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Adr. [Within.] Who is that at the door, that keeps all this noife?

S. Dro. By my troth, your town is troubled with unruly boys.

E. Ant. Are you there, wife? you might have come before.

Adr, Your wife, Sir Knave! go, get you from the door *.

E. Ant. Go get thee gone, fetch me an iron crow
Bal. Have patience, Sir: Oh, let it not be fo.
Herein you war against your reputation,
And draw within the compass of suspect
Th' unviolated honour of your wife.

Once, this -your long experience of her wifdom,
Her fober virtue, years, and modefty,

Plead on her part fome cause to you unknown;
And doubt not, Sir, but fhe will well excufe,
Why at this time the doors are barr'd against you.
Be rul'd by me, depart in patience,

And let us to the Tyger all to dinner;
And about evening come yourself alone,

* Adr.

get you from the door.

E. Dro. If you went in pain, mafter, this knave would go fore. Ang. Here is neither cheer, Sir, nor welcome; we would fain have either.

Bal. In debating which was beft, we shall have part with neither. E. Dro. They ftand at the door, mafter; bid them welcome hi

ther.

E. Ant. There is fomething in the wind that we cannot get in.
E. Dro. You would fay fo, mafter, if your garments were thin,
Your cake here is warm within: you ftand here in the cold:
It would make a man mad as a buck to be fo bought and fold.
E. Ant. Go fetch me fometh. ng, I'll break upe the gate.

S. Dro Break any thing here, and I'll break your knave's pate.
E. Dr. A man may break a word with you, Sir, and words are but

wind;

Ay, and break it in your face, fo he break it not behind.

S Dro. It feems, thou wantest breaking; out upon thee, hind! E. Do. Here's too much, out upon thee! I pray thee let me in. S. Dro Ay, when fowls nave no feathers, and fish have no fin. E. int. Well, I'll reak in; go borrow me a crow.

E Dro. A crow without feather, mafter, mean you fo? For a fish without a fin, there's a fowl without a feather: If a crow help us in, firrah, we'll pluck a crow together. E. Ant. Go, get thee gone, &c.

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To know the reason of this ftrange restraint.
If by ftrong hand you offer to break in,
Now in the stirring paffage of the day,
A vulgar comment will be made of it;
And that fuppofed by the common rout,
Against your yet ungalled eftimation,
That may with foul intrufion enter in,
And dwell upon your grave when you are dead:
For flander lives upon fucceffion;

For ever hous'd, where it once gets poffeffion;

E. Ant. You have prevail'd; I will depart in quiet, And, in defpight of mirth, mean to be merry. I know a wench of excellent discourse, Pretty and witty, wild, and yet too gentle; There will we dine; this woman that I mean, My wife (but, I proteft, without defert) Hath oftentimes upbraided me withal; To her will we to dinner. Get you home, And fetch the chain; by this I know 'tis made; Bring it, I pray you, to the Porcupine; For there's the houfe: that chain will I bestow (Be it for nothing but to fpight my wife) Upon mine hoftefs there. Good Sir, make hafte : Since my own doors refufe to entertain me, I'll knock elsewhere, to fee if they'll difdain me. Ang. I'll meet you at that place, fome hour, Sir, hence.

E. Ant. Do fo, this jeft fhall coft me fome expence. [Exeunt

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The houfe of Antipholis of Ephefus.

Enter Luciana, with Antipholis of Syracufe.
Luc. And may it be that you have quite forgot
A hufband's office thall, Antipholis,

Ev'n in the fpring of love, thy love-fprings rot?
Shall love, in building, grow fo ruinate?

If you did wed my fitter for her wealth,

Then for her wealth's fake ufe her with more kind

nefs;

Or

Or if you like elsewhere, do it by stealth;

Muille your falfe love with fome fhew of blindness; Let not my fifter read it in your eye;

Be not thy tongue thy own fhame's orator;
Look fweet, fpeak fair; become difloyalty:
Apparel vice, like virtue's harbinger;
Bear a fair presence, tho' your heart be tainted:
Teach fin the carriage of a holy faint;
Be fecret falfe: what need fhe be acquainted?
What fimple thief brags of his own attaint?
'Tis double wrong, to truant with your bed,
And let her read it in thy looks at board :
Shame hath a bastard fame, well managed;
Ill deeds are doubled with an evil word:
Alas, poor women! make us but believe,

Being compact of credit, that you love us;
Tho' others have the arm, fhew us the fleeve:
We in your motion turn, and you may move us.
Then, gentle brother, get you in again;
Comfort my fifter, chear her, call her wife;
'Tis holy fport to be a little vain,

When the fweet breath of flattery conquers ftrife. S. Ant. Sweet mistress (what your name is elfe, I Nor by what wonder you do hit of mine), [know not; Lefs in your knowledge and your grace you fhow not Than our earth's wonder, more than earth divine. Teach me dear creature, how to think and speak; Lay open to my earthy grofs conceit, Smother'd in errors, feeble, fhallow, weak,

The foulded meaning of your words' deceit ; Against my foul's pure truth why labour you, To make it wander in an unknown field! Are you a God? would you create me new? Transform me then, and to your pow'r I'll yield. But if that I am I, then well I know,

Your weeping fifter is no wife of mine;

Nor to her bed no homage do I owe;

Far more, far more, to you do I decline.
Oh, train me not, fweet mermaid, with thy note,
To drown me in thy fifter's flood of tears;
Sing, Syren, for thyfelf, and I will doat;
Spread o'er the filver waves thy golden hairs,

And

And as a bed I'll take thee, and there lie:
And in that glorious fuppofition* think,
He gains by death, that hath fuch means to die;
Let love, being light, be drowned if the fink.

Luc. What, are you mad, that you do reafon fo?
S. Ant. Not mad, but mated; how, I do not know.
Luc. It is a fault that fpringeth from your eye.
S. Ant. For gazing on your beams, fair fun, being by.
Luc. Gaze where you fhould, and that will clear
your fight.

S. Ant. As good to wink, fweet love, as look on night.

Luc. Why call you me love? call my fifter fo.
S. Ant. Thy filter's fifter.

Luc. That's my fifter.

S. Ant. No;

It is thyfelf, mine own felf's better part :

Mine eye's clear eye, my dear heart's dearer heart, My food, my fortune, and my fweet hope's aim, My fole earth's heaven, and my heaven's claim. Luc. All this my fifter is, or elfe fhould be.

S. Ant. Call thyself fifter, sweet; for I mean thee: Thee will I love, and with thee lead my life; Thou haft no husband yet, nor I no wife.

Give me thy hand.

Luc. Oh, foft, Sir, hold you still;

I'll fetch my fifter, to get her good-will.

[Exit. Luciana.

SCENE III. Enter Dromio of Syracufe. S. Ant. Why, how now, Dromio, where run'st thou

fo fast?

I

S. Dro. Do you know me, Sir? am I Dromio? am ? am your man I myself?

S. Ant. Thou art Dromio, thou art my man, thou art thyfelf.

S. Dro. I am an afs, I am a woman's man, and befides myself.

S. Ant What woman's man? and how befides thyfelf?

S. Dro. Marry, Sir, befides myfelf; I am due to a *Suppofition, for the thing lain open.

woman;

woman; one that claims me, one that haunts me, one that will have me.

S. Ant. What claim lays fhe to thee?

S. Dro. Marry, Sir, fuch a claim as you would lay to your horfe; and fhe would have me as a beaft: not that, I being a beaft, fhe would have me; but that fhe, being a very beaftly creature, lays claim to me. S. Ant. What is fhe?

S. Dro. A very reverend body; ay, fuch a one as a man may not fpeak of, without he fay, Sir reverence: I have but lean luck in the match; and yet is the a wondrous fat marriage.

S. Ant. How doft thou mean, a fat marriage?

S. Dro. Marry, Sir, fhe's the kitchen-wench, and all grease; and I know not what ufe to put her to, but to make a lamp of her, and run from her by her own light. I warrant her rags and the tallow in them, will burn a Lapland winter : if the lives till doomsday, she'll burn a week longer than the whole world.

S. Ant. What complexion is fhe of?

S. Dro. Swart like my fhoe, but her face nothing like fo clean kept; for why? fhe fweats, a man may go over fhoes in the grime of it.

S. Ant. That's a fault that water will mend.

S. Dro. No, Sir, 'tis in grain; Noah's flood could not do it.

S. Ant. What's her name?

S. Dro. Nell, Sir;-but her name and three quarters (that is, an ell and three quarters) will not meafure her from hip to hip.

S. Ant. Then fhe bears fome breadth?

S. Dro. No longer from head to foot, than from hip to hip: fhe is spherical, like a globe: I could find out countries in her.

S. Ant. In what part of her body stands Ireland? S. Dro. Marry, Sir, in her buttocks; I found it out by the bogs.

S. Ant. Where Scotland?

S. Dro. I found it out by the barrenness, hard in the palm of her hand.

S. Ant. Where France?

S. Dro.

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