Page 158 - Shakespeare - Vol. 4

FIRST FISHERMAN

What ho, Pilch!

SECOND FISHERMAN
Ha, come and bring away the nets!

FIRST FISHERMAN
What, Patchbreech, I say!

THIRD FISHERMAN
What say you, master? [15]

FIRST FISHERMAN
Look how thou stirrest now! Come away, or I’ll fetch thee with a wanion.

THIRD FISHERMAN
Faith, master, I am thinking of the poor men that were cast away before us

even now.

FIRST FISHERMAN
Alas, poor souls, it grieved my heart to [20] bear what pitiful cries they made
to us to help them, when, well a-day, we could scarce help ourselves.

THIRD FISHERMAN
Nay, master, said not I as much when I saw the porpoise how he bounced
and tumbled? They say they’re half fish, half flesh. A plague on [25] them,

they ne’er come but I look to be washed. Master, I marvel how the fishes live
in the sea?

FIRST FISHERMAN
Why, as men do a-land: the great ones eat up the little ones. I can compare
our rich misers to nothing so fitly as to a whale: ’a plays and [30] tumbles,

driving the poor fry before him, and at last devour them all at a mouthful.
Such whales have I heard on a-th’land who never leave gaping till they
swallowed the whole parish, church, steeple, bells, and all.

PERICLES