Isab. I am now going to resolve him; I had rather my brother die by the law than my son should be unlawfully born. But O, how much is the good duke deceived in Angelo! If ever be return and I can speak to him, I will open my ps in vain, or discover his government. 198 Duke. That shall not be much amiss: yet, as the matter now stands, he will avoid your accu-, sation; he made trial of you only.' Therefore, fasten your ear on my advisings: to the love I have in doing good a remedy presents itself. I do make myself believe that you may most uprighteously do a poor wronged lady merited benefit, redeem your brother from the angry law, do no stain to your own gracious person, and much please the absent duke, if peradventure he shall ever return to have hearing of this 210 Isab. Let me hear you speak further. I have spirit to do anything that appears not foul in the truth of my spirit.

business.

Duke. Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful. Have you not heard speak of Mariana, the sister of Frederick, the great soldier who

miscarried at sea?

Isab. I have heard of the lady, and good 219 Duke. She should this Angelo have married; was affianced to her by oath, and the nuptial appointed: between which time of the contract, and limit of the solemnity, her brother Frederick was wracked at sea, having in that perished vessel the dowry of his sister. But mark how heavily this befell to the poor gentlewoman: there she lost a noble and renowned brother, in his love toward her ever most kind and natural; with him the portion and sinew of her fortune, her marriage-dowry: with both, her combinate husband, this well-seeming Angelo.

words went with her name.

231

Isab. Can this be so? Did Angelo so leave her? Duke. Left her in her tears, and dried not one of them with his comfort; swallowed his To whole, pretending in her discoveries of dishonour: in few, bestowed her on her own lamentation, which she yet wears for his sake; and he, a marble to her tears, is washed with them, but relents not. 239

Isab. What a merit were it in death to take this poor maid from the world! What corrup tion in this life, that it will let this man live! But how out of this can she avail? 243

Duke. It is a rupture that you may easily heal; and the cure of it not only saves your brother, but keeps you from dishonour in doing it.

Isab. Show me how, good father.

248

Duke. This forenamed maid hath yet in her the continuance of her first affection: his unjust unkindness, that in all reason should have quenched her love, hath, like an impediment in the current, made it more violent and unruly. Go you to Angelo: answer his requiring with a plausible obedience: agree with his demands to the point; only refer yourself to this advantage, first, that your stay with him may not be long, that the time may have all shadow and silence in it, and the place answer to convenience. This being granted in course, and now follows all, we shall advise this wronged maid to stead up your appointment, go in your place; if the encounter acknowledge itself hereafter, it may compel him to her recompense; and here by this is your brother saved, your honour untainted, the poor Mariana advantaged, and the corrupt deputy scaled. The maid will I frame and make fit for his attempt. If you think well to carry this, as you may, the doubleness of the benefit defends the deceit from reproof. What think you of it?

271

Isab. The image of it gives me content already, and I trust it will grow to a most prosperous perfection.

Duke. It lies much in your holding up. Haste you speedily to Angelo: if for this night he entreat you to his bed, give him promise of satisfaction. I will presently to St. Luke's; there, at the moated grange, resides this dejected Mariana: at that place call upon me, and dispatch with Angelo, that it may be quickly. 281 Isab. I thank you for this comfort. Fare you well, good father. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.-The Street before the Prison. Enter DUKE, as a friar; to him ELBOW, POMPEY,

and Officers.

Elb. Nay, if there be no remedy for it, but that you will needs buy and sell men and women like beasts, we shall have all the world drink brown and white bastard.

Duke. O heavens! what stuff is here?

Pom. 'Twas never merry world, since, of two usuries, the merriest was put down, and the worser allowed by order of law a furred gown

to keep him warm; and furred with fox and lamb skins too, to signify that craft, being richer than innocency, stands for the facing. Elb. Come your way, sir. Bless you, good father friar. 13 Duke. And you, good brother father. What offence hath this man made you, sir?

Elb. Marry, sir, he hath offended the law: and, sir, we take him to be a thief too, sir; for we have found upon him, sir, a strange picklock, which we have sent to the deputy.

24

Duke. Fie, sirrah: a bawd, a wicked bawd! 20 The evil that thou causest to be done, That is thy means to live. Do thou but think What 'tis to cram a maw or clothe a back From such a filthy vice: say to thyself, From their abominable and beastly touches I drink, I eat, array myself, and live. Canst thou believe thy living is a life, So stinkingly depending? Go mend, go mend. 28 Pom. Indeed, it does stink in some sort, sir; but yet, sir, I would prove

Duke. Nay, if the devil have given thee proofs for sin,

Thou wilt prove his. Take him to prison, officer;

Correction and instruction must both work
Ere this rude beast will profit.

32

Elb. He must before the deputy, sir; he has given him warning. The deputy cannot abide a whoremaster: if he be a whoremonger, and comes before him, he were as good go a mile on his errand.

Duke. That we were all, as some would seem to be,

40 From our faults, as faults from seeming, free! Elh. His neck will come to your waist,-3 cord, sir.

Pom. I spy comfort: I cry, bail. gentleman and a friend of mine.

Enter LUCIO.

Here's a

45

Lucio. How now, noble Pompey! What, at the wheels of Cæsar? Art thou led in triumph? What, is there none of Pygmalion's images, newly made woman, to be had now, for putting the hand in the pocket and extracting it clutched? What reply? ha? What say'st thou to this tune, matter and method? Is't not drowned i' the last rain, ha? What sayest thou Trot? Is the world as it was, man? Which is the way? Is it sad, and few words, or how? The trick of it? 56

Duke. Still thus, and thus, still worse! Lucio. How doth my dear morsel, thy mistress? Procures she still, ha?

Lucio. Why, 'tis not amiss, Pompey. Farewell. Go, say I sent thee thither. For debt, Pompey? or how?

Elb. For being a bawd, for being a bawd. 70 Lucio. Well, then, imprison him. If imprisonment be the due of a bawd, why, 'tis his right: bawd is he, doubtless, and of antiquity too; bawd-born. Farewell, good Pompey. Commend me to the prison, Pompey. You will turn good husband now, Pompey; you will keep the house.

77

Duke. How should he be made, then? Lucio. Some report a sea-maid spawn'd him; some that he was begot between two stock-fishes. But it is certain that when he makes water his urine is congealed ice; that I know to be true; and he is a motion generative; that's infallible. Duke. You are pleasant, sir, and speak apace. Lucio. Why, what a ruthless thing is this in him, for the rebellion of a cod-piece to take away the life of a man! Would the duke that is absent have done this? Ere he would have hanged a man for the getting a hundred bastards, he would have paid for the nursing a thousand: he had some feeling of the sport; he knew the service, and that instructed him to mercy. 131 Duke. I never heard the absent duke much detected for women; he was not inclined

that way.

Lucio. O, sir, you are deceived. Duke. Tis not possible. 136 Lucio. Who? not the duke? yes, your beggar of fifty, and his use was to put a ducat in her clack-dish; the duke had crotchets in him. He would be drunk too; that let me inform you. 140 Duke. You do him wrong, surely. Lucio. Sir, I was an inward of his. A shy fellow was the duke; and, I believe I know the cause of his withdrawing.

144

Duke. What, I prithee, might be the cause? Lucio. No, pardon; 'tis a secret must be locked within the teeth and the lips; but this I can let you understand, the greater file of the subject held the duke to be wise.

Duke. Wisel why, no question but he was. Lucio. A very superficial, ignorant, unweigh

ing fellow.

152

Duke. Either this is envy in you, folly, or mistaking: the very stream of his life and the business he hath helmed must, upon a warranted need, give him a better proclamation. Let him be but testimonied in his own bringings forth, and he shall appear to the envious a scholar, a statesman and a soldier. Therefore you speak skilfully; or, if your knowledge be more, it is much darkened in your malice.

Lucio. Sir, I know him, and I love him. 162 Duke. Love talks with better knowledge, and knowledge with dearer love.

Lucio. Come, sir, I know what I know.

Duke. I can

Duke. He shall know you better, sir, if I may live to report you. 176

Lucio. I fear you not.

Duke. O you hope the duke will return no more, or you imagine me too unhurtful an opposite. But indeed I can do you little harm; you'll forswear this again.

hardly believe that, since you know not what you speak. But, if ever the duke return, as our prayers are he may,-let me | desire you to make your answer before him: if it be honest you have spoke, you have courage to maintain it. I am bound to call upon you; and, I pray you, your name? 172

Lucio. I'll be hanged first: thou art deceived in me, friar. But no more of this. Canst thou tell if Claudio die to-morrow or no? 184

Duke. Why should he die, sir?

Lucio. Why? for filling a bottle with a tundish. I would the duke we talk of were returned again: this ungenitured agent will unpeople the province with continency; sparrows must not build in his house-eaves, because they are lecherous. The duke yet would have dark deeds darkly answered; he would never bring them to light: would he were returned! Marry, this Claudio is condemned for untrussing. Farewell, good friar; I prithee, pray for me. The duke, Isay to thee again, would eat mutton on Fridays. He's not past it yet, and I say to thee, he would mouth with a beggar, though she smelt brown bread and garlic: say that I said so. Farewell.