MARGERY

Where is my lord?

EYRE

How now, Lady Madgy?

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MARGERY

The King’s most excellent Majesty is new come; he sends me for

thy honour. One of his most worshipful peers bade me tell thou

must be merry, and so forth - but let that pass.

EYRE

Is my sovereign come? Vanish, my tall shoemakers, my nimble

brethren. Look to my guests, the prentices. - Yet stay a little:

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how now, Hans? How looks my little Rose?

LACY

Let me request you to remember me.

I know your honour may easily obtain

Free pardon of the King for me and Rose,

And reconcile me to my uncle’s grace.

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EYRE

Have done, my good Hans, my honest journeyman. Look

cheerly. I’ll fall upon both my knees till they be as hard as horn,

but I’ll get thy pardon.

MARGERY

Good my lord, have a care what you speak to his Grace.

EYRE

Away, you Islington whitepot! Hence, you hopperarse, you barley

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pudding full of maggots, you broiled carbonado! Avaunt,

avaunt, avoid, Mephistophilus! Shall Sim Eyre learn to speak of

you, Lady Madgy? Vanish, Mother Miniver-Cap, vanish! Go,

trip and go, meddle with your partlets and your pishery-

pashery, your flews and your whirligigs! Go, rub, out of mine

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alley! Sim Eyre knows how to speak to a pope, to Sultan Soliman,

to Tamburlaine an’ he were here. And shall I melt, shall I droop

before my sovereign? No! Come, my Lady Madgy; follow me,

Hans; about your business, my frolic freebooters. Firk, frisk

about, and about, and about, for the honour of mad Simon

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Eyre, Lord Mayor of London.

FIRK

Hey for the honour of the shoemakers!

KING

Well, Lacy, though the fact was very foul

Of your revolting from the our kingly love

And your own duty, yet we pardon you.

Rise, both; and, Mistress Lacy, thank my Lord Mayor

For your young bridegroom here.

5

EYRE

So, my dear liege, Sim Eyre and my brethren the Gentlemen

Shoemakers shall set your sweet Majesty’s image cheek by jowl

by Saint Hugh for this honour you have done poor Simon Eyre.

I beseech your Grace pardon my rude behaviour. I am a

handicraftsman, yet my heart is without craft. I would be sorry

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at my soul that my boldness should offend my King.

KING

Nay, I pray thee, good Lord Mayor, be even as merry

As if thou wert among thy shoemakers.

It does me good to see thee in this humour.

EYRE

Sayst thou me so, my sweet Diocletian? Then, hump! Prince am

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I none, yet am I princely born. By the Lord of Ludgate, my liege,

I’ll be as merry as a pie.

KING

Tell me in faith, mad Eyre, how old thou art.

EYRE

My liege, a very boy, a stripling, a younker. You see not a white

hair on my head, not a grey in this beard. Every hair, I assure

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thy Majesty, that sticks in this beard Sim Eyre values at the King

of Babylon’s ransom. Tamar Cham’s beard was a rubbing-brush

to’t. Yet I’ll shave it off and stuff tennis balls with it to please my

bully King.

KING

But all this while I do not know your age.

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EYRE

My liege, I am six-and-fifty year old, yet I can cry hump with a

sound heart for the honour of Saint Hugh. Mark this old

wench, my King: I danced the shaking of the sheets with her

six-and-thirty years ago, and yet I hope to get two or three

young Lord Mayors ere I die! I am lusty still, Sim Eyre still. Care

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and cold lodgings brings white hairs. My sweet Majesty, let care

vanish. Cast it upon thy nobles. It will make thee look always

young, like Apollo, and cry hump! Prince am I none, yet am I

princely born.

KING

Ha, ha! Say, Cornwall, didst thou ever see his like?

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NOBLEMAN

Not I, my lord.