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APEMANTUS
Dost dialogue with thy shadow?
Varro's Servant
I speak not to thee.
APEMANTUS
No,'tis to thyself. [To the Fool] Come away.
Isidore's Servant
There's the fool hangs on your back already.
APEMANTUS
No, thou stand'st single, thou'rt not on him yet.
CAPHIS
Where's the fool now?
APEMANTUS
He last asked the question. Poor rogues, and
usurers' men! bawds between gold and want!
All Servants
What are we, Apemantus?
APEMANTUS
Asses.
All Servants
Why?
APEMANTUS
That you ask me what you are, and do not know
yourselves. Speak to 'em, fool.
Fool
How do you, gentlemen?
All Servants
Gramercies, good fool: how does your mistress?
Fool
She's e'en setting on water to scald such chickens
as you are. Would we could see you at Corinth!
APEMANTUS
Good! gramercy.
Enter Page
Fool
Look you, here comes my mistress' page.
Page
[To the Fool] Why, how now, captain! what do you
in this wise company? How dost thou, Apemantus?
APEMANTUS
Would I had a rod in my mouth, that I might answer
thee profitably.
Page
Prithee, Apemantus, read me the superscription of
these letters: I know not which is which.
APEMANTUS
Canst not read?
Page
No.
APEMANTUS
There will little learning die then, that day thou
art hanged. This is to Lord Timon; this to Alcibiades. Go; thou wast born a bastard, and
thou'lt
die a bawd.
Page
Thou wast whelped a dog, and thou shalt famish a
dog's death. Answer not; I am gone.
Exit
APEMANTUS
E'en so thou outrunnest grace. Fool, I will go with
you to Lord Timon's.
Fool
Will you leave me there?
APEMANTUS
If Timon stay at home. You three serve three usurers?
All Servants
Ay; would they served us!
APEMANTUS
So would I,--as good a trick as ever hangman served thief.
Fool
Are you three usurers' men?
All Servants
Ay, fool.
Fool
I think no usurer but has a fool to his servant: my
mistress is one, and I am her fool. When men come
to borrow of your masters, they approach sadly, and
go away merry; but they enter my mistress' house
merrily, and go away sadly: the reason of this?
Varro's Servant
I could render one.
APEMANTUS
Do it then, that we may account thee a whoremaster
and a knave; which not-withstanding, thou shalt be
no less esteemed.
Varro's Servant
What is a whoremaster, fool?
Fool
A fool in good clothes, and something like thee.
'Tis a spirit: sometime't appears like a lord;
sometime like a lawyer; sometime like a philosopher,
with two stones more than's artificial one: he is
very often like a knight; and, generally, in all
shapes that man goes up and down in from fourscore
to thirteen, this spirit walks in.
Varro's Servant
Thou art not altogether a fool.
Fool
Nor thou altogether a wise man: as much foolery as
I have, so much wit thou lackest.
APEMANTUS
That answer might have become Apemantus.
All Servants
Aside, aside; here comes Lord Timon.
Re-enter TIMON and FLAVIUS
APEMANTUS
Come with me, fool, come.
Fool
I do not always follow lover, elder brother and
woman; sometime the philosopher.
Exeunt APEMANTUS and Fool
FLAVIUS
Pray you, walk near: I'll speak with you anon.
Exeunt Servants
TIMON
You make me marvel: wherefore ere this time
Had you not fully laid my state before me,
That I might so have rated my expense,
As I had leave of means?
FLAVIUS
You would not hear me,
At many leisures I proposed.
TIMON
Go to:
Perchance some single vantages you took.
When my indisposition put you back:
And that unaptness made your minister,
Thus to excuse yourself.
FLAVIUS
O my good lord,
At many times I brought in my accounts,
Laid them before you; you would throw them off,
And say, you found them in mine honesty.
When, for some trifling present, you have bid me
Return so much, I have shook my head and wept;
Yea, 'gainst the authority of manners, pray'd you
To hold your hand more close: I did endure
Not seldom, nor no slight cheques, when I have
Prompted you in the ebb of your estate
And your great flow of debts. My loved lord,
Though you hear now, too late--yet now's a time--
The greatest of your having lacks a half
To pay your present debts.
TIMON
Let all my land be sold.
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