Come you hither to me, Master Tapster
Escalus
Come you hither to me, Master Tapster. What’s your
name, Master Tapster?
Pompey
Pompey.
Escalus
What else?
Pompey
Bum, sir.
Does your Worship mean to geld and
splay all the youth of the city?
Escalus
Troth, and your bum is the greatest thing
about you, so that in the beastliest sense you are
Pompey the Great.Allusion Pompey, you are partly a bawd,
Pompey, howsoever you color it in being a tapster,
are you not? Come, tell me true. It shall be the
better for you.
Pompey
Truly, sir, I am a poor fellow that would live.
Escalus
How would you live, Pompey? By being a
bawd? What do you think of the trade, Pompey? Is it
a lawful trade?
Pompey
If the law would allow it, sir.
Escalus
But the law will not allow it, Pompey, nor it
shall not be allowed in Vienna.
Pompey
Does your Worship mean to geld and splay all
the youth of the city?Rhetorical Question, Metaphor, & Hyperbole
Escalus
No, Pompey.
Pompey
Truly, sir, in my poor opinion, they will to ’t
then. If your Worship will take order for the drabs
and the knaves, you need not to fear the bawds.
Escalus
There is pretty orders beginning, I can tell
you. It is but heading and hanging.
Pompey
If you head and hang all that offend that way
but for ten year together, you’ll be glad to give out a
commission for more heads. If this law hold in
Vienna ten year, I’ll rent the fairest house in it after
threepence a bay. If you live to see this come to
pass, say Pompey told you so.
Escalus
Thank you, good Pompey. And in requital of
your prophecy, hark you: I advise you let me not
find you before me again upon any complaint
whatsoever; no, not for dwelling where you do. If I
do, Pompey, I shall beat you to your tent and prove
a shrewd Caesar to you.Allusion In plain dealing, Pompey, I
shall have you whipped. So, for this time, Pompey,
fare you well.
Pompey
I thank your Worship for your good counsel.
Aside. But I shall follow it as the flesh and fortune
shall better determine.Synecdoche
Whip me? No, no, let carman whip his jade.
The valiant heart’s not whipped out of his trade.Synecdoche
He exits.