Sub.Since, by my means, translated suburb-captain.
Face.By your means, doctor dog!
Sub.Within man's memory,
All this I speak of.
Face.Why, I pray you, have I
Been countenanced by you, or you by me?
Do but collect, sir, where I met you first.
Sub.I do not hear well.[1]
Face.Not of this, I think it.
But I shall put you in mind, sir;—at Pie-corner,
Taking your meal of steam in, from cooks' stalls,
Where, like the father of hunger, you did walk
Piteously costive, with your pinch'd-horn-nose,
And your complexion of the Roman wash,
Stuck full of black and melancholic worms,
Like powder corns shot at the artillery-yard.
Sub.I wish you could advance your voice a little.[2]
Face.When you went pinn'd up in the several rags
You had raked and pick'd from dunghills, before day;
Your feet in mouldy slippers, for your kibes;
A felt of rug, and a thin threaden cloke,
That scarce would cover your no buttocks———
Sub.So, sir!
- ↑ Sub. I do not hear well.
Face. Not of this, I think it.] A pleasant pun on the Latin sense of hear well, to be well reputed. Just below, there is an allusion, equally facetious, to the Aureli, pater esuritionum of Catullus. - ↑ I wish you could advance your voice a little.] i.e. speak louder. Face, who is the servant of the house, is afraid of being overheard by the neighbours, and therefore persists in speaking low, till he is completely roused by the sarcasms of Subtle. There is not a scene in any comedy in the English language, which, for genuine spirit and humour, and a close observance of nature, can pretend to vie with this.
