PETER. Marry, that do I, and will answer to ’t before any of womankind, and any of mankind too, that be less lusty than I. NURSE. Peter! PETER. Anon. NURSE. Some food, Peter, and presently. PETER. Here be strange fruits whose use I know not. A serving man of the young county Paris’s did to my knowing eat an apple that was brought from afar in a ship’s stomach, being a lusty youth and tall and much given to victual, and he did swell to bursting and died thereof while one might count thirteen by the clock. He made a fearsome dead body, as the saying is. NURSE. Peter. PETER. Anon. NURSE. Thou shalt taste these fruits for me singly and in order, good Peter, and if no such harm come to thee as thou pratest of, then will I eat likewise. PETER. Nay, but nurse, good nurse, good lady nurse-- NURSE. Hold thy peace, thou scurvy knave. Would’st suffer me to go nigh to death for lack of food and thou stand by the while like a jack o’ the clock when his hour has struck? Out upon thee, and do my pleasure quickly. [_Enter_ MERCUTIO _and_ ROMEO. MERCUTIO. Here’s fine matter toward. Thy Juliet’s nurse, and her man Peter, quarrelling. NURSE. God ye good den, gentlemen. MERCUTIO. God ye good morrow, most ancient, and most fair ancient lady. Thy five wits, meseems, are gone far astray the whiles. NURSE. Is it but good morrow? I had sworn ’twere long past noon, but, indeed, in this strange place, as one may say, there’s no telling so simple a circumstance as the time of day. ROMEO. Many things there be of which there’s no telling, such as the number of times a maid will say no, when her mind is to say yes; how many days the wind will sit i’ the east when one would desire fair weather; and how many years the toothless grandsire will wither out a young man’s revenue. NURSE. That is all very wisely said, good sir. Are you that he they call the young Romeo? MERCUTIO. He is rightly called Romeo, but as for his youth, if knavery be not left out of the count, why then was Methusaleh a very babe to him, a suckling babe. NURSE. Say you so? Then will I tell my lady Juliet so much, an’ I can come by her in this heathen place. MERCUTIO. Most ancient lady, yon Romeo would deceive the devil himself. NURSE. Beshrew my heart. Then were my young mistress (who, to be sure, is no kind of a devil at all, saving your presences), led straight to a fool’s paradise. She shall know, and presently, what a piece of man he is. MERCUTIO [_seeing_ MIRANDA _and_ FERDINAND. O Romeo the young; young Romeo, Forget thy Juliet but a space, for here A lady is, fairer than Juliet, [_pointing to_ MIRANDA] And mine eyes serve me truly.