The Two Gentlemen of Verona (11 page)

FIRST OUTLAW
    Fellows, stand fast: I see a
passenger.
¹

SECOND OUTLAW
    If there be ten, shrink not, but down with ’em.

THIRD OUTLAW
    
Stand
³
, sir, and throw us that you have about ye.

If not, we’ll make you sit and
rifle
⁴
you.

SPEED
    Sir, we are undone; these are the villains

That all the travellers do fear so much.

VALENTINE
    My friends—

FIRST OUTLAW
    That’s not so, sir: we are your enemies.

SECOND OUTLAW
    Peace: we’ll hear him.

THIRD OUTLAW
    Ay, by my beard, will we: for he is a
proper
¹⁰
man.

VALENTINE
    Then know that I have little wealth to lose;

A man I am,
crossed with
¹²
adversity:

My riches are these poor
habiliments,
¹³

Of which, if you should here
disfurnish
¹⁴
me,

You take the
sum and substance
¹⁵
that I have.

SECOND OUTLAW
    Whither travel you?

VALENTINE
    To Verona.

FIRST OUTLAW
    Whence came you?

VALENTINE
    From Milan.

THIRD OUTLAW
    Have you long
sojourned
²⁰
there?

VALENTINE
    Some sixteen months, and longer might have stayed,

If
crookèd
²²
fortune had not thwarted me.

FIRST OUTLAW
    What, were you banished thence?

VALENTINE
    I was.

SECOND OUTLAW
    For what offence?

VALENTINE
    For that which now torments me to rehearse:

I killed a man, whose death I much repent,

But yet I slew him manfully, in fight,

Without
false vantage
²⁹
or base treachery.

FIRST OUTLAW
    Why, ne’er repent it, if it were done so;

But were you banished for so small a fault?

VALENTINE
    I was, and
held me glad of such a doom.
³²

SECOND OUTLAW
    
Have you the tongues?
³³

VALENTINE
    My youthful travel therein made me
happy,
³⁴

Or else I often had been miserable.

THIRD OUTLAW
    By the bare scalp of Robin Hood’s
fat friar,
³⁶

This fellow
were
a king for our wild
faction!
³⁷

FIRST OUTLAW
    We’ll have him. Sirs, a word.

SPEED
    Master, be one of them: it’s an honourable kind of

thievery.

VALENTINE
    Peace, villain.

SECOND OUTLAW
    Tell us this: have you
anything to take to?
⁴²

VALENTINE
    Nothing but my fortune.

THIRD OUTLAW
    Know then that some of us are gentlemen,

Such as the fury of
ungoverned
⁴⁵
youth

Thrust from the company of
awful
⁴⁶
men.

Myself was from Verona banishèd

For
practising
⁴⁸
to steal away a lady,

An heir and
niece
⁴⁹
, allied unto the duke.

SECOND OUTLAW
    And I from
Mantua
⁵⁰
, for a gentleman,

Who, in my
mood
⁵¹
, I stabbed unto the heart.

FIRST OUTLAW
    And I for such like petty crimes as these.

But to the purpose: for we
cite
⁵³
our faults,

That they may
hold excused
⁵⁴
our lawless lives;

And partly, seeing you are beautified

With goodly
shape
⁵⁶
, and by your own report

A linguist and a man of such perfection

As we do in our
quality
⁵⁸
much want—

SECOND OUTLAW
    Indeed, because you are a banished man,

Therefore,
above the rest
, we
parley
⁶⁰
to you:

Are you content to be our general?

To make a virtue of necessity

And live as we do in this wilderness?

THIRD OUTLAW
    What say’st thou? Wilt thou be of our
consort?
⁶⁴

Say ‘ay’, and be the captain of us all:

We’ll
do thee homage
⁶⁶
and be ruled by thee,

Love thee as our commander and our king.

FIRST OUTLAW
    But if thou scorn our courtesy, thou diest.

SECOND OUTLAW
    Thou shalt not live to brag what we have offered.

VALENTINE
    I take your offer and will live with you,

Provided that you do no
outrages
⁷¹

On
silly
⁷²
women or poor passengers.

THIRD OUTLAW
    No, we detest such vile base practices.

Come, go with us: we’ll bring thee to our
crews,
⁷⁴

And show thee all the treasure we have got,

Which, with ourselves, all rest at thy
dispose.
⁷⁶

PROTEUS
    Already have I been false to Valentine,

And now I must be as unjust to Turio:

Under the
colour
of
commending
³
him,

I have access my own love to prefer.

But Silvia is too fair, too true, too holy,

To be corrupted with my worthless gifts;

When I
protest
⁷
true loyalty to her,

She
twits
⁸
me with my falsehood to my friend;

When to her beauty I
commend
⁹
my vows,

She bids me think how I have been forsworn

In breaking faith with Julia, whom I loved;

And notwithstanding all her sudden
quips,
¹²

The least whereof would quell a lover’s hope,

Yet, spaniel-like, the more she spurns my love,

The more it grows and fawneth on her still.

But here comes Turio; now must we to her window,

And give some evening music to her ear.

TURIO
    How now, Sir Proteus, are you
crept
¹⁸
before us?

PROTEUS
    Ay, gentle Turio, for you know that love

Will
creep
in service where it cannot
go.
²⁰

TURIO
    Ay, but I hope, sir, that you
love not here.
²¹

PROTEUS
    Sir, but I do: or else I would be hence.

TURIO
    Who, Silvia?

PROTEUS
    Ay, Silvia: for your sake.

TURIO
    
I thank you for your own.
²⁵
Now, gentlemen,

Let’s tune, and to it
lustily
²⁶
awhile.

HOST
    Now, my young guest, methinks you’re
allicholly
²⁷
; I

pray you, why is it?

JULIA
    Marry, mine host, because I cannot be merry.

HOST
    Come, we’ll have you merry: I’ll bring you where

you shall hear music and see the gentleman that you asked

for.

JULIA
    But shall I hear him speak?

HOST
    Ay, that you shall.

JULIA
    That will be music.

HOST
    Hark, hark!

JULIA
    Is he among these?

HOST
    Ay: but peace, let’s hear ’em.

Who is Silvia? What is she?

That all our
swains
⁴⁰
commend her?

Holy, fair and wise is she:

The heaven such
grace
⁴²
did lend her,

    That she might
admirèd
⁴³
be.

Is she kind as she is fair?

For beauty lives with kindness:

Love doth to her eyes
repair,
⁴⁶

To help him
of
⁴⁷
his blindness,

    And, being helped, inhabits there.

Then to Silvia let us sing,

That Silvia is excelling;

She excels each mortal thing

Upon the dull earth dwelling.

    To her let us garlands bring.

HOST
    How now? Are you sadder than you were before?

How
do
you, man? The music
likes
⁵⁵
you not.

JULIA
    You mistake: the musician
likes me not.
⁵⁶

HOST
    Why, my pretty youth?

JULIA
    He
plays false
,
father.
⁵⁸

HOST
    How, out of tune on the strings?

JULIA
    Not so: but yet so false that he grieves my very

heart-strings.

HOST
    You have a
quick
⁶²
ear.

JULIA
    Ay, I would I were deaf: it makes me have a
slow
⁶³

heart.

HOST
    I perceive you delight not in music.

JULIA
    Not a whit, when it
jars
⁶⁶
so.

HOST
    Hark what fine
change
⁶⁷
is in the music.

JULIA
    Ay, that change is the
spite.
⁶⁸

HOST
    You would have them always play
but one thing?
⁶⁹

JULIA
    I would always have
one play but one thing.
⁷⁰

But, host, doth this Sir Proteus that we talk on

Often resort unto this gentlewoman?

HOST
    I tell you what Lance his man told me: he loved her

out of all nick.
⁷⁴

JULIA
    Where is Lance?

HOST
    Gone to seek his dog, which tomorrow, by his

master’s command, he must carry for a present to his lady.

JULIA
    Peace, stand aside: the company parts.

PROTEUS
    Sir Turio, fear not you: I will so plead

That you shall say my cunning drift excels.

TURIO
    Where meet we?

PROTEUS
    At
Saint Gregory’s well.
⁸²

TURIO
    Farewell.

PROTEUS
    Madam, good even to your ladyship.

SILVIA
    I thank you for your music, gentlemen.

Who is that that spake?

PROTEUS
    One, lady, if you knew his pure heart’s truth,

You would quickly learn to know him by his voice.

SILVIA
    Sir Proteus, as I take it.

PROTEUS
    Sir Proteus, gentle lady, and your servant.

SILVIA
    What’s your
will?
⁹¹

PROTEUS
    That I may
compass yours.
⁹²

SILVIA
    You have your wish: my will is even this,

That presently you
hie
⁹⁴
you home to bed.

Thou
subtle,
⁹⁵
perjured, false, disloyal man:

Think’st thou I am so shallow, so
conceitless,
⁹⁶

To be seduced by thy flattery,

That hast deceived so many with thy vows?

Return, return, and make
thy love
⁹⁹
amends.

For me — by this
pale queen of night
¹⁰⁰
I swear—

I am so far from granting thy request

That I despise thee for thy
wrongful suit,
¹⁰²

And
by and by
¹⁰³
intend to chide myself,

Even for this time I spend in talking to thee.

PROTEUS
    I grant, sweet love, that I did love a lady:

But she is dead.