Sir Thomas.
“There is something in this. Thou mayest have sung about one, nevertheless. Young poets take great liberties with all female kind; not that mermaids are such very unlawful game for them, and there be songs even about worse and staler fish. Mind ye that! Thou hast written songs, and hast sung them, and lewd enough they be, God wot!”
William Shakspeare.
“Pardon me, your worship! they were not mine then. Peradventure the song about the mermaid may have been that ancient one which every boy in most parishes has been singing for many years, and, perhaps, his father before him; and somebody was singing it then, mayhap, to keep up his courage in the night.”
Sir Thomas.
“I never heard it.”
William Shakspeare.
“Nobody would dare to sing in the presence of your worship, unless commanded,—not even the mermaid herself.”
Sir Thomas.
“Canst thou sing it?”