A MASQUE

OF

THE METAMORPHOSED GIPSIES,

AS IT WAS THRICE PRESENTED TO KING JAMES, First at Burleigh on the Hill; next at Belvoir; and lastly at Windsor, August 1621.

THE SPEECH AT THE KING'S ENTRANCE AT BURLEIGH,

MADE IN THE CHARACTER OF THE PORTER.

IF for our thoughts there could but speech be found,
And all that speech be uttered in one sound,
So that some power above us would afford
The means to make a language of a word,
It should be WELCOME! in that only voice
We would receive, retain, enjoy, rejoice;
And all effects of love and life dispense,
Till it were called a copious eloquence;

For should we vent our spirits, now you are come,
In other syllables, were as to be dumb.

Welcome, O welcome then, and enter here

The house your bounty built, and still doth rear.
With those high favours, and those heaped increases
Which shows a hand not grieved but when it ceases.
The MASTER is your creature, as the place;
And every good about him is your grace:
Whom, though he stand by silent, think not rude,
But as a man turned all to gratitude.

For what he ne'er can hope how to restore,
Since while he meditates one, you pour on more,
Vouchsafe to think he only is opprest

With their abundance, not that in his breast
His powers are stupid grown; for please you enter
Him, and his house, and search him to the centre;
You'll find within no thanks, or vows there shorter,
For having trusted thus much to his Porter.

THE PROLOGUE AT WINDSOR.

As many blessings as there be bones
In Ptolemy's fingers, and all at ones,
Held up in an Andrew's cross for the nones,
Light on you, good Master.

I dare be no waster

Of time or of speech,
Where you are in place :
I only beseech

You take in good grace,
Our following the Court,
Since 'tis for your sport
To have you still merry,
And not make you weary.
We may strive to please,

So long (some will say) till we grow a disease.
But you, sir, that twice

Have graced us already, encourage to thrice:
Wherein if our boldness your patience invade,
Forgive us the fault that your favour hath made.

Enter a Gipsy (being the JACKMAN), leading a horse laden with five little children bound in a trace of scarfs upon him; followed by a second, leading another horse laden with stolen poultry, &c.

Jack. Room for the five Princes of Egypt, mounted all upon one horse, like the four sons of Aymon, to make the miracle the more by a head if it may be! Gaze upon them, as on the offspring of Ptolemy, begotten upon several Cleopatras, in their several counties; especially on this brave spark struck out of Flintshire, upon justice Jug's daughter, then sheriff of the county, who running away with a kinsman of our captain's, and her father pursuing her to the marches, he great with justice, she great with

juggling, they were both, for the time, turned stone, upon the sight each of other, in Chester: till at last (see the wonder), a jug of the town ale reconciling them, the memorial of both their gravities, his in beard, and hers in belly, hath remained ever since preserved in picture upon the most stone jugs of the kingdom. The famous imp yet grew a wretchock; and though for seven years together he was carefully carried at his mother's back, rocked in a cradle of Welsh cheese, like a maggot, and there fed with broken beer and blown wine of the best daily, yet looks as if he never saw his quinquennium. 'Tis true, he can thread needles on horseback, or draw a yard of inkle through his nose : but what is that to a grown gipsy, one of the blood, and of his time, if he had thrived! therefore, till with his painful progenitors he be able to beat it on the hard roof, to the bene bowse, or the stawling-ken, to nip a jan, and cly the jark, 'tis thought fit he march in the infants' equipage;

With the convoy, cheats and peckage,

Out of clutch of Harman Beckage,

To their libkins at the Crackman's,
Or some skipper of the Blackman's.

2 Gipsy. Where the cacklers, but no grunters,
Shall uncased be for the hunters:

Those we still must keep alive;

Ay, and put them out to thrive

In the parks, and in the chases,
And the finer walléd places;

As St. James's, Greenwich, Tibals, --
Where the acorns, plump as chibals,
Soon shall change both kind and name,
And proclaim them the king's game.

So the act no harm may be
Unto their keeper Barnaby;

It will prove as good a service,
As did ever gipsy Gervice,

Or our captain Charles, the tall-man,
And a part too of our salmon.

Jackman. If we here be a little obscure, 'tis our pleasure; for rather than we will offer to be our own interpreters, we are resolved not to be understood: yet if any man doubt of the significancy of the language, we refer him to the third volume of Reports, set forth by the learned in the laws of canting, and published in the gipsy tongue. Give me my guittara, and room for our chief! [Music.

Enter the CAPTAIN, with six of his Attendants.

HERE THEY DANCE.

After which,

SONG.

Jack. From the famous Peak of Darby,
And the Devil's arse there hard by,
Where we yearly keep our musters,
Thus the Ægyptians throng in clusters.
Be not frighted with our fashion,
Though we seem a tattered nation;
We account our rags our riches,
So our tricks exceed our stitches.
Give us bacon, rinds of walnuts,
Shells of cockles, and of small nuts,
Ribbons, bells, and saffroned linen,
All the world is ours to win in.

Knacks we have that will delight you,
Slights of hand that will invite you
To endure our tawny faces,
And not cause you cut your laces.
All your fortunes we can tell ye,
Be they for the back or belly:
In the moods too, and the tenses,
That may fit your fine five senses.
Draw but then your gloves, we pray you,
And sit still, we will not fray you;
For though we be here at Burley,
We'd be loth to make a hurley.

Enter the PATRICO.

Pat. Stay, my sweet singer,

The touch of thy finger

A little, and linger,

For me, that am bringer
Of bounds to the border,
The rule and recorder
And mouth of your order,
As priest of the game
And prelate of the same.

There's a gentry cove here,
Is the top of the shire
Of the Bever-Ken,

A man among men ;

You need not to fear,

I've an eye and an ear

That turns here and there
To look to our gear:

Some say that there be
One or two, if not three,
That are greater than he.
And for the roome-morts,
I know by their ports,
And their jolly resorts,

They are of the sorts
That love the true sports
Of King Ptolemeus,
Our great Coriphæus,
And Queen Cleopatra,
The gipsies grand matra.
Then if we shall shark it,
Here fair is and market.

Leave pig by and goose,
And play fast and loose,
A short cut, and long,

With, ever and among,
Some inch of a song,
Pythagoras' lot,

R