[_Exeunt all_.
_Enter_ Bessus, _And two Sword-men, and a Boy_.
_Bes_.
Y'are very welcome both; some stools boy,
And reach a Table; Gentlemen o'th' Sword,
Pray sit without more complement; be gone child.
I have been curious in the searching of you,
Because I understand you wise and valiant persons.
_1_.
We understand our selves Sir.
_Bes_.
Nay Gentlemen, and dear friends o'th' Sword,
No complement I pray, but to the cause
I hang upon, which in few, is my honour.
_2_.
You cannot hang too much Sir, for your honour,
But to your cause.
_Bes_.
Be wise, and speak truth, my first doubt is,
My beating by my Prince.
_1_.
Stay there a little Sir, do you doubt a beating?
Or have you had a beating by your Prince?
_Bes_.
Gentlemen o'th' Sword, my Prince has beaten me.
_2_.
Brother, what think you of this case?
_1_.
If he has beaten him, the case is clear.
_2_.
If he have beaten him, I grant the case;
But how? we cannot be too subtil in this business,
I say, but how?
_Bes_.
Even with his Royal hand.
_1_.
Was it a blow of love, or indignation?
_Bes_.
'Twas twenty blows of indignation, Gentlemen,
Besides two blows o'th face.
_2_.
Those blows o'th' face have made a new cause on't,
The rest were but an horrible rudeness.
_1_.
Two blows o'th' face, and given by a worse man, I must confess,
as the Sword-men say, had turn'd the business: Mark me brother,
by a worse man; but being by his Prince, had they been ten, and
those ten drawn teeth, besides the hazard of his nose for ever;
all this had been but favours: this is my flat opinion, which
I'le die in.
_2_.
The King may do much Captain, believe it; for had he crackt your
Scull through, like a bottle, or broke a Rib or two with tossing
of you, yet you had lost no honour: This is strange you may
imagine, but this is truth now Captain.
_Bes_.
I will be glad to embrace it Gentlemen;
But how far may he strike me?
_1_.
There is another: a new cause rising from the time and distance,
in which I will deliver my opinion: he may strike, beat, or cause
to be beaten: for these are natural to man: your Prince, I say,
may beat you, so far forth as his dominion reacheth, that's for
the distance; the time, ten miles a day, I take it.
_2_.
Brother, you err, 'tis fifteen miles a day,
His stage is ten, his beatings are fifteen.
_Bes_.
'Tis the longest, but we subjects must--
_1_.
Be subject to it; you are wise and vertuous.
_Bes_.
Obedience ever makes that noble use on't,
To which I dedicate my beaten body;
I must trouble you a little further, Gentlemen o'th' Sword.
_2_.
No trouble at all to us Sir, if we may
Profit your understanding, we are bound
By vertue of our calling to utter our opinions,
Shortly, and discreetly.
_Bes_.
My sorest business is, I have been kick'd.
_2_.
How far Sir?
_Bes_.
Not to flatter my self in it, all over, my sword forc'd but not
lost; for discreetly I rendred it to save that imputation.
_1_.
It shew'd discretion, the best part of valour.
_2_.
Brother, this is a pretty cause, pray ponder on't;
Our friend here has been kick'd.
_1_.
He has so, brother.
_2_.
Sorely he saies: Now, had he set down here
Upon the meer kick, 't had been Cowardly.
_1_.