The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works
Page 537
think you my master.
VALENTINE Are all these things perceived in me?
SPEED They are all perceived without ye.
VALENTINE Without me? They cannot.
SPEED Without you? Nay, that’s certain. For without
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you were so simple, none else would. But you are so
without these follies that these follies are within you,
and shine through you like the water in an urinal; that
not an eye that sees you but is a physician to
comment on your malady.
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VALENTINE But tell me: dost thou know my lady Silvia?
SPEED She that you gaze on so, as she sits at supper?
VALENTINE Hast thou observed that? Even she I mean.
SPEED Why, sir, I know her not.
VALENTINE Dost thou know her by my gazing on her,
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and yet know’st her not?
SPEED Is she not hard-favoured, sir?
VALENTINE Not so fair, boy, as well-favoured.
SPEED Sir, I know that well enough.
VALENTINE What dost thou know?
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SPEED That she is not so fair as, of you, well-favoured.
VALENTINE I mean that her beauty is exquisite, but her
favour infinite.
SPEED That’s because the one is painted, and the other
out of all count.
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VALENTINE How painted? And how out of count?
SPEED Marry, sir, so painted to make her fair that no
man counts of her beauty.
VALENTINE How esteem’st thou me? I account of her
beauty.
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SPEED You never saw her since she was deformed.
VALENTINE How long hath she been deformed?
SPEED Ever since you loved her.
VALENTINE I have loved her ever since I saw her, and
still I see her beautiful.
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SPEED If you love her, you cannot see her.
VALENTINE Why?
SPEED Because Love is blind. O that you had mine eyes,
or your own eyes had the lights they were wont to
have, when you chid at Sir Proteus, for going
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ungartered.
VALENTINE What should I see then?
SPEED Your own present folly, and her passing
deformity: for he, being in love, could not see to garter
his hose; and you, being in love, cannot see to put on
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your hose.
VALENTINE Belike, boy, then you are in love, for last
morning you could not see to wipe my shoes.
SPEED True, sir: I was in love with my bed. I thank you,
you swinged me for my love, which makes me the
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bolder to chide you for yours.
VALENTINE In conclusion, I stand affected to her.
SPEED I would you were set, so your affection would
cease.
VALENTINE Last night she enjoined me to write some
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lines to one she loves.
SPEED And have you?
VALENTINE I have.
SPEED Are they not lamely writ?
VALENTINE No, boy, but as well as I can do them.
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Enter SILVIA.
Peace, here she comes.
SPEED [aside] O excellent motion! O exceeding puppet!
Now will he interpret to her.
VALENTINE Madam and mistress, a thousand good-
morrows.
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SPEED [aside] O, ’give-ye-good-ev’n! Here’s a million of
manners.
SILVIA Sir Valentine, and servant, to you two thousand.
SPEED [aside] He should give her interest; and she gives
it him.
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VALENTINE As you enjoin’d me, I have writ your letter
Unto the secret, nameless friend of yours.
Which I was much unwilling to proceed in,
But for my duty to your ladyship. [Gives her a letter.]
SILVIA
I thank you, gentle servant. ’Tis very clerkly done.
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VALENTINE Now trust me, madam, it came hardly off.
For being ignorant to whom it goes,
I writ at random, very doubtfully.
SILVIA
Perchance you think too much of so much pains?
VALENTINE No, madam; so it stead you, I will write
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(Please you command) a thousand times as much.
And yet –
SILVIA A pretty period. Well, I guess the sequel;
And yet I will not name it; and yet I care not.
And yet take this again; and yet I thank you,
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Meaning henceforth to trouble you no more.
SPEED [aside] And yet you will; and yet another ‘yet’.
VALENTINE
What means your ladyship? Do you not like it?
SILVIA Yes, yes; the lines are very quaintly writ,
But (since unwillingly) take them again.
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Nay, take them.
VALENTINE Madam, they are for you.
SILVIA Ay, ay. You writ them, sir, at my request,
But I will none of them: they are for you.
I would have had them writ more movingly.
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VALENTINE [taking the letter]
Please you, I’ll write your ladyship another.
SILVIA And when it’s writ, for my sake read it over,
And if it please you, so; if not, why, so.
VALENTINE If it please me, madam? What then?
SILVIA Why, if it please you, take it for your labour;
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And so good-morrow, servant. Exit.
SPEED O jest unseen, inscrutable, invisible,
As a nose on a man’s face, or a weathercock on a
steeple!
My master sues to her; and she hath taught her
suitor,
He being her pupil, to become her tutor.
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O excellent device, was there ever heard a better?
That my master being scribe, to himself should write
the letter?
VALENTINE How now, sir? What are you reasoning with
yourself?
SPEED Nay, I was rhyming; ’tis you that have the reason.
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VALENTINE To do what?
SPEED To be a spokesman from Madam Silvia.
VALENTINE To whom?
SPEED To yourself. Why, she woos you by a figure.
VALENTINE What figure?
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SPEED By a letter, I should say.
VALENTINE Why, she hath not writ to me.
SPEED What need she, when she hath made you write to
yourself? Why, do you not perceive the jest?
VALENTINE No, believe me.
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SPEED No believing you indeed, sir. But did you
perceive her earnest?
VALENTINE She gave me none, except an angry word.
SPEED Why, she hath given you a letter.
VALENTINE That’s the letter I writ to her friend.
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SPEED And that letter hath she delivered, and there an
end.
VALENTINE I would it were no worse.
SPEED I’ll warrant you, ’tis as well.
For often have you writ to her, and she in modesty,
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Or else for want of idle time, could not again reply,
Or fearing else some messenger, that might her mind discover,
Herself hath taught her love himself to write unto her lover.
All this I speak in print, for in print I found it.
Why muse you, sir? ’Tis dinner time.
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VALENTINE I have dined.
SPEED
Ay, but hearken, sir: though the chameleon Love
can feed on the air, I am one that am nourished by
my victuals; and would fain have meat. O, be not
like your mistress, be moved, be moved. Exeunt.
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2.2 Enter PROTEUS and JULIA.
PROTEUS Have patience, gentle Julia.
JULIA I must where is no remedy.
PROTEUS When possibly I can, I will return.
JULIA If you turn not, you will return the sooner;
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Keep this remembrance for thy Julia’s sake.
[She gives Proteus a ring.]
PROTEUS
Why then we’ll make exchange; here, take you this.
[He gives Julia a ring.]
JULIA And seal the bargain with a holy kiss.
PROTEUS Here is my hand, for my true constancy.
And when that hour o’erslips me in the day
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Wherein I sigh not, Julia, for thy sake,
The next ensuing hour some foul mischance
Torment me for my love’s forgetfulness.
My father stays my coming. Answer not.
The tide is now; nay, not thy tide of tears,
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That tide will stay me longer than I should.
Julia, farewell. Exit Julia.
What, gone without a word?
Ay, so true love should do: it cannot speak,
For truth hath better deeds than words to grace it.
Enter PANTHINO.
PANTHINO Sir Proteus, you are stay’d for.
PROTEUS Go; I come, I come.
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Alas, this parting strikes poor lovers dumb. Exeunt.
2.3 Enter LAUNCE with his dog Crab.
LAUNCE Nay, ’twill be this hour ere I have done
weeping. All the kind of the Launces have this very
fault. I have received my proportion, like the
prodigious son, and am going with Sir Proteus to the
Imperial’s court. I think Crab my dog be the sourest-
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natured dog that lives: my mother weeping; my father
wailing; my sister crying; our maid howling; our cat
wringing her hands, and all our house in a great
perplexity; yet did not this cruel-hearted cur shed one
tear. He is a stone, a very pebble stone, and has no
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more pity in him than a dog. A Jew would have wept
to have seen our parting. Why, my grandam, having no
eyes, look you, wept herself blind at my parting. Nay,
I’ll show you the manner of it. This shoe is my father.
No, this left shoe is my father; no, no, this left shoe is
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my mother; nay, that cannot be so neither. Yes, it is so,
it is so: it hath the worser sole. This shoe with the hole
in it is my mother; and this my father. A vengeance
on’t, there ’tis. Now, sir, this staff is my sister; for, look
you, she is as white as a lily, and as small as a wand.
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This hat is Nan our maid. I am the dog. No, the dog is
himself, and I am the dog. O, the dog is me, and I am
myself. Ay; so, so. Now come I to my father: ‘Father,
your blessing.’ Now should not the shoe speak a word
for weeping; now should I kiss my father; well, he
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weeps on; now come I to my mother. O that she could
speak now, like a wood woman! Well, I kiss her. Why,
there ’tis: here’s my mother’s breath up and down.
Now come I to my sister: mark the moan she makes.
Now the dog all this while sheds not a tear; nor speaks
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a word; but see how I lay the dust with my tears.
Enter PANTHINO.
PANTHINO Launce, away, away; aboard; thy master is
shipped, and thou art to post after with oars. What’s
the matter? Why weep’st thou, man? Away, ass, you’ll
lose the tide, if you tarry any longer.
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LAUNCE It is no matter if the tied were lost, for it is the
unkindest tied that ever any man tied.
PANTHINO What’s the unkindest tide?
LAUNCE Why, he that’s tied here, Crab my dog.
PANTHINO Tut, man. I mean thou’lt lose the flood, and
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in losing the flood, lose thy voyage, and in losing thy
voyage, lose thy master, and in losing thy master, lose
thy service, and in losing thy service – why dost thou
stop my mouth?
LAUNCE For fear thou shouldst lose thy tongue.
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PANTHINO Where should I lose my tongue?
LAUNCE In thy tale.