But that's no matter; let him kill one first ;- LEON. Brother, b ANT. Content yourself: God knows, I lov'd my niece; As I dare take a serpent by the tongue : Brother Antony,— ANT. Hold you content: What, man! I know them, LEON. But, brother Antony, ANT. Come, 't is no matter; Do not you meddle, let me deal in this. yea, D. PEDRO. Gentlemen both, we will not wake your patience. My heart is sorry for your daughter's death; But, on my honour, she was charg'd with nothing But what was true, and very full of proof. LEON. My lord, my lord, D. PEDRO. LEON. Come, brother, away :-I will be heard ; I will not hear you. No? ANT. And shall, Or some of us will smart for it. [Exeunt LEONATO and ANTONIO. Enter BENEDICK. D. PEDRO. See, see; here comes the man we went to seek. CLAUD. Now, signior! what news? BENE. Good day, my lord. D. PEDRO. Welcome, signior: You are almost come to part almost a fray. "Steevens destroys this most characteristic line-and his reading is that of all popular editions -by his old fashion of metre-monging. He reads, "Come follow me, boy: come boy, follow me." b Foining-thrusting. • Fashion-monging. So the original copies; but always altered to "fashion-mong'ring." The participle of the Anglo-Saxon verb, meaning to trade, would give us monging; as the verb gives us the noun signifying a trader-monger. CLAUD. We had like to have had our two noses snapped off with two old men without teeth. D. PEDRO. Leonato and his brother: What think'st thou? Had we fought, I doubt we should have been too young for them. BENE. In a false quarrel there is no true valour: I came to seek you both. CLAUD. 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? BENE. It is in my scabbard: Shall I draw it? D. PEDRO. Dost thou wear thy wit by thy side? CLAUD. 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. D. PEDRO. As I am an honest man, he looks pale :-Art thou sick, or angry? CLAUD. What! courage, man! What though care killed a cat, thou hast mettle enough in thee to kill care. BENE. Sir, I shall meet your wit in the career, an you charge it against me:— I pray you, choose another subject. CLAUD. Nay, then, give him another staff; this last was broke cross. D. PEDRO. By this light, he changes more and more: I think he be angry indeed. CLAUD. If he be, he knows how to turn his girdle 21. BENE. Shall I speak a word in your ear? CLAUD. God bless me from a challenge! BENE. You are a villain;-I jest not-I will make it good how you dare, with what you dare, and when you dare:-Do me right, or I will protest your cowardice. You have killed a sweet lady, and her death shall fall heavy on you: Let me hear from you. CLAUD. Well, I will meet you, so I may have good cheer. D. PEDRO. What, a feast? a feast? CLAUD. I' faith, I thank him; he hath bid me to a calf's head and a capon, the which if I do not carve most curiously, say my knife 's naught.- Shall I not find a woodcock too? BENE. Sir, your wit ambles well; it goes easily. 66 66 D. PEDRO. I'll tell thee how Beatrice praised thy wit the other day: I said, thou hadst a fine wit: True," says she, a fine little one:""No," said I, "a great wit;" Right," says she, a great gross one:" " Nay," said I, "a good wit;" "Just," said she, "it hurts nobody:" "Nay," said I, "the gentleman is wise;" "Certain," said she, " a wise gentleman:" "Nay," said I, "he hath the tongues ;" "That I believe," said she, " for he swore a thing to me on Monday night, which he forswore on Tuesday morning; there's a double tongue; there's two tongues." Thus did she, an hour together, trans-shape thy particular virtues; yet, at last, she concluded with a sigh, thou wast the properest man in Italy. CLAUD. For the which she wept heartily, and said, she cared not. D. PEDRO. Yea, that she did; but yet, for all that, an if she did not hate him deadly, she would love him dearly: the old man's daughter told us all. CLAUD. All, all; and moreover, "God saw him when he was hid in the garden." D. PEDRO. But when shall we set the savage bull's horns on the sensible Benedick's head? CLAUD. Yea, and text underneath, Here dwells Benedick the married man?" BENE. Fare you well, boy! you know my mind; I will leave you now to your gossip-like humour: you break jests as braggarts do their blades, which, God be thanked, hurt not.-My lord, for your many courtesies, I thank you: I must discontinue your company: your brother, the bastard, is fled from Messina: you have, among you, killed a sweet and innocent lady: For my lord Lack-beard there, he and I shall meet; and till then peace be with him. [Exit BENEDICK. D. PEDRO. He is in earnest. CLAUD. In most profound earnest; and I'll warrant you, for the love of Beatrice. D. PEDRO. And hath challenged thee? CLAUD. Most sincerely. D. PEDRO. What a pretty thing man is, when he goes in his doublet and hose, and leaves off his wit! CLAUD. He is then a giant to an ape: but then is an ape a doctor to such a man. D. PEDRO. But, soft you, let me be; pluck up, my heart, and be sad! Did he not say my brother was fled? Enter DOG BERRY, VERGES, and the Watch, with CONRADE and BORACHIO. DOGB. Come, you, sir; if justice cannot tame you, she shall ne'er weigh more reasons in her balance: nay, an you be a cursing hypocrite once, you must be looked to. D. PEDRO. How now, two of my brother's men bound! Borachio one! D. PEDRO. Officers, what offence have these men done? DOGB. Marry, sir, they have committed false report; moreover, they have spoken untruths; secondarily, they are slanders; sixth and lastly, they have belied a lady; thirdly, they have verified unjust things; and, to conclude, they are lying knaves. D. PEDRO. First, I ask thee what they have done; thirdly, I ask thee what 's their offence; sixth and lastly, why they are committed; and, to conclude, what you lay to their charge? CLAUD. Rightly reasoned, and in his own division; and, by my troth, there's one meaning well suited. D. PEDRO. Whom have you offended, masters, that you are thus bound to your answer? this learned constable is too cunning to be understood: What 's your offence? BORA. Sweet prince, let me go no further to mine answer; do you hear me, and let this count kill me. I have deceived even your very eyes: what your wisdoms could not discover these shallow fools have brought to light; who, in the night, overheard me confessing to this man, how don John your brother insensed me to slander the lady Hero; how you were brought into the orchard, and saw me court Margaret in Hero's garments; how you disgraced her, when you should marry her: my villainy they have upon record; which I had rather seal with my death, than repeat over to my shame the lady is dead upon mine and my master's false accusation; and briefly, I desire nothing but the reward of a villain. D. PEDRO. Runs not this speech like iron through your blood? CLAUD. I have drunk poison whiles he utter'd it. D. PEDRO. But did my brother set thee on to this? BORA. Yea, and paid me richly for the practice of it. CLAUD. Sweet Hero! now thy image doth appear In the rare semblance that I lov'd it first. DOGB. Come, bring away the plaintiffs; by this time our sexton hath reformed signior Leonato of the matter: And, masters, do not forget to specify, when time and place shall serve, that I am an ass. VERG. Here, here comes master signior Leonato, and the sexton too. Re-enter LEONATO and ANTONIO, with the Sexton. LEON. Which is the villain? Let me see his eyes; That when I note another man like him I may avoid him: Which of these is he? BORA. If you would know your wronger, look on me. LEON. Art thou-thou-the slave that with thy breath hast kill'd LEON. No, not so, villain; thou beliest thyself; A third is fled, that had a hand in it: I thank you, princes, for my daughter's death; Can lay upon my sin: yet sinn'd I not, • The exquisite repetition of thou is found in the folio. All the modern editions read, " Art thon the slave." love LEON. I cannot bid you bid my daughter live, And she alone is heir to both of us; Give her the right you should have given her cousin, CLAUD. O, noble sir, Your over kindness doth wring tears from me! For henceforth of poor Claudio. LEON. To-morrow then I will expect your coming; BORA. No, by my soul, she was not; Nor knew not what she did, when she spoke to me; But always hath been just and virtuous, In anything that I do know by her. DOGB. Moreover, sir, (which, indeed, is not under white and black,) this plaintiff here, the offender, did call me ass: I beseech you, let it be remembered in his punishment: And also, the watch heard them talk of one Deformed: they say, he wears a key in his ear, and a lock hanging by it; and borrows money in God's name; the which he hath used so long, and never paid, that now men grow hard-hearted, and will lend nothing for God's sake: Pray you, examine him upon that point. LEON. I thank thee for thy care and honest pains. DOGB. Your worship speaks like a most thankful and reverend youth; and I praise God for you. LEON. There 's for thy pains. DOGB. God save the foundation! LEON. Go, I discharge thee of thy prisoner, and I thank thee. DOGB. I leave an arrant knave with your worship; which, I beseech your worship, to correct yourself, for the example of others. God keep your worship; I wish your worship well; God restore you to health: I humbly give you • Pack'd. The quarto and folio both have packt. Prynne tells us of a "pack'd parliament;" and in our own days we have heard of a "pack'd jury.” |