William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition (265 page)

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Authors: William Shakespeare

Tags: #Drama, #Literary Criticism, #Shakespeare

BOOK: William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition
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DON 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 tonight.
I will assume thy part in some disguise,
And tell fair Hero I am Claudio.
And in her bosom I’ll unclasp my heart
And take her hearing prisoner with the force
And strong encounter of my amorous tale.
Then after to her father will I break,
And the conclusion is, she shall be thine.
In practice let us put it presently.
Exeunt
1.2
Enter Leonato and Antonio, an old man brother to Leonato, severally
 
LEONATO How now, brother, where is my cousin, your son? Hath he provided this music?
ANTONIO, He is very busy about it. But brother, I can tell you strange news that you yet dreamt not of.
LEONATO Are they good?
ANTONIO, 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.
LEONATO Hath the fellow any wit that told you this?
ANTONIO A good sharp fellow. I will send for him, and question him yourself.
LEONATO 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. ⌈
Enter attendants
⌉ 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
1.3
Enter Don John the bastard and Conrad, his companion
 
CONRAD What the goodyear, my lord, why are you thus out of measure sad?
DON JOHN There is no measure in the occasion that breeds it, therefore the sadness is without limit.
CONRAD You should hear reason. DON JOHN And when I have heard it, what blessing brings it?
CONRAD If not a present remedy, at least a patient sufferance.
DON JOHN I wonder that thou—being, as thou sayst 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.
CONRAD 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.
DON 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 mean time, let me be that I am, and seek not to alter me.
CONRAD Can you make no use of your discontent?
DON JOHN I make all use of it, for I use it only. Who comes here?
Enter Borachio
 
What news, Borachio?
BORACHIO 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.
DON JOHN Will it serve for any model to build mischief on? What is he for a fool that betroths himself to unquietness?
BORACHIO Marry, it is your brother’s right hand.
DON JOHN Who, the most exquisite Claudio?
BORACHIO Even he.
DON JOHN A proper squire. And who, and who? Which way looks he?
BORACHIO Marry, on Hero, the daughter and heir of Leonato.
DON JOHN A very forward March chick. How came you to this?
BORACHIO 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 whipped 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.
DON 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?
CONRAD To the death, my lord.
DON JOHN Let us to the great supper. Their cheer is the greater that I am subdued. Would the cook were o’ my mind. Shall we go prove what’s to be done?
BORACHIO We’ll wait upon your lordship.
Exeunt
2.1
Enter Leonato, Antonio his brother, Hero his daughter, Beatrice his niece
, ⌈
Margaret
,
and Ursula
⌉
 
LEONATO Was not Count John here at supper?
ANTONIO I saw him not.
BEATRICE How tartly that gentleman looks. I never can see him but I am heartburned an hour after.
HERO He is of a very melancholy disposition.
BEATRICE 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.
LEONATO Then half Signor Benedick’s tongue in Count John’s mouth, and half Count John’s melancholy in Signor Benedick’s face—
BEATRICE 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.
LEONATO By my troth, niece, thou wilt never get thee a husband if thou be so shrewd of thy tongue.
ANTONIO In faith, she’s too curst.
BEATRICE 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.
LEONATO So, by being too curst, God will send you no horns.
BEATRICE just, if he send me no husband, for the which blessing I am at him upon my knees every morning and evening. Lord, I could not endure a husband with a beard on his face. I had rather lie in the woollen.
LEONATO You may light on a husband that hath no beard.
BEATRICE What should I do with him—dress him in my apparel and make him my waiting gentlewoman? He that hath a beard is more than a youth, and he that hath no beard is less than a man; and he that is more than a youth is not for me, and he that is less than a man, I am not for him. Therefore I will even take sixpence in earnest of the bearherd and lead his apes into hell.
LEONATO Well then, go you into hell?
BEATRICE No, but to the gate, and there will the devil meet me like an old cuckold with horns on his head, and say, ‘Get you to heaven, Beatrice, get you to heaven. Here’s no place for you maids.’ So deliver I up my apes and away to Saint Peter fore the heavens. He shows me where the bachelors sit, and there live we as merry as the day is long.
ANTONIO (
to Hero
) Well, niece, I trust you will be ruled by your father.
BEATRICE Yes, faith, it is my cousin’s duty to make curtsy and say, ‘Father, as it please you.’ But yet for all that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else make another curtsy and say, ‘Father, as it please me.’
LEONATO Well, niece, I hope to see you one day fitted with a husband.
BEATRICE Not till God make men of some other mettle than earth. Would it not grieve a woman to be overmastered 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.
LEONATO (
to Hero
) Daughter, remember what I told you. If the Prince do solicit you in that kind, you know your answer.
BEATRICE The fault will be in the music, cousin, if you 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 cinquepace. 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 cinquepace faster and faster till he sink into his grave.
LEONATO Cousin, you apprehend passing shrewdly.
BEATRICE I have a good eye, uncle. I can see a church by daylight.
LEONATO The revellers are entering, brother. Make good room.
Enter Don Pedro, Claudio
,
Benedick,
and
Balthasar, all masked, Don John, and Borachio,
⌈
with
a
drummer
⌉
 
DON PEDRO (
to Hero
) Lady, will you walk a bout 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.
DON PEDRO With me in your company?
HERO I may say so when I please.
DON PEDRO And when please you to say so?
HERO When I like your favour; for God defend the lute should be like the case.
DON PEDRO
My visor is Philemon’s roof. Within the house is Jove.
HERO
Why, then, your visor should be thatched.
DON PEDRO Speak low if you speak love.
They move aside
⌈BALTHASAR⌉ (to Margaret) Well, I would you did like me.
MARGARET So would not I, for your own sake, for I have many ill qualities.
⌈BALTHASAR⌉ Which is one?
MARGARET I say my prayers aloud.
⌈BALTHASAR⌉ I love you the better—the hearers may cry amen.
MARGARET God match me with a good dancer.
BALTHASAR Amen.
MARGARET And God keep him. out of my sight when the dance is done. Answer, clerk.
BALTHASAR No more words. The clerk is answered.
They move aside
URSULA (to Antonio) I know you well enough, you are Signor Antonio.
ANTONIO At a word, I am not.
URSULA I know you by the waggling of your head.
ANTONIO To tell you true, I counterfeit him.
URSULA 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.
ANTONIO At a word, I am not.
URSULA 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.
They move aside
 
BEATRICE (
to Benedick
) Will you not tell me who told you so? 115 BENEDICK No, you shall pardon me.
BEATRICE Nor will you not tell me who you are?
BENEDICK Not now.
BEATRICE That I was disdainful, and that I had my good wit out of the Hundred Merry Tales—well, this was Signor Benedick that said so. BENEDICK What’s he?
BEATRICE I am sure you know him well enough.
BENEDICK Not I, believe me.
BEATRICE Did he never make you laugh?
BENEDICK I pray you, what is he?
BEATRICE 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 pleases men and angers them, and then they laugh at him, and beat him. I am sure he is in the fleet. I would he had boarded me.
BENEDICK When I know the gentleman, I’ll tell him what you say.
BEATRICE 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
⌉
 

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