DAMON. Stephano, much meat breeds heaviness: thin diet makes thee light.
STEPHANO. I may be lighter thereby, but I shall never run the faster.
DAMON. I have had sufficiently discourse of amity, Which I had at dinner with Pithias; and his pleasant company Hath fully satisfied me: it doth me good to feed mine eyes on him.
STEPHANO. Course or discourse, your course is very coarse; for all your talk, You had but one bare course, and that was pick, rise, and walk: And surely, for all your talk of philosophy, I never heard that a man with words could fill his belly. Feed your eyes, quoth you? the reason from my wisdom swerveth, I stared on you both, and yet my belly starveth.
DAMON. Ah, Stephano, small diet maketh a fine memory.
STEPHANO. I care not for your crafty sophistry, You two are fine, let me be fed like a gross knave still; I pray you licence me for a while to have my will, At home to tarry, whiles you take view of this city! To find some odd victuals in a corner I am very witty.
DAMON. At your pleasure, sir: I will wait on myself this day; Yet attend upon Pithias, which for a purpose tarrieth at home: So doing, you wait upon me also.
STEPHANO. With wings on my feet I go. [_Exit._
DAMON. Not in vain the poet saith, _Naturam furcâ expellas, tamen usque recurret_; For train up a bondman never to so good a behaviour, Yet in some point of servility he will savour: As this Stephano, trusty to me his master, loving and kind, Yet touching his belly a very bondman I him find. He is to be borne withal, being so just and true, I assure you, I would not change him for no new. But methinks this is a pleasant city; The seat is good,[48] and yet not strong; and that is great pity.
CARISOPHUS (_aside_). I am safe, he is mine own.
DAMON. The air subtle and fine, the people should be witty, That dwell under this climate in so pure a region: A trimmer plat I have not seen in my peregrination. Nothing misliketh me in this country, But that I heard such muttering of cruelty: Fame reporteth strange things of Dionysius, But kings’ matters passing our reach, pertain not to us.
CARISOPHUS. Dionysius, quoth you? since the world began, In Sicilia never reigned so cruel a man: A despiteful tyrant to all men; I marvel, I, That none makes him away, and that suddenly.