O. Fos. I have no such fat legacy left me,
To teach me how to play the hypocrite.
Keeper. No? Why, look ye, sir, you shall want neither meat, drink, money, nor anything that the house affords; or if anything abroad like ye, sir, here's money, send for what you will, sir. Nay, you shall beg no more at the grate neither.
O. Fos. Ha! is not this Ludgate?
Keeper. Yes, sir.
O. Fos. A jail, a prison, a tomb of men lock'd up,
Alive and buried?
Keeper. 'Tis what you please to call it.
O. Fos. O, at what crevice, then, hath comfort,
Like a sunbeam, crept in? for all the doors
And windows are of iron, and barr'd to keep
Her out. I had a limb cut from my body
Dear to me as [my] life; I had a son
And brother, too. O grief!
They both would give me poison first in gold,
Before their hollow palms ten drops should hold
Of nature's drink, cold water, but to save
My life one minute: whence should pity come,
When my best friends do beat it from this room?
Keeper. No matter, sir; since you have good meat set before you, never ask who sent it. If heaven provide for you, and make the fowls of the air your caters, feed you fat, and be thankful; and so I leave you. [Exit.
Mrs Fos. The keeper is your friend, and pours true balm
Into your smarting wounds; therefore, dear husband,
Endure the dressing with patience.