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Twelfth Night
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Act I, Scene iii

OLIVIA'S house.
[Enter SIR TOBY BELCH and MARIA.]
SIR TOBY:
What a plague means my niece, to take the death of her brother
thus? I am sure care's an enemy to life.
MARIA:
By my troth, Sir Toby, you must come in earlier o' nights; your
cousin, my lady, takes great exceptions to your ill hours.
SIR TOBY:
Why, let her except before excepted.
MARIA:
Ay, but you must confine yourself within the modest limits of
order.
SIR TOBY:
Confine! I'll confine myself no finer than I am. These clothes
are good enough to drink in, and so be these boots too; and they
be not, let them hang themselves in their own straps.
MARIA:
That quaffing and drinking will undo you. I heard my lady talk of
it yesterday, and of a foolish knight that you brought in one
night here to be her wooer.
SIR TOBY:
Who, Sir Andrew Aguecheek?
MARIA:
Ay, he.
SIR TOBY:
He's as tall a man as any's in Illyria.
MARIA:
What's that to th' purpose?
SIR TOBY:
Why, he has three thousand ducats a year.
MARIA:
Ay, but he'll have but a year in all these ducats; he's a very
fool and a prodigal.
SIR TOBY:
Fie, that you'll say so! he plays o' th' viol-de-gamboys, and
speaks three or four languages word for word without book, and
hath all the good gifts of nature.
MARIA:
He hath indeed, almost natural; for, besides that he's a fool,
he's a great quarreller; and but that he hath the gift of a
coward to allay the gust he hath in quarrelling, 'tis thought
among the prudent he would quickly have the gift of a grave.
SIR TOBY:
By this hand, they are scoundrels and subtractors that say so of
him. Who are they?
MARIA:
They that add, moreover, he's drunk nightly in your company.
SIR TOBY:
With drinking healths to my niece. I'll drink to her as long as
there is a passage in my throat and drink in Illyria: he's a
coward and a coystrill that will not drink to my niece
till his brains turn o' th' toe like a parish-top. What, wench!
Castiliano vulgo! for here comes Sir Andrew Agueface.
[Enter SIR ANDREW AGUECHEEK.]
SIR ANDREW:
Sir Toby Belch; how now, Sir Toby Belch!
SIR TOBY:
Sweet Sir Andrew!
SIR ANDREW:
Bless you, fair shrew.
MARIA:
And you too, sir.
SIR TOBY:
Accost, Sir Andrew, accost.
SIR ANDREW:
What's that?
SIR TOBY:
My niece's chambermaid.
SIR ANDREW:
Good Mistress Accost, I desire better acquaintance.
MARIA:
My name is Mary, sir.
SIR ANDREW:
Good Mistress Mary Accost,—
SIR TOBY:
You mistake, knight; 'accost' is front her, board her, woo her,
assail her.
SIR ANDREW:
By my troth, I would not undertake her in this company. Is that
the meaning of 'accost'?
MARIA:
Fare you well, gentlemen.
SIR TOBY:
An thou let part so, Sir Andrew, would thou mightst never draw
sword again.
SIR ANDREW:
And you part so, mistress, I would I might never draw sword
again. Fair lady, do you think you have fools in hand?
MARIA:
Sir, I have not you by th' hand.
SIR ANDREW:
Marry, but you shall have; and here's my hand.
MARIA:
Now, sir, 'thought is free.' I pray you, bring your hand to th'
buttery-bar and let it drink.
SIR ANDREW:
Wherefore, sweet-heart? what's your metaphor?
MARIA:
It's dry, sir.
SIR ANDREW:
Why, I think so; I am not such an ass but I can keep my hand dry.
But what's your jest?
MARIA:
A dry jest, sir.
SIR ANDREW:
Are you full of them?
MARIA:
Ay, sir, I have them at my fingers' ends; marry, now I let go
your hand, I am barren.
[Exit.]
SIR TOBY:
O knight, thou lack'st a cup of canary; when did I see thee so
put down?
SIR ANDREW:
Never in your life, I think; unless you see canary put me down.
Methinks sometimes I have no more wit than a Christian or an
ordinary man has; but I am a great eater of beef, and I
believe that does harm to my wit.
SIR TOBY:
No question.
SIR ANDREW:
And I thought that, I'd forswear it. I'll ride home to-morrow,
Sir Toby.
SIR TOBY:
Pourquoi, my dear knight?
SIR ANDREW:
What is 'pourquoi'? do or not do? I would I had bestow'd that
time in the tongues that I have in fencing, dancing, and
bear-baiting! O, had I but follow'd the arts!
SIR TOBY:
Then hadst thou had an excellent head of hair.
SIR ANDREW:
Why, would that have mended my hair?
SIR TOBY:
Past question; for thou seest it will not curl by nature.
SIR ANDREW:
But it becomes me well enough, does't not?
SIR TOBY:
Excellent; it hangs like flax on a distaff.
SIR ANDREW:
Faith, I'll home to-morrow, Sir Toby. Your niece will not be
seen; or, if she be, it's four to one she'll none of me: the
count himself here hard by wooes her.
SIR TOBY:
She'll none o' th' count. She'll not match above her degree,
neither in estate, years, nor wit; I have heard her swear't. Tut,
there's life in't, man.
SIR ANDREW:
I'll stay a month longer. I am a fellow o' th' strangest mind i'
th' world; I delight in masques and revels sometimes altogether.
SIR TOBY:
Art thou good at these kickshawses, knight?
SIR ANDREW:
As any man in Illyria, whatsoever he be, under the degree of my
betters; and yet I will not compare with an old man.
SIR TOBY:
What is thy excellence in a galliard, knight?
SIR ANDREW:
Faith, I can cut a caper.
SIR TOBY:
And I can cut the mutton to't.
SIR ANDREW:
And I think I have the back-trick simply as strong as any man in
Illyria.
SIR TOBY:
Wherefore are these things hid? wherefore have these gifts a
curtain before 'em? are they like to take dust, like Mistress
Mall's picture? why dost thou not go to church in a galliard, and
come home in a coranto? My very walk should be a jig. What dost
thou mean? is it a world to hide virtues in? I did think, by the
excellent constitution of thy leg, it was form'd under the star
of a galliard.
SIR ANDREW:
Ay, 't is strong, and it does indifferent well in flame-colour'd
stock. Shall we set about some revels?
SIR TOBY:
What shall we do else? were we not born under Taurus?
SIR ANDREW:
Taurus! That's sides and heart.
SIR TOBY:
No, sir; it is legs and thighs. Let me see the caper. Ha! higher!
ha, ha, excellent!
[Exeunt.]
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