Oh Lord, sir, I resolve so.

BOB. I confess I love a cleanly and quiet privacy, above all the tumult and roar of fortune. What new book ha' you there? What! »Go by, Hieronymo«!

MAT. Aye, did you ever see it acted? Is't not well penned?

BOB. Well penned? I would fain see all the poets of these times pen such another play as that was! They'll prate and swagger, and keep a stir of art and devices, when (as I am a gentleman) read 'em, they are the most shallow, pitiful, barren fellows, that live upon the face of the earth, again!

MAT. Indeed, here are a number of fine speeches in this book! »O eyes, no eyes, but fountains fraught with tears!« There's a conceit! »Fountains fraught with tears!« »O life, no life, but lively form of death!« Another! »O world, no world, but mass of public wrongs!« A third! »Confused and filled with murder, and misdeeds!« A fourth! Oh, the Muses! Is't not excellent? Is't not simply the best that ever you heard, captain? Ha? How do you like it?

BOB. 'Tis good.

MAT.

»To thee, the purest object to my sense,

The most refined essence heaven covers,

Send I these lines, wherein I do commence

The happy state of turtle-billing lovers.

If they prove rough, unpolished, harsh, and rude,

Haste made the waste. Thus, mildly, I conclude.«

 

Bobadil is making him ready all this while

 

BOB. Nay, proceed, proceed. Where's this?

MAT. This, sir? A toy o' mine own, in my nonage: the infancy of my Muses! But when will you come and see my study? Good faith, I can show you some very good things I have done of late – That boot becomes your leg passing well, captain, methinks!

BOB. So, so, it's the fashion gentlemen now use.

MAT. Troth, captain, an' now you speak o' the fashion, Master Wellbred's elder brother and I are fallen out exceedingly: this other day, I happened to enter into some discourse of a hanger, which I assure you, both for fashion and workmanship, was most peremptory-beautiful and gentlemanlike! Yet he condemned and cried it down for the most pied and ridiculous that ever he saw.

BOB. Squire Downright? The half-brother? Was't not?

MAT. Aye, sir, he.

BOB. Hang him, rook, he! Why, he has no more judgement than a malt-horse. By St. George, I wonder you'd lose a thought upon such an animal: the most peremptory absurd clown of Christendom this day he is holden. I protest to you, as I am a gentleman and a soldier, I ne'er changed words with his like. By his discourse, he should eat nothing but hay. He was born for the manger, pannier, or pack-saddle! He has not so much as a good phrase in his belly, but all old iron, and rusty proverbs! A good commodity for some smith to make hobnails of.

MAT. Aye, and he thinks to carry it away with his manhood still, where he comes. He brags he will gi' me the bastinado, as I hear.

BOB. How! He the bastinado! How came he by that word, trow?

MAT. Nay, indeed, he said cudgel me; I termed it so, for my more grace.

BOB. That may be: for I was sure, it was none of his word. But, when? When said he so?

MAT. Faith, yesterday, they say: a young gallant, a friend of mine told me so.

BOB. By the foot of Pharaoh, and 'twere my case now, I should send him a chartel, presently. The bastinado! A most proper, and sufficient dependance, warranted by the great Caranza.