To go with us into the abbey here, These two Antipholus', these two so like, Ant. E. I came from Corinth, my most gracious lord. Ang. That is the chain, sir, which you had of me. Ant. S. I think it be, sir; I deny it not. Ant. E. And you, sir, for this chain arrested me. Ang. I think I did, sir: I deny it not. Adr. I sent you money, sir, to be your bail By Dromio; but I think he brought it not. Dro. E. No, none by me. 381 Ant. S. This purse of ducats I receiv'd from you, And Dromio, my man, did bring them me. I see we still did meet each other's man, And I was ta'en for him, and he for me, And thereupon these errors are arose. Ant. E. These ducats pawn I for my father here. 390 Duke. It shall not need: thy father hath his life. Cour. Sir, I must have that diamond from you. Ant. E. There, take it; and much thanks for my good cheer. Abb. Renowned duke, vouchsafe to take the pains 400 The duke, my husband, and my children both, Duke. With all my heart I'll gossip at this feast. Ant. E. Dromio, what stuff of mine hast thou embark'd? 410 Dro. S. Your goods that lay at host, sir, in the Centaur. Ant. S. He speaks to me. I am your master, Dromio: Come, go with us; we'll look to that anon: Embrace thy brother there; rejoice with him. Exeunt ANTIPHOLUS of Syracuse, ANTIPHOLUS of Ephesus, ADRIANA and LUCIANA. Dro. S. There is a fat friend at your master's house, That kitchen'd me for you to-day at dinner : I see by you I am a sweet-faced youth. Dro. S. We'll draw cuts for the senior: till then, lead thou first. Dro. E. Nay, then thus: We came into the world like brother and brother; And now let's go hand in hand not one before another. Exeunt. 420 Mess. But few of any sort, and none of name. Leon. A victory is twice itself when the achiever brings home full numbers. I find here that Don Pedro hath bestowed much honour on a young Florentine called Claudio. Mess. Much deserved on his part and equally remembered by Don Pedro. He hath borne himself beyond the promise of his age, doing in the figure of a lamb the feats of a lion: he hath indeed better bettered expectation than you must expect of me to tell you how. Leon. He hath an uncle here in Messina will be very much glad of it. 19 Mess. I have already delivered him letters, and there appears much joy in him; even so much that joy could not show itself modest enough without a badge of bitterness. Leon. Did he break out into tears? Leon. A kind overflow of kindness. There are no faces truer than those that are so washed: how much better is it to weep at joy than to joy at weeping! Beat. I pray you, is Signior Mountanto returned from the wars or no? 31 Mess. I know none of that name, lady: there was none such in the army of any sort. Leon. What is he that you ask for, niece? Hero. My cousin means Signior Benedick of Padua. Gentlewomen attending or Hero. Mess. O he's returned, and as pleasant as ever he was. 38 Beat. He set up his bills here in Messina and challenged Cupid at the flight; and my uncle's fool, reading the challenge, subscribed for Cupid, and challenged him at the bird-bolt. I pray you, how many hath he killed and eaten in these wars? But how many hath he killed? for indeed I promised to eat all of his killing. Leon. Faith, niece, you tax Signior Benedick too much; but he'll be meet with you, I doubt it not. Mess. He hath done good service, lady, in these wars. 50 Beat. You had musty victual, and he hath holp to eat it: he is a very valiant trencher-man; he hath an excellent stomach. Mess. And a good soldier too, lady. Beat. And a good soldier to a lady; but what is he to a lord? Mess. A lord to a lord, a man to a man; stuffed with all honourable virtues. Beat. It is so, indeed; he is no less than a stuffed man; but for the stuffing,-well, we are all mortal. 61 Leon. You must not, sir, mistake my niece. There is a kind of merry war betwixt Signior Benedick and her: they never meet but there's a skirmish of wit between them. Beat. Alas! he gets nothing by that. In our last conflict four of his five wits went halting off, and now is the whole man governed with one; so that if he have wit enough to keep himself warm, let him bear it for a difference between himself and his horse; for it is all the wealth that he hath left to be known a reasonable creature. Who is his companion now? He hath every month a new sworn brother. Mess. Is 't possible? 74 Beat. Very easily possible: he wears his faith but as the fashion of his hat; it ever changes with the next block. tongue, and so good a continuer. But keep your way, i' God's name; I have done. Beat. You always end with a jade's trick: I know you of old. 149 D. Pedro. This is the sum of all, Leonato: Signior Claudio, and Signior Benedick, my dear friend Leonato hath invited you all. I tell him we shall stay here at the least a month, and he heartily prays some occasion may detain us longer: I dare swear he is no hypocrite, but prays from his heart. Leon. If you swear, my lord, you shall not be forsworn. To Don JOHN. Let me bid you welcome, my lord: being reconciled to the prince your brother, I owe you all duty. 160 D. John. I thank you: I am not of many words, but I thank you. Leon. Please it your grace lead on? D. Pedro. Your hand, Leonato; we will go together. Beat. Scratching could not make it worse, an 't were such a face as yours were. 141 Bene. Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher. Beat. A bird of my tongue is better than a beast of yours. Bene. I would my horse had the speed of your Excunt all but BENEDICK and CLAUDIO. Claud. Benedick, didst thou note the daughter of Signior Leonato ? 169 Bene. I noted her not; but I looked on her. Claud. Is she not a modest young lady? Bene. Do you question me, as an honest man should do, for my simple true judgment; or would you have me speak after my custom, as being a professed tyrant to their sex? Claud. No; I pray thee speak in soberjudgment. Bene. Why, i' faith, methinks she's too low for a high praise, too brown for a fair praise, and too little for a great praise: only this commendation I can afford her, that were she other than she is, she were unhandsome, and being no other but as she is, I do not like her. 18) Claud. Thou thinkest I am in sport: I pray thee tell me truly how thou likest her. Bene. Would you buy her, that you inquire after her? Claud. Can the world buy such a jewel? Bene. Yea, and a case to put it into. But speak you this with a sad brow, or do you play the flouting Jack, to tell us Cupid is a good harefinder, and Vulcan a rare carpenter? Come, in what key shall a man take you, to go in the song? Claud. In mine eye she is the sweetest lady that ever I looked on. 192 Bene. I can see yet without spectacles and I see no such matter: there's her cousin, an she were not possessed with a fury, exceeds her as much in beauty as the first of May doth the last of December. But I hope you have no intent to turn husband, have you? Claud. I would scarce trust myself, though I had sworn the contrary, if Hero would be my wife. Bene. Is 't come to this, i' faith? Hath not the world one man but he will wear his cap with suspicion? Shall I never see a bachelor of threescore again? Go to, i' faith; an thou wilt needs thrust thy neck into a yoke, wear the print of it, and sigh away Sundays. Look! Don Pedro is returned to seek you. Re-enter Don PEDRO. Bene. You hear, Count Claudio: I can be secret as a dumb man; I would have you think so; but on my allegiance, mark you this, on my allegiance: he is in love. With who? now that is your grace's part. Mark how short his answer is with Hero, Leonato's short daughter. Claud. If this were so, so were it uttered. Bene. Like the old tale, my lord: 'it is not so, nor 'twas not so; but, indeed, God forbid it should be so.' 222 Bene. That a woman conceived me, I thank her; that she brought me up, I likewise give her most humble thanks: but that I will have a recheat winded in my forehead, or hang my bugle in an invisible baldrick, all women shall pardon me. Because I will not do them the wrong to mistrust any, I will do myself the right to trust none; and the fine is, for the which I may go the finer, I will live a bachelor. D. Pedro. I shall see thee, ere I die, look pale with love. 252 Bene. With anger, with sickness, or with hunger, my lord; not with love: prove that ever I lose more blood with love than I will get again with drinking, pick out mine eyes with a ballad. maker's pen, and hang me up at the door of a brothel-house for the sign of blind Cupid. 264 D. Pedro. Well, if ever thou dost fall from this faith, thou wilt prove a notable argument. Bene. If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat and shoot at me; and he that hits me, let him be clapped on the shoulder, and called Adam. D. Pedro. Well, as time shall try: 'In time the savage bull doth bear the yoke.' Bene. The savage bull may; but if ever the sensible Benedick bear it, pluck off the bull's horns and set them in my forehead; and let me be vilely painted, and in such great letters as they write 'Here is good horse to hire,' let them signify under my sign 'Here you may see Benedick the married man.' 272 Bene. I have almost matter enough in me for such an embassage; and so I commit you--Claud. To the tuition of God: from my house, if I had it,— D. Pedro. The sixth of July: your loving friend, Benedick. Bene. Nay, mock not, mock not. The body of your discourse is sometime guarded with fragments, and the guards are but slightly basted on neither: ere you flout old ends any further, examine your conscience and so I leave you. Exit. 23 Claud. My liege, your highness now may do me good. D. Pedro. My love is thine to teach teach it but how, And thou shalt see how apt it is to learn O! my lord, When you went onward on this ended action, I look'd upon her with a soldier's eye, That lik'd, but had a rougher task in hand Than to drive liking to the name of love; But now I am return'd, and that war-thoughts Have left their places vacant, in their rooms Come thronging soft and delicate desires, All prompting me how fair young Hero is, Saying, I lik'd her ere I went to wars. 310 D. Pedro. Thou wilt be like a lover presently, And tire the hearer with a book of words. If thou dost love fair Hero, cherish it, And I will break with her, and with her father, And thou shalt have her. Was 't not to this end That thou began'st to twist so fine a story? Claud. How sweetly do you minister to love, That know love's grief by his complexion! But lest my liking might too sudden seem, I would have salv'd it with a longer treatise. 320 D. Pedro. What need the bridge much broader than the flood? The fairest grant is the necessity. Look, what will serve is fit: 'tis once, thou lovest, And I will fit thee with the remedy. I know we shall have revelling to-night : 330 Excunt. SCENE II. A Room in LEONATO'S House. Enter LEONATO and ANTONIO, meeting. Leon. How now, brother! Where is my cousin, your son? Hath he provided this music? Ant. He is very busy about it. But, brother, I can tell you strange news that you yet dreamt not of. Leon. Are they good? Ant. As the event stamps them: but they have a good cover; they show well outward. The prince and Count Claudio, walking in a thick pleached alley in mine orchard, were thus much overheard by a man of mine: the prince discovered to Claudio that he loved my niece your daughter, and meant to acknowledge it this night in a dance; and if he found her accordant, he meant to take the present time by the top and instantly break with you of it. Leon. Hath the fellow any wit that told you this? Ant. A good sharp fellow: I will send for him; and question him yourself. 20 Leon. No, no; we will hold it as a dream till it appear itself: but I will acquaint my daughter withal, that she may be the better prepared for an answer, if peradventure this be true. Go you, and tell her of it. Several persons cross the stage. Cousins, you know what you have to do. O! I cry you mercy, friend; go you with me, and I will use your skill. Good cousin, have a care this busy time. Exeunt. SCENE III-Another Room in LEONATO's House. Enter Don JOHN and CONRADE. Con. What the good-year, my lord! why are you thus out of measure sad? D. John. There is no measure in the occasion that breeds; therefore the sadness is without limit. Con. You should hear reason. D. John. And when I have heard it, what blessing brings it? Con. If not a present remedy, at least a patient sufferance. 10 D. John. I wonder that thou, being, as thou sayest thou art, born under Saturn, goest about to apply a moral medicine to a mortifying mischief. I cannot hide what I am: I must be sad when I have cause, and smile at no man's jests; eat when I have stomach, and wait for no man's leisure; sleep when I am drowsy, and tend on no man's business; laugh when I am merry, and claw no man in his humour. 19 Con. Yea; but you must not make the full show of this till you may do it without controlment. You have of late stood out against your brother, and he hath ta'en you newly into his grace; where it is impossible you should take true root but by the fair weather that you make yourself: it is needful that you frame the season for your own harvest. 27 D. John. I had rather be a canker in a hedge than a rose in his grace; and it better fits my blood to be disdained of all than to fashion a carriage to rob love from any: in this, though I cannot be said to be a flattering honest man, it must not be denied but I am a plain-dealing villain. I am trusted with a muzzle and enfranchised with a clog; therefore I have decreed not to sing in my cage. If I had my mouth, I would bite; if I had my liberty, I would do my liking in the meantime, let me be that I am, and seek not to alter me. : 39 Con. Can you make no use of your discontent? D. John. I make all use of it, for I use it only. Who comes here? Bora. I came yonder from a great supper: the prince, your brother, is royally entertained by Leonato; and I can give you intelligence of an intended marriage. D. John. Will it serve for any model to build mischief on? What is he for a fool that betroths himself to unquietness? Bora. Marry, it is your brother's right hand. D. John. Who? the most exquisite Claudio? Bora. Even he. Enter BORACHIO. What news, Borachio? 50 And who, and D. John. A proper squire! who? which way looks he? Bora. Marry, on Hero, the daughter and heir of Leonato. D. John. A very forward March-chick! How came you to this? 53 Bora. Being entertained for a perfumer, as I was smoking a musty room, comes me the prince and Claudio, hand in hand, in sad conference: I whipt me behind the arras, and there heard it agreed upon that the prince should woo Hero for himself, and having obtained her, give her to Count Claudio. D. John. Come, come; let us thither: this may prove food to my displeasure. That young start-up hath all the glory of my overthrow: if I can cross him any way, I bless myself every way. You are both sure, and will assist me? n 6 ACT II. SCENE I.-A Hall in LEONATO's House. Enter LEONATO, ANTONIO, HERO, BEATRICE, and others. Leon. Was not Count John here at supper? Ant. I saw him not. Beat. How tartly that gentleman looks! I never can see him but I am heart-burned an hour after. Ilcro. He is of a melancholy disposition. Beat. He were an excellent man that were made just in the midway between him and Benedick: the one is too like an image, and says nothing; and the other too like my lady's eldest son, evermore tattling. 11 Leon. Then half Signior Benedick's tongue in Count John's mouth, and half Count John's melancholy in Signior Benedick's face. Beat. With a good leg and a good foot, uncle, and money enough in his purse, such a man would win any woman in the world, if a' could get her good will. Leon. By my troth, niece, thou wilt never get thee a husband, if thou be so shrewd of thy tongue. Ant. In faith, she's too curst. 21 Beat. Too curst is more than curst: I shall lessen God's sending that way; for it is said, God sends a curst cow short horns'; but to a cow too curst he sends none. Leon. So, by being too curst, God will send you no horns? Beat. Just, if he send me no husband; for the |
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