I promise you,
that many a pretty fellow has been mortally wounded with a quibble or
a carwitchet at the Mermaid, and sent from thence, in a pitiable
estate, to Wit's hospital in the Vintry, where they languish to this
day amongst fools and aldermen."
"It may be so," said Lord Nigel; "yet I could swear by my honour, that
last night I seemed to be in company with more than one man whose
genius and learning ought either to have placed him higher in our
company, or to have withdrawn him altogether from a scene, where,
sooth to speak, his part seemed unworthily subordinate."
"Now, out upon your tender conscience," said Lord Dalgarno; "and the
fico for such outcasts of Parnassus! Why, these are the very leavings
of that noble banquet of pickled herrings and Rhenish, which lost
London so many of her principal witmongers and bards of misrule. What
would you have said had you seen Nash or Green, when you interest
yourself about the poor mimes you supped with last night? Suffice it,
they had their drench and their doze, and they drank and slept as much
as may save them from any necessity of eating till evening, when, if
they are industrious, they will find patrons or players to feed them.
[Footnote: The condition of men of wit and talents was never more
melancholy than about this period. Their lives were so irregular, and
their means of living so precarious, that they were alternately
rioting in debauchery, or encountering and struggling with the meanest
necessities.
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