Assuredly, at your peril have you come here this day, with your trumped-up lies, your patched-up knaveries, you essence of effrontery. SOSIA Why no, it’s rather with garments patched-up that I’m arrived here, not with knaveries. MERCURY Why, you are lying again; you come with your feet, surely, and not with your garments. SOSIA Yes, certainly. MERCURY Then certainly take that for your lie. (He strikes him.) SOSIA By my troth, I certainly don’t wish for it of course. MERCURY But by my faith, you certainly shall have it of course, whether you wish or not: for, in fact, this is certainly my determination, and it is not at your own option. (He strikes him.) SOSIA Mercy, I entreat of you. MERCURY Do you dare to say that you are Sosia, when I myself am he? (Strikes him.) SOSIA (crying at the top of his voice.) I’m being murdered. MERCURY Why, you are crying out for a trifle as yet, compared with what it will be. Whose are you now? SOSIA Your own; for with your fists you have laid hands on me Laid hands on me : Usufecisti. Usufacere was a term used in law, to signify the taking possession of a thing by the laying of hands thereon. this, Sosia means to say, Mercury has most effectually done. . Help, help, citizens of Thebes . (MERCURY striking him.) MERCURY What, still bawling, you scoundrel? Speak—what have you come for? SOSIA For there to be somebody for you to belabour with your fists. MERCURY Whose are you? SOSIA Amphitryon’s Sosia, I tell you. MERCURY For this reason then you shall be beaten the more, because you prate thus idly; I am Sosia, not you. SOSIA (aside.) I wish the Gods would have it so, that you were he in preference, and that I were thrashing you. MERCURY What, muttering still? (Strikes him.) SOSIA I’ll hold my tongue then. MERCURY Who is your master? SOSIA Whoever you like. MERCURY How then? What’s your name now? SOSIA Nothing but what you shall command. MERCURY You said that you were Amphitryon’s Sosia. SOSIA I made a mistake; but this I meant to say, that I was Amphitryon’s associate Associate : This poor pun is founded on the similarity of sound between Sosia and socius, a companion or associate. . MERCURY Why, I was sure that we had no servant called Sosia except myself. Your senses are forsaking you. SOSIA I wish that those fists of yours had done so. MERCURY I am that Sosia, whom you were just now telling me that you are.