Mal. And how doth thy old lord, that hath wit enough to be a flatterer, and conscience enough to be a knave?
Pass. O, excellent: he keeps beside me fifteen jesters, to instruct him in the art of fooling, and utters their jests in private to the duke and duchess: he’ll lie like to your Switzer or lawyer; he’ll be of any side for most money. 50
Mal. I am in haste, be brief.
Pass. As your fiddler when he is paid.—He’ll thrive, I warrant you, while your young courtier stands like Good-Friday in Lent; men long to see it, because more fatting days come after it; else he’s the leanest and pitifullest actor in the whole pageant. Adieu, Malevole.
Mal. [Aside.] O world most vile, when thy loose vanities,
Taught by this fool, do make the fool seem wise!
Pass. You’ll know me again, Malevole.
Mal. O, ay, by that velvet. 60
Pass. Ay, as a pettifogger by his buckram bag. I am as common in the court as an hostess’s lips in the country; knights, and clowns, and knaves, and all share me: the court cannot possibly be without me. Adieu, Malevole.
[Exeunt.
[398] This scene was added in ed. 2.