Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare (ebook reader with highlighter txt) 📖

a woodcock too?

BENEDICK. Sir, your wit ambles well; it goes easily.

DON PEDRO. I'll tell thee how Beatrice praised thy wit the other day. I said, thou hadst a fine wit. 'True,' says she, 'a fine little one.' 'No,' said I, 'a great wit.' 'Right,' said she, 'a great gross one.' 'Nay,' said I, 'a good wit.' 'Just,' said she, 'it hurts nobody.' 'Nay,' said I, 'the gentleman is wise.' 'Certain,' said she,a wise gentleman.' 'Nay,' said I, 'he hath the tongues.' 'That I believe' said she, 'for he swore a thing to me on Monday night, which he forswore on Tuesday morning: there's a double tongue; there's two tongues.' Thus did she, an hour together, trans-shape thy particular virtues; yet at last she concluded with a sigh, thou wast the properest man in Italy.

CLAUDIO. For the which she wept heartily and said she cared not.

DON PEDRO. Yea, that she did; but yet, for all that, an if she did not hate him deadly, she would love him dearly. The old man's daughter told us all.

CLAUDIO. All, all; and moreover, God saw him when he was hid in the garden.

DON PEDRO. But when shall we set the savage bull's horns on the sensible Benedick's head?

CLAUDIO. Yea, and text underneath, 'Here dwells Benedick the married man!'

BENEDICK. Fare you well, boy: you know my mind. I will leave you now to your gossip-like humour; you break jests as braggarts do their blades, which, God be thanked, hurt not. My lord, for your many courtesies I thank you: I must discontinue your company. Your brother the bastard is fled from Messina: you have, among you, killed a sweet and innocent lady. For my Lord Lack-beard there, he and I shall meet; and till then, peace be with him.

[Exit.]

DON PEDRO. He is in earnest.

CLAUDIO. In most profound earnest; and, I'll warrant you, for the love of Beatrice.

DON PEDRO. And hath challenged thee?

CLAUDIO. Most sincerely.

DON PEDRO. What a pretty thing man is when he goes in his doublet and hose and leaves off his wit!

CLAUDIO. He is then a giant to an ape; but then is an ape a doctor to such a man.

DON PEDRO. But, soft you; let me be: pluck up, my heart, and be sad! Did he not say my brother was fled?

[Enter DOGBERRY, VERGES, and the Watch, with CONRADE and BORACHIO.]

DOGBERRY. Come you, sir: if justice cannot tame you, she shall ne'er weigh more reasons in her balance. Nay, an you be a cursing hypocrite once, you must be looked to.

DON PEDRO. How now! two of my brother's men bound! Borachio, one!

CLAUDIO. Hearken after their offence, my lord.

DON PEDRO. Officers, what offence have these men done?

DOGBERRY. Marry, sir, they have committed false report; moreover, they have spoken untruths; secondarily, they are slanders; sixth and lastly, they have belied a lady; thirdly, they have verified unjust things; and to conclude, they are lying knaves.

DON PEDRO. First, I ask thee what they have done; thirdly, I ask thee what's their offence; sixth and lastly, why they are committed; and, to conclude, what you lay to their charge?

CLAUDIO. Rightly reasoned, and in his own division; and, by my troth, there's one meaning well suited.

DON PEDRO. Who have you offended, masters, that you are thus bound to your answer? this learned constable is too cunning to be understood. What's your offence?

BORACHIO. Sweet prince, let me go no further to mine answer: do you hear me, and let this count kill me. I have deceived even your very eyes: what your wisdoms could not discover, these shallow fools have brought to light; who, in the night overheard me confessing to this man how Don John your brother incensed me to slander the Lady Hero; how you were brought into the orchard and saw me court Margaret in Hero's garments; how you disgraced her, when you should marry her. My villany they have upon record; which I had rather seal with my death than repeat over to my shame. The lady is dead upon mine and my master's false accusation; and, briefly, I desire nothing but the reward of a villain.

DON PEDRO. Runs not this speech like iron through your blood?

CLAUDIO. I have drunk poison whiles he utter'd it.

DON PEDRO. But did my brother set thee on to this?

BORACHIO. Yea; and paid me richly for the practice of it.

DON PEDRO. He is compos'd and fram'd of treachery: And fled he is upon this villany.

CLAUDIO. Sweet Hero! now thy image doth appear In the rare semblance that I lov'd it first.

DOGBERRY. Come, bring away the plaintiffs: by this time our sexton hath reformed Signior Leonato of the matter. And masters, do not forget to specify, when time and place shall serve, that I am an ass.

VERGES. Here, here comes Master Signior Leonato, and the sexton too.

[Re-enter LEONATO, ANTONIO, and the Sexton.]

LEONATO. Which is the villain? Let me see his eyes, That, when I note another man like him, I may avoid him. Which of these is he?

BORACHIO. If you would know your wronger, look on me.

LEONATO. Art thou the slave that with thy breath hast kill'd Mine innocent child?

BORACHIO. Yea, even I alone.

LEONATO. No, not so, villain; thou beliest thyself: Here stand a pair of honourable men; A third is fled, that had a hand in it. I thank you, princes, for my daughter's death: Record it with your high and worthy deeds. 'Twas bravely done, if you bethink you of it.

CLAUDIO. I know not how to pray your patience; Yet I must speak. Choose your revenge yourself; Impose me to what penance your invention Can lay upon my sin: yet sinn'd I not But in mistaking.

DON PEDRO. By my soul, nor I: And yet, to satisfy this good old man, I would bend under any heavy weight That he'll enjoin me to.

LEONATO. I cannot bid you bid my daughter live; That were impossible; but, I pray you both, Possess the people in Messina here How innocent she died; and if your love Can labour aught in sad invention, Hang her an epitaph upon her tomb, And sing it to her bones: sing it to-night. To-morrow morning come you to my house, And since you could not be my son-in-law, Be yet my nephew. My brother hath a daughter, Almost the copy of my child that's dead, And she alone is heir to both of us: Give her the right you should have given her cousin, And so dies my revenge.

CLAUDIO. O noble sir, Your over-kindness doth wring tears from me! I do embrace your offer; and dispose For henceforth of poor Claudio.

LEONATO. To-morrow then I will expect your coming; To-night I take my leave. This naughty man Shall face to face be brought to Margaret, Who, I believe, was pack'd in all this wrong, Hir'd to it by your brother.

BORACHIO. No, by my soul she was not; Nor knew not what she did when she spoke to me; But always hath been just and virtuous In anything that I do know by her.

DOGBERRY. Moreover, sir, - which, indeed, is not under white and black, - this plaintiff here, the offender, did call me ass: I beseech you, let it be remembered in his punishment. And also, the watch heard them talk of one Deformed: they say he wears a key in his ear and a lock hanging by it, and borrows money in God's name, the which he hath used so long and never paid, that now men grow hard-hearted, and will lend nothing for God's sake. Pray you, examine him upon that point.

LEONATO. I thank thee for thy care and honest pains.

DOGBERRY. Your worship speaks like a most thankful and reverent youth, and I praise God for you.

LEONATO. There's for thy pains.

DOGBERRY. God save the foundation!

LEONATO. Go, I discharge thee of thy prisoner, and I thank thee.

DOGBERRY. I leave an arrant knave with your worship; which I beseech your worship to correct yourself, for the example of others. God keep your worship! I wish your worship well; God restore you to health! I humbly give you leave to depart, and if a merry meeting may be wished, God prohibit it! Come, neighbour.

[Exeunt DOGBERRY and VERGES.]

LEONATO. Until to-morrow morning, lords, farewell.

ANTONIO. Farewell, my lords: we look for you to-morrow.

DON PEDRO. We will not fail.

CLAUDIO. To-night I'll mourn with Hero.

[Exeunt DON PEDRO and CLAUDIO.]

LEONATO. [To the Watch.] Bring you these fellows on. We'll talk with Margaret, How her acquaintance grew with this lewd fellow.

[Exeunt.]


Scene 2. LEONATO'S Garden.

[Enter BENEDICK and MARGARET, meeting.]

BENEDICK. Pray thee, sweet Mistress Margaret, deserve well at my hands by helping me to the speech of Beatrice.

MARGARET. Will you then write me a sonnet in praise of my beauty?

BENEDICK. In so high a style, Margaret, that no man living shall come over it; for, in most comely truth, thou deservest it.

MARGARET. To have no man come over me! why, shall I always keep below stairs?

BENEDICK. Thy wit is as quick as the greyhound's mouth; it catches.

MARGARET. And yours as blunt as the fencer's foils, which hit, but hurt not.

BENEDICK. A most manly wit, Margaret; it will not hurt a woman: and so, I pray thee, call Beatrice. I give thee the bucklers.

MARGARET. Give us the swords, we have bucklers of our own.

BENEDICK. If you use them, Margaret, you must put in the pikes with a vice; and they are dangerous weapons for maids.

MARGARET. Well, I will call Beatrice to you, who I think hath legs.

BENEDICK. And therefore will come.

[Exit MARGARET.]

The god of love,
That sits above,
And knows me, and knows me,
How pitiful I deserve, -

I mean, in singing: but in loving, Leander the good swimmer, Troilus the first employer of panders, and a whole book full of these quondam carpet-mongers, whose names yet run smoothly in the even road of a blank verse, why, they were never so truly turned over and over as my poor self in love. Marry, I cannot show it in rime; I have tried: I can find out no rime to 'lady' but 'baby', an innocent rhyme; for 'scorn,' 'horn', a hard rime; for 'school', 'fool', a babbling rhyme; very ominous endings: no, I was not born under a riming planet, nor I cannot woo in festival terms.

[Enter BEATRICE.]

Sweet Beatrice, wouldst thou come when I called thee?

BEATRICE. Yea, signior; and depart when you bid me.

BENEDICK. O, stay but till then!

BEATRICE. 'Then' is spoken; fare you well now: and yet, ere I go, let me go with that I came for; which is, with knowing what hath passed between you and Claudio.

BENEDICK. Only foul words; and thereupon I will kiss thee.

BEATRICE. Foul words is but foul wind, and foul wind is but foul breath, and foul breath is noisome; therefore I will depart unkissed.

BENEDICK. Thou hast frighted the word out of his right sense, so forcible is thy wit. But I must tell thee plainly, Claudio undergoes my challenge, and either I must shortly hear from him, or