Volume Ix Part 94 (1/2)

CLOWN. I have heard of many black-jacks, sir, but never of a blue-bottle.

ILF. Well, sir, are you of the house?

CLOWN. No, sir, I am twenty yards without, and the house stands without me.

BAR. Prythee, tell's who owes[333] this building?

CLOWN. He that dwells in it, sir.

ILF. Who dwells in it, then?

CLOWN. He that owes it.

ILF. What's his name?

CLOWN. I was none of his G.o.d-father.

ILF. Does Master Scarborow lie here?

CLOWN. I'll give you a rhyme for that, sir-- Sick men may lie, and dead men in their graves.

Few else do lie abed at noon, but drunkards, punks, and knaves.

ILF. What am I the better for thy answer?

CLOWN. What am I the better for thy question?

ILF. Why, nothing.

CLOWN. Why, then, of nothing comes nothing.

_Enter_ SCARBOROW.

WEN. 'Sblood, this is a philosophical fool.

CLOWN. Then I, that am a fool by art, am better than you, that are fools by nature. [_Exit_.

SCAR. Gentlemen, welcome to Yorks.h.i.+re.

ILF. And well-encountered, my little villain of fifteen hundred a year.

'Sfoot, what makest thou here in this barren soil of the North, when thy honest friends miss thee at London?

SCAR. Faith, gallants, 'tis the country where my father lived, where first I saw the light, and where I am loved.

ILF. Loved! ay, as courtiers love usurers, and that is just as long as they lend them money. Now, dare I lay--

WEN. None of your land, good knight, for that is laid to mortgage already.

ILF. I dare lay with any man, that will take me up.

WEN. _Who list to have a lubberly load_. [_Sings this_.[334]