"Look! he darts on like a greyhound whelp after a leveret. He, sure
enough, it was! I now remember the sorrel mare his father bought of
John Kinderley last Lammas, swift as he threaded the trees along the
park. He must have reached Wellesbourne ere now at that gallop, and
pretty nigh Walton-hill."
SIR THOMAS.
"Merciful Christ! grant the country be rid of him for ever! What
dishonour upon his friends and native town! A reputable wool-
stapler's son turned gipsy and poet for life."
SIR SILAS.
"A Beelzebub; he spake as bigly and fiercely as a soaken yeoman at
an election feast,--this obedient and conducible youth!"
SIR THOMAS.
"It was so written. Hold thy peace, Silas!"
LAUS DEO.
E. B.
POST-SCRIPTUM
BY ME, EPHRAIM BARNETT.
Twelve days are over and gone since William Shakspeare did leave our
parts. And the spinster, Hannah Hathaway, is in sad doleful plight
about him; forasmuch as Master Silas Cough went yesterday unto her,
in her mother's house at Shottery, and did desire both her and her
mother to take heed and be admonished, that if ever she, Hannah,
threw away one thought after the runagate William Shakspeare, he
should swing.
The girl could do nothing but weep; while as the mother did give her
solemn promise that her daughter should never more think about him
all her natural life, reckoning from the moment of this her promise.
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