Page:Henry IV Part 2 (1921) Yale.djvu/23

King Henry the Fourth, I. ii

Fal. Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at

me: the brain of this foolish-compounded clay,

man, is not able to invent anything that tends

to laughter, more than I invent or is invented

on me: I am not only witty in myself, but the

cause that wit is in other men. I do here walk

before thee like a sow that hath overwhelmed all

her litter but one. If the prince put thee into

my service for any other reason than to set me

off, why then I have no judgment. Thou whore-

son mandrake, thou art fitter to be worn in my

cap than to wait at my heels. I was never

manned with an agate till now; but I will set

you neither in gold nor silver, but in vile apparel,

and send you back again to your master, for a

jewel; the juvenal, the prince your master, whose

chin is not yet fledged. I will sooner have a

beard grow in the palm of my hand than he shall

get one on his cheek; and yet he will not stick

to say, his face is a face-royal: God may finish it

when he will, it is not a hair amiss yet: he may

keep it still as a face-royal, for a barber shall

never earn sixpence out of it; and yet he'll

be crowing as if he had writ man ever since his

father was a bachelor. He may keep his own

grace, but he is almost out of mine, I can assure

him. What said Master Dombledon about the

satin for my short cloak and my slops?

Page. He said, sir, you should procure him

better assurance than Bardolph; he would not

 6 gird: jeer

15 whoreson: a coarse term of endearment (as here) or of contempt (as in l. 30)

16 mandrake: a poisonous plant whose forked root was supposed to resemble the human form

18 manned with an agate; cf. n.

21 juvenal: used jocularly for 'youth'

25 face-royal; cf. n.

29 writ man: enrolled himself a man

33 slops: loose breeches 