d better still. This is beyond
expectation; why, now this gear begins to work. But, beshrew my heart, I
was afraid that Lelia would have yielded. When I saw her father take her
by the hand and call me for a witness, my heart began to quake; but, to
say the truth, she had little reason to take a cullian lug-loaf, milksop
slave, when she may have a lawyer, a gentleman that stands upon his
reputation in the country, one whose diminutive defect of law may
compare with his little learning. Well, I see that Churms must be the
man must carry Lelia, when all's done.

_Enter_ ROBIN GOODFELLOW.

ROBIN GOODFELLOW.
How now, Master Churms? What news abroad? Methinks you look very spruce;
y'are very frolic now a-late.

CHURMS.
What, fellow Robin? How goes the squares with you? Y'are waxen very
proud a-late; you will not know your own friends.

ROBIN GOODFELLOW.
Faith, I even came to seek you, to bestow a quart of wine of you.

CHURMS.
That's strange; you were never wont to be so liberal.

ROBIN GOODFELLOW.
Tush, man; one good turn asks another; clear gains, man, clear gains!
Peter Plod-all shall pay for all. I have gulled him once, and I'll come
over him again and again, I warrant ye.

CHURMS.
Faith, Lelia has e'en given him the doff[148] here, and has made her
father almost stark-mad.

ROBIN GOODFELLOW.
O, all the better; then I shall be sure of more of his custom. But what
success have you in your suit with her?

CHURMS.
Faith, all hitherto goes well. I have made the motion to her, but as yet
we are grown to no conclusion. But I am in very good hope.

ROBIN GOODFELLOW.
But do you think you shall get her father's goodwill?

CHURMS.
Tut, if I get the wench, I care not for that; that will come afterward;
and I'll be sure of something in the meantime, for I have outlawed a
great number of his debtors, and I'll gather up what money I can amongst
them, and Gripe shall never know of it neither.

ROBIN GOODFELLOW.
Ay, and of those that are scarce able to pay, take the one half, and
forgive them the other, rather than sit out at all.

CHURMS.
Tush! let me alone for that; but, sirrah, I have brought the scholar
into a fool's paradise. Why, he has made me his spokesman to Mistress
Lelia, and, God's my judge, I never so much as name him to her.

ROBIN GOODFELLOW.
O, by the mass, well-remembered.
I'll tell you what I mean to do:
I'll attire myself fit for the same purpose,
Like to some hellish hag or damned fiend