ACT TWO
2.1
n5021
Act 2 is in two scenes, the first outside Camelion's shop in the New Exchange. As in the first act, what happens here in public is more suited to privacy, and Hannah is mortified by the possible damage to her reputation.
The scene takes place in the New Exchange of the play's alternative title, with a counter for Hannah to stand behind while serving customers. The setting is integral to the play's themes: Hannah is being used as an advertisement for her husband's wares. Perhaps that is too coy: she is bait to draw the amorous young men to the shop. She knows this, as does her husband, and she is humiliated by the tactic. Camelion's exposure of his wife resembles the representation of merchants' wives in Middleton and Decker's The Roaring Girl, Scene 3: 'The three shops open in a rank ... Mistress Gallipot in the first, Mistress Tiltyard in the next, Master Openwork and his wife in the third'. The sexual advertisement echoes through the scene, but in The Roaring Girl the wives show no sign of displeasure or resentment (Middleton, Collected Works, pp. 734-741). Brome may also be remembering this play as he makes Camelion a devoted participant in duck hunting at the Islington ducking ponds: in The Roaring Girl Scene 3 'Master Gallipot [and] Master Tiltyard' enter, 'with water spaniels and a duck', on their way to Hogsden (p. 741); and the earlier play's shopwomen discourse on the nature of the gallants in ways that are clearly pertinent to Valentine in particular (Scene 9; pp. 760-761).
The scene's tensions are essential preparation for Scene 2 in Lady Nestlecock's house. There, people and bodies are also being bought and sold, although the transactions are cloaked in poetry and the diction of romantic passion. Arriving at that scene through Hannah's humiliation makes inescapable such an interpretation of the 'new exchanges' of the cross-marriages of Lady Nestlecock and Whimlby and of Nehemiah and Blith.
The relationship between Hannah and Camelion is both funny and disturbing, with the husband's distinctly dubious motives being cloaked in embarrassing baby-talk. The dialogue between husband and wife is followed by the conversation between Erasmus and Valentine, before Valentine moves in to try to extort money from Hannah. Erasmus is the cool observer of his amusing but ultimately reprehensible friend; and Brome makes Valentine amusingly self-obsessed and persuaded by his own self-presentation as an irresistible lover. Having represented him as something of a figure of fun, however, Brome switches the emotional tone, showing us a Valentine who is crude and oppressing in his relations with a woman he thinks is powerless before him. This gives Erasmus the opportunity to comment to the audience on Valentine's moral character, preparing us to see Erasmus and Hannah as the two characters in the play with the most certain moral foundation.
Exploring this sequence of interactions -- Camelion and Hannah, joined ultimately by the Footpost; Erasmus and Valentine with Hannah in the background; Valentine and Hannah; lastly Erasmus and Valentine -- with actors revealed a remarkably complex set of possibilities. Much depended on the playing of Camelion. Is he simply a fool, naive and harming his wife without intent to do so? Or is he a manipulator, playing the fool but actually fully conscious of what he is about? Similarly, Hannah can be played with differing degrees of strength, acquiescence, and resentment. In exploration of the initial conversation between them, use of the playing area became crucial, interpretation of the characters being expressed through relative mobility on the stage -- Hannah, in a sense, trapped and her husband free to range about her; or Camelion being circled by an accusatory Hannah -- and invasions of personal space .
Both the small role of the Footpost and the somewhat larger, but still seemingly marginal role of Erasmus in this scene emerged as contributing crucially to the tone. Erasmus's interactions with the audience shaped responses to Valentine; the Footpost's response to Camelion crystalised reactions and judgements.
Perhaps the most remarkable feature of this scene is that Brome leaves the audience in the dark about why Hannah gives Valentine money. At the end of the play she reveals that he is her half-brother and that she has been commissioned to fund him by Captain Hardyman, her father and Valentine's step-father. Normally, though the characters might remain in ignorance of such an explanation, the audience would be informed; much of the energy of the plot might come from the audience knowing more than the characters. But here Brome provides the audience with no explanation: though Hannah proclaims her chastity and fidelity to Camelion, her actions seem to suggest otherwise. Valentine appears correct: she gives him her husband's money purely because of his 'delineaments'.
As a result, the audience experiences confusions and discomfort that parallel those of the characters on stage. And, as Julie Sanders reminded actors and editors in the detailed and lengthy discussion of this scene, we should bear in mind the fact that the audience was not monolithic or necessarily homogenous. There would have been young men who, at least initially, would have seen little amiss in Valentine's conduct; other audience members would probably have registered from the outset Hannah's discomfort and revulsion, in response to both her husband and Valentine. Some members of the audience may also have been shocked at the casually-expressed class disdain that permeates Valentine's (and Erasmus's) attitudes to both Hannah and Rachel, Matchil's new wife: they are dehumanised, as 'things'. Valentine's assumptions about Hannah -- that as a shopkeeper's wife she is 'fair game' and that her loss of integrity would be without significance -- are ironic: she turns out to be his half-sister. But both he and the audience learn that only much later; for the time being the audience is left uneasy, complicit in the contempt, unable to reconcile what she says (that she is chaste and faithful to her husband) and what she does (apparently betraying Camelion by giving away his money to a gallant).
n5021
The scene takes place in the New Exchange of the play's alternative title, with a counter for Hannah to stand behind while serving customers. The setting is integral to the play's themes: Hannah is being used as an advertisement for her husband's wares. Perhaps that is too coy: she is bait to draw the amorous young men to the shop. She knows this, as does her husband, and she is humiliated by the tactic. Camelion's exposure of his wife resembles the representation of merchants' wives in Middleton and Decker's The Roaring Girl, Scene 3: 'The three shops open in a rank ... Mistress Gallipot in the first, Mistress Tiltyard in the next, Master Openwork and his wife in the third'. The sexual advertisement echoes through the scene, but in The Roaring Girl the wives show no sign of displeasure or resentment (Middleton, Collected Works, pp. 734-741). Brome may also be remembering this play as he makes Camelion a devoted participant in duck hunting at the Islington ducking ponds: in The Roaring Girl Scene 3 'Master Gallipot [and] Master Tiltyard' enter, 'with water spaniels and a duck', on their way to Hogsden (p. 741); and the earlier play's shopwomen discourse on the nature of the gallants in ways that are clearly pertinent to Valentine in particular (Scene 9; pp. 760-761).
The scene's tensions are essential preparation for Scene 2 in Lady Nestlecock's house. There, people and bodies are also being bought and sold, although the transactions are cloaked in poetry and the diction of romantic passion. Arriving at that scene through Hannah's humiliation makes inescapable such an interpretation of the 'new exchanges' of the cross-marriages of Lady Nestlecock and Whimlby and of Nehemiah and Blith.
The relationship between Hannah and Camelion is both funny and disturbing, with the husband's distinctly dubious motives being cloaked in embarrassing baby-talk. The dialogue between husband and wife is followed by the conversation between Erasmus and Valentine, before Valentine moves in to try to extort money from Hannah. Erasmus is the cool observer of his amusing but ultimately reprehensible friend; and Brome makes Valentine amusingly self-obsessed and persuaded by his own self-presentation as an irresistible lover. Having represented him as something of a figure of fun, however, Brome switches the emotional tone, showing us a Valentine who is crude and oppressing in his relations with a woman he thinks is powerless before him. This gives Erasmus the opportunity to comment to the audience on Valentine's moral character, preparing us to see Erasmus and Hannah as the two characters in the play with the most certain moral foundation.
Exploring this sequence of interactions -- Camelion and Hannah, joined ultimately by the Footpost; Erasmus and Valentine with Hannah in the background; Valentine and Hannah; lastly Erasmus and Valentine -- with actors revealed a remarkably complex set of possibilities. Much depended on the playing of Camelion. Is he simply a fool, naive and harming his wife without intent to do so? Or is he a manipulator, playing the fool but actually fully conscious of what he is about? Similarly, Hannah can be played with differing degrees of strength, acquiescence, and resentment. In exploration of the initial conversation between them, use of the playing area became crucial, interpretation of the characters being expressed through relative mobility on the stage -- Hannah, in a sense, trapped and her husband free to range about her
; or Camelion being circled by an accusatory Hannah -- and invasions of personal space .
Both the small role of the Footpost and the somewhat larger, but still seemingly marginal role of Erasmus in this scene emerged as contributing crucially to the tone. Erasmus's interactions with the audience shaped responses to Valentine; the Footpost's response to Camelion crystalised reactions and judgements.
Perhaps the most remarkable feature of this scene is that Brome leaves the audience in the dark about why Hannah gives Valentine money. At the end of the play she reveals that he is her half-brother and that she has been commissioned to fund him by Captain Hardyman, her father and Valentine's step-father. Normally, though the characters might remain in ignorance of such an explanation, the audience would be informed; much of the energy of the plot might come from the audience knowing more than the characters. But here Brome provides the audience with no explanation: though Hannah proclaims her chastity and fidelity to Camelion, her actions seem to suggest otherwise. Valentine appears correct: she gives him her husband's money purely because of his 'delineaments'.
As a result, the audience experiences confusions and discomfort that parallel those of the characters on stage. And, as Julie Sanders reminded actors and editors in the detailed and lengthy discussion of this scene, we should bear in mind the fact that the audience was not monolithic or necessarily homogenous. There would have been young men who, at least initially, would have seen little amiss in Valentine's conduct; other audience members would probably have registered from the outset Hannah's discomfort and revulsion, in response to both her husband and Valentine. Some members of the audience may also have been shocked at the casually-expressed class disdain that permeates Valentine's (and Erasmus's) attitudes to both Hannah and Rachel, Matchil's new wife: they are dehumanised, as 'things'. Valentine's assumptions about Hannah -- that as a shopkeeper's wife she is 'fair game' and that her loss of integrity would be without significance -- are ironic: she turns out to be his half-sister. But both he and the audience learn that only much later; for the time being the audience is left uneasy, complicit in the contempt, unable to reconcile what she says (that she is chaste and faithful to her husband) and what she does (apparently betraying Camelion by giving away his money to a gallant).
[Outside CAMELION's shop in the New Exchange]*n5020
There is no indication of setting in the original printed edition.
n5020
[Enter] CAMELION and HANNAHn8951
The entry of these characters shapes the scene, making it clear that the audience is witnessing the latter stages of an argument that has been going on offstage. Beginning with the characters already onstage resulted in a strikingly different mood from versions in which the characters emerge already in debate .
n8951
resulted in a strikingly different mood from versions in which the characters emerge already in debate .
215CamelionI prithee now, I prithee, prithee now
Urge me no more in this case; for I cannot,
Nor I wo’ not so, I wo’ not, I, be jealous
Of mine own wife, mine own dear flesh and blood.
That’s such a thing! I pideen4637
Camelion frequently uses 'baby language' and childish pronunciation in his conversations with his wife Hannah. This could signal his simplicity and perhaps immaturity, particularly since he does so in this scene in a public area. But it may be that he uses terms of affectation and endearment to masks the cynicism of his use of his wife as a form of sexual advertising and potentially as one of his 'goods' for sale. As a result of the cloak of affection and trust, he is able to manipulate her without open challenge to his motives.
Actors performing these lines were able to find in them a wide variety of different degrees of affection, manipulation and hostility. The public nature of the conversation was made all the more powerful and potentially uncomfortable when Sam Alexander, the actor playing Camelion, hinted at acknowledgement and involvement of the audience.
, speak no more on’t.
n4637
Actors performing these lines were able to find in them a wide variety of different degrees of affection, manipulation and hostility. The public nature of the conversation was made all the more powerful and potentially uncomfortable when Sam Alexander, the actor playing Camelion, hinted at acknowledgement and involvement of the audience
.
216HannahYou show you love, Rafe.*n5053
Throughout this tense exchange, Camelion addresses Hannah as 'thou', but she maintains a formal distance, always addressing him as 'you'. Camelion as husband is the head of the household, though Hannah, a gentleman's daughter, has higher social origins. This line could be spoken with different degrees of ingratiation, resignation, or assertiveness.
The complexity of performance led the actors to ask for guidance: does she love her husband? The question is unanswerable, but one that must be in the audience's mind. Hannah, a gentleman's daughter, has married a shopkeeper -- was this a love match? Or was the daughter married off for economic advantage, as often the case in the period? We see the Camelion/Hannah relationship in the first half of Act 2; in the second we see another intelligent young woman, Mistress Blith, being forced towards marriage with a man not worthy of her, the immature Nehemiah. Does Brome prepare us to see the stark dangers facing Blith by first showing us Hannah as 'fool-clogged' (Blith's phrase from Act 5)?
The comparison between Hannah and Blith is all the more suggestive given the presence within a few lines of Erasmus, the play's most admirable young and marriagable man. Erasmus will eventually marry Blith; later in this scene he will express his respect and admiration for Hannah; but she is already married, and so the 'Erasmus option' is not available to her.
n5053
The complexity of performance led the actors to ask for guidance: does she love her husband? The question is unanswerable, but one that must be in the audience's mind. Hannah, a gentleman's daughter, has married a shopkeeper -- was this a love match? Or was the daughter married off for economic advantage, as often the case in the period? We see the Camelion/Hannah relationship in the first half of Act 2; in the second we see another intelligent young woman, Mistress Blith, being forced towards marriage with a man not worthy of her, the immature Nehemiah. Does Brome prepare us to see the stark dangers facing Blith by first showing us Hannah as 'fool-clogged' (Blith's phrase from Act 5)?
The comparison between Hannah and Blith is all the more suggestive given the presence within a few lines of Erasmus, the play's most admirable young and marriagable man. Erasmus will eventually marry Blith; later in this scene he will express his respect and admiration for Hannah; but she is already married, and so the 'Erasmus option' is not available to her.
My cockn4638
Camelion uses 'Cock' as an affectionate nickname for his wife Hannah (still in use in a phrase like 'my old cock'). However, 'Cock' primarily means a male domestic fowl, and applications to a female are rare. The term is prominent in The New Academy: Matchil's sister is Lady Nestlecock, and in her name it has a clear anatomical meaning.
As a playful name for Hannah, Camelion may be using it to suggest that she is really the one with power in the relationship, holding the position of the male bird. If so, this may be another example of his attempt to manipulate her, since he seems to be - until the end of the play - the one pulling the strings.
Camelion's repeated use of the term in this scene was explored with actors: it could be affectionate; it could be possessive ; it could be almost a challenge to Hannah, close to insulting in its inappropriateness .
Judgements on how to play Hannah's response to the nickname were similarly complicated. She could be offended or she could go along with the intimate lovers' language at least at first, perhaps in the hope that this would enable her to argue Camelion out of his resolution. After Camelion has left, Hannah comments on his folly, calling her husband 'Cockscomb'. She turns the inappropriate nickname back on him in pungently adapted form.
, my pity nittle nansy cocksyn5494
Again, Camelion uses lovers' baby talk: 'my pretty little nansy cock'. Sam Alexander, picking up on Hannah's use of 'assaults' in the previous speech, emphasized the transparency of the pretence of affection, by 'playfully' striking his wife .
,
n4638
As a playful name for Hannah, Camelion may be using it to suggest that she is really the one with power in the relationship, holding the position of the male bird. If so, this may be another example of his attempt to manipulate her, since he seems to be - until the end of the play - the one pulling the strings.
Camelion's repeated use of the term in this scene was explored with actors: it could be affectionate
; it could be possessive ; it could be almost a challenge to Hannah, close to insulting in its inappropriateness .Judgements on how to play Hannah's response to the nickname were similarly complicated. She could be offended or she could go along with the intimate lovers' language at least at first, perhaps in the hope that this would enable her to argue Camelion out of his resolution. After Camelion has left, Hannah comments on his folly, calling her husband 'Cockscomb'. She turns the inappropriate nickname back on him in pungently adapted form.
n5494
. Do I not show my love when I deny thee
Unreasonable requests*n8960
Camelion plays the rationality card, well known in male-female disputes: he, the male, is being rational; she is being 'unreasonable'.
? I never heard
n8960
Of woman that desired a loving husband
To be a jealous master over her;
Especially a city-shopkeeper,
The best part of whose trade runs through the hands
Of his fair wife too! ’Tis unreasonable.
And thou the first that e’er take up the humour.
218HannahAnd you the first that e’er I knew besotted
Into a wilful confidence, which renders
Me to a vile construction†gs594
the interpretation put upon conduct, action, facts, words, etc.; the way in which these are taken or viewed by onlookers; usually with qualification, as to put a good, bad, favourable, charitable (or other) construction upon (OED n. 8a)
; and yourself,
gs594
By leaving me to all assaults and hazards,
Have got the reputation of a wittol†gg1251
'man who is aware of and complaisant about the infidelity of his wife; a contented cuckold' (OED 1a); a fool, idiot (1b)
,
gg1251
Or one that seems contented to become so.
219CamelionHoni soit qui maly pense.*n4639
'Evil to him who evil thinks', the motto of the Order of the Garter. Camelion claims that other people's misinterpretation of his wife's conduct and position is their problem, not his or hers. But, in the commodified world of new consumer London, appearances and reputation do matter, are real, and have value.
There appears to be no other reason beyond this meaning for Camelion to associate himself with the Order of the Garter. No direct contemporary connection to the Order has been found.
n4639
There appears to be no other reason beyond this meaning for Camelion to associate himself with the Order of the Garter. No direct contemporary connection to the Order has been found.
My cock, my nansy cock, my cocksy nansy,
Kiss men8962
Again, Camelion's words are open to a wide range of possible performances. Is this genuinely affectionate , or more a command that demonstrates his power in the relationship? Do they kiss or does she, in effect, submit to being kissed?
, and use thine own conscience: I scorn
n8962
, or more a command that demonstrates his power in the relationship? Do they kiss or does she, in effect, submit to being kissed? The yellow†gg3076
a figurative meaning for jealousy, derived from "yellow", the colour traditionally emblematic of jealousy (The OED cites Every Man In His Humour, where Ben Jonson makes aural (and in terms of the printed text, a visual) pun which explains wittily the connection between the psychological state and the colour: "You have a spice of the jealous yet both of you, (in your hose I mean)". The quotation is to be found only in the Quarto text of 1601 (5.3.389-390), see Herford and the Simpsons, vol.III.)
sickness*n4640
Yellow is the colour associated with jealousy [GLOSS gg3076], so 'yellow sickness' is like the 'green sickness' of envy.
, I, let ’em all say what they will.
gg3076
n4640
Dainty, come thou to me. I will not lose
An hair’s breadth o’my humour, nor retain
An ill thought o’my cock’s honesty
For all the wealth i’the Exchange, not I.
220HannahI not desire you should, but only that
You will not seem so careless of my credit*n4641
Hannah means 'reputation', 'that which is believed about me'. But her choice of words associates moral reputation with the reputation for honest dealing necessary for good credit as a merchant in a modern commercial economy. She will continue laying bare the commercial nature of Camelion's behaviour later in this scene and elsewhere. He has already associated her 'honesty' with 'all the wealth i' the Exchange'.
,
n4641
Exposing me to all temptations
Of the wild gallantry of the wanton time.
By whom – although my chastity remains
Untouched – my name and your discretion suffers.*n8964
By this stage in the exchange the audience cannot be unaware of the contrast between the speech patterns of husband (immature, babyish, colloquial) and wife (extended sentences with complex clause structures, more formal and consciously patterned word choices). Hannah is trying to get her husband to be more responsible; she addresses him in language that claims dignity and authority.
n8964
221CamelionPish†gg3269
an interjection 'expressing contempt, impatience, or disgust' (OED)
n8969
Camelion exclaims in this way frequently. It could be innocent, but he seems to be belittling her arguments rather than answering them, often with a confrontational tone .
, Honi soit again: Cock, I defy
gg3269
n8969
. Calumniation and detraction, I.
When I am jealous, let the horn-curse take me;
And let me be with hornets stung to death*n4642
No specific curse has been found, but possible meanings are clear: Camelion deserves to be really cuckolded if he falls into jealousy. One other appropriate meaning might be impotence ('horn' is sometimes used to mean penis). Camelion's mind continues to run on 'horn' and 'hornets'.
Camelion's phrase sounds proverbial, though no similar instances have been found.
.
n4642
Camelion's phrase sounds proverbial, though no similar instances have been found.
222HannahStill you fly from the point. I would not haven8966
Hannah could easily be erupting with frustration at this point .
n8966
. You vex yourself with causeless jealousy
Over my constant love, but only seem
A little watchful o’er my reputation,n5181
Hannah does not necessarily expect her husband to be really watchful, but at least to give the appearance that he is. The illusion alone will deter some attacks on her chastity. Olivia Darnley played Hannah's exasperation at Camelion's obtuseness and refusal to take seriously the threats to her reputation.
n5181
Whereby you may decline men’s lewd attempts;
And not to throw me upon opportunities
To draw them on, as if I were a thing
Set out, as in your shop, for common sale.n4643
Hannah drops all circumlocution here, shedding a cold light on Camelion's use of his wife as bait and advertising. Her use of the word 'thing' is particularly stinging: she has no human identity but is simply a thing to be deployed cynically and perhaps sold by her commercial husband.
n4643
223CamelionCock, thou shalt never tie me to’t; not I.
I must not lose my harmless recreations
Thought’st ha’ me like the hare-brained†gg1186
having or showing no more 'brains' or sense than a hare
point-tagger†gg3337
a maker of point tags, the metal terminations of laces
,
gg1186
gg3337
That used to hammer his fingers at one end
O’ th’ shop, while’s wife was bargaining at the other?
Not I; sweet Cock, pidee, let’s hear no more on’t.
Enter FOOTPOST†gg598
messenger, or early version of a postman, though not publicly funded
n8971
Using the stage space, Hannah (Olivia Darnley) moved away from her husband in frustration, making space for the arrival of the Footpost.
[carrying a letter]
gg598
n8971
Now friend! Is your business to me or my wife?
224FootpostThis superscription†gg2350
address or direction (OED 3)
will inform you, sir.*n4644
The footpost's diction is strikingly formal and latinate.
gg2350
n4644
225Camelion
[CAMELION reads] 'To my dear daughter Mistress Hannah Camelion, at her shop or house in or near the New Exchange.'*n5228
As Steggle (2004), pp. 91-92, points out, the letter from Captain Hardyman to his daughter is addressed not to a single location that doubles (as many did) as both residence and shop, but to either her house near the New Exchange or to her shop within it. The physical structure of the New Exchange did not permit residential apartments.
[CAMELION reads] 'To my dear daughter Mistress Hannah Camelion, at her shop or house in or near the New Exchange.'*
n5228
Cock*n5022
'Cock' is set as a Speech Prefix in the original, but it is clearly part of Camelion's speech.
, take it quickly. [To FOOTPOST] What a knave art thou to put a letter in my hands that is directed to my wife. ’Sbobs†gg3444
'an unmeaning oath' (OED); but it probably begins with a variant of 'God's', so perhaps 'God's bobs'
, I would not ha’ opened it for forty pound*n4645
The number forty recurs in this scene, though it is not clear exactly why. There may be a topical reference, now lost.
.
n5022
gg3444
n4645
226Footpost [Aside] If all husbands in the City were of his mind,
it were a forest of fools*n4646
This phrase, with its memorable alliteration, is likely to be common. Ben Jonson uses it in The Staple of News (3.2.309), printed first in 1631:
CUSTOMER 4: Ha'you any Forest-newes? THOMAS: None very wild, Sir,
Some tame there is, out o'the Forrest of fooles ....
indeed.
n4646
CUSTOMER 4: Ha'you any Forest-newes? THOMAS: None very wild, Sir,
Some tame there is, out o'the Forrest of fooles ....
227CamelionCock, I must leave thee.
228HannahPray stay a little. This letter’s from my father.
229CamelionI hope the good captain’s well.
230HannahYes, very well, pray read his letter here.
231CamelionCock, you shall pardon me. Not I.
I have a match to play at the ducking-pond*n4647
A pond specifically for the hunting of ducks, either with a gun or, more commonly, with a dog. Topographical references in this play locate the pond as that on the site that is now Spa Fields Garden. Samuel Pepys writes of visiting these Ducking Pond Fields in 1667, noting that they were much altered from when he saw them as a child with his father (Pepys, Diary, 5 p. 101).
.
n4647
Prithee, foreslow†gg3338
to make slow, delay, hinder, impede, obstruct; to slacken (OED foreslow v, 2)
not my occasions, Cock,
gg3338
As I forbear to pry into thy secrets.
232HannahHere’s nothing but what I would have you see.
There’s for your postage, friend. [HANNAH gives FOOTPOST money] It needs no answer.
233FootpostI thank you, mistress.Exit FOOTPOST
234HannahBut if you will not stay to read this letter,
You shall not deny me one thing.
235CamelionWhat is it? Quickly, my sweet Nanny Cock.
236Hannah [HANNAH gives CAMELION a pen] Here, take this pen: write here a word or sentence.
What you please. But keep it well in mind,
And look that you be sure to know’t again
When I shall show’t you.
237Camelion [CAMELION writes*n5121
It becomes clear in Act 5 [NA 5.2.speech1170] that he has written his catchphrase (the Order of the Garter's motto): 'Honi soit qui maly pense'.
on the letter] ’Tis done, there: I defy, and dare the devil
n5121
And all his clerks to counterfeit my hand.
So, my sweet Cock, a kiss and adieu.[CAMELION kisses HANNAH]
238HannahWell, Rafe, remember that you won’t be jealous.
239CamelionNot I. ’Sbobs, yonder comes one of the blades
That thou would’st have me have an eye to, he
That lives by his wits, and yet is seldom sober;
That goes so gallantly, and has no credit,
Nor ever buys with ready money, but
Barters commodity for commodity,
Such as it is, with tradesmen’s wives, they say.*n4648
Camelion's description of a gallant is shrewd and precise, recognising the bargain such a one will try to make with his wife, trading sexual favours for goods. Yet he hastens her to the shop counter.
Brome's representation of the gallant and Camelion's speech defining at least one prominent type thereof take their place in a vigorous tradition on the Jacobean and Caroline stage, and in some popular printed texts such as Thomas Decker's The Gull's Hornbook. In particular, Brome may be influenced by Thomas Middleton, whose comedies repeatedly address the figure of the gallant (as in Your Five Gallants [c.1607] and The Roaring Girl [c.1607], especially Scene 9).
n4648
Brome's representation of the gallant and Camelion's speech defining at least one prominent type thereof take their place in a vigorous tradition on the Jacobean and Caroline stage, and in some popular printed texts such as Thomas Decker's The Gull's Hornbook. In particular, Brome may be influenced by Thomas Middleton, whose comedies repeatedly address the figure of the gallant (as in Your Five Gallants [c.1607] and The Roaring Girl [c.1607], especially Scene 9).
What call you him? Oh, Askal. There’s another
Comes with him too. Into thy shop*n5182
The selling spaces in the New Exchange were often small, little more than a counter for the salesperson to stand behind. See Dillon, pp. 110-113.
, good Cock.
n5182
I wo’ not stay, not I. So farewell, Cock.Exit CAMELION
240HannahAnd farewell, cockscomb, some wife would say now.
I am much troubled at his silliness†gg3339
foolishness, intellectual feebleness; sometimes innocence
gg3339
And would, to right me, strain a woman’s wit,
Knew I with modesty how to answer it.
Something I’ll do.*n8970
Hannah's final comments on Camelion's obtuseness or callous recklessness convey her frustration even through their indefiniteness, like Lear's angry 'I will do such things -- /
What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be /
The terrors of the earth!' (King Lear 2.4).
n8970
Enter ERASMUS and VALENTINE. [They talk unheard by HANNAH]n11333
Workshop experiments with this scene resulted in prolonged discussion among actors and editors, all responding to the discomfort produced by Valentine's conduct and Hannah's exposed situation. Julie Sanders began by pointing out that the original theatre audience was likely to have been quite various and it would probably have included 'gallants' who would, at least initially, have identified with Valentine. Alan Morrissey and others pointed out the different ways in which the young men could be performed, asking how sophisticated they might be and what evidence from elsewhere in the play there was for Valentine's success as a seducer; Olivia Darnley, fresh from taking the role of Hannah, questioned how Hannah would respond to such offensive conduct, and this was situated by Liz Schafer in relation to the disturbing presentation of women's responses even by a female playwright like Aphra Behn .
n11333
. Merchant Matchil is possessed with,
To marry so, to spite his child and kindred?
242ValentineHe has made his daughter by’t a match worth nothing*n4649
There may be a pun on the word 'nothing', based on what appears to have been very similar pronunciation of 'nothing' and 'noting' in the period. Hitherto Joyce was worth noting as a potential marriage partner; now, without the prospect of inherited wealth, she has become nothing.
.
n4649
And there your hope is gone.
243ErasmusAnd yours in me.
For as I said before, good Valentine,
I must return you to your City wives,
By the old trade*n8909
Erasmus makes no attempt to conceal his judgement that Valentine's way of extracting money from merchants' wives is a trade. Valentine seems not to resent at all the implications. This is all happening in the play's great site of commerce, the New Exchange. The emphasis on trade picks up on Hannah's increasingly pointed wordchoice in seeking to shame Camelion into protecting her: 'credit', 'a thing set out, as in your shop, for common sale'.
to pick your maintenance†gg2387
support, means of subsistence (OED n. 3a)
n8909
gg2387
Out of ’em, as you boast you can.
244Valentine’Tis well, sir.
And now to let you know that I can liven8980
From the beginning of this sequence Brome makes it clear that Valentine is more interested in money than sexual opportunity; and more interested in impressing his friend Erasmus than in either. He consciously performs, perhaps also acting out a fantasy of himself as more sophisticated and persuasive than he is in actuality.
n8980
Without the helps of such cool friends as you,
I’ll show you a present probability.
Dost*n5122
Val. Doest An unnecessary duplicate Speech Prefix has been removed. The ms. annotators of several copies make this emendation.
see yond pretty, mumping piece*n4650
'Mumper' is usually defined as 'beggar' or low-life person, but Brome's characters frequently use it of women to mean sexually available, close to prostitution. 'Piece' is also frequently used as a dismissive term for a woman, particularly when viewed as a sexual object.
i’ th’
n5122
n4650
shop, there?
245ErasmusYes, is that one –?
246ValentineOne o’th’ forty, boy,
That renders tribute in to my exchequer*n5495
Valentine imagines himself as reigning over an empire of desiring women, all of whom make payments (tribute paid into his account) to try to secure his favour.
.
n5495
247ErasmusDid’st ever lie with her?
248ValentineHow plain you are! Not I, not I.
That’s her fool-husband’s word*n4651
Valentine imitates Camelion's habit of repeating 'Not I, not I'.
.
n4651
Let it suffice that I have seen her thrice,
And that I lay with, drink, and wear her money.*n4652
Valentine's line makes no attempt to conceal the interchangeability in his mind of Hannah's body and her husband's money.
n4652
O, ’tis the sweetest rogue.
249ErasmusHow got you acquainted?
250ValentineI’ll tell you that. Walking by chance, as now,
Before her shop, where a young gentleman
Was bargaining, he called me by my name,
Val Askal. Instantly her eye was fixed
And straight ran over my delineaments*n4653
In his vanity, Valentine preens by using Latinate diction.
,
n4653
Which I set to her view; and took occasion
To ask her how the object pleased her.
252ValentineI never lost by that.
She then demands, 'Is your name Askal, sir?'
I answer, 'Yes'. 'Pray, of what country, sir?'*n5183
Valentine is enjoying his self-promoting narrative so much that he moves into the historic present tense, remembering and imagining himself as playing the leading role in a drama. The New Academy, like so many of Brome's plays, is highly conscious both of its own theatricality and of the theatrical nature of life, especially as lived in contemporary London. Valentine shows himself caught up in this, but without the self-awareness to recognise the disparity between his fictional self and the altogether less heroic reality.
n5183
I told her; when a sudden flaming blush
Did in her face betray the fire of love*n4654
Again, Valentine dramatises through his diction, this time adopting the vocabulary of love poetry.
,
n4654
That was at th’ instant raging in her breast.
She looked me through and through, sighed, turned away,n5184
This play concerns itself with the use of appearances and costumes to communicate and persuade, and with the issues of sight, looking, and gazing. Here, ironically, Valentine is shown to misinterpret visual signs, for all his emphasis on looking. His unrecognised half-sister 'look[s] [him] through and through'; but instead of being overpowered by desire, she is dismayed by him. He interprets her blush of shame as the expression of overpowering sexual attraction.
In this speech particularly, but throughout the dialogue, Brome plays on the homophones 'I', 'eye', and 'Aye', to drive home Valentine's the self-absorbtion. Occasionally, Erasmus participates in the game also, wryly amused by his friend's impenetrable vanity.
n5184
In this speech particularly, but throughout the dialogue, Brome plays on the homophones 'I', 'eye', and 'Aye', to drive home Valentine's the self-absorbtion. Occasionally, Erasmus participates in the game also, wryly amused by his friend's impenetrable vanity.
Then looked again under her hat-brims thus*n4655
A pose recognisable from contemporary illustrations. Valentine's 'thus' shows that he is acting this out for Erasmus, continuing to perform and conceive of himself theatrically.
.
n4655
And thus I nimbly caught her with mine eye*n4658
Valentine here begins a series of references to 'catching' and particularly to fishing. His bait is his 'eye'; but 'eye' can also be a term for a looped piece of metal, used in fishing, and -- in combination with 'hook' -- as a fastening for clothes, especially doublet and hose. The first instance given for this usage in the OED is 1626.
.
n4658
253ErasmusAye, thou hast a devilish catch i’that same eye*n4656
Erasmus and Valentine are bantering in this passage, playing with homophones. Erasmus's response may be a dry, sceptical, ironic commentary on Valentine's flight of fancy; it also continues the emphasis on the eye, visual signs, and the self-regarding creation of identity.
.
n4656
254ValentineSir, what I have, I have. I gave a leer
255ErasmusBut to the point.
256ValentineWhy, do you think a woman’s so quicklyn5184
This play concerns itself with the use of appearances and costumes to communicate and persuade, and with the issues of sight, looking, and gazing. Here, ironically, Valentine is shown to misinterpret visual signs, for all his emphasis on looking. His unrecognised half-sister 'look[s] [him] through and through'; but instead of being overpowered by desire, she is dismayed by him. He interprets her blush of shame as the expression of overpowering sexual attraction.
In this speech particularly, but throughout the dialogue, Brome plays on the homophones 'I', 'eye', and 'Aye', to drive home Valentine's the self-absorbtion. Occasionally, Erasmus participates in the game also, wryly amused by his friend's impenetrable vanity.
n5184
In this speech particularly, but throughout the dialogue, Brome plays on the homophones 'I', 'eye', and 'Aye', to drive home Valentine's the self-absorbtion. Occasionally, Erasmus participates in the game also, wryly amused by his friend's impenetrable vanity.
brought to the point?n5184
This play concerns itself with the use of appearances and costumes to communicate and persuade, and with the issues of sight, looking, and gazing. Here, ironically, Valentine is shown to misinterpret visual signs, for all his emphasis on looking. His unrecognised half-sister 'look[s] [him] through and through'; but instead of being overpowered by desire, she is dismayed by him. He interprets her blush of shame as the expression of overpowering sexual attraction.
In this speech particularly, but throughout the dialogue, Brome plays on the homophones 'I', 'eye', and 'Aye', to drive home Valentine's the self-absorbtion. Occasionally, Erasmus participates in the game also, wryly amused by his friend's impenetrable vanity.
n5184
In this speech particularly, but throughout the dialogue, Brome plays on the homophones 'I', 'eye', and 'Aye', to drive home Valentine's the self-absorbtion. Occasionally, Erasmus participates in the game also, wryly amused by his friend's impenetrable vanity.
257ErasmusWhat followed then?
258ValentineI saw she was struck†gs595
to cause the hook to pierce the mouth of (a fish) by a jerk or sudden movement of the tackle; to hook; also said of the hook or the rod; and to cause (a hook) to pierce the mouth (OED strike v, 33f); there may also be a reference to being struck by the arrows of love
; and thus I gave her line
gs595
To play withal. I whispered in her ear
The way to find my lodging and my service*n5186
Valentine's word has multiple potential meanings and the precise point here is left purposefully vague. As Hannah's potential lover, he could be the 'servant' of a mistress; but Valentine seems to see himself as dominant in this relationship: Hannah, because she is overwhelmed by desire for him, is to be his sexual servant (as well as giving him money).
.
n5186
Inviting me to dinner; cheer and welcome
Plenteously flowed; and, sir, before we parted,
Upon some private conference twenty pieces
Were clutched into this hand, but with a caution
To be discreet and thrifty of her purse,
And keep a friend in store. I have been modest,
And have not struck her since, but for ten more.
259ErasmusAnd that’s your last.
260ValentineI’ll hold you ten o’that.*n4659
Valentine has received thirty pieces from Hannah so far, which Erasmus asserts will be the end of her generosity. But Valentine will now ask for ten more, adding up to forty, the number that dominates this scene.
n4659
See, she has spied me.n8985
Throughout his exchanges with Hannah, Valentine is highly conscious of the effect on Erasmus, though he ultimately misinterprets it. In working on the sequence with actors there was experimentation with where Hannah should be placed. The scene is set in front of Camelion's shop counter in the New Exchange; and Hannah was initially placed as herself an object for the gaze and, in a sense, for sale, sitting as though in a shop window. . Further discussion resulted in agreement that this overly trapped the actor; but the experiments made clear the importance of her being subject to gazing and, in a sense, trapped by structure of shop, Exchange, and societal attitudes.
n8985
. Further discussion resulted in agreement that this overly trapped the actor; but the experiments made clear the importance of her being subject to gazing and, in a sense, trapped by structure of shop, Exchange, and societal attitudes.
261HannahWhat lack ye, gentlemen?*n4660
'What lack ye' or 'What do you lack' are the traditional shopkeeper's or inn-keeper's cries. However, there is a sense that this common phrase is extended here to a bigger question: what is it that shallow young men like Valentine lack? Money alone, or a sense of honour or larger purpose beyond the pursuit of pleasure?
Fair cut-work†gg3341
openwork embroidery
bands†gg3342
the collar of a shirt, neck-band
, boot-hose†gg3343
boot stockings
, or boot-hose tops†gg3749
elaborate decorative work displayed at the top of boot hose
, shirts, waistcoats, nightcaps, what will you buy?
n4660
gg3341
gg3342
gg3343
gg3749
262Valentine [Aloud to HANNAH] I come not now to buy,
But in plain terms to borrow. Do you not know me?
263HannahNot on these terms.
264Erasmus [Aside to VALENTINE] Sure, thou mistakest the woman.
265Valentine [Aside to ERASMUS] She’s cautious before thee. Walk off a little.n8990
Throughout the triangular sequence with Erasmus and Hannah, Valentine manipulates the space in front of her shop counter and, indeed, the stage space. He seeks, not least, to create self-flattering stage pictures for Erasmus.
Erasmus, being commanded to stand apart, also frames the action for the audience, who see Valentine's conduct through the appraising and sceptical eyes of the onstage observer.
[ERASMUS stands apart]
n8990
He seeks, not least, to create self-flattering stage pictures for Erasmus.
Erasmus, being commanded to stand apart, also frames the action for the audience, who see Valentine's conduct through the appraising and sceptical eyes of the onstage observer.
[Aloud to HANNAH] Now you may hear me, lady.
266HannahGive me leave
A little first to wonder at your rashness,
To talk so openly before a stranger.
267ValentineMy intimate friend; I’ll trust him with my life.
268HannahWhat’s that to my unblemished reputation?
’Tis not your life can salve†gs686
figuratively and as a verb, to heal
that, being wounded.n9029
Attacks on a woman's reputation for sexual honesty were particularly damaging in this period. In discussions of the scene, Julie Sanders and Lucy Munro stressed the causes of Hannah's anxiety.
gs686
n9029
But thus it is, when women out of goodness
Hazard their fortunes to relieve the wants
Of such as you, that carry no respect
But to your own licentious appetites,
And think no favour’s sweet, unless you may
Have privilege to boast ’em to our shame.
269ValentineI do not boast of yours.
270HannahPray, boast no more
Than you have found, and much good may they do
you.
’Tis not poor thirty pieces*n4661
Hannah's reference to 'thirty pieces' recalls the payment to Judas Iscariot of thirty pieces of silver, for the betrayal of Christ.
can undo me.
n4661
271ValentineNo, nor ten more, I hope; and that’s the sum
I would entreat: all makes but forty pound*n4662
Again, the text stresses that Valentine will receive forty pounds.
.
n4662
I’ll pay thee like a gentleman, as I am onen8991
Valentine's speech shows anything but a gentlemanly respect for Hannah, insinuating a baseness of motive to her and insulting her husband to her face. Valentine is too absorbed in his own fantasy and the performance being seen by Erasmus to consider Hannah's likely response, as Olivia Darnley's performance conveyed.
Staging the scene with greater mobility for Hannah enabled Valentine's presumption to be made manifest in his invasion of her space, her retreat, and his oppressive pursuit of a woman trapped by both the physical need to remain near her shop counter and by her commitment to their father to assist her brother. However, it should be remembered that this latter motive remains a mystery to the audience.
;
n8991
Staging the scene with greater mobility for Hannah enabled Valentine's presumption to be made manifest in his invasion of her space, her retreat, and his oppressive pursuit of a woman trapped by both the physical need to remain near her shop counter and by her commitment to their father to assist her brother.
However, it should be remembered that this latter motive remains a mystery to the audience. Either in money or – dost hear me, rogue? –
In what shall please thee better*n4663
Valentine leeringly assumes that Hannah's primary motive is to gain him as a lover. Note that he uses 'thee' and 'thou', while she maintains the distance by using 'you'.
. Come, be wise,
n4663
Thy husband’s a dull ducking gamester†gg409
one who gambles (OED 3); lewd person of either sex (OED 5)
n4664
'Gamester' can mean 'gambler' or, figuratively, a lewd person. Valentine seems to suggest that Camelion is both a dull gambler and a dull lover.
As Lucy Munro pointed out when working on this scene, the offensiveness of Valentine's words and attitudes here begins of a series of speeches in which Hannah tries to shock Valentine into desisting. But he is too insensitive to notice.
, and
gg409
n4664
As Lucy Munro pointed out when working on this scene, the offensiveness of Valentine's words and attitudes here begins of a series of speeches in which Hannah tries to shock Valentine into desisting. But he is too insensitive to notice.
Kennels his water-dog in Turnbull Street*n5498
Previously known as Turnmill Street, this was a road or lane in Clerkenwell notorious for prostitution. It is regularly referred to in Elizabethan and Jacobean drama, from Henry IV, pt. 2 (3.2.279) onwards (Norton Shakespeare, p. 1374).
*n4665
This is literally true, in the sense that Camelion keeps his dog near the Ducking Ponds; but Valentine implies that he is also engaged in extra-marital activity. Camelion later comes close to confirming that.
.
n5498
n4665
We’ll answer his delights with better sport.
272HannahThere’s your presumption.
273ValentineNo, ’tis my ambition.
When shall we walk to Tottenham? Or cross o’er
The water, or take coach to Kensington
Or Paddington; or to some one or other
And hear the cuckoo sing to th’ purpose? When?n4666
Valentine proposes assignations in some of the well-known places for illicit sexual activity (hence the reference to the cuckoo) outside the area controlled by the City of London authorities. Apart from the liberties in Southwark 'across the water', these are in the villages to the west: Tottenham, Kensington, and Paddington.
The enumeration of places has an air of sexual fantasy or euphemism, as actors and editors suggested in working through the scene. Valentine's strategem is going so badly that he may be embarrassed; but he may also be as confused as the audience: why, if she so resents his conduct, does she keep giving him money? Julie Sanders and Helen Ostovich pointed out that the place names, the proposal to go by coach, and the use of the term 'outleap' would have left no-one (not Hannah, not the audience) in any doubt about the sexual purpose of the excursion. Valentine's attitude shows class disdain: however she responds, Hannah is a shopworker and therefore of low morals.
Experimenting with the scene, this speech became a crucial moment: it will provoke Hannah to her most stark rebuke of Valentine. Rather than being a manifestation of an urgent sexual desire, the actors found that Valentine's conduct was more a response to his need to impress Erasmus by appearing to take liberties with Hannah. Using the diagonal placing on the stage of the characters, Valentine's consciousness of the success of his performance in Erasmus's eyes could be expressed in highly visible, nervous glances, checking on the results. But with her vehement response Valentine's show begins to disintegrate; his insistence then on whispering seemed a way of limiting the damage.
n4666
The enumeration of places has an air of sexual fantasy or euphemism, as actors and editors suggested in working through the scene. Valentine's strategem is going so badly that he may be embarrassed; but he may also be as confused as the audience: why, if she so resents his conduct, does she keep giving him money? Julie Sanders and Helen Ostovich pointed out that the place names, the proposal to go by coach, and the use of the term 'outleap' would have left no-one (not Hannah, not the audience) in any doubt about the sexual purpose of the excursion. Valentine's attitude shows class disdain: however she responds, Hannah is a shopworker and therefore of low morals.
Experimenting with the scene, this speech became a crucial moment: it will provoke Hannah to her most stark rebuke of Valentine. Rather than being a manifestation of an urgent sexual desire, the actors found that Valentine's conduct was more a response to his need to impress Erasmus by appearing to take liberties with Hannah. Using the diagonal placing on the stage of the characters, Valentine's consciousness of the success of his performance in Erasmus's eyes could be expressed in highly visible, nervous glances, checking on the results. But with her vehement response Valentine's show begins to disintegrate; his insistence then on whispering seemed a way of limiting the damage.
274HannahA woman were a wise one that would trust
Herself in such wild hands as yours, to have
Her name made tavern-talk among your blades,
And thrust i’ th’ list of your loose-hiltedn4667
Hannah uses vocabulary with obvious sexual connotations - 'thrust', 'loose-hilted' - to convey her disdain for the easy-virtued women with whom Valentine associates her. At this point Hannah seems to turn back on Valentine his own kind of offensive diction, challenging him and taking control of the scene. Working on the scene with actors, the director, Brian Woolland, made a connection with a similar moment earlier in the scene when Hannah seized rhetorical control from her husband Camelion. Both Hannah and Valentine are acutely aware of being observed by Erasmus.
A second version of this exchange emphasised more Valentine's offensively insinuating invasion of Hannah's space and the vigour of her response. Rather than remaining close to him she moved to the far edge of the stage; Valentine then used the need to whisper as a means of coaxing or compelling her to come close to him again, for the benefit of Erasmus's observation. Alternatively, Hannah's sense of her integrity could result in her refusal to cede physical space to Valentine, causing him to back down in the face of strength. This staging was discussed, and thought perhaps to be preferable, but not performed.
Lucy Munro also suggested that Valentine could be played as finding Hannah's vehement rebuff sexually exciting or encouraging: because she nonetheless funds him, he may think she is playing hard to get.
mistresses.
n4667
A second version of this exchange emphasised more Valentine's offensively insinuating invasion of Hannah's space and the vigour of her response. Rather than remaining close to him she moved to the far edge of the stage; Valentine then used the need to whisper as a means of coaxing or compelling her to come close to him again, for the benefit of Erasmus's observation.
Alternatively, Hannah's sense of her integrity could result in her refusal to cede physical space to Valentine, causing him to back down in the face of strength. This staging was discussed, and thought perhaps to be preferable, but not performed. Lucy Munro also suggested that Valentine could be played as finding Hannah's vehement rebuff sexually exciting or encouraging: because she nonetheless funds him, he may think she is playing hard to get.
And careful I will be. Hark in thine ear.
[VALENTINE and HANNAH talk apart]
276Erasmus [Aside] I cannot blame this fellow now so much
For using of his wits to get a living,
People of worth and virtue, as this woman
Who I am credibly informed is virtuous
And too discreet for him to shark†gg3446
to prey upon, to victimize, sponge upon, swindle (OED)
upon.
gg3446
Therefore to grace himself, he slanders her.
I have always liked his company till now,
And shall hereafter be more wary of him.n4669
Erasmus's judgements on conduct and morals are the surest in the play (and hence his reward of a sensible, wealthy wife in Mistress Blith at the end). Here, his decision to distance himself from Valentine validates and confirms the audience's disquiet.
Once more in this scene, Erasmus speaks for and to the audience.
n4669
Once more in this scene, Erasmus speaks for and to the audience.
277Hannah [Aloud] Well, sir, upon your*n5037
pour. The unemended reading could be defended (poor), but this looks like a compositor's misreading. Later in this Act the compositor seems to have difficulty with this word again, when Lady Nestlecock labels her son 'pure' or 'poor' thing. [NA 2.2.speech395] [NOTE n5058]. The Newberry Library Y135.B779 ms. annotator corrects to 'your'.
faithful protestation
n5037
And vow of secrecy, here’s ten pieces more.
[HANNAH gives VALENTINE ten pieces of money]
You have found a tender-hearted woman of me
Over your wants; and all the satisfaction
That I desire is, that I may not suffer
Under a lavish tonguen4670
Hannah asks that Valentine does not corrupt her reputation by bragging of her favour and his power over her.
The actors experimented with playing this speech to give an impression of Hannah's authority and Valentine's discomfiture at the stark revelation that he is, for all his posturing, dependent on her for money. In particular, Valentine does not dare look across at Erasmus, for fear Hannah will lose any patience with him. In the case of such an interpretation, the actor playing Valentine would need to convey the character's irrepressibility: he immediately recovers and resumes lewd insinuation. The difficulties were explored in discussion.
; ’tis easy payment.
n4670
The actors experimented with playing this speech to give an impression of Hannah's authority and Valentine's discomfiture at the stark revelation that he is, for all his posturing, dependent on her for money.
In particular, Valentine does not dare look across at Erasmus, for fear Hannah will lose any patience with him. In the case of such an interpretation, the actor playing Valentine would need to convey the character's irrepressibility: he immediately recovers and resumes lewd insinuation. The difficulties were explored in discussion.
278ValentineYes, but I’ll pay thee better. Therefore,
tell me, when we shall meet and have a spirt†gg3344
a sudden burst of activity; a variant of 'spurt', also used in the seventeenth century.
abroad?
gg3344
279HannahYour friend stays for you, sir.
280ValentinePish*n8910
Valentine uses a word that has already become closely associated with Camelion in the first moments of this scene. Both men patronise Hannah, both treat her as a 'thing', and both belittle what she says with the same exclamation.
, let him stay.
n8910
281HannahYou slight him now, but he knows all your counsels.n8992
Hannah is at least as aware as Valentine of the effect of the stage pictures he is creating. She is constantly conscious of Erasmus's observation and possible interpretations.
Experimenting with the scene, the actors themselves commented on how Erasmus's presence on stage affected the tone and that there were two different impressions being made: one by the conversation between Hannah and Valentine and one by their physical actions.
There was also discussion of how threatened Hannah feels by being observed by Erasmus. Though Valentine claims antagonising Erasmus would not matter, Hannah's line may mean that Erasmus is dangerous and must not be alienated, because he knows all Valentine's secrets.
n8992
Experimenting with the scene, the actors themselves commented on how Erasmus's presence on stage affected the tone and that there were two different impressions being made: one by the conversation between Hannah and Valentine and one by their physical actions.
There was also discussion of how threatened Hannah feels by being observed by Erasmus. Though Valentine claims antagonising Erasmus would not matter, Hannah's line may mean that Erasmus is dangerous and must not be alienated, because he knows all Valentine's secrets.
282ValentineBy this good tongue, no more than the unbegotten Hans that I mean to clap into thy Kelder*n4671
Valentine employs an Englishing of the Dutch saying, that an unborn child is 'Hans in Kelder', 'Jack in the cellar'. Again, he is veneering over an ugly meaning by employing wit and a diction that he hopes will predispose his listener to accept his stance. Here the jocularity is entirely inappropriate, savouring of all-male sexual banter and, as such, completely counter-productive with Hannah.
.
n4671
Nor ever shall: dost think I am so foolish
To talk away my hopes? No, thou art my fairy,
Pinch*n4672
Pinching appears to be the fairies' favoured form of torment, as most memorably in The Merry Wives of Windsor and, perhaps uppermost in Brome's mind, in Jonson's The Alchemist.
me to death when I discover thee.
n4672
283HannahGo to†gg2147
an exhortation, equivalent to 'come, come', or the modern 'for heaven's sake' (OED go v, 93b)
, avoid suspicion then. Besides,
gg2147
I have occasions that do call me hence.Exit HANNAH
284ErasmusYour stay was somewhat long.
285ValentineYet ’twas to purpose,
As here you may behold; but I must make no words on’t.[VALENTINE counts out his money]*n5023
The numbers, '1, 2, 3, 4, etc.' are set as a stage direction in the original; and it is possible that the actor is suppose to count audibly. But Valentine stresses that he has been enjoined to 'make no words on it' by Hannah, so this is probably an exaggerated action of counting.
n5023
She has enjoined me that. O, ’tis a cunning gypsy†gg2651
cunning, deceitful; also used as a derogatory term for a woman, similar to 'hussy' or 'baggage' (OED n. 2b), so could refer to the actions of such a woman
.
gg2651
286Erasmus
So’t seems, by trusting thee that hast no power to keep a secret.*n5189
Erasmus is ironic once more, questioning how clever Hannah can really be, if she trusts Valentine.
n5189
287ValentineTroth, to tell you true,
My conscience will not bear ’t, I cannot be
So ungrateful to receive a courtesy,
But to acknowledge it.
288ErasmusYet thou hast the conscience*n4673
Erasmus's cool and unvarnished statement exposes the contrast between the real virtues of honesty and concern for others and the breezy, self-serving immorality of an exploitative gallant. Valentine is prepared to corrupt Hannah and drive Camelion to financial ruin.
n4673
To work a man’s estate out of his hands
By his wife’s frailty, even to break his back†gg3345
sexual stamina
*n5190
Erasmus means that Valentine will undermine Camelion financially, but his phrase opens the way for Valentine to respond with a sexual meaning.
.
gg3345
n5190
289Valentine’Tis rather to be feared she may break mine.*n4674
Valentine picks up Erasmus's phrase for Camelion's possible financial ruin ('break his back') and makes a sexual joke: Hannah's sexual demands may exhaust him physically.
n4674
She’s a tight†gg3347
(figuratively of a person, expressing somewhat indefinite commendation) competent, capable, able, skilful; alert, smart; lively, vigorous, stout; (OED tight a, 3); often with sexual connotations
, strong-docked†gg3346
having firm buttocks (OED: 'strong-docked, "that has strong Reins and Sinews, lusty, stout" (Phillips 1706)'; found in East Anglian dialects, frequently applied to women assumed to be sexually vigorous
tit†gg3348
a girl or young woman: often qualified as little: cf. chit; also applied indiscriminately to women of any age:(a) usually in depreciation or disapproval: esp. one of loose character, a hussy, a minx; or (b) sometimes in affection or admiration, or playful meiosis (common in 17th and 18th c.; now low slang) (OED n. 3 and 2a)
.n8993
Valentine's vulgarity provokes Erasmus to exclaim a response, again framing the exchange for the audience verbally and visually. Liz Schafer, Julie Sanders, and Sam Alexander expressed the power of Erasmus's commentary as a device for framing and focusing the audience's attention.
gg3347
gg3346
gg3348
n8993
Liz Schafer, Julie Sanders, and Sam Alexander expressed the power of Erasmus's commentary as a device for framing and focusing the audience's attention.
290ErasmusO tradesmen, why do you marry?
For gentlemen that want*n5191
Valentine puns on two meanings of 'want': desire and have the need of.
money and commodity.
n5191
That had my mother’s whole estate, and buried her,
Allows me nothing.
292ErasmusThank your own sweet courses†gg29
way of proceeding, action; also trick, way of gaining money illicitly
*n5054
Valentine has behaved so badly that he has been cut off without funds by his step-father, Hardyman.
.
gg29
n5054
293ValentineMy courses are sweet courses, they serve me to live upon*n4675
Valentine's complacent acknowledgement of his immoral exploitation of others links him with Strigood in the older generation.
.
n4675
294Erasmus [Aside] But I shall put you off
O’ one of your sweet courses, or at least
I’ll strain a point of friendship to be satisfied
Touching this woman; ’twill be worth discovery.
295ValentineBut why these cloudy looks? Do not you like my courses? Ha!*n4676
Valentine uses the exclamation characteristic of Matchil, Lady Nestlecock, and Strigood, another indication that he resembles them in his egocentrism and tendency to be immoral in the exploitation of the virtuous and weak.
n4676
296ErasmusI cry thee mercy, Val,
297ValentineAye, there’s a hasty match clapped up. You asked
Why tradesmen marry: there’s a marriage now!
A humorous cockscomb that could never laugh
In all his last wife’s days; and since her death
For poor and coarse*n5192
Valentine puns using the homophones 'coarse' and 'course'.
obedience! Well, I hope
n5192
To take my course*n5192
Valentine puns using the homophones 'coarse' and 'course'.
in his house yet, for all
n5192
Her boasted chastity and obedience.
298ErasmusWould’st thou touch such a thing*n4677
Erasmus expresses class disdain for servant girls as sexual partners. Hannah has already sought to shame Camelion by comparing herself to a 'thing', an object for sale; and Valentine has also labelled Hannah a 'thing'.
?
n4677
299ValentineWhat, not for money*n4678
Valentine's response reveals him as being close to male prostitution, though he would protest against being so identified.
?
n4678
She can pay well, and her ugliness cannot fright me.
I can do that work winking*n5497
Valentine's crude assertion -- that he can stomach having sex with an ugly woman for money if he keeps his eyes closed -- is another example of his self-centredness, lack of emotional sympathy, and immorality.
.
n5497
300ErasmusShe can be no such woman.
301ValentineTell not me
What any woman can or cannot be.n8994
Valentine's underlying mysogyny and class disdain manifest themselves unmistakably here.
n8994
You’ll give me leave to try my fortune with her.
302ErasmusYes, and walk with you towards it.ERASMUS and VALENTINE exit together*n5024
Ex. Ambo.
n5024
2.2*n5240
Act 2's second scene returns us to the main plot but introduces a new element: Lady Nestlecock's intriguings to achieve a pair of cross marriages, matching herself with Sir Swithin Whimlby and her son, Nehemiah, with Whimlby's niece, Blith Tripshort. Most of these characters are broadly comedic: Lady Nestlecock is given to passionate utterance, particularly in indulgent praise of her immature son. Nehemiah himself is a wonderful creation: well of an age to be assuming the responsibilities and attitudes of adult manhood, he remains obsessed with children's games and apparently unaware of adult sexuality. Whimlby is an aged and decrepit lover, and he seems most in love with himself as a grieving widower. As with the other young women in the play, Blith is represented as a victim of the follies of the others, about to be sacrificed in marriage to the idiot Nehemiah so that her uncle -- or is it her natural father? -- can achieve the cross marriage with Lady Nestlecock. Added to this is another upwardly mobile servant, Ephraim, who is Malvolio-like in his aspiration to marry Lady Nestlecock.
In the second half of the scene these characters are joined my Lady Nestlecock's brother, Matchil, and his new wife, Rachel, who had hitherto been his domestic servant. On discovering that Lady Nestlecock has lost Matchil's daughter, relations between brother and sister spiral into antagonism, leading Matchil to deter Whimlby from marrying Lady Nestlecock, or indeed anyone at all, advising him that marriage results in the loss of freedom. Incautiously, he does this in front of his own new wife, who reveals that her meekness and silence as a domestic servant have been replaced in the wife by a capacity for forthright and vigorous expression of her own views. Matchil's discomfiture is enjoyed by everyone else on the stage.
n5240
In the second half of the scene these characters are joined my Lady Nestlecock's brother, Matchil, and his new wife, Rachel, who had hitherto been his domestic servant. On discovering that Lady Nestlecock has lost Matchil's daughter, relations between brother and sister spiral into antagonism, leading Matchil to deter Whimlby from marrying Lady Nestlecock, or indeed anyone at all, advising him that marriage results in the loss of freedom. Incautiously, he does this in front of his own new wife, who reveals that her meekness and silence as a domestic servant have been replaced in the wife by a capacity for forthright and vigorous expression of her own views. Matchil's discomfiture is enjoyed by everyone else on the stage.
[In LADY NESTLECOCK's house]*n5019
There is no indication of location in the original, but the setting is clear from the dialogue.
n5019
Enter LADY NESTLECOCK and EPHRAIM
303Lady NestlecockNo news, no tidings of ’em, Ephraim, ha!
304EphraimNot since the rape
Of Helen, I’m persuaded*n4679
Ephraim alludes to the story of the cause of the Trojan war, Paris's abduction of Menalaus's wife, Helen. The analogy is over-stretched and thus bathetic. Throughout his interactions with Lady Nestlecock he attempts to make a good impression, hoping to become her husband, by inflating his diction and manner of speech. The effect is gained not least by the contrast with her sometimes coarse responses. In this speech Ephraim is repeatedly forced to reformulate his statements, in case his florid phrasing and circumlocutions have lost Lady Nestlecock. There are obvious resemblances here to ambitious servants like Malvolio in Twelfth Night.
. I have searched
n4679
And diligence in most secret places.
And can no way inform myself, what is
Betide of the young damsels, or old squire –
Your niece, and the French virgin, and the man
Unworthy to be called your brother, Strigood.
305Lady NestlecockO, hang him, villain.
306EphraimDoubtless ’twas his plot
To work upon your ladyship’s good nature
To harbour them, that he might take th’ advantage
Of stealing them away.
307Lady NestlecockWhat to do, ha?
308EphraimTo do? Much may be done*n4680
Ephraim picks up on Lady Nestlecock's question, 'What to do, ha?', and draws on the sexual sense of 'doing'.
, by his seducements,
n4680
On two such tender virgins, though he should
But plant them in our suburbs*n4681
Outside the boundaries of the City, the suburbs were supposed to be places for illicit sexuality and prostitution, because of the absence of strict control of morality by local authorities.
; but my fear
n4681
Is that he has transported them beyond seas
Into some nunnery. Your ladyship
Knows he is adverse in religion*n4682
A commonly used phrase (see The Alchemist 3.2.57), meaning a Catholic, a papist.
.
n4682
309Lady NestlecockI know he is of none*n4683
As often in this period, an association is made between atheism and adherence to Catholicism, which was deemed no religion by more extreme Protestants.
.
n4683
310EphraimSatan will work
The stronger in him, then, to their subversion.
311Lady NestlecockHow shall I answer now my brother Matchil?
But he is justly served to marry so.
The thought of it torments me. Where’s my comfort?
Where’s Nehemiah, ha?
312EphraimHe’s busy, madam.
313Lady NestlecockWhat, at his book? Or at his music, ha?
314EphraimThat is, his ballet*n4684
'Ballet' is a variant spelling of 'ballad', still in use by Samuel Pepys in the 1660s. It is retained here because Ephraim may again be elevating his diction through vague anachronism to impress Lady Nestlecock.
, or his jew’s trump†gg3350
a variant term for 'jew's harp', a simple musical instrument
. No,
n4684
gg3350
Madam. He is busy at his exercise of arms*n4685
Ephraim sardonically applies to Nehemiah's schoolboy games a term for the practice of fighting and tournament skills. At nineteen he should be developing more manly attainments.
n4685
With a new castingtop†gg3351
a variant of 'pegtop', a game in which an opponent knocks over another's pegs with a spinning 'top'
, a cat and catstick†gg3352
a bat or stick used in games of tip-cat and trap-ball (see [NOTE n5066])
*n5066
Throughout the play, Nehemiah - though nineteen years old - is represented as being excited most by children's games. Often, Brome chooses games whose names are capable of bawdy meanings; but always these are the most popular children's games of the time, games that continued well into the twentieth century but which have often died out in the age of television, video, and computer games.
Nehemiah's games usually involve 'things' (the term taken from Iona and Peter Opie's study, Children's Games with Things (Oxford: Oxford University Pres, 1997). Most of Nehemiah's games are to do with spinning tops (here he's been given a 'castingtop'; when he comes on he asks if his prospective wife will play 'peg-top') or ball ('cat') and bat ('catstick'), the latter a variant of 'tipcat'.
,
gg3351
gg3352
n5066
Nehemiah's games usually involve 'things' (the term taken from Iona and Peter Opie's study, Children's Games with Things (Oxford: Oxford University Pres, 1997). Most of Nehemiah's games are to do with spinning tops (here he's been given a 'castingtop'; when he comes on he asks if his prospective wife will play 'peg-top') or ball ('cat') and bat ('catstick'), the latter a variant of 'tipcat'.
I bought and brought him home.
315Lady NestlecockI thank you for ’em,
My careful, discreet Ephraim. I like
His harmless exercises well.
316EphraimI hope
Your ladyship can say since I have had
I have been careful of the gentleman,
And have his love withal so much, that I
Dare say – I hope you’ll pardon the comparison –
That had you married me – which was as likely
As that your brother would have ta’en his maid*n8911
Ephraim touches on a gender and class difference here. He, like Matchil's servant Cash, aspires to marry above himself; and the play treats this as inherently ridiculous. But Ephraim is right to challenge the audience: why is this so different from Matchil marrying 'down', making his former servant Rachel his wife?
–
n8911
I think that Master Nehemiah would not
Have run away in hatred of our match,
As Mistress Joyce, it seems, hath done of theirs.
I hope your ladyship’s pardon, I understand
My duty.
317Lady NestlecockAnd you speak but reason, Ephraim.
318Ephraim [Aside] I have given her there a touch of my affection.
Who knows how it may work?
319Lady NestlecockGo, call him in.
I would not have him overheat himself.
320Ephraim’Tis a good care. And, madam, by the way,
Let me advise, that since his riper years
Require, and that fair propositions
Of marriage are tendered for him, that
We gently by degrees do take him off
From childish exercise, indeed plain boy’s play.
More manly would become him.
321Lady NestlecockYou would have him
Do worse, then, would you? And be nought, you varlet?
’Fore he be married, ha? What, what? How now?
Is it but up and ride*n5087
A variant of the phrase commonly found in early modern texts, 'Nothing but up and ride' (Tilley N284), meaning sexual activity.
w’ ye, ha?
n5087
322EphraimI humbly
Beseech your ladyship’s pardon, I will call
Sweet Master Nehemiah to your worship.
323Lady NestlecockGo*n5229
La. Duplicate speech prefix deleted.
, th’art an honest man. I know thou lov’st him.Exit EPHRAIM
n5229
Indeed he’s all my comfort and my care
And I must naturally respect all those
That do partake with me my care of him.
Enter NEHEMIAH, looking down and eating
324Lady NestlecockMy boy Neh, son Nehemiah.
325NehemiahF’sooth*n4686
Brome gives Nehemiah a characteristic verbal exclamation, 'F'sooth', which he will use frequently.
.
n4686
326Lady NestlecockThat’s my good lamb. Hold up thy head and thou
Shalt have a wife.
327NehemiahBut mother, f’sooth, when I have her,
Will she play with me at peg-top†gg3353
a children's game in which a player tries to knock down an opponent's pegs with a spinning 'top'
?
gg3353
328Lady NestlecockAt anything, my boy.
329NehemiahAnd she ha’ not good box and steel*n5067
This is likely to be a reference to a playground game, but no other instance has been found.
, I shall so grull*n5068
No other use of this word has been found. It may be a nonsense word of Nehemiah's invention, heard as vaguely obscene by the audience.
her.*n4687
Nehemiah's brags are all to do with children's games, but he seems always on the fringes of double-entendres.
n5067
n5068
n4687
And then at Mumbledepeg†gg3354
a variant of 'mumble the peg' or 'mumblety-peg', a children's game in which a participant has to try to remove with his teeth a peg driven into the ground
I will so firk†gg2864
drive, urge on
her.
gg3354
gg2864
330Lady NestlecockBut when y’are married, you’ll find other pastime.
331NehemiahWhate’er I say, I have a meaning though:
But yet, I doubt, I shall not forsake all
332Lady NestlecockI know thy will is good to leave thy wag-tricks†gg3355
the tricks of a mischievous or playful young man
,
gg3355
And I commend your understanding in it.
It shows you man, and ready for a wife.
For I did beat a boy as high as myself
Yesterday, with one hand.
334Lady NestlecockWhere was thy tother?
335NehemiahThe boy had but one hand f’sooth. I used both.*n5193
This is an old comic routine, drawing on verbal ambiguity and the audience's assumptions. There is often a clown-like quality to Nehemiah and his scenes.
n5193
336Lady NestlecockWell, th’ art too witty to live long*n4688
A common proverbial compliment concerning a young, intelligent person
, I fear.
n4688
But as I was saying, son, I do expect
Sir Swithen Whimlby to bring his niece.
337NehemiahWho, f’sooth, the crying knight, he that has wept
E’er since his lady died, and mourns in colours*n4689
Nehemiah means that he expresses his mourning in a consciously rhetorical manner (as in 'colours of rhetoric'). But there may also be a hint that Sir Swithin is suspected of 'colouring', slightly falsifying his grief. Is it sufficiently excessive to be something of a pose? As an old man seeking to engage in amours, he may also be 'colouring' in the sense of using face-paint, though there are no other indications in the text to support this.
,
n4689
Speaks nothing but in verse, and gives me ballads?
The old Knight Powel*n5056
No similar usage has been traced, but there is probably a popular saying or character from a romance behind this phrase.
that pronounces what d’ye call
n5056
’em?
338Lady NestlecockOdes, child, and elegies. He has been inspired
With the infection of poetry
E’er since his wife’s departure; and ’tis thought
Nothing can put him out, or cure him of it
But a new wife to kill the furious itch*n4690
Lady Nestlecock's diction rises to the latinate and euphemistic as she describes Sir Swithin's flights of poetry. But she then descends to monosyllables and more Anglo-Saxon diction, with the effect that the 'furious itch of it', by which she presumably means 'of the infection of poetry', is associated by the audience at least in part with the itch of sexual desire, to be satisfied by a new wife.
of it.
n4690
339NehemiahBut is not his niece too big for me? I would be loth
To be over-matched.
340Lady NestlecockO witty, witty, still.
But when she comes, Nehemiah, what’ll you say to her?
341NehemiahI’ll give her the time of the day or the night,
I warrant her, come at what hour she will.
Why, if I eat not all before she come –
And she must try her, if I don’t – I’ll ask her
If she can speak with plums in her mouth; and then
I’ll offer her a long one and two round ones*n4691
Nehemiah's description of the plums obviously suggests the male genitalia. As usual he seems naively unconscious of the double entendres. 'Plum' is still used in colloquial American English for 'testicle'.
,
n4691
And nod at her.
342Lady NestlecockYou will not, will you, ha?
343NehemiahMother, I know both what to say and do.
I trust I am not to be taught to woo.
344Lady NestlecockToo witty still, I say, to be long-lived.
345NehemiahBut hark you mother, f’sooth: I am told that you
And a cross match†gg3358
a pair of marriages between members of two families
is talked on betwixt you
gg3358
And the old Knight, and me and his young niece.
O ho – is’t so?
346Lady NestlecockThis is no crafty child.*n5499
Lady Nestlecock's remark could be an aside, but there is no indication of that in the original printing. It more likely that she is, characteristically, responding her son's disconcerting perceptiveness about the dynamics of the cross marriages by praising him to others on the stage.
n5499
347NehemiahLet me but see how you will handle him now
And mark how I’ll come over her with small jerks†gg390
witty gibes; can also refer to copulation
*n4692
Again, Nehemiah's speech is capable of obscene meaning, though he appears not to know it.
.
gg390
n4692
348Lady NestlecockO th’art a witty wag. A blessing on it.
Enter EPHRAIM, ushering WHIMLBY and BLITH
349EphraimMadam, Sir Swithen Whimlby and his niece,
Mistress Blith Tripshort.
350Lady NestlecockThey are very welcome.
Noble Sir Swithen.[LADY NESTLECOCK and WHIMLBY] kiss [in greeting]
351NehemiahNoble Mistress Blith.[NEHEMIAH and BLITH] kiss [in greeting]
352Lady NestlecockSweet knight, y’are welcome.
353NehemiahWelcome, sweet Lady.
354Lady NestlecockStill weeping?
355WhimlbyO, good Madam!
356NehemiahStill weeping for a husband.
357BlithHa, ha, ha.*n8912
Blith laughs a lot here. Is the laughter hysterical, as she finds herself in the nightmare of being forced to marry a fool?
n8912
358NehemiahMother, she puts me out*n5028
she puts me on't. The original reading makes little sense, but 'puts me out' is exactly what Blith does. This emendation is also proposed by the manuscript annotator in Folger Shakespeare Library B4872. The phrase is drawn from theatrical jargon, where an actor may be 'out', lost in his lines.
,
n5028
She laughs.
359Lady NestlecockLaugh with her, then.
360NehemiahAmardla, so I will, and if you laugh
At me, I’ll laugh at you again, so I will.
361BlithHa, ha.
362NehemiahAre you there with me? I’ll be here with you, then.
Will you eat any sugar plums? No, I’ll eat ’em for you.
There’s ha, ha, ha, ha, for you now.
363Lady NestlecockDo you note, Sir Swithin, what a wag it is?
Walk into the next room, Nehemiah. Did you note him?Exit NEHEMIAH and BLITH
364WhimlbyMadam, to tell you true,
My love to you
Springs from the joy,
I take in your sweet boy.
365Ephraim [Aside] And that’s the way to win her*n4693
Ephraim's cryptic commentary to the audience frequently matches the metre of Sir Swithin's verse. It acts as a kind of refrain and is set against the right margin in the 1659 text.
.
n4693
366[Whimlby]*n5029
No speech prefix in the original.
I can take no delight
n5029
But in his sight,
Nor any pride,
Since my dear Grissel*n4695
The name of Sir Swithin's dead wife alludes to the story of Patient Grissel, which appears in Chaucer's 'Clerk's Tale' and frequently elsewhere in English literature, including the play Patient Grissel by Thomas Dekker, Henry Chettle, and William Haughton (c. 1599), mentioned in Henslowe's Diary. 'Grissle' is also a Scottish word for 'cry' or 'weep'.
died,
n4695
In all I see on earth or find in books,
But that which overcomes me in his looks.
367Lady NestlecockO sweet Sir Swithen, you have all wooed and won me.
368Ephraim [Aside] Then all my hopes are frustrate.
369Lady NestlecockMy son shall have your niece; and for mine own part,
You loving him so well, of what’s in me
I can deny you nothing.
370WhimlbyGentle madam.
371Ephraim [Aside] She offers up herself; now may the proverb*n4694
'Proffered service is little valued', probably Dutch in origin.
n4694
Of proffered service light upon her.
372Lady NestlecockNay, Sir Swithen,
Let me entreat you to leave weeping now.
373WhimlbyMadam, I cannot so
Forgo my woe.
For while I strive
My solace to revive,
I do but still restore
My grief, before
That did betide
When my dear Grissel died.
And when your ladyship appears in sight,
Pardon, I cannot choose but cry outright.
374Lady NestlecockAlas, good knight. He weeps pure Helicon†gg3359
a mountain in Beotia, in myth the haunt of the Muses, and thus a figure for art, especially poetry
*n5027
Whimlby's self-indulgently poetic grief expresses itself in trivial poetry.
.
gg3359
n5027
He has not wherewithal to quench his love,
But his own tears. A wife would cool him better.
Why, sir, does sight of me renew your grief?
375WhimlbyO Madam, Madam, yes;
In you the bliss,
That I do miss,
I find enshrinèd is.
And till to ease my pain,
I shall regain
In you the bride,
That in my Grissel died.
So oft as she in you to me appears,
My numbers†gg3360
verse, poetry
cannot cease to flow in tears.
gg3360
376Lady NestlecockGood sir, collect yourself, and be assured
I am your own, so Neh may have your niece,
With her full dowry of four thousand pounds*n4696
Though Lady Nestlecock portrays herself as overwhelmed by romantic emotion, she remains clear and unambiguous about the financial basis for the pair of marriages.
.
n4696
My personal estate is full as much.
That and myself are yours on the cross marriage,
You making me an answerable jointure†gg1144
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)
.
gg1144
To dote on poetry in an old man.
Ladies may love it in the young and bold,
And when they are sick give gally-pots†gg3362
small earthenware pot often used by apothecaries and for trapping insects
of gold,
gg3362
For cordial†gg1292
invigorating, hearty
electuaries†gg3363
a medicinal paste made with syrup, sugar, or other sweetener
to cheer
gg1292
gg3363
Their crop-sick†gg3364
with an upset stomach, often from over-eating
muses; but to an old and sere†gg3365
dried up and withered
gg3364
gg3365
Man that outlives his labours*n4697
Ephraim says that Sir Swithin is likely to be impotent, so Lady Nestlecock's willingness to match with him is futile in sexual terms.
, who can be
n4697
So vain to give herself away but she?
I had been fitter for her, and I’ll watch
Occasion yet, perhaps, to cross†gg2445
(v) thwart, forestall; contradict; afflict, go against
the match.
gg2445
I can turn poet too.Exit EPHRAIM
378Lady NestlecockDry now your eyes, and answer me in prose.*n4698
Lady Nestlecock again drops the veneer of romance to focus on the matter of money.
n4698
Are you content to yield to those conditions
I have propounded, ha?
379WhimlbyI am content
And now for joy could weep,
Finding my Grissel in your ladyship.
380Lady NestlecockI hope the young ones do accord as well.
Enter NEHEMIAH and BLITH
381Blith’Protest, I cannot abide you.
382NehemiahNor I you,
Amardla, that I cannot.
383WhimlbyThey’re agreed.
Madam, it seems they both are of one mind.
384Lady NestlecockI do not like it. What’s the matter, Nehemiah?
385NehemiahShe is no wife for me, she has broke my jew’s trump; look you here else. And almost broke my
head with one of my bounding stones*n4699
A children's game, perhaps related to marbles or 'fives'. Abraham Cowley mentions it in his essay 'Of Greatness' (1668): 'Would one think that Augustus himself, the highest and most fortunate of mankind, a person endowed too with excellent parts of Nature, should be so hard put to it sometimes for want of recreations, as to be found playing at Nuts, and bounding stones, with little Syrian and Moorish Boys, whose company he took delight in, for their prating and their wantonness' (p. 122). Apart from The New Academy, I have not found an earlier use of the term before that in Cowley's essay.
.
n4699
386Lady NestlecockBless my boy, she has not, has she, ha?
387NehemiahAnd yet after all that, and for all I offered to
teach her to shoot in my trunk†gs599
pea shooter
and my stone-bow*n4700
A catapult or two-stringed crossbow firing stones or baked clay pellets at birds and small game.
,
do you think she would play with me at Trou*n5194
This is probably a card game, otherwise known as Tru or Truc. See David Partlett, A History of Card Games, pp. 170-173.
, Madam? No, nor at any thing else. I’ll none of her.
And yet I’ll have her too, if she will promise to do
as I would have her hereafter.*n5057
Nehemiah suddenly says he would marry Blith if she promises to obey him, mirroring the simple-minded conclusion his uncle reached when he chose to marry his servant Rachel.
gs599
n4700
n5194
n5057
388Lady NestlecockThere, do you note him there, Sir Swithen?
This child has no childish meaning in’t, I warrant you.
389WhimlbyNo, madam, no, I know him inwardly†gg3366
intimately, deeply, spiritually, not solely superficially
.
gg3366
Or fare the worse.
390Lady NestlecockShe will, I know she will.
Will you not have my son, sweet Mistress Blith?
391BlithSweet Madam, what to do? Ha, ha, I shall be
quickly weary with laughing at him. His fooling will
soon be stale and tedious; and then to beat him would
be as toilsome to me; and lastly, to be tied†gs688
to be bound in marriage
to nothing
but to cuckold him is such a common town-trick†gg3368
a trick played on an unsuspecting country visitor to the town
that
I scorn to follow the fashion.
gs688
gg3368
392Lady NestlecockCan she talk thus? Ha!
393WhimlbyA merry, harmless girl.
Fear not, good madam, she will come about.
394BlithA thousand mile about rather than meet him.
395Lady NestlecockI much desire she would; for now my son
Is set a-marrying, I warrant it, poor*n5058
pure. The original reading is possible: Lady Nestlecock thinks her son is a pure young man. But 'poor thing' seems more likely, a more usual phrase. However, the compositor seems to have had particular difficulty with the writing of this word, misinterpreting it on at least one other occasion [NA 2.1.speech277] [NOTE n5037]. The National Art Library Dyce 25.E.45 ms. annotator emends this to 'pore'.
thing,
n5058
It is in pain, till it be at it*n4701
As usual, the imprecision of 'it' opens Lady Nestlecock's phrase to an obscene meaning.
: ha!
n4701
Pray, bring her on, Sir Swithen, let him kiss her.
Poor heart, he licks his lips; and look how arseward†gg3367
backwards or contrary and perverse
she is.*n5500
Having spoken in verse throughout this speech up to this point, Lady Nestlecock manages three iambic feet ('Poor heart, he licks his lips'), then falters, finally collapsing into the crude and prosaic.
gg3367
n5500
396WhimlbyFie, Blith, be courteous, Blith. [BLITH moves as though to kiss NEHEMIAH, but in fact spits in his face]
397NehemiahMother! – She has spit, Amard, just in my
mouth.
398BlithAmard, what’s that? If you speak French you wrong me.
399Lady NestlecockGip†gg3369
an intensitive; an exclamation of anger or remonstrance addressed to a horse; an expression of surprise, derision, or contempt addressed to a person; the equivalent of 'get out', 'go along with you' (OED)
, Mistress Tripshort. Is this the manners your mother left you?
gg3369
400BlithSpeak not you of mothers, madam.
401Lady NestlecockSir Swithen, will you see my child abused so, ha?
402WhimlbyI can but grieve for’t, Madam.
403NehemiahMy mother is as good as your mother, so she
is, for all she’s dead.
404Lady NestlecockAye, well said, Neh.
405BlithYes, it appears in your good breeding.
Your fine qualities express her virtues sufficiently.
406Lady NestlecockHow dare you, hussy*n5244
housewife. Lady Nestlecock's tone clearly indicates that she uses the term 'housewife' pejoratively [GLOSS gg1940].
, talk thus to my son,
of me, and before my face too? Ha! Sir Swithen, can
you think well of me, and suffer this, ha?
n5244
407WhimlbyAlas, good madam, I am down†gg3751
to be depressed or in low spirits (OED down adv, 18)
again. I know
not what to think of living woman now.
gg3751
408Lady NestlecockDo you bring your niece to abuse me?
409WhimlbyI’m so drowned in tears, that I cannot see
what to say to’t.
410NehemiahMother, Amardla, the more I look on her, the
better I like her.
411Lady Nestlecock*n5030
Lady Nestlecock's speech is set as part of Nehemiah's in the original, but with the Speech Prefix 'La.' as part of the line. The lines have been separated and the necessary next Speech Prefix, '[Nehemiah]', added. Several ms. annotators make this change.
Sayest so, my boy?
n5030
412[Nehemiah]Besides, I have a conceit she can out-scold you, and that’s more
than ever woman did, I think, f’sooth.
Enter MATCHIL and RACHEL
414MatchilBy your leave, my Lady Nestlecock, I have
brought a sister of yours*n4702
Now married to Matchil, the servant Rachel is Lady Nestlecock's sister-in-law. This introduction tests Lady Nestlecock's willingness to acknowledge the new status of her brother's former servant.
here to salute you.
n4702
415Lady NestlecockThough unworthy to be of your counsel, or
at the ceremony, I heard you were married, brother.
And by a sister’s name you are welcome.
416RachelI thank your ladyship.
417MatchilSir Swithen Whimlby! And your pretty niece!
Well met, what affairs have you in hand here? What,
do you cry for your old wife still or for a new one?
But hark you, lady sister, where’s my daughter?
419MatchilIs she not with you, ha?
420Lady NestlecockNo truly, sir.
She’s slipped from me with her good uncle Strigood.
421MatchilThat thief has sold her then into some bawdyhouse.
Was this your project for her education,
To steal my child to make a whore of her?
Because you have no daughter? O the devil!
If there be law, I’ll trounce†gg3371
trouble, harass, upset
your Lady Hagship*n4703
An insulting mock-title
.
gg3371
n4703
422Lady NestlecockWhat, what? How now? Do you taunt me, sirrah, ha?
423MatchilI’ll make thee an example.
424Lady NestlecockThou hast made thyself an example, and the
scorn of thine own child in marrying of thy drudge†gg2774
menial servant
there; and that’s the cause of her running away, thou
mayest think, because she hates to live where she must
call her mother that was thy droil†gg3372
a menial servant, a drudge
.
gg2774
gg3372
425RachelDroil, I think she said.
426MatchilSpeak to her, I charge thee on thy obedience
to speak to her.
427RachelThe droil is now your brother’s wife, madam,
and in that, setting your ladyship’s lavish tongue aside, as
good a woman as yourself, none dispraised†gg3373
disparage, depreciate
, ha.*n8913
Strikingly, Rachel now uses the exclamation 'ha!', hitherto the characteristic utterance of Matchil and his sister.
gg3373
n8913
428MatchilWell said, Rachel; hold thine own, Rachel.*n5501
Not yet realising that his wife's vociferousness will not be limited to judging his sister, Matchil praises her for her new-found assertiveness. Rachel's transformation echoes that of Morose's wife in Ben Jonson's Epicoene. See the Introduction for connections with this play.
[MATCHIL attempts to bid farewell to WHIMLBY] *n5059
Matchil is trying to avoid escalation in the conflict between his new wife Rachel and his sister, Lady Nestlecock, and therefore tries to make their farewells.
And
so to you, Sir Swithen.
n5501
n5059
429Nehemiah [NEHEMIAH attempts to get LADY NESTLECOCK to leave] Mother, come away, mother.*n5060
Nehemiah's speech indicates that, like his uncle Matchil, he is also trying to defuse the argument by getting Lady Nestlecock to withdraw.
n5060
430Lady NestlecockBy and by, my boy.
431RachelDo you presume to call me drudge and droil,
that am a lady’s sister every day in the week, and have
been any time these three days, ha*n4704
Rachel's comic assertion of her new status recalls that of the Clown in The Winter's Tale:
AUTOLYCUS: I know you are now, sir, a gentleman born.
CLOWN: Ay, and have been so any time these four hours.
(5.2.121-122)
?.
n4704
AUTOLYCUS: I know you are now, sir, a gentleman born.
CLOWN: Ay, and have been so any time these four hours.
(5.2.121-122)
432BlithThat’s not every day in a whole week yet.
433Lady NestlecockThou shalt not dare to call me sister, hussy*n5244
housewife. Lady Nestlecock's tone clearly indicates that she uses the term 'housewife' pejoratively [GLOSS gg1940].
.
n5244
434RachelCods†gg3374
variant of 'God's', an oath
so, and why, trow? Because a lady scorns to
be a housewife, ha? If you be no housewife*n5245
huswife. Stung by Lady Nestlecock's calling her a 'hussy', a pejorative contraction, Rachel responds by returning to the original meaning and accusing her new sister-in-law of not being in control of her household affairs.
, I scorn to call you sister, I, though my husband be your brother.
From whence came you, trow, ha?*n4705
The question silences Lady Nestlecock. The play does not reveal the source of her title, but her brother Matchil is a merchant and commerce, rather than inherited land, is probably the source of the family's wealth and status. If so, Lady Nestlecock's origins are not so remote from Rachel's.
gg3374
n5245
n4705
435Lady NestlecockI know not what to say to the boldface.
436NehemiahPray, f’sooth, come away, I am afeared she’ll
beat you.
437Lady NestlecockThanks, my good child, but do not be afraid,
my lamb.
438RachelBoldface, ha! Her brother’s wife’s a boldface!
But her face is not varnished over yet*n4706
Rachel attacks Lady Nestlecock for her excessive use of cosmetics, which conceal a face at least as bold as her own.
, like his lady sister’s face, but it may be in time when she learns the
trick on’t, and have as many flies upon’t, though not
so troubled with ’em, as a bald mare at Midsummer*n4707
There is probably a proverbial saying behind this. Rachel is moving from 'bold' to 'bald', as has the term 'boldfaced' to 'baldfaced', for a brazen lie.
,
ha.
n4706
n4707
439Lady NestlecockI know not what to say to her, she has charmed
the virtue of my tongue.
440MatchilI never heard her speak so much in all her
life, Sir Swithen, nor half so loud. Thank heaven, she
has a voice yet on a good occasion. And so far I’ll
maintain her in it. Nephew Nehemiah, when saw you
your cousin Joyce?
[MATCHIL seizes NEHEMIAH]*n5512
There is no stage direction in the original printing. It is introduced here because Nehemiah, in his next speech, says 'mine uncle holds me'.
n5512
441NehemiahO Lud, O mother, f’sooth, look you, mine
uncle holds me.
[NEHEMIAH attempts to hit MATCHIL]*n5513
There is no stage direction in the original printing. It is introduced because Matchil, in his following speech, is reacting to something Nehemiah has done in response to being seized: 'did a so gi' me a stroke'.
n5513
442MatchilAh, naughty man, did a so gi’ me a stroke, and
I’ beat it, ha –
443Lady NestlecockYour wife has taught you to play the rude
companion, has she? Pray take her home, sir, and let
her discipline your own child if you have one, and
let mine alone. You know the way you came, sir.
Or if you have a mind to stay here, come sir Swithen,
come away children; I hope I shall find some other
room in my own house, free from your assaults; if
not, I’m sure there’s law against riots. Come, Sir
Swithen.
444MatchilNot yet, good Madam Nestlecock, you shall hear me.
You have enticed away, then lost my daughter.
And your small worm here, to catch up for gudgeons†gg3748
(literally) a small fresh-water fish; (figuratively) a gullible person (OED gudgeon n1, 2a)
*n4708
Matchil draws on the vocabulary of angling here, as Erasmus and Valentine did in the first scene of this act. The implication is that Lady Nestlecock and her son, like Valentine, are preying on the innocent, seeking to trap them. 'Gudgeon' is used contemporaneously to mean a gullible person [GLOSS gg3748].
gg3748
n4708
Sir Swithen and his niece, I know your plot.
She’s not fit match for you, Sir Swithen; and her son
Much less for your fair niece. Come, dry your eyes,
And look upon him, and not only look,
But laugh at him, I charge you.
445BlithI could now for him, heartily.
446MatchilMark how his mother’s milk drops at his
nose*n4709
Nehemiah is obviously 'snotty', dropping mucus from his nose; but Matchil is also suggesting that he is practicing arts learnt from Lady Nestlecock, absorbed with 'his mother's milk'.
, while I show you the mother and the child.
He was her youngest son, and all that’s left of
seven, and dreaming that he needs must prove a prophet,
she has bred him up a fool.
n4709
447NehemiahF’sooth, mother, he mocks me, oh – [NEHEMIAH begins weeping]
448Lady NestlecockO profane wretch, worse than thy brother Strigood.
Do not cry, Nehemiah, peace, good boy, peace. So, so.
449MatchilA tender mother I must say she has been.
For till he was fifteen, none but herself
For making of it cry. Laugh at her, good Sir Swithen.
And before that, till he was twelve years old
She would dance him on her knee, and play with’s cock*n4710
A 'cock' in this period is a toy (mentioned by Francis Bacon in Sylva sylvarum (1627): 'Children have also little Things they call Cocks, which have Water in them; And when they blow, or whistle in them, they yield a Trembling Noise; Which Trembling of Water, hath an affinity with the Letter L' [p. 51]) and Matchil's comment could mean that his mother joined in Nehemiah's games. But it is also a term, then as now, for 'penis'. Matchil's representation of the unhealthy relationship between doting mother and immature boy becomes starkly sexual here.
.
n4710
450WhimlbyAh ah ah ah. –
451MatchilSo well said, Sir Swithen.
452WhimlbyJust so, ifac†gg3375
a mild oath: in faith
, thy*n5031
my. Whimlby's mother is nowhere else invoked or mentioned, and 'my' makes no sense. This emendation suggests that Whimlby speaks this line to Nehemiah, noting that, once married to her, he might be thus treated by Lady Nestlecock.
mother would serve me, ha, ha.
gg3375
n5031
453[Matchil]*n5032
This exchange is set as a single speech, continuing from Whimbly's previous line. But the question is clearly not Whimlby's but Matchil's; the response must therefore be Whimlby's. It is clearly an exchange of dialogue.
Is not this better than whining?
n5032
454[Whimlby]*n5032
This exchange is set as a single speech, continuing from Whimbly's previous line. But the question is clearly not Whimlby's but Matchil's; the response must therefore be Whimlby's. It is clearly an exchange of dialogue.
Yes, or perhaps than wiving either.
n5032
455Rachel [Aside] Do you say so?
456WhimlbyHa, ha.
457MatchilWell said, Sir Swithen, laugh on. [Aside] I hope I ha’ done a cure on him, by showing him a more ridiculous object than himself, to turn the tide of ’s tears.
458WhimlbyHa, ha.
459MatchilLaugh still, defy the fiends, women, and all their works.
460WhimlbyHa, ha, ha.
461[Matchil]*n5033
This speech is set as a continuing from Whimlby's laughter in the original, but the lines clearly belong to Matchil, both for what he says about their respective dead wives and to provoke Rachel's withering response. Several manuscript annotators spot the need for this emendation.
Let the dead go, and the quick care for themselves. You buried your wife, and cried; and
I buried mine, and laugh. Which is the manlier passion?
n5033
462Rachel [Aside] He knows not that he is married again.
463WhimlbyYou are the merriest merchant, ha, ha, ha.
I think I shall not marry again in haste, ha, ha.
464MatchilWell said, hold there. And for your niece,
Let me alone, I’ll fit her with a match.
I know a lad that’s worthy of her.
465WhimlbyHa, ha, ha–––.
466MatchilHe’ll laugh too much, I fear.
467RachelHe may at you,
For your officiousness.
468MatchilHow’s that ?
469WhimlbyHa, ha–––
470RachelTo thrust yourself into unthankful offices,
In things concern you not. Will you turn match-maker
For others, unintreated? ’Tis enough
For you, I hope, that you have matched yourself, ha!
471Matchil'Ha'? Do you 'ha'*n4711
Matchil is caught up short by the realization that Rachel has appropriated his characteristic exclamation - 'Ha!' - and that this is a sign that she is going to be as domineering as he has been, linguistically and otherwise.
, or talk to me?
n4711
472RachelWho else
Should talk or give you counsel but your wife?
473Lady NestlecockWell said, Rachel, hold thine own, Rachel.
474MatchilI am matched again.
475WhimlbyHa, ha, ha.
476MatchilPax†gg1993
an interjection, a shortened form of 'a pox on it!' (OED pax n2, with further examples)
, cry again, or burst thyself with laughing.
gg1993
477Whimlby and Lady NestlecockHa, ha, ha.
478[Lady Nestlecock]*n5034
This line continues from Whimlby and Lady Nestlecock's laughter, but the words should be spoken by her alone.
Laugh, son Nehemiah.
n5034
479NehemiahHa, ha, ha
480MatchilWhat am I? What do you make of me?
481Lady NestlecockNay, what ha’ you made yourself? Best ask
the chimney piece*n4712
Lady Nestlecock insults Rachel's looks but also her origin as a servant.
that you have married there.
n4712
482MatchilDurst thou advance a voice against me, ha?
483RachelYou did commend it in me against your sister
Ha, are you not my husband? I am sure
’Tis not so long since we were married that
You can forget it, or repent so soon.
I am not now your slave, to have my face
Washed with your snuffs†gg3376
small quantity of liquid left at the bottom of a container
, nor to be kicked and trod on
gg3376
Without resistance, nor to make you answers
Merely with silent curtsies, run when you bid go
To fetch and carry like your spaniel*n5061
Rachel's analogy links her interpretation with Hannah's literal problem and Camelion's involvement with the games of the ducking pond.
,
n5061
In which condition I lived long enough,
And was content until you freed me out on’t.
Now free I am, and will be a free woman,
As you are a freeman*n4713
Rachel emphatically states the paradox that applies to her and maybe no other woman in the play: as an unmarried woman she was constrained by her poverty. She was a servant. The other unmarried women (Joyce, Gabriella, and Blith Tripshort) are constrained by dependence on their fathers and guardians. Now married, Rachel is free because financially untroubled. Conversely, her new husband was free when unmarried, but he has trapped himself, assuming that the power structure would not be changed by Rachel's 'elevation'.
, ha.
n4713
484WhimlbyHa, ha, ha.
485MatchilO base-born beggar.
486RachelYou wrong your wife in that.
487MatchilHow she holds up the wife.
488RachelI never begged
Nor moved a lip to be your wife, not I.
You held my service portion good enough,
And for my blood, ’tis no more base than yours,
Since both are mixed in marriage.
489MatchilCome your way.
And let me hear you speak so much at home –
490RachelI hope I may be bolder in mine own house.
So, madam, for the love I have found in yours
You shall be welcome thither, when you’re sent for.
491Lady NestlecockWhat a bold piece of kitchen-stuff*n4714
Lady Nestlecock brings together many of the insulting terms used to brand Rachel as inferior and not quite human: 'bold', 'piece', 'kitchen-stuff'.
is this ?
n4714
Brother, you’re*n5035
Brothery, 'are. The emendation is made by the National Art Library Dyce 25.E.45 ms. annotator.
match’t.
n5035
493Lady NestlecockHe has not a word to speak.
494MatchilFollow me home and dar’st.Exit MATCHIL
495RachelYes, sir, I dare without more leave taking, ha.Exit RACHEL
496Lady NestlecockWas ever comb so cut*n4715
to cut a comb, to humiliate, take down a peg; a common idiom in the period and the basis of labelling someone a 'coxcomb' or foolish, vain person.
?
n4715
497WhimlbyHa, ha, ha, ha.
498NehemiahThere’s a new aunt indeed. She brought me nothing.
499WhimlbyI have not laughed so much I know not when.
H’ has me laugh until I cry again.
500Lady NestlecockAgain, you are welcome, sir. Mistress Blith,
Now the unwelcome guests are gone, let’s in
And dine, then will we after meat–––
501WhimlbyOf jointures, madam, and of nuptials treat*n4716
The sharing of a rhyme here shows Lady Nestlecock and Sir Swithin emerging united, having seen Matchil humiliated and abashed by his new wife Rachel.
.
n4716
502Lady NestlecockRight, sir.
503Blith [Aside] Love, as I shall adore thee for a deity,
Rid me of this ridiculous society.[LADY NESTLECOCK, WHIMLBY,
NEHEMIAH and BLITH exit]*n5036
No stage direction in the original
NEHEMIAH and BLITH exit]*
n5036
Edited by Michael Leslie