_Hen. 4. A._ II, ii, 43.
_Fal._ (to Hal.). Go hang thyself in thine own heir-apparent
garters! If I be ta'en, I'll peach for this. An I have not
_ballads made on you all_, and _sung to filthy tunes_, let a
cup of sack be my poison.
Two other worthy knights claim our attention in the next quotation,
which contains many interesting allusions. _Inter alia_; Sir Toby
gives Feste sixpence to sing a song; Sir Andrew follows it up with a
'testril.' The Clown then sings them 'O mistress mine.' [For the
original music see Prof. Bridge's 'Shakespeare Songs,' Novello, a
collection which every reader of Shakespeare ought to have. Price 2s.
6d.] Then, at Sir Toby's suggestion, they all three sing a catch, or,
in his own words, 'draw _three_ souls out of _one_ weaver,' an
allusion to the _three_ vocal parts which are evolved from the _one_
melody of the catch, as well as a sly reference to 'weavers' singing
catches. (See Introduction.) They sing 'Thou knave,' for which see the
Appendix. It is not a good catch, but sounds humorous if done smartly,
and perhaps its very roughness suits the circumstances. Next, after
Maria's entrance, Toby either quotes the titles, or sings odd lines of
four old songs [Appendix]; and when Malvolio comes in, furious with
the noise they are making in the middle of the night, he applies
precisely those epithets to their proceedings that our histories lead
us to expect--_e.g._, 'gabbling like _tinkers_,' '_alehouse_,'
squeaking out your '_cozier's_ catches' ['cozier' is 'cobbler']. Sir
Toby's puns on 'keep time' in ll. 94 and 115 ought not to be missed.
To 'keep time' is almost the only virtue a catch singer _must_ have.
_Tw._ II, iii, 18.
_Sir To._ Welcome, ass. Now _let's have a catch_.
_Sir And._ By my troth, the fool has an _excellent breast_.
I had rather than forty shillings I had such a leg, and so
_sweet a breath to sing_, as the fool has.