Vit. Pray, my Lord, let him speak his usual tongue, I'll make no answer else.

Fra. Why, you understand Latin.

Vit. I do, Sir, but amongst this auditory

Which come to hear my cause, the half or more
May be ignorant in't.

Mon. Go on, Sir.

Vit. By your favor,

I will not have my accusation clouded

In a strange tongue : all this assembly
Shall hear what you can charge me with.

Fra. Signior,

You need not stand on't much; pray, change your lan

guage.

Mon. Oh, for God's sake! gentlewoman, your credit

Shall be more famous by it.

Law. Well then have at you.

Vit. I am the mark, Sir, I'll give aim to you, And tell you how near you shoot.

Law. Most literated judges, please your lordships

So to connive your judgments to the view

Of this debauch'd and diversivolent woman;

Who such a concatenation

Of mischief hath effected, that to extirp

The memory of it, must be the consummation
Of her, and her projections.

Vit. What's all this?

Law. Hold your peace!

Exorbitant sins must have exulceration.

Vit. Surely, my Lords, this lawyer hath swallowed

Some apothecaries bills, or proclamations;

And now the hard and undigestible words

Come up like stones we use give hawks for physic.
Why, this is Welch to Latin.

Law. My Lords, the woman

Knows not her tropes, nor is perfect

In the academick derivation

Of grammatical elocution.

Fra. Sir, your pains

Shall

Shall be well spared, and your deep eloquence
Be worthily applauded among those
Which understand you.

Law. My good Lord.

Fra. Sir,

Put up your papers in your fustian bag;

(Francisco speaks this as in scorn.)

Cry mercy, Sir, 'tis buckram, and accept

My notion of your learn'd verbosity.

Law. I most graduatically thank your lordship;

I shall have use for them elsewhere.

Mon. [to Vittoria.] I shall be plainer with you, and paint out

Your follies in more natural red and white,

Than that upon your cheek.

Vit. O you mistake,

You raise a blood as noble in this cheek

As ever was your mother's.

Mon. I must spare you, till proof cry whore to that. Observe this creature here, my honor'd Lords,

A woman of a most prodigious spirit.

Vit. My honorable Lord,

It doth not suit a reverend Cardinal

To play the Lawyer thus.

Mon. Oh your trade instructs your language. You see, my Lords, what goodly fruit she seems, Yet like those apples travellers report

To grow where Sodom and Gomorrah stood,

I will but touch her, and you straight shall see
She'll fall to soot and ashes.

Vit. Your invenom'd apothecary should do't.
Mon. I am resolved,

Were there a second paradise to lose,

This devil would betray it.

Vit. O poor charity,

Thou art seldom found in scarlet.

Mon. Who knows not how, when several night by night Her gates were choakt with coaches, and her rooms Outbrav'd the stars with several kinds of lights;

When

When she did counterfeit a Prince's court

In musick, banquets, and most riotous surfeits;
This whore forsooth was holy.

Vit. Ha! whore? what's that?

Mon. Shall I expound whore to you? sure I shall.
I'll give their perfect character. They are first,
Sweetmeats which rot the eater: In man's nostrils
Poison'd perfumes. They are cozening alchymy;
Shipwrecks in calmest weather. What are whores?
Cold Russian winters, that appear so barren,
As if that nature had forgot the spring.
They are the true material fire of hell.

Worse than those tributes i'th' low countries paid,
Exactions upon meat, drink, garments, sleep;
Ay even on man's perdition, his sin.
They are those brittle evidences of law,
Which forfeit all a wretched man's estate
For leaving out one syllable.
They are those flattering bells
At weddings and at funerals.

What are whores?

have all one tune,

Your rich whores

Are only treasuries by extortion fill'd,

And empty'd by curs'd riot. They are worse,

Worse than dead bodies, which are begg'd at th' gallows, And wrought upon by surgeons, to teach man

Wherein he is imperfect. What's a whɔre?

She's like the guilt counterfeited coin,

Which, whosoe'er first stamps it, brings in trouble
All that receive it.

Vit. This character 'scapes me.

Mon. You, gentlewoman?

Take from all beasts and from all minerals

Their deadly poison

Vit. Well, what then?

Mon. I'll tell thee;

I'll find in thee an apothecary's shop,

To sample them all.

Fr. Emb. She hath lived ill.

En. Emb. True, but the Cardinal's too bitter.

Mon. You know what whore is. Next the devil adul❜try,

Enters the devil murder.

Fra.

Fra. Your unhappy husband
Is dead.

Vit. O he's a happy husband,
Now he owes Nature nothing.
Fra. And by a vaulting engine.
Mon. An active plot:

He jumpt into his grave.

Fra. What a prodigy was't,

That from some two yards high, a slender man

Should break his neck?

Mon. I'th' rushes!

Fra. And what's more,

Upon the instant lose all use of speech,

All vital motion, like a man had lain

Wound up three days. Now mark each circumstance.
Mon. And look upon this creature was his wife.
She comes not like a widow: she comes arm'd
With scorn and impudence: is this a mourning-habit?
Vit. Had I foreknown his death as you suggest,

I would have bespoke my mourning.

Mon. O you are cunning!

Vit. You shame your wit and judgment,

To call it so; what, is my just defence

By him that is my judge call'd impudence?

Let me appeal then from this christian court
To the uncivil Tartar.

Mon. See, my lords,

She scandals our proceedings.

Vit. Humbly thus,

Thus low, to the most worthy and respected
Leiger embassadors, my modesty

And woman-hood I tender; but withall,

So entangled in a cursed accusation,
That my defence, of force, like Perseus,

Must personate masculine virtue. To the point.
Find me but guilty, sever head from body,
We'll part good friends: I scorn to hold my life
At yours, or any man's intreaty, Sir.

En. Emb. She hath a brave spirit.

Mon

Mon. Well, well, such counterfeit jewels Make true ones oft suspected.

Vit. You are deceived;

For know, that all your strict combined heads,
Which strike against this mine of diamonds,
Shall prove but glassen hammers, they shall break.
These are but feigned shadows of my evils.
Terrify babes, my Lord, with painted devils;
I am past such needless palsy. For your names
Of whore and murdress, they proceed from you,
As if a man should spit against the wind;
The filth returns in's face.

Mon. Pray you mistress, satisfy me one question :
Who lodg'd beneath your roof that fatal night
Your husband brake his neck?

Bra. That question

Inforceth me break silence; I was there.
Mon. Your business?

Bra. Why, I came to comfort her,

And take some course for settling her estate,
Because I heard her husband was in debt

you would cozen her.

Mon. Who made you overseer?

Bra. Why, my charity, my charity, which should flow From every generous and noble spirit,

To orphans and to widows.

Mon. Your lust.

Bra. Cowardly dogs bark loudest! sirrah, priest,
I'll talk with you hereafter.Do you hear?

The sword you frame of such an excellent temper,
I'll sheath in your own bowels.

There are a number of thy coat resemble
Your common post-boys.

Mon. Ha!

Bra. Your mercenary post-boys.

Your