Proteus
Sweet lady, let me rake it from the earth.
Silvia
Go to thy lady’s grave and call hers thence,
Or, at the least, in hers sepulchre thine.
Julia
[Aside] He heard not that.
Proteus
Madam, if your heart be so obdurate,
Vouchsafe me yet your picture for my love,
The picture that is hanging in your chamber;
To that I’ll speak, to that I’ll sigh and weep:
For since the substance of your perfect self
Is else devoted, I am but a shadow;
And to your shadow will I make true love.
Julia
[Aside] If ’twere a substance, you would, sure, deceive it, And make it but a shadow, as I am.
Silvia
I am very loath to be your idol, sir;
But since your falsehood shall become you well
To worship shadows and adore false shapes,
Send to me in the morning and I’ll send it:
And so, good rest.
Proteus
As wretches have o’ernight
That wait for execution in the morn.
Exeunt Proteus and Silvia severally
Julia
Host, will you go?
Host
By my halidom, I was fast asleep.
Julia
Pray you, where lies Sir Proteus?
Host
Marry, at my house. Trust me, I think ’tis almost day.
Julia
Not so; but it hath been the longest night
That e’er I watch’d and the most heaviest.
Exeunt
SCENE III. THE SAME.
Enter Eglamour
Eglamour
This is the hour that Madam Silvia
Entreated me to call and know her mind:
There’s some great matter she’ld employ me in.
Madam, madam!
Enter Silvia above
Silvia
Who calls?
Eglamour
Your servant and your friend;
One that attends your ladyship’s command.
Silvia
Sir Eglamour, a thousand times good morrow.
Eglamour
As many, worthy lady, to yourself:
According to your ladyship’s impose,
I am thus early come to know what service
It is your pleasure to command me in.
Silvia
O Eglamour, thou art a gentleman —
Think not I flatter, for I swear I do not —
Valiant, wise, remorseful, well accomplish’d:
Thou art not ignorant what dear good will
I bear unto the banish’d Valentine,
Nor how my father would enforce me marry
Vain Thurio, whom my very soul abhors.
Thyself hast loved; and I have heard thee say
No grief did ever come so near thy heart
As when thy lady and thy true love died,
Upon whose grave thou vow’dst pure chastity.
Sir Eglamour, I would to Valentine,
To Mantua, where I hear he makes abode;
And, for the ways are dangerous to pass,
I do desire thy worthy company,
Upon whose faith and honour I repose.
Urge not my father’s anger, Eglamour,
But think upon my grief, a lady’s grief,
And on the justice of my flying hence,
To keep me from a most unholy match,
Which heaven and fortune still rewards with plagues.
I do desire thee, even from a heart
As full of sorrows as the sea of sands,
To bear me company and go with me:
If not, to hide what I have said to thee,
That I may venture to depart alone.
Eglamour
Madam, I pity much your grievances;
Which since I know they virtuously are placed,
I give consent to go along with you,
Recking as little what betideth me
As much I wish all good befortune you.
When will you go?
Silvia
This evening coming.
Eglamour
Where shall I meet you?
Silvia
At Friar Patrick’s cell,
Where I intend holy confession.
Eglamour
I will not fail your ladyship. Good morrow, gentle lady.
Silvia
Good morrow, kind Sir Eglamour.
Exeunt severally
SCENE IV. THE SAME.
Enter Launce, with his his Dog
Launce
When a man’s servant shall play the cur with him, look you, it goes hard: one that I brought up of a puppy; one that I saved from drowning, when three or four of his blind brothers and sisters went to it. I have taught him, even as one would say precisely, ‘thus I would teach a dog.’ I was sent to deliver him as a present to Mistress Silvia from my master; and I came no sooner into the dining-chamber but he steps me to her trencher and steals her capon’s leg: O, ’tis a foul thing when a cur cannot keep himself in all companies! I would have, as one should say, one that takes upon him to be a dog indeed, to be, as it were, a dog at all things. If I had not had more wit than he, to take a fault upon me that he did, I think verily he had been hanged for’t; sure as I live, he had suffered for’t; you shall judge. He thrusts me himself into the company of three or four gentlemanlike dogs under the duke’s table: he had not been there — bless the mark!— a pissing while, but all the chamber smelt him. ‘Out with the dog!’ says one: ‘What cur is that?’ says another: ‘Whip him out’ says the third: ‘Hang him up’ says the duke. I, having been acquainted with the smell before, knew it was Crab, and goes me to the fellow that whips the dogs: ‘Friend,’ quoth I, ‘you mean to whip the dog?’ ‘Ay, marry, do I,’ quoth he. ‘You do him the more wrong,’ quoth I; ‘’twas I did the thing you wot of.’ He makes me no more ado, but whips me out of the chamber. How many masters would do this for his servant? Nay, I’ll be sworn, I have sat in the stocks for puddings he hath stolen, otherwise he had been executed; I have stood on the pillory for geese he hath killed, otherwise he had suffered for’t. Thou thinkest not of this now. Nay, I remember the trick you served me when I took my leave of Madam Silvia: did not I bid thee still mark me and do as I do? when didst thou see me heave up my leg and make water against a gentlewoman’s farthingale? didst thou ever see me do such a trick?
Enter Proteus and Julia
Proteus
Sebastian is thy name? I like thee well
And will employ thee in some service presently.
Julia
In what you please: I’ll do what I can.
Proteus
I hope thou wilt.
To Launce
How now, you whoreson peasant!
Where have you been these two days loitering?
Launce
Marry, sir, I carried Mistress Silvia the dog you bade me.
Proteus
And what says she to my little jewel?
Launce
Marry, she says your dog was a cur, and tells you currish thanks is good enough for such a present.
Proteus
But she received my dog?
Launce
No, indeed, did she not: here have I brought him back again.
Proteus
What, didst thou offer her this from me?
Launce
Ay, sir: the other squirrel was stolen from me by the hangman boys in the market-place: and then I offered her mine own, who is a dog as big as ten of yours, and therefore the gift the greater.
Proteus
Go get thee hence, and find my dog again,
Or ne’er return again into my sight.
Away, I say! stay’st thou to vex me here?
Exit Launce
A slave, that st
ill an end turns me to shame!
Sebastian, I have entertained thee,
Partly that I have need of such a youth
That can with some discretion do my business,
For ’tis no trusting to yond foolish lout,
But chiefly for thy face and thy behavior,
Which, if my augury deceive me not,
Witness good bringing up, fortune and truth:
Therefore know thou, for this I entertain thee.
Go presently and take this ring with thee,
Deliver it to Madam Silvia:
She loved me well deliver’d it to me.
Julia
It seems you loved not her, to leave her token.
She is dead, belike?
Proteus
Not so; I think she lives.
Julia
Alas!
Proteus
Why dost thou cry ‘alas’?
Julia
I cannot choose
But pity her.
Proteus
Wherefore shouldst thou pity her?
Julia
Because methinks that she loved you as well
As you do love your lady Silvia:
She dreams of him that has forgot her love;
You dote on her that cares not for your love.
’Tis pity love should be so contrary;
And thinking of it makes me cry ‘alas!’
Proteus
Well, give her that ring and therewithal
This letter. That’s her chamber. Tell my lady
I claim the promise for her heavenly picture.
Your message done, hie home unto my chamber,
Where thou shalt find me, sad and solitary.
Exit
Julia
How many women would do such a message?
Alas, poor Proteus! thou hast entertain’d
A fox to be the shepherd of thy lambs.
Alas, poor fool! why do I pity him
That with his very heart despiseth me?
Because he loves her, he despiseth me;
Because I love him I must pity him.
This ring I gave him when he parted from me,
To bind him to remember my good will;
And now am I, unhappy messenger,
To plead for that which I would not obtain,
To carry that which I would have refused,
To praise his faith which I would have dispraised.
I am my master’s true-confirmed love;
But cannot be true servant to my master,
Unless I prove false traitor to myself.
Yet will I woo for him, but yet so coldly
As, heaven it knows, I would not have him speed.
Enter Silvia, attended
Gentlewoman, good day! I pray you, be my mean
To bring me where to speak with Madam Silvia.
Silvia
What would you with her, if that I be she?
Julia
If you be she, I do entreat your patience
To hear me speak the message I am sent on.
Silvia
From whom?
Julia
From my master, Sir Proteus, madam.
Silvia
O, he sends you for a picture.
Julia
Ay, madam.
Silvia
Ursula, bring my picture here.
Go give your master this: tell him from me,
One Julia, that his changing thoughts forget,
Would better fit his chamber than this shadow.
Julia
Madam, please you peruse this letter.—
Pardon me, madam; I have unadvised
Deliver’d you a paper that I should not:
This is the letter to your ladyship.
Silvia
I pray thee, let me look on that again.
Julia
It may not be; good madam, pardon me.
Silvia
There, hold!
I will not look upon your master’s lines:
I know they are stuff’d with protestations
And full of new-found oaths; which he will break
As easily as I do tear his paper.
Julia
Madam, he sends your ladyship this ring.
Silvia
The more shame for him that he sends it me;
For I have heard him say a thousand times
His Julia gave it him at his departure.
Though his false finger have profaned the ring,
Mine shall not do his Julia so much wrong.
Julia
She thanks you.
Silvia
What say’st thou?
Julia
I thank you, madam, that you tender her.
Poor gentlewoman! my master wrongs her much.
Silvia
Dost thou know her?
Julia
Almost as well as I do know myself:
To think upon her woes I do protest
That I have wept a hundred several times.
Silvia
Belike she thinks that Proteus hath forsook her.
Julia
I think she doth; and that’s her cause of sorrow.
Silvia
Is she not passing fair?
Julia
She hath been fairer, madam, than she is:
When she did think my master loved her well,
She, in my judgment, was as fair as you:
But since she did neglect her looking-glass
And threw her sun-expelling mask away,
The air hath starved the roses in her cheeks
And pinch’d the lily-tincture of her face,
That now she is become as black as I.
Silvia
How tall was she?
Julia
About my stature; for at Pentecost,
When all our pageants of delight were play’d,
Our youth got me to play the woman’s part,
And I was trimm’d in Madam Julia’s gown,
Which served me as fit, by all men’s judgments,
As if the garment had been made for me:
Therefore I know she is about my height.
And at that time I made her weep agood,
For I did play a lamentable part:
Madam, ’twas Ariadne passioning
For Theseus’ perjury and unjust flight;
Which I so lively acted with my tears
That my poor mistress, moved therewithal,
Wept bitterly; and would I might be dead
If I in thought felt not her very sorrow!
Silvia
She is beholding to thee, gentle youth.
Alas, poor lady, desolate and left!
I weep myself to think upon thy words.
Here, youth, there is my purse; I give thee this
For thy sweet mistress’ sake, because thou lovest her.
Farewell.
Exit Silvia, with attendants
Julia
And she shall thank you for’t, if e’er you know her.
A virtuous gentlewoman, mild and beautiful
I hope my master’s suit will be but cold,
Since she respects my mistress’ love so much.
Alas, how love can trifle with itself!
Here is her picture: let me see; I think,
If I had such a tire, this face of mine
Were full as lovely as is this of hers:
And yet the painter flatter’d her a little,
Unless I flatter with myself too much.
Her hair is auburn, mine is perfect yellow:
If that be all the difference in his love,
I’ll get me such a colour’d periwig.
Her eyes are grey as glass, and so are mine:
Ay, but her forehead’s low, and mine’s as high.
What should it be that he respects in her
But I can make respective in myself,
If this fond Lo
ve were not a blinded god?
Come, shadow, come and take this shadow up,
For ’tis thy rival. O thou senseless form,
Thou shalt be worshipp’d, kiss’d, loved and adored!
And, were there sense in his idolatry,
My substance should be statue in thy stead.
I’ll use thee kindly for thy mistress’ sake,
That used me so; or else, by Jove I vow,
I should have scratch’d out your unseeing eyes
To make my master out of love with thee!
Exit
ACT V
SCENE I. MILAN. AN ABBEY.
Enter Eglamour
Eglamour
The sun begins to gild the western sky;
And now it is about the very hour
That Silvia, at Friar Patrick’s cell, should meet me.
She will not fail, for lovers break not hours,
Unless it be to come before their time;
So much they spur their expedition.
See where she comes.
Enter Silvia
Lady, a happy evening!
Silvia
Amen, amen! Go on, good Eglamour,
Out at the postern by the abbey-wall:
I fear I am attended by some spies.
Eglamour
Fear not: the forest is not three leagues off;
If we recover that, we are sure enough.
Exeunt
SCENE II. THE SAME. THE DUKE’S PALACE.
Enter Thurio, Proteus, and Julia
Thurio
Sir Proteus, what says Silvia to my suit?
Proteus
O, sir, I find her milder than she was;
And yet she takes exceptions at your person.
Thurio
What, that my leg is too long?
Proteus
No; that it is too little.
Thurio
I’ll wear a boot, to make it somewhat rounder.
Julia
[Aside] But love will not be spurr’d to what it loathes.
Thurio
What says she to my face?
Proteus
She says it is a fair one.
Thurio
Nay then, the wanton lies; my face is black.
Proteus
But pearls are fair; and the old saying is,
Black men are pearls in beauteous ladies’ eyes.
Julia
[Aside] ’Tis true; such pearls as put out ladies’ eyes; For I had rather wink than look on them.
Thurio
How likes she my discourse?
Proteus
Ill, when you talk of war.
Thurio
But well, when I discourse of love and peace?
Julia
[Aside] But better, indeed, when you hold your peace.
Thurio
What says she to my valour?
Proteus
O, sir, she makes no doubt of that.
Julia
Complete Plays, The Page 345