Act I. Scene
III.
Scene III.—A Room in the Palace.
Enter the Lord Chamberlain and LORD SANDS.
Cham. Is't possible the spells of France
should juggle
Men into such strange mysteries?
Sands. New customs,
Though they be never so ridiculous,
Nay, let 'em be unmanly, yet are follow'd.
Cham. As far as I see, all the good our
English
Have got by the late voyage is but merely
A fit or two o' the face; but they are shrewd
ones;
For when they hold 'em, you would swear
directly
Their very noses had been counsellors
To Pepin or Clotharius, they keep state so.
Sands. They have all new legs, and lame
ones: one would take it,
That never saw 'em pace before, the spavin
Or springhalt reign'd'among 'em.
Cham. Death! my lord,
Their clothes are after such a pagan cut too,
That, sure, they've worn out Christendom.
Enter SIR THOMAS LOVELL.
How now!
What news. Sir Thomas Lovell?
Lov. Faith, my lord,
I hear of none, but the new proclamation
That's clapp'd upon the court-gate.
Cham. What is't for?
Lov. The reformation of our travell'd gal-
lants,
That fill the court with quarrels, talk, and
tailors.
Cham. I am glad 'tis there: now I would
pray our monsieurs
To think an English courtier may be wise,
And never see the Louvre.
Lov. They must either—
For so run the conditions—leave those rem-
nants
Of fool and feather that they got in France,
With all their honourable points of ignorance
Pertaining thereunto,—as fights and fireworks;
Abusing better men than they can be,
Out of a foreign wisdom;— renouncing clean
The faith they have in tennis and tall stockings,
Short blister'd breeches, and those types of
travel,
And understand again like honest men;
Or pack to their old playfellows: there, I take it,
They may, cum privilegio, wear away
The lag end of their lewdness, and be laugh'd at.
Sands. 'Tis time to give 'em physic, their
diseases
Are grown so catching.
Cham. What a loss our ladies
Will have of these trim vanities!
Lov. Ay, marry,
There will be woe indeed, lords: the sly whore-
sons
Have got a speeding trick to lay down ladies;
A French song and a fiddle has no fellow.
Sands. The devil fiddle 'em! I am glad
they're going:
For, sure, there's no converting of 'em: now
An honest country lord, as I am, beaten
A long time out of play, may bring his plain-
song
And have an hour of hearing; and, by'r lady,
Held current music too.
Cham. Well said. Lord Sands;
Your colt's tooth is not cast yet.
Sands. No, my lord;
Nor shall not, while I have a stump.
Cham. Sir Thomas,
Whither were you a-going?
Lov. To the cardinal's:
Your lordship is a guest too.
Cham. O! 'tis true:
This night he makes a supper, and a great one,
To many lords and ladies; there will be
The beauty of this kingdom, I'll assure you.
Lov. That churchman bears a bounteous
mind indeed,
A hand as fruitful as the land that feeds us;
His dews fall everywhere.
Cham. No doubt he's noble;
He had a black mouth that said other of him.
Sands. He may, my lord; he has wherewithal:
in him
Sparing would show a worse sin than ill
doctrine:
Men of his way should be most liberal;
They are set here for examples.
Cham. True, they are so;
But few now give so great ones. My barge
stays;
Your lordship shall along. Come, good Sir
Thomas,
We shall be late else; which I would not be,
For I was spoke to, with Sir Henry Guildford,
This night to be comptrollers.
Sands. I am your lordship's.
[Exeunt.
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