Languages & literature > Amphitryon,or, The two Sosias

AMPHITRYON. 69
ran as faft as ever my legs could carry me, to call
1 em : nay you may truft my diligence, in all affairs
belonging to the belly.
Grij>. He has been very faithful to his commif-
lon. I’ll bear him witnefs.
> Jmj>. How can you be witnefs, where you were
Hot prefent ? The balcony ! Sirrah, the balcony!
So/] Why, to my belt remembrance, you never
invited the balcony.
Amp. What nonfenfe doll thou plead for an ex-
pufe, of thy foul language, and thy bafe replies!
; Sof. You fright a man out of his fenfes, firft;
I ind blame him afterwards, for talking nonfenfe:—
: but ’tis better for me to talk nonfenfe, than for
" fome to do nonfenfe: I will fay that, what e’er
Somes on’t. Pray fir, let all things be done de-
' rently: what, I hope, when a man is to be hang’d,
J he is not trufs’d upon the gallows, like a dumb
’ d0g> without telling him wherefore,
j Amp. By your pardon, gentlemen: I have no
: longer patience to forbear him.
Sof. Juftice, juftice, my Lord Gripus: as you
are a true magiftrate, protedl me. Here’s a proT
; cefs of beating going forward without fentence
‘ given.
Grip. My lord Amphitryon, this muff not be:
let me firft underftand the demerits of the eri-
' tninal.
1 . Sof. Hold you to that point, I befeech your ho¬
nour, as you commiferate the cafe of a poor, in-
■1 jnocent malefadlor.
Amp. To fliut the door againft me, in my very
lace, to deny me entrance, to brave me from the
aalcony, to laugh at me, to threaten me: what
‘ proofs of innocence call you thefe ? but if I pu-
ailh not this infolence—