of a cheese-paring: when a' was naked, he was, for all the world, like a forked radish, with a head fantastically carved upon it with a knife: a' was so forlorn, that his dimensions to any thick sight were invincible: a' was the very genius of famine; yet lecherous as a monkey, and the whores called him mandrake: a' came ever in the rearward of the fashion, and sung those tunes to the overscutched huswives that he heard the carmen whistle, and swear they were his fancies or his good-nights. And now is this Vice's dagger become a squire, and talks as familiarly of John a Gaunt as if he had been sworn brother to him; and I'll be sworn a' ne'er saw him but once in the Tilt-yard; and then he burst his head for crowding among the marshal's men. I saw it, and told John a Gaunt he beat his own name; for you might have thrust him and all his apparel into an eel-skin; the case of a treble hautboy was a mansion for him, a court: and now has he land and beefs. Well, I'll be acquainted with him, if I return; and it shall go hard but I will make him a philosopher's two stones to me: if the young dace be a bait for the old pike, I see no reason in the law of nature but I may snap at him. Let time shape, and there an end. What is this forest call'd? 'Tis Gaultree Forest, an't shall please your grace. Here stand, my lords; and send discoverers forth To know the numbers of our enemies. We have sent forth already. 'Tis well done. My friends and brethren in these great affairs, I must acquaint you that I have received New-dated letters from Northumberland; Their cold intent, tenor and substance, thus: Here doth he wish his person, with such powers As might hold sortance with his quality, The which he could not levy; whereupon He is retired, to ripe his growing fortunes, To Scotland: and concludes in hearty prayers That your attempts may overlive the hazard And fearful melting of their opposite. Thus do the hopes we have in him touch ground And dash themselves to pieces. Now, what news? West of this forest, scarcely off a mile, In goodly form comes on the enemy; And, by the ground they hide, I judge their number Upon or near the rate of thirty thousand. The just proportion that we gave them out Let us sway on and face them in the field. What well-appointed leader fronts us here? I think it is my