That ill do company his thin grey hairs.
Soft music heard.
[Exeunt Falstaff, Launce, Mercutio,
Romeo, Nurse and Peter by twos. A
mist arises, and after a little vanishes.
Trinculo. A murrain light on all unsociable folk. They might have bidden us to be of their company, methinks.
Stephano. Why, man, these are but ghosts come from nowhere. By the bones of my dead grandsire, I’ve small mind to turn myself into a ghost even thereby to leave this isle and Caliban’s hard service. But, look you, Prospero’s daughter and her prince are stayed behind; an’ they be not ghosts of the same feather I marvel where they have bestowed themselves on this isle since Prospero forsook it.
Caliban. Will you be ever talking, fool? [beats him] take that,
And make your tongue a prisoner to your teeth.
Stephano runs away, crying out loudly the while.
[Enter the Fool and Lear.
Fool. Good nuncle, here be Christian folk; let’s bide. The night cometh when a rotten thatch, even, is a more comfortable blanket than a skyful of little stars.