Dum. Ay, marry, there ;-soine flattery for this evil. Long. O, some authority how to proceed; Some tricks, some quillets, how to cheat the devil. Dum. Some salve for perjury. Biron. And where that you have vow'd to study, lords, The nimble spirits in the arteries; (1) Law-chicane. Such fiery numbers, as the prompting eyes Still climbing trees in the Hesperides? Or else we lose ourselves to keep our oaths: For charity itself fulfils the law; And who can sever love from charity? King. Saint Cupid, then! and, soldiers, to the field! Biron. Advance your standards, and upon them, lords; Pell-mell, down with them! but be first advis'd, In conflict that you get the sun of them. Long. Now to plain-dealing; lay these glozes by: Shall we resolve to woo these girls of France? King. And win them too: therefore let us devise Some entertainment for them in their tents. Biron. First, from the park let us conduct them thither; Then, homeward, every man attach the hand We will with some strange pastime solace them, no corn; And justice always whirls in equal measure : Light wenches may prove plagues to men forsworn; so, our copper buys no better treasure. If ACT V. [Exeunt. SCENE I-Another part of the same. Holofernes, Sir Nathaniel, and Dull. Hol. Satis quod sufficit. Enter Nuth. I praise God for you, sir: your reasons! (1) Discourses. at dinner have been sharp and sententious; pleasant without scurrility, witty without affection,1 audacious without impudency, learned without opinion, and strange without heresy. I did converse this quondam day with a companion of the king's, who is intituled, nominated, or called, Don Adriano de Armado. Hol. Novi hominem tanquam te: His humour is lofty, his discourse peremptory, his tongue filed, his eye ambitious, his gait majestical, and his general behaviour vain, ridiculous, and thrasonical.2 He is too picked,3 too spruce, too affected, too odd, as it were, too perigrinate, as I may call it. Nath. A most singular and choice epithet. [Takes out his table-book. Hol. He draweth out the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument. I abhor such fanatical phantasms, such insociable and point-devise4 companions; such rackers of orthography, as to speak, dout, fine, when he should say doubt; det, when he should pronounce debt; d, e, b, t; not d, e, t: he clepeth a calf, cauf; half, hauf; neighbour, vocatur, nebour; neigh, abbreviated, ne: This is abhominable (which he would call abominable,) it insinuateth me of insanie; Ne intelligis domine? to make frantic, lunatic. Nath. Laus deo, bone intelligo. Hol. Bone?bone, for benè: Priscian a little scratch'd; 'twill serve. Enter Armado, Moth, and Costard. Nath. Videsne quis venit? Hol. Video, et gaudeo. Arm. Chirra! Hol. Quare Chirra, not sirrah? [To Moth. Arm. Men of peace, well encounter'd. Hol. Most military sir, salutation. (1) Affectation. (2) Boastful. (3) Over-dressed. Finical exactness. Moth. They have been at a great feast of languages, and stolen the scraps. [To Costard aside. Cost. O, they have lived long in the alms-basket of words! I marvel, thy master hath not eaten thee for a word; for thou art not so long by the head as honorificabilitudinitatibus: thou art easier swallowed than a flap-dragon.! Moth. Peace; the peal begins. Arm. Monsieur, [To Hol.] are you not letter'd? Moth. Yes, yes; he teaches boys the hornbook What is a, b, spelt backward, with a horn on his head? Hol. Ba, pueritia, with a horn added. Moth. Ba, most silly sheep, with a horn :-You hear his learning. Hol. Quis, quis, thou consonant? Moth. The third of the five vowels, if peat them; or the fifth, if I. Hol. I will repeat them, a, e, i.— you re Moth. The sheep: the other two concludes it; o, u. Arm. Now, by the salt wave of the Mediterraneum, a sweet touch,2 a quick venew of wit: snip, snap, quick and home; it rejoiceth my intellect: true wit. Moth. Offer'd by a child to an old man ; which is wit-old. Hol. What is the figure? what is the figure? Moth. Horns. Hol. Thou disputest like an infant: go, whip thy gig. Moth. Lend me your horn to make one, and I will whip about your infamy circùm circà; A gig of a cuckold's horn! Cost. An I had but one penny in the world, thou should'st have it to buy gingerbread: hold, (1) A small inflammable substance, swallowed in a glass of wine. (2) A hit. |