they are too little for thy body, and then too fair to pull over so foul a skin.

Pip. These boys be drunk, I would not be in your takings.

Lic. I think so, for we take nothing in our hands but weapons; it is for thee to use needles and pins; a sampler, not a buckler.

Pip. Nay, then we shall never have done, I mean I would not be so coursed as you shall be. Pet. Worse and worse. We are no chase (pretty mops) for deer we are not, neither red nor fallow, because we are batchelors, and have not cornu copia, we want heads: hares we are not, because they are male one year, and the next female *; we change not our sex: badgers we are not, for our legs are one as long as another and who will take us to be foxes, that stand so near a goose and bite not.

Pip. Fools you are, and therefore good game for wise men to hunt; but for knaves I leave you, for honest wenches to talk of.

Lic. Nay, stay, sweet Pipenetta, we are but disposed to be merry.

Pip. I marvel how old you will be before you are disposed to be honest; but this is the matter, my master is gone abroad, and wants his page to wait on him; my mistress would rise, and lacks your worship to fetch her hair.

Pet. Why, is it not on her head?

Pip. Methinks it should; but I mean the hair she must wear to day.

* This was a vulgar error introduced early and expelled late, which extended itself to the works of many writers on natural history.

Lic. Why, doth she wear any but her own? Pip. In faith, sir, no, I am sure it is her own when she pays for it*. But do you hear the strange news at the court?

Pet. No, except this be it, to have one's hair lie all night out of the house from one's head. Pip. Tush, every thing that Midas toucheth is gold.

Pet. The devil it is!

Pip. Indeed gold is the devil.

Lic. Thou art deceived, wench, angels are gold t. But is it true?

Pip. True? Why the meat that he toucheth turneth to gold, so doth the drink, so doth his raiment.

Pet. I would he would give me a good box on the ear, that I might have a golden cheek.

Lic. How happy should we be if he would but stroke our heads, that we might have golden hairs. But let us all in, lest he lose the virtue of the gift before we taste the benefit.

Pip. If he take a cudgel and that turn to gold, yet beating you with it, you shall only feel the weight of gold.

Pet. What difference to be beaten with gold, and to be beaten gold?

Pip. As much as to say, drink before you go and go before you drink.

Lic. Come, let us go, lest we drink of a dry cup for our long tarrying. [Exeunt.

* This is a jest that has been very frequently repeated since the time of our poet. The Pontia of Prior, and the Epigram on Galla's golden hair are well known.

+ An angel was a small gold coin of the value of ten shillings.

ACT II. SCENE I.

ERISTUS and CŒLIA.

Erist. Fair Colia, thou seest of gold there is satiety, of love there cannot.

Col. If thou shouldst wish that whatsoever thou thoughtest might be love, as Midas whatever he touched might be gold; it may be, love would be as lothsome to thine ears as gold is to his eyes, and make thy heart pinch with melancholy as his guts do with famine.

Erist. No, sweet Cœlia, in love there is variety.

Cal. Indeed men vary in their love.

Erist. They vary their love, yet change it not. Cal. Love and change are at variance, therefore if they vary they must change.

Erist. Men change the manner of their love, not the humour; the means how to obtain, not the mistress they honour. So did Jupiter, that could not intreat Danae by golden words, possess his love by a golden shower, not altering his affection, but using art.

Cal. The same Jupiter was an eagle, a swan, a bull, and for every saint a new shape, as men have for every mistress a new shadow. If you take example of the gods; who more wanton, more wavering? If of yourselves, being but men, who will think you more constant than gods?

Eristus, if gold could have allured mine eyes, thou knowest Midas, that commandeth all things to be gold, had conquered: if threats might have feared my heart, Midas being a king, might have commanded my affections: if love, gold, or authority might have enchanted me, Midas had obtained by love, gold, and authority, Quorum si singula nostram flectere non poterant, potuissent

omnia mentem.

Erist. Ah, Cœlia, if kings say they love, and yet dissemble, who dare say that they dissemble and not love? They command the affections of others to yield, and their own to be believed. My tears, which have made furrows in my cheeks, and in mine eyes fountains; my sighs, which have made of my heart a furnace, and kindled in my head flames; my body, that melteth by piecemeal, and my mind, that pineth at an instant, may witness that my love is both unspotted and unspeakable, Quorum si singula duram flectere non poterant, deberent omnia mentem. But soft, here cometh the princess, with the rest of the lords.

Enter SOPHRONIA, MELLACRITES and MARTIUS.

Sop. Mellacrites, I cannot tell whether I should more mislike thy counsel, or Midas' consent; but the covetous humour of you both I contemn and wonder at, being unfit for a king, whose ho

* To fear (as hath been observed by Stevens) is often used by our old writers in this sense. So the Prince of Morocco, in the "Merchant of Venice:"

"I tell thee, lady, this aspect of mine
Hath fear'd the valiant."

nour should consist in liberality not greediness; and unworthy the calling of Mellacrites, whose fame should rise by the soldier's god, Mars, not by the merchant's god, gold.

Mel. Madam, things past cannot be recalled, but repented; and, therefore, are rather to be pitied than punished. It now behoveth us to consider how to redress the miserable estate of our king, not to dispute of the occasion. Your highness sees, and without grief you cannot see, that his meat turneth to massy gold in his mouth, and his wine slideth down his throat like liquid gold; if he touch his robes they are turned to gold and what is there not that toucheth him

but becometh gold?

Erist. Ah, Mellacrites, if thy tongue had been turned to gold before thou gavest our king such counsel, Midas' heart had been full of ease, and thy mouth of gold.

*

Mart. If my advice had taken place, Midas, that now sitteth over head and ears in crowns had worn upon his head many kings crowns; and been conqueror of the world, that is now commander of dross. That greediness of Mellacrites, whose heart-strings are made of Plutus' purse-strings, hath made Midas a lump of earth, that should be a god on earth; and thy effeminate mind, Eristus, whose eyes are stitched on Cœlia's face, and thoughts gyved † to her beauty,

* It is perhaps needless to say that a coin is here meant, which were formerly sometimes of gold; such were coined both by Edward VI. and Elizabeth.

+ "Gyved," chained. In the strict sense gyves were the irons fastened round the legs of prisoners. But Ben Jonson uses it figuratively, and talks of "golden gyves."