"Take care of thyself, lad," said Shakespeare kindly, stretching out a hand to help his friend draw the cloak closer.
"Behoved me think of that sooner, I doubt," Nashe answered, glancing up with a wry, pathetic smile, yet gratefully. He dropped his eyes to the cloak and quoted—
"Sometime it was of cloth-in-grain,
'Tis now but a sigh-clout, as you may see;
It will hold out neither wind nor rain—
and—and—I thank thee, Will——
But I'll take my old cloak about me.
There's salt in the very warp of it, good Yarmouth salt. Will?"
"Ay, lad?"
"Is't true thou'rt become a landowner, down in thy native shire?"
"In a small way, Tom."