| ACT IV SCENE II | The same. | |
| | Enter HOLOFERNES the Pedant, NATHANIEL, and DULL. | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Very reverend sport, truly; and done in the testimony | |
| | of a good conscience. | |
| HOLOFERNES | The deer was, as you know, sanguis, in blood; ripe | |
| | as the pomewater, who now hangeth like a jewel in | 5 |
| | the ear of caelo, the sky, the welkin, the heaven; | |
| | and anon falleth like a crab on the face of terra, | |
| | the soil, the land, the earth. | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Truly, Master Holofernes, the epithets are sweetly | |
| | varied, like a scholar at the least: but, sir, I | 10 |
| | assure ye, it was a buck of the first head. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Sir Nathaniel, haud credo. | |
| DULL | 'Twas not a haud credo; 'twas a pricket. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Most barbarous intimation! yet a kind of | |
| | insinuation, as it were, in via, in way, of | 15 |
| | explication; facere, as it were, replication, or | |
| | rather, ostentare, to show, as it were, his | |
| | inclination, after his undressed, unpolished, | |
| | uneducated, unpruned, untrained, or rather, | |
| | unlettered, or ratherest, unconfirmed fashion, to | 20 |
| | insert again my haud credo for a deer. | |
| DULL | I said the deer was not a haud credo; twas a pricket. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Twice-sod simplicity, his coctus! | |
| | O thou monster Ignorance, how deformed dost thou look! | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Sir, he hath never fed of the dainties that are bred | 25 |
| | in a book; he hath not eat paper, as it were; he | |
| | hath not drunk ink: his intellect is not | |
| | replenished; he is only an animal, only sensible in | |
| | the duller parts: | |
| | And such barren plants are set before us, that we | 30 |
| | thankful should be, | |
| | Which we of taste and feeling are, for those parts that | |
| | do fructify in us more than he. | |
| | For as it would ill become me to be vain, indiscreet, or a fool, | |
| | So were there a patch set on learning, to see him in a school: | 35 |
| | But omne bene, say I; being of an old father's mind, | |
| | Many can brook the weather that love not the wind. | |
| DULL | You two are book-men: can you tell me by your wit | |
| | What was a month old at Cain's birth, that's not five | |
| | weeks old as yet? | 40 |
| HOLOFERNES | Dictynna, goodman Dull; Dictynna, goodman Dull. | |
| DULL | What is Dictynna? | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | A title to Phoebe, to Luna, to the moon. | |
| HOLOFERNES | The moon was a month old when Adam was no more, | |
| | And raught not to five weeks when he came to | 45 |
| | five-score. | |
| | The allusion holds in the exchange. | |
| DULL | 'Tis true indeed; the collusion holds in the exchange. | |
| HOLOFERNES | God comfort thy capacity! I say, the allusion holds | |
| | in the exchange. | 50 |
| DULL | And I say, the pollusion holds in the exchange; for | |
| | the moon is never but a month old: and I say beside | |
| | that, 'twas a pricket that the princess killed. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Sir Nathaniel, will you hear an extemporal epitaph | |
| | on the death of the deer? And, to humour the | 55 |
| | ignorant, call I the deer the princess killed a pricket. | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Perge, good Master Holofernes, perge; so it shall | |
| | please you to abrogate scurrility. | |
| HOLOFERNES | I will something affect the letter, for it argues facility. | |
| | The preyful princess pierced and prick'd a pretty | 60 |
| | pleasing pricket; | |
| | Some say a sore; but not a sore, till now made | |
| | sore with shooting. | |
| | The dogs did yell: put L to sore, then sorel jumps | |
| | from thicket; | 65 |
| | Or pricket sore, or else sorel; the people fall a-hooting. | |
| | If sore be sore, then L to sore makes fifty sores | |
| | one sorel. | |
| | Of one sore I an hundred make by adding but one more L. | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | A rare talent! | 70 |
| DULL | Aside If a talent be a claw, look how he claws him with a talent. | |
| | him with a talent. | |
| HOLOFERNES | This is a gift that I have, simple, simple; a | |
| | foolish extravagant spirit, full of forms, figures, | |
| | shapes, objects, ideas, apprehensions, motions, | |
| | revolutions: these are begot in the ventricle of | 75 |
| | memory, nourished in the womb of pia mater, and | |
| | delivered upon the mellowing of occasion. But the | |
| | gift is good in those in whom it is acute, and I am | |
| | thankful for it. | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Sir, I praise the Lord for you; and so may my | 80 |
| | parishioners; for their sons are well tutored by | |
| | you, and their daughters profit very greatly under | |
| | you: you are a good member of the commonwealth. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Mehercle, if their sons be ingenuous, they shall | |
| | want no instruction; if their daughters be capable, | 85 |
| | I will put it to them: but vir sapit qui pauca | |
| | loquitur; a soul feminine saluteth us. | |
| | Enter JAQUENETTA and COSTARD. | |
| JAQUENETTA | God give you good morrow, master Parson. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Master Parson, quasi pers-on. An if one should be | |
| | pierced, which is the one? | 90 |
| COSTARD | Marry, master schoolmaster, he that is likest to a hogshead. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Piercing a hogshead! a good lustre of conceit in a | |
| | tuft of earth; fire enough for a flint, pearl enough | |
| | for a swine: 'tis pretty; it is well. | |
| JAQUENETTA | Good master Parson, be so good as read me this | 95 |
| | letter: it was given me by Costard, and sent me | |
| | from Don Armado: I beseech you, read it. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Fauste, precor gelida quando pecus omne sub umbra | |
| | Ruminat, and so forth. Ah, good old Mantuan! I | |
| | may speak of thee as the traveller doth of Venice; | 100 |
| | Venetia, Venetia, | |
| | Chi non ti vede non ti pretia. | |
| | Old Mantuan, old Mantuan! who understandeth thee | |
| | not, loves thee not. Ut, re, sol, la, mi, fa. | |
| | Under pardon, sir, what are the contents? or rather, | 105 |
| | as Horace says in his--What, my soul, verses? | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Ay, sir, and very learned. | |
| HOLOFERNES | Let me hear a staff, a stanze, a verse; lege, domine. | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Reads | |
| | If love make me forsworn, how shall I swear to love? | |
| | Ah, never faith could hold, if not to beauty vow'd! | 110 |
| | Though to myself forsworn, to thee I'll faithful prove: | |
| | Those thoughts to me were oaks, to thee like | |
| | osiers bow'd. | |
| | Study his bias leaves and makes his book thine eyes, | |
| | Where all those pleasures live that art would | 115 |
| | comprehend: | |
| | If knowledge be the mark, to know thee shall suffice; | |
| | Well learned is that tongue that well can thee commend, | |
| | All ignorant that soul that sees thee without wonder; | |
| | Which is to me some praise that I thy parts admire: | 120 |
| | Thy eye Jove's lightning bears, thy voice his dreadful thunder, | |
| | Which not to anger bent, is music and sweet fire. | |
| | Celestial as thou art, O, pardon, love, this wrong, | |
| | That sings heaven's praise with such an earthly tongue. | |
| HOLOFERNES | You find not the apostraphas, and so miss the | 125 |
| | accent: let me supervise the canzonet. Here are | |
| | only numbers ratified; but, for the elegancy, | |
| | facility, and golden cadence of poesy, caret. | |
| | Ovidius Naso was the man: and why, indeed, Naso, | |
| | but for smelling out the odouriferous flowers of | 130 |
| | fancy, the jerks of invention? Imitari is nothing: | |
| | so doth the hound his master, the ape his keeper, | |
| | the tired horse his rider. But, damosella virgin, | |
| | was this directed to you? | |
| JAQUENETTA | Ay, sir, from one Monsieur Biron, one of the strange | 135 |
| | queen's lords. | |
| HOLOFERNES | I will overglance the superscript: 'To the | |
| | snow-white hand of the most beauteous Lady | |
| | Rosaline.' I will look again on the intellect of | |
| | the letter, for the nomination of the party writing | 140 |
| | to the person written unto: 'Your ladyship's in all | |
| | desired employment, BIRON.' Sir Nathaniel, this | |
| | Biron is one of the votaries with the king; and here | |
| | he hath framed a letter to a sequent of the stranger | |
| | queen's, which accidentally, or by the way of | 145 |
| | progression, hath miscarried. Trip and go, my | |
| | sweet; deliver this paper into the royal hand of the | |
| | king: it may concern much. Stay not thy | |
| | compliment; I forgive thy duty; adieu. | |
| JAQUENETTA | Good Costard, go with me. Sir, God save your life! | 150 |
| COSTARD | Have with thee, my girl. | |
| | Exeunt COSTARD and JAQUENETTA. | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Sir, you have done this in the fear of God, very | |
| | religiously; and, as a certain father saith,-- | |
| HOLOFERNES | Sir tell me not of the father; I do fear colourable | |
| | colours. But to return to the verses: did they | 155 |
| | please you, Sir Nathaniel? | |
| SIR NATHANIEL | Marvellous well for the pen. | |
| HOLOFERNES | I do dine to-day at the father's of a certain pupil | |
| | of mine; where, if, before repast, it shall please | |
| | you to gratify the table with a grace, I will, on my | 160 |
| | privilege I have with the parents of the foresaid | |
| | child or pupil, undertake your ben venuto; where I | |
| | will prove those verses to be very unlearned, | |
| | neither savouring of poetry, wit, nor invention: I | |
| | beseech your society. | 165 |
| SIR NATHANIEL | And thank you too; for society, saith the text, is | |
| | the happiness of life. | |
| HOLOFERNES | And, certes, the text most infallibly concludes it. | |
| | To DULL | |
| | Sir, I do invite you too; you shall not | |
| | say me nay: pauca verba. Away! the gentles are at | 170 |
| | their game, and we will to our recreation. | |
| | Exeunt | |
