Complete Plays, The (432 page)

Host

How now! are you sadder than you were before? How do you, man? the music likes you not.

Julia

You mistake; the musician likes me not.

Host

Why, my pretty youth?

Julia

He plays false, father.

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 ear.

Julia

Ay, I would I were deaf; it makes me have a slow heart.

Host

I perceive you delight not in music.

Julia

Not a whit, when it jars so.

Host

Hark, what fine change is in the music!

Julia

Ay, that change is the spite.

Host

You would have them always play but one thing?

Julia

I would always have one play but one thing.
But, host, doth this Sir Proteus that we talk on
Often resort unto this gentlewoman?

Host

I tell you what Launce, his man, told me: he loved her out of all nick.

Julia

Where is Launce?

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 Thurio, fear not you: I will so plead
That you shall say my cunning drift excels.

Thurio

Where meet we?

Proteus

 
At Saint Gregory’s well.

Thurio

Farewell.

Exeunt Thurio and Musicians

Enter Silvia above

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?

Proteus

 
That I may compass yours.

Silvia

You have your wish; my will is even this:
That presently you hie you home to bed.
Thou subtle, perjured, false, disloyal man!
Think’st thou I am so shallow, so conceitless,
To be seduced by thy flattery,
That hast deceived so many with thy vows?
Return, return, and make thy love amends.
For me, by this pale queen of night I swear,
I am so far from granting thy request
That I despise thee for thy wrongful suit,
And by and by 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.

Julia

[Aside]
 
’Twere false, if I should speak it;
For I am sure she is not buried.

Silvia

Say that she be; yet Valentine thy friend
Survives; to whom, thyself art witness,
I am betroth’d: and art thou not ashamed
To wrong him with thy importunacy?

Proteus

I likewise hear that Valentine is dead.

Silvia

And so suppose am I; for in his grave
Assure thyself my love is buried.

Proteus

Sweet lady, let me rake it from the earth.

Silvia

Go to thy lady’s grave and call hers thence,
Or, at the least, in hers sepulchre thine.

Julia

[Aside]
 
He heard not that.

Proteus

Madam, if your heart be so obdurate,
Vouchsafe me yet your picture for my love,
The picture that is hanging in your chamber;
To that I’ll speak, to that I’ll sigh and weep:
For since the substance of your perfect self
Is else devoted, I am but a shadow;
And to your shadow will I make true love.

Julia

[Aside]
 
If ’twere a substance, you would, sure, deceive it, And make it but a shadow, as I am.

Silvia

I am very loath to be your idol, sir;
But since your falsehood shall become you well
To worship shadows and adore false shapes,
Send to me in the morning and I’ll send it:
And so, good rest.

Proteus

 
As wretches have o’ernight
That wait for execution in the morn.

Exeunt Proteus and Silvia severally

Julia

Host, will you go?

Host

By my halidom, I was fast asleep.

Julia

Pray you, where lies Sir Proteus?

Host

Marry, at my house. Trust me, I think ’tis almost day.

Julia

Not so; but it hath been the longest night
That e’er I watch’d and the most heaviest.

Exeunt

S
CENE
III. T
HE
SAME
.

Enter Eglamour

Eglamour

This is the hour that Madam Silvia
Entreated me to call and know her mind:
There’s some great matter she’ld employ me in.
Madam, madam!

Enter Silvia above

Silvia

 
Who calls?

Eglamour

Your servant and your friend;
One that attends your ladyship’s command.

Silvia

Sir Eglamour, a thousand times good morrow.

Eglamour

As many, worthy lady, to yourself:
According to your ladyship’s impose,
I am thus early come to know what service
It is your pleasure to command me in.

Silvia

O Eglamour, thou art a gentleman —
Think not I flatter, for I swear I do not —
Valiant, wise, remorseful, well accomplish’d:
Thou art not ignorant what dear good will
I bear unto the banish’d Valentine,
Nor how my father would enforce me marry
Vain Thurio, whom my very soul abhors.
Thyself hast loved; and I have heard thee say
No grief did ever come so near thy heart
As when thy lady and thy true love died,
Upon whose grave thou vow’dst pure chastity.
Sir Eglamour, I would to Valentine,
To Mantua, where I hear he makes abode;
And, for the ways are dangerous to pass,
I do desire thy worthy company,
Upon whose faith and honour I repose.
Urge not my father’s anger, Eglamour,
But think upon my grief, a lady’s grief,
And on the justice of my flying hence,
To keep me from a most unholy match,
Which heaven and fortune still rewards with plagues.
I do desire thee, even from a heart
As full of sorrows as the sea of sands,
To bear me company and go with me:
If not, to hide what I have said to thee,
That I may venture to depart alone.

Eglamour

Madam, I pity much your grievances;
Which since I know they virtuously are placed,
I give consent to go along with you,
Recking as little what betideth me
As much I wish all good befortune you.
When will you go?

Silvia

 
This evening coming.

Eglamour

Where shall I meet you?

Silvia

At Friar Patrick’s cell,
Where I intend holy confession.

Eglamour

I will not fail your ladyship. Good morrow, gentle lady.

Silvia

Good morrow, kind Sir Eglamour.

Exeunt severally

S
CENE
IV. T
HE
SAME
.

Enter Launce, with his his Dog

Launce

When a man’s servant shall play the cur with him, look you, it goes hard: one that I brought up of a puppy; one that I saved from drowning, when three or four of his blind brothers and sisters went to it. I have taught him, even as one would say precisely, ‘thus I would teach a dog.’ I was sent to deliver him as a present to Mistress Silvia from my master; and I came no sooner into the dining-chamber but he steps me to her trencher and steals her capon’s leg: O, ’tis a foul thing when a cur cannot keep himself in all companies! I would have, as one should say, one that takes upon him to be a dog indeed, to be, as it were, a dog at all things. If I had not had more wit than he, to take a fault upon me that he did, I think verily he had been hanged for’t; sure as I live, he had suffered for’t; you shall judge. He thrusts me himself into the company of three or four gentlemanlike dogs under the duke’s table: he had not been there — bless the mark!— a pissing while, but all the chamber smelt him. ‘Out with the dog!’ says one: ‘What cur is that?’ says another: ‘Whip him out’ says the third: ‘Hang him up’ says the duke. I, having been acquainted with the smell before, knew it was Crab, and goes me to the fellow that whips the dogs: ‘Friend,’ quoth I, ‘you mean to whip the dog?’ ‘Ay, marry, do I,’ quoth he. ‘You do him the more wrong,’ quoth I; ‘’twas I did the thing you wot of.’ He makes me no more ado, but whips me out of the chamber. How many masters would do this for his servant? Nay, I’ll be sworn, I have sat in the stocks for puddings he hath stolen, otherwise he had been executed; I have stood on the pillory for geese he hath killed, otherwise he had suffered for’t. Thou thinkest not of this now. Nay, I remember the trick you served me when I took my leave of Madam Silvia: did not I bid thee still mark me and do as I do? when didst thou see me heave up my leg and make water against a gentlewoman’s farthingale? didst thou ever see me do such a trick?

Enter Proteus and Julia

Proteus

Sebastian is thy name? I like thee well
And will employ thee in some service presently.

Julia

In what you please: I’ll do what I can.

Proteus

I hope thou wilt.

To Launce

How now, you whoreson peasant!
Where have you been these two days loitering?

Launce

Marry, sir, I carried Mistress Silvia the dog you bade me.

Proteus

And what says she to my little jewel?

Launce

Marry, she says your dog was a cur, and tells you currish thanks is good enough for such a present.

Proteus

But she received my dog?

Launce

No, indeed, did she not: here have I brought him back again.

Proteus

What, didst thou offer her this from me?

Launce

Ay, sir: the other squirrel was stolen from me by the hangman boys in the market-place: and then I offered her mine own, who is a dog as big as ten of yours, and therefore the gift the greater.

Proteus

Go get thee hence, and find my dog again,
Or ne’er return again into my sight.
Away, I say! stay’st thou to vex me here?

Exit Launce

A slave, that still an end turns me to shame!
Sebastian, I have entertained thee,
Partly that I have need of such a youth
That can with some discretion do my business,
For ’tis no trusting to yond foolish lout,
But chiefly for thy face and thy behavior,
Which, if my augury deceive me not,
Witness good bringing up, fortune and truth:
Therefore know thou, for this I entertain thee.
Go presently and take this ring with thee,
Deliver it to Madam Silvia:
She loved me well deliver’d it to me.

Julia

It seems you loved not her, to leave her token.
She is dead, belike?

Proteus

Not so; I think she lives.

Julia

Alas!

Proteus

Why dost thou cry ‘alas’?

Julia

I cannot choose
But pity her.

Proteus

 
Wherefore shouldst thou pity her?

Julia

Because methinks that she loved you as well
As you do love your lady Silvia:
She dreams of him that has forgot her love;
You dote on her that cares not for your love.
’Tis pity love should be so contrary;
And thinking of it makes me cry ‘alas!’

Proteus

Well, give her that ring and therewithal
This letter. That’s her chamber. Tell my lady
I claim the promise for her heavenly picture.
Your message done, hie home unto my chamber,
Where thou shalt find me, sad and solitary.

Exit

Julia

How many women would do such a message?
Alas, poor Proteus! thou hast entertain’d
A fox to be the shepherd of thy lambs.
Alas, poor fool! why do I pity him
That with his very heart despiseth me?
Because he loves her, he despiseth me;
Because I love him I must pity him.
This ring I gave him when he parted from me,
To bind him to remember my good will;
And now am I, unhappy messenger,
To plead for that which I would not obtain,
To carry that which I would have refused,
To praise his faith which I would have dispraised.
I am my master’s true-confirmed love;
But cannot be true servant to my master,
Unless I prove false traitor to myself.
Yet will I woo for him, but yet so coldly
As, heaven it knows, I would not have him speed.

Enter Silvia, attended

Gentlewoman, good day! I pray you, be my mean
To bring me where to speak with Madam Silvia.

Silvia

What would you with her, if that I be she?

Julia

If you be she, I do entreat your patience
To hear me speak the message I am sent on.

Silvia

From whom?

Julia

From my master, Sir Proteus, madam.

Silvia

O, he sends you for a picture.

Julia

Ay, madam.

Silvia

Ursula, bring my picture here.
Go give your master this: tell him from me,
One Julia, that his changing thoughts forget,
Would better fit his chamber than this shadow.