Master Skylark

ored cloak bordered with gold braid. His long hose were the color of his cloak, and his shoes were russet leather, with rosettes of plum, and such high heels as Nic

ad a little pointed beard, and the ends of his mustache were twisted so that they stood up fiercely on either side of his sharp nose. At his side was a long

taken by surpr

led nevertheless. "What! How now?" he cr

nything to say--"why, sir,--" and knowing noth

se legs, that have put on the very gentleman in proud Verona's streets, laid in Stratford's common stocks, like a silly apprentice's slouching heels? Nay, nay; some one should

d by the stranger's wild words and imperi

rned to Nick, "thou art no fool. Why, boy, I say I love thee now for this, since what hath passed in Stratford. A murrain on the town! Dost hear me, boy?--a black murrain

he stranger, sharply. 'Do

at with scorn, "a town like that is it

se. Then all at once he laughed,--a rollicking, merry laugh,--and threw off his furious manner as one does an old coat. "Well, boy," said he, with a quiet smile, looking k

ent from the mad tone in which he had just been

Burbage's mighty tragic style; and I--I am only Gaston Carew, hail-fellow-well-met wit

icholas Attwood

od, and I love thee. So thou art going to Coventry to see the players act? Surely thine is a nimble wit to follow fancy nineteen miles. Come; I am going to Coventry to join my fellows. Wilt thou go with me, Nick, and dine with us this night at the be

wonderful adventure, "indeed I will, and that right gladly, sir." And with heart beati

such great to-do as all that--upon my word, I'm not! A man of some few parts, perhaps, not common in the world; but quite a plain fell

hey went on together, Nick in

Dingles wind irregularly up from the foot-path below to the crest of Welcombe hill, thro

ed a moment at the top to catch

ched away to the blue knolls beyond which lay Oxford and Northamptonshire. The ragged stretches of Snitterfield downs scrambled away to the left; and on the right, beyond Bearley, were the wooded uplands where Guy of Warwick and Hera

a caterpillar on the kingdom of England, a vagabond, and a common player of interludes! Called me vagabond! Me! Why, I have more good licenses than he has wits. And as to Master Bailiff Stubbes, I have permits to play from more justices of the peace than he can shake a stick at in a month

ck, hesitatingly, "that the

"They dared not come to blows--they knew my kind! Yet John Shakspere is no bad sort--he knoweth what is what. But Master Bailiff Stubbes, I

" sai

world rogue. Why, boy," cried the master-player, vehemently, "he thought to buy my tongue! Marry, if tongues were troubles he ha