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your eyes; with your arms crossed on your thin belly-doublet, like a rabbit on a spit; or your hands in your pocket, like a man after the old painting; and keep not too long in one tune, but a snip and away: These are complements 5, these are humours; these betray nice wenches-that would be betrayed without these; and make them men of note, (do you note, men?) that most are affected to these.

Arm. How hast thou purchased this experience?
Moth. By my penny of observation7.
Arm. But 0,—but 0,—

Moth. the hobby-horse is forgot.

Arm. Callest thou my love, hobby-horse? Moth. No, master; the hobby-horse is but a colt, and your love perhaps a hackney. But have you forgot your love?

Arm. Almost I had.

Moth. Negligent student! learn her by heart.
Arm. By heart, and in heart, boy.

Moth. And out of heart, master: all those three

I will prove.

Arm. What wilt thou prove?

Moth. A man, if I live; and this, by, in, and

5 i. e. accomplishments.

6 One of the modern editors, with great plausibility, proposes to read do you note me?'

7 The allusion is probably to the old popular pamphlet ‘A Pennyworth of Wit.'

8 The Hobby-horse was a personage belonging to the ancient Morris dance, when complete. It was the figure of a horse fastened round the waist of a man, his own legs going through the body of the horse, and enabling him to walk, but concealed by a long footcloth; while false legs appeared where those of the man should be at the sides of the horse. Latterly the Hobby-horse was frequently omitted, which appears to have occasioned a popular ballad, in which was this line, or burden. It had become almost a proverbial expression, and occurs again in Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 2.

without, upon the instant: By heart you love her, because your heart cannot come by her: in heart you love her, because your heart is in love with her; and out of heart you love her, being out of heart that you cannot enjoy her.

Arm. I am all these three.

Moth. And three times as much more, and yet nothing at all.

Arm. Fetch hither the swain; he must carry me a letter.

Moth. A message well sympathised; a horse to be embassador for an ass!

Arm. Ha, ha! what sayest thou?

Moth. Marry, sir, you must send the ass upon the horse, for he is very slow-gaited: But I go. Arm. The way is but short; away. Moth. As swift as lead, sir.

Arm. Thy meaning, pretty ingenious?

Is not lead a metal heavy, dull, and slow?

Moth. Minimè, honest master; or rather, master, no. Arm. I say, lead is slow.

Moth.

You are too swift9, sir, to say so:

Is that lead slow which is fir'd from a gun?

Arm. Sweet smoke of rhetorick!

He reputes me a cannon; and the bullet, that's he :I shoot thee at the swain.

Moth.

Thump then, and I flee.

[Exit.

Arm. A most acute juvenal: voluble and free of

grace!

By thy favour, sweet welkin, I must sigh in thy face :
Most rude melancholy, valour gives thee place.
My herald is return'd.

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Re-enter MOTH and COSTARD.

Moth. A wonder, master; here's a Costard 10 broken in a shin.

Arm. Some enigma, some riddle;-come,-thy l'envoy ;-begin.

11

Cost. No egma, no riddle, no l'envoy: no salve in the mail 12, sir: O, sir, plantain, a plain plantain; no l'envoy, no l'envoy, no salve, sir, but a plantain !

Arm. By virtue, thou enforcest laughter; thy silly thought, my spleen; the heaving of my lungs. provokes me to ridiculous smiling; O, pardon me, my stars! Doth the inconsiderate take salve for l'envoy, and the word, l'envoy, for a salve?

Moth. Do the wise think them other? is not l'envoy a salve?

Arm. No, page; it is an epilogue or discourse, to make plain

Some obscure precedence that hath tofore been sain.
I will example it:

The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,
Were still at odds, being but three.

There's the moral: Now the l'envoy.

Moth. I will add the l'envoy: Say the moral again.
Arm. The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,
Were still at odds, being but three:

10 i. e. a head; a name adopted from an apple shaped like a man's head. It must have been a common sort of apple, as it gave a name to the dealers in apples, who were called costarmongers.

11 An old French term for concluding verses, which served either to convey the moral, or to address the poem to some person. 12 A mail or male was a budget, wallet, or portmanteau. Costard, mistaking enigma, riddle, and l'envoy for names of salves, objects to the application of any salve in the budget, and cries out for a plantain leaf. There is a quibble upon salve and salvé, a word with which it was not unusual to conclude epistles, &c. and which therefore was a kind of l'envoy.

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Moth. Until the goose came out of door,

And stay'd the odds by adding four.

Now will I begin your moral, and do you follow with my l'envoy.

The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,

Were still at odds, being but three:
Arm. Until the goose came out of door,
Staying the odds by adding four.
Moth. A good l'envoy, ending in the goose,
Would you desire more?

Cost. The boy hath sold him a bargain, a goose; that's flat:

Sir, your pennyworth is good, an your goose be fat.

To sell a bargain well, is as cunning as fast and loose : Let me see a fat l'envoy; ay, that's a fat goose.

Arm. Come hither, come hither: How did this argument begin?

Moth. By saying that a Costard was broken in a shin.

Then call'd you for the l'envoy.

Cost. True, and I for a plantain; Thus came your

argument in;

Then the boy's fat l'envoy, the goose that you bought; And he ended the market 13.

Arm. But tell me; how was there a Costard 14 broken in a shin?

Moth. I will tell you sensibly.

Cost. Thou hast no feeling of it, Moth; I will speak that l'envoy:

I, Costard, running out, that was safely within,
Fell over the threshold, and broke my shin.

Arm. We will talk no more of this matter.

13 Alluding to the proverb, 'Three women and a goose make a market.'

14 See p. 337, note 10.

Cost. Till there be more matter in the shin. Arm. Sirrah Costard, I will enfranchise thee. Cost. O, marry me to one Frances:-I smell some l'envoy, some goose, in this.

Arm. By my sweet soul, I mean, setting thee at liberty, enfreedoming thy person; thou wert immured, restrained, captivated, bound.

Cost. True, true; and now you will be my purgation, and let me loose.

Arm. I give thee thy liberty, set thee from durance; and, in lieu thereof, impose on thee nothing but this: Bear this significant 15 to the country maid Jaquenetta: there is remuneration; [Giving him money.] for the best ward of mine honour, is, rewarding my dependents. Moth, follow. [Exit. Moth. Like the sequel, I.-Signior Costard, adieu. Cost. My sweet ounce of man's flesh! my in16 Jew!cony [Exit MOTH. Now will I look to his remuneration. Remuneration! O, that's the Latin word for three farthings: three farthings-remuneration.—What's the price of this inkle? a penny :—No, I'll give you a remuneration: why, it carries it.-Remuneration!-why, it is a fairer name than French crown. I will never buy and sell out of this word.

Enter BIRON.

Biron. O, my good knave Costard! exceedingly well met.

15 Armado sustains his character well; he will not give any thing its vulgar name, he calls the letter he would send to Jaquenetta a significant.

16 Incony. The meaning and etymology of this phrase is not clearly defined, though numerous instances of its use are adduced. Sweet, pretty, delicate seem to be some of its acceptations; and the best derivation seems to be from the northern word canny or conny, meaning pretty, the in will be intensive and equivalent to

very.

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