Perde 4
[Textpart 2]
Why, I’ll so manage it, that you yourself shall wish to be profuse, though I myself should desire you not.
HEGIO
Then you are my master.
ERGASILUS
Yes, and a kindly disposed one. Do you wish me to make you happy?
HEGIO
Certainly I would, rather than miserable.
ERGASILUS
Give me your hand.
ERGASILUS
All the Gods are blessing you.
HEGIO
I don’t feel it so.
ERGASILUS
Why, you are not in a quickset hedgeIn a quickset hedge: Here is a most wretched attempt at wit, which cannot be expressed in a literal translation. Hegio says, Nihil sentio, I don’t feel it. Ergasilus plays upon the resemblance of the verb sentio to sentis and senticetum, a bramble-bush or quickset hedge; and says You don’t feel it so non senis. because you are not in a quickset hedge, in senticeto., therefore you don’t feel it; but order the vessels, in a clean state, to be got for you forthwith in readiness for the sacrifice, and one lamb to be brought here with all haste, a fat one.
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ERGASILUS
That you may offer sacrifice
HEGIO
To which one of the Gods?
ERGASILUS
To myself, i’ faith, for now am I your supreme Jupiter. I likewise am your salvation, your fortune, your life, your delight, your joy.
Do you at once, then, make this Divinity propitious to you by cramming him.
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HEGIO
You seem to me to be hungry.
ERGASILUS
For myself am I hungry, and not for you.
HEGIO
I readily allow of it at your own good will.
ERGASILUS
I believe you; from a boyFrom a boy: An indelicate allusion is covertly intended in this line. you were in the habit—
