William Shakespeare - Ultimate Collection: Complete Plays & Poetry in One Volume. William Shakespeare

till her owner comes aboard,

       And then, sir, bears away: our fraughtage, sir,

       I have convey’d aboard; and I have bought

       The oil, the balsamum, and aqua-vitae.

       The ship is in her trim; the merry wind

       Blows fair from land; they stay for nought at all

       But for their owner, master, and yourself.

       ANTIPHOLUS OF EPHESUS.

       How now! a madman? Why, thou peevish sheep,

       What ship of Epidamnum stays for me?

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       A ship you sent me to, to hire waftage.

       ANTIPHOLUS OF EPHESUS.

       Thou drunken slave! I sent the for a rope;

       And told thee to what purpose and what end.

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       You sent me, sir, for a rope’s end as soon:

       You sent me to the bay, sir, for a bark.

       ANTIPHOLUS OF EPHESUS.

       I will debate this matter at more leisure,

       And teach your ears to list me with more heed.

       To Adriana, villain, hie thee straight:

       Give her this key, and tell her, in the desk

       That’s cover’d o’er with Turkish tapestry

       There is a purse of ducats; let her send it:

       Tell her I am arrested in the street,

       And that shall bail me: hie thee, slave; be gone.

       On, officer, to prison till it come.

       [Exeunt MERCHANT, ANGELO, OFFICER, and ANTIPHOLUS OF EPHESUS.]

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       To Adriana! that is where we din’d,

       Where Dowsabel did claim me for her husband:

       She is too big, I hope, for me to compass.

       Thither I must, although against my will,

       For servants must their masters’ minds fulfil.

       [Exit.]

      SCENE 2. The same.

       [Enter ADRIANA and LUCIANA.]

       ADRIANA.

       Ah, Luciana, did he tempt thee so?

       Might’st thou perceive austerely in his eye

       That he did plead in earnest, yea or no?

       Look’d he or red or pale, or sad or merrily?

       What observation mad’st thou in this case

       Of his heart’s meteors tilting in his face?

       LUCIANA.

       First he denied you had in him no right.

       ADRIANA.

       He meant he did me none; the more my spite.

       LUCIANA.

       Then swore he that he was a stranger here.

       ADRIANA.

       And true he swore, though yet forsworn he were.

       LUCIANA.

       Then pleaded I for you.

       ADRIANA.

       And what said he?

       LUCIANA.

       That love I begg’d for you he begg’d of me.

       ADRIANA.

       With what persuasion did he tempt thy love?

       LUCIANA.

       With words that in an honest suit might move.

       First he did praise my beauty, then my speech.

       ADRIANA.

       Didst speak him fair?

       LUCIANA.

       Have patience, I beseech.

       ADRIANA.

       I cannot, nor I will not hold me still;

       My tongue, though not my heart, shall have his will.

       He is deformed, crooked, old, and sere,

       Ill-fac’d, worse bodied, shapeless everywhere;

       Vicious, ungentle, foolish, blunt, unkind;

       Stigmatical in making, worse in mind.

       LUCIANA.

       Who would be jealous then of such a one?

       No evil lost is wail’d when it is gone.

       ADRIANA.

       Ah! but I think him better than I say,

       And yet would herein others’ eyes were worse:

       Far from her nest the lapwing cries, away;

       My heart prays for him, though my tongue do curse.

       [Enter DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.]

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       Here, go; the desk, the purse: sweet now, make haste.

       LUCIANA.

       How hast thou lost thy breath?

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       By running fast.

       ADRIANA.

       Where is thy master, Dromio? is he well?

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       No, he’s in Tartar limbo, worse than hell.

       A devil in an everlasting garment hath him;

       One whose hard heart is button’d up with steel;

       A fiend, a fairy, pitiless and rough;

       A wolf—nay worse, a fellow all in buff;

       A back-friend, a shoulder-clapper, one that countermands

       The passages of alleys, creeks, and narrow lands;

       A hound that runs counter, and yet draws dry foot well;

       One that, before the judgment, carries poor souls to hell.

       ADRIANA.

       Why, man, what is the matter?

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       I do not know the matter: he is ‘rested on the case.

       ADRIANA.

       What, is he arrested? tell me at whose suit?

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       I know not at whose suit he is arrested, well;

       But he’s in a suit of buff which ‘rested him, that can I tell.

       Will you send him, mistress, redemption, the money in his desk?

       ADRIANA.

       Go fetch it, sister. This I wonder at,

       [Exit LUCIANA]

       Thus he unknown to me should be in debt.—

       Tell me, was he arrested on a band?

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       Not on a band, but on a stronger thing;

       A chain, a chain: do you not hear it ring?

       ADRIANA.

       What, the chain?

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       No, no, the bell; ‘tis time that I were gone.

       It was two ere I left him, and now the clock strikes one.

       ADRIANA.

       The hours come back! that did I never hear.

       DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.

       O yes. If any hour meet a sergeant, ‘a turns