Page images
PDF
EPUB
[ocr errors]

And as a bed1 I'll take thee, and there lie

e;

And, in that glorious supposition, think
He gains by death, that hath such means to die.-
Let love, being light, be drowned if she sink!
Luc. What, are you mad, that you do reason so?
Ant. S. Not mad, but mated; how, I do not know.
Luc. It is a fault that springeth from your eye.
Ant. S. For gazing on your beams, fair sun, being by.
Luc. Gaze where you should, and that will clear
your sight.

Ant. S. As good to wink, sweet love, as look on
night.

Luc. Why call you me love? call my sister so.
Ant. S. Thy sister's sister.

Luc.

Ant. S.

That's my sister.

No;

It is thyself, mine own self's better part;
Mine eye's clear eye, my dear heart's dearer heart;
My food, my fortune, and my sweet hope's aim;
My sole earth's heaven, and my heaven's claim.
Luc. All this my sister is, or else should be.
Ant. S. Call thyself sister, sweet, for I aim2 thee.
Thee will I love, and with thee lead my life;
Thou hast no husband yet, nor I no wife.
Give me thy hand.

Luc.

O, soft, sir, hold you still;
I'll fetch my sister, to get her good will.

[Exit Luc.

Enter, from the House of ANTIPHOLUS of Ephesus,
DROMIO of Syracuse.

Ant. S. Why, how now, Dromio? where run'st thou so fast?

I

Dro. S. Do you know me, sir? am I Dromio? am man? am I myself?

your

1 The first folio reads:

"And as a bud I'll take thee, and there lie."

2 The old copy reads, I am thee. The present reading is Steevens's. Others have proposed I mean thee; but aim, for aim at, was sometimes used.

[blocks in formation]

Ant. S. Thou art Dromio; thou art my man; thou art thyself.

Dro. S. I am an ass; I am a woman's man, and besides myself.

Ant. S. What woman's man? and how besides thyself?

Dro. S. Marry, sir, besides myself, I am due to a woman; one that claims me, one that haunts me, one that will have me.

Ant. S. What claim lays she to thee?

Dro. S. Marry, sir, such claim as you would lay to your horse; and she would have me as a beast; not that, I being a beast, she would have me; but that she, being a very beastly creature, lays claim to me. Ant. S. What is she?

Dro. S. A very reverend body; ay, such a one as a man may not speak of, without he say, sir-reverence.1 I have but lean luck in the match, and yet she is a wondrous fat marriage.

Ant. S. How dost thou mean, a fat marriage?

Dro. S. Marry, sir, she's the kitchen wench, and all grease and I know not what use to put her to, but to make a lamp of her, and run from her by her own light. I warrant, her rags, and the tallow in them, will burn a Poland winter. If she lives till doomsday, she'll burn a week longer than the whole world.

Ant. S. What complexion is she of?

Dro. S. Swart,2 like my shoe, but her face, nothing like so clean kept. For why? she sweats, a man may go over shoes in the grime of it.

Ant. S. That's a fault that water will mend.

Dro. S. No, sir, 'tis in grain; Noah's flood could not do it.

[blocks in formation]

Dro. S. Nell, sir ;-but her name and three quarters, that is, an ell and three quarters, will not measure her from hip to hip.

1 This is a very old corruption of save reverence, salva reverentia. See Blount's Glossography, 1682.

2 Swart, or swarth, i. e. dark, dusky, infuscus.

Ant. S.

Then she bears some breadth?

Dro. S. No longer from head to foot, than from hip to hip; she is spherical, like a globe; I could find out countries in her.

Ant. S. In what part of her body stands Ireland? Dro. S. Marry, sir, in her buttocks; I found it out by the bogs.

Ant. S. Where Scotland?

Dro. S. I found it by the barrenness; hard, in the palm of the hand.

Ant. S. Where France?

Dro. S. In her forehead; armed and reverted, making war against her heir.1

Ant. S. Where England?

Dro. S. I looked for the chalky cliffs, but I could find no whiteness in them; but I guess, it stood in her chin, by the salt rheum that ran between France and it. Ant. S. Where Spain?

Dro. S. 'Faith, I saw it not; but I felt it hot in her breath.

Ant. S. Where America, the Indies?

Dro. S. O, sir, upon her nose, all o'er embellished with rubies, carbuncles, sapphires, declining their rich aspect to the hot breath of Spain; who sent whole armadas of carracks 2 to be ballast at her nose.

Ant. S. Where stood Belgia, the Netherlands? Dro. S. O, sir, I did not look so low. To conclude this drudge, or diviner, laid claim to me; called me Dromio; swore I was assured3 to her; told me what privy marks I had about me, as the mark of my shoul

1 “An equivoque," says Theobald, "is intended. In 1589, Henry III. of France, being stabbed, was succeeded by Henry IV. of Navarre, whom he had appointed his successor; but whose claim the states of France resisted on account of his being a Protestant. This I take to be what is meant by France making war against her heir. Elizabeth had sent over the earl of Essex with four thousand men to the assistance of Henry of Navarre, in 1591. This oblique sneer at France was, therefore, a compliment to the Poet's royal mistress."

2 Carracks, large ships of burthen (caraca, Span.). Ballast is merely a contraction of ballassed; to balase being the old orthography; as we write drest for dressed, embost for embossed, &c.

3 i. e. affianced.

der, the mole in my neck, the great wart on my left arm, that I, amazed, ran from her as a witch; and, I think, if my breast had not been made of faith,' and my heart of steel, she had transformed me to a curtaildog, and made me turn i' the wheel.

Ant. S. Go, hie thee presently, post to the road; And if the wind blow any way from shore, I will not harbor in this town to-night. If any bark put forth, come to the mart, Where I will walk, till thou return to me. If every one knows us, and we know none, 'Tis time, I think, to trudge, pack, and be gone. Dro. S. As from a bear a man would run for life, So fly I from her that would be my wife. [Exit. Ant. S. There's none but witches do inhabit here; And therefore 'tis high time that I were hence. She that doth call me husband, even my soul Doth for a wife abhor; but her fair sister, Possessed with such a gentle, sovereign grace, Of such enchanting presence and discourse, Hath almost made me traitor to myself; But, lest myself be guilty to self-wrong, I'll stop my ears against the mermaid's song.

Enter ANGELO.

Ang. Master Antipholus ?

Ant. S. Ay, that's my name.

Ang. I know it well, sir. Lo, here is the chain ; I thought to have ta'en you at the Porcupine.2 The chain unfinished made me stay thus long.

Ant. S. What is your will, that I shall do with this? Ang. What please yourself, sir; I have made it for

you.

Ant. S. Made it for me, sir! I bespoke it not.

1 Alluding to the popular belief that a great share of faith was a protection from witchcraft.

2 Porcupine throughout the old editions of these plays is written porpentine. It is written porpyn in an old phrase book, called Hormanni Vulgaria, 1519, thus :-" Porpyns have longer prickles than Yrchins."

Ang. Not once nor twice, but twenty times you

have.

Go home with it, and please your wife withal;
And soon at supper-time I'll visit you,
And then receive my money for the chain.

Ant. S. I pray you, sir, receive the money now,
For fear you ne'er see chain, nor money, more.
Ang. You are a merry man, sir; fare you well.

[Exit. Ant. S. What I should think of this, I cannot tell; But this I think, there's no man is so vain, That would refuse so fair an offered chain.

I see, a man here needs not live by shifts,

When in the streets he meets such golden gifts.
I'll to the mart, and there for Dromio stay ;
If any ship put out, then straight away.

[Exit.

ACT IV.

SCENE I. The same.

Enter a Merchant, ANGELO, and an Officer.

Mer. You know, since pentecost the sum is due, And since I have not much impórtuned you;

Nor now I had not, but that I am bound
To Persia, and want gilders for my voyage.
Therefore make present satisfaction,
Or I'll attach you by this officer.

Ang. Even just the sum that I do owe to you,

Is growing1 to me by Antipholus.
And in the instant that I met with you,
He had of me a chain; at five o'clock,

I shall receive the money for the same.
Pleaseth you walk with me down to his house,
I will discharge my bond, and thank you too.

1 i. e. accruing.

« PreviousContinue »