The Comedy of Errors

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Original text
Act II, Scene I
Enter Adriana, wife to Antipholis Sereptus, with
Luciana her Sister

Adr.
Neither my husband nor the slaue return'd, 
That in such haste I sent to seeke his Master? 
Sure Luciana it is two a clocke. 

Luc.
Perhaps some Merchant hath inuited him, 
And from the Mart he's somewhere gone to dinner: 
Good Sister let vs dine, and neuer fret; 
A man is Master of his libertie: 
Time is their Master, and when they see time, 
They'll goe or come; if so, be patient Sister. 

Adr.
Why should their libertie then ours be more? 

Luc.
Because their businesse still lies out a dore.

Adr.
Looke when I serue him so, he takes it thus. 

Luc.
Oh, know he is the bridle of your will. 

Adr.
There's none but asses will be bridled so. 

Luc.
Why, headstrong liberty is lasht with woe: 
There's nothing situate vnder heauens eye, 
But hath his bound in earth, in sea, in skie. 
The beasts, the fishes, and the winged fowles 
Are their males subiects, and at their controules: 
Man more diuine, the Master of all these, 
Lord of the wide world, and wilde watry seas, 
Indued with intellectuall sence and soules, 
Of more preheminence then fish and fowles, 
Are masters to their females, and their Lords: 
Then let your will attend on their accords. 

Adri.
This seruitude makes you to keepe vnwed. 

Luci.
Not this, but troubles of the marriage bed. 

Adr.
But were you wedded, you wold bear some sway 

Luc.
Ere I learne loue, Ile practise to obey. 

Adr.
How if your husband start some other where? 

Luc.
Till he come home againe, I would forbeare. 

Adr.
Patience vnmou'd, no maruel though she pause, 
They can be meeke, that haue no other cause: 
A wretched soule bruis'd with aduersitie, 
We bid be quiet when we heare it crie. 
But were we burdned with like waight of paine, 
As much, or more, we should our selues complaine: 
So thou that hast no vnkinde mate to greeue thee, 
With vrging helpelesse patience would releeue me; 
But if thou liue to see like right bereft, 
This foole-beg'd patience in thee will be left. 

Luci.
Well, I will marry one day but to trie: 
Heere comes your man, now is your husband nie. 
Enter Dromio Eph.

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

E.Dro.
Nay, hee's at too hands with mee, 
and that my two eares can witnesse. 

Adr.
Say, didst thou speake with him? knowst thou his minde? 

E.Dro.
I, I, he told his minde vpon mine eare, 
Beshrew his hand, I scarce could vnderstand it. 

Luc.
Spake hee so doubtfully, thou couldst not feele 
his meaning. 

E.Dro.
Nay, hee strooke so plainly, I could 
too well feele his blowes; and withall so doubtfully, that I 
could scarce vnderstand them. 

Adri.
But say, I prethee, is he comming home? 
It seemes he hath great care to please his wife. 

E.Dro.
Why Mistresse, sure my Master is horne mad. 

Adri.
Horne mad, thou villaine? 

E.Dro.
I meane not Cuckold mad, 
But sure he is starke mad: 
When I desir'd him to come home to dinner, 
He ask'd me for a hundred markes in gold: 
'Tis dinner time, quoth I: my gold, quoth he: 
Your meat doth burne, quoth I: my gold quoth he: 
Will you come, quoth I: my gold, quoth he; 
Where is the thousand markes I gaue thee villaine? 
The Pigge quoth I, is burn'd: my gold, quoth he: 
My mistresse, sir, quoth I: hang vp thy Mistresse: 
I know not thy mistresse, out on thy mistresse. 

Luci.
Quoth who? 

E.Dr.
Quoth my Master, 
I know quoth he, no house, no wife, no mistresse: 
so that my arrant due vnto my tongue, 
I thanke him, I bare home vpon my shoulders: 
for in conclusion, he did beat me there. 

Adri.
Go back againe, thou slaue, & fetch him home. 

Dro.
Goe backe againe, and be new beaten home? 
For Gods sake send some other messenger. 

Adri.
Backe slaue, or I will breake thy pate a-crosse. 

Dro.
And he will blesse yt crosse with other beating: 
Betweene you, I shall haue a holy head. 

Adri.
Hence prating pesant, fetch thy Master home. 

Dro.
Am I so round with you, as you with me, 
That like a foot-ball you doe spurne me thus: 
You spurne me hence, and he will spurne me hither, 
If I last in this seruice, you must case me in leather. 

Luci.
Fie how impatience lowreth in your face. 

Adri.
His company must do his minions grace, 
Whil'st I at home starue for a merrie looke: 
Hath homelie age th' alluring beauty tooke 
From my poore cheeke? then he hath wasted it. 
Are my discourses dull? Barren my wit, 
If voluble and sharpe discourse be mar'd, 
Vnkindnesse blunts it more then marble hard. 
Doe their gay vestments his affections baite? 
That's not my fault, hee's master of my state. 
What ruines are in me that can be found, 
By him not ruin'd? Then is he the ground 
Of my defeatures. My decayed faire, 
A sunnie looke of his, would soone repaire. 
But, too vnruly Deere, he breakes the pale, 
And feedes from home; poore I am but his stale. 

Luci.
Selfe-harming Iealousie; fie beat it hence. 

Ad.
Vnfeeling fools can with such wrongs dispence: 
I know his eye doth homage other-where, 
Or else, what lets it but he would be here? 
Sister, you know he promis'd me a chaine, 
Would that alone, a loue he would detaine, 
So he would keepe faire quarter with his bed: 
I see the Iewell best enamaled 
Will loose his beautie: yet the gold bides still 
That others touch, and often touching will, 
Where gold and no man that hath a name, 
By falshood and corruption doth it shame: 
Since that my beautie cannot please his eie, 
Ile weepe (what's left away) and weeping die. 

Luci.
How manie fond fooles serue mad Ielousie? 
Exit.

Original text
Act II, Scene II
Enter Antipholis Errotis.

Ant.
The gold I gaue to Dromio is laid vp 
Safe at the Centaur, and the heedfull slaue 
Is wandred forth in care to seeke me out 
By computation and mine hosts report. 
I could not speake with Dromio, since at first 
I sent him from the Mart? see here he comes. 
Enter Dromio Siracusia.
How now sir, is your merrie humor alter'd? 
As you loue stroakes, so iest with me againe: 
You know no Centaur? you receiu'd no gold? 
Your Mistresse sent to haue me home to dinner? 
My house was at the Phoenix? Wast thou mad, 
That thus so madlie thou did didst answere me? 

S.Dro.
What answer sir? when spake I such a word? 

E.Ant.
Euen now, euen here, not halfe an howre since. 

S.Dro.
I did not see you since you sent me hence 
Home to the Centaur with the gold you gaue me. 

Ant.
Villaine, thou didst denie the golds receit, 
And toldst me of a Mistresse, and a dinner, 
For which I hope thou feltst I was displeas'd. 

S.Dro.
I am glad to see you in this merrie vaine, 
What meanes this iest, I pray you Master tell me? 

Ant.
Yea, dost thou ieere & flowt me in the teeth? 
Thinkst yu I iest? hold, take thou that, & that.
Beats Dro.

S.Dr.
Hold sir, for Gods sake, now your iest is earnest, 
Vpon what bargaine do you giue it me? 

Antiph.
Because that I familiarlie sometimes 
Doe vse you for my foole, and chat with you, 
Your sawcinesse will iest vpon my loue, 
And make a Common of my serious howres, 
When the sunne shines, let foolish gnats make sport, 
But creepe in crannies, when he hides his beames: 
If you will iest with me, know my aspect, 
And fashion your demeanor to my lookes, 
Or I will beat this method in your sconce. 

S.Dro.
Sconce call you it? so you 
would leaue batte-ring, I had rather haue it a head, and you 
vse these blows long, I must get a sconce for my head, 
and Insconce it to, or else I shall seek my wit in my 
shoulders, but I pray sir, why am I beaten? 

Ant.
Dost thou not know? 

S.Dro.
Nothing sir, but that I am 
beaten. 

Ant.
Shall I tell you why? 

S.Dro.
I sir, and wherefore; for they 
say, euery why hath a wherefore. 

Ant.
Why first for flowting me, and then wherefore, 
for vrging it the second time to me. 

S.Dro.
Was there euer anie man thus beaten out of season, 
when in the why and the wherefore, is neither rime nor reason. 
Well sir, I thanke you. 

Ant.
Thanke me sir, for what? 

S.Dro.
Marry sir, for this something 
that you gaue me for nothing. 

Ant.
Ile make you amends next, 
to giue you nothing for something. But say sir, is it 
dinner time? 

S.Dro.
No sir, I thinke the meat wants 
that I haue. 

Ant.
In good time sir: what's 
that? 

S.Dro.
Basting. 

Ant.
Well sir, then 'twill be 
drie. 

S.Dro.
If it be sir, I pray you eat none 
of it. 

Ant.
Your reason? 

S.Dro.
Lest it make you chollericke, and 
purchase me another drie basting. 

Ant.
Well sir, learne to iest in 
good time, there's a time for all things. 

S.Dro.
I durst haue denied that before 
you were so chollericke. 

Anti.
By what rule sir? 

S.Dro.
Marry sir, by a rule as plaine as 
the plaine bald pate of Father time himselfe. 

Ant.
Let's heare it. 

S.Dro.
There's no time for a man to 
recouer his haire that growes bald by nature. 

Ant.
May he not doe it by fine 
and recouerie? 

S.Dro.
Yes, to pay a fine for a perewig, 
and recouer the lost haire of another man. 

Ant.
Why, is Time such a 
niggard of haire, being (as it is) so plentifull an excrement? 

S.Dro.
Because it is a blessing that hee 
bestowes on beasts, and what he hath scanted them in 
haire, hee hath giuen them in wit. 

Ant.
Why, but theres manie a 
man hath more haire then wit. 

S.Dro.
Not a man of those but he hath 
the wit to lose his haire. 

Ant.
Why thou didst conclude 
hairy men plain dealers without wit. 

S.Dro.
The plainer dealer, the sooner 
lost; yet he looseth it in a kinde of iollitie. 

An.
For what reason. 

S.Dro.
For two, and sound ones to. 

An.
Nay not sound I pray 
you. 

S.Dro.
Sure ones then. 

An.
Nay, not sure in a thing 
falsing. 

S.Dro.
Certaine ones then. 

An.
Name them. 

S.Dro.
The one to saue the money 
that he spends in trying: the other, that at dinner they 
should not drop in his porrage. 

An.
You would all this time 
haue prou'd, there is no time for all things. 

S.Dro.
Marry and did sir: namely, in 
no time to recouer haire lost by Nature. 

An.
But your reason was not 
substantiall, why there is no time to recouer. 

S.Dro.
Thus I mend it: Time himselfe is bald, and therefore 
to the worlds end, will haue bald followers. 

An.
I knew 'twould be a bald 
conclusion: but soft, who wafts vs yonder. 
Enter Adriana and Luciana.

Adri.
I, I, Antipholus, looke strange and frowne, 
Some other Mistresse hath thy sweet aspects: 
I am not Adriana, nor thy wife. 
The time was once, when thou vn-vrg'd wouldst vow, 
That neuer words were musicke to thine eare, 
That neuer obiect pleasing in thine eye, 
That neuer touch well welcome to thy hand, 
That neuer meat sweet-sauour'd in thy taste, 
Vnlesse I spake, or look'd, or touch'd, or caru'd to thee. 
How comes it now, my Husband, oh how comes it, 
That thou art then estranged from thy selfe? 
Thy selfe I call it, being strange to me: 
That vndiuidable Incorporate 
Am better then thy deere selfes better part. 
Ah doe not teare away thy selfe from me; 
For know my loue: as easie maist thou fall 
A drop of water in the breaking gulfe, 
And take vnmingled thence that drop againe 
Without addition or diminishing, 
As take from me thy selfe, and not me too. 
How deerely would it touch thee to the quicke, 
Shouldst thou but heare I were licencious? 
And that this body consecrate to thee, 
By Ruffian Lust should be contaminate? 
Wouldst thou not spit at me, and spurne at me, 
And hurle the name of husband in my face, 
And teare the stain'd skin of my Harlot brow, 
And from my false hand cut the wedding ring, 
And breake it with a deepe-diuorcing vow? 
I know thou canst, and therefore see thou doe it. 
I am possest with an adulterate blot, 
My bloud is mingled with the crime of lust: 
For if we two be one, and thou play false, 
I doe digest the poison of thy flesh, 
Being strumpeted by thy contagion: 
Keepe then faire league and truce with thy true bed, 
I liue distain'd, thou vndishonoured. 

Antip.
Plead you to me faire dame? I know you not: 
In Ephesus I am but two houres old, 
As strange vnto your towne, as to your talke, 
Who euery word by all my wit being scan'd, 
Wants wit in all, one word to vnderstand. 

Luci.
Fie brother, how the world is chang'd with you: 
When were you wont to vse my sister thus? 
She sent for you by Dromio home to dinner. 

Ant.
By Dromio? 

Drom.
By me. 

Adr.
By thee, and this thou didst returne from him. 
That he did buffet thee, and in his blowes, 
Denied my house for his, me for his wife. 

Ant.
Did you conuerse sir with this gentlewoman: 
What is the course and drift of your compact? 

S.Dro.
I sir? I neuer saw her till this time. 

Ant.
Villaine thou liest, for euen her verie words, 
Didst thou deliuer to me on the Mart. 

S.Dro.
I neuer spake with her in all my life. 

Ant.
How can she thus then call vs by our names? 
Vnlesse it be by inspiration. 

Adri.
How ill agrees it with your grauitie, 
To counterfeit thus grosely with your slaue, 
Abetting him to thwart me in my moode; 
Be it my wrong, you are from me exempt, 
But wrong not that wrong with a more contempt. 
Come I will fasten on this sleeue of thine: 
Thou art an Elme my husband, I a Vine: 
Whose weaknesse married to thy stranger state, 
Makes me with thy strength to communicate: 
If ought possesse thee from me, it is drosse, 
Vsurping Iuie, Brier, or idle Mosse, 
Who all for want of pruning, with intrusion, 
Infect thy sap, and liue on thy confusion. 

Ant.

To mee shee speakes, shee moues mee for her theame; 
What, was I married to her in my dreame? 
Or sleepe I now, and thinke I heare all this? 
What error driues our eies and eares amisse? 
Vntill I know this sure vncertaintie, 
Ile entertaine the free'd fallacie. 

Luc.
Dromio, goe bid the seruants spred for dinner. 

S.Dro.

Oh for my beads, I crosse me for a sinner. 
This is the Fairie land, oh spight of spights 
We talke with Goblins, Owles and Sprights; 
If we obay them not, this will insue: 
They'll sucke our breath, or pinch vs blacke and blew. 

Luc.
Why prat'st thou to thy selfe, and answer'st not? 
Dromio, thou Dromio, thou snaile, thou slug, thou sot. 

S.Dro.
I am transformed Master, am I not? 

Ant.
I thinke thou art in minde, and so am I. 

S.Dro.
Nay Master, both in minde, and in my shape. 

Ant.
Thou hast thine owne forme. 

S.Dro.
No, I am an Ape. 

Luc.
If thou art chang'd to ought, 'tis to an Asse. 

S.Dro.
'Tis true she rides me, and I long for grasse. 
'Tis so, I am an Asse, else it could neuer be, 
But I should know her as well as she knowes me. 

Adr.
Come, come, no longer will I be a foole, 
To put the finger in the eie and weepe; 
Whil'st man and Master laughes my woes to scorne: 
Come sir to dinner, Dromio keepe the gate: 
Husband Ile dine aboue with you to day, 
And shriue you of a thousand idle prankes: 
Sirra, if any aske you for your Master, 
Say he dines forth, and let no creature enter: 
Come sister, Dromio play the Porter well. 

Ant.
Am I in earth, in heauen, or in hell? 
Sleeping or waking, mad or well aduisde: 
Knowne vnto these, and to my selfe disguisde: 
Ile say as they say, and perseuer so: 
And in this mist at all aduentures go. 

S.Dro.
Master, shall I be Porter at the gate? 

Adr.
I, and let none enter, least I breake your pate. 

Luc.
Come, come, Antipholus, we dine to late.
Modern text
Act II, Scene I
Enter Adriana, wife of Antipholus of Ephesus, with
Luciana, her sister

ADRIANA
Neither my husband nor the slave returned,
That in such haste I sent to seek his master?
Sure, Luciana, it is two o'clock.

LUCIANA
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.

ADRIANA
Why should their liberty than ours be more?

LUCIANA
Because their business still lies out o' door.

ADRIANA
Look when I serve him so he takes it ill.

LUCIANA
O, know he is the bridle of your will.

ADRIANA
There's none but asses will be bridled so.

LUCIANA
Why, headstrong liberty is lashed 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 watery seas,
Indued 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.

ADRIANA
This servitude makes you to keep unwed.

LUCIANA
Not this, but troubles of the marriage-bed.

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

LUCIANA
Ere I learn love, I'll practise to obey.

ADRIANA
How if your husband start some otherwhere?

LUCIANA
Till he come home again I would forbear.

ADRIANA
Patience unmoved! No marvel though she pause.
They can be meek that have no other cause.
A wretched soul, bruised with adversity,
We bid be quiet when we hear it cry.
But were we burdened 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-begged patience in thee will be left.

LUCIANA
Well, I will marry one day, but to try.
Here comes your man. Now is your husband nigh.
Enter Dromio of Ephesus

ADRIANA
Say, is your tardy master now at hand?

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
Nay, he's at two hands with me,
and that my two ears can witness.

ADRIANA
Say, didst thou speak with him? Knowest thou his mind?

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
I? Ay. He told his mind upon mine ear.
Beshrew his hand, I scarce could understand it.

LUCIANA
Spake he so doubtfully thou couldst not feel
his meaning?

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
Nay, he struck so plainly I could
too well feel his blows, and withal so doubtfully that I
could scarce understand them.

ADRIANA
But say, I prithee, is he coming home?
It seems he hath great care to please his wife.

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
Why, mistress, sure my master is horn-mad.

ADRIANA
Horn-mad, thou villain?

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
I mean not cuckold-mad,
But sure he is stark mad.
When I desired him to come home to dinner
He asked 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 home?’ quoth I. ‘ My gold,’ quoth he.
‘ Where is the thousand marks I gave thee, villain?’
‘ The pig,’ quoth I, ‘ is burned.’ ‘ My gold,’ quoth he.
‘ My mistress, sir – ’ quoth I – ‘ Hang up thy mistress!
I know not thy mistress. Out on thy mistress!’

LUCIANA
Quoth who?

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
Quoth my master.
‘ I know,’ quoth he, ‘ no house, no wife, no mistress.’
So that my errand, due unto my tongue,
I thank him, I bare home upon my shoulders;
For, in conclusion, he did beat me there.

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

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
Go back again, and be new-beaten home?
For God's sake send some other messenger.

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

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
And he will bless that cross with other beating,
Between you I shall have a holy head.

ADRIANA
Hence, prating peasant, fetch thy master home.
She beats Dromio

DROMIO OF EPHESUS
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.
If I last in this service you must case me in leather.
Exit

LUCIANA
(to Adriana)
Fie, how impatience loureth in your face.

ADRIANA
His company must do his minions grace
Whilst I at home starve for a merry look.
Hath homely age the alluring beauty took
From my poor cheek? Then he hath wasted it.
Are my discourses dull? barren my wit?
If voluble and sharp discourse be marred,
Unkindness blunts it more than marble hard.
Do their gay vestments his affections bait?
That's not my fault; he's master of my state.
What ruins are in me that can be found
By him not ruined? Then is he the ground
Of my defeatures. My decayed fair
A sunny look of his would soon repair.
But, too unruly deer, he breaks the pale
And feeds from home. Poor I am but his stale.

LUCIANA
Self-harming jealousy! Fie, beat it hence.

ADRIANA
Unfeeling fools can with such wrongs dispense.
I know his eye doth homage otherwhere,
Or else what lets it but he would be here?
Sister, you know he promised me a chain.
Would that alone a love he would detain
So he would keep fair quarter with his bed.
I see the jewel best enamelled
Will lose his beauty. Yet the gold bides still
That others touch; and often touching will
Wear gold, and no man that hath a name
But falsehood and corruption doth it shame.
Since that my beauty cannot please his eye,
I'll weep what's left away, and weeping die.

LUCIANA
How many fond fools serve mad jealousy!
Exeunt
Modern text
Act II, Scene II
Enter Antipholus of Syracuse

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
The gold I gave to Dromio is laid up
Safe at the Centaur, and the heedful slave
Is wandered forth in care to seek me out
By computation and mine host's report.
I could not speak with Dromio since at first
I sent him from the mart. See, here he comes.
Enter Dromio of Syracuse
How now, sir. Is your merry humour altered?
As you love strokes, so jest with me again.
You know no Centaur. You received no gold.
Your mistress sent to have me home to dinner?
My house was at the Phoenix. Wast thou mad
That thus so madly thou didst answer me?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
What answer, sir? When spake I such a word?

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Even now, even here, not half an hour since.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
I did not see you since you sent me hence
Home to the Centaur with the gold you gave me.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Villain, thou didst deny the gold's receipt,
And toldest me of a mistress and a dinner,
For which I hope thou feltest I was displeased.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
I am glad to see you in this merry vein.
What means this jest, I pray you, master, tell me?

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Yea, dost thou jeer and flout me in the teeth?
Thinkest thou I jest? Hold, take thou that, and that.
He beats Dromio

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Hold, sir, for God's sake; now your jest is earnest.
Upon what bargain do you give it me?

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Because that I familiarly sometimes
Do use you for my fool, and chat with you,
Your sauciness will jest upon my love,
And make a common of my serious hours.
When the sun shines let foolish gnats make sport,
But creep in crannies when he hides his beams.
If you will jest with me, know my aspect,
And fashion your demeanour to my looks,
Or I will beat this method in your sconce.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
‘ Sconce ’ call you it? So you
would leave battering I had rather have it a head. An you
use these blows long I must get a sconce for my head,
and ensconce it too, or else I shall seek my wit in my
shoulders. But I pray, sir, why am I beaten?

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Dost thou not know?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Nothing, sir, but that I am
beaten.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Shall I tell you why?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Ay, sir, and wherefore; for they
say every why hath a wherefore.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Why, first: for flouting me; and then wherefore:
For urging it the second time to me.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Was there ever any man thus beaten out of season,
When in the why and the wherefore is neither rhyme nor reason?
Well, sir, I thank you.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Thank me, sir, for what?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Marry, sir, for this something
that you gave me for nothing.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
I'll make you amends next,
to give you nothing for something. But say, sir, is it
dinner-time?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
No, sir. I think the meat wants
that I have.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
In good time, sir. What's
that?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Basting.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Well, sir, then 'twill be
dry

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
If it be, sir, I pray you eat none
of it.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Your reason?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Lest it make you choleric, and
purchase me another dry basting.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Well, sir, learn to jest in
good time. There's a time for all things.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
I durst have denied that before
you were so choleric.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
By what rule, sir?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Marry, sir, by a rule as plain as
the plain bald pate of Father Time himself.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Let's hear it.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
There's no time for a man to
recover his hair that grows bald by nature.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
May he not do it by fine
and recovery?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Yes, to pay a fine for a periwig,
and recover the lost hair of another man.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Why is Time such a
niggard of hair, being, as it is, so plentiful an excrement?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Because it is a blessing that he
bestows on beasts, and what he hath scanted men in
hair he hath given them in wit.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Why, but there's many a
man hath more hair than wit.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Not a man of those but he hath
the wit to lose his hair.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Why, thou didst conclude
hairy men plain dealers, without wit.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
The plainer dealer, the sooner
lost. Yet he loseth it in a kind of jollity.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
For what reason?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
For two, and sound ones, too.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Nay, not sound, I pray
you.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Sure ones, then.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Nay, not sure in a thing
falsing.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Certain ones, then.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Name them.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
The one, to save the money
that he spends in tiring. The other, that at dinner they
should not drop in his porridge.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
You would all this time
have proved there is no time for all things.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Marry, and did, sir; namely, e'en
no time to recover hair lost by nature.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
But your reason was not
substantial, why there is no time to recover.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Thus I mend it: Time himself is bald, and therefore
to the world's end will have bald followers.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
I knew 'twould be a bald
conclusion. But, soft – who wafts us yonder?
Enter Adriana and Luciana

ADRIANA
Ay, ay, Antipholus, look strange and frown.
Some other mistress hath thy sweet aspects.
I am not Adriana, nor thy wife.
The time was once when thou unurged wouldst vow
That never words were music to thine ear,
That never object pleasing in thine eye,
That never touch well welcome to thy hand,
That never meat sweet-savoured in thy taste,
Unless I spake, or looked, or touched, or carved to thee.
How comes it now, my husband, O how comes it,
That thou art then estranged from thyself?
Thyself I call it, being strange to me
That, undividable, incorporate,
Am better than thy dear self's better part.
Ah, do not tear away thyself from me;
For know, my love, as easy mayst thou fall
A drop of water in the breaking gulf,
And take unmingled thence that drop again
Without addition or diminishing,
As take from me thyself, and not me too.
How dearly would it touch me to the quick
Shouldst thou but hear I were licentious,
And that this body consecrate to thee
By ruffian lust should be contaminate?
Wouldst thou not spit at me, and spurn at me,
And hurl the name of husband in my face,
And tear the stained skin off my harlot brow,
And from my false hand cut the wedding ring,
And break it with a deep-divorcing vow?
I know thou canst, and therefore see thou do it!
I am possessed with an adulterate blot.
My blood is mingled with the crime of lust;
For if we two be one, and thou play false,
I do digest the poison of thy flesh,
Being strumpeted by thy contagion.
Keep then fair league and truce with thy true bed,
I live unstained, thou undishonoured.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Plead you to me, fair dame? I know you not.
In Ephesus I am but two hours old,
As strange unto your town as to your talk,
Who, every word by all my wit being scanned,
Wants wit in all one word to understand.

LUCIANA
Fie, brother, how the world is changed with you.
When were you wont to use my sister thus?
She sent for you by Dromio home to dinner.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
By Dromio?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
By me?

ADRIANA
By thee; and this thou didst return from him:
That he did buffet thee, and in his blows
Denied my house for his, me for his wife.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Did you converse, sir, with this gentlewoman?
What is the course and drift of your compact?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
I, sir? I never saw her till this time.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Villain, thou liest; for even her very words
Didst thou deliver to me on the mart.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
I never spake with her in all my life.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
How can she thus then call us by our names? –
Unless it be by inspiration.

ADRIANA
How ill agrees it with your gravity
To counterfeit thus grossly with your slave,
Abetting him to thwart me in my mood.
Be it my wrong you are from me exempt;
But wrong not that wrong with a more contempt.
Come, I will fasten on this sleeve of thine.
Thou art an elm, my husband; I a vine,
Whose weakness, married to thy stronger state,
Makes me with thy strength to communicate.
If aught possess thee from me, it is dross,
Usurping ivy, briar, or idle moss,
Who, all for want of pruning, with intrusion
Infect thy sap, and live on thy confusion.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
(aside)
To me she speaks; she moves me for her theme.
What, was I married to her in my dream?
Or sleep I now, and think I hear all this?
What error drives our eyes and ears amiss?
Until I know this sure uncertainty,
I'll entertain the offered fallacy.

LUCIANA
Dromio, go bid the servants spread for dinner.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
(aside)
O for my beads! I cross me for a sinner.
This is the fairy land. O spite of spites,
We talk with goblins, owls, and sprites.
If we obey them not, this will ensue:
They'll suck our breath, or pinch us black and blue.

LUCIANA
Why pratest thou to thyself, and answerest not?
Dromio, thou Dromio, thou snail, thou slug, thou sot.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
I am transformed, master, am not I?

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
I think thou art in mind, and so am I.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Nay, master, both in mind and in my shape.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Thou hast thine own form.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
No, I am an ape.

LUCIANA
If thou art changed to aught, 'tis to an ass.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
'Tis true, she rides me, and I long for grass.
'Tis so, I am an ass; else it could never be
But I should know her as well as she knows me.

ADRIANA
Come, come, no longer will I be a fool,
To put the finger in the eye and weep
Whilst man and master laughs my woes to scorn.
Come, sir, to dinner. – Dromio, keep the gate. –
Husband, I'll dine above with you today,
And shrive you of a thousand idle pranks. –
Sirrah, if any ask you for your master,
Say he dines forth, and let no creature enter. –
Come, sister. – Dromio, play the porter well.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
(aside)
Am I in earth, in heaven, or in hell?
Sleeping or waking? mad or well-advised?
Known unto these, and to myself disguised!
I'll say as they say and persever so,
And in this mist at all adventures go.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Master, shall I be porter at the gate?

ADRIANA
Ay, and let none enter, lest I break your pate.

LUCIANA
Come, come, Antipholus, we dine too late.
Exeunt
x

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