Much Ado About Nothing

by William Shakespeare

BENEDICK If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat and shoot at

  me, and he that hits me, let him be clapped on the shoulder

  and called Adam.

  DON PEDRO Well, as try. ‘In time the savage bull doth bear the

  yoke.’

  BENEDICK The savage bull may, but if ever the sensible

  Benedick bear it, pluck off the bull’s horns and set them in

  my forehead, and let me be vilely painted, and in such great

  letters as they write ‘Here is good horse to hire’, let them

  signify under my sign ‘Here you may see Benedick the

  married man.’

  CLAUDIO If this should ever happen, thou wouldst be horn-

  mad.

  DON PEDRO Nay, if Cupid have not spent all his quiver in Venice,

  thou wilt quake for this shortly.

  BENEDICK I look for an earthquake too, then.

  DON PEDRO Well, you will temporize with the hours. In the

  meantime, good Signior Benedick, repair to Leonato’s, commend

  me to him, and tell him I will not fail him at

  supper, for indeed he hath made great preparation.

  BENEDICK I have almost matter enough in me for such an

  embassage, and so I commit you—

  CLAUDIO To the tuition of God. From my house, if I had it—

  DON PEDRO The sixth of July. Your loving friend, Benedick.

  BENEDICK Nay, mock not, mock not; the body of your discourse

  is sometime guarded with fragments, and the guards are but

  slightly basted on neither. Ere you flout old ends any further,

  examine your conscience. And so I leave you.

  Exit

  CLAUDIO My liege, your Highness now may do me good.

  DON PEDRO My love is thine to teach: teach it but how,

  And thou shalt see how apt it is to learn

  Any hard lesson that may do thee good.

  CLAUDIO Hath Leonato any son, my lord?

  DON PEDRO No child but Hero, she’s his only heir.

  Dost thou affect her, Claudio?

  CLAUDIO O, my lord,

  When you went onward on this ended action,

  I looked upon her with a soldier’s eye

  That liked, but had a rougher task in hand

  Than to drive liking to the name of love.

  But now I am returned, and that war-thoughts

  Have left their places vacant, in their rooms

  Come thronging soft and delicate desires,

  All prompting me how fair young Hero is,

  Saying I liked her ere I went to wars.

  DON PEDRO Thou wilt be like a lover presently

  And tire the hearer with a book of words.

  If thou dost love fair Hero, cherish it,

  And I will break with her and with her father,

  And thou shalt have her. Wast not to this end

  That thou began’st to twist so fine a story?

  CLAUDIO How sweetly you do minister to love,

  That know love’s grief by his complexion!

  But lest my liking might too sudden seem,

  I would have salved it with a longer treatise.

  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

  Act 1 Scene 2

  running scene 2

  Enter Leonato and an old man [Antonio] brother to Leonato [meeting]

  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 my orchard,

  were thus 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 regard 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.

  Act 1 Scene 3

  running scene 3

  Enter Sir [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,

  therefore the sadness is without limit.

  CONRAD You should hear reason.

  DON JOHN And when I have heard it, what blessing bringeth it?

  CONRAD If not a present remedy, yet a patient sufferance.

  DON JOHN I wonder that thou — being as thou sayest 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

  meantime, let me be that I am, and seek not to alter me.

  CONRAD Can you make no use of your discontent?

  DON JOHN I will 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 of my mind. Shall

  we go prove what’s to be done?

  BORACHIO We’ll wait upon your lordship.

  Exeunt

  Act 2 Scene 1

  running scene 4

  Enter Leonato, [Antonio] his brother, [Innogen] his wife, Hero his daughter [attended by Margaret and Ursula], and Beatrice his niece and a Kinsman

  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 heart-burned 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.

  LEONATO Then half Signior Benedick’s tongue in Count

  John’s mouth, and half Count John’s melancholy in Signior

  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 he 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 upon 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

  bearward 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,

  for the heavens. He shows me where the bachelors sit, and

  there live we as merry as the day is long.

  ANTONIO Well, niece, I trust you will be ruled

  To Hero

  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 metal than

  earth. Would it not grieve a woman to be overmastered with

  a piece of valiant dust? To make 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 Daughter, remember what I told you:

  To Hero

  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 cinque-pace: 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 cinque-pace faster and faster, till he sinks 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.

  All put on their masks

  Enter Prince [Don] Pedro, Claudio, and Benedick, and Balthasar, [Don] John, [Borachio, Margaret, Ursula and other] Masquers with a drum

  Couples pair up and begin dancing

  DON PEDRO 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 dance aside

  BALTHASAR 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 dance aside

  URSULA I know you well enough, you are Signior 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,

  yo
u 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 dance aside

  BEATRICE Will you not tell me who told you so?

  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 Signior

  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 pleaseth 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.

  Aside?

  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.

  We must follow the leaders.

  Music

  BENEDICK In every good thing.

  BEATRICE Nay, if they lead to any ill, I will leave them at the

  next turning.

  Music for the Dance. [Then] exeunt [dancing, all except Don John, Borachio and Claudio]

  DON JOHN Sure my brother is amorous on Hero and

  Aside to Borachio

  hath withdrawn her father to break with him about

  it. The ladies follow her and but one visor remains.

  BORACHIO And that is Claudio: I know him by his bearing.

  DON JOHN Are not you Signior Benedick?

  To Claudio

  CLAUDIO You know me well, I am he.