“Sir shepherd!  I held down my head,
And “Mother!  Fie, for shame!” I said;
   All I could say would not content her;
Mother she would for ever harp on’t,
“A man’s no better than A SARPENT,
   and not A Crumb more INNOCENTER."’

“I know not how it happeneth; but a poet doth open before a poet, albeit of baser sort.  It is not that I hold my poetry to be better than some other in time past, it is because I would shew thee that I was virtuous and wooed virtuously, that I repeat it.  Furthermore, I wished to leave a deep impression on the mother’s mind that she was exceedingly wrong in doubting my innocence.

William Shakspeare.

“Gracious Heaven! and was this too doubted?”

Sir Thomas.

“Maybe not; but the whole race of men, the whole male sex, wanted and found in me a protector.  I shewed her what I was ready to do.”

William Shakspeare.

“Perhaps, sir, it was for that very thing that she put the daughter back and herself forward.”

Sir Thomas.

“I say not so; but thou mayest know as much as befitteth, by what follows:-

“’Worshipful lady! honoured madam! 
I at this present truly glad am
   To have so fair an opportunity
Of saying I would be the man
To bind in wedlock Mistress Anne,
   Living with her in holy unity.

“’And for a jointure I will gi’e her
A good two hundred pounds a year
   Accruing from my landed rents,
Whereof see t’other paper, telling
Lands, copses, and grown woods for felling,
   Capons, and cottage tenements.

“’And who must come at sound of horn,
And who pays but a barley-corn,
   And who is bound to keep a whelp,
And what is brought me for the pound,
And copyholders, which are sound,
   And which do need the leech’s help.

“’And you may see in these two pages
Exact their illnesses and ages,
   Enough (God willing) to content ye;
Who looks full red, who looks full yellow,
Who plies the mullen, who the mallow,
   Who fails at fifty, who at twenty.

“’Jim Yates must go; he’s one day very hot,
And one day ice; I take a heriot;
   And poorly, poorly’s Jacob Burgess. 
The doctor tells me he has pour’d
Into his stomach half his hoard
   Of anthelminticals and purges.

“’Judith, the wife of Ebenezer
Fillpots, won’t have him long to tease her;
   Fillpots blows hot and cold like Jim,
And, sleepless lest the boys should plunder
His orchard, he must soon knock under;
   Death has been looking out for him.

“’He blusters; but his good yard land
Under the church, his ale-house, and
   His Bible, which he cut in spite,
Must all fall in; he stamps and swears
And sets his neighbours by the ears —
   Fillpots, thy saddle sits not tight!’