Certie, we were in luck,
Or both our noses would have been snapped off
By those two she-dragons; how their sainthoods squealed
To see a brace of beards peep in! Poor child!
Two sweet companions for her loneliness!
C. Pama. But ah! what lodging! 'Tis at that my heart bleeds!
That hut, whose rough and smoke-embrowned spars
Dip to the cold clay floor on either side!
Her seats bare deal!--her only furniture
Some earthen crock or two! Why, sir, a dungeon
Were scarce more frightful: such a choice must argue
Aberrant senses, or degenerate blood!
C. Wal. What? Were things foul?
C. Pama. I marked not, sir.
C. Wal. I did.
You might have eat your dinner off the floor.
C. Pama. Off any spot, sir, which a princess' foot
Had hallowed by its touch.
C. Wal. Most courtierly.
Keep, keep those sweet saws for the lady's self.
[Aside] Unless that shock of the nerves shall send them flying.
C. Pama. Yet whence this depth of poverty? I thought
You and her champions had recovered for her
Her lands and titles.
C. Wal. Ay; that coward Henry
Gave them all back as lightly as he took them:
Certie, we were four gentle applicants--
And Rudolph told him some unwelcome truths--
Would God that all of us might hear our sins,
As Henry heard that day!
C.
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