網頁圖片
PDF
ePub 版

Bene. God keep your Ladyship still in that mind! so some gentleman or other shall scape a predestinate scratch'd face.

Beat.

66

"'twere fuch a face as your's were."

Scratching could not make it worse, an

Bene. Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher.Beat. A bird of my tongue is better than a beast of your's.

Bene. I would my horse had the speed of your tongue, and fo good a continuer; but keep your way o' God's name, I have done.

Beat. You always end with a jade's trick; I know you of old.

Pedro. This is the fum of all: Leonato, -Signior Claudio, and Signior Benedick,-my dear friend Leonato hath invited you all; I tell him, we shall stay here at the least a month; and he heartily prays fome occafion may detain us longer: I dare swear he is no hypocrite, but prays from his heart.

Leon. If you swear, my Lord, you shall not be forfworn.-Let me bid you welcome, my Lord, being reconciled to the Prince your brother; I owe you all duty.

John. I thank you; I am not of many words, but I thank you.

Leon. Please it your Grace lead on?

Pedro. Your hand, Leonato; we will go together. [Exeunt all but Benedick and Claudio.

[blocks in formation]

t

Claud. Benedick, didst thou note the daughter of Signior Leonato ?

Bene. I noted her not, but I look'd on her.
Claud. Is the not a modest young Lady?

Bene. Do you question me, as an honest man should do, for my fimple true judgement? or would you have me fpeak after my custom, as being a professed tyrant to their fex?

Claud. No, I pr'ythee, speak in sober judgement. Bene. Why, i'faith, methinks she is too low for an high praise, too brown for a fair praise, and too little for a great praife; only this commendation I can

" afford

"afford her, that were the other than she is, the 1 " unhandfome; and being no other but as she is, "not like her."

Claud. Thou think'st I am in sport; I pray thee me truly how thou lik'st her.

Bene. Wou'd you buy her, that you inquire a her?

Claud. Can the world buy such a jewel?

Bene. Yea, and a cafe to put it into: but speak this with a fad brow? or do you play the flouting Ja to tell us, Cupid is a good hare-finder, and Vulca rare carpenter? Come, in what key shall a man t you to go in the fong?

Claud. In mine eye, she is the sweetest lady tha ever look'd on.

Bene. I can fee yet without spectacles, and I fee such matter; there's her coufin, if the were not p sess'd with fuch a fury, exceeds her as much in beau as the first of May doth the last of December. Bu hope you have no intent to turn husband, have you Claud. I would scarce trust myself, though I h fworn the contrary, if Hero would be my wife.

Bene. Is't come to this, in faith? hath not the wor one man, but he will wear his cap with fufpicion? th I never fee a batchelor of threescore again? Got i'faith, if thou wilt needs thrust thy neck into a yol wear the print of it, and figh away Sundays. Loc Don Pedro is return'd to feek you.

SCENE IV. Re-enter Don Pedro.

Pedro. What secret hath held you here, that yo followed not to Leonato's house?

Bene. I would your Grace would constrain me to tel Pedro. I charge thee on thy allegiance.

Bene. You hear, Count Claudio, I can be fecret as dumb man, I would have you think fo; but on my a legiance, mark you this, on my allegiance:-he is love; with whom? now that is your Grace's part mark, how short his anfwer is, with Hero, Leonato short daughter.

Claud. If this were so, so were it uttered.

Rene. Like the old tale. my Lord. it is not fo. no

'twas not fo; but, indeed, God forbid it should be fo. Claud. If my paffion change not shortly, God forbid it should be otherwise.

Pedro. Amen, if you love her; for the lady is very well worthy.

Claud. You speak this to fetch me in, my Lord.
Pedro. By my troth, I speak my thought.

Claud. And, in faith, my Lord. I spoke mine,

Bene. And by my two faiths and troths, my Lord,

I fpeak mine,

Claud. That I love her, I feel.

Pedro. That she is worthy, I know.

Bene. That I neither feel how the should be loved, nor know how she should be worthy, is the opinion that fire cannot melt out of me; I will die in it at the stake. Pedro. Thou wast ever an obstinate heretic in the defpight of beauty.

Claud. And never could maintain his part, but in the force of his will.

Bene. That a woman conceived me, I thank her; that she brought me up, I likewise give her most humble thanks: but that I will have a recheate winded in my forehead, or hang my bugle in an invifible baldric, all women shall pardon me; because I will not do them the wrong to mistrust any, I will do myself the right to truft none; and the fine is, (for the which I may go the finer), I will live a bachelor.

Pedro. I shall fee thee, ere I die, look pale with love.

Bene. With anger, with fickness, or with hunger, my Lord, not with love: prove, that ever I lose more " blood with love, than I will get again with drink

ing, pick out mine eyes with a ballad-maker's pen, " and hang me up at the door of a brothel-house for "the fign of blind Cupid."

Pedro. Well, if ever thou dost fall from this faith, thou wilt prove a notable argument.

Bene. If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat, and shoot at me; and he that hits me, let him be clapt on the shoulder, and call'd Adam *.

Alluding to one Adım Bell, a famous archer of old.

Pedro. Well, as time shall try; in time the favage bull doth bear the yoke.

Bene. The favage bull may; but if ever the sensible Benedick bear it, pluck off the bull's horns, and fet them in my forehead, and let me be vilely painted; and in fuch great letters as they write, Here is good horse to hire, let them fignify under my fign, Here you may fee Benedick the marry'd man.

Claud. If this should ever happen, thou would'st be horn-mad.

Pedro. Nay, if Cupid hath not spent all his quiver in Venice*, thou wilt quake for this shortly. Bene. I look for an earthquake too then.

Pedro. Well, you will temporise with the hours; in the mean time, good Signior Benedick, repair to Leonato's, commend me to him, and tell him I will not fail him at fupper; for indeed he hath made great preparation.

Bene. I have almost matter enough in me for fuch an embaffage, and fo I commit you

Claud. To the tuition of God: From my house, if I had it,

Pedro. The fixth of July, your loving friend, Benedick.

Bene. Nay, mock not, mock not; the body of your difcourse is fometime guarded with fragments, and the guards are but flightly beasted on neither: ere you flout old ends any further, examine your confcience, and fo I leave you. [Exit.

[blocks in formation]

Claud. My Liege, your Highness now may do me

good.

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.

* Besides that Venice is as remarkable for freedoms in amorous intrigues as Cyprus was of old, there may be a farther conjecture why this expreffion is here used. The Italians give to each of their principal cities a particular dißinguishing title, as, Roma la fanta, Napoli la gentile, Genoua la juperba, &c. and among the rest it is, Venetia la ricca, Venice the wealthy. A farcasm therefore feems to be here implied, that money governs love.

Σ

Claud.

Claud. Hath Leonato any fon, my Lord? Pedro. No child but Hero, she's his only heir: Doft thou affect her, Claudio?

Claud. O my Lord,

When you went onward on this ended action,
I look'd upon her with a foldier's eye;
That lik'd, but had a rougher task in hand
Than to drive liking to the name of love;
But now I am return'd, and that war-thoughts
Have left their places vacant; in their rooms
Come thronging foft and delicate defires,
All prompting me how fair young Hero is;
Saying, I lik'd her ere I went to wars.

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 thou shalt have her:

and with her father, was't not to this end

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

Claud. How sweetly do you minister to love,
That know love's grief by his complexion !
But left my liking might too fudden feem,
I would have falv'd it with a longer treatise.

1

Pedro. What need the bridge much broader than

the flood?

The fairest grant is the neceffity;
Look, what will serve, is fit; 'tis once, thou lov'st;
And I will fit thee with the remedy.
I know, we shall have revelling to-night;
I will assume thy part in some disguife,
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 conclufion is, she shall be thine.
In practice let us put it presently.

Re-enter Leonato and Antonio.

[Exeunt.

Leon. How now, brother, where is my cousin your

fon? hath he provided this music ?

[blocks in formation]

Ant..

« 上一頁繼續 »