Complete Plays, The (401 page)

Benedick

Is Claudio thine enemy?

Beatrice

Is he not approved in the height a villain, that hath slandered, scorned, dishonoured my kinswoman? O that I were a man! What, bear her in hand until they come to take hands; and then, with public accusation, uncovered slander, unmitigated rancour, — O God, that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the market-place.

Benedick

Hear me, Beatrice,—

Beatrice

Talk with a man out at a window! A proper saying!

Benedick

Nay, but, Beatrice,—

Beatrice

Sweet Hero! She is wronged, she is slandered, she is undone.

Benedick

Beat —

Beatrice

Princes and counties! Surely, a princely testimony, a goodly count, Count Comfect; a sweet gallant, surely! O that I were a man for his sake! or that I had any friend would be a man for my sake! But manhood is melted into courtesies, valour into compliment, and men are only turned into tongue, and trim ones too: he is now as valiant as Hercules that only tells a lie and swears it. I cannot be a man with wishing, therefore I will die a woman with grieving.

Benedick

Tarry, good Beatrice. By this hand, I love thee.

Beatrice

Use it for my love some other way than swearing by it.

Benedick

Think you in your soul the Count Claudio hath wronged Hero?

Beatrice

Yea, as sure as I have a thought or a soul.

Benedick

Enough, I am engaged; I will challenge him. I will kiss your hand, and so I leave you. By this hand, Claudio shall render me a dear account. As you hear of me, so think of me. Go, comfort your cousin: I must say she is dead: and so, farewell.

Exeunt

S
CENE
II. A
PRISON
.

Enter Dogberry, Verges, and Sexton, in gowns; and the Watch, with Conrade and Borachio

Dogberry

Is our whole dissembly appeared?

Verges

O, a stool and a cushion for the sexton.

Sexton

Which be the malefactors?

Dogberry

Marry, that am I and my partner.

Verges

Nay, that’s certain; we have the exhibition to examine.

Sexton

But which are the offenders that are to be examined? let them come before master constable.

Dogberry

Yea, marry, let them come before me. What is your name, friend?

Borachio

Borachio.

Dogberry

Pray, write down, Borachio. Yours, sirrah?

Conrade

I am a gentleman, sir, and my name is Conrade.

Dogberry

Write down, master gentleman Conrade. Masters, do you serve God?

Conrade

Borachio

Yea, sir, we hope.

Dogberry

Write down, that they hope they serve God: and write God first; for God defend but God should go before such villains! Masters, it is proved already that you are little better than false knaves; and it will go near to be thought so shortly. How answer you for yourselves?

Conrade

Marry, sir, we say we are none.

Dogberry

A marvellous witty fellow, I assure you: but I will go about with him. Come you hither, sirrah; a word in your ear: sir, I say to you, it is thought you are false knaves.

Borachio

Sir, I say to you we are none.

Dogberry

Well, stand aside. ’Fore God, they are both in a tale. Have you writ down, that they are none?

Sexton

Master constable, you go not the way to examine: you must call forth the watch that are their accusers.

Dogberry

Yea, marry, that’s the eftest way. Let the watch come forth. Masters, I charge you, in the prince’s name, accuse these men.

First Watchman

This man said, sir, that Don John, the prince’s brother, was a villain.

Dogberry

Write down Prince John a villain. Why, this is flat perjury, to call a prince’s brother villain.

Borachio

Master constable,—

Dogberry

Pray thee, fellow, peace: I do not like thy look,
I promise thee.

Sexton

What heard you him say else?

Second Watchman

Marry, that he had received a thousand ducats of
Don John for accusing the Lady Hero wrongfully.

Dogberry

Flat burglary as ever was committed.

Verges

Yea, by mass, that it is.

Sexton

What else, fellow?

First Watchman

And that Count Claudio did mean, upon his words, to disgrace Hero before the whole assembly. and not marry her.

Dogberry

O villain! thou wilt be condemned into everlasting redemption for this.

Sexton

What else?

Watchman

This is all.

Sexton

And this is more, masters, than you can deny. Prince John is this morning secretly stolen away; Hero was in this manner accused, in this very manner refused, and upon the grief of this suddenly died. Master constable, let these men be bound, and brought to Leonato’s: I will go before and show him their examination.

Exit

Dogberry

Come, let them be opinioned.

Verges

Let them be in the hands —

Conrade

Off, coxcomb!

Dogberry

God’s my life, where’s the sexton? let him write down the prince’s officer coxcomb. Come, bind them. Thou naughty varlet!

Conrade

Away! you are an ass, you are an ass.

Dogberry

Dost thou not suspect my place? dost thou not suspect my years? O that he were here to write me down an ass! But, masters, remember that I am an ass; though it be not written down, yet forget not that I am an ass. No, thou villain, thou art full of piety, as shall be proved upon thee by good witness. I am a wise fellow, and, which is more, an officer, and, which is more, a householder, and, which is more, as pretty a piece of flesh as any is in Messina, and one that knows the law, go to; and a rich fellow enough, go to; and a fellow that hath had losses, and one that hath two gowns and every thing handsome about him. Bring him away. O that I had been writ down an ass!

Exeunt

A
CT
V

S
CENE
I. B
EFORE
L
EONATO
’
S
HOUSE
.

Enter Leonato and Antonio

Antonio

If you go on thus, you will kill yourself:
And ’tis not wisdom thus to second grief
Against yourself.

Leonato

 
I pray thee, cease thy counsel,
Which falls into mine ears as profitless
As water in a sieve: give not me counsel;
Nor let no comforter delight mine ear
But such a one whose wrongs do suit with mine.
Bring me a father that so loved his child,
Whose joy of her is overwhelm’d like mine,
And bid him speak of patience;
Measure his woe the length and breadth of mine
And let it answer every strain for strain,
As thus for thus and such a grief for such,
In every lineament, branch, shape, and form:
If such a one will smile and stroke his beard,
Bid sorrow wag, cry ‘hem!’ when he should groan,
Patch grief with proverbs, make misfortune drunk
With candle-wasters; bring him yet to me,
And I of him will gather patience.
But there is no such man: for, brother, men
Can counsel and speak comfort to that grief
Which they themselves not feel; but, tasting it,
Their counsel turns to passion, which before
Would give preceptial medicine to rage,
Fetter strong madness in a silken thread,
Charm ache with air and agony with words:
No, no; ’tis all men’s office to speak patience
To those that wring under the load of sorrow,
But no man’s virtue nor sufficiency
To be so moral when he shall endure
The like himself. Therefore give me no counsel:
My griefs cry louder than advertisement.

Antonio

Therein do men from children nothing differ.

Leonato

I pray thee, peace. I will be flesh and blood;
For there was never yet philosopher
That could endure the toothache patiently,
However they have writ the style of gods
And made a push at chance and sufferance.

Antonio

Yet bend not all the harm upon yourself;
Make those that do offend you suffer too.

Leonato

There thou speak’st reason: nay, I will do so.
My soul doth tell me Hero is belied;
And that shall Claudio know; so shall the prince
And all of them that thus dishonour her.

Antonio

Here comes the prince and Claudio hastily.

Enter Don Pedro and Claudio

Don Pedro

Good den, good den.

Claudio

Good day to both of you.

Leonato

Hear you. my lords,—

Don Pedro

We have some haste, Leonato.

Leonato

Some haste, my lord! well, fare you well, my lord:
Are you so hasty now? well, all is one.

Don Pedro

Nay, do not quarrel with us, good old man.

Antonio

If he could right himself with quarreling,
Some of us would lie low.

Claudio

Who wrongs him?

Leonato

Marry, thou dost wrong me; thou dissembler, thou:—
Nay, never lay thy hand upon thy sword;
I fear thee not.

Claudio

 
Marry, beshrew my hand,
If it should give your age such cause of fear:
In faith, my hand meant nothing to my sword.

Leonato

Tush, tush, man; never fleer and jest at me:
I speak not like a dotard nor a fool,
As under privilege of age to brag
What I have done being young, or what would do
Were I not old. Know, Claudio, to thy head,
Thou hast so wrong’d mine innocent child and me
That I am forced to lay my reverence by
And, with grey hairs and bruise of many days,
Do challenge thee to trial of a man.
I say thou hast belied mine innocent child;
Thy slander hath gone through and through her heart,
And she lies buried with her ancestors;
O, in a tomb where never scandal slept,
Save this of hers, framed by thy villany!

Claudio

My villany?

Leonato

 
Thine, Claudio; thine, I say.

Don Pedro

You say not right, old man.

Leonato

My lord, my lord,
I’ll prove it on his body, if he dare,
Despite his nice fence and his active practise,
His May of youth and bloom of lustihood.

Claudio

Away! I will not have to do with you.

Leonato

Canst thou so daff me? Thou hast kill’d my child:
If thou kill’st me, boy, thou shalt kill a man.

Antonio

He shall kill two of us, and men indeed:
But that’s no matter; let him kill one first;
Win me and wear me; let him answer me.
Come, follow me, boy; come, sir boy, come, follow me:
Sir boy, I’ll whip you from your foining fence;
Nay, as I am a gentleman, I will.

Leonato

Brother,—

Antonio

Content yourself. God knows I loved my niece;
And she is dead, slander’d to death by villains,
That dare as well answer a man indeed
As I dare take a serpent by the tongue:
Boys, apes, braggarts, Jacks, milksops!

Leonato

Brother Antony,—

Antonio

Hold you content. What, man! I know them, yea,
And what they weigh, even to the utmost scruple,—
Scrambling, out-facing, fashion-monging boys,
That lie and cog and flout, deprave and slander,
Go anticly, show outward hideousness,
And speak off half a dozen dangerous words,
How they might hurt their enemies, if they durst;
And this is all.

Leonato

But, brother Antony,—

Antonio

Come, ’tis no matter:
Do not you meddle; let me deal in this.

Don Pedro

Gentlemen both, we will not wake your patience.
My heart is sorry for your daughter’s death:
But, on my honour, she was charged with nothing
But what was true and very full of proof.

Leonato

My lord, my lord,—

Don Pedro

I will not hear you.

Leonato

No? Come, brother; away! I will be heard.

Antonio

And shall, or some of us will smart for it.

Exeunt Leonato and Antonio

Don Pedro

See, see; here comes the man we went to seek.

Enter Benedick

Claudio

Now, signior, what news?

Benedick

Good day, my lord.

Don Pedro

Welcome, signior: you are almost come to part almost a fray.

Claudio

We had like to have had our two noses snapped off with two old men without teeth.

Don Pedro

Leonato and his brother. What thinkest thou? Had we fought, I doubt we should have been too young for them.

Benedick

In a false quarrel there is no true valour. I came to seek you both.

Claudio

We have been up and down to seek thee; for we are high-proof melancholy and would fain have it beaten away. Wilt thou use thy wit?

Benedick

It is in my scabbard: shall I draw it?

Don Pedro

Dost thou wear thy wit by thy side?

Claudio

Never any did so, though very many have been beside their wit. I will bid thee draw, as we do the minstrels; draw, to pleasure us.