I don't understand how to behave in the company of ladies. Madam, in the course of my life I have seen more women than you have sparrows. Three times have I fought duels for women, twelve I jilted and nine jilted me. There was a time when I played the fool, used honeyed language, bowed and scraped. I loved, suffered, sighed to the moon, melted in love's torments. I loved passionately, I loved to madness, loved in every key, chattered like a magpie on emancipation, sacrificed half my fortune in the tender passion, until now the devil knows

The story is worth hearing. Listen! From here I rushed straight to the Senate, right in the track of this man; he was already letting loose the storm, unchaining the lightning, crushing the Knights beneath huge mountains of calumnies heaped together and having all the air of truth; he called you conspirators and his lies caught root like weeds in every mind; dark were the looks on every side and brows were knitted. When I saw that the Senate listened to him favourably and was being tricked by his imposture

[Discovered in his counting house, With heaps of gold before him.] So that of thus much that return was made; And of the third part of the Persian ships There was the venture summ'd and satisfied. As for those Samnites, and the men of Uz, That brought my Spanish oils and wines of Greece, Here have I purs'd their paltry silverlings. Fie, what a trouble 'tis to count this trash! Well fare the Arabians, who so richly pay The things they traffic for with wedge of gold, Whereof a man may easily in a day Tell that which may maintain him

Listen, when I set off to come here, I mean here in the large sense, to this town, ten days ago, I made up my mind, of course, to assume a character. It would have been best to have done without anything, to have kept one's own character, wouldn't it? There is no better dodge than one's

It ain't the lecturing I mind. I'll lecture them blue in the face, I will, and not turn a hair. It's making a gentleman of me that I object to. Who asked him to make a gentleman of me? I was happy. I was free. I touched pretty nigh everybody for money when I wanted it, same as I touched you, Enry Iggins. Now I am worried; tied neck and heels; and everybody touches me for money. It's a fine thing for you, says my solicitor. Is it? says I. You mean it's a good thing

No, maam; marriage didn't come natural. My wife had to break me into it. It came natural to her: she's what you might call a regular old hen. Always wants to have her family within sight of her. Wouldn't go to bed unless she knew they was all safe at home and the door locked, and the lights out. Always wants her luggage in the carriage with her. Always goes and makes the engine driver promise her to be careful. She's a born wife and mother, maam. That's why my children all ran away from home. I

You won't misunderstand me, dear. I'm old enough to be your grandfather. [Very seriously.] Take care how you choose your partner for life. You'll have a wide choice, and all your future happiness, and the happiness of many generations to come, will depend on the one moment when you say "Yes" to one of the scores of young fellows who'll ask you to be his wife. Take care! Look him thoroughly up and down! Be sure that he has a good full open eye that can look you straight in the face; and be sure that the whites

Such a queer dream, King-Post, I never had. You know the old man's ivory leg, well I dreamed he kicked me with it; and when I tried to kick back, upon my soul, my little man, I kicked my leg right off! And then, presto! Ahab seemed a pyramid, and I, like a blazing fool, kept kicking at it. But what was still more curious, Flask--you know how curious all dreams are--through all this rage that I was in, I somehow seemed to be thinking to myself, that after

I was never served so before without giving a hard blow for it. It's very queer. Stop, Stubb; somehow, now, I don't well know whether to go back and strike him, or--what's that?--down here on my knees and pray for him? Yes, that was the thought coming up in me; but it would be the first time I ever DID pray. It's queer; very queer; and he's queer too; aye, take him fore and aft, he's about the queerest old man Stubb ever sailed with. How he flashed at me!--his

She has no discrimination. She takes to all the animals--all of them! She thinks they are all treasures, every new one is welcome. When the brontosaurus came striding into camp, she regarded it as an acquisition, I considered it a calamity; that is a good sample of the lack of harmony

This new creature with the long hair is a good deal in the way. It is always hanging around and following me about. I don't like this; I am not used to company. I wish it would stay with the other animals. I get no chance to name anything myself. The new creature names everything

Wait, Nancy, wait--let me finish--I've been secretly bailing and fuming with this grand inspiration for weeks, and I must talk or I'll burst! I haven't whispered to a soul--not a word--have had my countenance under lock and key, for fear it might drop something that would tell even these animals

Are you not ashamed, gentlemen, to have shown so little prudence for people of your age, and to have quarrelled like two young madcaps? Do you not see What harm such disputes do us in the world, and is it not enough that learned men should see the want of agreement and difference

If we take fifty-two from sixty-four, we get twelve; five years you spent in Holland, seventeen; seven years spent in England, twenty-four; eight years in Rome, thirty-two; and if to thirty-two we add your age when we first became acquainted, we have exactly fifty-two. So that, Mr. Sganarelle, according to

If you knew the man as I do, you would find it no hard matter to believe. I have no proof as yet. You know that I was ordered to start before him, and we have had no talk together since his arrival; but it is as a kind of warning that I tell you, inter nos, that you see

No, I tell you; they made a doctor of me in spite of myself. I had never dreamt of being so learned as that, and all my studies came to an end in the lowest form. I can't imagine what put that whim into their heads; but when I saw that they were resolved to force me to be a

What! would you have a man bind himself to the first girl he falls in love with, say farewell to the world for her sake, and have no eyes for anyone else? A fine thing, to be sure, to pride oneself upon the false honour of being faithful, to lose oneself in one passion for ever,

Who goes there? [Listens] My fear increases every minute! Gentlemen, you see in me a friend of the whole world. Ah! what boldness in me to walk about at this time of the night! My master, all covered with glory as he is, plays me here but a wretched trick. What! if he had any

Ah, yes, yes, there's nothing in the world like love, no bloom like its bloom; not a thing can you mention that has more flavour and more savour. Upon my soul, it's most surprising that cooks, with all their use of spices, don't use this one spice that excels them all. Why, when you spice a dish with love it'll tickle every palate, I do believe. Not a thing can be either salt or sweet without a dash of love: it will turn gall, bitter thought it be, to honey--an old curmudgeon to a [self-consciously] pleasing

I do believe it was Love that first devised the torturer's profession here on earth. It's my own experience--no need to look further--that makes me think so, for in torment of soul no man rivals me, comes near me. I'm tossed around, bandied about, goaded, whirled on the wheel of love, done to death, poor wretch that I am! I'm torn, torn asunder, disrupted, dismembered--yes, all my mental faculties are befogged! Where I am, there I am not; where I am not, there my soul is--yes, I am in a thousand moods! The thing that pleases me

 If you weren't mean, if you weren't stupid, if you weren't a violent virago, what you see displeases your husband would be displeasing to you, too. Now mark my words, if you act like this toward me after today, you shall hie yourself home to your father as a divorcee. Why, whenever

Here's neither bush nor shrub to bear off any weather at all, and another storm brewing: I hear it sing i' th' wind. Yond same black cloud, yond huge one, looks like a foul bombard that would shed his liquor. If it should thunder as it did before, I know not where to hide my head. Yond same cloud cannot choose but fall by pailfuls. What have we here? a man or a fish? dead or alive? A fish: he smells like a fish; a very ancient and fishlike smell; a kind of not of the

Nay, 'twill be this hour ere I have done weeping. All the kind of the Launces have this very fault. I have received my proportion, like the prodigious son, and am going with Sir Proteus to the Imperial's court. I think Crab, my dog, be the sourest-natured dog that lives. My mother weeping, my father wailing, my sister crying, our maid howling, our cat wringing her hands, and all our house in a great perplexity, yet did not this cruel-hearted cur shed one tear. He is a stone, a very pebble stone, and has no more pity

To leave my Julia, shall I be forsworn; To love fair Silvia, shall I be forsworn; To wrong my friend, I shall be much forsworn; And ev'n that pow'r which gave me first my oath Provokes me to this threefold perjury. Love bade me swear, and Love bids me forswear. O sweet-suggesting Love, if thou hast sinned, Teach me, thy tempted subject, to excuse it. At first I did adore a twinkling star, But now I worship a celestial sun. Unheedful vows may heedfully be broken, And he wants wit that wants resolvFd will To learn his wit t' exchange the

And I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been love's whip, A very beadle to a humorous sigh, A critic, nay, a night-watch constable, A domineering pedant o'er the boy, Than whom no mortal so magnificent. This wimpled, whining, purblind, wayward boy, This signor-junior, giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid, Regent of love-rimes, lord of folded arms, The anointed sovereign of sighs and groans, Liege of all loiterers and malcontents, Dread prince of plackets, king of codpieces, Sole imperator and great general Of trotting paritors -- O my little heart! And I to

As I remember, Adam, it was upon this fashion bequeathed me by will but poor a thousand crowns, and, as thou sayest, charged my brother, on his blessing, to breed me well: and there begins my sadness. My brother Jaques he keeps at school, and report speaks goldenly of his profit: for my part, he keeps me rustically at home, or, to speak more properly, stays me here at home unkept; for call you that keeping for a gentleman of my birth, that differs not from the stalling of an ox? His horses are bred better; for, besides that they

Certainly my conscience will serve me to run from this Jew my master. The fiend is at mine elbow and tempts me, saying to me, 'Gobbo, Launcelot Gobbo, good Launcelot,' or 'good Gobbo,' or 'good Launcelot Gobbo -- use your legs, take the start, run away.' My conscience says, 'No. Take heed, honest Launcelot; take heed, honest Gobbo,' or as aforesaid, 'honest Launcelot Gobbo -- do not run; scorn running with thy heels.' Well, the most courageous fiend bids me pack. 'Fia!' says the fiend; 'away!' says the fiend. 'For

Here's a knocking indeed! If a man were porter of hell-gate, he should have old turning the key. Knock, knock, knock! Who's there, i' the name of Beelzebub? Here's a farmer, that hanged himself on the expectation of plenty: come in time; have napkins enow about you; here you'll sweat for't. Knock, knock! Who's there, in the other devil's name? Faith, here's an equivocator, that could swear in both the scales against either scale; who committed treason enough for God's sake, yet could not equivocate to heaven: O, come in, equivocator. Knock, knock, knock! Who's there? Faith, here's an English tailor come hither, for stealing out of a French

I am known to be a humorous patrician, and one that loves a cup of hot wine with not a drop of allaying Tiber in't; said to be something imperfect in favoring the first complaint; hasty and tinder-like upon too trivial motion; one that converses more with the buttock of the night than with the forehead of the morning. What I think, I utter, and spend my malice in my breath. Meeting two such wealsmen as you are, -- I cannot call you Lycurguses -- if the drink you give

I do much wonder that one man, seeing how much another man is a fool when he dedicates his behaviors to love, will, after he hath laughed at such shallow follies in others, become the argument of his own scorn by failing in love: and such a man is Claudio. I have known when there was no music with him but the drum and the fife; and now had he rather hear the tabour and the pipe: I have known when he would have walked ten mile a-foot to see a good armour; and now will he lie ten

It is not politic in the commonwealth of nature to preserve virginity. Loss of virginity is rational increase, and there was never virgin got till virginity was first lost. That you were made of is metal to make virgins. Virginity by being once lost may be ten times found; by being ever kept is ever lost. 'Tis too cold a companion. Away with't! 'Tis against the rule of nature. To speak on the part of virginity is to accuse your mothers, which is most infallible disobedience. He that hangs himself

Marry, if you would put me to verses or to dance for your sake, Kate, why, you undid me. For the one I have neither words nor measure; and for the other I have no strength in measure, yet a reasonable measure in strength. If I could win a lady at leapfrog, or by vaulting into my saddle with my armor on my back, under the correction of bragging be it spoken, I should quickly leap into a wife. Or if I might buffet for my love, or bound my

My mistress with a monster is in love. Near to her close and consecrated bower, While she was in her dull and sleeping hour, A crew of patches, rude mechanicals, That work for bread upon Athenian stalls, Were met together to rehearse a play, Intended for great Theseus' nuptial day. The shallowest thickskin of that barren sort, Who Pyramus presented in their sport, Forsook his scene and entered in a brake. When I did him at this advantage take, An ass's nole I fixèd on his head. Anon his Thisby

Nay, 'twill be this hour ere I have done weeping; all the kind of the Launces have this very fault. I have received my proportion, like the prodigious son, and am going with Sir Proteus to the Imperial's court. I think Crab, my dog, be the sourest-natured dog that lives: my mother weeping, my father wailing, my sister crying, our maid howling, our cat wringing her hands, and all our house in a great perplexity, yet did not this cruel-hearted cur shed one tear: he is a stone, a very pebble stone, and has no more pity in him than

O, she misused me past the endurance of a block! An oak but with one green leaf on it would have answered her; my very visor began to assume life and scold with her. She told me, not thinking I had been myself, that I was the Prince's jester, that I was duller than a great thaw; huddling jest upon jest with such impossible conveyance upon me that I stood like a man at a mark, with a whole army shooting at me. She speaks poniards, and every word stabs.

O, then I see Queen Mab hath been with you. She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate stone On the forefinger of an alderman, Drawn with a team of little atomies Over men's noses as they lie asleep; Her wagon spokes made of long spinners' legs, The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers; Her traces, of the smallest spider web; Her collars, of the moonshine's wat'ry beams; Her whip, of cricket's bone; the lash, of film; Her wagoner, a small grey-coated gnat,

So sweet a kiss the golden sun gives not To those fresh morning drops upon the rose, As thy eye-beams, when their fresh rays have smote The night of dew that on my cheeks down flows: Nor shines the silver moon one half so bright Through the transparent bosom of the deep, As doth thy face through tears of mine give light; Thou shinest in every tear that I do weep: No drop but as a coach doth carry thee; So ridest thou triumphing in my woe. Do but behold the tears that swell in me, And they thy glory through

Some god direct my judgment! Let me see-- I will survey th' inscriptions back again. What says this leaden casket? 'Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath.' Must give -- for what? for lead! hazard for lead? This casket threatens; men that hazard all Do it in hope of fair advantages. A golden mind stoops not to shows of dross; I'll then nor give nor hazard aught for lead. What says the silver with her virgin hue? 'Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves.'

This can be no trick. The conference was sadly borne; they have the truth of this from Hero; they seem to pity the lady. It seems her affections have their full bent. Love me? Why, it must be requited. I hear how I am censured. They say I will bear myself proudly if I perceive the love come from her. They say too that she will rather die than give any sign of affection. I did never think to marry. I must not seem proud. Happy are they that hear

It was a real bully circus. It was the splendidest sight that ever was when they all come riding in, two and two, a gentleman and lady, side by side, the men just in their drawers and undershirts, and no shoes nor stirrups, and resting their hands on their thighs easy and comfortable--there must a been twenty of them--and every lady with a lovely complexion, and perfectly beautiful, and looking just like a gang of real sure-enough queens, and dressed in clothes that cost millions of dollars, and just

It was Tom's idea--to start up a band of robbers. He made us swear an oath that if anybody that belonged to the band told the secrets, he must have his throat cut, and then have his carcass burnt up and the ashes scattered all around, and his name blotted off of the list with blood and never mentioned again by the gang, but have a curse put on it and be forgot forever. Everybody said it was a real beautiful oath, and asked Tom if he got it

Miss Watson told me to pray every day, and whatever I asked for I would get it. But it warn't so. I tried it. Once I got a fish-line, but no hooks. It warn't any good to me without hooks. I tried for the hooks three or four times, but somehow I couldn't make it work. By and by, one day, I asked Miss Watson to try for me, but she said I was a fool. She never told me why, and I couldn't make it out no way.

Well, if that ain't just like you, Huck Finn. You CAN get up the infant-schooliest ways of going at a thing. Why, hain't you ever read any books at all?--Baron Trenck, nor Casanova, nor Benvenuto Chelleeny, nor Henri IV, nor none of them heroes? Who ever heard of getting a prisoner loose in such an old-maidy way as that? No; the way all the best authorities does is to saw the bed-leg in two, and leave it just so, and swallow the sawdust, so it can't be found, and