“‘Well, then, give me the one nearest you, and take the other.’
“‘Yes, brother, yes,’ said the girl; and taking the cakes, she flung them into the air two or three times, catching them as they fell, and singing the while. ‘Pretty brother, grey-haired brother—here, brother,’ said she, ‘here is your cake, this other is mine. . . .’”
I cannot afford to quote the whole passage, but it is at once as real and as phantasmal as the witch scene in “Macbeth.” He eats the poisoned cake and lies deadly sick. Mrs. Herne and Leonora came to see the effect of the poison:
“‘Ha, ha! bebee, and here he lies, poisoned like a hog.’
“‘You have taken drows, sir,’ said Mrs. Herne; ‘do you hear, sir? drows; tip him a stave, child, of the song of poison.’
“And thereupon the girl clapped her hands, and sang—
“The Rommany churl
And the Rommany girl
To-morrow shall hie
To poison the sty,
And bewitch on the mead
The farmer’s steed.”
“‘Do you hear that, sir?’ said Mrs. Herne; ‘the child has tipped you a stave of the song of poison: that is, she has sung it Christianly, though perhaps you would like to hear it Romanly; you were always fond of what was Roman. Tip it him Romanly, child.’”
It is not much use to remark on “the uncolloquial vocabulary of the speakers.” Iago’s vocabulary is not colloquial when he says:
“Not poppy nor mandragora
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
That thou ow’dst yesterday.”