READ STUDY GUIDE: Act I, scene i |
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Act I, Scene i:
Street in Messina.
Street in Messina.
| [Enter Leonato, Hero, Beatrice, and others, with a Messenger.] |
| Leon. : |
| I learn in this letter, that Don Pedro of Arragon comes this |
| night to Messina. |
| Mess. : |
| He is very near by this; he was not three leagues off when I |
| left him. |
| Leon. : |
| How many gentlemen have you lost in this action? |
| Mess. : |
| But few of any sort, and none of name. |
| Leon. : |
| A victory is twice itself when the achiever brings home full |
| numbers. I find here that Don Pedro hath bestowed much honour on |
| a young Florentine, called Claudio. |
| Mess. : |
| Much deserved on his part, and equally remembered by Don Pedro: |
| He hath borne himself beyond the promise of his age; doing, |
| in the figure of a lamb, the feats of a lion: he hath, indeed, |
| better bettered expectation than you must expect of me to tell |
| you how. |
| Leon. : |
| He hath an uncle here in Messina will be very much glad of it. |
| Mess. : |
| I have already delivered him letters, and there appears much |
| joy in him; even so much that joy could not show itself modest |
| enough without a badge of bitterness. |
| Leon. : |
| Did he break out into tears? |
| Mess. : |
| In great measure. |
| Leon. : |
| A kind overflow of kindness: There are no faces truer than |
| those that are so washed. How much better is it to weep at joy, |
| than to joy at weeping! |
| Beat. : |
| I pray you, is Signior Montanto returned from the wars or no? |
| Mess. : |
| I know none of that name, lady; there was none such in the |
| army of any sort. |
| Leon. : |
| What is he that you ask for, niece? |
| Hero. : |
| My cousin means signior Benedick of Padua. |
| Mess. : |
| O, he is returned, and as pleasant as ever he was. |
| Beat. : |
| He set up his bills here in Messina, and challenged Cupid at |
| the flight: and my uncle's fool, reading the challenge, |
| subscribed for Cupid and challenged him at the bird-bolt. I pray |
| you, how many hath he killed and eaten in these wars? But how |
| many hath he killed? for indeed I promised to eat all of his |
| killing. |
| Leon. : |
| Faith, niece, you tax Signior Benedick too much; but he'll |
| be meet with you, I doubt it not. |
| Mess. : |
| He hath done good service, lady, in these wars. |
| Beat. : |
| You had musty victual, and he hath holp to eat it: he is a |
| very valiant trencherman, he hath an excellent stomach. |
| Mess. : |
| And a good soldier too, lady. |
| Beat. : |
| And a good soldier to a lady:—But what is he to a lord? |
| Mess. : |
| A lord to a lord, a man to a man; stuffed with all honourable |
| virtues. |
| Beat. : |
| It is so indeed: he is no less than a stuffed man: but for |
| the stuffing,—Well, we are all mortal. |
| Leon. : |
| You must not, sir, mistake my niece: there is a kind of merry |
| war betwixt signior Benedick and her: they never meet but there |
| is a skirmish of wit between them. |
| Beat. : |
| Alas! he gets nothing by that. In our last conflict, four of |
| his five wits went halting off, and now is the whole man governed |
| with one: so that if he have wit enough to keep himself warm, let |
| him bear it for a difference between himself and his horse; for |
| it is all the wealth that he hath left, to be known a reasonable |
| creature. Who is his companion now? He hath every month a new |
| sworn brother. |
| Mess. : |
| Is it possible? |
| Beat. : |
| Very easily possible: he wears his faith but as the fashion |
| of his hat; it ever changes with the next block. |
| Mess. : |
| I see, lady, the gentleman is not in your books. |
| Beat. : |
| No: an he were, I would burn my study. But I pray you, who is |
| his companion? Is there no young squarer now, that will make a |
| voyage with him to the devil? |
| Mess. : |
| He is most in the company of the right noble Claudio. |
| Beat. : |
| O Lord! he will hang upon him like a disease: he is sooner |
| caught than the pestilence, and the taker runs presently mad. |
| God help the noble Claudio! if he have caught the Benedick, it |
| will cost him a thousand pound ere he be cured. |
| Mess. : |
| I will hold friends with you, lady. |
| Beat. : |
| Do, good friend. |
| Leon. : |
| You will ne'er run mad, niece. |
| Beat. : |
| No, not till a hot January. |
| Mess. : |
| Don Pedro is approached. |
| [Enter Don Pedro, attended by Balthazar and others, Don John, Claudio, and Benedick.] |
| D. Pedro. |
| Good signior Leonato, you are come to meet your trouble: the |
| fashion of the world is to avoid cost, and you encounter it. |
| Leon. : |
| Never came trouble to my house in the likeness of your grace; |
| for trouble being gone, comfort should remain; but when you |
| depart from me sorrow abides, and happiness takes his leave. |
| D. Pedro. |
| You embrace your charge too willingly. I think this is your |
| daughter. |
| Leon. : |
| Her mother hath many times told me so. |
| Bene. : |
| Were you in doubt that you asked her? |
| Leon. : |
| Signior Benedick, no; for then were you a child. |
| D. Pedro. |
| You have it full, Benedick: we may guess by this what you |
| are, being a man. Truly the lady fathers herself:—Be happy, |
| lady! for you are like an honourable father. |
| Bene. : |
| If Signior Leonato be her father, she would not have his head |
| on her shoulders for all Messina, as like him as she is. |
| Beat. : |
| I wonder that you will still be talking, signior Benedick; |
| nobody marks you. |
| Bene. : |
| What, my dear lady Disdain! are you yet living? |
| Beat. : |
| Is it possible Disdain should die, while she hath such meet |
| food to feed it as signior Benedick? Courtesy itself must |
| convert to disdain if you come in her presence. |
| Bene. : |
| Then is courtesy a turncoat:—But it is certain I am loved of |
| all ladies, only you excepted: and I would I could find in my |
| heart that I had not a hard heart: for, truly, I love none. |
| Beat. : |
| A dear happiness to women; they would else have been troubled |
| with a pernicious suitor. I thank God, and my cold blood, I am |
| of your humour for that; I had rather hear my dog bark at a crow, |
| than a man swear he loves me. |
| Bene. : |
| God keep your ladyship still in that mind! so some gentleman |
| or other shall 'scape a predestinate scratched face. |
| Beat. : |
| Scratching could not make it worse, an 't were such a face as |
| yours were. |
| Bene. : |
| Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher. |
| Beat. : |
| A bird of my tongue is better than a beast of yours. |
| Bene. : |
| I would my horse had the speed of your tongue; and so good a |
| continuer: But keep your way o' God's name; I have done. |
| Beat. : |
| You always end with a jade's trick; I know you of old. |
| D. Pedro. |
| That is the sum of all, Leonato.—Signior Claudio, and signior |
| Benedick,—my dear friend Leonato hath invited you all. I tell |
| him we shall stay here at the least a month; and he heartly |
| prays some occasion may detain us longer: I dare swear he is |
| no hypocrite, but prays from his heart. |
| Leon. : |
| If you swear, my lord, you shall not be forsworn.— |
| Let me bid you welcome, my lord: being reconciled |
| to the prince your brother, I owe you all duty. |
| D. John. |
| I thank you. I am not of many words, but I thank you. |
| Leon. : |
| Please it your grace lead on? |
| D. Pedro. |
| Your hand, Leonato; we will go together. |
| [Exeunt all but Benedick and Claudio.] |
| Claud. : |
| Benedick, didst thou note the daughter of signior Leonato? |
| Bene. : |
| I noted her not: but I looked on her. |
| Claud. : |
| Is she not a modest young lady? |
| Bene. : |
| Do you question me as an honest man should do, for my simple |
| true judgment; or would you have me speak after my custom, as |
| being a professed tyrant to their sex? |
| Claud. : |
| No, I pray thee, speak in sober judgment. |
| Why, i' faith, methinks she's too low for a high praise, |
| too brown for a fair praise, and too little for a great praise; |
| only this commendation I can afford her: that were she other |
| than she is, she were unhandsome; and being no other but as she |
| is, I do not like her. |
| Claud. : |
| Thou thinkest I am in sport; I pray thee tell me truly how |
| thou likest her. |
| Bene. : |
| Would you buy her, that you enquire after her? |
| Claud. : |
| Can the world buy such a jewel? |
| Bene. : |
| Yea, and a case to put it into. But speak you this with a sad |
| brow? or do you play the flouting Jack; to tell us Cupid is a |
| good hare-finder, and Vulcan a rare carpenter? Come, in what key |
| shall a man take you, to go in the song? |
| Claud. : |
| In mine eye she is the sweetest lady that ever I looked on. |
| Bene. : |
| I can see yet without spectacles, and I see no such matter: |
| there's her cousin, an she were not possessed with a fury, |
| exceeds her as much in beauty as the first of May doth the |
| last of December. But I hope you have no intent to turn |
| husband; have you? |
| Claud. : |
| I would scarce trust myself, though I had sworn the |
| contrary, if Hero would be my wife. |
| Bene. : |
| Is't come to this, i' faith? Hath not the world one man but |
| he will wear his cap with suspicion? Shall I never see a |
| bachelor of three-score again? Go to, i' faith: an thou wilt |
| needs thrust thy neck into a yoke, wear the print of it, and |
| sigh away Sundays. Look, Don Pedro is returned to seek you. |
| [Re-enter Don Pedro.] |
| D. Pedro. |
| What secret hath held you here, that you followed not to |
| Leonato's? |
| Bene. : |
| I would your Grace would constrain me to tell. |
| D. Pedro. |
| I charge thee on thy allegiance. |
| Bene. : |
| You hear, count Claudio: I can be secret as a dumb man, I |
| would have you think so; but on my allegiance,—mark you this, on |
| my allegiance:—He is in love. With who?—now that is your |
| Grace's part.—Mark how short his answer is:—With Hero, |
| Leonato's short daughter. |
| Claud. : |
| If this were so, so were it uttered. |
| Bene. : |
| Like the old tale, my lord: 'it is not so, nor 't was not so; |
| but, indeed, God forbid it should be so.' |
| Claud. : |
| If my passion change not shortly, God forbid it should be |
| otherwise. |
| D. Pedro. |
| Amen, if you love her; for the lady is very well worthy. |
| Claud. : |
| You speak this to fetch me in, my lord. |
| D. Pedro. |
| By my troth I speak my thought. |
| Claud. : |
| And in faith, my lord, I spoke mine. |
| Bene. : |
| And by my two faiths and troths, my lord, I spoke mine. |
| Claud. : |
| That I love her, I feel. |
| D. Pedro. |
| That she is worthy, I know. |
| Bene. : |
| That I neither feel how she should be loved, nor know how she |
| should be worthy, is the opinion that fire cannot melt out of me: |
| I will die in it at the stake. |
| D. Pedro. |
| Thou wast ever an obstinate heretic in the despite of beauty. |
| Claud. : |
| And never could maintain his part but in the force of his |
| will. |
| Bene. : |
| That a woman conceived me, I thank her; that she brought me up, |
| I likewise give her most humble thanks: but that I will have |
| a recheat winded in my forehead, or hang my bugle in an invisible |
| baldrick, all women shall pardon me: Because, I will not do them |
| the wrong to mistrust any, I will do myself the right to trust |
| none; and the fine is (for the which I may go the finer,) I will |
| live a bachelor. |
| D. Pedro. |
| I shall see thee, ere I die, look pale with love. |
| Bene. : |
| With anger, with sickness, or with hunger, my lord; not with |
| love: prove that ever I lose more blood with love than I will get |
| again with drinking, pick out mine eyes with a ballad-maker's |
| pen, and hang me up at the door of a brothel house for the sign of |
| blind Cupid. |
| D. Pedro. |
| Well, if ever thou dost fall from this faith thou wilt |
| prove a notable argument. |
| Bene. : |
| If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat, and shoot at me; and |
| he that hits me let him be clapped on the shoulder and called |
| Adam. |
| D. Pedro. |
| Well, as time shall try: |
| 'In time the savage bull doth bear the yoke.' |
| Bene. : |
| The savage bull may; but if ever this sensible Benedick bear |
| it, pluck off the bull's horns and set them in my forehead: and |
| let me be vilely painted; and in such great letters as they write |
| 'Here is good horse to hire,' let them signify under my sign, |
| 'Here you may see Benedick the married man.' |
| Claud. : |
| If this should ever happen thou wouldst be horn-mad. |
| D. Pedro. |
| Nay, if Cupid have not spent all his quiver in Venice, thou |
| wilt quake for this shortly. |
| Bene. : |
| I look for an earthquake too then. |
| D. Pedro. |
| Well, you will temporize with the hours. In the meantime, |
| good signior Benedick, repair to Leonato's: commend me to him, |
| and tell him I will not fail him at supper; for indeed, he |
| hath made great preparation. |
| Bene. : |
| I have almost matter enough in me for such an embassage; and |
| so I commit you— |
| Claud. : |
| To the tuition of God: From my house (if I had it)— |
| D. Pedro. |
| The sixth of July: Your loving friend, Benedick. |
| Bene. : |
| Nay, mock not, mock not: The body of your discourse is |
| sometime guarded with fragments, and the guards are but slightly |
| basted on neither: ere you flout old ends any further, examine |
| your conscience; and so I leave you. |
| [Exit Benedick.] |
| Claud. : |
| My liege, your highness now may do me good. |
| D. Pedro. |
| My love is thine to teach; teach it but how, |
| And thou shalt see how apt it is to learn |
| Any hard lesson that may do thee good. |
| Claud. : |
| Hath Leonato any son, my lord? |
| D. Pedro. |
| No child but Hero, she's his only heir: |
| Dost thou affect her, Claudio? |
| Claud. : |
| O my lord, |
| When you went onward on this ended action, |
| I look'd upon her with a soldier's eye, |
| That lik'd, but had a rougher task in hand |
| Than to drive liking to the name of love: |
| But now I am return'd and that war-thoughts |
| Have left their places vacant, in their rooms |
| Come thronging soft and delicate desires, |
| All prompting me how fair young Hero is, |
| Saying I lik'd her ere I went to wars. |
| D. Pedro. |
| Thou wilt be like a lover presently, |
| And tire the hearer with a book of words: |
| If thou dost love fair Hero, cherish it; |
| And I will break with her;[and with her father, And thou shalt have her:]Was't not to this end, |
| That thou begann'st to twist so fine a story? |
| Claud. : |
| How sweetly do you minister to love, |
| That know love's grief by his complexion! |
| But lest my liking might too sudden seem, |
| I would have salv'd it with a longer treatise. |
| D. Pedro. |
| What need the bridge much broader than the flood? |
| The fairest grant is the necessity: |
| Look, what will serve is fit: 't is once, thou lovest; |
| And I will fit thee with the remedy. |
| I know we shall have revelling to-night; |
| I will assume thy part in some disguise, |
| And tell fair Hero I am Claudio; |
| And in her bosom I'll unclasp my heart, |
| And take her hearing prisoner with the force |
| And strong encounter of my amorous tale: |
| Then, after, to her father will I break; |
| And the conclusion is, she shall be thine: |
| In practice let us put it presently. |
| [Exeunt.] |
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