I assure you, in these times, no man has his servant more obsequious and pliant, than gentlemen their creditors: to whom, if at any time. you pay but a moiety, or a fourth part, it comes more acceptably than if you gave them a newyear's gift. Sog. I perceive you, sir: I will take up,' and bring myself in credit, sure. Car. Marry this, always beware you commerce not with bankrupts, or poor needy Ludgathians:* they are impudent creatures, turbulent spirits, they care not what violent tragedies they stir, nor how they play fast and loose with a poor gentleman's fortunes, to get their own. Marry, these rich fellows, that have the world, or the better part of it, sleeping in their countinghouses, they are ten times more placable, they; either fear, hope, or modesty restrains them from offering any outrages: but this is nothing to your followers, you shall not run a penny more in arrearage for them, an you list, yourself. 'I will take up,] That is, goods on credit. The phrase is "If a common in the writers of those times. So Falstaff; "gentleman would be thorough with 'em, in honest taking up, they stand upon security." Again, in Donne, There's now as great an itch of bravery, And heat of taking up. Elegy xvi. WHAL. Always beware you commerce not with bankrupts, or poor needy Ludgathians, &c.] I know not how this reflection on the poverty of the tradesmen of Ludgate crept in here; they were surely among the wealthiest of our author's time. The thought itself, though obvious enough, is from Erasmus: Caveto, ne cum tenuibus habeas commercium; nam hi ob parvulam summulam ingentes excitant tragadias. Placabiliores sunt, quibus lautior est fortuna; cohibet illos pudor, lactat spes, deterret metus. Idem. Our old writers sometimes use Ludgate for the prison there. Jonson could scarcely mean people imprisoned for debt by Ludgathians; for Sogliardo needed no caution on that head. Sog. No! how should I keep 'em then? Car. Keep 'em! 'sblood, let them keep themselves, they are no sheep, are they? what! you shall come in houses, where plate, apparel, jewels, and divers other pretty commodities lie negligently scattered, and I would have those Mercuries follow me, I trow, should remember they had not their fingers for nothing.3 Sog. That's not so good, methinks. Car. Why, after you have kept them a fortnight, or so, and shew'd them enough to the world, you may turn them away, and keep no more but a boy, it's enough. Sog. Nay, my humour is not for boys, I'll keep men, an I keep any; and I'll give coats, that's my humour: but I lack a cullisen." 3 I would have those Mercuries follow me, I trow, should remember they had not their fingers for nothing.] Non ales famulos axepous et ob id axprovs, mittantur huc et illuc, invenient aliquid: scis varias esse talium rerum occasiones.—Ergo famulos ale non segnes, aut etiam sanguine propinquos, qui alioqui forent alendi.Reperient aliquid in diversoriis, aut in ædibus, incustoditum. Tenes? Meminerint non frustra datos homini digitos, &c. Eras. Id. But I lack a cullisen.] No dictionary that I can find will help us to the meaning of this word; nor does the context lead us to discover it. WHAL. I had occasion to observe, in a note on Massinger, that dictionaries were but ill calculated to supply the kind of information here wanted, which must be sought in the colloquial language of contemporary poets. Happily, however, Jonson explains himself. In a subsequent scene, Carlo says, I come from Sogliardo but now, he is at the herald's office yonder; he requested me to go afore and take up a man or two for him in Paul's, against his cognizance was ready." Cognizance, or as Sogliardo ignorantly and corruptly terms it, cullisen, is the badge or mark of distinction which retainers, servants, &c. usually wore on the shoulder or sleeve of their coats, that it might be known to whom and what they belonged. It should be recollected that the livery of servants at this time was, with few exceptions, of blue, so that some note of discrimination was Car. Why, now you ride to the city, you may buy one; I'll bring you where you shall have your choice for money. of Sog. Can you, sir? Car. O, ay: you shall have one take measure and make you a coat of arms to fit you, of what fashion you will. you, Sog. By word of mouth, I thank you, signior: I'll be once a little prodigal in a humour, i'faith, and have a most prodigious coat. Mac. Torment and death! break head and brain at once, To be deliver'd of your fighting issue. Who can indure to see blind fortune dote thus ? This clod, a whoreson puck-fist! O G-! Sog. Nay, I will examine him before I go, sure. Car. The lord of the soil has all wefts and strays here, has he not? Sog. Yes, sir. Car. Faith then I pity the poor fellow, he's fallen into a fool's hands. [Aside. Sog. Sirrah, who gave you a commission to lie in my lordship? Mac. Your lordship! absolutely necessary. Cullisen appears again in the Case is Altered, and in a way that clearly determines its sense: "But what badge shall we give, what cullisen?" A. IV. 5 This clod, a whoreson puck-fist!] A fungous excrescence of the mushroom kind, often used by our author to denote an in. sipid, insignificant fellow. WHAL. VOL. II. E Sog. How! my lordship? do you know me, sir? Car. He answers him like an echo. [Aside. Mac. One of those that fortune favours. this better. Mac. I mean simply: that you are one that lives not by your wits. Sog. By my wits! no, sir, I scorn to live by my wits, I. I have better means, I tell thee, than to take such base courses, as to live by my wits. What, dost thou think I live by my wits? Mac. Methinks, jester, you should not relish this well. Car. Ha! does he know me? Mac. Though yours be the worst use a man can put his wit to, of thousands, to prostitute it at every tavern and ordinary; yet, methinks, you should have turn'd your broadside at this, and have been ready with an apology, able to sink this hulk of ignorance into the bottom aud depth of his contempt. Car. Oh, 'tis Macilente! Signior, you are well encountered; how is it?-O, we must not regard what he says, man, a trout, a shallow fool, he has no more brain than a butterfly, a mere stuft suit; he looks like a musty bottle new wicker'd, his head's the cork, light, light! [Aside to Macilente.]-I am glad to see you so well return'd, signior. • The periphrasis of a fool.] According to the Latin adage, Fortuna favet fatuis. So in Wily Beguiled, "Sir, you may see that fortune is your friend, "But fortune favours fools." WHAL. Mac. You are! gramercy, good Janus. Sog. Is he one of your acquaintance? I love him the better for that. Car. Od's precious, come away, man, what do you mean? an you knew him as I do, you'd shun him as you would do the plague. Sog. Why, sir? Car. O, he's a black fellow,' take heed of him. Car. Both, both; a lean mungrel, he looks as if he were chop-fallen, with barking at other men's good fortunes: 'ware how you offend him; he carries oil and fire in his pen, will scald where it drops: his spirit is like powder, quick, violent; he'll blow a man up with a jest: I fear him worse than a rotten wall does the cannon; shake an hour after at the report. Away, come not near him. Sog. For God's sake let's be gone; an he be a scholar, you know I cannot abide him; I had as lieve see a cockatrice, specially as cockatrices go now. Car. What, you'll stay, signior? this gentleman Sogliardo, and I, are to visit the knight Puntarvolo, and from thence to the city; we shall meet there. [Exit with Sogliardo. Mac. Ay, when I cannot shun you, we will meet. 'Tis strange! of all the creatures I have seen, I envy not this Buffone, for indeed 7 O, he's a black fellow, &c.] Black is mischievous, malignant. It is from Horace : Hic niger est, hunc tu, Romane, caveto. WHAL. I had as lieve see a cockatrice, specially as cockatrices go now.] A cockatrice, as every one knows, is a serpent, supposed to kill by the look; but Jonson plays on the cant meaning of the term, which I have already explained, p. 9. |