Yes, ” said Cooley. “That is the question, as the Bard might say.” “The Bard?” “What’s so funny?” said Cooley. “Nothing, sir, ” I said. “I just didn’t know people still used that term.” “Well, I’m a people, Burke. Am I not?” “Of course.” “If you prick me, do I not bleed, you scat-gobbling, mother-rimming prick?” Occasionally Dean Cooley reverted to a vocabulary more suited to his marine years, but some maintained it was only when he felt threatened, or stretched for time. “Yes, sir, ” I said. Sam Lipsyte
About This Quote

“If you prick me, do I not bleed, you scat-gobbling, mother-rimming prick?” is an old English nursery rhyme. It's about a farmer who pokes his finger with a pin and finds he bleeds. He thinks this is not normal, so he pricks his finger again. This time it doesn't bleed at all, so he pricks it again.

This time it does bleed, but not much. The farmer thinks this must be some kind of joke played on him by someone in the village. So when he meets another farmer in the pub, he asks him to poke him in return.

And this time it doesn't bleed at all. The second farmer then tells him that he's been pricked by a wasp and has been stung in the finger. The farmer praises the wasp for doing such a good job of stinging the other one in exactly the spot where it hurts most and sends him home to put a plaster on his finger with a promise to come back later in the day to see how his finger is doing.

The farmer then goes home and puts a plaster over his own finger where he has been stinged by another wasp just as promised by his friend in the pub that afternoon. When he returns to see how his finger is doing after putting on his plaster, he discovers that there is blood under his plaster and lots of little holes in it from being stung by so many wasps!

Source: The Ask

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