Page:Henry IV Part 2 (1921) Yale.djvu/81

King Henry the Fourth, III. ii

Fal. 'Fore God I would you would, Master

Shallow.

Shal. Go to; I have spoke at a word. God

keep you.

Fal. Fare you well, gentle gentlemen.

On, Bardolph; lead the men away.

As I return, I will fetch off these justices:

I do see the bottom of Justice Shallow. Lord,

Lord! how subject we old men are to this

vice of lying. This same starved justice hath

done nothing but prate to me of the wildness of

his youth and the feats he hath done about

Turnbull Street; and every third word a lie, duer

paid to the hearer than the Turk's tribute. I do

remember him at Clement's Inn like a man made

after supper of a cheese-paring: when a' was

naked he was for all the world like a forked

radish, with a head fantastically carved upon it

with a knife: a' was so forlorn that his dimen-

sions to any thick sight were invisible: a' was

the very genius of famine; yet lecherous as a

monkey, and the whores called him mandrake:

a' came ever in the rearward of the fashion and

sung those tunes to the over-scutched huswives

that he heard the carmen whistle, and sware

they were his fancies or his good-nights. And

now is this Vice's dagger become a squire, and

talks as familiarly of John a Gaunt as if he had

 322 at a word: briefly but sincerely

326 fetch off: get the better of, 'take in'

332 duer: more duly

343 over-scutched huswives: cant term for 'harlots'

344 carmen: teamsters

345 fancies good-nights: common names for little poems

346 Vice's dagger; cf. n. 