soon returned to London, and attached himself to the stage. In 1598, he was challenged by an actor, and again he killed his opponent; an event that very nearly nipped his dramatic career in the bud. He worked most earnestly as a dramatist for forty years. The stone over his grave in Westminster Abbey bears the legend:

'O Rare Ben Jonson !'

Jonson s first comedy, Every Man in his Humour, was acted in 1598 (if not earlier), Shakspeare taking a part. Jonson dedicated it (in the collected edition of his works, 1616) 'to the most learned, and my honoured friend, Master Camden.' Every Man out of his Humour followed in 1599. By 1616 he had written about a dozen more plays, including his two tragedies-Sejanus (1603), and Catiline (1611). From 1616 to 1625 he seems to have produced nothing for the regular stage; and only four or five plays appeared at long intervals in the next ten years. From the accession of James in 1603, he furnished yearly masks or other entertainments for the Court down to 1627. He left among his papers The Sad Shepherd, a pastoral drama, incomplete; and a collection of jottings in prose under the title of Timber; or Discoveries made upon Men and Matter.

CAPTAIN BOBADILL'S VALOUR.

(From Every Man in his Humour, Act IV., Scene v.)
SCENE.-Moorfields.

Enter Master MATTHEW (a town gull), Edward Knowell (a young gentleman), Captain BOBADILL (a Paul's man), and Master STEPHEN (a country gull).

Mat. Sir, did your eyes ever taste the like clown of him where we were to-day, Mr Wellbred's half-brother? I think the whole earth cannot shew his parallel, by this daylight.

E. Know. We were now speaking of him: Captain Bobadill tells me he is fallen foul of you too.

Mat. O, ay, sir, he threatened me with the bastinado.

Bob. Ay, but I think I taught you prevention this morning for that: You shall kill him beyond question, if you be so generously minded.

Mat. Indeed, it is a most excellent trick.

Bob. O, you do not give are too tardy, too heavy! hay!

Mat. Rare, captain !

[Fences.

spirit enough to your motion; you O, it must be done like lightning, [Practises at a post with his cudgel.

Bob. Tut! 'tis nothing, an 't be not done in a

punto.

E. Know. Captain, did you ever prove yourself upon any of our masters of defence here ?

Mat. O good sir! yes, I hope he has.

Bob. I will tell you, sir. Upon my first coming to the city, after my long travel for knowledge in that mystery only, there came three or four of them to me, at a gentleman's house where it was my chance to be resident at that time, to entreat my presence at their schools; and withal so much importuned me that I protest to you, as I am a gentleman, I was ashamed of their rude demeanour out of all measure. Well, I told them that to come to a public school, they should pardon me,—it was opposite, in diameter, to my humour; but, if so be they would give their attendance at my lodging, I protested to do them what right or favour I could, as I was a gentleman, and so forth.

E. Know. So, sir! then you tried their skill?

Bob. Alas, soon tried: you shall hear, sir. Within two or three days after, they came; and, by honesty, fair sir, believe me, I graced them exceedingly, shewed them some two or three tricks of prevention have purchased them since a credit to admiration : they cannot deny this; and yet now they hate me, and why? because I am excellent; and for no other vile reason on the earth.

E. Know. This is strange and barbarous, as ever I heard. Bob. Nay, for a more instance of their preposterous natures, but note, sir. They have assaulted me some three, four, five, six of them together, as I have walked alone in divers skirts i' the town, as Turnbull, Whitechapel, Shoreditch, which were then my quarters; and since, upon the Exchange, at my lodging, and at my ordinary: where I have driven them afore me the whole length of a street, in the open view of all our gallants, pitying to hurt them, believe me. Yet all this lenity will not overcome their spleen; they will be doing with the pismire, raising a hill a man may spurn abroad with his foot at pleasure. By myself, I could have slain them all, but I delight not in murder. I am loth to bear any other than this bastinado for them: yet I hold it good polity not to go disarmed, for though I be skilful, I may be oppressed with multitudes.

E. Know. Ay, believe me, may you, sir: and in my conceit, our whole nation should sustain the loss by it, if it were so. Bob. Alas, no! what's a peculiar man to a nation? not

seen.

E. Know. O, but your skill, sir.

Bob. Indeed, that might be some loss; but who respects it? I will tell you, sir, by the way of private, and under seal; I am a gentleman, and live here obscure, and to myself; but were I known to her majesty and the lords-observe me-I would undertake, upon this poor head and life, for the public benefit of the state, not only to spare the entire lives of her subjects in general, but to save the one half, nay, three parts of her yearly charge in holding war, and against what enemy soever. And how would I do it, think you ?

E. Know. Nay, I know not, nor can I conceive.

Bob. Why thus, sir. I would select nineteen more, to myself, throughout the land; gentlemen they should be of good spirit, strong and able constitution; I would choose them by an instinct, a character that I have and I would teach these nineteen the special rules, as your punto, your reverso, your stoccata, your imbroccato, your passada, your montanto; till they could all play very near or altogether as well as myself. This done, say the enemy were forty thousand strong, we twenty would come into the field the tenth of March, or thereabouts; and we would challenge twenty of the enemy; they could not in their honour refuse us. Well, we would kill them; challenge twenty more, kill them; twenty more, kill them; twenty more, kill them too; and thus would we kill every man his twenty a day, that's twenty score; twenty score, that's two hundred; two hundred a day, five days a thousand; forty thousand; forty times five, five times forty, two hundred days kills them all up by computation. And this will I venture my poor gentleman-like carcase to perform, provided there be no treason practised upon us, by fair and discreet manhood; that is, civilly by the sword.

E. Know. Why, are you so sure of your hand, captain, at all times?

Bob. Tut never miss thrust, upon my reputation with you.

E. Know. I would not stand in Downright's state then, an you meet him, for the wealth of any one street in London.

Bob. Why, sir, you mistake me: if he were here now, by this welkin, I would not draw my weapon on him. Let this gentleman do his mind: but I will bastinado him, by the bright sun, wherever I meet him.

Mat. Faith, and I'll have a fling at him, at my distance.

E. Know. Ods so, look where he is! yonder he goes.

[DOWNRIGHT crosses the stage. Down. What peevish luck have I, I cannot meet with these bragging rascals?

Bob. It is not he, is it?

E. Know. Yes, faith, it is he.

Mat. I'll be hanged, then, if that were hc.

E. Know. Sir, keep your hanging good for some greater matter, for I assure you that was he.

Step. Upon my reputation, it was he.

Bob. Had I thought it had been he, he must not have gone so: but I can hardly be induced to believe it was he yet. E. Know. That I think, sir.

Re-enter DoWNRIGHT.

But see, he is come again.

Down. O, Pharaoh's foot, have I found you? Come, draw to your tools; draw, gipsy, or I'll thrash you.

Bob. Gentleman of valour, I do believe in thee; hear

me

Down. Draw your weapon then.

Bob. Tall man, I never thought on it till now Body of me, I had a warrant of the peace served on me, even now as I came along, by a water-bearer; this gentleman saw it, Master Matthew.

Down. 'Sdeath! you will not draw then?

[Disarms and beats him. MATTHEW runs away.

Bob. Hold, hold! under thy favour forbear!

Down. Prate again, as you like this! You'll control the point, you! Your consort is gone; had he staid he had shared with you, sir.

[Exit.

Bob. Well, gentlemen, bear witness, I was bound to the peace, by this good day.

E. Know. No, faith, it's an ill day, captain, never reckon it other: but, say you were bound to the peace, the law allows you to defend yourself: that will prove but a poor excuse.

Bob. I cannot tell, sir; I desire good construction in fair sort. I never sustained the like disgrace, by heaven! sure I was struck with a planet thence, for I had no power to touch my weapon.

E. Know. Ay, like enough; I have heard of many that have been beaten under a planet: go, get you to a surgeon. 'Slid! an these be your tricks, your passados, and your montantos, I'll none of them. [Exit BOBADILL.] O, manners ! that this age should bring forth such creatures! that nature should be at leisure to make them! Come, coz. [Exeunt.

NOTES.

Gull, witling, stupid fellow. Gifford
quotes Sir J. Davies, Epig. ii., where
the term is explained. The gull is
cowardly, licentious, vain; and he in-
terlards his foolish talk with oaths.
'But, to define a gull in terms pre-
cise,

A gull is he which seems, and is
not, wise.'

A Paul's man, 'a frequenter of the

middle aisle of St Paul's Cathedral, the common resort of cast captains, sharpers, gulls, and gossipers of every description' (Gifford). Bastinado, cudgel. Span. bastonada

(Fr. bastonnade), from baston (Fr. bâton), a cane, stick, baton. Cf. Act i., sc. 4: 'Mat. He brags he will give me the bastinado, as I hear. Bob. How! he the bastinado! how came he by that word, trow? Mat. Nay, indeed, he said cudgel me; I termed it so, for my more grace.' Hay! A hit! from the Ital. hai, you have it' (Gifford). An't, an it. 'An' if. Have purchased. Subject? More, greater. Cf. the present usage. Preposterous, perverted, the reverse of what should be. Lat. præ-postěrus, lit. putting before, or first, what should come after, or last. They have assaulted me, &c. 'Nothing

can be more exquisitely imagined than the conduct of this scene, in which Bobadill boasts so loudly of his skill and intrepidity, just as disgrace is about to burst on his head. In the elevation of his fancy, Jonson, with genuine humour, makes him forget his usual caution, and betray his haunts, which, in his first conversation with Master Matthew, he appears so solicitous to conceal. All the places which he enumerates were the abodes of poverty and vice; and his acquaintance with them completely disproves his claims to gentility and fashion' (Gifford). Ordinary, public dining-room, where a fixed (ordinary, regular) price is charged.

In my conceit, opinion; what is conceived (Lat. conceptum) or thought by me. Cf. (below) 'Discoveries,' On Lord Bacon: 'My conceit of his person.'

Your punto, &c. Fencing-terms adopted from Italy. 'Punto' (Ital. punta), a thrust, stroke. 'Reverso,' or 'punto reverso' (Ital. punta riversa), a back-handed thrust or stroke. 'Stoccata' ('stoccado' is another form), a thrust, properly of the long rapier (stocco). 'Imbroccato,' down stroke. 'Passada,' a pass, advance