Journeys Through Bookland Volume Viii Part 34

SCENE I.--_Another part of the Island._

_Enter ALONSO, SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, GONZALO, ADRIAN, FRANCISCO, and Others._

_GONZALO speaks._

Beseech you, sir, be merry: you have cause-- So have we all--of joy; for our escape Is much beyond our loss. Our hint of woe Is common; every day some sailor's wife, The master of some merchant,[394-1] and the merchant, Have just our theme of woe: but for the miracle-- I mean our preservation--few in millions Can speak like us: then wisely, good sir, weigh Our sorrow with our comfort.

_Alon._ Pr'ythee, peace.

_Sebas._ He receives comfort like cold porridge.

_Anto._ The visitor[395-2] will not give him o'er so.

_Sebas._ Look, he's winding up the watch of his wit; by-and-by it will strike.

_Gonza._ Sir,--

_Sebas._ One:--tell.[395-3]

_Gonza._--When every grief is entertained that's offer'd, Comes to the entertainer--

_Sebas._ A dollar.

_Gonza._ Dolour[395-4] comes to him, indeed; you have spoken truer than you purposed.

_Sebas._ You have taken it wiselier than I meant you should.

_Gonza._ Therefore, my lord,--

_Anto._ Fie, what a spendthrift is he of his tongue!

_Alon._ I pr'ythee, spare me.

_Gonza._ Well, I have done: but yet--

_Sebas._ He will be talking.

_Anto._ Which, of he or Adrian,[395-5] for a good wager, first begins to crow?

_Sebas._ The old c.o.c.k.[395-6]

_Anto._ The c.o.c.kerel.

_Sebas._ Done! The wager?

_Anto._ A laughter.

_Sebas._ A match![395-7]

_Adri._ Though this island seem to be desert,--

_Sebas._ Ha, ha, ha!--So, you're paid.[396-8]

_Adri._--uninhabitable, and almost inaccessible,--

_Sebas._ Yet--

_Adri._--yet--

_Anto._ He could not miss't.

_Adri._--it must needs be of subtle, tender, and delicate temperance.[396-9]

_Anto._ Temperance was a delicate wench.[396-10]

_Sebas._ Ay, and a subtle; as he most learnedly delivered.

_Adri._ The air breathes upon us here most sweetly.

_Sebas._ As if it had lungs, and rotten ones.

_Anto._ Or as 'twere perfumed by a fen.

_Gonza._ Here is everything advantageous to life.

_Anto._ True; save means to live.

_Sebas._ Of that there's none, or little.

_Gonza._ How lush[396-11] and l.u.s.ty the gra.s.s looks! how green!

_Anto._ The ground, indeed, is tawny.

_Sebas._ With an eye[396-12] of green in't.

_Anto._ He misses not much.

_Sebas._ No: he doth but mistake the truth totally.

_Gonza._ But the rarity of it is,--which is indeed almost beyond credit,--

_Sebas._ As many vouch'd rarities are.

_Gonza._--that our garments, being, as they were, drenched in the sea, are now as fresh as when we put them on first in Afric, at the marriage of the King's fair daughter Claribel to the King of Tunis.

_Sebas._ 'Twas a sweet marriage, and we prosper well in our return.

_Adri._ Tunis was never graced before with such a paragon to[397-13]

their Queen.