PROLOGUE

At the theatre, a citizen and his wife object to the satirical subject matter of the play, The London Merchant: they insist on a more romantic offering starring their apprentice, Rafe, as a heroic grocer. The boy actors do their best to provide this within the play they have rehearsed. In the play, Luce prefers her father Venturewell’s apprentice Jasper to his chosen son-in-law, Humphrey; so Venturewell discharges Jasper, and he goes home to a family impoverished by the irresponsible merriment of his father, Old Merrythought. His mother, who 1607 favours his younger brother Michael, insists that he be paid his inheritance and sent out into the world. Several of the characters go to Waltham Forest. Luce elopes with Humphrey, intending to meet Jasper there. Rafe the grocer, a voluminous reader of chivalric romance, becomes the Knight of the Burning Pestle and leaves in search of heroic deeds. He scares Mistress Merrythought, who leaves behind her jewels. These are found and taken away by Jasper, who then meets the eloping couple, beats Humphrey, and takes Luce. In the audience, the citizen and his wife take Jasper to be the villain and Humphrey the hero; they demand that Rafe return to fight Jasper, but Jasper beats him. Notified by Humphrey, Venturewell confronts Jasper’s father, but is offended by his refusal to take the matter seriously. Jasper tests Luce’s love by threatening her with violence. She accepts her fate, but Humphrey and her father seize her before he can admit he was only pretending. Rafe stays at the Bell inn, but cannot understand that he must pay for its hospitality. (The citizen settles the bill for him.) The host sends him to fight the giant Barbaroso, better known as Nick the barber, who has imprisoned many knights and ladies — actually clients and venereal disease patients. Rafe defeats the ‘giant’ and releases the ‘knights’. The citizens then have a scene inserted in which he meets a foreign king’s daughter, but refuses her offer oflove. Later interpolated scenes show Rafe as the city’s May Lord, and mustering troops at Mile End. Venturewell incarcerates Luce in her room, but Jasper gains access by pretending to be dead: Venturewell accedes to a request that his body should be brought to Luce, and then has the coffin sent on to Old Merrythought, unaware that Luce has taken Jasper’s place inside. Left behind in Luce’s room, Jasper appears to Venturewell in ghostly guise and instructs him to repent, compensate Old Merrythought for his…