The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works
Page 188
BARDOLPH Yea, sir, in a pottle-pot.
SHALLOW By God’s liggens, I thank thee. The knave will stick by thee, I can assure thee that; a will not out; ’tis true-bred.
BARDOLPH And I’ll stick by him, sir.
SHALLOW Why, there spoke a king! Lack nothing, be merry!
One knocks at the door within
Look who’s at door there, ho! Who knocks?
⌈Exit Davy⌉
⌈Silence drinks⌉
SIR JOHN ⌈to Silence⌉ Why, now you have done me right!
SILENCE ⌈sings⌉ Do me right,
And dub me knight—
Samingo.
Is’t not so?
SIR JOHN ’Tis so.
SILENCE Is’t so?—Why then, say an old man can do somewhat.
⌈Enter Davy⌉
DAVY An’t please your worship, there’s one Pistol come from the court with news.
SIR JOHN From the court? Let him come in.
Enter Pistol
How now, Pistol?
PISTOL Sir John, God save you.
SIR JOHN What wind blew you hither, Pistol?
PISTOL
Not the ill wind which blows no man to good.
Sweet knight, thou art now one of the greatest men in
this realm.
SILENCE By‘r Lady, I think a be—but goodman Puff of Bar’son.
PISTOL Puff?
Puff in thy teeth, most recreant coward base!—
Sir John, I am thy Pistol and thy friend,
And helter-skelter have I rode to thee,
And tidings do I bring, and lucky joys,
And golden times, and happy news of price.
SIR JOHN I pray thee now, deliver them like a man of this world.
PISTOL
A foutre for the world and worldlings base!
I speak of Africa and golden joys.
SIR JOHN
O base Assyrian knight, what is thy news?
Let King Cophetua know the truth thereof.
SILENCE ⌈singing⌉
‘And Robin Hood, Scarlet, and John.’
PISTOL
Shall dunghill curs confront the Helicons?
And shall good news be baffled?
Then Pistol lay thy head in Furies’ lap.
SHALLOW Honest gentleman, I know not your breeding.
PISTOL Why then, lament therefor.
SHALLOW Give me pardon, sir. If, sir, you come with news from the court, I take it there’s but two ways: either to utter them, or conceal them. I am, sir, under the King in some authority.
PISTOL
Under which king, besonian? Speak, or die.
SHALLOW
Under King Harry.
PISTOL Harry the Fourth, or Fifth?
SHALLOW
Harry the Fourth.
PISTOL A foutre for thine office!
Sir John, thy tender lambkin now is king.
Harry the Fifth’s the man. I speak the truth.
When Pistol lies, do this, (making the fig) and fig me,
Like the bragging Spaniard.
SIR JOHN What, is the old King dead?
PISTOL
As nail in door. The things I speak are just.
SIR JOHN Away, Bardolph, saddle my horse! Master Robert Shallow, choose what office thou wilt in the land; ’tis thine. Pistol, I will double-charge thee with dignities.
BARDOLPH O joyful day!
I would not take a knighthood for my fortune.
PISTOL What, I do bring good news?
SIR JOHN (to Davy) Carry Master Silence to bed.
⌈Exit Davy with Silence⌉
Master Shallow—my lord Shallow—be what thou wilt, I am fortune’s steward—get on thy boots; we’ll ride all night.—O sweet Pistol!—Away, Bardolph!
⌈Exit Bardolph⌉
Come, Pistol, utter more to me, and withal devise something to do thyself good. Boot, boot, Master Shallow! I know the young King is sick for me. Let us take any man’s horses—the laws of England are at my commandment. Blessed are they that have been my friends, and woe to my Lord Chief Justice.
PISTOL
Let vultures vile seize on his lungs also!
‘Where is the life that late I led?’ say they.
Why, here it is. Welcome these pleasant days. Exeunt
5.4 Enter Beadles, dragging in Mistress Quickly and Doll Tearsheet
MISTRESS QUICKLY No, thou arrant knave! I would to God that I might die, that I might have thee hanged. Thou hast drawn my shoulder out of joint.
FIRST BEADLE The constables have delivered her over to me; and she shall have whipping-cheer, I warrant her. There hath been a man or two killed about her.
DOLL TEARSHEET Nut-hook, nut-hook, you lie! Come on, I’ll tell thee what, thou damned tripe-visaged rascal, an the child I go with do miscarry, thou wert better thou hadst struck thy mother, thou paper-faced villain.
MISTRESS QUICKLY O the Lord, that Sir John were come! He would make this a bloody day to somebody. But I pray God the fruit of her womb miscarry!
FIRST BEADLE If it do, you shall have a dozen of cushions again; you have but eleven now. Come, I charge you both go with me, for the man is dead that you and Pistol beat amongst you.
DOLL TEARSHEET I’ll tell you what, you thin man in a censer, I will have you as soundly swinged for this, you bluebottle rogue, you filthy famished correctioner! If you be not swinged, I’ll forswear half-kirtles.
FIRST BEADLE Come, come, you she knight-errant, come!
MISTRESS QUICKLY O God, that right should thus o’ercome might! Well, of sufferance comes ease.
DOLL TEARSHEET Come, you rogue, come; bring me to a justice.
MISTRESS QUICKLY Ay, come, you starved bloodhound.
DOLL TEARSHEET Goodman death, goodman bones!
MISTRESS QUICKLY Thou atomy, thou!
DOLL TEARSHEET Come, you thin thing; come, you rascal.
FIRST BEADLE Very well. Exeunt
5.5 Enter ⌈two⌉ Grooms, strewing rushes
FIRST GROOM More rushes, more rushes!
SECOND GROOM The trumpets have sounded twice.
⌈FIRST⌉ GROOM ‘Twill be two o’clock ere they come from the coronation. Exeunt
Enter Sir John Falstaff, Shallow, Pistol, Bardolph, and the Page
SIR JOHN Stand here by me, Master Robert Shallow. I will make the King do you grace. I will leer upon him as a comes by, and do but mark the countenance that he will give me.
PISTOL God bless thy lungs, good knight.
SIR JOHN Come here, Pistol; stand behind me. (To Shallow) O, if I had had time to have made new liveries, I would have bestowed the thousand pound I borrowed of you! But ’tis no matter; this poor show doth better; this doth infer the zeal I had to see him.
⌈SHALLOW⌉ It doth so.
SIR JOHN It shows my earnestness of affection—
PISTOL It doth so.
SIR JOHN My devotion—
PISTOL It doth, it doth, it doth.
SIR JOHN As it were, to ride day and night, and not to deliberate, not to remember, not to have patience to shift me—
SHALLOW It is most certain.
⌈SIR JOHN⌉ But to stand stained with travel and sweating with desire to see him, thinking of nothing else, putting all affairs in oblivion, as if there were nothing else to be done but to see him.
PISTOL ’Tis semper idem, for absque hoc nihil est: ’tis all in every part.
SHALLOW ’Tis so indeed.
PISTOL
My knight, I will inflame thy noble liver,
And make thee rage.
Thy Doll, and Helen of thy noble thoughts,
Is in base durance and contagious prison,
Haled thither
By most mechanical and dirty hand.
Rouse up Revenge from ebon den with fell Alecto’s
snake,
For Doll is in. Pistol speaks naught but truth.
SIR JOHN I will deliver her.
⌈Shouts within.⌉ Trumpets soun
d
PISTOL
There roared the sea, and trumpet-clangour sounds!
Enter King Harry the Fifth, Prince John of Lancaster, the Dukes of Clarence and Gloucester, the Lord Chief Justice, ⌈and others⌉
SIR JOHN
God save thy grace, King Hal, my royal Hal!
PISTOL
The heavens thee guard and keep, most royal imp of fame!
SIR JOHN God save thee, my sweet boy!
KING HARRY
My Lord Chief Justice, speak to that vain man.
LORD CHIEF JUSTICE (to Sir John)
Have you your wits? Know you what ’tis you speak?
SIR JOHN
My king, my Jove, I speak to thee, my heart!
KING HARRY
I know thee not, old man. Fall to thy prayers.
How ill white hairs becomes a fool and jester!
I have long dreamt of such a kind of man,
So surfeit-swelled, so old, and so profane;
But being awake, I do despise my dream.
Make less thy body hence, and more thy grace.
Leave gormandizing; know the grave doth gape
For thee thrice wider than for other men.
Reply not to me with a fool-born jest.
Presume not that I am the thing I was,
For God doth know, so shall the world perceive,
That I have turned away my former self;
So will I those that kept me company.
When thou dost hear I am as I have been,
Approach me, and thou shalt be as thou wast,
The tutor and the feeder of my riots.
Till then I banish thee, on pain of death,
As I have done the rest of my misleaders,
Not to come near our person by ten mile.
For competence of life I will allow you,
That lack of means enforce you not to evils;
And as we hear you do reform yourselves,
We will, according to your strengths and qualities,
Give you advancement. (To Lord Chief Justice) Be it
your charge, my lord,
To see performed the tenor of our word. (To his train)
Set on! Exeunt King Harry and his train
SIR JOHN Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pound.
SHALLOW Yea, marry, Sir John; which I beseech you to let me have home with me.
SIR JOHN That can hardly be,, Master Shallow. Do not you grieve at this. I shall be sent for in private to him. Look you, he must seem thus to the world. Fear not your advancements. I will be the man yet that shall make you great.
SHALLOW I cannot perceive how, unless you give me your doublet and stuff me out with straw. I beseech you, good Sir John, let me have five hundred of my thousand.
SIR JOHN Sir, I will be as good as my word. This that you heard was but a colour.
SHALLOW A colour I fear that you will die in, Sir John.
SIR JOHN Fear no colours. Go with me to dinner. Come, Lieutenant Pistol; come, Bardolph. I shall be sent for soon at night.
Enter the Lord Chief Justice and Prince John, with officers
LORD CHIEF JUSTICE (to officers)
Go carry Sir John Falstaff to the Fleet.
Take all his company along with him.
SIR JOHN My lord, my lord!
LORD CHIEF JUSTICE
I cannot now speak. I will hear you soon.—
Take them away.
PISTOL
Si fortuna me tormenta, spero me contenta.
Exeunt all but Prince John and Lord Chief Justice
PRINCE JOHN
I like this fair proceeding of the King’s.
He hath intent his wonted followers
Shall all be very well provided for,
But all are banished till their conversations
Appear more wise and modest to the world.
LORD CHIEF JUSTICE And so they are.
PRINCE JOHN
The King hath called his parliament, my lord.
LORD CHIEF JUSTICE He hath.
PRINCE JOHN
I will lay odds that, ere this year expire,
We bear our civil swords and native fire
As far as France. I heard a bird so sing,
Whose music, to my thinking, pleased the King.
Come, will you hence? Exeunt
Epilogue Enter Epilogue
EPILOGUE First my fear, then my curtsy, last my speech.
My fear is your displeasure; my curtsy, my duty; and my speech to beg your pardons. If you look for a good speech now, you undo me; for what I have to say is of mine own making, and what indeed I should say will, I doubt, prove mine own marring. But to the purpose, and so to the venture. Be it known to you, as it is very well, I was lately here in the end of a displeasing play, to pray your patience for it, and to promise you a better. I did mean indeed to pay you with this; which, if like an ill venture it come unluckily home, I break, and you, my gentle creditors, lose. Here I promised you I would be, and here I commit my body to your mercies. Bate me some, and I will pay you some, and, as most debtors do, promise you infinitely.
If my tongue cannot entreat you to acquit me, will you command me to use my legs? And yet that were but light payment, to dance out of your debt. But a good conscience will make any possible satisfaction, and so would I. All the gentlewomen here have forgiven me; if the gentlemen will not, then the gentlemen do not agree with the gentlewomen, which was never seen before in such an assembly.
One word more, I beseech you. If you be not too much cloyed with fat meat, our humble author will continue the story with Sir John in it, and make you merry with fair Catherine of France; where, for anything I know, Falstaff shall die of a sweat—unless already a be killed with your hard opinions. For Oldcastle died a martyr, and this is not the man. My tongue is weary; when my legs are too, I will bid you good night, and so kneel down before you—but, indeed, to pray for the Queen.
⌈He dances, then kneels for applause.⌉ Exit
ADDITIONAL PASSAGES
Along with some substantial additions, Shakespeare probably made a number of short excisions when preparing the finished version of the play. The following, present in the Quarto but entirely or substantially omitted in the later Folio text, are the most significant:
A. AFTER 2.2.22
And God knows whether those that bawl out the ruins of thy linen shall inherit his kingdom—but the midwives say the children are not in the fault, whereupon the world increases, and kindreds are mightily strengthened.
B. AFTER ‘LIQUORS!’, 3.1-52
O, if this were seen,
The happiest youth, viewing his progress through,
What perils past, what crosses to ensue,
Would shut the book and sit him down and die.
C. AFTER ‘FAMINE.’, 3.2.309
yet lecherous as a monkey; and the whores called him ‘mandrake’. A came ever in the rearward of the fashion, and sung those tunes to the overscutched hussies that he heard the carmen whistle, and sware they were his fancies or his good-nights.
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING
Much Ado About Nothing is not mentioned in the list of plays by Shakespeare given by Francis Meres in his Palladis Tamia, published in the autumn of 1598. Certain speech-prefixes of the first edition, published in 1600, suggest that as Shakespeare wrote he had in mind for the role of Dogberry the comic actor Will Kemp, who is believed to have left the Lord Chamberlain’s Men during 1599. Probably Shakespeare wrote the play between summer 1598 and spring 1599.
The action is set in Sicily, where Don Pedro, Prince of Aragon, has recently defeated his half-brother, the bastard Don John, in a military engagement. Apparently reconciled, they return to the capital, Messina, as guests of the Governor, Leonato. There Count Claudio, a young nobleman serving in Don Pedro’s army, falls in love with Hero, Leonato’s daughter, whom Don Pedro woos on his behalf. The play’s central plot, written mainly in verse, shows how Don John maliciously deceives Claudio into bel
ieving that Hero has taken a lover on the eve of her marriage, causing Claudio to repudiate her publicly, at the altar. This is a variation on an old tale that existed in many versions; it had been told in Italian verse by Ariosto, in his Orlando Furioso (1516, translated into English verse by Sir John Harington, 1591), in Italian prose by Matteo Bandello in his Novelle (1554, adapted into French by P. de Belleforest, 1569), in English prose by George Whetstone (The Rock of Regard, 1576), in English verse by Edmund Spenser (The Faerie Queene, Book 2, canto 4, 1590), and in a number of plays including Luigi Pasqualigo’s II Fedele (1579), adapted into English—perhaps by Anthony Munday—as Fedele and Fortunio (published in 1583). Shakespeare, whose plot is an independent reworking of the traditional story, seems to owe most to Ariosto and Bandello, perhaps indirectly.
Don John’s deception, with its tragicomical resolution, is offset by a parallel plot written mainly in prose, portraying another, more light-hearted deception, by which Hero’s cousin, Beatrice, and Benedick—friend of Don Pedro and Claudio—are tricked into acknowledging, first to themselves and then to each other, that they are in love. This part of the play seems to be of Shakespeare’s invention: the juxtaposition of this clever, sophisticated, apparently unillusioned pair with the more naive Claudio and Hero recalls Shakespeare’s earlier contrast of romantic and antiromantic attitudes to love and marriage in The Taming of the Shrew. The play’s third main strand is provided by Constable Dogberry, his partner Verges, and the Watchmen, clearly English rather than Sicilian in origin. Although Benedick and Beatrice are, technically, subordinate characters, they have dominated the imagination of both readers and playgoers.
THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY
Much Ado About Nothing