Volume Ix Part 37 (1/2)

It is a plain case, whereon I mooted[111] in our Temple, and that was this: put case, there be three brethren, John a Nokes, John a Nash, and John a Stile. John a Nokes the elder, John a Nash the younger, and John a Stile the youngest of all. John a Nash the younger dieth without issue of his body lawfully begotten. Whether shall his lands ascend to John a Nokes the elder, or descend to John a Stile the youngest of all? The answer is, the lands do collaterally descend, not ascend.

RECORDER.

Very true; and for a proof hereof I will show you a place in Littleton which is very pregnant in this point.

ACTUS IV., SCAENA 2.

_Enter_ INGENIOSO, FUROR, PHANTASMA.

INGENIOSO.

I'll p.a.w.n my wits, that is, my revenues, my land, my money, and whatsoever I have, for I have nothing but my wit, that they are at hand.

Why, any sensible snout may wind Master Amoretto and his pomander, Master Recorder and his two neat's feet that wear no socks, Sir Raderic by his rammish complexion; _Olet Gorgonius hirc.u.m, sicut Lupus in fabula_. Furor, fire the touch-box of your wit: Phantasma, let your invention play tricks like an ape: begin thou, Furor, and open like a flap-mouthed hound: follow thou, Phantasma, like a lady's puppy: and as for me, let me alone; I'll come after, like a water-dog, that will shake them off when I have no use of them. My masters, the watchword is given.

Furor, discharge.

FUROR to SIR RADERIC.

The great projector of the thunderbolts, He that is wont to p.i.s.s whole clouds of rain Into the earth, vast gaping urinal, Which that one-ey'd subsizer of the sky, Dan Phoebus, empties by calidity; He and his townsmen planets brings to thee Most fatty lumps of earth's fecundity.[112]

SIR RADERIC.

Why, will this fellow's English break the Queen's peace?

I will not seem to regard him.

PHANTASMA _to_ AMORETTO.

[_Reads from a Horace, addressing himself_.]

_Mecaenas, atavis edite regibus, O, et praesidium et dulce decus meum, Dii faciant votis vela secunda tuis_.

INGENIOSO.

G.o.d save you, good Master Recorder, and good fortunes follow your deserts.

I think I have cursed him sufficiently in few words. [_Aside_.

SIR RADERIC.

What have we here? three begging soldiers?

Come you from Ostend or from Ireland?

PAGE.

_Cujum pecus? an Melibaei?_ I have vented all the Latin one man had.

PHANTASMA.

_Quid dicam amplius? domini similis os_.

AMORETTO'S PAGE.

Let him [not] alone, I pray thee. To him again: tickle him there!

PHANTASMA.

_Quam dispari domino dominaris?_

RECORDER.

Nay, that's plain in Littleton; for if that fee-simple and fee-tail be put together, it is called hotch-potch. Now, this word hotch-potch in English is a pudding; for in such a pudding is not commonly one thing only, but one thing with another.

AMORETTO.