Complete Plays, The

by William Shakespeare

  Lorenzo

  In such a night

  Stood Dido with a willow in her hand

  Upon the wild sea banks and waft her love

  To come again to Carthage.

  Jessica

  In such a night

  Medea gather’d the enchanted herbs

  That did renew old Aeson.

  Lorenzo

  In such a night

  Did Jessica steal from the wealthy Jew

  And with an unthrift love did run from Venice

  As far as Belmont.

  Jessica

  In such a night

  Did young Lorenzo swear he loved her well,

  Stealing her soul with many vows of faith

  And ne’er a true one.

  Lorenzo

  In such a night

  Did pretty Jessica, like a little shrew,

  Slander her love, and he forgave it her.

  Jessica

  I would out-night you, did no body come;

  But, hark, I hear the footing of a man.

  Enter Stephano

  Lorenzo

  Who comes so fast in silence of the night?

  Stephano

  A friend.

  Lorenzo

  A friend! what friend? your name, I pray you, friend?

  Stephano

  Stephano is my name; and I bring word

  My mistress will before the break of day

  Be here at Belmont; she doth stray about

  By holy crosses, where she kneels and prays

  For happy wedlock hours.

  Lorenzo

  Who comes with her?

  Stephano

  None but a holy hermit and her maid.

  I pray you, is my master yet return’d?

  Lorenzo

  He is not, nor we have not heard from him.

  But go we in, I pray thee, Jessica,

  And ceremoniously let us prepare

  Some welcome for the mistress of the house.

  Enter Launcelot

  Launcelot

  Sola, sola! wo ha, ho! sola, sola!

  Lorenzo

  Who calls?

  Launcelot

  Sola! did you see Master Lorenzo?

  Master Lorenzo, sola, sola!

  Lorenzo

  Leave hollaing, man: here.

  Launcelot

  Sola! where? where?

  Lorenzo

  Here.

  Launcelot

  Tell him there’s a post come from my master, with his horn full of good news: my master will be here ere morning.

  Exit

  Lorenzo

  Sweet soul, let’s in, and there expect their coming.

  And yet no matter: why should we go in?

  My friend Stephano, signify, I pray you,

  Within the house, your mistress is at hand;

  And bring your music forth into the air.

  Exit Stephano

  How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank!

  Here will we sit and let the sounds of music

  Creep in our ears: soft stillness and the night

  Become the touches of sweet harmony.

  Sit, Jessica. Look how the floor of heaven

  Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold:

  There’s not the smallest orb which thou behold’st

  But in his motion like an angel sings,

  Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins;

  Such harmony is in immortal souls;

  But whilst this muddy vesture of decay

  Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.

  Enter Musicians

  Come, ho! and wake Diana with a hymn!

  With sweetest touches pierce your mistress’ ear,

  And draw her home with music.

  Music

  Jessica

  I am never merry when I hear sweet music.

  Lorenzo

  The reason is, your spirits are attentive:

  For do but note a wild and wanton herd,

  Or race of youthful and unhandled colts,

  Fetching mad bounds, bellowing and neighing loud,

  Which is the hot condition of their blood;

  If they but hear perchance a trumpet sound,

  Or any air of music touch their ears,

  You shall perceive them make a mutual stand,

  Their savage eyes turn’d to a modest gaze

  By the sweet power of music: therefore the poet

  Did feign that Orpheus drew trees, stones and floods;

  Since nought so stockish, hard and full of rage,

  But music for the time doth change his nature.

  The man that hath no music in himself,

  Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,

  Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils;

  The motions of his spirit are dull as night

  And his affections dark as Erebus:

  Let no such man be trusted. Mark the music.

  Enter Portia and Nerissa

  Portia

  That light we see is burning in my hall.

  How far that little candle throws his beams!

  So shines a good deed in a naughty world.

  Nerissa

  When the moon shone, we did not see the candle.

  Portia

  So doth the greater glory dim the less:

  A substitute shines brightly as a king

  Unto the king be by, and then his state

  Empties itself, as doth an inland brook

  Into the main of waters. Music! hark!

  Nerissa

  It is your music, madam, of the house.

  Portia

  Nothing is good, I see, without respect:

  Methinks it sounds much sweeter than by day.

  Nerissa

  Silence bestows that virtue on it, madam.

  Portia

  The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark,

  When neither is attended, and I think

  The nightingale, if she should sing by day,

  When every goose is cackling, would be thought

  No better a musician than the wren.

  How many things by season season’d are

  To their right praise and true perfection!

  Peace, ho! the moon sleeps with Endymion

  And would not be awaked.

  Music ceases

  Lorenzo

  That is the voice,

  Or I am much deceived, of Portia.

  Portia

  He knows me as the blind man knows the cuckoo,

  By the bad voice.

  Lorenzo

  Dear lady, welcome home.

  Portia

  We have been praying for our husbands’ healths,

  Which speed, we hope, the better for our words.

  Are they return’d?

  Lorenzo

  Madam, they are not yet;

  But there is come a messenger before,

  To signify their coming.

  Portia

  Go in, Nerissa;

  Give order to my servants that they take

  No note at all of our being absent hence;

  Nor you, Lorenzo; Jessica, nor you.

  A tucket sounds

  Lorenzo

  Your husband is at hand; I hear his trumpet:

  We are no tell-tales, madam; fear you not.

  Portia

  This night methinks is but the daylight sick;

  It looks a little paler: ’tis a day,

  Such as the day is when the sun is hid.

  Enter Bassanio, Antonio, Gratiano, and their followers

  Bassanio

  We should hold day with the Antipodes,

  If you would walk in absence of the sun.

  Portia

  Let me give light, but let me not be light;

  For a light wife doth make a heavy husband,

  And never be Bassanio so for me:

  But God sort all! You are welcome home, my lord.

 
; Bassanio

  I thank you, madam. Give welcome to my friend.

  This is the man, this is Antonio,

  To whom I am so infinitely bound.

  Portia

  You should in all sense be much bound to him.

  For, as I hear, he was much bound for you.

  Antonio

  No more than I am well acquitted of.

  Portia

  Sir, you are very welcome to our house:

  It must appear in other ways than words,

  Therefore I scant this breathing courtesy.

  Gratiano

  [To Nerissa] By yonder moon I swear you do me wrong;

  In faith, I gave it to the judge’s clerk:

  Would he were gelt that had it, for my part,

  Since you do take it, love, so much at heart.

  Portia

  A quarrel, ho, already! what’s the matter?

  Gratiano

  About a hoop of gold, a paltry ring

  That she did give me, whose posy was

  For all the world like cutler’s poetry

  Upon a knife, ‘Love me, and leave me not.’

  Nerissa

  What talk you of the posy or the value?

  You swore to me, when I did give it you,

  That you would wear it till your hour of death

  And that it should lie with you in your grave:

  Though not for me, yet for your vehement oaths,

  You should have been respective and have kept it.

  Gave it a judge’s clerk! no, God’s my judge,

  The clerk will ne’er wear hair on’s face that had it.

  Gratiano

  He will, an if he live to be a man.

  Nerissa

  Ay, if a woman live to be a man.

  Gratiano

  Now, by this hand, I gave it to a youth,

  A kind of boy, a little scrubbed boy,

  No higher than thyself; the judge’s clerk,

  A prating boy, that begg’d it as a fee:

  I could not for my heart deny it him.

  Portia

  You were to blame, I must be plain with you,

  To part so slightly with your wife’s first gift:

  A thing stuck on with oaths upon your finger

  And so riveted with faith unto your flesh.

  I gave my love a ring and made him swear

  Never to part with it; and here he stands;

  I dare be sworn for him he would not leave it

  Nor pluck it from his finger, for the wealth

  That the world masters. Now, in faith, Gratiano,

  You give your wife too unkind a cause of grief:

  An ’twere to me, I should be mad at it.

  Bassanio

  [Aside] Why, I were best to cut my left hand off

  And swear I lost the ring defending it.

  Gratiano

  My Lord Bassanio gave his ring away

  Unto the judge that begg’d it and indeed

  Deserved it too; and then the boy, his clerk,

  That took some pains in writing, he begg’d mine;

  And neither man nor master would take aught

  But the two rings.

  Portia

  What ring gave you my lord?

  Not that, I hope, which you received of me.

  Bassanio

  If I could add a lie unto a fault,

  I would deny it; but you see my finger

  Hath not the ring upon it; it is gone.

  Portia

  Even so void is your false heart of truth.

  By heaven, I will ne’er come in your bed

  Until I see the ring.

  Nerissa

  Nor I in yours

  Till I again see mine.

  Bassanio

  Sweet Portia,

  If you did know to whom I gave the ring,

  If you did know for whom I gave the ring

  And would conceive for what I gave the ring

  And how unwillingly I left the ring,

  When nought would be accepted but the ring,

  You would abate the strength of your displeasure.

  Portia

  If you had known the virtue of the ring,

  Or half her worthiness that gave the ring,

  Or your own honour to contain the ring,

  You would not then have parted with the ring.

  What man is there so much unreasonable,

  If you had pleased to have defended it

  With any terms of zeal, wanted the modesty

  To urge the thing held as a ceremony?

  Nerissa teaches me what to believe:

  I’ll die for’t but some woman had the ring.

  Bassanio

  No, by my honour, madam, by my soul,

  No woman had it, but a civil doctor,

  Which did refuse three thousand ducats of me

  And begg’d the ring; the which I did deny him

  And suffer’d him to go displeased away;

  Even he that did uphold the very life

  Of my dear friend. What should I say, sweet lady?

  I was enforced to send it after him;

  I was beset with shame and courtesy;

  My honour would not let ingratitude

  So much besmear it. Pardon me, good lady;

  For, by these blessed candles of the night,

  Had you been there, I think you would have begg’d

  The ring of me to give the worthy doctor.

  Portia

  Let not that doctor e’er come near my house:

  Since he hath got the jewel that I loved,

  And that which you did swear to keep for me,

  I will become as liberal as you;

  I’ll not deny him any thing I have,

  No, not my body nor my husband’s bed:

  Know him I shall, I am well sure of it:

  Lie not a night from home; watch me like Argus:

  If you do not, if I be left alone,

  Now, by mine honour, which is yet mine own,

  I’ll have that doctor for my bedfellow.

  Nerissa

  And I his clerk; therefore be well advised

  How you do leave me to mine own protection.

  Gratiano

  Well, do you so; let not me take him, then;

  For if I do, I’ll mar the young clerk’s pen.

  Antonio

  I am the unhappy subject of these quarrels.

  Portia

  Sir, grieve not you; you are welcome notwithstanding.

  Bassanio

  Portia, forgive me this enforced wrong;

  And, in the hearing of these many friends,

  I swear to thee, even by thine own fair eyes,

  Wherein I see myself —

  Portia

  Mark you but that!

  In both my eyes he doubly sees himself;

  In each eye, one: swear by your double self,

  And there’s an oath of credit.

  Bassanio

  Nay, but hear me:

  Pardon this fault, and by my soul I swear

  I never more will break an oath with thee.

  Antonio

  I once did lend my body for his wealth;

  Which, but for him that had your husband’s ring,

  Had quite miscarried: I dare be bound again,

  My soul upon the forfeit, that your lord

  Will never more break faith advisedly.

  Portia

  Then you shall be his surety. Give him this

  And bid him keep it better than the other.

  Antonio

  Here, Lord Bassanio; swear to keep this ring.

  Bassanio

  By heaven, it is the same I gave the doctor!

  Portia

  I had it of him: pardon me, Bassanio;

  For, by this ring, the doctor lay with me.

  Nerissa

  And pardon me, my gentle Gratiano;

  For that same scrubbed boy, the doctor’s cler
k,

  In lieu of this last night did lie with me.

  Gratiano

  Why, this is like the mending of highways

  In summer, where the ways are fair enough:

  What, are we cuckolds ere we have deserved it?

  Portia

  Speak not so grossly. You are all amazed:

  Here is a letter; read it at your leisure;

  It comes from Padua, from Bellario:

  There you shall find that Portia was the doctor,

  Nerissa there her clerk: Lorenzo here

  Shall witness I set forth as soon as you

  And even but now return’d; I have not yet

  Enter’d my house. Antonio, you are welcome;

  And I have better news in store for you

  Than you expect: unseal this letter soon;

  There you shall find three of your argosies

  Are richly come to harbour suddenly:

  You shall not know by what strange accident

  I chanced on this letter.

  Antonio

  I am dumb.

  Bassanio

  Were you the doctor and I knew you not?

  Gratiano

  Were you the clerk that is to make me cuckold?

  Nerissa

  Ay, but the clerk that never means to do it,

  Unless he live until he be a man.

  Bassanio

  Sweet doctor, you shall be my bed-fellow:

  When I am absent, then lie with my wife.

  Antonio

  Sweet lady, you have given me life and living;

  For here I read for certain that my ships

  Are safely come to road.

  Portia

  How now, Lorenzo!

  My clerk hath some good comforts too for you.

  Nerissa

  Ay, and I’ll give them him without a fee.

  There do I give to you and Jessica,

  From the rich Jew, a special deed of gift,

  After his death, of all he dies possess’d of.

  Lorenzo

  Fair ladies, you drop manna in the way

  Of starved people.

  Portia

  It is almost morning,

  And yet I am sure you are not satisfied

  Of these events at full. Let us go in;

  And charge us there upon inter’gatories,

  And we will answer all things faithfully.

  Gratiano

  Let it be so: the first inter’gatory

  That my Nerissa shall be sworn on is,

  Whether till the next night she had rather stay,

  Or go to bed now, being two hours to day:

  But were the day come, I should wish it dark,

  That I were couching with the doctor’s clerk.

  Well, while I live I’ll fear no other thing

  So sore as keeping safe Nerissa’s ring.

  Exeunt

  A Midsummer Night’s Dream

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  CHARACTERS OF THE PLAY

  ACT I

  SCENE I. ATHENS. THE PALACE OF THESEUS.

  SCENE II. ATHENS. QUINCE’S HOUSE.

  ACT II

  SCENE I. A WOOD NEAR ATHENS.