Page 881 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

Thine, as he vowed to thee in thine ear,
Parolles.

BERTRAM
He shall be whipped through the army, with [225] this rhyme in’s forehead.

SECOND LORD
This is your devoted friend, sir, the manifold linguist, and the armipotent
soldier.

BERTRAM
I could endure anything before but a cat, and now he’s a cat to me. [230]

FIRST SOLDIER
I perceive, sir, by the General’s looks, we shall be fain to hang you.

PAROLLES
My life, sir, in any case! Not that I am afraid to die, but that, my offences
being many, I would repent out the remainder of nature. Let me live, sir, in a
dungeon, [235] i’th’stocks, or anywhere, so I may live.

FIRST SOLDIER
We’ll see what may be done, so you confess freely. Therefore once more to

this Captain Dumaine: you have answered to his reputation with the Duke
and to his valour; what is his honesty? [240]

PAROLLES
He will steal, sir, an egg out of a cloister. For rapes and ravishments he
parallels Nessus. He professes not keeping of oaths; in breaking ‘em he is
stronger than Hercules. He will lie, sir, with such volubility that you would

think truth were a fool. Drunkenness is his best [245] virtue, for he will be
swine-drunk, and in his sleep he does little harm, save to his bedclothes
about him; but they know his conditions and lay him in straw. I have but little

more to say, sir, of his honesty: he has everything that an honest man should
not have; what an [250] honest man should have, he has nothing.

FIRST LORD