momentous' (OED 3a), but Mendicant will respond to it as if it meant `heavy' (OED 1).
[go to text]
gg3821
grains.
smallest English units of weight; twelve grains would amount to 3/1750ths of a pound avoirdupois
[go to text]
gg3822
platform
diagram, plan, map
[go to text]
gs1714
propounded
proposed
[go to text]
gg6022
grievance
infliction of hardship, injury (OED 1)
[go to text]
n10121
Take ’em into particulars,
Mendicant’s visitors will proceed to set out, in varying degrees of detail, a series of different projects: see [CB 1.1.speech77] through [CB 1.1.speech102]. Brome’s Projector sequence here corresponds to the third anti-masque in James Shirley's The Triumph of Peace, a masque staged at Whitehall in February 1634. (See Introduction and [NOTE n9575].) As described in the printed text, Shirley’s projectors were all visually sensational; and some of their respective projects, which are articulated and assessed in dialogue between Opinion and Phansie, do not look so very silly in historical hindsight. (1) `The first [was] a Iocky with a Bonnet on his head upon the top of it a whip, he seeming much to obserue and affect a bridle which he had in his hand’: his project was the invention of a bridle which would refresh the horse that wore it. (2) `The second a Country fellow in a Leather Doublet and gray trunke Hose, a wheele with a perpetuall motion on his head, and in his hand a flayle’: his project was the invention of a mechanical thresher. (3) `The third, a grimme Philosophicall fac’d fellow in his gowne furr’d and girdled about him, a furnace upon his head, and in his hand a Lampe’: his project was the invention of a double-boiler for alchemists. (4) `The fourth in a case of blacke Leather vaste to the middle, and round on the top, with glasse eyes, and bellowes under each arme’ : his project was the invention of an underwater diving bell. (5) `The fift a Physition, on his head a Hat with a bunch of Carrots, a Capon perched upon his fist’: his project was the manufacture of chicken-feed from carrot-scrapings. (6) `The sixt like a Seaman, A Shippe upon his head and holding a Line and Plummet in his hand’ : his project is a double invention – a ship that can sail against the wind and can serve in the construction of a gravel-processing factory on the Godwin Sands (The Triumph of Peace... third impression, [London: John Norton for William Cook, 1633[4], sigs. A1v - 2, B3v - 4v).
[go to text]
gg3823
perukes:
wigs
[go to text]
gg1040
capital
pertaining to the head
[go to text]
gg3826
sluttish
dirty, grimy
[go to text]
gg214
pox
disease characterised by pustules on the skin (OED 1a); syphilis (OED 1b)
[go to text]
gg3824
effectuate
accomplish, bring to pass
[go to text]
gg3825
mandate
command, order, injunction
[go to text]
gs1322
clowns
man without refinement or culture; an ignorant, rude, uncouth, ill-bred man (OED clown n, 2), opposed to `courtier'
[go to text]
gs1046
several
individual
[go to text]
gg5459
pride-money
tax on ostentation (OED pride n1, Compound C1c) (this instance is the only example which the OED gives for this `obsolete humorous nonce-use')
[go to text]
gg5458
Per annum?
annually, by the year
[go to text]
gg3823
perukes
wigs
[go to text]
gg75
groat,
coin valued at roughly fourpence (OED 2), which in today's currency would be worth about £1.43
[go to text]
n8347
a new theatre or play-house Upon the Thames, on barges or flat boats
Late in March 1639 Sir William Davenant obtained a patent for building a new theatre, 'forty yards square at the most', on a site off Fleet Street and assembling a company to 'exercise Action, musical Presentments, Scenes, Dancing and the like' in it. The location would have put it into direct competition with both the Blackfriars and Salisbury Court Theatres, and the modishness of the entertainments planned for it would have given it some advantage over the fare at these established private playhouses. Meeting opposition from the start, the project was in October crippled with restrictions and eventually came to nothing. Brome had been under contract to write plays for Salisbury Court since July 1635, and while his mid-1639 defection to the Cockpit was probably prompted by a change of management at Salisbury Court, it may possibly also have been an immediate response to the Davenant project. The jokey project for a floating theatre here in The Court Beggar is certainly a delayed response to Davenant's Fleet Theatre. (See G.E.Bentley, JCS, VI, 305-9; John Freehafer, 'Brome, Suckling and Davenant's Theatre Project of 1639, Texas Studies in Language & Literature, X.3 (Fall 1968), 367-382; G.Wickham, H.Berry & W.Ingram, eds., English Professional Theatre 1530-1660 [Cambridge University Press, 2000], 657-667.)
[go to text]
gg6024
sedans,
closed vehicles, each seating one person, which were carried on a parallel pair of poles by two bearers, one in front and one behind. In The Sparagus Garden Brome refers to them as `hand-barrows' (1.3) and `hand-litters' (4.10).
[go to text]
n8348
To help the watermen out of the loss They’ve suffered by sedans, under which project The subject groans, when for the ease of one Two abler men must suffer, and not the price Or pride of horse-flesh or coach-hire abated.
Coach traffic had been banned in the environs of the private theatres; and in October 1634 Sir Sanders Dunscombe had been awarded a monopoly on sedan-chairs.
[go to text]
gg6023
board
take on board ship (OED v. 3)
[go to text]
gg3827
massy
great, substantial, impressive
[go to text]
gg3452
City,
The City of London, the ancient capital and commercial area with its own system of power and government; often contrasted with the Royal Court, based a few miles down the Thames at Westminster and Whitehall, a rival base of power, authority, and culture
[go to text]
gg3828
engross
to monopolise, to gain or keep exclusive possession of
[go to text]
gg3829
cavaliers
gentlemen trained to arms, gallants
[go to text]
gs1715
put me by
put me off, make me give over
[go to text]
gg3829
cavalier,
gentlemen trained to arms, gallants
[go to text]
n9716
beside
] besides
[go to text]
n5667
beg
The Projector here proposes that Mendicant take control of the estate and thus revenues) of the estate of the reportedly insane Sir Ferdinando by getting the knight made his ward. To this end he would have applied to the Court of Wards and Liveries, which, from 1541 until the Revolution, administered the property of landed minors, idiots and the insane. See [NOTE n5662].
[go to text]
gg6025
nearer
closer, more intimate
[go to text]
gg80
pieces.
of gold or silver, i.e. money (OED n. 1b)
[go to text]
gg3831
Find
obtain, procure
[go to text]
gg80
pieces?
of gold or silver, i.e. money (OED n. 1b)
[go to text]
n9758
stand no longer thus in your own light.
That is: do yourself a favour, stop missing your chance.
[go to text]
gg3830
denier.
French coin, made of copper from the 16th century and worth a twelfth of a sou: hence, a tiny sum in any currency
[go to text]
gg80
piece.
of gold or silver, i.e. money (OED n. 1b)
[go to text]
gg3827
massy
great, substantial, impressive
[go to text]
gg5426
half-crown
silver coin worth two shillings sixpence (£0.125 in decimal currency)
[go to text]
n8305
on the condition?
in exchange: in other words, a kick for each projector in return for a half-crown from the trio
[go to text]
gg5349
bullion
gold or silver in the lump, as distinguished from coin or manufactured articles (OED bullion n2, II 2)
[go to text]
n9244
[GABRIEL kicks out at] PROJECTORS[, who] exit.
Octavo of 1653 places the Projectors' exit to the right of the dialogue, across Gabriel's first two lines of verse in [CB 1.1.speech133]. Probably a lot of business goes on while he begins this speech in prose. Minimally, in order to motivate Gabriel's complaint about having lamed his toes, his foot must bash the buttocks of the last Projector to exit.
[go to text]
n10117
The devil ride that hindmost
Gabriel here adapts a proverb, one which appears in other plays of the period: see Tilley D267.
[go to text]
gg5461
jade!
a contemptuous name for a horse of inferior breed, a hack, a sorry, ill-conditioned, wearied, or worn-out horse (OED n1. 1)
[go to text]
n8293
’Sfoot! he has lamed my toes!
Gabriel's oath, an abbreviation of `God's foot!', is especially apt: having just kicked the projectors offstage, he claims to have stubbed his toe on the scrawny backside of one of the projectors (probably Projector 1, who is the last of the trio to speak).
[go to text]
gg578
’Sfoot!
an oath, short for ‘God’s foot’
[go to text]
gg5427
start
escape (the latest usage which the OED gives for this now obsolete sense (v, 6) is 1622)
[go to text]
gg2799
imposed
placed (in someone)
[go to text]
gg5435
set my rest.
stake my last (OED rest n2, 6b and 7)
[go to text]
n9245
Enter CHARISSA.
Octavo of 1653 prints Charissa's entrance two lines further on, after the end of Gabriel's speech [CB 1.1.speech 141]
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gg4751
’Sprecious,
Shortened form of `God's precious', used as an asseveration or oath (OED, where The Court Beggar provides the last of three examples, the others being from Jonson's The Alchemist and Bartholomew Fair)
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gg5436
divert
turn away (OED v. 3 and 5)
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gg5438
relieve
assist in difficulty (OED v. 1a)
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gg1525
observe
act in accordance with, follow the instructions in
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n10122
travail
] travell
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gg6027
Peppered
seasoned, sprinkled; (figuratively) infected with venereal disease
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gg1220
cousin.
generally used in speaking to or of kin, whether nephew or actual cousin, or any other relationship by blood or marriage outside the immediate nuclear family
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gg6028
godling,
inferior deity, a god possessing little power
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gs1181
crossed
thwarted, opposed, obstructed
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gg2130
dispose.
management
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n9247
[FREDERICK] draw[s his sword and then GABRIEL draws his].
Octavo of 1653 places the stage direction -- `Draw' -- to the right, at the end of Frederick's speech, and it obviously indicates an act of armed aggression by him. That it also indicates a response from Gabriel has been inferred from the end of the scene: Frederick's stage-clearing couplet makes clear that Gabriel's claim to `have a sword [which] speaks other language' (1.1. Speech No. 163) has been more than a macho metaphor. What is left to directorial discretion is the point at which they put up their weapons.
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gg319
trespass
(n) offence (OED n. 1); minor violation of the law (OED n. 2); crime
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gs1716
bustle
scuffle, struggle (OED v. 3)
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n5666
arm's reach
] arm-reach
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gg3835
Exchequer,
royal treasury (OED n 5)
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gg3836
due
necessary or requisite for some purpose; adequate, sufficient
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gg3837
order
authoritative direction; an injunction, or mandate; in banking and finance, the word has a special sense (as `a written direction to pay money or deliver property, made by a person legally entitled to do so') which may also be current here, even though the earliest OED example of this sense is from 1673 (OED n. 22a and 23b)
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gg1781
ere
before
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n9870
ere
] e're
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gs1717
Full
possessed of all qualities belonging to the designation -- in this case, `man' (OED adj. 7b)
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