THRASIMACHUS. Villains, I say, tell us the cause hereof?
STRUMBO. Wild fire and pitch, &c.
THRASIMACHUS. Tell me, you villains, why you make this noise, Or with my lance I will prick your bowels out.
ALBA. Where are your houses, where's your dwelling place?
STRUMBO. Place? Ha, ha, ha! laugh a month and a day at him. Place! I cry God mercy: why, do you think that such poor honest men as we be, hold our habitacles in kings' palaces? Ha, ha, ha! But because you seem to be an abominable chieftain, I will tell you our state.
From the top to the toe, From the head to the shoe; From the beginning to the ending, From the building to the burning.
This honest fellow and I had our mansion cottage in the suburbs of this city, hard by the temple of Mercury. And by the common soldiers of the Shitens, the Scithians-- what do you call them?--with all the suburbs were burnt to the ground, and the ashes are left there, for the country wives to wash bucks withall.
And that which grieves me most, My loving wife, (O cruel strife!) The wicked flames did roast. And therefore, captain crust, We will continually cry, Except you seek a remedy Our houses to reedify Which now are burnt to dust.
BOTH CRY. Wild fire and pitch, wild fire and pitch.
ALBA. Well, we must remedy these outrages, And throw revenge upon their hateful heads. And you, good fellows, for your houses burnst, We will remunerate you store of gold, And build your houses by our palace gate.
STRUMBO. Gate! O petty treason to my person! nowhere else but by your backside? Gate! Oh how I am vexed in my collar! Gate! I cry God mercy! Do you hear, master king? If you mean to gratify such poor men as we be, you must build our houses by the Tavern.
ALBA. It shall be done, sir.
STRUMBO. Near the Tavern, aye! by lady, sir, it was spoken like a good fellow. Do you hear, sir? when our house is builded, if you do chance to pass or repass that way, we will bestow a quart of the best wine upon you.
[Exit.]
ALBA. It grieves me, lordings, that my subjects' goods Should thus be spoiled by the Scithians, Who, as you see, with lightfoot foragers Depopulate the places where they come. But cursed Humber thou shalt rue the day That ere thou camest unto Cathnesia.
[Exeunt.]
ACT II. SCENE IV. The camp of Humber.
[Enter Humber, Hubba, Trussier, and their soldiers.]
HUMBER. Hubba, go take a coronet of our horse, As many lancers, and light armed knights As may suffice for such an enterprise, And place them in the grove of Caledon. With these, when as the skirmish doth increase, Retire thou from the shelters of the wood, And set upon the weakened Troyans' backs, For policy joined with chivalry Can never be put back from victory.
[Exit. Albanact enter and say (clowns with him).]
ALBA. Thou base born Hun, how durst thou be so bold As once to menace warlike Albanact, The great commander of these regions? But thou shalt buy thy rashness with thy death, And rue too late thy over bold attempts; For with this sword, this instrument of death, That hath been drenched in my foe-men's blood, I'll separate thy body from they head, And set that coward blood of thine abroach.
STRUMBO. Nay, with this staff, great Strumbo's instrument, I'll crack thy cockscomb, paltry Scithian.
HUMBER. Nor wreak I of thy threat, thou princox boy, Nor do I fear thy foolish insolency; And but thou better use thy bragging blade, Then thou doest rule thy overflowing tongue, Superbious Brittain, thou shalt know too soon The force of Humber and his Scithians.
[Let them fight. Humber and his soldiers run in.]
STRUMBO. O horrible, terrible.
[Exit.]
ACT II. SCENE V. Another part of the field of battle.
[Sound the alarm. Enter Humber and his soldiers.]
HUMBER. How bravely this young Brittain, Albanact, Darteth abroad the thunderbolts of war, Beating down millions with his furious mood, And in his glory triumphs over all, Moving the mass squadrants of the ground; Heaps hills on hills, to scale the starry sky, As when Briareus, armed with an hundreth hands, Flung forth an hundreth mountains at great Jove, And when the monstrous giant Monichus Hurled mount Olympus at great Mars his target, And shot huge caedars at Minerva's shield. How doth he overlook with haughty front My fleeting hosts, and lifts his lofty face Against us all that now do fear his force, Like as we see the wrathful sea from far, In a great mountain heaped, with hideous noise, With thousand billows beat against the ships, And toss them in the waves like tennis balls.