Peas. A word before you go--Take warning by me--avoid that same
serpent, wisdom--Pray to the Saints to make you a blockhead--Never
send your boys to school--For Heaven knows, a poor man that will
live honest, and die in his bed, ought to have no more scholarship
than a parson, and no more brains than your jackass.
SCENE VII
The Gateway of a Castle. Elizabeth and her suite standing at the
top of a flight of steps. Mob below.
Peas. Bread! Bread! Bread! give us bread; we perish.
1st Voice. Ay, give, give, give! God knows, we're long past
earning.
2d Voice. Our skeleton children lie along in the roads--
3d Voice. Our sheep drop dead about the frozen leas--
4th Voice. Our harness and our shoes are boiled for food--
Old Man's Voice. Starved, withered, autumn hay that thanks the
scythe!
Send out your swordsmen, mow the dry bents down,
And make this long death short--we'll never struggle.
All. Bread! Bread!
Eliz. Ay, bread--Where is it, knights and servants?
Why butler, seneschal, this food forthcomes not!
Butler. Alas, we've eaten all ourselves: heaven knows
The pages broke the buttery hatches down--
The boys were starved almost.
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