APEMANTUS. If thou couldst please me with speaking to me, thou mightst have hit upon it here. The commonwealth of Athens is become a forest of beasts. TIMON. How has the ass broke the wall, that thou art out of the city? APEMANTUS. Yonder comes a poet and a painter. The plague of company light upon thee! I will fear to catch it, and give way. When I know not what else to do, I’ll see thee again. TIMON. When there is nothing living but thee, thou shalt be welcome. I had rather be a beggar’s dog than Apemantus. APEMANTUS. Thou art the cap of all the fools alive. TIMON. Would thou wert clean enough to spit upon! APEMANTUS. A plague on thee! Thou art too bad to curse. TIMON. All villains that do stand by thee are pure. APEMANTUS. There is no leprosy but what thou speak’st. TIMON. If I name thee, I’ll beat thee, but I should infect my hands. APEMANTUS. I would my tongue could rot them off! TIMON. Away, thou issue of a mangy dog! Choler does kill me that thou art alive. I swoon to see thee. APEMANTUS. Would thou wouldst burst! TIMON. Away, thou tedious rogue! I am sorry I shall lose a stone by thee. [_Throws a stone at him._] APEMANTUS. Beast! TIMON. Slave! APEMANTUS. Toad! TIMON. Rogue, rogue, rogue! I am sick of this false world, and will love nought But even the mere necessities upon’t. Then, Timon, presently prepare thy grave. Lie where the light foam of the sea may beat Thy gravestone daily. Make thine epitaph, That death in me at others’ lives may laugh. [_To the gold._] O thou sweet king-killer and dear divorce ’Twixt natural son and sire; thou bright defiler Of Hymen’s purest bed, thou valiant Mars; Thou ever young, fresh, loved, and delicate wooer, Whose blush doth thaw the consecrated snow That lies on Dian’s lap; thou visible god, That solder’st close impossibilities And mak’st them kiss, that speak’st with every tongue To every purpose! O thou touch of hearts, Think thy slave man rebels, and by thy virtue Set them into confounding odds, that beasts May have the world in empire! APEMANTUS. Would ’twere so! But not till I am dead. I’ll say thou’st gold; Thou wilt be thronged to shortly. TIMON. Thronged to? APEMANTUS. Ay. TIMON. Thy back, I prithee. APEMANTUS. Live and love thy misery. TIMON. Long live so, and so die! I am quit. APEMANTUS. More things like men. Eat, Timon, and abhor them. [_Exit Apemantus._] Enter Banditti. FIRST BANDIT. Where should he have this gold? It is some poor fragment, some slender ort of his remainder. The mere want of gold and the falling-from of his friends drove him into this melancholy. SECOND BANDIT. It is noised he hath a mass of treasure. THIRD BANDIT. Let us make the assay upon him. If he care not for’t, he will supply us easily; if he covetously reserve it, how shall’s get it? SECOND BANDIT. True, for he bears it not about him. ’Tis hid. FIRST BANDIT. Is not this he? BANDITTI. Where? SECOND BANDIT. ’Tis his description. THIRD BANDIT. He; I know him.