Digital Renaissance Editions

About this text

  • Title: The Honest Whore, Part 2 (Quarto 1, 1630)
  • Editor: Joost Daalder
  • 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.
    Author: Thomas Dekker
    Editor: Joost Daalder
    Not Peer Reviewed

    The Honest Whore, Part 2 (Quarto 1, 1630)

    The Honest Whore.
    Omnes. Your wife, Matheo?
    Hip. Sure it cannot be.
    Mat. Oh, Sir, you loue no quarters of Mutton that hang
    vp, you loue none but whole Mutton; she set the robbery, I
    2570perform'd it; she spur'd me on, I gallop'd away.
    Orl. My Lords.
    Bel. My Lords, (fellow giue me speach) if my poore life
    may ransome thine, I yeeld it to the Law,
    Thou hurt'st thy soule (yet wipest off no offence)
    2575By casting blots vpon my Innocence:
    Let not these spare me, but tell truth: no, see
    Who slips his necke out of the misery,
    Tho not out of the mischiefe: let thy Seruant
    That shared in this base Act, accuse me here,
    2580Why should my Husband perish, he goe cleare?
    Orl. A god Child, hang thine owne Father.
    Duke. Old fellow, was thy hand in too?
    Orl. My hand was in the Pye, my Lord, I confesse it: my
    Mistris I see, will bring me to the Gallowes, and so leaue me;
    2585but Ile not leaue her so: I had rather hang in a womans com-
    pany, then in a mans; because if weshould go to hell together,
    I should scarce be letten in, for all the Deuils are afraid to
    haue any women come amongst them, as I am true Thiefe,
    she neither consented to this fellony, nor knew of it.
    2590Duke. What fury prompts thee on to kill thy wife?
    Mat. It's my humor, Sir, 'tis a foolish Bag-pipe that I
    make my selfe merry with: why should I eate hempe-seed
    at the Hangmans thirteene-pence halfe-penny Ordinary,
    and haue this whore laugh at me as I swing, as I totter?
    2595Duke. Is she a Whore?
    Mat. A sixe-penny Mutton Pasty, for any to cut vp.
    Orl. Ah, Toad, Toad, Toad.
    Mat. A Barbers Citterne for euery Seruingman to play
    vpon, that Lord, your Sonne, knowes it.
    2600Hip. I, sir, am I her Bawd then?
    Mat. No, sir, but she's your Whore then,
    Orl. Yea Spider, doest catch at great Flies?
    Hip.