Page:Victor Hugo's Works (Guernsey Edition) v14.djvu/110

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Good-day, Sir Poet; stand aside, Sir Fool.

You are going in?

Ay!

There's a shrewd hiatus

Needs filling at the table. You have War

And Love, but, lacking Poetry and Folly,

War is but butchery, and Love goes lame.

Tuck us beneath your wings, sweet Baldassare,

And you'll be trebly welcome. [Seizing him by one arm, and motioning to take the other.

The Duke for once has shut his doors against

Both Poetry and Folly. He is cloistered

For grave affairs.

Tush! tell me not, sweet gossip.

Why, man, I know that there 's a petticoat—

And more, I know the wearer.

Thou!

You've lost

The rarest sport. Ascolti and Ordelaffi

Have had their will of me. For once I'll own

You've turned the tables fairly on the fool!

That our Ginevra should be Fiordelisa,