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FRANCIS BACON'S CRYPTIC RHYMES
Helas !
Sire, conclud Cy&, vivez content ;
car vous pouvez faire ce/a maintewaw/,
sans vous donner tant de peine.
Instead of "peine'* Bacon may possibly have em
ployed the word " bruit " as a final
rhyme to " Amis "
and " Puis." The meaning
is and remains "
: Much
"
Ado About Nothing," Viel Larm um Nichts,"
"
Beaucoup de Bruit, peu de Fruit."
The following witty, charmingly rhymed
little anec
dote (which, by the bye,
is more profusely rhymed
in
French than in English) is of a youth who resembled
the Emperor Augustus. Bacon probably told it
oftener in French than English
:
Auguste ayant sceu qu'il y auoit dans Rome vn ieune
homme qui luy ressembloit grandement, commanda qu'on le fist
venir : & apres 1'auoir bien regard^, Parlez mon Amy, luy dit-il,
vostre mere n'est-elle iamais venue a Rome ?
Nenny, respondit
le ieune homme, mais mon pere y a bien este" quelquesfois.
(Augustus, having heard that there was a youth in Rome
who bore a striking likeness to himself, had the young man
brought before him. After scrutinising him for some time, he
said : Tell me, my friend, has your mother never been in Rome ?
No, answered the youth, but my father was there several
times.)
The youth retaliated very smartly, and paid the
Emperor in his own coin for the suspicion cast upon
his mother. A perfect volley of rhymes is discharged
the moment the words of Augustus begin :
Parlez mon Amy,
luy dit-il, vostre mere
n'est elle iamais venue a Rome ?
Nenwy,
respond