MRS ART. Was he not at my father-in-law's?
PIP. Yes, marry, was he.
MRS ART. Didst thou not entreat him to come home?
PIP. How should I, mistress? he came not there to-day.
MRS ART. Didst thou not say he was there?
PIP. True, mistress, he was there? but I did not tell ye when; he hath been there divers times, but not of late.
MRS ART. About your business! here I'll sit and wait
His coming home, though it be ne'er so late.
Now once again go look him at the 'Change,
Or at the church with Sir Aminadab.
'Tis told me they use often conference;
When that is done, get you to school again.
PIP. I had rather play the truant at home, than go seek my master at school: let me see, what age am I? some four and twenty, and how have I profited? I was five years learning to crish cross[16] from great A, and five years longer coming to F; there I stuck some three years, before I could come to Q; and so, in process of time, I came to e per se e, and com per se, and tittle; then I got to a, e, i, o, u; after, to Our Father; and, in the sixteenth year of my age, and the fifteenth of my going to school, I am in good time gotten to a noun, By the same token there my hose went down; Then I got to a verb, There I began first to have a beard; Then I came to iste, ista, istud, There my master whipped me till he fetched the blood, And so forth: so that now I am become the greatest scholar in the school, for I am bigger than two or three of them. But I am gone; farewell, mistress!
[Exit.