Page:Love's Labour's Lost (1925) Yale.djvu/102

90

I hope, sir, three times thrice, sir,—

Ber. Is not nine?

Cost. Under correction, sir, we know where-

until it doth amount.

Ber. By Jove, I always took three threes for nine.

Cost. O Lord, sir! it were pity you should get

your living by reckoning, sir.

Ber. How much is it?

Cost. O Lord, sir! the parties themselves, the

actors, sir, will show whereuntil it doth amount:

for mine own part, I am, as they say, but to par-

fect one man in one poor man, Pompion the

Great, sir.

Ber. Art thou one of the Worthies?

Cost. It pleased them to think me worthy of

Pompey the Great: for mine own part, I know

not the degree of the Worthy, but I am to stand

for him.

Ber. Go, bid them prepare.

Cost. We will turn it finely off, sir; we will take some care.

King. Berowne, they will shame us; let them not approach.

Ber. We are shame-proof, my lord; and 'tis some policy

To have one show worse than the king's and his company.

King. I say they shall not come.

Prin. Nay, my good lord, let me o'errule you now.

That sport best pleases that doth least know how;

Where zeal strives to content, and the contents

Dies in the zeal of that which it presents;

Their form confounded makes most form in mirth,

 502 Pompion: pumpkin

517, 518 Cf. n.

