[EXEUNT MERCHANTS.]
[ENTER WAITING-WOMAN.]
PER: Save you, fair lady! Is sir Pol within?
WOM: I do not know, sir.
PER: Pray you say unto him, Here is a merchant, upon earnest business, Desires to speak with him.
WOM: I will see, sir.
[EXIT.]
PER: Pray you.- I see the family is all female here.
[RE-ENTER WAITING-WOMAN.]
WOM: He says, sir, he has weighty affairs of state, That now require him whole; some other time You may possess him.
PER: Pray you say again, If those require him whole, these will exact him, Whereof I bring him tidings.
[EXIT WOMAN.]
-What might be His grave affair of state now! how to make Bolognian sausages here in Venice, sparing One o" the ingredients?
[RE-ENTER WAITING-WOMAN.]
WOM: Sir, he says, he knows By your word "tidings," that you are no statesman, And therefore wills you stay.
PER: Sweet, pray you return him; I have not read so many proclamations, And studied them for words, as he has done- But-here he deigns to come.
[EXIT WOMAN.]
[ENTER SIR POLITICK.]
SIR P: Sir, I must crave Your courteous pardon. There hath chanced to-day, Unkind disaster "twixt my lady and me; And I was penning my apology, To give her satisfaction, as you came now.
PER: Sir, I am grieved I bring you worse disaster: The gentleman you met at the port to-day, That told you, he was newly arrived-
SIR P: Ay, was A fugitive punk?
PER: No, sir, a spy set on you; And he has made relation to the senate, That you profest to him to have a plot To sell the State of Venice to the Turk.
SIR P: O me!
PER: For which, warrants are sign"d by this time, To apprehend you, and to search your study For papers-
SIR P: Alas, sir, I have none, but notes Drawn out of play-books-
PER: All the better, sir.
SIR P: And some essays. What shall I do?
PER: Sir, best Convey yourself into a sugar-chest; Or, if you could lie round, a frail were rare: And I could send you aboard.
SIR P: Sir, I but talk"d so, For discourse sake merely.
[KNOCKING WITHIN.]
PER: Hark! they are there.
SIR P: I am a wretch, a wretch!
PER: What will you do, sir?
Have you ne"er a currant-b.u.t.t to leap into?
They"ll put you to the rack, you must be sudden.
SIR P: Sir, I have an ingine-
3 MER [WITHIN.]: Sir Politick Would-be?
2 MER [WITHIN.]: Where is he?
SIR P: That I have thought upon before time.
PER: What is it?
SIR P: I shall ne"er endure the torture.
Marry, it is, sir, of a tortoise-sh.e.l.l, Fitted for these extremities: pray you, sir, help me.
Here I"ve a place, sir, to put back my legs, Please you to lay it on, sir, [LIES DOWN WHILE PEREGRINE PLACES THE Sh.e.l.l UPON HIM.]
-with this cap, And my black gloves. I"ll lie, sir, like a tortoise, "Till they are gone.
PER: And call you this an ingine?
SIR P: Mine own device-Good sir, bid my wife"s women To burn my papers.
[EXIT PEREGRINE.]
[THE THREE MERCHANTS RUSH IN.]
1 MER: Where is he hid?
3 MER: We must, And will sure find him.
2 MER: Which is his study?
[RE-ENTER PEREGRINE.]
1 MER: What Are you, sir?
PER: I am a merchant, that came here To look upon this tortoise.