Bravo. I tell thee, boy, I do as much surpass Hercules at my rapier as he did me in club-fighting.[324] [I'll have you] draw[325] a register of those men that have been forced by this weak instrument to lay down their lives. I think it has cut more lives than Atropos.
Boy. But pray, sir, were they all your own exploits?
Bravo. Indeed, boy, thou may'st question it; for, and they were to perform again, they would hardly be done. What will this age come to? Where be those stirring humours that were wont to trouble the world? Peace, I think, will o'er-spread them all like a gangrene, and men will die with a lethargy; there's no malice extant, no jealousies, no employment to set wickedness awork! 'tis never a dead time with me but when there's nobody to kill.
Boy. That's a miserable extremity indeed, sir.
Bravo. Leave me, boy, to my meditations. [Exit Boy
Enter Mocinigo.
Well, go thy ways, old Nick Machiavel, there will never be the peer of thee for wholesome policy and good counsel. Thou took'st pains to chalk men out the dark paths and hidden plots of murther and deceit, and no man has the grace to follow thee; the age is unthankful, thy principles are quite forsaken and worn out of memory.
Moc. There's a fellow walks melancholy, and that's commonly a passion apt to entertain any mischief; discontent and honesty seldom harbour together. How scurvily he looks, like one of the devil's factors! I'll tempt him. By your leave, sir.
Bravo. Ha!
Moc. No hurt, good sir; be not so furious, I beseech you.