Volpone and Other Plays (16 page)

30        Your hopes, sir, are like happy blossoms fair,

And promise timely fruit, if you will stay

But the maturing; keep you at your couch.

Corbaccio will arrive straight with the will;

When he is gone, I'll tell you more.

[
Exit
MOSCA
.]

VOLPONE
:                                            My blood,

My spirits are returned; I am alive;

And, like your wanton gamester at primero,

Whose thought had whispered to him, not go less,

Methinks I lie, and draw – for an encounter.

[
VOLPONE
draws the curtains of his bed
.]

III, vi         [
MOSCA
leads in
BONARIO
and hides him
.]

[
MOSCA
:] Sir, here concealed you may hear all. But pray you

One knocks
.

Have patience, sir; the same's your father knocks.

I am compelled to leave you.

BONARIO
:                                  Do so. – Yet

Cannot my thought imagine this a truth.

III, vi         [
MOSCA
admits
CORVINO
with
CELIA
.]

[
MOSCA
:] Death on me! you are come too soon, what meant you?

Did not I say I would send?

CORVINO
:                                Yes, but I feared

You might forget it, and then they prevent us.

MOSCA
: Prevent! [
Aside
] Did e'er man haste so for his horns?

A courtier would not ply it so for a place. –

Well, now there's no helping it, stay here;

I'll presently return.

[
He crosses the stage
.]

CORVINO
:                        Where are you, Celia?

You know not wherefore I have brought you hither?

CELIA
: Not well, except you told me.

CORVINO
:                                           Now I will:

Hark hither.

[
They talk apart
.]

10    
MOSCA
(
To
BONARIO
): Sir, your father hath sent word,

It will be half an hour ere he come;

And therefore, if you please to walk the while

Into that gallery – at the upper end

There are some books to entertain the time.

And I'll take care no man shall come unto you, sir.

BONARIO
: Yes, I will stay there. [
Aside
] I do doubt this fellow.

[
Exit
.]

MOSCA
: There, he is far enough; he can hear nothing.

And for his father, I can keep him off.

[
MOSCA
stands by
VOLPONE
's
bed
.]

CORVINO
: Nay, now, there is no starting back, and therefore

20        Resolve upon it: I have so decreed.

It must be done. Nor would I move't afore,

Because I would avoid all shifts and tricks,

That might deny me.

CELIA
:                                  Sir, let me beseech you,

Affect not these strange trials; if you doubt

My chastity, why, lock me up forever;

Make me the heir of darkness. Let me live

Where I may please your fears, if not your trust.

CORVINO
: Believe it, I have no such humour, I

All that I speak I mean; yet I am not mad,

30        Not horn-mad, see you? Go to, show yourself

Obedient, and a wife.

CELIA
:                                  O heaven!

CORVINO
:                                              I say it,

Do so.

CELIA
: Was this the train?

CORVINO
:                                            I've told you reasons:

What the physicians have set down; how much

It may concern me; what my engagements are;

My means, and the necessity of those means

For my recovery; wherefore, if you be

Loyal and mine, be won, respect my venture.

CELIA
: Before your honour?

CORVINO
:                                             Honour! tut, a breath.

There's no such thing in nature; a mere term

40        Invented to awe fools. What, is my gold

The worse for touching? clothes for being looked on?

Why, this 's no more. An old, decrepit wretch,

That has no sense, no sinew; takes his meat

With others' fingers; only knows to gape

When you do scald his gums; a voice, a shadow;

And what can this man hurt you?

CELIA
:                                        Lord! what spirit

Is this hath entered him?

CORVINO
:                                            And for your fame,

That's such a jig; as if I would go tell it,

Cry it, on the Piazza! Who shall know it

50        But he that cannot speak it, and this fellow,

Whose lips are i' my pocket, save yourself –

If you'll proclaim 't, you may. I know no other

Should come to know it.

CELIA
:                                  Are heaven and saints then nothing?

Will they be blind, or stupid?

CORVINO
:                                       How?

CELIA
:                                                       Good sir,

Be jealous still, emulate them, and think

What hate they burn with toward every sin.

CORVINO
: I grant you: if I thought it were a sin

I would not urge you. Should I offer this

To some young Frenchman, or hot Tuscan blood

60        That had read Aretine, conned all his prints,

Knew every quirk within lust's labyrinth,

And were professed critic in lechery;

And I would look upon him, and applaud him,

This were a sin; but here, 'tis contrary,

A pious work, mere charity, for physic

And honest policy to assure mine own.

CELIA
: O heaven! canst thou suffer such a change?

VOLPONE
: Thou art mine honour, Mosca, and my pride,

My joy, my tickling, my delight! Go, bring 'em.

MOSCA
[
advancing
]: Please you draw near, sir.

70    
CORVINO
:                                                           Come on, what –

You will not be rebellious? By that light –

[
He forces
CELIA
to the bed
.]

MOSCA
: Sir, signior corvino, here, is come to see you.

VOLPONE
: oh!

MOSCA
:             And hearing of the consultation had,

So lately, for your health, is come to offer,

Or rather, sir, to prostitute –

CORVINO
:                                         Thanks, sweet Mosca.

MOSCA
: Freely, unasked, or unentreated –

CORVINO
:                                                              Well

MOSCA
: As the true, fervent instance of his love,

His own most fair and proper wife, the beauty

Only of price in Venice –

CORVINO
:                               'Tis well urged.

80    
MOSCA
: To be your comfortress, and to preserve you.

VOLPONE
: Alas, I'm past already! Pray you, thank him

For his good care and promptness; but for that,

'Tis a vain labour e'en to fight 'gainst heaven;

Applying fire to a stone: uh, uh, uh, uh!

Making a dead leaf grow again. I take

His wishes gently, though; and you may tell him

What I've done for him. Marry, my state is hopeless!

Will him to pray for me, and t' use his fortune

With reverence when he comes to't.

MOSCA
:                                              Do you hear, sir?

90         Go to him with your wife.

CORVINO
: [
to
CELIA
]:          Heart of my father!

Wilt thou persist thus? Come, I pray thee, come.

Thou seest 'tis nothing, Celia. By this hand

I shall grow violent. Come, do 't, I say.

CELIA
: Sir, kill me rather. I will take down poison,

Eat burning coals, do anything –

CORVINO
:                                             Be damned!

Heart! I will drag thee hence home by the hair,

Cry thee a strumpet through the streets, rip up

Thy mouth unto thine ears, and slit thy nose,

Like a raw
rochet
! – Do not tempt me, come.

100      Yield, I am loth – Death! I will buy some slave

Whom I will kill, and bind thee to him, alive;

And at my window hang you forth, devising

Some monstrous crime, which I, in capital letters,

Will eat into thy flesh with
aquafortis
,

And burning
cor'sives
, on this stubborn breast.

Now, by the blood thou hast incensed, I'll do 't!

CELIA
: Sir, what you please, you may; I am your martyr.

CORVINO
: Be not thus obstinate, I ha' not deserved it.

Think who it is entreats you. Pray thee, sweet;

110      Good faith, thou shalt have jewels, gowns, attires,

What thou wilt, think and ask. Do but go kiss him.

Or touch him, but. For my sake. At my suit.

This once. No? Not? I shall remember this.

Will you disgrace me thus? D' you thirst my undoing?

MOSCA
: Nay, gentle lady, be advised.

CORVINO
:                                                 No, no.

She has watched her time. God's precious, this is Scurvy,

'Tis very scurvy; and you are –

MOSCA
:                                                  Nay, good sir.

CORVINO
: An errant locust, by heaven, a locust! whore,

Crocodile, that hast thy tears prepared,

Expecting how thou'lt bid 'em flow.

120  
MOSCA
:                                                          Nay, pray you, sir!

She will consider.

CELIA
                          Would my life would serve

To satisfy.

CORVINO
: 'Sdeath! if she would but speak to him,

And save my reputation, 'twere somewhat;

But spitefully to effect my utter ruin!

MOSCA
: Ay, now you've put your fortune in her hands.

Why i' faith, it is her modesty; I must
quit
her.

If you were absent, she would be more
coming;

I know it, and dare undertake for her.

What woman can before her husband? Pray you,

Let us depart and leave her here.

130  
CORVINO
:                                          Sweet Celia,

Thou may'st redeem all yet; I'll say no more.

If not, esteem yourself as lost. Nay, stay there.

    [
Exeunt
MOSCA
and
CORVINO
.]

CELIA
: O God, and his good angels! Whither, Whither,

Is shame fled human breasts? that with such ease

Men dare put off your honours, and their own?

Is that, which ever was a cause of life,

Now placed beneath the basest circumstance,

And modesty an exile made, for money?

VOLPONE:
Ay, in Corvino, and such earth-fed minds,

   
He leaps off from the couch
.

140      That never tasted the true heaven of love.

Assure thee, Celia, he that would sell thee,

Only for hope of gain, and that uncertain,

He would have sold his part of Paradise

For ready money, had he met a
cope-man
.

Why art thou 'mazed to see me thus revived?

Rather applaud thy beauty's miracle;

‘Tis thy great work, that hath, not now alone,

But sundry times raised me in several shapes,

And, but this morning, like a mountebank,

150     To see thee at thy window. Ay, before

I would have left my practice for thy love,