Verg. Yes, I thank God, I am as honest as any man living, that is an old man, and no honester than I.

Dogb. Comparisons are odorous: palabras, neighbour Verges.

Leon. Neighbours, you are tedious. Dogb. It pleases your worship to say so, but we are the poor duke's officers: but, truly, for mine own part, if I were as tedious as a king, I could find in my heart to bestow it all of your worship.

Leon. All thy tediousness on me! ha? Dogb. Yea, and 'twere a thousand times more than 'tis; for I hear as good exclamation on your worship, as of any man in the city; and though I be but a poor man, I am glad to hear it. Verg. And so am I.

Leon. I would fain know what you have to say. Verg. Marry, sir, our watch to-night, except ing your worship's presence, have ta'en a couple of as arrant knaves as any in Messina.

Dogb. A good old man, sir; he will be talking; as they say, When the age is in, the wit is out; God help us! it is a world to see!-Well said, i'faith, neighbour Verges:-well, God's a good man; an two men ride of a horse, one must ride behind :-An honest soul, i' faith, sir! by my troth he is, as ever broke bread: but, God is to be worshipped: All men are not alike; alas! good neighbour!

Leon. Indeed, neighbour, he comes too short of you.

Dogb. Gifts, that God gives.

Leon. I must leave you. Dogb. One word, sir: our watch, sir, have, indeed, comprehended two aspicions persons, and we would have them this morning examined before your worship.

Leon. Take their examination yourself, and bring it me: I am now in great haste, as it may

appear unto you.

Dogb. It shall be suffigance.

Leon. Drink some wine ere you go; fare you well.

Enter a Messenger.

Mess. My lord, they stay for you to give your daughter to her husband. Leon. I will wait upon them; I am ready. [Exeunt Leonato and Messenger. Dogb. Go, good partner, go, get you to Francis Seacoal, bid him bring his pen and inkhorn to the gaol; we are now to examination these men. Verg. And we must do it wisely.

Dogb. We will spare for no wit, I warrant you; here's that [ Touching his forehead.] shall drive some of them to a non com: only get the learned writer to set down our excommunication, and meet me at the gaol. [Exeunt.

Hero. None, my lord.

Friar. Know you any, count? Leon. I dare make his answer, none. Claud. O, what men dare do! what men may do! what men daily do! not knowing what they do 1

Bene. How now! Interjections 7 Why, then some be of laughing, as, ha! ha! he! Claud. Stand thee by, friar :-Father, by your leave!

Will you with free and unconstrained soul
Give me this maid, your daughter?
Leon. As freely, son, as God did give her me.
Claud. And what have I to give you back,
whose worth

May counterpoise this rich and precious gift.
D. Pedro. Nothing, unless you render her
again.

Claud. Sweet prince, you learn me noble thankfulness.

There, Leonato, take her back again :
Give not this rotten orange to your friend;
She's but the sign and semblance of her honour.
Behold, how like a maid she blushes here:
O, what authority, and show of truth
Can cunning sin cover itself withal!
Comes not that blood, as modest evidence,
To witness simple virtue? Would you not swear,
All you that see ber, that she were a maid,
By these exterior shows 7-But she is none:
She knows the heat of a luxurious bed:
Her blush is guiltiness, not modesty.
Leon. What do you mean, my lord ?
Claud.
Not to be married,
Not to knit my soul to an approved wanton.
Leon. Dear my lord, if you, in your own proof
Have vanquish'd the resistance of her youth,
And made defeat of her virginity,-
Claud. I know what you would say; If I have
You'll say, she did embrace me as a husband,
known her,

And so extenuate the 'forehand sin:
No, Leonato,

I never tempted her with word too large;
But, as a brother to his sister, show'd
Bashful sincerity, and comely love.

Hero. And seem'd I ever otherwise to you?
Claud. Out on thy seeming! I will write against

it:

You seem to me as Dian in her orb:
As chaste as is the bud ere it be blown;
But you are more intemperate in your blood
Than Venus or those pamper'd animals
That rage in savage sensuality.
Hero. Is my lord well, that he doth speak so
wide?

Leon. Sweet prince, why speak not you?
D. Pedro.
What should I speak 7

I stand dishonour'd, that have gone about
To link my dear friend to a common stale.
Leon. Are these things spoken? or do I but
dream?

D. John Sir, they are spoken, and these things

are true.

Bene. This looks not like a 1.ptial.
Hero.
True, O God!
Claud. Leonato, stand I here 7
Is this the prince? is this the prince's brother?
Is this face Hero's? Are our eyes our own?
Leon. All this is so ; But what of this, my lord?
Claud. Let me but move one question to your
daughter;

And, by that fatherly and kindly power
That you have in her, bid her answer truly.
Leon. I charge thee do so, as thou art my child.
Hero. O God, defend me! how am I beset 1-
What kind of catechizing call you this?

Claud. To make you answer truly to your name
Hero. Is it not Hero? Who can blot that name
With any just reproach?
Claud.
Marry, that can Hero;
Hero itself can blot ont Hero's virtue.

D. Pedro. Why, then are you no maiden.-
Leonato,

I am sorry you must hear; Upon mine honour,
Myself, my brother, and this grieved count,
Did see her, hear her, at that hour last night,
Talk with a ruffian at her chamber-window;
Who hath, indeed, most like a liberal villain,
Confess'd the vile encounters they have had
A thousand times in secret.

D. John.
Fie, fie! they are
Not to be nam'd, my lord, not to be spoke of;
There is not chastity enough in language,
Without offence, to utter them: Thus, pretty
lady,

I am sorry for thy much misgovernment.
Claud. O Hero! what a Hero hadst thou been,
If half thy outward graces had been placed
About thy thoughts, and counsels of thy heart!
But, fare thee well, most foul, most fair! fare-
well,

Thou pure impiety, and impious purity!
For thee I'll lock up all the gates of love,
And on my eyelids shall conjecture hang,
To turn all beauty into thoughts of harm,
And never shall it more be gracious.
Leon. Hath no man's dagger here a point for
me ?
[Hero swoons.
Beat. Why, how now, cousin? wherefore sink
you down?

D. John. Come, let us go: these things, come thus to light,

Smother her spirits up.

[Exeunt Don Pedro, Don John, and Claudio. Bene. How doth the lady? Beat.

Dead, I think;-help, uncle;Hero! why, Hero I-Uncle !-Signior Benedick! -friar?

Leon. O fate, take not away thy heavy hand!
Death is the fairest cover for her shame,
That may be wish'd for.
Bent.
How now, cousin Hero.
Friar. Have comfort, lady.
Leon. Dost thou look up?

Friar.

Yea; wherefore should she not? Leon. Wherefore? Why, doth not every earthly thing

Cry shame upon her? Could she here deny
The story that is printed in her blood ?-
Do not live, Hero; do not ope thine eyes:
For did I think thou would'st not quickly die,
Thought I thy spirits were stronger than thy
shames,

Myself would, on the rearward of reproaches,
Strike at thy life. Griev'd I, I had but one?
Chid 1 for that at frugal nature's frame?
0. one too much by thee! Why had I one?
Why ever wast thou lovely in my eyes?
Why had I not, with charitable hand,
Took up a beggar's issue at my gates;
Who smirch'd thus, and mired with infamy,
I might have said, No part of it is mine,
This shame derives itself from unknown loins?
But mine, and mine I lov'd, and mine I prais'd,
And mine that I was proud on; mine so much,
That I myself was to myself not mine,
Valuing of her: why, she-O, she is fallen
Into a pit of ink! that the wide sea

Hath drops too few to wash her clean again;
And salt too little, which may season give
To her foul tainted flesh!
Bene.

Sir, sir, be patient;
For my part, I am so attir'd in wonder,"
I know not what to say.

Beat. O, on my soul, my cousin is belied! Bene. Lady, were you her bedfellow last night? Beat. No, truly not: although, until last night I have this twelvemonth been her bedfellow.

Friar. Hear me a little;

For I have only been silent so long,
And given way unto this course of fortune,
By noting of the lady: 1 have mark'd
A thousand blushing apparitions start
Into her face; a thousand innocent shames
In angel whiteness bear away those blushes;
And in her eye there hath appeared a fire,
To burn the errors that these princes hold
Against her maiden truth :-Call me a fool;
Trust not my reading, nor my observations,
Which with experimental seal doth warrant
The tenour of my book; trust not my age,
My reverence, calling, nor divinity,
If this sweet lady lie not guiltless here
Under some biting error.
Leon.
Friar, it cannot be:
Thou seest, that all the grace that she hath left,
Is, that she will not add to her damnation
A sin of perjury; she not denies it;
Why seek'st thou then to cover with excuse
That which appears in proper nakedness?
Friar. Lady,what man is he you are accus'd of 7
Hero. They know, that do accuse me; I know

none:

If I know more of any man alive,
Than that which maiden modesty doth warrant,
Let all my sins lack mercy!-O my father,
Prove you that any man with me convers'd
At hours unmeet, or that I yesternight
Maintain'd the change of words with any crea.
ture,

Refuse me, hate me, torture me to death.
Friar. There is some strange misprision in the
princes.

Bene. Two of them have the very bent of ho

nour:

And if their wisdoms be misled in this,
The practice of it lives in John the bastard,
Whose spirits toil in frame of villanies.
Leon. I know not; If they speak but truth of
her,

These hands shall tear her; if they wrong her honour,

The proudest of them shall well hear of it.
Time hath not yet so dried this blood of mine,
Nor age so eat up my invention,

Nor fortune made such havock of my means,
Nor my bad life reft me so much of friends,
But they shall find, awak'd in such a kind,
Both strength of limb, and policy of mind,
Ability in means, and choice of friends,
To quit me of them thoroughly.

Friar.
Pause a while,
And let my counsel sway you in this case.
Your daughter here the princes left for dead;
Let her awhile be secretly kept in,
And publish it, that she is dead indeed:
Maintain a mourning ostentation;
And on your family's old monument
Hang mournful epitaphs, and do all rites
That appertain unto a burial.

Leon. What shall become of this? What will this do?

Friar. Marry, this well carried, shall on her behalf

Change slander to remorse; that is some good:
But not for that, dream I on this strange course,
But on this travail look for greater birth.
She dying, as it must be so maintain'd,
Upon the instant that she was accus'd,
Shall be lamented, pitied, and excus'd,
Of every hearer: For it so falls out,
That what we have we prize not to the worth,
Whiles we enjoy it; but being lack'd and lost,

Why, then we rack the value; then we find
The virtue, that possession would not show us
Whiles it was ours:-So will it fare with Claudio:
When he shall hear she died upon his words,
The idea of her life shall sweetly creep
Into his study of imagination;
And every lovely organ of her life
Shall come apparell'd in more precious habit,
More moving-delicate, and full of life,
Into the eye and prospect of his soul,
Than when she liv'd indeed :-then shall
mourn,,

Bene. Beatrice,

Beat. In faith, I will go.

Bene. We'll be friends first.

(If ever love had interest in his liver,)
And wish he had not so accus'd her;
No, though he thought his accusation true.
Let this be so, and doubt not but success
Will fashion the event in better shape
Than I can lay it down in likelihood.
But if all aim but this be levell'd false,
The supposition of the lady's death
Will quench the wonder of her infamy:
And, if it sort not well, you may conceal her
(As best befits her wounded reputation,)
In some reclusive and religious life,
Ont of all eyes, tongues, minds, and injuries.
Bene. Signior Leonato, let the friar advise you:
And though, you know, my inwardness and love
Is very much unto the prince and Claudio,
Yet, by mine honour, I will deal in this
As secretly, and justly, as your soul
Should with your body.
Leon.
Being that I flow in grief,
The smallest twine may lead me.
Friar. 'Tis well consented; presently away;
For to strange sores strangely they strain the

Beat. Yea, and I will weep a while longer.
Bene. I will not desire that.

Beat. You have no reason, I do it freely.
Bene. Surely, I do believe your fair cousin is
wrong'd.

Beat. Ah, how much might the man deserve of me, that would right her f

Bene. Is there any way to show such friendship?

Beat. A very even way, but no such friend.
Bene. May a man do it?

Beat. It is a man's office, but not yours. Bene. I do love nothing in the world so well as you? Is not that strange?

Beat. As strange as the thing I know not: It were as possible for me to say, I loved nothing so well as you: but believe me not; and yet I lie not; I confess nothing, nor I deny nothing: -I am sorry for my cousin.

Bene. By my sword, Beatrice, thou lovest me. Beat. Do not swear by it, and eat it. Bene. I will swear by it, that you love me; and 1 will make him eat it, that says, I love not you. Beat. Will you not eat your word? Bene. With no sauce that can be devised to it:

I protest, I love thee.

Beat. Why then, God forgive me!

Bene. What offence, sweet Beatrice?

Bene. Hear me, Beatrice;

Beat. Talk with a man out at a window 7-a proper saying!

Bene. Nay but, Beatrice;

Beat. Sweet Hero!-She is wronged, she is slandered, she is undone.

Bene. Beat

Beat. Princes, and counties! Surely, a princely testimony, a goodly count-confect; a sweet gal lant, surely! O that I were a man for his sake! or that I had any friend would be a man for my sake! But manhood is melted into courtesies, valour into compliment, and men are only turned into tongue, and trim ones too: he is now as valiant as Hercules, that only tells a lie, and swears it-I cannot be a man with wishing, therefore I will die a woman with grieving. Bene. Tarry, good Beatrice: By this hand, I love thee.

Beat. Use it for my love some other way than swearing by it.

Bene. Think you in your soul the count Claudio hath wronged Hero ?

Beat. Yea, as sure as I have a thought, or a soul.

Bene. Enough, I am engaged, I will challenge him; I will kiss your hand, and so leave you: By this hand, Claudio shall render me a dear account: As you hear of me, so think of me. Go, comfort your cousin; I must say, she is dead; and so, farewell. Exeunt.

SCENE II. A Prison.

Enter Dogberry, Verges, and Sexton, in gowns;
and the Watch, with Conrade and Borachio.
Dogb. Is our whole dissembly appeared?
Verg. O, a stool and a cushion for the sexton.
Sexton. Which be the malefactors?
Dogb. Marry, that am I and my partner.
Verg. Nay, that's certain; we have the exhi-
bition to examine.

Sexton. But which are the offenders that are to be examined 7 let them come before master constable.

Dogb. Yea, marry, let them come before me.-What is your name, friend? Bora. Borachio.

Dogb. Pray write down-Borachio.—Yours, sirrah? Con. I am a gentleman, sir, and my name is Conrade.

Dogb. Write down-master gentleman Conrade.-Masters, do you serve God? Con. Bora. Yea, sir, we hope.

Dogb. Write down-that they hope they serve

was about to protest, I loved you.

Bene. And do it with all thy heart. Beat. I love you with so much of my heart, that none is left to protest.

Bene. Come, bid me do any thing for thee.
Beat. Kill Claudio.

Bene. Ha! not for the wide world.
Beat. You kill me to deny it: Farewell.
Bene. Tarry, sweet Beatrice.

Beat. I am gone, though I am here:-There is no love in you:-Nay, I pray you, let me go.

God should go before such villains!-Masters, it is proved already that you are little better than false knaves; and it will go near to be thought so shortly. How answer you for yourselves T

Con. Marry, sir, we say we are none.

Dogb. A marvellous witty fellow, I assure you; but will go about with him.-Come you hither, sirrah; a word in your ear, sir; I say to you, it is thought you are false knaves.

Bora. Sir, I say to you, we are none.
Dogb. Well, stand aside.-'Fore God, they are