PERICLES PRINCE OF TYRE
Page: 14

All that may men approve or men detect!
Peace be at your labour, honest fishermen.

SECOND FISHERMAN.
Honest! good fellow, what's that; If it be a day fits you, search
out of the calendar, and nobody look after it.

PERICLES.
May see the sea hath cast upon your coast.

SECOND FISHERMAN.
What a drunken knave was the sea to cast thee in our way!

PERICLES.
A man whom both the waters and the wind,
In that vast tennis-court, have made the ball
For them to play upon, entreats you pity him;
He asks of you, that never used to beg.

FIRST FISHERMAN.
No, friend, cannot you beg? Here's them in our country of Greece
gets more with begging than we can do with working.

SECOND FISHERMAN.
Canst thou catch any fishes, then?

PERICLES.
I never practised it.

SECOND FISHERMAN.
Nay, then thou wilt starve, sure; for here's nothing to be got
now-a-days, unless thou canst fish for 't.

PERICLES.
What I have been I have forgot to know;
But what I am, want teaches me to think on:
A man throng'd up with cold: my veins are chill,
And have no more of life than may suffice
To give my tongue that heat to ask your help;
Which if you shall refuse, when I am dead,
For that I am a man, pray see me buried.

FIRST FISHERMAN.
Die quoth-a? Now gods forbid! I have a gown here; come, put it
on; keep thee warm. Now, afore me, a handsome fellow! Come,
thou shalt go home, and we'll have flesh for holidays, fish for
fasting-days, and moreo'er puddings and flap-jacks, and thou
shalt be welcome.

PERICLES.
I thank you, sir.

SECOND FISHERMAN.
Hark you, my friend; you said you could not beg.

PERICLES.
I did but crave.

SECOND FISHERMAN.
But crave! Then I'll turn craver too, and so I shall 'scape
whipping.

PERICLES.
Why, are your beggars whipped, then?

SECOND FISHERMAN.
O, not all, my friend, not all; for if all your beggars were
whipped, I would wish no better office than to be beadle.
But, master, I'll go draw up the net.

[Exit with Third Fisherman.]

PERICLES. [Aside.]
How well this honest mirth becomes their 1abour!

FIRST FISHERMAN.
Hark you, sir, do you know where ye are?