The Fancies Chaste and Noble

By John Ford

John Ford (1586-1637) was an English playwright and poet whose interest in aberrant psychology helped him create very unique and very successful works. After collaboration with various playwrights, from about 1621 to 1625, Ford began working independently, writing plays for theatrical companies like the "Kings Men" at the Blackfriars. Following the literary reign of such figures as Jonson, Marlowe, and Shakespeare, Ford felt the need to shock and intrigue audiences with new and exciting material. "The Fancies Chaste and Noble" is a fascinating Caroline era stage play. Treated as a comedy, Ford's subject matter focused on the then-fashionable topic of platonic love. The approach he gave the subject, however, was bluntly condemned for its crudeness and prurience by the public and critics of the day. The strange obsession of English Renaissance drama is displayed in Ford's work as the play heavily relies on the spectra of high merit and morality tested by false accusations, uncertainties and tricks.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Digireads.com Publishing
• Release date: Jan 1, 2011
• ISBN: 9781420943672

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THE FANCIES CHASTE AND NOBLE

BY JOHN FORD

A Digireads.com Book

Digireads.com Publishing

Print ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-4282-8

Ebook ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-4367-2

This edition copyright © 2012

Please visit www.digireads.com

CONTENTS

DEDICATION

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

PROLOGUE

THE FANCIES, CHASTE AND NOBLE

ACT I.

SCENE II.—The Street.

SCENE III.—A Room in the Home of Livio.

ACT II.

SCENE I.—An Apartment in Julia's House.

SCENE II.—A Room in the Palace.

ACT III.

SCENE I.—The Street.

SCENE II.—An Apartment in Julio's House.

SCENE III.—An Apartment in the Palace.

ACT IV.

SCENE I.—An Apartment in the same.

SCENE II.—Romanello's Lodgings.

ACT V.

SCENE I.—An Apartment in the Palace.

SCENE II.—Another in the same.

SCENE III.—A state room in the same.

EPILOGUE

DEDICATION

TO

THE RIGHT NOBLE LORD, THE LORD

RANDAL MACDONNELL,

EARL OF ANTRIM IN THE KINGDOM OF

IRELAND, LORD VISCOUNT DUNLUCE.

MY LORD,

Princes, and worthy personages of your own eminence, have entertained poems of this nature with a serious welcome. The desert of their authors might transcend mine, not their study of service. A practice of courtship to greatness hath not hitherto, in me, aimed at any thrift: yet I have ever honoured virtue, as the richest ornament to the noblest titles. Endeavour of being known to your Lordship, by such means, I conceive no ambition; the extent being bounded by humility: so neither can the argument appear ungracious; nor the writer, in that, without allowance. You enjoy, my Lord, the general suffrage, for your freedom of merits: may you likewise please, by this particular presentment, amongst the number of such, as I faithfully honour those merits, to admit, into your noble construction,

John Ford.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

OCTAVIO, marquis of Sienna.

TROYLO-SAVELLI, his nephew.

LIVIO, brother to Castamela.

ROMANELLO, brother to Flavia.

JULIO DE VARANA, lord of Camerino.

CAMILLO, attendant on Julio

VESPUCCI, attendant on Julio

FABRICIO, a merchant, Flavia' first husband.

NITIDO, a page, attendant on the Marquis.

SECCO, a barber, attendant on the Marquis.

SPADONE, attendant on the Marquis.

CASTAMELA, sister to Livio.

CLARELLA, a Fancy.

SILVIA, a Fancy.

FLORIA, a Fancy.

FLAVIA, wife to Julio.

MOROSA, guardianess to the Fancies.

Scene—Sienna.

PROLOGUE

The Fancies! that's our play; in it is shown

Nothing, but what our author knows his own

Without a learnèd theft; no servant here

To some fair mistress, borrows for his care,

His lock, his belt, his sword, the fancied grace

Of any pretty ribbon; nor, in place

Of charitable friendship, is brought in

A thriving gamester, that doth chance to win

A lusty sum; while the good hand doth ply him,

And Fancies this or that, to him sits by him.

His free invention runs but in conceit

Of mere imaginations; there's the height

Of what he writes; which if traduced by some,

'Tis well, he says, he's far enough from home.

For you, for him, for us, then this remains,

Fancy your own opinions, for our pains.

THE FANCIES, CHASTE AND NOBLE

ACT I.

SCENE I.—An Apartment in the Palace.

[Enter Troylo-Savelli, and Livio.]

TROYLO-SAVELLI. Do, do: Be wilful, desperate! 'tis manly;

Build on your reputation! Such a fortune

May furnish out your tables, trim your liveries,

Enrich your heirs with purchase of a patrimony,

Which shall hold out beyond the waste of riot;

Stick honours on your heraldry, with titles

As swelling, and as numerous as may likely

Grow to a pretty volume,—Here's eternity!

All this can reputation, marry, can it;

Indeed, what not?

LIVIO. Such language from a gentleman

So noble in his quality as you are,

Deserves, in my weak judgment, rather pity

Than a contempt.

TROYLO-SAVELLI. Could'st thou consider, Livio,

The fashion of the times, their study, practice,

Nay, their ambitions, thou would st soon distinguish.

Betwixt the abject lowness of a poverty,

And the applauded triumph of abundance,

Though compass'd by the meanest service. Wherein

Shall you betray your guilt to common censure,

Waving the private charge of your opinion,

By rising up to greatness, or at least

To plenty, which now buys it?

LIVIO. Troylo-Savclli

Plays merrily on my wants.

TROYLO-SAVELLI. Troylo-Savelli

Speaks to the friend he loves, to his own Livio.

Look, pr'ythee, through the great duke's court in Florence;

Number his favourites, and then examine

By what steps some chief officers in state

Have reached the height they stand in.

LIVIO. By their merits.

TROYLO-SAVELLI. Right, by their merits: well he merited

Th' intendments o'er the galleys at Leghorn,

Made grand collector of the customs there,

Who led the prince unto his wife's chaste bed,

And stood himself by, in his night-gown, fearing

The jest might be discover'd: Was't not handsome?

The lady knows not yet on't.

LIVIO. Most impossible.

TROYLO-SAVELLI. He merited well to wear a robe of chamlet

Who train'd his brother's daughter, scarce a girl,

Into the arms of Mont-Argentorato;

Whilst the young lord of Telamon, her husband,

Was packeted to France, to study courtship,

Under, forsooth, a colour of employment,—

Employment! yea of honour.

LIVIO. You're well read

In mysteries of state.

TROYLO-SAVELLI. Here, in Sienna,

Bold Julio de Varana, lord of Camerine,

Held it no blemish to his blood and greatness,

From a plain merchant, with a thousand ducats,

To buy his wife, nay, justify the purchase;

Procur'd it by a dispensation

From Rome, allow'd and warranted: 'twas thought

By his physicians, that she was a creature

Agreed best with the cure of the disease,

His present new infirmity then labour'd in.

Yet these are things in prospect of the world,

Advanced, employ'd, and eminent.

LIVIO. At best,

'Tis but a goodly panderism.

TROYLO-SAVELLI. Shrewd business!

Thou child in thrift, thou fool of honesty,

Is't a disparagement for gentlemen,

For friends of lower rank, to do the offices

Of necessary kindness, without fee,

For one another, courtesies of course,

Mirths of society; when petty mushrooms,

Transplanted from their dunghills, spread on mountains,

And pass for cedars by their servile flatteries

On