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SUMMARY
The Servant Launce, again with dog in tow,
again complains of the creature's insensitivity.
When a man's servant shall play the
cur with him, look you, it goes hard; one that
I brought up of a puppy; one that I saved from
drowning, when three or four of his blind bro
thers and sisters went to it. I have taught him,
even as one would say precisely, 'Thus would I
teach a dog.' I was sent to deliver him as a
present to Mistress Silvia from my master, and
I came no sooner into the dining-chamber but
he steps me to her trencher and steals her
capon's leg. O! 'tis a foul thing when a cur
cannot keep himself in all companies. I would
have, as one should say, one that takes upon
him to be a dog indeed, to be, as it were, a dog
at all things. If I had not had more wit than
he, to take a fault upon me that he did, I think
verily he had been hanged for't: sure as I live,
he had suffered for't: you shall judge. He thrusts
me himself into the company of three or four
gentleman like dogs under the duke's table: he
had not been there, bless the mark, a pissing while,
but all the chamber smelt him. 'Out with
the dog!' says one; 'What cur is that?' says
another; 'Whip him out,' says the third; 'Hang
him up,' says the duke. I, having been acquainted
with the smell before, knew it was Crab, and
goes me to the fellow that whips the dogs:
'Friend,' quoth I, 'you mean to whip the dog?'
'Ay, marry, do I,' quoth he. 'You do him the
more wrong,' quoth I; ' 'twas I did the thing you
wot of.' He makes me no more ado, but whips
me out of the chamber. How many masters
would do this for his servant? Nay, I'll be
sworn, I have sat in the stocks for puddings he
hath stolen, otherwise he had been executed;
I have stood on the pillory for geese he hath
killed, otherwise he had suffered for't; thou
thinkest not of this now. Nay, I remember the
trick you served me when I took my leave of
Madam Silvia: did not I bid thee still mark me
and do as I do? When didst thou see me heave
up my leg and make water against a gentle-
woman's farthingale? Didst thou ever see me
do such a trick?