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Mem. Vile boy, thy young master?

Drom. Let me have in a device *.

Mem. I'll have thy advice; and if it fadget, thou shalt eat, thou shalt sweat, play till thou sleep, and sleep till thy bones ake.

Drom. Ah marry, now you tickle me;

I am

both hungry, gamesome, and sleepy, and all at once; I'll break this head against the wall, but I'll make it bleed good matter.

Mem. Then, this it is: thou knowest I have but one son, and he is a fool.

Drom. A monstrous fool.

Mem. A wife, and she an arrant scold. Drom. Ah, master, I smell your device; it will be excellent.

Mem. Thou canst not know it till I tell it.

Drom. I see it through your brains; your hair is so thin, and your scull so transparent, I may sooner see it than hear it.

Mem. Then, boy, hast thou a quick wit, and I a slow tongue: but what is't?

Drom. Marry, either you would have your wife's tongue in your son's head, that he might be a prating fool; or his brains in her brain-pan, that she might be a foolish scold.

Mem. Thou dream'st, Dromio; there is no such matter. Thou knowest I have kept them close, so that my neighbours think him to be wise, and her to be temperate, because they never heard them speak.

Drom. Well.

Mem. Thou knowest that Stellio hath a good

* Permit me to suggest a contrivance to you.

+ Fadge, "to suit, to fit, to go with." STEVENS.

farm and a fair daughter; yea, so fair that she is mewed up, and only looketh out at the windows, lest she should, by some roisting courtier, be stolen away.

Drom. So, sir.

Mem. Now if I could compass a match between my son and Stellio's daughter, by conference of us parents, and without theirs, I should be blessed, he coz'ned *, and thou for ever set at liberty.

Drom. A singular conceit.

Mem. Thus much for my son: now for my wife. I would have this kept from her, else shall I not be able to keep my house from smoke; for let it come to one of her ears, and then woe to both mine: I would have her go to my house into the country, whilst we conclude this; and this once done, I care not if her tongue never have done: these if thou canst effect, thou shalt make thy master happy.

Drom. Think it done; this noddle shall coin such new device as you shall have your son married by to-morrow.

Mem. But take heed that neither the father nor the maid speak to my son, for then his folly will mar all.

Drom. Lay all the care on me. Sublevabo te onere, I will rid you of a fool.

Mem. Wilt thou rid me for a fool?
Drom. Tush, quarrel not.

Mem. Then for the dowry, let it be at least

* "Coz'ned," cheated, tricked. I give the explanation here more for the word "coz'nage," which occurs in the next page, and is more obscure; it has, however, the same meaning.

two hundred ducats, and after his death the farm.

Drom. What else?

Mem. Then let us in, that I may furnish thee with some better counsel, and my son with better apparel.

Drom. Let me alone, I lack but a wag more to make of my council, and then you shall see an exquisite coz'nage, and the father more fool than the son. But hear you, sir, I forgot one thing. Mem. What's that?

Drom. Nay, expellas furca licet usque recurret. Mem. What's the meaning?

Drom. Why, though your son's folly be thrust up with a pair of horns on a fork, yet being natural, it will have his course.

Mem. I pray thee no more, but about it.

SCENE II.

[Exeunt.

STELLIO and RISIO.

Stel. Risio, my daughter is passing amiable,

but very simple.

Ris. You mean a fool, sir.

Stel. Faith, I imply so much.

Ris. Then I apply it fit; the one she takes of her father, the other of her mother; now you may be sure she is your own.

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Stel. I have penned her up in a chamber, having only a window to look out, that youths seeing her fair cheeks, may be enamoured before they hear her fond* speech. How likest thou this head?

* "Fond," foolish.

Ris. There is very good workmanship in it, but the matter is but base: if the stuff had been good as the mould, your daughter had been as wise as she is beautiful.

Stel. Dost thou think she took her foolishness of me?

Ris. Aye, and so cunningly, she took it not from you.

Stel. Well. Quod natura dedit tollere nemo potest.

Ris. A good evidence to prove the fee-simple of your daughter's folly.

Stel. Why?

Ris. It came by nature, and if none can take it is perpetual.

it away

Stel. Nay, Risio, she is no natural fool; but in this consisteth her simplicity, that she thinketh herself subtle; in this her rudeness, that she imagines she is courtly; in this the overshooting of herself, that she overweeneth of herself.

Ris. Well, what follows?

Stel. Risio, this is my plot: Memphio hath a pretty stripling to his son, whom with cockering he hath made wanton; his girdle must be warmed, the air must not breathe on him, he must lie a-bed till noon, and yet in his bed break his fast; that which I do to conceal the folly of my daughter, that doth he in too much cockering of Now, Risio, how shall I compass a

his son.

match between my girl and his boy?

Ris. Why, with a pair of compasses, and bring them both into the circle; I'll warrant they'll match themselves.

Stel. Tush! plot it for me, that never speaking

one to another, they may be in love one with another: I like not solemn wooing, it is for courtiers; let country folks believe other's reports as much as their own opinions.

Ris. Oh, then, so it be made a match you care

not.

Stel. Not I, nor for a match neither, were it not that I thirst after my neighbour's farm.

Ris. A very good nature. Well, if by flat wit I bring this to pass, what's my reward?

Stil. Whatsoever thou wilt ask.

· Ris. I'll ask no more than by my wit I can get in the bargain.

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Ris. If I come not about you*, never trust me. I'll seek out Dromio, the counsellor of my conceit.

SCENE III.

PRISIUS and SPERANTUS.

Pris. It is unneighbourly done, to suffer your son, since he came from school, to spend his time in love; and unwisely done, to let him hover over my daughter, who hath nothing to her dowry but her needle, and must prove a sempstress; nor he any thing to take to but a grammar, and cannot at the best be but a schoolmaster.

Sper. Prisius, you bite and whine, wring me on the withers, and yet wince yourself; it is you

*

you.

"If I come not about you;" that is, if I do not overreach

"Let the gall'd jade wince, our withers are unwrung."

HAMLET.

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