Heath. I'll be thy squire, though I fare no better than Sanch Pancha, and am tossed in a blanket.
Bris. Come, follow me. [Exeunt.
SCENE II.
Enter Nancy Curdwell.
Curd. I have fresh cheese and cream; I have fresh cheese and cream. Heigho! But one suitor yet? Must my sheets lie smooth till I am wrinkled? Nay, then, I see beauty is not a cable-rope, to draw men's hearts after it, nor our mouths a mouse-trap, our tongues a lure, and lips a gin; our hairs are not fishing-lines, nor our noses hooks. These gudgeons will not swallow the bait that hangs there. Nay, we cannot catch these mermen, though our smocks were made of network, and we hung all o'er with looking-glasses. No, no; I see, when these buzzards look after mates, they wink and choose. I think I must have my nose turned into a bill, and write upon it, Here is a house to be let. I am but six-and-twenty years old, and that's young enough to play with a baby. O, how like the picture of Charity should I look with two sucklings at my breast!
Enter Budget, a tinker.
Bud. Have you any work for a tinker? Old brass, old pots, old kettles. I'll mend them all with a tara-tink, and never hurt your metal.—Here she is! Methinks she looks very smug upon me. Now to my 'ration. Most beautiful, fair and virtuous mistress, whose face is a burning-glass, and hath set me on fire. My sugar-plum and stewed-prune lady, whose fine sharp nose, like Cupid's darts, hath pricked me to the heart! Whiter than the curds thou sell'st, softer than the silk thou wearest, milder than the four-shilling beer thou drink'st! Venus, I believe, was a fresh cheese and cream woman, and, letting fall her pail, made the Milky Way, but yet came as far short of thee, my sweet, honey Nancy, as whey of butter-milk or skimmed milk of cream! O, that I were a worm to crawl on that face of thine, or a flea———
Curd. He'd bite me, sure?
Bud. To slip about thy neck. Do not, I pray, tread on me with the foot of disdain, lest thou crush my heart as flat as a pancake.
Curds. Pray, leave off your suit; I have no mind to marry; I'll always live a virgin.