ACT II
Sc. I

withdrawn her father to break with him about it. The ladies follow her, and but one visor remains.

BORA. [to DON JOHN.] And that is Claudio: I know him
by his bearing.

D. JOHN [to CLAUDIO, masked.] Are not you Signior
Benedick?

CLAUD. You know me well; I am he.

150

D. JOHN. Signior, you are very near my brother in his love he is enamour'd on Hero. I pray you, dissuade him from her, she is no equal for his birth: you may

do the part of an honest man in it. CLAUD. How know you he loves her?

D. JOHN. I heard him swear his affection.

BORA. So did I too; and he swore he would marry her to-night.

D. JOHN. Come, let us to the banquet.

160

Exeunt DoN JOHN and BORACHIO.

CLAUD. Thus answer I in name of Benedick,

But hear these ill news with the ears of Claudio.

"Tis certain so; the Prince wooes for himself.
Friendship is constant in all other things,

Save in the office and affairs of love:

Therefore all hearts in love use their own tongues;

Let every eye negotiate for itself,

And trust no agent. Beauty is a witch

Against whose charms faith melteth into blood.

This is an accident of hourly proof,

170

Which I mistrusted1 not.

Farewell, then, Hero!

Re-enter BENEDICK.

BENE. Count Claudio?

CLAUD. Yea; the same.

BENE. Come, will you go with me?

CLAUD. Whither?

BENE. Even to the next willow, about your own busi-
ness, Count. What fashion will you wear the garland
of? about your neck, like an usurer's chain? or under
your arm, like a lieutenant's scarf? You must wear
it one way, for the Prince hath got your Hero.
CLAUD. I wish him joy of her.

1 suspected.

180

BENE. Why, that's spoken like an honest drovier: so

they sell bullocks. But did you think the Prince
would have serv'd you thus ?
CLAUD. I pray you, leave me.

BENE. HO! now you strike like the blind man: 'twas
the boy that stole your meat, and you'll beat the post.
CLAUD. If it will not be, I'll leave you.
[exit.
BENE. Alas, poor hurt fowl! now will he creep into
sedges. But that my Lady Beatrice should know
me, and not know me! The Prince's Fool! Ha!
It may
be I go under that title because I am merry.
Yea; but so I am apt to do myself wrong. I am not
so reputed it is the base, though bitter, disposition
of Beatrice that puts the World into her person, and
so gives me out. Well, I'll be reveng'd as I may.

Re-enter DON PEDRO.

D. PEDRO. Now, Signior, where's the Count? did you see him?

198

BENE. Troth, my Lord, I have play'd the part of Lady
Fame. I found him here as melancholy as a lodge
in a warren: I told him, and I think I told him true,
that your Grace had got the good-will of this young
lady; and I offer'd him my company to a willow-tree,
either to make him a garland, as being forsaken, or to
bind him up a rod, as being worthy to be whipp'd.
D. PEDRO. To be whipp'd! What's his fault?
BENE. The flat transgression of a schoolboy: who, being
overjoy'd with finding a bird's-nest, shews it his com-
panion, and he steals it.

209

D. PEDRO. Wilt thou make a trust a transgression?
The transgression is in the stealer.

BENE. Yet it had not been amiss the rod had been made,
and the garland too; for the garland he might have
worn himself, and the rod he might have bestow'd on
you, who, as I take it, have stol'n his bird's-nest.

D. PEDRO. I will but teach them to sing, and restore them to the owner.

BENE. If their singing answer your saying, by my faith, you say honestly.

219

ACT II

Sc. I

ACT II D. PEDRO. The Lady Beatrice hath a quarrel to you: the gentleman that danc'd with her told her she is much wrong'd by you.

Sc. I

BENE. O, she misus'd me past the endurance of a block!
An oak but with one green leaf on it would have
answer'd her; my very visor began to assume life, and
scold with her. She told me-not thinking I had been
myself that I was the Prince's Jester, and that I was
duller than a great thaw; huddling jest upon jest with
such impossible conveyance1 upon me that I stood like
a man at a mark, with a whole army shooting at me.
She speaks poniards, and every word stabs: if her
breath were as terrible as her terminations, there were
no living near her; she would infect to the North Star.
I would not marry her, though she were endow'd with
all that Adam had left him before he transgress'd: she
would have made Hercules have turn'd spit, yea, and
have cleft his club to make the fire too. Come, talk
not of her: you shall find her the infernal Até in good
apparel. I would to God some scholar would conjure
her; for certainly, while she is here, a man may live as
quiet in Hell as in a sanctuary, and people sin upon
purpose, because they would go thither; so, indeed,
all disquiet, horror, and perturbation follows her.
D. PEDRO. Look, here she comes.

3

243

Re-enter CLAUDIO, BEATRICE, HERO, and LEONATO. BENE. Will your Grace command me any service to the World's end? I will go on the slightest errand now to the Antipodes that you can devise to send me on; I will fetch you a toothpicker now from the farthest inch of Asia; bring you the length of Prester John's foot; fetch you a hair off the great Cham's beard; do you any embassage to the Pigmies; rather than hold three words' conference with this Harpy. You have no employment for me?

253

D. PEDRO. None, but to desire your good company.
BENE. O God, Sir, here's a dish I love not: I cannot
endure my Lady Tongue.

1 preternatural contrivance.

[exit.

D. PEDRO. Come, Lady, come; you have lost the heart of ACT II
Signior Benedick.
Sc. I

BEAT. Indeed, my Lord, he lent it me awhile; and I
gave him use1 for it-a double heart for his single one:
marry, once before he won it of me with false dice;
therefore your Grace may well say I have lost it. 262
D. PEDRO. You have put him down, Lady, you have put
him down.

BEAT. So I would not he should do me, my Lord, lest

I should prove the mother of fools. I have brought
Count Claudio, whom you sent me to seek.

D. PEDRO. Why, how now, Count! wherefore are you sad?
CLAUD. Not sad, my Lord.

D. PEDRO. How then? sick?

CLAUD. Neither, my Lord.

270

BEAT. The Count is neither sad, nor sick, nor merry, nor well; but civil Count-civil as an orange, and something of that jealous complexion.

D. PEDRO. I'faith, Lady, I think your blazon to be true; though, I'll be sworn, if he be so, his conceit is false. Here, Claudio, I have woo'd in thy name, and fair Hero is won; I have broke with her father, and his good-will obtain'd: name the day of marriage, and God give thee joy!

280

LEON. Count, take of me my daughter, and with her my fortunes: his Grace hath made the match, and all Grace say Amen to it!

BEAT. Speak, Count, 'tis your cue.

CLAUD. Silence is the perfectest herald of joy: I were

but little happy, if I could say how much. Lady, as you are mine, I am your's: I give away myself for you, and doat upon the exchange.

BEAT. Speak, Cousin; or, if you cannot, stop his mouth with a kiss, and let not him speak neither.

290

D. PEDRO. In faith, Lady, you have a merry heart.
BEAT. Yea, my Lord; I thank it, poor fool-it keeps on
the windy side of care. My cousin tells him in his
ear that he is in her heart.

CLAUD. And so she doth-Cousin !

BEAT. Good Lord, for alliance! Thus goes every one to

ACT II

Sc. I

the World1 but I, and I am sunburn'd;2 I may sit in a corner, and cry Heigh-ho for a husband!

D. PEDRO. Lady Beatrice, I will get you one.

BEAT. I would rather have one of your father's getting. Hath your Grace ne'er a brother like you? Your father got excellent husbands, if a maid could come by them.

D. PEDRO. Will you have me, Lady?

BEAT. No, my Lord; unless I might have another for working-days: your Grace is too costly to wear every day. But I beseech your Grace, pardon me: I was born to speak all mirth and no matter.

D. PEDRO. Your silence most offends me, and to be merry best becomes you; for out of question you were born in a merry hour.

311

BEAT. No, sure, my Lord, my mother cried; but then there was a star danc'd, and under that was I born. Cousins, God give you joy!

you of?

LEON. Niece, will you look to those things I told
BEAT. I cry you mercy, Uncle. By your Grace's pardon.

[exit.

D. PEDRO. By my troth, a pleasant-spirited lady.
LEON. There's little of the melancholy element in her,
my Lord: she is never sad but when she sleeps; and
not ever sad then; for I have heard my daughter say
she hath often dream'd of unhappiness, and wak'd
herself with laughing.

322

D. PEDRO. She cannot endure to hear tell of a husband. LEON. O, by no means: she mocks all her wooers out of suit.

D. PEDRO. She were an excellent wife for Benedick. LEON. O Lord, my Lord, if they were but a week married, they would talk themselves mad!

D. PEDRO. Count Claudio, when mean you to go to church?

330

CLAUD. To-morrow, my Lord: Time goes on crutches till
Love have all his rites.

LEON. Not till Monday, my dear Son, which is hence a
just seven-night; and a time too brief too, to have all
things answer my mind.

T