SIR WALTER Under the shade of a thick-spreading tree, Upon the grass, no better carpeting, We'll eat our noon-tide meal; and, dinner done, One of us shall repair to Nottingham, To seek some safe night-lodging in the town, Where you may sleep, while here with us you dwell, By day, in the forest, expecting better times, And gentler habitations, noble Margaret. SIMON _Allons_, young Frenchman-- MARGARET _Allons_, Sir Englishman. The time has been, I've studied love-lays in the English tongue, And been enamour'd of rare poesy: Which now I must unlearn. Henceforth, Sweet mother-tongue, old English speech, adieu; For Margaret has got new name and language new. (_Exeunt._) ACT THE THIRD SCENE.--_An Apartment of State in Woodvil Hall--Cavaliers drinking._ JOHN WOODVIL, LOVEL, GRAY, _and four more._ JOHN More mirth, I beseech you, gentlemen--Mr. Gray, you are not merry.-- GRAY More wine, say I, and mirth shall ensue in course. What! we have not yet above three half-pints a man to answer for. Brevity is the soul of drinking, as of wit. Despatch, I say. More wine. (_Fills._) FIRST GENTLEMAN I entreat you, let there be some order, some method, in our drinkings. I love to lose my reason with my eyes open, to commit the deed of drunkenness with forethought and deliberation. I love to feel the fumes of the liquor gathering here, like clouds. SECOND GENTLEMAN And I am for plunging into madness at once. Damn order, and method, and steps, and degrees, that he speaks of. Let confusion have her legitimate work. LOVEL I marvel why the poets, who, of all men, methinks, should possess the hottest livers, and most empyreal fancies, should affect to see such virtues in cold water. GRAY Virtue in cold water! ha! ha! ha!-- JOHN Because your poet-born hath an internal wine, richer than lippara or canaries, yet uncrushed from any grapes of earth, unpressed in mortal wine-presses. THIRD GENTLEMAN What may be the name of this wine? JOHN It hath as many names as qualities. It is denominated indifferently, wit, conceit, invention, inspiration, but its most royal and comprehensive name is _fancy_. THIRD GENTLEMAN And where keeps he this sovereign liquor? JOHN Its cellars are in the brain, whence your true poet deriveth intoxication at will; while his animal spirits, catching a pride from the quality and neighbourhood of their noble relative, the brain, refuse to be sustained by wines and fermentations of earth. THIRD GENTLEMAN But is your poet-born alway tipsy with this liquor? JOHN He hath his stoopings and reposes; but his proper element is the sky, and in the suburbs of the empyrean. THIRD GENTLEMAN Is your wine-intellectual so exquisite? henceforth, I, a man of plain conceit, will, in all humility, content my mind with canaries. FOURTH GENTLEMAN I am for a song or a catch. When will the catches come on, the sweet wicked catches?