The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works
Page 83
OFFICER Away, they’ll kill us!
They run all out, as fast as may be, frighted.
ANTIPHOLUS S.
I see these witches are afraid of swords.
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DROMIO S.
She that would be your wife now ran from you.
ANTIPHOLUS S.
Come to the Centaur, fetch our stuff from thence;
I long that we were safe and sound aboard.
DROMIO S. Faith, stay here this night, they will surely
do us no harm; you saw they speak us fair, give us
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gold. Methinks they are such a gentle nation, that but
for the mountain of mad flesh that claims marriage of
me, I could find in my heart to stay here still and turn
witch.
ANTIPHOLUS S. I will not stay to-night for all the town;
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Therefore away, to get our stuff aboard. Exeunt.
5.1 Enter Second Merchant and ANGELO the goldsmith.
ANGELO I am sorry, sir, that I have hinder’d you,
But I protest he had the chain of me,
Though most dishonestly he doth deny it.
2 MERCHANT
How is the man esteem’d here in the city?
ANGELO Of very reverend reputation, sir,
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Of credit infinite, highly belov’d,
Second to none that lives here in the city;
His word might bear my wealth at any time.
2 MERCHANT Speak softly; yonder, as I think, he walks.
Enter ANTIPHOLUS and DROMIO OF SYRACUSE again.
ANGELO ’Tis so; and that self chain about his neck
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Which he forswore most monstrously to have.
Good sir, draw near to me; I’ll speak to him.
Signior Antipholus, I wonder much
That you would put me to this shame and trouble,
And not without some scandal to yourself,
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With circumstance and oaths so to deny
This chain, which now you wear so openly.
Beside the charge, the shame, imprisonment,
You have done wrong to this my honest friend,
Who, but for staying on our controversy,
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Had hoisted sail and put to sea to-day.
This chain you had of me, can you deny it?
ANTIPHOLUS S. I think I had; I never did deny it.
ANGELO Yes, that you did, sir, and forswore it too.
ANTIPHOLUS S.
Who heard me to deny it or forswear it?
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2 MERCHANT
These ears of mine thou know’st did hear thee.
Fie on thee, wretch, ’tis pity that thou liv’st
To walk where any honest men resort.
ANTIPHOLUS S. Thou art a villain to impeach me thus;
I’ll prove mine honour and mine honesty
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Against thee presently, if thou dar’st stand.
2 MERCHANT I dare, and do defy thee for a villain.
They draw. Enter ADRIANA, LUCIANA, Courtesan and others.
ADRIANA
Hold, hurt him not for God’s sake, he is mad;
Some get within him, take his sword away;
Bind Dromio too, and bear them to my house.
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DROMIO S.
Run master, run, for God’s sake take a house;
This is some priory; in, or we are spoil’d.
Exeunt Antipholus and Dromio to the priory.
Enter EMILIA, the Lady Abbess.
ABBESS Be quiet, people; wherefore throng you hither?
ADRIANA To fetch my poor distracted husband hence;
Let us come in, that we may bind him fast
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And bear him home for his recovery.
ANGELO I knew he was not in his perfect wits.
2 MERCHANT I am sorry now that I did draw on him.
ABBESS How long hath this possession held the man?
ADRIANA This week he hath been heavy, sour, sad,
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And much, much different from the man he was;
But till this afternoon his passion
Ne’er brake into extremity of rage.
ABBESS Hath he not lost much wealth by wrack of sea?
Buried some dear friend? Hath not else his eye
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Stray’d his affection in unlawful love,
A sin prevailing much in youthful men,
Who give their eyes the liberty of gazing?
Which of these sorrows is he subject to?
ADRIANA To none of these, except it be the last,
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Namely, some love that drew him oft from home.
ABBESS You should for that have reprehended him.
ADRIANA Why, so I did.
ABBESS Ay, but not rough enough.
ADRIANA As roughly as my modesty would let me.
ABBESS Haply in private.
ADRIANA And in assemblies too.
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ABBESS Ay, but not enough.
ADRIANA It was the copy of our conference;
In bed he slept not for my urging it,
At board he fed not for my urging it;
Alone, it was the subject of my theme;
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In company I often glanc’d at it;
Still did I tell him it was vile and bad.
ABBESS And thereof came it that the man was mad.
The venom clamours of a jealous woman
Poisons more deadly than a mad dog’s tooth.
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It seems his sleeps were hinder’d by thy railing,
And thereof comes it that his head is light.
Thou say’st his meat was sauc’d with thy
upbraidings;
Unquiet meals make ill digestions;
Thereof the raging fire of fever bred,
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And what’s a fever but a fit of madness?
Thou sayest his sports were hinder’d by thy brawls;
Sweet recreation barr’d, what doth ensue
But moody and dull melancholy,
Kinsman to grim and comfortless despair,
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And at her heels a huge infectious troop
Of pale distemperatures and foes to life?
In food, in sport and life-preserving rest
To be disturb’d, would mad or man or beast;
The consequence is then, thy jealous fits
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Hath scar’d thy husband from the use of wits.
LUCIANA She never reprehended him but mildly,
When he demean’d himself rough, rude and wildly;
Why bear you these rebukes and answer not?
ADRIANA She did betray me to mine own reproof.
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Good people, enter and lay hold on him.
ABBESS No, not a creature enters in my house.
ADRIANA
Then let your servants bring my husband forth.
ABBESS Neither. He took this place for sanctuary,
And it shall privilege him from your hands
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Till I have brought him to his wits again,
Or lose my labour in assaying it.
ADRIANA I will attend my husband, be his nurse,
Diet his sickness, for it is my office,
And will have no attorney but myself,
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And therefore let me have him home with me.
ABBESS Be patient, for I will not let him stir
Till I have us’d the approved means I have,
With wholesome syrups, drugs and holy prayers,
To make of him a formal man again.
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It is a branch and parcel of mine oath,
A charitable duty of my order;
Therefore depart, and leave him here with me.
ADRIANA I will not hence and leave my husband h
ere:
And ill it doth beseem your holiness
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To separate the husband and the wife.
ABBESS Be quiet and depart, thou shalt not have him.
Exit.
LUCIANA Complain unto the duke of this indignity.
ADRIANA Come, go, I will fall prostrate at his feet,
And never rise until my tears and prayers
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Have won his grace to come in person hither,
And take perforce my husband from the abbess.
2 MERCHANT By this I think the dial points at five;
Anon I’m sure the Duke himself in person
Comes this way to the melancholy vale,
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The place of death and sorry execution
Behind the ditches of the abbey here.
ANGELO Upon what cause?
2 MERCHANT To see a reverend Syracusian merchant,
Who put unluckily into this bay,
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Against the laws and statutes of this town,
Beheaded publicly for his offence.
ANGELO
See where they come; we will behold his death.
LUCIANA Kneel to the Duke before he pass the abbey.
Enter SOLINUS the DUKE of Ephesus, and EGEON the merchant of Syracuse barehead, with the headsman and other officers.
DUKE Yet once again proclaim it publicly,
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If any friend will pay the sum for him,
He shall not die, so much we tender him.
ADRIANA Justice, most sacred duke, against the abbess.
DUKE She is a virtuous and a reverend lady,
It cannot be that she hath done thee wrong.
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ADRIANA
May it please your grace, Antipholus my husband,
Who I made lord of me and all I had
At your important letters, this ill day
A most outrageous fit of madness took him;
That desp’rately he hurried through the street,
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With him his bondman, all as mad as he,
Doing displeasure to the citizens
By rushing in their houses; bearing thence
Rings, jewels, any thing his rage did like.
Once did I get him bound, and sent him home,
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Whilst to take order for the wrongs I went,
That here and there his fury had committed;
Anon, I wot not by what strong escape,
He broke from those that had the guard of him,
And with his mad attendant and himself,
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Each one with ireful passion, with drawn swords
Met us again, and madly bent on us,
Chas’d us away; till raising of more aid
We came again to bind them. Then they fled
Into this abbey, whither we pursu’d them,
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And here the abbess shuts the gates on us,
And will not suffer us to fetch him out,
Nor send him forth that we may bear him hence.
Therefore, most gracious duke, with thy command
Let him be brought forth, and borne hence for help.
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DUKE Long since thy husband serv’d me in my wars,
And I to thee engag’d a prince’s word,
When thou didst make him master of thy bed,
To do him all the grace and good I could.
Go some of you, knock at the abbey gate,
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And bid the lady abbess come to me.
I will determine this before I stir.
Enter a Messenger.
MESSENGER
O mistress, mistress, shift and save yourself;
My master and his man are both broke loose,
Beaten the maids a-row, and bound the doctor,
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Whose beard they have sing’d off with brands of fire,
And ever as it blaz’d, they threw on him
Great pails of puddled mire to quench the hair;
My master preaches patience to him, and the while
His man with scissors nicks him like a fool;
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And sure (unless you send some present help)
Between them they will kill the conjurer.
ADRIANA Peace, fool, thy master and his man are here,
And that is false thou dost report to us.
MESSENGER Mistress, upon my life I tell you true,
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I have not breath’d almost since I did see it.
He cries for you, and vows if he can take you
To scorch your face and to disfigure you.
[cry within]
Hark, hark, I hear him, mistress – fly, be gone.
DUKE
Come, stand by me, fear nothing; guard with