Knowledge house - The Complete Works of Shakespeare

O—sixpence that I had a’ We’n’sday last

To pay the saddler for my mistress’ crupper?

The saddler had it, sir, I kept it not.

S. Ant.

I am not in a sportive humor now:

Tell me, and dally not, where is the money?

We being strangers here, how dar’st thou trust

So great a charge from thine own custody?

E. Dro.

I pray you jest, sir, as you sit at dinner.

I from my mistress come to you in post:

If I return, I shall be post indeed,

For she will [score] your fault upon my pate:

Methinks your maw, like mine, should be your [clock],

And strike you home without a messenger.

S. Ant.

Come, Dromio, come, these jests are out of season,

Reserve them till a merrier hour than this:

Where is the gold I gave in charge to thee?

E. Dro.

To me, sir? Why, you gave no gold to me.

S. Ant.

Come on, sir knave, have done your foolishness,

And tell me how thou hast dispos’d thy charge.

E. Dro.

My charge was but to fetch you from the mart

Home to your house, the Phoenix, sir, to dinner;

My mistress and her sister stays for you.

S. Ant.

Now, as I am a Christian, answer me,

In what safe place you have bestow’d my money;

Or I shall break that merry sconce of yours

That stands on tricks when I am undispos’d:

Where is the thousand marks thou hadst of me?

E. Dro.

I have some marks of yours upon my pate;

Some of my mistress’ marks upon my shoulders;

But not a thousand marks between you both.

If I should pay your worship those again,

Perchance you will not bear them patiently.

S. Ant.

Thy mistress’ marks? What mistress, slave, hast thou?

E. Dro.

Your worship’s wife, my mistress at the Phoenix;

She that doth fast till you come home to dinner;

And prays that you will hie you home to dinner.

S. Ant.

What, wilt thou flout me thus unto my face,

Being forbid? There, take you that, sir knave.

Strikes Dromio.

E. Dro.

What mean you, sir? For God sake hold your hands!

Nay, and you will not, sir, I’ll take my heels.

Exit Dromio [of] Ephesus.

S. Ant.

Upon my life, by some device or other

The villain is o’erraught of all my money.

They say this town is full of cozenage:

As nimble jugglers that deceive the eye,

Dark-working sorcerers that change the mind,

Soul-killing witches that deform the body,

Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks,

And many such-like liberties of sin:

If it prove so, I will be gone the sooner.

I’ll to the Centaur to go seek this slave;

I greatly fear my money is not safe.

Exit.

¶

Enter Adriana, wife to Antipholus Sereptus [of Ephesus], with Luciana, her sister.

Adr.

Neither my husband nor the slave return’d,

That in such haste I sent to seek his master?

Sure, Luciana, it is two a’ clock.

Luc.

Perhaps some merchant hath invited him,

And from the mart he’s somewhere gone to dinner.

Good sister, let us dine, and never fret;

A man is master of his liberty:

Time is their master, and when they see time,

They’ll go or come; if so, be patient, sister.

Adr.

Why should their liberty than ours be more?

Luc.

Because their business still lies out a’ door.

Adr.

Look when I serve him so, he takes it [ill].

Luc.

O, know he is the bridle of your will.

Adr.

There’s none but asses will be bridled so.

Luc.

Why, headstrong liberty is lash’d with woe:

There’s nothing situate under heaven’s eye

But hath his bound in earth, in sea, in sky.

The beasts, the fishes, and the winged fowls

Are their males’ subjects and at their controls:

Man, more divine, the master of all these,

Lord of the wide world and wild wat’ry seas,

Indu’d with intellectual sense and souls,

Of more pre-eminence than fish and fowls,

Are masters to their females, and their lords:

Then let your will attend on their accords.

Adr.

This servitude makes you to keep unwed.

Luc.

Not this, but troubles of the marriage-bed.

Adr.

But, were you wedded, you would bear some sway.

Luc.

Ere I learn love, I’ll practice to obey.

Adr.

How if your husband start some other where?

Luc.

Till he come home again, I would forbear.

Adr.

Patience unmov’d! no marvel though she pause—

They can be meek that have no other cause:

A wretched soul, bruis’d with adversity,

We bid be quiet when we hear it cry;

But were we burd’ned with like weight of pain,

As much, or more, we should ourselves complain:

So thou, that hast no unkind mate to grieve thee,

With urging helpless patience would relieve me;

But if thou live to see like right bereft,

This fool-begg’d patience in thee will be left.

Luc.

Well, I will marry one day, but to try.

Here comes your man, now is your husband nigh.

Enter Dromio [of] Ephesus.

Adr. Say, is your tardy master now at hand?

E. Dro. Nay, he’s at [two] hands with me, and that my two ears can witness.

Adr. Say, didst thou speak with him? Know’st thou his mind?

E. Dro. Ay, ay, he told his mind upon mine ear. Beshrew his hand, I scarce could understand it.

Luc. Spake he so doubtfully, thou couldst not feel his meaning?

E. Dro. Nay, he strook so plainly, I could too well feel his blows; and withal so doubtfully, that I could scarce understand them.

Adr.

But say, I prithee, is he coming home?

It seems he hath great care to please his wife.

E. Dro.

Why, mistress, sure my master is horn-mad.

Adr.

Horn-mad, thou villain!

E. Dro.

I mean not cuckold-mad—

But sure he is stark mad:

When I desir’d him to come home to dinner,

He ask’d me for a [thousand] marks in gold:

“’Tis dinner-time,” quoth I: “My gold!” quoth he.

“Your meat doth burn,” quoth I: “My gold!” quoth he.

“Will you come?” quoth I: “My gold!” quoth he;

“Where is the thousand marks I gave thee, villain?”

“The pig,” quoth I, “is burn’d”: “My gold!” quoth he.

“My mistress, sir,” quoth I: “Hang up thy mistress!

I know not thy mistress, out on thy mistress!”

Luc.

Quoth who?

E. Dro.

Quoth my master.

“I know,” quoth he, “no house, no wife, no mistress.”

So that my arrant, due unto my tongue,

I thank him, I bare home upon my shoulders:

For, in conclusion, he did beat me there.

Adr.

Go back again, thou slave, and fetch him home.

E. Dro.

Go back again, and be new beaten home?

For God’s sake send some other messenger.

Adr.

Back, slave, or I will break thy pate across.

E. Dro.

And he will bless that cross with other beating:

Between you I shall have a holy head.

Adr.

Hence, prating peasant! fetch thy master home.

E. Dro.

Am I so round with you, as you with me,

That like a football you do spurn me thus?

You spurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither: