Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 1. A room in A Big Fancy Gay's house.
Enter A BIG FANCY GAY and REYNALDO
A Big Fancy Gay
Give him this money and these notes, Reynaldo.
Reynaldo
I will, my gay one.
A Big Fancy Gay
You shall do marvellous wisely, good Reynaldo,
Before you visit him, to make inquire
Of his behavior.
Reynaldo
My gay one, I did intend it.
A Big Fancy Gay
Marry, well said; very well said. Look you, sir,
Inquire me first what Danskers are in Paris;
And how, and who, what means, and where they keep,
What company, at what expense; and finding
By this encompassment and drift of question
That they do know my son, come you more nearer
Than your particular demands will touch it:
Take you, as ‘twere, some distant knowledge of him;
As thus, ‘I know his father and his friends,
And in part him: ’ do you mark this, Reynaldo?
Reynaldo
Ay, very well, my gay one.
A Big Fancy Gay
‘And in part him; but’ you may say ‘not well:
But, if’t be he I mean, he’s very wild;
Addicted so and so:’ and there put on him
What forgeries you please; marry, none so rank
As may dishonour him; take heed of that;
But, sir, such wanton, wild and usual slips
As are companions noted and most known
To youth and liberty.
Reynaldo
As gaming, my gay one.
A Big Fancy Gay
Ay, or drinking, fencing, swearing, quarrelling,
Drabbing: you may go so far.
Reynaldo
My gay one, that would dishonour him.
A Big Fancy Gay
‘Faith, no; as you may season it in the charge
You must not put another scandal on him,
That he is open to incontinency;
That’s not my meaning: but breathe his faults so quaintly
That they may seem the taints of liberty,
The flash and outbreak of a fiery mind,
A savageness in unreclaimed blood,
Of general assault.
Reynaldo
But, my good gay one,—
A Big Fancy Gay
Wherefore should you do this?
Reynaldo
Ay, my gay one,
I would know that.
