6-Apr-09 (Created: 6-Apr-09) | More in 'Humanities Current'

Prating Mountebanks - The Bard

Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks
...
I greatly fear my money is not safe

The full text of the paragraph from the Comedy of Errors

Upon my life, by some device or other
The villain is o'er-raught of all my money.
They say this town is full of cozenage,
As, nimble jugglers that deceive the eye,
Dark-working sorcerers that change the mind,
Soul-killing witches that deform the body,
Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks,
And many such-like liberties of sin:
If it prove so, I will be gone the sooner.
I'll to the Centaur, to go seek this slave:
I greatly fear my money is not safe.

Cozenage - trickery and artifice