ver to come in my sight again; for, if one thing were not, I would have
your legs and arms cut off. Well, said he, that were all one to me, to
want both legs and arms, provided you and I had but one merry bout together
at the brangle-buttock game; for herewithin is--in showing her his long
codpiece--Master John Thursday, who will play you such an antic that you
shall feel the sweetness thereof even to the very marrow of your bones. He
is a gallant, and doth so well know how to find out all the corners,
creeks, and ingrained inmates in your carnal trap, that after him there
needs no broom, he'll sweep so well before, and leave nothing to his
followers to work upon. Whereunto the lady answered, Go, villain, go. If
you speak to me one such word more, I will cry out and make you to be
knocked down with blows. Ha, said he, you are not so bad as you say--no,
or else I am deceived in your physiognomy. For sooner shall the earth
mount up unto the heavens, and the highest heavens descend unto the hells,
and all the course of nature be quite perverted, than that in so great
beauty and neatness as in you is there should be one drop of gall or
malice. They say, indeed, that hardly shall a man ever see a fair woman
that is not also stubborn. Yet that is spoke only of those vulgar
beauties; but yours is so excellent, so singular, and so heavenly, that I
believe nature hath given it you as a paragon and masterpiece of her art,
to make us know what she can do when she will employ all her skill and all
her power. There is nothing in you but honey, but sugar, but a sweet and
celestial manna. To you it was to whom Paris ought to have adjudged the
golden apple, not to Venus, no, nor to Juno, nor to Minerva, for never was
there so much magnificence in Juno, so much wisdom in Minerva, nor so much
comeliness in Venus as there is in you. O heavenly gods and goddesses!
How happy shall that man be to whom you will grant the favour to embrace
her, to kiss her, and to rub his bacon with hers! By G--, that shall be I,
I know it well; for she loves me already her bellyful, I am sure of it, and
so was I predestinated to it by the fairies. And therefore, that we lose
no time, put on, thrust out your gammons!--and would have embraced her, but
she made as if she would put out her head at the window to call her
neighbours for help. Then Panurge on a sudden ran out, and in his running
away said, Madam, stay here till I come again; I will go call