hath bred in all the court such a tender wantonness, that nothing is thought of but love; a passion proceeding of beastly lust, and coloured with a courtly name, of love: thus whilest we follow the nature of things we forget the names. Since this unsatiable thirst of gold, and untemperate humour of lust crept into the king's court, soldiers have begged arms of artificers, and with their helmet on their head been glad to follow a lover with a glove in his hat, which so much abateth the courage of true captains, that they must account it more honourable, in the court to be a coward so rich and amorous, than in a camp to be valiant, if poor and maimed. He is move favoured that pricks his finger with his mistress's needle, than he that breaks his lance on his enemy s face; and he that hath his mouth full of fair words, than he that hath his body full of deep scars. If one be old and have silver hairs on his beard, so he have golden ruddocks in his bags, he must be wise and honourable: if young, and have curled locks on his head, amorous glances with his eyes, smooth speeches in his mouth, every lady's lap shall be his pillow, every lady's face his glass, every lady's ear a sheath for his flatteries; only soldiers, if they be old, must beg in their own countries; if young, try the fortune of wars in another. He is the man that, being let blood, carries his arm in a scarf of his

* Ruddock is literally the red breast, so called by Chaucer and Spencer. It is used metaphorically for a piece of gold coin, So in the "Heir of Linne:"

"He told him forth, the good red gold,

He told it forth with mickle dinne."

mistress' favour; not he that bears his leg on a stilt for his country's safety.

Sop. Stay, Martius; though I know love to grow to such looseness, and hoarding to such misery, that I may rather grieve at both than remedy either; yet thy animating my father to continual arms to conquer crowns, hath only brought him into imminent danger of his own head: the love he hath followed, I fear unnatural, the riches he hath got, I know unmeasurable, the wars he hath levied, I doubt unlawful, have drawn his body with grey hairs to the grave's mouth, and his mind with eating cares to desperate determinations: ambition hath but two steps; the lowest blood, the highest envy: both these hath my unhappy father climbed; digging mines of gold with the lives of men; and now, 'envied of the whole world, is environed with enemies round about the world; not knowing that ambition hath one heel nailed in hell, though she stretch her finger to touch the heavens. 1 would the gods would remove this punishment, so that Midas would be penitent. Let him thrust thee, Eristus, with thy love into Italy, where they honour lust for a god, as the Egyptians did dogs; thee, Mellacrites, with thy greediness of gold, to the utmost part of the west*, where all the guts of the earth are gold: and thee, Martius, that soundest but blood and terror, into those barbarous nations, where nothing is to be found

*There can be no doubt that South America is here meant but the expression is so general that the Anachronism is not so gross and palpable as many in both Shakspeare and Beaumont and Fletcher.

but blood and terror. Let Phrygia be an example of chastity, not lust; liberality, not covetousness; valour, not tyranny. I wish not your bodies banished, but your minds; that my father and your king may be our honour and the world's wonder. And thou, Cœlia, and all you ladies, learn this of Sophronia; that beauty in a minute is both a blossom and a blast; love, a worm which seeming to live in the eye, dies in the heart. You be all young and fair, endeavour all to be wise and virtuous; that when, like roses, shall fall from the stalk, you may be gatheryou ed and put to the still.

Cal. Madam, I am free from love, and unfortunate to be beloved.

Erist. To be free from love is strange, but to think scorn to be beloved, monstrous.

Sop. Eristus, thy tongue doth itch to talk of love, and my ears tingle to hear it. I charge you all, if you owe any duty to your king, to go presently unto the temple of Bacchus, offer praise, gifts, and sacrifice, that Midas may be released of his wish, or his life: this I entreat you, this Midas commands you. Jar not with yourselves; agree in one for your king, if ever you took Midas for your lawful king.

Mel. Madam, we will go, and omit nothing that duty may perform or pains.

Sop. Go speedily, lest Midas die before you return: and you, Coelia, shall go with me, that with talk we my beguile the time; and my father think of no meat.

Cal. I attend.

Exeunt.

SCENE II.

LICIO, PETULUS, and PIPENETTA.

Lic. Ah, my girl, is not this a golden world? Pip. It is all one as if it were lead with me, and yet as golden with me as with the king; for I see it and feel it not, he feels it and enjoys it not.

Lic. Gold is but the earth's garbage, a weed bred by the sun, the very rubbish of barren ground.

Pet. Tush, Licio, thou art unlettered, all the earth is an egg; the white, silver; the yolk, gold.

Lic. Why, thou fool, what hen should lay that egg?

Pip. I warrant a goose.

Lic. Nay, I believe a bull.

Pet. Blirt* to you both, it was laid by the sun. Pip. The sun is rather a cock than a hen. Lic. 'Tis true, girl, else how could Titan have trodden Daphne?

Pet. I weep over both your wits, if I prove in every respect no difference between an egg and gold, will you not then grant gold to be an egg?

Pip. Yes; but I believe thy idle imagination will make it an addle egg.

Lic. Let us hear. Proceed, Doctor Egg.

*This, as Mr. Reed hath observed, is a frequent expression of contempt in the writers of that age. So in Marston's "Antonio and Melida :"

"Blirt on your Aymees, guard her safely hence."

Pet. Gold will be cracked; a common saying, a cracked crown.

Pip. Ah, that's a broken head.

Pet. Nay, then, I see thou hast a broken wit. Lic. Well, suppose gold will crack.

Pet. So will an egg.

Lic. On.

Pet. An egg is roasted in the fire.
Pip. Well.

Pet. So is gold tried in the fire.

Lic. Forth.

Pet. An egg (as physicians say) will make one lusty.

Pip. Conclude.

Pet. And who knows not that gold will make one frolic?

Lic. Pipenetta, this is true, for it is called egg as a thing that doth egg on, so doth gold. Pip. Let us hear all.

Pet. Eggs poach'd are for a weak stomach, and gold boiled for a consuming body.

Lic. Spoken like a physician.

Pip. Or a fool of necessity.

Pet. An egg is eaten at one sup, and a portague* lost at one cast.

Lic. Gamester-like concluded.

Pet. Eggs make custards, and gold makes spoons to eat them.

Pip. A reason dough-baked †.

* A portague was a Portuguese coin, worth four pounds and ten shillings. The word is found in the "Sea Voyage" of Beaumont and Fletcher, and this explanation given of it by Mr. Weber.

+"A reason dough-baked;" i.e. an imperfect reason.