Enter Countess and Clown.
COUNTESS.
Come on, sir; I shall now put you to the height of your breeding.
CLOWN.
I will show myself highly fed and lowly taught. I know my business is but to the court.
COUNTESS.
To the court! Why, what place make you special, when you put off that with such contempt? But to the court!
CLOWN.
Truly, madam, if God have lent a man any manners, he may easily put it off at court: he that cannot make a leg, put off’s cap, kiss his hand, and say nothing, has neither leg, hands, lip, nor cap; and indeed such a fellow, to say precisely, were not for the court; but for me, I have an answer will serve all men.
COUNTESS.
Marry, that’s a bountiful answer that fits all questions.
CLOWN.
It is like a barber’s chair, that fits all buttocks—the pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawn-buttock, or any buttock.
COUNTESS.
Will your answer serve fit to all questions?
CLOWN.
As fit as ten groats is for the hand of an attorney, as your French crown for your taffety punk, as Tib’s rush for Tom’s forefinger, as a pancake for Shrove-Tuesday, a morris for May-day, as the nail to his hole, the cuckold to his horn, as a scolding quean to a wrangling knave, as the nun’s lip to the friar’s mouth; nay, as the pudding to his skin.
COUNTESS.
Have you, I say, an answer of such fitness for all questions?