Marg. Give us the swords; we have bucklers of our own. Bene. If you use them, Margaret, you must put 20 in the pikes with a vice; and they are dangerous weapons for maids. Marg. Well, I will call Beatrice to you, who I think hath legs. Bene. And therefore will come. [Sings] [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 30 swimmer, Troilus the first employer of pandars, and a whole bookful 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 rhyme; I have tried: I can find out no rhyme to 'lady' but 'baby,' an innocent rhyme; for 'scorn,' 'horn,' a hard rhyme; for school,' 'fool,' a babbling rhyme; very ominous endings: no, I was not born under a 40 rhyming planet, nor I cannot woo in festival terms. Enter BEATRICE. Sweet Beatrice, wouldst thou come when I called Beat. Yea, signior, and depart when you bid me. 21. pikes, the spiked centrepieces in sixteenth-century bucklers. 32. carpet-mongers, 'carpet knights, frequenters of ladies' bowers (like our 'drawing-room hero'). Beat. 'Then' is spoken; fare you well now: and yet, ere I go, let me go with that I came ; which is, with knowing what hath passed between you and Claudio. Bene. Only foul words; and thereupon I will 50 kiss thee. Beat. Foul words is but foul wind, and foul wind is but foul breath, and foul breath is noisome ; therefore I will depart unkissed. Bene. 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 I will subscribe him a coward. And, I pray thee now, tell me for which of my bad parts didst thou first 60 fall in love with me? Beat. For them all together; which maintained so politic a state of evil that they will not admit any good part to intermingle with them. But for which of my good parts did you first suffer love for me? Bene. Suffer love! a good epithet! I do suffer love indeed, for I love thee against my will. Beat. In spite of your heart, I think; alas, poor heart! If you spite it for my sake, I will spite it 70 for yours; for I will never love that which my friend hates. Bene. Thou and I are too wise to woo peaceably. Beat. It appears not in this confession: there's not one wise man among twenty that will praise himself. Bene. An old, an old instance, Beatrice, that 47. came, i. e. came for. 78. an old instance, an argument derived from the good old days, and which had force ('lived') when men might trust their neighbours to praise them. lived in the time of good neighbours. If a man do not erect in this age his own tomb ere he dies, he 80 shall live no longer in monument than the bell rings and the widow weeps. Beat. And how long is that, think you? Bene. Question: why, an hour in clamour and a quarter in rheum: therefore is it most expedient for the wise, if Don Worm, his conscience, find no impediment to the contrary, to be the trumpet of his own virtues, as I am to myself. So much for praising myself, who, I myself will bear witness, is praiseworthy and now tell me, how doth your 90 cousin? : Beat. Very ill. Bene. And how do you? Beat. Very ill too. Bene. Serve God, love me and mend. There will I leave you too, for here comes one in haste. Enter URSULA. Urs. Madam, you must come to your uncle. Yonder's old coil at home: it is proved my Lady Hero hath been falsely accused, the prince and Claudio mightily abused; and Don John is the 100 author of all, who is fled and gone. Will you come presently? Beat. Will you go hear this news, signior? Bene. I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap and be buried in thy eyes; and moreover I will go with thee to thy uncle's. 81. in monument, in memory. 85. rheum, tears. 86. Don Worm, his conscience; the gnawing' of conscience was popularly attributed [Exeunt. Cf. to a worm; hence the worm 98. old coil, a rare to-do.' SCENE III. A church. Enter DON PEDRO, CLAUDIO, and three or four Claud. Is this the monument of Leonato ? Claud. [Reading out of a scroll] Done to death by slanderous tongues Gives her fame which never dies. Now, music, sound, and sing your solemn hymn. SONG. Pardon, goddess of the night, Graves, yawn and yield your dead, Heavily, heavily. 19-21. Graves, yawn, etc. These not very lucid verses are best understood as a parallel to the three preceding ones. As 'Midnight' is there summoned to join in the chorus of grief, so here the shades of the dead are ΙΟΙ ΙΟ 20 called up to share in the commemoration until Hero's requiem be chanted to the end. 21. Heavily, heavily. Ff have 'heavenly, heavenly'; but the words are best understood of the grievous song of death. Claud. Now, unto thy bones good night! D. Pedro. Good morrow, masters; put your torches out : The wolves have prey'd; and look, the gentle day, Before the wheels of Phœbus, round about Dapples the drowsy east with spots of grey. Thanks to you all, and leave us fare you well. Claud. Good morrow, masters: each his several way. D. Pedro. Come, let us hence, and put on other weeds; And then to Leonato's we will go. Claud. And Hymen now with luckier issue speed's Than this for whom we render'd up this woe. [Exeunt. 30 SCENE IV. A room in LEONATO's house. Enter LEONATO, ANTONIO, BENEDICK, BEATRICE, MARGARET, URSULA, FRIAR FRANCIS, and HERO. Friar. Did I not tell you she was innocent? Leon. So are the prince and Claudio, who accused her Upon the error that you heard debated: Ant. Well, I am glad that all things sort so well. Bene. And so am I, being else by faith enforced To call young Claudio to a reckoning for it. |