The Complete Works of William Shakespeare - Israel Gollancz William Shakespeare [1938]
Or that your lading be aboard your bark.
SURESBY.
In plainer English, Lifter, if my purse
Be stored or no?
LIFTER.
Ye have it, sir.
SURESBY.
Excellent, excellent.
LIFTER.
Then, sir, you cannot but for manner's sake
Walk on with him; for he will walk your way,
Alleging either you have much forgot him,
Or he mistakes you.
SURESBY.
But in this time has he my purse or no?
LIFTER.
Not yet, sir, fie!—
[Aside.} No, nor I have not yours.—
[Enter Lord Mayor, &c.]
But now we must forbear; my lords return.
SURESBY.
A murren on't!—Lifter, we'll more anon:
Aye, thou sayest true, there are shrewd knaves indeed:
[He sits down.]
But let them gull me, widgen me, rook me, fop me!
Yfaith, yfaith, they are too short for me.
Knaves and fools meet when purses go:
Wise men look to their purses well enough.
MORE.
[Aside.] Lifter, is it done?
LIFTER.
[Aside.] Done, Master Shreeve; and there it is.
MORE.
[Aside.] Then build upon my word. I'll save thy life.
RECORDER.
Lifter, stand to the bar:
The jury have returned the guilty; thou must die,
According to the custom.—Look to it, Master Shreeve.
LORD MAYOR.
Then, gentlemen, as you are wont to do,
Because as yet we have no burial place,
What charity your meaning's to bestow
Toward burial of the prisoners now condemned,
Let it be given. There is first for me.
RECORDER.
And there for me.
ANOTHER.
And me.
SURESBY.
Body of me, my purse is gone!
MORE.
Gone, sir! what, here! how can that be?
LORD MAYOR.
Against all reason, sitting on the bench.
SURESBY.
Lifter, I talked with you; you have not lifted me? ha!
LIFTER.
Suspect ye me, sir? Oh, what a world is this!
MORE.
But hear ye, master Suresby; are ye sure
Ye had a purse about ye?
SURESBY.
Sure, Master Shrieve! as sure as you are there,
And in it seven pounds, odd money, on my faith.
MORE.
Seven pounds, odd money! what, were you so mad,
Being a wise man and a magistrate,
To trust your purse with such a liberal sum?
Seven pounds, odd money! fore God, it is a shame,
With such a sum to tempt necessity:
I promise ye, a man that goes abroad
With an intent of truth, meeting such a booty,
May be wrought to that he never thought.
What makes so many pilferers and felons,
But these fond baits that foolish people lay
To tempt the needy miserable wretch?
Should he be taken now that has your purse,
I'd stand to't, you are guilty of his death;
For, questionless, he would be cast by law.
Twere a good deed to fine ye as much more,
To the relief of the poor prisoners,
To teach ye lock your money up at home.
SURESBY.
Well, Master More, you are a merry man;
I find ye, sir, I find ye well enough.
MORE.
Nay, ye shall see, sir, trusting thus your money,
And Lifter here in trial for like case,
But that the poor man is a prisoner,
It would be now suspected that he had it.
Thus may ye see what mischief often comes
By the fond carriage of such needless sums.
LORD MAYOR.
Believe me, Master Suresby, this is strange,
You, being a man so settled in assurance,
Will fall in that which you condemned in other.
MORE.
Well, Master Suresby, there's your purse again,
And all your money: fear nothing of More;
Wisdom still keeps the mean and locks the door.
SCENE III. London. A state apartment.
[Enter the Earls of Shrewsbury and Surrey, Sir Thomas Palmer, and Sir Roger Cholmley.]
SHREWSBURY.
My lord of Surrey, and Sir Thomas Palmer
Might I with patience tempt your grave advise,
I tell ye true, that in these dangerous times
I do not like this frowning vulgar brow:
My searching eye did never entertain
A more distracted countenance of grief
Than I have late observed
In the displeased commons of the city.
SURREY.
Tis strange that from his princely clemency,
So well a tempered mercy and a grace,
To all the aliens in this fruitful land,
That this high-crested insolence should spring
From them that breathe from his majestic bounty,
That, fattened with the traffic of our country,
Already leaps into his subject's face.
PALMER.
Yet Sherwin, hindered to commence