SCENE IV.—A monastery near Milan. Night. Enter two monks, Brun, a fat little monk, and Wast, a tall, lean one, with an extremely ugly face.
Brun. How he doth take on, this new Friar Gerbhert. I had not thought a man would lose his appetite for any woman.
Wast. Ah, Brun, you gluttonous men know not of love. Such dangerous passions are beyond thy ken, lacking the attractive, the magnetic, you descend to lower pleasures. Now look on me a victim to woman’s fancy. Within those walls I find a haven from woman’s importunities.
Brun. Verily, Brother, thou must have slain hearts.
Wast. It was my daily sorrow, so many beauties sought me. I could not walk the streets, but I were pestered. It did sorrow me much, I could not pity all the passions I awoke, so fled me here, sacrificing my prospects, my youth, my person, rather than light fires I could not quench. (Eyeing himself in a metal hand-mirror.) Alas, alas, Brun, my beauty falleth off sadly of late.
Brun. Yea, thou hast a haggard cast to thy looks. It wonders me much where all thy provender goeth, it doth thee so little service.
Wast. Ah, Brun, Brun, so many broken hearts, so many tender reminiscences. But thou canst not touch my feelings. Yea, Brun, didst thou but know the former dignity, the port, the carriage of my person; the flash, the majesty of my eye; the symmetry, the moulding of my form; thou wouldst but marvel at this ruin I am.
Brun. I doubt it not old Sucker, but let not thy former beauty fret thy present comliness out o’ countenance.
Wast. Nay Brother, I will so endeavor, but I am ever on the tremble lest some one of those former victims, in cruel desperation maddened, may find me here and seize my person. Brun, wilt thou protect me in such extremity, wilt thou, Brother?