William Shakespeare - The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

[Re-enter SERVANT.]

How now! who is it?

SERVANT.

An it please your honour, players

That offer service to your lordship.

LORD.

Bid them come near.

[Enter PLAYERS.]

Now, fellows, you are welcome.

PLAYERS.

We thank your honour.

LORD.

Do you intend to stay with me tonight?

PLAYER.

So please your lordship to accept our duty.

LORD.

With all my heart. This fellow I remember

Since once he play’d a farmer’s eldest son;

‘Twas where you woo’d the gentlewoman so well.

I have forgot your name; but, sure, that part

Was aptly fitted and naturally perform’d.

PLAYER.

I think ‘twas Soto that your honour means.

LORD.

‘Tis very true; thou didst it excellent.

Well, you are come to me in happy time,

The rather for I have some sport in hand

Wherein your cunning can assist me much.

There is a lord will hear you play tonight;

But I am doubtful of your modesties,

Lest, over-eying of his odd behaviour,—

For yet his honour never heard a play,—

You break into some merry passion

And so offend him; for I tell you, sirs,

If you should smile, he grows impatient.

PLAYER.

Fear not, my lord; we can contain ourselves,

Were he the veriest antick in the world.

LORD.

Go, sirrah, take them to the buttery,

And give them friendly welcome every one:

Let them want nothing that my house affords.

[Exit one with the PLAYERS.]

Sirrah, go you to Barthol’mew my page,

And see him dress’d in all suits like a lady;

That done, conduct him to the drunkard’s chamber,

And call him ‘madam,’ do him obeisance.

Tell him from me—as he will win my love,—

He bear himself with honourable action,

Such as he hath observ’d in noble ladies

Unto their lords, by them accomplished;

Such duty to the drunkard let him do,

With soft low tongue and lowly courtesy,

And say ‘What is’t your honour will command,

Wherein your lady and your humble wife

May show her duty and make known her love?’

And then with kind embracements, tempting kisses,

And with declining head into his bosom,

Bid him shed tears, as being overjoy’d

To see her noble lord restor’d to health,

Who for this seven years hath esteemed him

No better than a poor and loathsome beggar.

And if the boy have not a woman’s gift

To rain a shower of commanded tears,

An onion will do well for such a shift,

Which, in a napkin being close convey’d,

Shall in despite enforce a watery eye.

See this dispatch’d with all the haste thou canst;

Anon I’ll give thee more instructions.

[Exit SERVANT.]

I know the boy will well usurp the grace,

Voice, gait, and action, of a gentlewoman;

I long to hear him call the drunkard husband;

And how my men will stay themselves from laughter

When they do homage to this simple peasant.

I’ll in to counsel them; haply my presence

May well abate the over-merry spleen,

Which otherwise would grow into extremes.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE II. A bedchamber in the LORD’S house.

[SLY is discovered in a rich nightgown, with ATTENDANTS: some with apparel, basin, ewer, and other appurtenances; and LORD, dressed like a servant.]

SLY.

For God’s sake! a pot of small ale.

FIRST SERVANT.

Will’t please your lordship drink a cup of sack?

SECOND SERVANT.

Will’t please your honour taste of these conserves?

THIRD SERVANT.

What raiment will your honour wear to-day?

SLY. I am Christophero Sly; call not me honour nor lordship. I ne’er drank sack in my life; and if you give me any conserves, give me conserves of beef. Ne’er ask me what raiment I’ll wear, for I have no more doublets than backs, no more stockings than legs, nor no more shoes than feet: nay, sometime more feet than shoes, or such shoes as my toes look through the over-leather.

LORD.

Heaven cease this idle humour in your honour!

O, that a mighty man of such descent,

Of such possessions, and so high esteem,

Should be infused with so foul a spirit!

SLY. What! would you make me mad? Am not I Christopher Sly, old Sly’s son of Burtonheath; by birth a pedlar, by education a cardmaker, by transmutation a bear-herd, and now by present profession a tinker? Ask Marian Hacket, the fat alewife of Wincot, if she know me not: if she say I am not fourteen pence on the score for sheer ale, score me up for the lyingest knave in Christendom. What! I am not bestraught. Here’s—

THIRD SERVANT.

O! this it is that makes your lady mourn.

SECOND SERVANT.

O! this is it that makes your servants droop.

LORD.

Hence comes it that your kindred shuns your house,

As beaten hence by your strange lunacy.

O noble lord, bethink thee of thy birth,

Call home thy ancient thoughts from banishment,

And banish hence these abject lowly dreams.

Look how thy servants do attend on thee,

Each in his office ready at thy beck:

Wilt thou have music? Hark! Apollo plays,

[Music]

And twenty caged nightingales do sing:

Or wilt thou sleep? We’ll have thee to a couch

Softer and sweeter than the lustful bed

On purpose trimm’d up for Semiramis.

Say thou wilt walk: we will bestrew the ground:

Or wilt thou ride? Thy horses shall be trapp’d,

Their harness studded all with gold and pearl.

Dost thou love hawking? Thou hast hawks will soar

Above the morning lark: or wilt thou hunt?

Thy hounds shall make the welkin answer them

And fetch shall echoes from the hollow earth.

FIRST SERVANT.

Say thou wilt course; thy greyhounds are as swift

As breathed stags; ay, fleeter than the roe.

SECOND SERVANT.

Dost thou love pictures? We will fetch thee straight

Adonis painted by a running brook,

And Cytherea all in sedges hid,

Which seem to move and wanton with her breath

Even as the waving sedges play with wind.

LORD.

We’ll show thee Io as she was a maid

And how she was beguiled and surpris’d,

As lively painted as the deed was done.

THIRD SERVANT.

Or Daphne roaming through a thorny wood,

Scratching her legs, that one shall swear she bleeds

And at that sight shall sad Apollo weep,

So workmanly the blood and tears are drawn.

LORD.

Thou art a lord, and nothing but a lord:

Thou hast a lady far more beautiful

Than any woman in this waning age.

FIRST SERVANT.

And, till the tears that she hath shed for thee

Like envious floods o’er-run her lovely face,

She was the fairest creature in the world;

And yet she is inferior to none.

SLY.

Am I a lord? and have I such a lady?

Or do I dream? Or have I dream’d till now?

I do not sleep: I see, I hear, I speak;

I smell sweet savours, and I feel soft things:

Upon my life, I am a lord indeed;

And not a tinker, nor Christophero Sly.

Well, bring our lady hither to our sight;

And once again, a pot o’ the smallest ale.

SECOND SERVANT.

Will’t please your mightiness to wash your hands?

[Servants present a ewer, basin, and napkin.]

O, how we joy to see your wit restor’d!

O, that once more you knew but what you are!

These fifteen years you have been in a dream,

Or, when you wak’d, so wak’d as if you slept.

SLY.

These fifteen years! by my fay, a goodly nap.

But did I never speak of all that time?

FIRST SERVANT.

O! yes, my lord, but very idle words;

For though you lay here in this goodly chamber,