University of Virginia Library

SCENE III.

CAPTAIN BILKUM, MOTHER PUNCHBOWL.
MOTHER.
What is the Reason, Captain, that you make
This Noise within my House? Do you intend
To arm reforming Constables against me?
Wou'd it delight your Eyes to see me dragg'd
By base Plebeian Hands to Westminster,
The Scoff of Serjeants and Attornies Clerks,
And then exalted on the Pillory,
To stand the Sneer of ev'ry virtuous Whore?
Oh! cou'dst thou bear to see the rotten Egg
Mix with my Tears, and trickle down my Cheeks,
Like Dew distilling from the full blown Rose:
Or see me follow the attractive Cart,
To see the Hangman lift the Virgal Rod,
That Hangman you so narrowly escap'd!

CAPTAIN BILKUM.
Ha! that last Thought has stung me to the Soul;
Damnation on all Laws and Lawyers too:
Behold thee carted—oh! forefend that Sight,
May Bilkum's Neck be stretch'd before that Day.

MOTHER.
Come to my Arms, thou best belov'd of Sons,
Forgive the Weakness of thy Mother's Fears:
Oh! may I never, never see thee hang'd!

CAPTAIN BILKUM.
If born to swing, I never shall be drown'd:
Far be it from me, with too curious Mind,
To search the Office whence eternal Fate
Issues her Writs of various Ills to Men;
Too soon arrested we shall know our Doom,
And now a present Evil gnaws my Heart.
Oh! Mother, Mother—

MOTHER.
Say, what wou'd my Son?

CAPTAIN BILKUM.
Get me a Wench, and lend me half a Crown.

MOTHER.
Thou shalt have both.

CAPTAIN BILKUM.
Oh! Goodness most unmatch'd,
What are your 'Nelope's compar'd to thee?
In vain we'd search the Hundreds of the Town,
From where, in Goodman's-Fields, the City Dame
Emboxed sits, for two times Eighteen Pence.
To where at Midnight Hours, the nobler Race
In borrow'd Voice, and mimick Habit squeak.
Yet where, oh where is such a Bawd as thou?

MOTHER.
Oh! deal not Praise with such a lavish Tongue,
If I excel all others of my Trade,
Thanks to those Stars that taught me to excel!