butcher's offal; and to be thrown into the Thames? Well, if I be served such another trick, I'll have my brains ta'en out and buttered, and give them to a dog for a newyear's gift. The rogues slighted me into the river with as little remorse as they would have drowned a bitch's blind puppies, fifteen i' the litter; and you may know by my size, that I have a kind of alacrity in sinking; if the bottom were as deep as hell, I should down. I had been drowned,

but that the shore was shelvy and shallow; a death that I abhor; for the water swells a man, and what a thing should I have been, when I had been swelled! I should have been a mountain of mummy.

W. SHAKESPEARE

3

SCENE FROM COMEDY OF ERRORS

Adr.

ADRIANA-DROMIO-LUCIANA

SAY, is your tardy master now at hand? Drom. At hand? nay, he is at two hands with me, and that my two ears can witness.

Adr.

Say, didst thou speak with him? know'st thou his mind?

Drom. Aye, aye, he told his mind upon mine ear: beshrew his hand, I scarce could understand it. Spake he so doubtfully, thou could'st not feel his meaning?

Luc.

Drom. Nay, he struck so plainly, I could too well feel his blows: and withal so doubtfully that I could scarce understand them.

Adr.

But say, I pr'ythee, is he coming home?
It seems, he hath great care to please his wife.

W. SHAKESPEARE

4 'Why,' exclaimed one of them to the aged dame, 'thou that art, like a corpse on the funeral pile, a disgrace to mortal life, and Pluto's abomination, dost thou make game of us that thou hast thus been sitting at home all day idle? What? at this late hour, after all our labours and perils hast thou nothing to give us for supper, and nought to think of but continually to pour wine down thy throat, into that greedy growling stomach of thine?'

'Brave, honourable young gentlemen, my masters,' replied the old woman, who seemed frightened out of her

wits, 'all, all is ready, stewed meats, sweet and smoking in rich gravy, wine in abundance, cups cleaned bright, and plenty of loaves of bread. The water too, for your hasty bath, is heated as usual.'

5

SCENE FROM MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR

MR FORD-MR PAGE-MRS FORD

Ford. WELL, he's not here I seek for.

Page. No, nor no where else, but in your brain. Ford. Help to search my house this one time: if I find not what I seek, show no colour for my extremity, let me for ever be your table-sport; let them say of me, As jealous as Ford, that searched a hollow walnut for his wife's leman. Satisfy me once more; once more search with me. Mrs Ford. What, hoa, mistress Page! come you and the old woman down; my husband will come into the chamber.

Ford.
Mrs F.

Ford.

Old woman! What old woman's that?
Why, it is my maid's aunt of Brentford.
A witch, a quean, an old cozening quean! Have
I not forbid her my house! She comes of
errands does she? We are simple men; we
do not know what's brought to pass under the
profession of fortune-telling. She works by
charms, by spells, by the figure, and such
daubery as this; beyond our element; we know
nothing.- Come down, you witch, you hag,
you; come down I say.

Mrs F. Nay, good, sweet husband; good gentlemen, let him not strike the old woman.

[Enter Falstaff in woman's clothes, led by Mrs Page.] Mrs Page. Come, mother Prat, come give me your hand. Ford. I'll prat her:-out of my door, you witch, you

6

rag, you baggage, you polecat, you ronyon ! out, out, I'll conjure you, I'll fortune-tell you. [exit Falstaff.

SCENE FROM COMEDY OF ERRORS
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE-DROMIO OF EPHESUS

Ant. Stop in your wind, sir; tell me this, I pray; where have you left the money that I gave you?

Drom. O,-sixpence, that I had o' Wednesday last: to pay the saddler for my mistress' crupper ;— the saddler had it, sir, I kept it not.

Ant.

Drom.

Ant.

I am not in a sportive humour now;

tell me and dally not, where is the money?
We being strangers here, how dar'st thou trust
so great a charge from thine own custody!
I pray you, jest, sir, as you sit at dinner:
I from my mistress come to you in post;
If I return, I shall be post indeed:
for she will score your fault upon my pate.
Come, Dromio, come, these jests are

season;

out of

reserve them till a merrier hour than this. Where is the gold I gave in charge to thee? Drom. To me, sir! why you gave no gold to me. Ant. Come on, sir knave; have done your foolishness, and tell me, how thou hast disposed thy charge. Drom. My charge was but to fetch you from the mart home to your house, the Phoenix, sir, to dinner; my mistress and her sister stay for you.

Ant.

7

Ant.

Now, as I am a Christian, answer me,

in what safe place you have bestowed my money;
or I shall break that merry sconce of yours,
that stands on tricks when I am undisposed.

SCENE FROM COMEDY OF ERRORS

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE-ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE

Drom.
Ant.
Drom,

Ant.

Drom.

How now, sir? is your merry humour altered?
as you love strokes, so jest with me again.
You know no Centaur? you received no gold?
your mistress sent to have me home to dinner?
my house was at the Phoenix? Wast thou mad,
that thus so madly thou didst answer me?
What answer, sir? when spake I such a word?
Even now, even here, not half an hour since.
I did not see you since you sent me hence
home to the Centaur, with the gold you gave me.
Villain, thou didst deny the gold's receipt;
and told'st me of a mistress and a dinner;
for which, I hope, thou felt'st I was displeased.
I am glad to see you in this merry vein:
what means this jest? I pray you, master, tell me.

Ant.

Yea, dost thou jeer and flout me in the teeth? Thinkest thou, I jest? Hold, take thou that and that

[beating him

Drom. Hold, sir, for God's sake: now your jest is earnest : upon what bargain do you give it me?

Ant.

Luc.

Ant.

SCENE FROM COMEDY OF ERRORS

ANTIPHOLUS--LUCIANA-ADRIANA-
-DROMIO

Plead you to me, fair dame? I know you not:
in Ephesus I am but two years old,

as strange unto your town, as to your talk;
who every word by all my wit being scanned
want wit in all one word to understand.

Fye, brother, how the world is changed with you:
When were you wont to use my sister thus ?
She sent for you by Dromio home to dinner.
By Dromio?

Drom. By me?
Adr.

Ant.

Drom.
Ant.

Drom.
Ant.

By thee and this thou didst return from him,-
that he did buffet thee and in his blows
denied my house for his, me for his wife.
Did you converse, sir, with this gentlewoman?
what is the course and drift of your compact?
I, sir? I never saw her till this time.
Villain, thou liest: for even her very words
didst thou deliver to me on the mart.

I never spake to her in all my life.

How can she thus then call us by our names, unless it be by inspiration!

9

SCENE FROM COMEDY OF ERRORS

ANTIPHOLUS OF EPHESUS BEFORE THE DUKE OF

Ant.

EPHESUS

My liege, I am advised what I say;
Neither disturbed with the effect of wine,
nor heady-rash, provok'd with raging ire,
albeit, my wrongs might make one wiser mad.
This woman lock'd me out this day from dinner:
that goldsmith there, were he not pack'd with her,

ΙΟ

could witness it, for he was with me then;
who parted with me to go fetch a chain,
promising to bring it to the Porcupine,
where Balthazar and I did dine together.
Our dinner done, and he not coming thither,
I went to seek him: in the street I met him;
and in his company, that gentleman,

there did this perjur'd goldsmith swear me down,
that I this day of him receiv'd the chain,

which, God he knows, I saw not: for the which,
he did arrest me with an officer.

I did obey; and sent my peasant home
for certain ducats: he with none return'd.
Then fairly I bespoke the officer,

to go in person with me to my house.
By the way we met

my wife, her sister, and a rabble more

of vile confederates; along with them

they brought one Pinch; a hungry lean-fac'd villain,

a mere anatomy, a mountebank,

a thread-bare juggler, and a fortune-teller;
a needy, hollow-ey'd, sharp-looking wretch,
a living dead man: this pernicious slave,
forsooth, took on him as a conjurer;
and, gazing in mine eyes, feeling my pulse,
and with no face, as 'twere, outfacing me,
cries out, I was possessed: then all together
they fell upon me, bound me, bore me thence;
and in a dark and dankish vault at home
there left me and my man, both bound together;
till gnawing with my teeth my bonds in sunder,
I gain'd my freedom, and immediately

ran hither to your grace; whom I beseech

to give me ample satisfaction

for these deep shames and great indignities.

SCENE FROM THE FOX

MOSCA, the knavish parasite of VOLPONE, a rich and childless Venetian nobleman, persuades VOLTORE, an advocate, that he is named for the inheritance of his master, who feigns himself to be dying.

Volt. But am I sole heir?