Nath. Laus deo, bone intelligo.

Hol. Bone?-bone, for bene; Priscian a little scratched; 'twill serve.

Enter ARMADO, MOTH, and COSTARD.

Nath. Videsne quis venit?

Hol. Video et gaudeo.

Arm. Chirra !

Hol. Quare Chirra, not sirrah?

Arm. Men of peace, well encountered.

Hol. Most military sir, salutation.

[TO MOTH.

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;1 thou art easier swallowed than a flap-dragon.2

Moth. Peace; the peal begins.

Arm. Monsieur, [To HOL.] are you not lettered? Moth. Yes, yes; he teaches boys the horn-book. 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 you repeat them; or the fifth, if I.

Hol. I will repeat them, a, e, I.—

Moth. The sheep; the other two concludes it; o, u. Arm. Now by the salt wave of the Mediterraneum, a sweet touch, a quick venew3 of wit. Snip, snap, quick and home: it rejoiceth my intellect; true wit.

1 This word, whencesoever it comes, is often mentioned as the longest word known.

2 A flap-dragon was some small combustible body set on fire and put afloat in a glass of liquor. It was an act of dexterity in the toper to swallow it without burning his mouth.

3 A hit.

Moth. Offered 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 circum circa. A gig of a cuckold's horn!

Cost. An I had but one penny in the world, thou shouldst have it to buy gingerbread. Hold, there is the very remuneration I had of thy master, thou halfpenny purse of wit, thou pigeon-egg of discretion. O, an the heavens were so pleased, that thou wert but my bastard! What a joyful father wouldst thou make me! Go to; thou hast it ad dunghill, at the fingers' ends, as they say.

Hol. O, I smell false Latin; dunghill for unguem. Arm. Arts-man, præambula; we will be singled from the barbarous. Do you not educate youth at the charge-house on the top of the mountain?

1

Hol. Or, mons, the hill.

Arm. At your sweet pleasure, for the mountain.
Hol. I do, sans question.

Arm. Sir, it is the king's most sweet pleasure and affection, to congratulate the princess at her pavilion, in the posteriors of this day; which the rude multitude call the afternoon.

Hol. The posterior of the day, most generous sir, is liable, congruent, and measurable for the afternoon. The word is well culled, chose; sweet and apt, I do assure you, sir, I do assure.

Arm. Sir, the king is a noble gentleman; and my familiar, I do assure you, very good friend.-For what is inward 2 between us, let it pass.-I do beseech thee, remember thy courtesy; 3-1 beseech thee, apparel thy

1 Free-school.

2 Confidential.

3 By remember thy courtesy, Armado probably means "remember that all this time thou art standing with thy hat off." "The putting off the hat at table is a kind of courtesie or ceremonie rather to be avoided than otherwise."-Florio's Second Frutes, 1591.

head; and among other importunate and most serious designs, and of great import indeed, too;-but let that pass; for I must tell thee, it will please his grace (by the world) sometime to lean upon my poor shoulder; and with his royal finger, thus, dally with my excrement,1 with my mustachio; but, sweet heart, let that pass. By the world, I recount no fable; some certain special honors it pleaseth his greatness to impart to Armado, a soldier, a man of travel, that hath seen the world; but let that pass.-The very all of all is,but, sweet heart, I do implore secrecy,—that the king would have me present the princess, sweet chuck, with some delightful ostentation, or show, or pageant, or antic, or firework. Now, understanding that the curate and your sweet self are good at such eruptions, and sudden breaking out of mirth, as it were, I have acquainted you withal, to the end to crave your assistance.

Hol. Sir, you shall present before her the nine worthies.-Sir Nathaniel, as concerning some entertainment of time, some show in the posterior of this day, to be rendered by our assistance, the king's command, and this most gallant, illustrate, and learned gentleman, before the princess; I say, none so fit as to present the nine worthies.

Nath. Where will you find men worthy enough to present them?

Hol. Joshua, yourself; myself, or this gallant gentleman, Judas Maccabeus; this swain, because of his great limb or joint, shall pass Pompey the Great; the page, Hercules.

Arm. Pardon, sir, error; he is not quantity enough for that worthy's thumb; he is not so big as the end of his club.

Hol. Shall I have audience? He shall present Hercules in minority; his enter and exit shall be strangling a snake; and I will have an apology for that purpose.

Moth. An excellent device! So, if any of the au

1 The beard is called valor's excrement in the Merchant of Venice.

dience hiss, you may cry, Well done, Hercules! Now
thou crushest the snake! That is the way to make an
offence gracious; though few have the grace to do it.
Arm. For the rest of the worthies ?-
Hol. I will play three myself.

Moth. Thrice worthy gentleman!
Arm. Shall I tell you a thing?
Hol. We attend.

Arm. We will have, if this fadge1 not, an antic. I beseech you, follow.

Hol. Via, goodman Dull! Thou hast spoken no word all this while.

Dull. Nor understood none neither, sir.

Hol. Allons! we will employ thee.

Dull. I'll make one in a dance, or so; or I will play on the tabor to the worthies, and let them dance the hay.

Hol. Most dull, honest Dull, to our sport, away.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. Another part of the same. Before the Princess's Pavilion.

Enter the Princess, KATHARINE, ROSALINE, and MARIA.

Prin. Sweet hearts, we shall be rich ere we depart,

If fairings come thus plentifully in.

A lady walled about with diamonds !—

Look you, what I have from the loving king.

Ros. Madam, came nothing else along with that? Prin. Nothing but this? Yes, as much love in rhyme,

As would be crammed up in a sheet of paper,
Writ on both sides the leaf, margent and all;
That he was fain to seal on Cupid's name.

1 i. e. suit not, go not.

An Italian exclamation, signifying Courage! Come on!

Ros. That was the way to make his god-head wax; For he hath been five thousand years a boy.

Kath. Ay, and a shrewd, unhappy gallows too. Ros. You'll ne'er be friends with him: he killed your sister.

Kath. He made her melancholy, sad, and heavy ;
And so she died. Had she been light like you,
Of such a merry, nimble, stirring spirit,

She might have been a grandam ere she died!
And so may you; for a light heart lives long.

Ros. What's your dark meaning, mouse, of this light word?

Kath. A light condition in a beauty dark.

Ros. We need more light to find your meaning out. Kath. You'll mar the light by taking it in snuff:2 Therefore I'll darkly end the argument.

Ros. Look, what you do, you do it still i'the dark. Kath. So do not you; for you are a light wench. Ros. Indeed, I weigh not you; and therefore light. Kath. You weigh me not,-O, that's you care not for me.

Ros. Great reason; for, past cure is still past care. Prin. Well bandied both; a set of wit well played.

But, Rosaline, you have a favor too.

Who sent it, and what is it?

Ros.
I would you knew;
And if my face were but as fair as yours,
My favor were as great; be witness this.
Nay, I have verses too, I thank Birón;

The numbers true; and, were the numbering too,
I were the fairest goddess on the ground.

I am compared to twenty thousand fairs.

O, he hath drawn my picture in his letter!
Prin. Any thing like?

Ros. Much, in the letters; nothing in the praise.

1 Grow.

2 Snuff is here used equivocally for anger, and the snuff of a candle. See King Henry IV. Act i. Sc. 3.

3 A set is a term at tennis for a game.