Volume Vi Part 86 (1/2)

A crafty villain, perceiving how we meant to Usury, slipt away.

_Enter_ SIMPLICITY _in haste, and give the Lords a paper to read_.

SIMPLICITY.

All hail, all rain, all frost, and all snow Be to you three Lords of London on a row!

Read my supplantation, and my suit ye shall know, Even for G.o.d's sake above, and three ladies' sakes below.

FRAUD.

Master Diligence, do me a favour: you know I am a gentleman.

DILIGENCE.

Step aside, till my lords be gone; I'll do for you what I can.

[_Slip aside_.

POMP.

What's here, my boy, what's here? Pleasure, this suit is, sure, to you; for it's mad stuff, and I know not what it means.

PLEASURE.

Neither do I. Sirrah, your writing is so intricate, that you must speak your mind; otherwise we shall not know your meaning.

POLICY.

You sue for three things here, and what be they? tell them.

SIMPLICITY.

Cannot you three tell, and the suit to you three? I am glad a simple fellow yet can go beyond you three great Lords of London. Why, my suit, look ye, is such a suit, as you are bound in honour to hear, for it is for the puppet-like[281] wealth. I would have no new orders nor new sciences set up in the city, whereof I am a poor freeman, and please ye, as ye may read in my bill there--Simplicity freeman. But, my lords, I would have three old trades, which are not for the commonwealth, put down.

PLEASURE.

And after all this circ.u.mstance, sir, what be they?

SIMPLICITY.

They be not three what-lack-ye's, as what do ye lack? fine lockram,[282]

fine canvas, or fine Holland cloth, or what lack ye? fine ballads, fine sonnets, or what lack ye? a purse, or a gla.s.s, or a pair of fine knives?

but they be three have-ye-any's, which methinks are neither sciences nor occupations; and if they be trades, they are very malapert trades--and more than reason.

POLICY.

As how, sir? name them.

SIMPLICITY.

Will you banish them as readily as I can name them? The first is, have ye any old iron, old mail, or old harness?

POMP.

And what fault find ye with this?

SIMPLICITY.

What fault? I promise ye, a great fault: what have you, or any man else, to do to ask me if I have any old iron? What, if I have, or what, if I have not; why should you be so saucy to ask?

PLEASURE.

Why, fool, 'tis for thy good to give thee money for that that might lie and rust by thee.

SIMPLICITY.