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    Eastward Ho
    Eastward Ho
    Eastward Ho
    Ebook115 pages1 hour

    Eastward Ho

    By Ben Jonson

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    About this ebook

    Benjamin Jonson (1572-1637) was a Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor, known best for his satirical plays and lyric poems. Jonson's works are particularly recognizable because of his consistencies in style, intricacy of plot, characterization and setting. He focused on creating works that implemented elements of the realistic as well as the absurd. For a few years around the turn of the century, Jonson had participated in the War of the Theatres with his rival playwrights, John Marston and Thomas Dekker; the men satirized each other in scathing comedies. However, a few years later Jonson worked with Marston and George Chapman on a satirical city comedy called "Eastward Ho!" The collaborative effort was a remarkable success, blending three very different writings styles into a single, coherent play. The tale of contemporary London life was written in response to the immense success of Thomas Dekker and John Webster's "Westward Ho!"
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDigireads.com Publishing
    Release dateJan 1, 2011
    ISBN9781420941920
    Eastward Ho
    Author

    Ben Jonson

    Benjamin Jonson (c. 11 June 1572 – c. 16 August 1637 was an English playwright and poet. Jonson's artistry exerted a lasting influence upon English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours; he is best known for the satirical plays Every Man in His Humour (1598), Volpone, or The Fox (c. 1606), The Alchemist (1610) and Bartholomew Fair (1614) and for his lyric and epigrammatic poetry. He is generally regarded as the second most important English dramatist, after William Shakespeare.

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    • 4/5
      Best known for the mockery of Scotsd which got the authors in trouble with the government, but it is a reasonably funny play.

    Book preview

    Eastward Ho - Ben Jonson

    EASTWARD HO

    BY BEN JONSON, JOHN MARSTON, AND GEORGE CHAPMAN

    A Digireads.com Book

    Digireads.com Publishing

    Print ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-4084-8

    Ebook ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-4192-0

    This edition copyright © 2012

    Please visit www.digireads.com

    CONTENTS

    DRAMATIS PERSONAE

    PROLOGUS

    ACT I, Scene i.

    ACT I, Scene ii.

    ACT II, Scene i.

    ACT II, Scene ii.

    ACT III, Scene i.

    ACT III, Scene ii.

    ACT III, Scene iii.

    ACT III, Scene iv.

    ACT IV, Scene i.

    ACT IV, Scene ii.

    ACT IV, Scene iii.

    ACT V, Scene i.

    ACT V, Scene ii.

    ACT V, Scene iii.

    ACT V, Scene iv.

    ACT V, Scene v.

    EPILOGUE

    DRAMATIS PERSONAE

    Touchstone, a goldsmith.

    Mistress Touchstone, his wife.

    Gertrude, }

    Mildred,  } his daughters.

    Quicksilver, }

    Golding,  } his apprentices.

    Bettrice, a waiting woman.

    Poldavy, a tailor.

    Sir Petronel Flash.

    Security, an old usurer.

    Winifred, wife to Security.

    Sindefy, mistress to Quicksilver.

    Bramble, a lawyer.

    A scrivener.

    Seagull, a sea captain.

    Scapethrift, } adventurers bound for

    Spendall,  }  Virginia.

    A drawer at the Blue Anchor Tavern.

    A coachman.

    Hamlet, a footman.

    Potkin, a tankard-bearer.

    Mistress Fond.

    Mistress Gazer.

    Slitgut, a butcher's apprentice.

    WOLF,   } 

    HOLDFAST, } officers of the Counter.

    A constable.

    TOBY, a prisoner.

    A friend of the prisoners.

    A page of Sir Petronel Flash.

    A messenger.

    The Scene

    London, and Thames-side.

    PROLOGUS

    Not out of envy, for there's no effect

    Where there's no cause; nor out of imitation,

    For we have evermore been imitated;

    Nor out of our contention to do better

    Than that which is opposed to ours in title,

    For that was good; and better cannot be:

    And, for the title, if it seem affected,

    We might as well have called it, God you good even:

    Only that eastward westwards still exceeds;

    Honor the sun's fair rising, not his setting.

    Nor is our title utterly enforced,

    As by the points we touch at you shall see.

    Bear with our willing pains, if dull or witty;

    We only dedicate it to the city.

    ACT I, Scene i.

    [Enter Master Touchstone and Quicksilver at several doors, Quicksilver with his hat, pumps, short sword and dagger, and a racket trussed up under his cloak. At the middle door, enter Golding, discovering a goldsmith's shop and walking short turns before it.]

    TOUCHSTONE. And whither with you now? What loose action are you bound for? Come, what comrades are you to meet withal? Where's the supper? Where's the rendezvous?

    QUICKSILVER. Indeed, and in very good sober truth, sir——

    TOUCHSTONE. 'Indeed, and in very good sober truth, sir?' Behind my back thou wilt swear faster than a French footboy, and talk more bawdily than a common midwife; and now 'indeed, and in very good sober truth, sir!' But, if a privy search should be made, with what furniture are you rigged now? Sirrah, I tell thee, I am thy master, William Touchstone, goldsmith; and thou my prentice, Francis Quicksilver; and I will see whither you are running. Work upon that now!

    QUICKSILVER. Why, sir, I hope a man may use his recreation with his master's profit.

    TOUCHSTONE. Prentices' recreations are seldom with their masters' profit. Work upon that now! You shall give up your cloak, though you be no alderman. [Touchstone uncloaks Quicksilver.] Heyday! Ruffians Hall! Sword, pumps, here's a racket indeed!

    QUICKSILVER. Work upon that now!

    TOUCHSTONE. Thou shameless varlet! Dost thou jest at thy lawful master, contrary to thy indentures?

    QUICKSILVER. Why, 'sblood, sir! my mother's a gentlewoman, and my father a justice of peace and of quorum; and, though I am a younger brother and a prentice, yet I hope I am my father's son; and by God's lid, 'tis for your worship and for your commodity that I keep company. I am entertained among gallants, true; they call me cousin Frank, right; I lend them moneys, good; they spend it, well. But, when they are spent, must not they strive to get more? Must not their land fly?—and to whom? Shall not your worship ha' the refusal? Well, I am a good member of the City, if I were well considered. How would merchants thrive, if gentlemen would not be unthrifts? How could gentlemen be unthrifts if their humors were not fed? How should their humors be fed but by white-meat and cunning secondings? Well, the city might consider us. I am going to an ordinary now: the gallants fall to play; I carry light gold with me. The gallants call, 'Cousin Frank, some gold for silver;' I change, gain by it; the gallants lose the gold, and then call, 'Cousin Frank, lend me some silver.' Why——

    TOUCHSTONE. Why? I cannot tell. Seven score pound art thou out in the cash; but look to it, I will not be gallanted out of my moneys. And, as for my rising by other men's fall, God shield me! Did I gain my wealth by ordinaries? No! By exchanging of gold? No! By keeping of gallants' company? No! I hired me a little shop, fought low, took small gain, kept no debt book, garnished my shop, for want of plate, with good wholesome thrifty sentences: as, 'Touchstone, keep thy shop, and thy shop will keep thee;' 'Light gains makes heavy purses;' ''Tis good to be merry and wise.' And, when I was wived, having something to stick to, I had the horn of suretyship ever before my eyes.—[to the audience] You all know the device of the horn, where the young fellow slips in at the butt end, and comes squeezed out at the buckle: and I grew up, and, I praise providence, I bear my brows now as high as the best of my neighbors: but thou—well, look to the accounts; your father's bond lies for you: seven score pound is yet in the rear.

    QUICKSILVER. Why, 'slid, sir, I have as good, as proper gallants' words for it as any are in London—gentlemen of good phrase, perfect language, passingly behaved; gallants that wear socks and clean linen, and call me 'kind cousin Frank,' 'good cousin Frank,' for they know my father: and, by God's lid, shall not I trust 'em? Not trust?

    [Enter a Page, as inquiring for Touchstone's shop.]

    GOLDING. What do ye lack, sir? What is't you'll buy, sir?

    TOUCHSTONE. Aye, marry sir; there's a youth of another piece. There's thy fellow-prentice, as good a gentleman born as thou art: nay, and better meaned. But does he pump it, or racket it? Well, if he thrive not, if he outlast not a hundred such crackling bavins as thou art, God and men neglect industry.

    GOLDING. [to the Page] It is his shop, and here my master walks.

    TOUCHSTONE. With me, boy?

    PAGE. My master, Sir Petronel Flash, recommends his love to you, and will instantly visit you.

    TOUCHSTONE. To make up the match with my eldest daughter, my wife's dilling, whom she longs to call madam.—He shall find me unwillingly ready, boy. [Exit Page.]—[to the audience] There's another affliction too. As I have two prentices, the one of a boundless prodigality, the other of a most hopeful industry, so have I only two daughters: the eldest, of a proud ambition and nice wantonness; the other, of a modest humility and comely soberness. The one must be ladified, forsooth, and be attired just to the court cut and long tail. So far is she ill-natured to the place and means of my preferment and fortune that she throws all the contempt and despite hatred itself can cast upon it. Well, a piece of land she has; 'twas her grandmother's gift; let her and her Sir Petronel flash out that; but, as for my substance, she that scorns me, as I am a citizen and tradesman, shall never pamper her pride with my industry, shall never use me as men do foxes; keep themselves warm in the skin, and throw the body that

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