Flam. Hang him; a gilder that hath his brains perished with quicksilver
is not more cold in the liver. The great barriers moulted not more
feathers, than he hath shed hairs, by the confession of his doctor. An
Irish gamester that will play himself naked, and then wage all
downward, at hazard, is not more venturous. So unable to please a
woman, that, like a Dutch doublet, all his back is shrunk into his
breaches.
Shroud you within this closet, good my lord;
Some trick now must be thought on to divide
My brother-in-law from his fair bed-fellow.
Brach. Oh, should she fail to come----
Flam. I must not have your lordship thus unwisely amorous. I myself
have not loved a lady, and pursued her with a great deal of under-age
protestation, whom some three or four gallants that have enjoyed would
with all their hearts have been glad to have been rid of. 'Tis just
like a summer bird-cage in a garden: the birds that are without despair
to get in, and the birds that are within despair and are in a
consumption for fear they shall never get out. Away, away, my lord.
[Exit Brachiano as Camillo enters.
See here he comes. This fellow by his apparel
Some men would judge a politician;
But call his wit in question, you shall find it
Merely an ass in 's foot-cloth. How now, brother?
What, travelling to bed with your kind wife?
Cam. I assure you, brother, no. My voyage lies
More northerly, in a far colder clime.
I do not well remember, I protest,
When I last lay with her.
Flam. Strange you should lose your count.
Cam. We never lay together, but ere morning
There grew a flaw between us.
Flam. 'T had been your part
To have made up that flaw.
Cam. True, but she loathes I should be seen in 't.
Flam. Why, sir, what 's the matter?
Cam. The duke your master visits me, I thank him;
And I perceive how, like an earnest bowler,
He very passionately leans that way
he should have his bowl run.
Flam. I hope you do not think----
Cam. That nobleman bowl booty? faith, his cheek
Hath a most excellent bias: it would fain
Jump with my mistress.
Flam. Will you be an ass,
Despite your Aristotle? or a cuckold,
Contrary to your Ephemerides,
Which shows you under what a smiling planet
You were first swaddled?
Cam. Pew wew, sir; tell me not
Of planets nor of Ephemerides.
A man may be made cuckold in the day-time,
When the stars' eyes are out.
Flam. Sir, good-bye you;
I do commit you to your pitiful pillow
Stuffed with horn-shavings.
Cam. Brother!
Flam. God refuse me.
Might I advise you now, your only course
Were to lock up your wife.
Cam. 'Twere very good.
Flam. Bar her the sight of revels.
Cam. Excellent.
Flam. Let her not go to church, but, like a hound
In leon, at your heels.
Cam. 'Twere for her honour.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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