Went that Sow backe at that biddyng trowe you?
Backare, quoth Mortimer to his sow: se
Mortimers sow speakth as good latin as he.
Howel takes this from Heywood, in his Old Sawes and Adages: and Philpot introduces it into the Proverbs collected by Camden.
We have but few observations concerning Shakespeare's knowledge of the Spanish tongue. Dr. Grey indeed is willing to suppose that the plot of Romeo and Juliet may be borrowed from a Comedy of Lopes de Vega. But the Spaniard, who was certainly acquainted with Bandello, hath not only changed the Catastrophe, but the names of the Characters. Neither Romeo nor Juliet, neither Montague nor Capulet, appears in this performance: and how came they to the knowledge of Shakespeare?—Nothing is more certain than that he chiefly followed the Translation by Painter from the French of Boisteau, and hence arise the Deviations from Bandello's original Italian. It seems, however, from a passage in Ames's Typographical Antiquities, that Painter was not the only Translator of this popular Story: and it is possible, therefore, that Shakespeare might have other assistance.
In the Induction to the Taming of the Shrew, the Tinker attempts to talk Spanish: and consequently the Author himself was acquainted with it.
Paucas pallabris, let the World slide, Sessa.
But this is a burlesque on Hieronymo; the piece of Bombast that I have mentioned to you before:
What new device have they devised, trow?
Pocas pallabras, &c.——