Page:The whole familiar colloquies of Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam.djvu/262

258 FAMILIAR COLLOQUIES. 

Bu. Tell me, silly seller of salt fish, have you not bought a halter yet? Fi. A halter, butcher? Bu. Yes, I say an halter. Fi. For what? Bu. To hang yourself with. Fi. Let them buy halters that want them, I am not weary of my life yet. Bu. But you will be weary of it quickly. Fi. God send that may rather be your case than mine. What is the matter? Bu. I will tell you if you do not know. Here is a time coming upon you that you and your brother tradesmen will be all starved to death, and ready to hang yourselves out of the way. Fi. Easy, easy, butcher, God send this may be our enemies' case and not ours. But prithee, butcher, how came you to be a fortuneteller all on a sudden, to divine such a calamity? Bu. It is no guess work, I promise you; do not flatter yourself, it is matter of fact. Fi. You fright me out of my wits; if you have anything to say let us have it out.

Bu. I will tell you to your cost. Here is a dispensation of the college of cardinals coming out for everybody to eat what he lists. Then what will you and your fraternity do but be starved to death in the midst of your heaps of stinking salt fish? Fi. They that have a mind to it may feed upon snails or nettles with all my heart. But is there a prohibition that nobody shall eat fish? Bu. No, but everybody is at liberty to eat flesh that has a mind to it. Fi. If what you predict be true, you rather deserve to be hanged than I; and if it be false, you have more need to buy a halter. For I hope for a better trade for the future. Bu. You may have stock enough by you, but your bellyful of fasting. But if you will hear the best of the story you may live a little cleanlier than you used to do, and not have occasion to wipe your snotty, scabby nose upon your elbow. Fi. Ha, ha, now it has come out at last: the kettle calls the pot black. Is there any part of a butcher cleaner and sweeter than his backside? I wish what you say were true, but I am afraid you only feed me with fancies.

Bu. What I tell you is too true to make a jest on. But, prithee, how do you promise yourself a better trade upon this consideration? Fi. Because peopleare of that humour that they are most desirous of that which is forbidden. Bu. What, then? Fi. When they are at liberty to eat flesh, they will eat least of it; and then no entertainment will be accounted noble but what has fish at it, as it used to be in old time. So I shall be glad if there be a licence to eat flesh. And I wish heartily that the eating fish were forbidden too, then people would covet it more earnestly. Bu. Well wished indeed. I should wish so too if I were like you, and aimed at nothing but getting money, for the sake of which thou sendest that lumpish, flesh-fed soul of thine to the devil.

Fi. You are very smart upon me, but what you say is very silly. What is it puts the see of Rome upon the relaxing the law for prohibiting eating of flesh, that has been observed for so many ages? Bu. Why, indeed, they have had a mind to do it a great while ago, and for 