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EMPEROR. Farewell, Master Doctor: yet, ere you go,
Expect from me a bounteous reward.
[Exeunt EMPEROR, KNIGHT, and ATTENDANTS.]
FAUSTUS. Now, Mephistophilis, the restless course
That time doth run with calm and silent foot,
Shortening my days and thread of vital life,
Calls for the payment of my latest years:
Therefore, sweet Mephistophilis, let us
Make haste to Wertenberg.
MEPHIST. What, will you go on horse-back or on foot[?]
FAUSTUS. Nay, till I'm past this fair and pleasant green,
I'll walk on foot.
Enter a HORSE-COURSER.
HORSE-COURSER. I have been all this day seeking one Master Fustian:
mass, see where he is!—God save you, Master Doctor!
FAUSTUS. What, horse-courser! you are well met.
HORSE-COURSER. Do you hear, sir? I have brought you forty dollars
for your horse.
FAUSTUS. I cannot sell him so: if thou likest him for fifty, take
him.
HORSE-COURSER. Alas, sir, I have no more!—I pray you, speak for
me.
MEPHIST. I pray you, let him have him: he is an honest fellow,
and he has a great charge, neither wife nor child.
FAUSTUS. Well, come, give me your money [HORSE-COURSER gives
FAUSTUS the money]: my boy will deliver him to you. But I must
tell you one thing before you have him; ride him not into the
water, at any hand.
HORSE-COURSER. Why, sir, will he not drink of all waters?
FAUSTUS. O, yes, he will drink of all waters; but ride him not
into the water: ride him over hedge or ditch, or where thou wilt,
but not into the water.
HORSE-COURSER. Well, sir.—Now am I made man for ever: I'll not
leave my horse for forty: if he had but the quality of
hey-ding-ding, hey-ding-ding, I'd make a brave living on him:
he has a buttock as slick as an eel [Aside].—Well, God b'wi'ye,
sir: your boy will deliver him me: but, hark you, sir; if my horse
be sick or ill at ease, if I bring his water to you, you'll tell
me what it is?
FAUSTUS. Away, you villain! what, dost think I am a horse-doctor?
[Exit HORSE-COURSER.]
What art thou, Faustus, but a man condemn'd to die?
Thy fatal time doth draw to final end;
Despair doth drive distrust into my thoughts:
Confound these passions with a quiet sleep:
Tush, Christ did call the thief upon the Cross;
Then rest thee, Faustus, quiet in conceit.
[Sleeps in his chair.]
Re-enter HORSE-COURSER, all wet, crying.
HORSE-COURSER. Alas, alas! Doctor Fustian, quoth a mass, Doctor
Lopus was never such a doctor: has given me a purgation, has
purged me of forty dollars; I shall never see them more. But yet,
like an ass as I was, I would not be ruled by him, for he bade me
I should ride him into no water: now I, thinking my horse had had
some rare quality that he would not have had me know of, I,
like a venturous youth, rid him into the deep pond at the town's
end. I was no sooner in the middle of the pond, but my horse
vanished away, and I sat upon a bottle of hay, never so near
drowning in my life. But I'll seek out my doctor, and have my
forty dollars again, or I'll make it the dearest horse!—O,
yonder is his snipper-snapper.—Do you hear? you, hey-pass,
where's your master?
MEPHIST. Why, sir, what would you? you cannot speak with him.
HORSE-COURSER. But I will speak with him.
MEPHIST. Why, he's fast asleep: come some other time.
HORSE-COURSER. I'll speak with him now, or I'll break his
glass-windows about his ears.
MEPHIST. I tell thee, he has not slept this eight nights.
HORSE-COURSER. An he have not slept this eight weeks, I'll
speak with him.
