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Milan. A Room in the DUKE’S Palace. | |
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Enter VALENTINE, SILVIA, THURIO, and SPEED. | |
| Sil. Servant! | |
| Val. Mistress? | |
| Speed. Master, Sir Thurio frowns on you. | 5 |
| Val. Ay, boy, it’s for love. | |
| Speed. Not of you. | |
| Val. Of my mistress, then. | |
| Speed. ’Twere good you knock’d him. | |
| Sil. Servant, you are sad. | 10 |
| Val. Indeed, madam, I seem so. | |
| Thu. Seem you that you are not? | |
| Val. Haply I do. | |
| Thu. So do counterfeits. | |
| Val. So do you. | 15 |
| Thu. What seem I that I am not? | |
| Val. Wise. | |
| Thu. What instance of the contrary? | |
| Val. Your folly. | |
| Thu. And how quote you my folly? | 20 |
| Val. I quote it in your jerkin. | |
| Thu. My jerkin is a doublet. | |
| Val. Well, then, I’ll double your folly. | |
| Thu. How? | |
| Sil. What, angry, Sir Thurio! do you change colour? | 25 |
| Val. Give him leave, madam; he is a kind of chameleon. | |
| Thu. That hath more mind to feed on your blood than live in your air. | |
| Val. You have said, sir. | |
| Thu. Ay, sir, and done too, for this time. | |
| Val. I know it well, sir: you always end ere you begin. | 30 |
| Sil. A fine volley of words, gentlemen, and quickly shot off. | |
| Val. ’Tis indeed, madam; we thank the giver. | |
| Sil. Who is that, servant? | |
| Val. Yourself, sweet lady; for you gave the fire. Sir Thurio borrows his wit from your ladyship’s looks, and spends what he borrows kindly in your company. | |
| Thu. Sir, if you spend word for word with me, I shall make your wit bankrupt. | 35 |
| Val. I know it well, sir: you have an exchequer of words, and, I think, no other treasure to give your followers; for it appears by their bare liveries that they live by your bare words. | |
| Sil. No more, gentlemen, no more. Here comes my father. | |
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Enter DUKE. | |
| Duke. Now, daughter Silvia, you are hard beset. | |
| Sir Valentine, your father’s in good health: | 40 |
| What say you to a letter from your friends | |
| Of much good news? | |
| Val. My lord, I will be thankful | |
| To any happy messenger from thence. | |
| Duke. Know ye Don Antonio, your countryman? | 45 |
| Val. Ay, my good lord; I know the gentleman | |
| To be of worth and worthy estimation, | |
| And not without desert so well reputed. | |
| Duke. Hath he not a son? | |
| Val. Ay, my good lord; a son that well deserves | 50 |
| The honour and regard of such a father. | |
| Duke. You know him well? | |
| Val. I know him as myself; for from our infancy | |
| We have convers’d and spent our hours together: | |
| And though myself have been an idle truant, | 55 |
| Omitting the sweet benefit of time | |
| To clothe mine age with angel-like perfection, | |
| Yet hath Sir Proteus,—for that’s his name,— | |
| Made use and fair advantage of his days: | |
| His years but young, but his experience old; | 60 |
| His head unmellow’d, but his judgment ripe; | |
| And, in a word,—for far behind his worth | |
| Come all the praises that I now bestow,— | |
| He is complete in feature and in mind | |
| With all good grace to grace a gentleman. | 65 |
| Duke. Beshrew me, sir, but if he make this good, | |
| He is as worthy for an empress’ love | |
| As meet to be an emperor’s counsellor. | |
| Well, sir, this gentleman is come to me | |
| With commendation from great potentates; | 70 |
| And here he means to spend his time awhile: | |
| I think, ’tis no unwelcome news to you. | |
| Val. Should I have wish’d a thing, it had been he. | |
| Duke. Welcome him then according to his worth. | |
| Silvia, I speak to you; and you, Sir Thurio:— | 75 |
| For Valentine, I need not cite him to it. | |
| I’ll send him hither to you presently. [Exit. | |
| Val. This is the gentleman I told your ladyship | |
| Had come along with me, but that his mistress | |
| Did hold his eyes lock’d in her crystal looks. | 80 |
| Sil. Belike that now she hath enfranchis’d them | |
| Upon some other pawn for fealty. | |
| Val. Nay, sure, I think she holds them prisoners still. | |
| Sil. Nay, then he should be blind; and, being blind, | |
| How could he see his way to seek out you? | 85 |
| Val. Why, lady, Love hath twenty pairs of eyes. | |
| Thu. They say that Love hath not an eye at all. | |
| Val. To see such lovers, Thurio, as yourself: | |
| Upon a homely object Love can wink. | |
| Sil. Have done, have done. Here comes the gentleman. | 90 |
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Enter PROTEUS. | |
| Val. Welcome, dear Proteus! Mistress, I beseech you, | |
| Confirm his welcome with some special favour. | |
| Sil. His worth is warrant for his welcome hither, | |
| If this be he you oft have wish’d to hear from. | 95 |
| Val. Mistress, it is: sweet lady, entertain him | |
| To be my fellow-servant to your ladyship. | |
| Sil. Too low a mistress for so high a servant. | |
| Pro. Not so, sweet lady; but too mean a servant | |
| To have a look of such a worthy mistress. | 100 |
| Val. Leave off discourse of disability: | |
| Sweet lady, entertain him for your servant. | |
| Pro. My duty will I boast of, nothing else. | |
| Sil. And duty never yet did want his meed. | |
| Servant, you are welcome to a worthless mistress. | 105 |
| Pro. I’ll die on him that says so but yourself. | |
| Sil. That you are welcome? | |
| Pro. That you are worthless. | |
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Enter a Servant. | |
| Ser. Madam, my lord your father would speak with you. | 110 |
| Sil. I wait upon his pleasure. [Exit Servant.] Come, Sir Thurio, | |
| Go with me. Once more, new servant, welcome: | |
| I’ll leave you to confer of home-affairs; | |
| When you have done, we look to hear from you. | |
| Pro. We’ll both attend upon your ladyship. [Exeunt SILVIA, THURIO, and SPEED. | 115 |
| Val. Now, tell me, how do all from whence you came? | |
| Pro. Your friends are well and have them much commended. | |
| Val. And how do yours? | |
| Pro. I left them all in health. | |
| Val. How does your lady and how thrives your love? | 120 |
| Pro. My tales of love were wont to weary you: | |
| I know you joy not in a love-discourse. | |
| Val. Ay, Proteus, but that life is alter’d now: | |
| I have done penance for contemning love; | |
| Whose high imperious thoughts have punish’d me | 125 |
| With bitter fasts, with penitential groans, | |
| With nightly tears and daily heart-sore sighs; | |
| For, in revenge of my contempt of love, | |
| Love hath chas’d sleep from my enthralled eyes, | |
| And made them watchers of mine own heart’s sorrow. | 130 |
| O, gentle Proteus! Love’s a mighty lord, | |
| And hath so humbled me as I confess, | |
| There is no woe to his correction, | |
| Nor to his service no such joy on earth. | |
| Now no discourse, except it be of love; | 135 |
| Now can I break my fast, dine, sup and sleep, | |
| Upon the very naked name of love. | |
| Pro. Enough; I read your fortune in your eye. | |
| Was this the idol that you worship so? | |
| Val. Even she; and is she not a heavenly saint? | 140 |
| Pro. No; but she is an earthly paragon. | |
| Val. Call her divine. | |
| Pro. I will not flatter her. | |
| Val. O! flatter me, for love delights in praises. | |
| Pro. When I was sick you gave me bitter pills, | 145 |
| And I must minister the like to you. | |
| Val. Then speak the truth by her; if not divine, | |
| Yet let her be a principality, | |
| Sovereign to all the creatures on the earth. | |
| Pro. Except my mistress. | 150 |
| Val. Sweet, except not any, | |
| Except thou wilt except against my love. | |
| Pro. Have I not reason to prefer mine own? | |
| Val. And I will help thee to prefer her too: | |
| She shall be dignified with this high honour,— | 155 |
| To bear my lady’s train, lest the base earth | |
| Should from her vesture chance to steal a kiss, | |
| And, of so great a favour growing proud, | |
| Disdain to root the summer-swelling flower, | |
| And make rough winter everlastingly. | 160 |
| Pro. Why, Valentine, what braggardism is this? | |
| Val. Pardon me, Proteus: all I can is nothing | |
| To her whose worth makes other worthies nothing. | |
| She is alone. | |
| Pro. Then, let her alone. | 165 |
| Val. Not for the world: why, man, she is mine own, | |
| And I as rich in having such a jewel | |
| As twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl, | |
| The water nectar, and the rocks pure gold. | |
| Forgive me that I do not dream on thee, | 170 |
| Because thou see’st me dote upon my love. | |
| My foolish rival, that her father likes | |
| Only for his possessions are so huge, | |
| Is gone with her along, and I must after, | |
| For love, thou know’st, is full of jealousy. | 175 |
| Pro. But she loves you? | |
| Val. Ay, and we are betroth’d: nay, more, our marriage-hour, | |
| With all the cunning manner of our flight, | |
| Determin’d of: how I must climb her window, | |
| The ladder made of cords, and all the means | 180 |
| Plotted and ’greed on for my happiness. | |
| Good Proteus, go with me to my chamber, | |
| In these affairs to aid me with thy counsel. | |
| Pro. Go on before: I shall inquire you forth: | |
| I must unto the road, to disembark | 185 |
| Some necessaries that I needs must use, | |
| And then I’ll presently attend you. | |
| Val. Will you make haste? | |
| Pro. I will. [Exit VALENTINE. | |
| Even as one heat another heat expels, | 190 |
| Or as one nail by strength drives out another, | |
| So the remembrance of my former love | |
| Is by a newer object quite forgotten. | |
| Is it mine eye, or Valentinus’ praise, | |
| Her true perfection, or my false transgression, | 195 |
| That makes me reasonless to reason thus? | |
| She’s fair; and so is Julia that I love,— | |
| That I did love, for now my love is thaw’d, | |
| Which, like a waxen image ’gainst a fire, | |
| Bears no impression of the thing it was. | 200 |
| Methinks my zeal to Valentine is cold, | |
| And that I love him not as I was wont: | |
| O! but I love his lady too-too much; | |
| And that’s the reason I love him so little. | |
| How shall I dote on her with more advice, | 205 |
| That thus without advice begin to love her? | |
| ’Tis but her picture I have yet beheld, | |
| And that hath dazzled my reason’s light; | |
| But when I look on her perfections, | |
| There is no reason but I shall be blind. | 210 |
| If I can check my erring love, I will; | |
| If not, to compass her I’ll use my skill. [Exit. | |
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