1 Leon. Well, niece, I hope to see you one day fitted with a husband. Beat. Not till God make men of some other metal than earth. Would it not grieve a woman to be over-mastered with a piece of valiant dust? to make an account of her life to a clod of wayward marl? No, uncle, I'll none: Adam's sons are my brethren; and truly, I hold it a sin to match in my kindred. Leon. Daughter, remember what I told you : if the prince do solicit you in that kind, you know your answer. you Beat. The fault will be in the music, cousin, if be not wooed in good time: if the prince be too important, tell him there is measure in everything, and so dance out the answer. For hear me, Hero; wooing, wedding, and repenting, is as a Scotch jig, a measure, and a cinque-pace: the first suit is hot and hasty, like a Scotch jig, and full as fantastical; the wedding, mannerly modest, as a measure full of state and ancientry; and then comes repentance, and, with his bad legs, falls into the cinque-pace faster and faster, till he sink into his grave. Leon. Cousin, you apprehend passing shrewdly. Beat. I have a good eye, uncle; I can see a church by daylight. Leon. The revelers are entering; brother, make good room. Enter DON PEDRO, CLAUDIO, BENEDICK, BALTHAZAR, DON JOHN, BORACHIO, MARGARET, URSULA, and others, masked. D. Pedro. Lady, will you walk about with your friend? Hero. So you walk softly, and look sweetly, and say nothing, I am yours for the walk; and especially when I walk away. D. Pedro. With me in your company? D. Pedro. And when please you to say so? Hero. When I like your favor; for God defend the lute should be like the case! D. Pedro. Speak low, if you speak love. [Takes her aside. Bene. Well, I would you did like me. Marg. So would not I, for your own sake; for I have many ill qualities. Bene. Which is one? Marg. I say my prayers aloud. Bene. I love you the better; the hearers may cry, Amen. Marg. God match me with a good dancer! Marg. And God keep him out of my sight, when the dance is done! Answer, clerk. Balth. No more words; the clerk is answered. Urs. I know you well enough; you are Signior Antonio. Ant. At a word, I am not. Urs. I know you by the waggling of your head. Ant. To tell you true, I counterfeit him. Urs. You could never do him so ill-well, unless you were the very man. Here's his dry hand up and down; you are he, you are he. Ant. At a word, I am not. Urs. Come, come; do you think I do not know you by your excellent wit? Can virtue hide itself? Go to, mum, you are he: graces will appear, and there's an end. Beat. I am sure you know him well enough. Beat. Did he never make you laugh? Beat. Why, he is the prince's jester: a very dull fool; only his gift is in devising impossible slanders: none but libertines delight in him; and the commendation is not in his wit, but in his villainy; for he both pleaseth men and angers them, and then they laugh at him, and beat him. I am D. Pedro. My visor is Philemon's roof; within sure he is in the fleet: I would he had boarded me. the house is Jove. Bene. When I know the gentleman, I'll tell Hero. Why then your visor should be thatched. him what you say. Beat. Do, do: he'll but break a comparison or two on me; which, peradventure, not marked, or not laughed at, strikes him into melancholy and then there's a partridge' wing saved, for the fool will eat no supper that night. [Music within.] We must follow the leaders. Bene. In every good thing. Beat. Nay, if they lead to any ill, I will leave them at the next turning. [Dance. [Exeunt all but DON JOHN, BORACHIO, and CLAUDIO. D. John. Sure my brother is amorous on Hero, and hath withdrawn her father to break with him about it. The ladies follow her, and but one visor remains. Bora. And that is Claudio: I know him by his bearing. D. John. Are not you Signior Benedick? D. John. Signior, you are very near my brother in his love: he is enamored on Hero; I pray you, dissuade him from her, she is no equal for his birth: you may do the part of an honest man in it. Claud. How know you he loves her? D. John. I heard him swear his affection. Bora. So did I, too; and he swore he would marry her to-night. D. John. Come, let us to the banquet. [Exeunt DON JOHN and BORACHIO. Claud. Thus answer I in name of Benedick, But hear these ill news with the ears of Claudio. 'Tis certain so; the prince woos for himself. Friendship is constant in all other things, Save in the office and affairs of love: Bene. Even to the next willow, about your own business, Count. What fashion will you wear the garland of? About your neck, like an usurer's chain? or under your arm, like a lieutenant's scarf? You must wear it one way, for the prince hath got your Hero. Claud. I wish him joy of her. Bene. Why, that's spoken like an honest drover; so they sell bullocks. But did you think the prince would have served you thus? Claud. I pray you, leave me. Bene. Ho! now you strike like the blind man ; 't was the boy that stole your meat, and you'll beat the post. Claud. If it will not be, I'll leave you. [Exit. Bene. Alas! poor hurt fowl! Now will he creep into sedges. But that my Lady Beatrice should know me, and not know me! The Prince's fool! Ha, it may be I go under that title, because I am merry. — Yea; but so; I am apt to do myself wrong: I am not so reputed: it is the base, the bitter disposition of Beatrice, that puts the world into her person, and so gives me out. Well, I'll be revenged as I may. Re-enter DON PEDRO, HERO, LEONATO. D. Pedro. Now, signior, where's the Count? Did you see him? Bene. Troth, my lord, I have played the part of lady Fame. I found him here as melancholy as a lodge in a warren: I told him, and I think I told him true, that your grace had got the good will of this young lady; and I offered him my company to a willow tree, either to make him a garland, as being forsaken, or to bind him up a rod, as being Therefore, all hearts in love use their own tongues; worthy to be whipped. Let every eye negociate for itself, And trust no agent: for beauty is a witch, Against whose charms faith melteth into blood. This is an accident of hourly proof, Which I mistrusted not: Farewell, therefore, Hero. Re-enter BENEDICK. Bene. Count Claudio? Claud. Yea, the same. Bene. Come, will you go with me? Claud. Whither? D. Pedro. To be whipped! What's his fault? Bene. The flat transgression of a schoolboy; who, being overjoyed with finding a bird's-nest, shews it his companion, and he steals it. D. Pedro. Wilt thou make a trust a transgression? The transgression is in the stealer. Bene. Yet it had not been amiss the rod had been made, and the garland too; for the garland he might have worn himself; and the rod he might have bestowed on you, who, as I take it, have stolen his bird's-nest. D. Pedro. I will but teach them to sing, and restore them to the owner. Bene. If their singing answer your saying, by my faith, you say honestly. D. Pedro. The lady Beatrice hath a quarrel to you; the gentleman that danced with her, told her she is much wronged by you. Bene. O, she misused me past the endurance of a block; an oak but with one green leaf on it would have answered her; my very visor began to assume life, and scold with her. She told me, not thinking I had been myself, that I was the Prince's jester; that I was duller than a great thaw; huddling jest upon jest, with such impossible conveyance, upon me, that I stood like a man at a mark, with a whole army shooting at me. She speaks poniards, and every word stabs: if her breath were as terrible as her terminations, there were no living near her, she would infect to the north star. I would not marry her, though she were endowed with all that Adam had left him before he transgressed she would have made Hercules have turned spit; yea, and have cleft his club to make the fire, too. Come, talk not of her; you shall find her the infernal Até in good apparel. I would to God some scholar would conjure her; for certainly, while she is here, a man may live as quiet in hell as in a sanctuary; and people sin upon purpose, because they would go thither; so, indeed, all disquiet, horror, and perturbation follow her. Re-enter CLAUDIO and BEATRICE. D. Pedro. Look, here she comes. Bene. Will your grace command me any service to the world's end? I will go on the slightest errand now to the antipodes, that you can devise to send me on; I will fetch you a tooth-picker now from the farthest inch of Asia; bring you the length of Prester John's foot; fetch you a hair off the great Cham's beard; do you any embassage to the Pigmies, rather than hold three words' conference with this harpy. You have no employment for me? D. Pedro. None, but to desire your good company. D. Pedro. Come, lady, come; you have lost the heart of Signior Benedick. Beat. Indeed, my lord, he lent it me a while; and I gave him use for it, a double heart for his single one: marry, once before he won it of me with false dice, therefore your grace may well say I have lost it. D. Pedro. You have put him down, lady, you have put him down. Beat. So I would not he should do me, my lord, lest I should prove the mother of fools. I have brought Count Claudio, whom ye sent me to seek. D. Pedro. Why, how now, Count? wherefore are you sad? Claud. Not sad, my lord. D. Pedro. How then? sick? Beat. The Count is neither sad, nor sick, nor merry, nor well: but civil, Count; civil as an orange, and something of that jealous complexion. D. Pedro. I' faith, lady, I think your blazon to be true; though I'll be sworn, if he be so, his conceit is false. Here, Claudio, I have wooed in thy name, and fair Hero is won; I have broke with her father, and his good will obtained: name the day of marriage, and God give thee joy! Leon. Count, take of me my daughter, and with her my fortunes; his grace hath made the match, and all grace say Amen to it! Beat. Speak, Count, 't is your cue. Claud. Silence is the perfectest herald of joy: I were but little happy, if I could say how much.Lady, as you are mine, I am yours: I give away myself for you, and dote upon the exchange. Beat. Speak, cousin; or, if you cannot, stop his mouth with a kiss, and let him not speak neither. D. Pedro. In faith, lady, you have a merry heart. Beat. Yea, my lord; I thank it, poor fool, it keeps on the windy side of care. My cousin tells him in his ear, that he is in her heart. Claud. And so she doth, cousin. Beat. Good lord, for alliance! Thus goes every one to the world but I, and I am sunburned; Bene. O God, sir, here's a dish I love not; II may sit in a corner, and cry, "Heigh-ho! for a cannot endure my lady Tongue. [Exit. husband." D. Pedro. Lady Beatrice, I will get you one. Beat. I would rather have one of your father's getting. Hath your grace ne'er a brother like you? Your father got excellent husbands, if a maid could come by them. D. Pedro. Will you have me, lady? Beat. No, my lord, unless I might have another for working-days: your grace is too costly to wear every day. But I beseech your grace, pardon me; I was born to speak all mirth, and no matter. D. Pedro. Your silence most offends me, and to be merry best becomes you; for, out of question, you were born in a merry hour. Beat. No, sure, my lord, my mother cried; but then there was a star danced, and under that was I born. Cousins, God give you joy! to fashion it, if you three will but minister such assistance as I shall give you direction. Leon. My lord, I am for you, though it cost me ten nights' watchings. Claud. And I, my lord. D. Pedro. And you, too, gentle Hero? Hero. I will do any modest office, my lord, to help my cousin to a good husband. D. Pedro. And Benedick is not the unhopefullest husband that I know: thus far can I praise him; he is of a noble strain, of approved valor, and confirmed honesty. I will teach you how to humor your cousin, that she shall fall in love with Benedick: and I, with your two helps, will so practice on Benedick, that, in despite of his quick wit and his queasy stomach, he shall fall in love Leon. Niece, will you look to those things I told with Beatrice. If we can do this, Cupid is no you of? longer an archer; his glory shall be ours, for we Beat. I cry you mercy, uncle. By your grace's pardon. [Exit BEATRICE. D. Pedro. By my troth, a pleasant-spirited lady. Leon. There's little of the melancholy element in her, my lord; she is never sad, but when she SCENE II. · Another Room in LEONATO's House. sleeps; and not ever sad then; for I have heard my daughter say, she hath often dreamed of unhappiness and waked herself with laughing. Enter DON JOHN and BORACHIO. D. John. It is so; the Count Claudio shall D. Pedro. She cannot endure to hear tell of a marry the daughter of Leonato. husband. Leon. O, by no means; she mocks all her wooers out of suit. Bora. Yea, my lord, but I can cross it. D. John. Any bar, any cross, any impediment will be medicinal to me: I am sick in displeasure D. Pedro. She were an excellent wife for Bene- to him; and whatsoever comes athwart his affecdick. tion, ranges evenly with mine. How canst thou Leon. O Lord, my lord, if they were but a week cross this marriage? married, they would talk themselves mad. Bora. Not honestly, my lord; but so covertly, D. Pedro. Count Claudio, when mean you to go that no dishonesty shall appear in me. to church? D. John. Shew me briefly how. Claud. To-morrow, my lord: Time goes on crutches, till Love have all his rites. Leon. Not till Monday, my dear son, which is hence a just sevennight; and a time too brief, too, to have all things answer my mind. D. Pedro. Come, you shake the head at so long a breathing; but I warrant thee, Claudio, the time shall not go dully by us. I will, in the interim, undertake one of Hercules' labors; which is, to bring Signior Benedick and the Lady Beatrice into a mountain of affection, the one with the other. I would fain have it a match; and I doubt not but Bora. I think I told your lordship, a year since, how much I am in favor of Margaret, the waitinggentlewoman to Hero. D. John. I remember. Bora. I can, at any unseasonable instant of the night, appoint her to look out at her lady's chamber-window. D. John. What life is in that to be the death of this marriage? Bora. The poison of that lies in you to temper. Go you to the Prince your brother; spare not to tell him that he hath wronged his honor in marry D. John. Only to despite them, I will endeavor to see a good armor; and now will he lie ten nights anything. awake, carving the fashion of a new doublet. He was wont to speak plain and to the purpose, like an honest man and a soldier; and now is he turned orthographer; his words are a very fantastical banquet, just so many strange dishes. May I be so converted, and see with these eyes? I cannot tell; I think not. I will not be sworn but love may transform me to an oyster; but I'll take my oath on it, till he have made an oyster of me, he shall never make me such a fool. One woman is fair; yet I am well: another is wise; yet I am well : another virtuous; yet I am well: but till all graces be in one woman, one woman shall not come in my grace. Rich she shall be, that 's certain ; wise, or I'll none; virtuous, or I'll never cheapen her; fair, or I'll never look on her; mild, or come not near me; noble, or not I for an angel; of good discourse, an excellent musician, and her hair shall be of what color it please God. Ha! the Prince and Monsieur Love! I will hide me in the arbor. [Withdraws. Bora. Go then, find me a meet hour to draw Don Pedro and the Count Claudio alone: tell them, that you know that Hero loves me; intend a kind of zeal both to the Prince and Claudio, as-in love of your brother's honor, who hath made this match; and his friend's reputation, who is thus like to be cozened with the semblance of a maid that you have discovered thus. They will scarcely believe this without trial offer them instances; which shall bear no less likelihood, than to see me at her chamber-window; hear me call Margaret, Hero; hear Margaret term me Claudio; and bring them to see this the very night before the intended wedding: for, in the mean time, I will so fashion the matter that Hero shall be absent; and there shall appear such seeming truth of Hero's disloyalty, that jealousy shall be called assurance, and all the preparation overthrown. D. John. Grow this to what adverse issue it can, I will put it in practice. Be cunning in the working this, and thy fee is a thousand ducats. Bora. Be you constant in the accusation, and my cunning shall not shame me. D. John. I will presently go learn their day of marriage. [Exeunt. SCENE III. - LEONATO's Garden. Enter BENEDICK and a Boy. Bene. Boy, Boy. Signior. Bene. In my chamber-window lies a book; bring it hither to me in the orchard. Boy. I am here already, sir. Bene. I know that; - but I would have thee hence, and here again. [Exit Boy. I do much wonder, that one man, seeing how much another man is a fool when he dedicates his Enter DON PEDRO, LEONATO, CLAUDIO, and D. Pedro. Come, shall we hear this music? As hushed on purpose to grace harmony! D. Pedro. See you where Benedick hath hid himself? Claud. O, very well, my lord: the music ended, We'll fit the kid-fox with a pennyworth. D. Pedro. Come, Balthazar, we'll hear that song again. Balth. O, good my lord, tax not so bad a voice D. Pedro. It is the witness still of excellency, |
