FIRST MADMAN

God speed the plough: thou shalt not speed me. True, but thou wilt dance in a halter, & I shall not see thee. No, i'm neither fish nor flesh. Dost not see fool! theres a fresh Salmon in't: if you step one foot further, yowl be over shoes, for you see ime over head & ear in the salt-water: & if you fall into this whirl pool where I am, you're drowned: you're a drowned rat.—I am fishing here for five ships, but I cannot have a good draught, for my net breaks still, and breaks, but I'll break some of your necks & I catch you in my clutches. Stay, stay, stay, stay—where the wind, where the wind, where the wind: where the wind: out you gulls, you goose-caps, you gudgeon eaters! do you look for the wind in the heavens? would would would would, no no, look there, look there, look there, the wind is always at that door: hark how it blows, pooff pooff, pooff. Do you laugh at Gods creatures? do you mock old age you rogues? is this grey beard and head counterfeit, that you cry would would would?—Sirrah, art not thou my eldest son? Then th'art a fool, for my eldest son had a pol foot, crooked legs, a vergis face, & a peare-coullourd beard; I made him a scholar, and he made himself a fool.—Sirrah! thou there? hold out thy hand. Look, look, look, look: has he not long nails, and short hair? Such nails had my second boy: kneel down thou varlet, and ask thy father blessing. Such nails had my middlemost son and I made him a Promoter: & he scrapped, & scrapped, & scrapped, till he God the devil and all: but he scrapped thus and thus, & thus, and it went under his legs, till at length a company of Kites taking him for carrion, swept up all, all, all all, all, all, all.—If you love your lives, look to your selves, see, see, see, see, the Turks galleys are fighting with my ships, Bownce goes the guns.—oooh! cry the men: romble romble go the waters—Alas! there! 'tis sunk—'tis sunk: I am un done, I am undone, you are the damned Pirates have undone me,—you are bith Lord, you are, you are, stop em, you are. Tame me? no: isle be madder than a roasted Cat: see, see, I am burned with gum ̄ powder, these are our close fights. Whip me? out you toad:—whip me? what justice is this, to whip me because Ime a beggar?—Alas? I am a poor man: a very poor man: I am starved, and have had no meat by this light, ever since the great sloud, I am a poor man. I, I, pray do, for look you, here be my guts: these are my ribs,—you may look through my ribs,—see how my guts come out—these are my read guts, my very guts, o, o! Tenpenny nail's are they not?