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  • Title: The Honest Whore, Part 1 (Quarto 1, 1604)
  • Editor: Joost Daalder
  • Contributing editor: Brett Greatley-Hirsch
  • Coordinating editor: Brett Greatley-Hirsch
  • General textual editor: Eleanor Lowe
  • ISBN: 978-1-55058-490-5

    Copyright Digital Renaissance Editions. This text may be freely used for educational, non-profit purposes; for all other uses contact the Editor.
    Authors: Thomas Dekker, Thomas Middleton
    Editor: Joost Daalder
    Peer Reviewed

    The Honest Whore, Part 1 (Quarto 1, 1604)

    THE HONEST WHORE.
    Cast. And where is father Anselmo now?
    2535Tow. Mary hees gon but eene now.
    Duk. I, well done, tell me, whether is he gone?
    Tow. Why to God a mighty.
    Flu. Ha, ha, this fellow is a foole, talkes idlelie.
    Pio. Sirra are all the mad folkes in Millan brought hither?
    2540Tow. How all, theres a wise question indeede: why if al the
    mad folkes in Millan should come hither, there would not be
    left ten men in the Citty.
    Duk. Few gentlemen or Courtiers here, ha.
    Tow. Oh yes? abundance, aboundance, lands no sooner fall
    2545into their hands, but straight they runne out a their wits: Ci-
    tizēs sons & heires are free of the house by their fathers copy:
    Farmers sons come hither like geese (in flocks) & when they
    ha sould all their corne fields, here they sit & picke the straws.
    Sin. Me thinks you should haue women here aswel as men.
    2550Tow. Oh, I: a plague on em, theres no ho with them, they are
    madder then march haires.
    Flu. Are there no lawyers here amongst you?
    Tow. Oh no, not one: neuer any lawyer, we dare not let a
    lawyer come in, for heele make em mad faster than we can
    2555recouer em.
    Du. And how long ist er'e you recouer any of these.
    Tow. Why according to the quantitie of the Moone thats
    got into em, an Aldermans sonne will be mad a great while
    a very great while, especially if his friends left him well, a
    2560whore will hardly come to her wits agen: a puritane ther's no
    hope of him, vnlesse he may pull downe the steeple and hang
    himselfe it'h bell-ropes.
    Flu. I perceiue all sorts of fish come to your net.
    Tow. Yes intruth, we haue blockes for all heads, we haue
    2565good store of wilde oates here: for the Courtier is mad at
    the Cittizen, the Cittizen is madde at the Country men, the
    shoomaker is mad at the cobler, the cobler at the carman, the
    punke is mad that the Marchants wife is no whore, the Mar-
    chants wife is mad that the puncke is so common a whore:
    2570gods so, heres father Anselmo. pray say nothing that I tel tales
    out of the schoole. Exit.
    Omn. God blesse you father. Enter Anselmo.
    Ans.