:59:03
I deed, I was their tutor
to instruct them.
:59:07
Ah, that codding spirit
had they from their mother.
:59:11
That bloody mind,
I think, they learned of me.
:59:16
Oh!
:59:17
Let my deeds be witness of my worth.
:59:20
I trained thy brethren
to that guileful hole
:59:23
where the dead corpse
of Bassianus lay.
:59:26
I wrote the letter
that thy father found
:59:28
and hid the bag of gold
beneath the tree.
:59:31
I played the cheater
for thy father's hand,
:59:34
and when I had it,
drew myself apart
:59:37
and almost broke my heart
with extreme laughter.
:59:40
And when I told the empress
of this sport,
:59:43
she swooned almost
at my pleasing tale,
:59:46
and for my tidings
gave me twenty kisses.
:59:49
What?
:59:52
Canst thou say all this
and never blush?
:59:55
Ay, like a black dog,
as the saying is.
1:00:06
Art thou not sorry
for these heinous deeds?
1:00:09
Ay...
1:00:11
that I had not done
a thousand more.
1:00:17
Even now, I curse the day--
1:00:20
and yet, I think, few come
within the compass of my curse--
1:00:25
wherein I did not
some notorious ill as kill a man
1:00:28
or else devise his death;
1:00:30
ravish a maid
or plot the way to do it;
1:00:33
accuse some innocent
and forswear myself;
1:00:36
make poor men's cattle
break their necks;
1:00:40
set fire on barns
and haystacks in the night
1:00:43
and bid the owners quench them
with their tears.
1:00:46
Oft have I digged up dead men
from their graves
1:00:50
and set them upright
at their dear friends' doors,
1:00:53
even when their sorrows
almost was forgot.
1:00:56
And on their skins,
as on the barks of trees,