iles, et a bona progenie;
Malam vero uxorem, malique patris filiam
Ducere non curat vir bonus,
Modo ei magnam dotem afferat,"

"Our dogs and horses still from the best breed
We carefully seek, and well may they speed:
But for our wives, so they prove wealthy,
Fair or foul, we care not what they be."

If she be rich, then she is fair, fine, absolute and perfect, then they
burn like fire, they love her dearly, like pig and pie, and are ready to
hang themselves if they may not have her. Nothing so familiar in these
days, as for a young man to marry an old wife, as they say, for a piece of
gold; _asinum auro onustum_; and though she be an old crone, and have never
a tooth in her head, neither good conditions, nor a good face, a natural
fool, but only rich, she shall have twenty young gallants to be suitors in
an instant. As she said in Suetonius, _non me, sed mea ambiunt_, 'tis not
for her sake, but for her lands or money; and an excellent match it were
(as he added) if she were away. So on the other side, many a young lovely
maid will cast away herself upon an old, doting, decrepit dizzard,

[5043] "Bis puer effoeto quamvis balbutiat ore,
Prima legit rarae tam culta roseta puellae,"

that is rheumatic and gouty, hath some twenty diseases, perhaps but one
eye, one leg, never a nose, no hair on his head, wit in his brains, nor
honesty, if he have land or [5044]money, she will have him before all other
suitors, [5045]_Dummodo sit dives barbarus ille placet_. "If he be rich, he
is the man," a fine man, and a proper man, she will go to Jacaktres or
Tidore with him; _Galesimus de monte aureo_. Sir Giles Goosecap, Sir
Amorous La-Fool, shall have her. And as Philemasium in [5046] Aristaenetus
told Emmusus, _absque argento omnia vana_, hang him that hath no money,
"'tis to no purpose to talk of marriage without means," [5047] trouble me
not with such motions; let others do as they will, "I'll be sure to have
one shall maintain me fine and brave." Most are of her mind, [5048] _De
moribus ultima fiet questio_, for his conditions, she shall inquire after
them another time, or when all is done, the match made, and everybody gone
home. [5049]Lucian's Lycia was a proper young maid, and had many fine
gentlemen to her suitors; Ethecles, a senator's son, Melissus, a merchant,
&c.; but she forsook them all for one Passius, a base, hirsute, bald-pated
knave; but why was it? "H