Mam. I will have all my beds blown up; not stuft :
Down is too hard. And then, mine oval room
Fill'd with such pictures as Tiberius took
From Elephantis, and dull Aretine

But coldly imitated. Then, my glasses
Cut in more subtil angles, to disperse
And multiply the figures, as I walk
Naked between my Succuba. My mists
I'll have of perfume, vapour'd 'bout the room,
To lose ourselves in ; and my baths, like pits
To fall into from whence we will come forth,
And roll us dry in gossamour and roses,
(Is it arriv'd at Ruby?)-Where I spy
A wealthy citizen, or rich lawyer,

Have a sublim'd pure wife, unto that fellow
I'll send a thousand pound to be

Face. And I shall carry it?

Mam. No, I'll have no bawds,

my cuckold.

But fathers and mothers. They will do it best,
Best of all others. And my flatterers
Shall be the pure and gravest of divines
That I can get for money. My meet fools,
Eloquent burgesses; and then my poets,
The same that writ so subtily of the Fart:
Whom I will entertain still for that subject.
The few that would give out themselves to be
Court and town stallions, and each-where belye
Ladies, who are known most innocent (for them)
Those will I beg, to make me eunuchs of:
And they shall fan me with ten estrich tails
A piece, made in a plume, to gather wind.
We will be brave, Puffe, now we ha' the medicine
My meat shall all come in in Indian shells,
Dishes of Agate set in gold, and studded
With emeralds. saphires, hyacinths, and rubies:
The tongues of carps, dormice, and camels' heels,
Boil'd i' the spirit of Sol, and dissolv'd pearl,
(Apicius' diet 'gainst the epilepsy)

And I will eat these broths with spoons of amber,

Headed

Headed with diamant and carbuncle.

My foot-boy shall eat pheasants, calver'd salmons,
Knots, godwits, lampreys: I myself will have
The beards of barbels serv'd, in stead of sallads;
Oil'd mushrooms; and the swelling unctuous paps
Of a fat pregnant sow, newly cut off,

Drest with an exquisite and poignant sauce:
For which, I'll say unto my cook, There's gold,
Go forth, and be a knight."

Face. Sir, I'll go

look

A little, how it heightens.

Mam. Do.-My shirts

I'll have of taffata-sarsnet, soft and light
As cobwebs; and, for all my other rayment,
It shall be such as might provoke the Persian,
Were he to teach the world riot anew.

My gloves of fishes' and birds' skins, perfum'd
With gums of paradise, and eastern air.

Sur. And do you think to have the Stone with this?
Mam. No, I do think to have all this with the Stone.
Sur. Why, I have heard, he must be homo frugi,
A pious, holy, and religious man,

One free from mortal sin, a very virgin

Mam. That makes it Sir, he is so. But I buy it.
My venture brings it me. He, honest wretch,
A notable, superstitious, good soul,

Has worn his knees bare, and his slippers bald,
With prayer and fasting for it: and, sir, let him
Do it alone, for me, still. Here he comes.
Not a prophane word, afore him: tis poison.92

92 The judgment is perfectly overwhelmed by the torrent of images, words, and book-knowledge with which Mammon confounds and stuns his incredulous hearer. They come pouring out like the successive strokes of Nilus. They "doubly redouble strokes upon the foe." Description outstrides proof. We are made to believe effects before we have testimony for their causes : as a lively description of the joys of heaven sometimes passes for an argument to prove the existence of such a place. If there be no one image which rises to the height of the sublime, yet the confluence and assem

blage

A COMEDY. BY BEN

VOLPONE; OR, THE FOX.

JONSON.

Volpone, a rich Venetian nobleman, who is without children, feigns himself to be dying, to draw gifts from such as pay their court to him in the expectation of becoming his heirs. Mosca, his knavish confederate, persuades each of these men in turn, that he is named for the inheritance, and by this means extracts from their credulity many costly presents.

VOLPONE as on his death bed. MOSCA. CORBACCIO, an old gentleman.

Mos. Signior Corbaccio,

You are very welcome, sir.

Corb. How does your patron?

Mos. Troth, as he did, sir, no amends.

Corb. What? mends he?

Mos. No, sir, he is rather worse.

Corb.

blage of them all produces an effect equal to the grandest poetry. Zerxes' army that drank up whole rivers from their numbers may stand for single Achilles.-Epicure Mammon is the most determined offspring of the author. It has the whole "matter and copy of the father, eye, nose, lip, the trick of his frown:" It is just such a swaggerer as contemporaries have described old Ben to be. Meercraft, Bobadil, the Host of the New Inn, have all his "image and superscription:" but Mammon is_arrogant pretension personified. Sir Samson Legend, in Love for Love, is such another lying overbearing character, but he does not come up to Epicure Mammon. What a 66 towring bravery" there is in his sensuality! He affects no pleasure under a Sultan. It is as if "Egypt with Assyria strove in luxury."

Mos. Upon his couch, sir, newly fall'n asleep.
Corb. Does he sleep well?

Mos. No wink, sir, all this night,

Nor yesterday; but slumbers.

Corb. Good! he shall take

Some counsel of physicians: I have brought him
An opiate here, from mine own doctor-
Mos. He will not hear of drugs.

Corb. Why? I myself

Stood by, while 'twas made; saw all th' ingredients;
And know it cannot but most gently work.

My life for his, 'tis but to make him sleep.
Volp. I, his last sleep if he would take it.
Mos. Sir,

He has no faith in physic.

Corb. Say you, say you?

Mos. He has no faith in physic: he does think, Most of your doctors are the greatest danger, And worst disease t'escape. I often have

Heard him protest, that your physician

Should never be his heir.

Corb. Not I his heir?

Mos. Not your physician, sir.

Corb. O, no, no, no,

I do not mean it..

Mos. No, sir, nor their fees

He cannot brook: he says they flay a man,
Before they kill him.

Corb. Right, I do conceive you.

Mos. And then, they do it by experiment; For which the law not only doth absolve 'em, But gives them great reward; and he is loth To hire his death, so.

Corb. It is true, they kill,

With as much licence as a Judge.

Mos. Nay, more;

For he but kills, sir, where the law condemns,
And these can kill him too.

Corb.

His speech is broken, and his eyes are set,
His face drawn longer than 'twas wont.-
Corb. How? how?

Stronger than he was wont ?

Mos. No, sir: his face Drawn longer than 'twas wont. Corb. O, good.

Mos. His mouth

Mos. A freezing numbness stiffens all his joints, And makes the colour of his flesh like lead.

Corb. "Tis good.

Mos. His pulse beats slow, and dull.

Corb. Good symptoms still.

Mos. And from his brain

Corb. Ha? how? not from his brain?

Mos. Yes, sir, and from his brain

Corb. I conceive you, good.

Mos. Flows a cold sweat, with a continual rheum Forth the resolved corners of his eyes.

Corb. Is't possible? yet I am better, ha!

How does he with the swimming of his head?
Mos. O, sir 'tis past the scotomy; he now
Hath lost his feeling, and hath left to snort:
You hardly can perceive him that he breathes.
Corb. Excellent, excellent, sure I shall outlast him:
This makes me young again a score of years.
Mos. I was coming for you, sir.

Corb. Has he made his wilk?

What has he giv'n me?

Mos. No, sir.

Corb. Nothing? ha?

Mos. He has not made his will, sir.
Corb. Oh, oh, oh,

What