Volpone and Other Plays by Ben Jonson Page B

:                              Another, sir.
    SIR POLITIC :                                                   Now heaven!
    What prodigies be these? The fires at Berwick!
    And the new star! These things concurring, strange!
    And full of omen! Saw you those meteors?
    PEREGRINE : I did, sir.
    SIR POLITIC :                    Fearful! Pray you, sir, confirm me,
    40        Were there three porpoises seen above the bridge,
    As they give out?
    PEREGRINE :                        Six, and a sturgeon, sir.
    SIR POLITIC : I am astonished!
    PEREGRINE :                              Nay, sir, be not so;
    I’ll tell you a greater prodigy than these –
    SIR POLITIC : What should these things portend?
    PEREGRINE :                                                           The very day
    (Let me be sure) that I put forth from London,
    There was a whale discovered in the river,
    As high as Woolwich, that had waited there,
    Few know how many months, for the subversion
    Of the Stode fleet.
    SIR POLITIC :                      Is’t possible? Believe it,
    50       ’Twas either sent from Spain, or the Archdukes!
    Spinola’s whale, upon my life, my credit!
    Will they not leave these projects? Worthy sir,
    Some other news.
    PEREGRINE :                     Faith, Stone the fool is dead,
    And they do lack a tavern fool extremely.
    SIR POLITIC : Is Mas’Stone dead?
    PEREGRINE :                                         He’s dead, sir; why, I hope
    You thought him not immortal? [
Aside.
] – O, this knight,
    Were he well known, would be a precious thing
    To fit our English stage. He that should write
    But such a fellow, should be thought to feign
    Extremely, if not maliciously –
    60    SIR POLITIC :                                         Stone dead!
    PEREGRINE : Dead. Lord, how deeply, sir, you apprehend it!
    He was no kinsman to you?
    SIR POLITIC :                                         That I know of.
    Well, that same fellow was an unknown fool.
    PEREGRINE : And yet you know him, it seems?
    SIR POLITIC :                                                            I did so. Sir,
    I knew him one of the most dangerous heads
    Living within the state, and so I held him.
    PEREGRINE : Indeed, sir?
    SIR POLITIC :                     While he lived, in action.
    He has received weekly intelligence,
    Upon my knowledge, out of the Low Countries,
    70        For all parts of the world, in cabbages;
    And those dispensed, again, t’ambassadors,
    In oranges, musk-melons, apricots,
    Lemons,