Page:Henry IV Part 2 (1921) Yale.djvu/29

King Henry the Fourth, I. ii

so little regard in these costermonger times that

true valour is turned bear-herd: pregnancy is

made a tapster, and hath his quick wit wasted

in giving reckonings: all the other gifts apperti-

nent to man, as the malice of this age shapes

them, are not worth a gooseberry. You that are

old consider not the capacities of us that are

young; you measure the heat of our livers with

the bitterness of your galls; and we that are in

the vaward of our youth, I must confess, are

wags too.

''Ch. Just.'' Do you set down your name in the

scroll of youth, that are written down old with

all the characters of age? Have you not a moist

eye, a dry hand, a yellow cheek, a white beard,

a decreasing leg, an increasing belly? Is not

your voice broken, your wind short, your chin

double, your wit single, and every part about

you blasted with antiquity, and will you yet call

yourself young? Fie, fie, fie, Sir John!

Fal. My lord, I was born about three of the

clock in the afternoon, with a white head, and

something a round belly. For my voice, I have

lost it with hollaing, and singing of anthems.

To approve my youth further, I will not: the

truth is, I am only old in judgment and under-

standing; and he that will caper with me for a

thousand marks, let him lend me the money,

and have at him! For the box o' the ear that

the prince gave you, he gave it like a rude prince,

and you took it like a sensible lord. I have

 193 costermonger: commercial

194 bear-herd: one who leads about a tame bear

pregnancy: readiness of wit

196 reckonings: bills

202 vaward: vanguard

210 single: thin

220 marks: a mark was worth about thirteen shillings 