II. THE BABY’S DEBUT. [5a] (continued 2)

Dance, Regan! dance, with Cordelia and Goneril— Down the middle, up again, poussette, and cross; Stop, Cordelia! do not tread upon her heel, Regan feeds on coltsfoot, and kicks like a horse. See, she twists her mutton fists like Molyneux or Beelzebub, And t’other’s clack, who pats her back, is louder far than hell’s hubbub. They tweak my nose, and round it goes—I fear they’ll break the ridge of it, Or leave it all just like Vauxhall, with only half the bridge of it. [103c]

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday, Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

I kill’d the king; my husband is a heavy dunce; He left the grooms unmassacred, then massacred the stud. One loves long gloves; for mittens, like king’s evidence, Let truth with the fingers out, and won’t hide blood.

When spoonys on two knees implore the aid of sorcery, To suit their wicked purposes they quickly put the laws awry; With Adam I in wife may vie, for none could tell the use of her, Except to cheapen golden pippins hawk’d about by Lucifer.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday, Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

Wife, come to life, forgive what your black lover did, Spit the feathers from your mouth, and munch roast beef; Iago he may go and be toss’d in the coverlet That smother’d you, because you pawn’d my handkerchief.

Why, neger, so eager about your rib immaculate? Milwood shows for hanging us they’ve got an ugly knack o’ late; If on beauty ’stead of duty but one peeper bent he sees, Satan waits with Dolly baits to hook in us apprentices.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday, Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

I’m Hamlet in camlet; my ap and peri-helia The moon can fix, which lunatics makes sharp or flat. I stuck by ill luck, enamour’d of Ophelia, Old Polony like a sausage, and exclaim’d, “Rat, rat!”

Let Gertrude sup the poison’d cup—no more I’ll be an actor in Such sorry food, but drink home-brew’d of Whitbread’s manufacturing.

I’ll Polly it, and folly it, and dance it quite the dandy O; But as for tunes, I have but one, and that is Drops of Brandy O.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday, Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!

I’m Juliet Capulet, who took a dose of hellebore— A hell-of-a-bore I found it to put on a pall.

And I am the friar, who so corpulent a belly bore.

And that is why poor skinny I have none at all.

I’m the resurrection-man, of buried bodies amorous.

I’m fagg’d to death, and out of breath, and am for quiet clamorous; For though my paunch is round and stanch, I ne’er begin to feel it ere I Feel that I have no stomach left for entertainment military.

Round let us bound, for this is Punch’s holyday, Glory to Tomfoolery, huzza! huzza!