Much Ado About Nothing

1 Enter Leonato, Hero, Beatrice and others,
2 with a Messenger.
3 LEONATO.
4 I learn in this letter that Don Pedro of Arragon comes this night
5 to Messina.
6 MESSENGER.
7 He is very near by this: he was not three leagues off when I left him.
8 LEONATO.
9 How many gentlemen have you lost in this action?
10 MESSENGER.
11 But few of any sort, and none of name.
12 LEONATO.
13 A victory is twice itself when the achiever brings home full
14 numbers. I find here that Don Pedro hath bestowed much honour on a
15 young Florentine called Claudio.
16 MESSENGER.
17 Much deserved on his part, and equally remembered by Don Pedro.
18 He hath borne himself beyond the promise of his age, doing in the figure
19 of a lamb the feats of a lion: he hath indeed better bettered expectation
20 than you must expect of me to tell you how.
21 LEONATO.
22 He hath an uncle here in Messina will be very much glad of it.
23 MESSENGER.
24 I have already delivered him letters, and there appears much
25 joy in him; even so much that joy could not show itself modest enough
26 without a badge of bitterness.
27 LEONATO.
28 Did he break out into tears?
29 MESSENGER.
30 In great measure.
31 LEONATO.
32 A kind overflow of kindness. There are no faces truer than those
33 that are so washed; how much better is it to weep at joy than to joy at
34 weeping!
35 BEATRICE.
36 I pray you, is Signior Mountanto returned from the wars or no?
37 MESSENGER.
38 I know none of that name, lady: there was none such in the army
39 of any sort.
40 LEONATO.
41 What is he that you ask for, niece?
42 HERO.
43 My cousin means Signior Benedick of Padua.
44 MESSENGER.
45 O! he is returned, and as pleasant as ever he was.
46 BEATRICE.
47 He set up his bills here in Messina and challenged Cupid at the
48 flight; and my uncle’s fool, reading the challenge, subscribed for
49 Cupid, and challenged him at the bird-bolt. I pray you, how many hath he
50 killed and eaten in these wars? But how many hath he killed? for, indeed,
51 I promised to eat all of his killing.
52 LEONATO.
53 Faith, niece, you tax Signior Benedick too much; but he’ll
54 be meet with you, I doubt it not.
55 MESSENGER.
56 He hath done good service, lady, in these wars.
57 BEATRICE.
58 You had musty victual, and he hath holp to eat it; he is a very
59 valiant trencher-man; he hath an excellent stomach.
60 MESSENGER.
61 And a good soldier too, lady.
62 BEATRICE.
63 And a good soldier to a lady; but what is he to a lord?
64 MESSENGER.
65 A lord to a lord, a man to a man; stuffed with all honourable
66 virtues.
67 BEATRICE.
68 It is so indeed; he is no less than a stuffed man; but for the
69 stuffing,—well, we are all mortal.
70 LEONATO.
71 You must not, sir, mistake my niece. There is a kind of merry war
72 betwixt Signior Benedick and her; they never meet but there’s a
73 skirmish of wit between them.
74 BEATRICE.
75 Alas! he gets nothing by that. In our last conflict four of his
76 five wits went halting off, and now is the whole man governed with one! so
77 that if he have wit enough to keep himself warm, let him bear it for a
78 difference between himself and his horse; for it is all the wealth that he
79 hath left to be known a reasonable creature. Who is his companion now? He
80 hath every month a new sworn brother.
81 MESSENGER.
82 Is’t possible?
83 BEATRICE.
84 Very easily possible: he wears his faith but as the fashion of
85 his hat; it ever changes with the next block.
86 MESSENGER.
87 I see, lady, the gentleman is not in your books.
88 BEATRICE.
89 No; and he were, I would burn my study. But I pray you, who is
90 his companion? Is there no young squarer now that will make a voyage with
91 him to the devil?
92 MESSENGER.
93 He is most in the company of the right noble Claudio.
94 BEATRICE.
95 O Lord, he will hang upon him like a disease: he is sooner
96 caught than the pestilence, and the taker runs presently mad. God help the
97 noble Claudio! If he have caught the Benedick, it will cost him a thousand
98 pound ere he be cured.
99 MESSENGER.
100 I will hold friends with you, lady.
101 BEATRICE.
102 Do, good friend.
103 LEONATO.
104 You will never run mad, niece.
105 BEATRICE.
106 No, not till a hot January.
107 MESSENGER.
108 Don Pedro is approached.
109 Enter Don Pedro, Don John, Claudio, Benedick,
110 Balthasar and Others.
111 DON PEDRO.
112 Good Signior Leonato, you are come to meet your trouble: the
113 fashion of the world is to avoid cost, and you encounter it.
114 LEONATO.
115 Never came trouble to my house in the likeness of your Grace, for
116 trouble being gone, comfort should remain; but when you depart from me,
117 sorrow abides and happiness takes his leave.
118 DON PEDRO.
119 You embrace your charge too willingly. I think this is
120 your daughter.
121 LEONATO.
122 Her mother hath many times told me so.
123 BENEDICK.
124 Were you in doubt, sir, that you asked her?
125 LEONATO.
126 Signior Benedick, no; for then were you a child.
127 DON PEDRO.
128 You have it full, Benedick: we may guess by this what you are,
129 being a man. Truly the lady fathers herself. Be happy, lady, for you are
130 like an honourable father.
131 BENEDICK.
132 If Signior Leonato be her father, she would not have his head on
133 her shoulders for all Messina, as like him as she is.
134 BEATRICE.
135 I wonder that you will still be talking, Signior Benedick:
136 nobody marks you.
137 BENEDICK.
138 What! my dear Lady Disdain, are you yet living?
139 BEATRICE.
140 Is it possible Disdain should die while she hath such meet food
141 to feed it as Signior Benedick? Courtesy itself must convert to disdain if
142 you come in her presence.
143 BENEDICK.
144 Then is courtesy a turncoat. But it is certain I am loved of all
145 ladies, only you excepted; and I would I could find in my heart that I had
146 not a hard heart; for, truly, I love none.
147 BEATRICE.
148 A dear happiness to women: they would else have been troubled
149 with a pernicious suitor. I thank God and my cold blood, I am of your
150 humour for that. I had rather hear my dog bark at a crow than a man swear
151 he loves me.
152 BENEDICK.
153 God keep your Ladyship still in that mind; so some gentleman or
154 other shall scape a predestinate scratched face.
155 BEATRICE.
156 Scratching could not make it worse, and ’twere such a face
157 as yours were.
158 BENEDICK.
159 Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher.
160 BEATRICE.
161 A bird of my tongue is better than a beast of yours.
162 BENEDICK.
163 I would my horse had the speed of your tongue, and so good a
164 continuer. But keep your way, i’ God’s name; I have done.
165 BEATRICE.
166 You always end with a jade’s trick: I know you of old.
167 DON PEDRO.
168 That is the sum of all, Leonato: Signior Claudio, and Signior
169 Benedick, my dear friend Leonato hath invited you all. I tell him we shall
170 stay here at the least a month, and he heartly prays some occasion may
171 detain us longer: I dare swear he is no hypocrite, but prays from his
172 heart.
173 LEONATO.
174 If you swear, my lord, you shall not be forsworn. [To
175 Don John] Let me bid you welcome, my lord: being reconciled to
176 the Prince your brother, I owe you all duty.
177 DON JOHN.
178 I thank you: I am not of many words, but I thank you.
179 LEONATO.
180 Please it your Grace lead on?
181 DON PEDRO.
182 Your hand, Leonato; we will go together.
183 [Exeunt all but Benedick and Claudio.]
184 CLAUDIO.
185 Benedick, didst thou note the daughter of Signior Leonato?
186 BENEDICK.
187 I noted her not; but I looked on her.
188 CLAUDIO.
189 Is she not a modest young lady?
190 BENEDICK.
191 Do you question me, as an honest man should do, for my simple
192 true judgment; or would you have me speak after my custom, as being a
193 professed tyrant to their sex?
194 CLAUDIO.
195 No; I pray thee speak in sober judgment.
196 BENEDICK.
197 Why, i’ faith, methinks she’s too low for a high
198 praise, too brown for a fair praise, and too little for a great praise;
199 only this commendation I can afford her, that were she other than she is,
200 she were unhandsome, and being no other but as she is, I do not like her.
201 CLAUDIO.
202 Thou thinkest I am in sport: I pray thee tell me truly how thou
203 likest her.
204 BENEDICK.
205 Would you buy her, that you enquire after her?
206 CLAUDIO.
207 Can the world buy such a jewel?
208 BENEDICK.
209 Yea, and a case to put it into. But speak you this with a sad
210 brow, or do you play the flouting Jack, to tell us Cupid is a good
211 hare-finder, and Vulcan a rare carpenter? Come, in what key shall a man
212 take you, to go in the song?
213 CLAUDIO.
214 In mine eye she is the sweetest lady that ever I looked on.
215 BENEDICK.
216 I can see yet without spectacles and I see no such matter: there’s
217 her cousin and she were not possessed with a fury, exceeds her as much in
218 beauty as the first of May doth the last of December. But I hope you have
219 no intent to turn husband, have you?
220 CLAUDIO.
221 I would scarce trust myself, though I had sworn to the contrary,
222 if Hero would be my wife.
223 BENEDICK.
224 Is’t come to this, in faith? Hath not the world one
225 man but he will wear his cap with suspicion? Shall I never see a bachelor
226 of threescore again? Go to, i’ faith; and thou wilt needs thrust thy
227 neck into a yoke, wear the print of it and sigh away Sundays.
228 Re-enter Don Pedro.
229 Look! Don Pedro is returned to seek you.
230 DON PEDRO.
231 What secret hath held you here, that you followed not to
232 Leonato’s?
233 BENEDICK.
234 I would your Grace would constrain me to tell.
235 DON PEDRO.
236 I charge thee on thy allegiance.
237 BENEDICK.
238 You hear, Count Claudio: I can be secret as a dumb man; I would
239 have you think so; but on my allegiance mark you this, on my allegiance:
240 he is in love. With who? now that is your Grace’s part. Mark how
241 short his answer is: with Hero, Leonato’s short daughter.
242 CLAUDIO.
243 If this were so, so were it uttered.
244 BENEDICK.
245 Like the old tale, my lord: ‘it is not so, nor
246 ’twas not so; but indeed, God forbid it should be so.’
247 CLAUDIO.
248 If my passion change not shortly, God forbid it should be otherwise.
249 DON PEDRO.
250 Amen, if you love her; for the lady is very well worthy.
251 CLAUDIO.
252 You speak this to fetch me in, my lord.
253 DON PEDRO.
254 By my troth, I speak my thought.
255 CLAUDIO.
256 And in faith, my lord, I spoke mine.
257 BENEDICK.
258 And by my two faiths and troths, my lord, I spoke mine.
259 CLAUDIO.
260 That I love her, I feel.
261 DON PEDRO.
262 That she is worthy, I know.
263 BENEDICK.
264 That I neither feel how she should be loved, nor know how she
265 should be worthy, is the opinion that fire cannot melt out of me: I will
266 die in it at the stake.
267 DON PEDRO.
268 Thou wast ever an obstinate heretic in the despite of beauty.
269 CLAUDIO.
270 And never could maintain his part but in the force of his will.
271 BENEDICK.
272 That a woman conceived me, I thank her; that she brought me up,
273 I likewise give her most humble thanks; but that I will have a recheat
274 winded in my forehead, or hang my bugle in an invisible baldrick, all
275 women shall pardon me. Because I will not do them the wrong to mistrust
276 any, I will do myself the right to trust none; and the fine is,—for the
277 which I may go the finer,—I will live a bachelor.
278 DON PEDRO.
279 I shall see thee, ere I die, look pale with love.
280 BENEDICK.
281 With anger, with sickness, or with hunger, my lord; not with
282 love: prove that ever I lose more blood with love than I will get again
283 with drinking, pick out mine eyes with a ballad-maker’s pen and hang
284 me up at the door of a brothel-house for the sign of blind Cupid.
285 DON PEDRO.
286 Well, if ever thou dost fall from this faith, thou wilt prove a
287 notable argument.
288 BENEDICK.
289 If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat and shoot at me; and he
290 that hits me, let him be clapped on the shoulder and called Adam.
291 DON PEDRO.
292 Well, as time shall try: ‘In time the savage bull
293 doth bear the yoke.’
294 BENEDICK.
295 The savage bull may; but if ever the sensible Benedick bear it,
296 pluck off the bull’s horns and set them in my forehead; and let me
297 be vilely painted, and in such great letters as they write, ‘Here is
298 good horse to hire,’ let them signify under my sign ‘Here you
299 may see Benedick the married man.’
300 CLAUDIO.
301 If this should ever happen, thou wouldst be horn-mad.
302 DON PEDRO.
303 Nay, if Cupid have not spent all his quiver in Venice, thou
304 wilt quake for this shortly.
305 BENEDICK.
306 I look for an earthquake too then.
307 DON PEDRO.
308 Well, you will temporize with the hours. In the meantime,
309 good Signior Benedick, repair to Leonato’s: commend me to him
310 and tell him I will not fail him at supper; for indeed he hath made
311 great preparation.
312 BENEDICK.
313 I have almost matter enough in me for such an embassage; and so
314 I commit you—
315 CLAUDIO.
316 To the tuition of God: from my house, if I had it,—
317 DON PEDRO.
318 The sixth of July: your loving friend, Benedick.
319 BENEDICK.
320 Nay, mock not, mock not. The body of your discourse is sometime
321 guarded with fragments, and the guards are but slightly basted on neither:
322 ere you flout old ends any further, examine your conscience: and so I
323 leave you.
324 [Exit.]
325 CLAUDIO.
326 My liege, your Highness now may do me good.
327 DON PEDRO.
328 My love is thine to teach: teach it but how,
329 And thou shalt see how apt it is to learn
330 Any hard lesson that may do thee good.
331 CLAUDIO.
332 Hath Leonato any son, my lord?
333 DON PEDRO.
334 No child but Hero; she’s his only heir.
335 Dost thou affect her, Claudio?
336 CLAUDIO.
337 O! my lord,
338 When you went onward on this ended action,
339 I looked upon her with a soldier’s eye,
340 That lik’d, but had a rougher task in hand
341 Than to drive liking to the name of love;
342 But now I am return’d, and that war-thoughts
343 Have left their places vacant, in their rooms
344 Come thronging soft and delicate desires,
345 All prompting me how fair young Hero is,
346 Saying, I lik’d her ere I went to wars.
347 DON PEDRO.
348 Thou wilt be like a lover presently,
349 And tire the hearer with a book of words.
350 If thou dost love fair Hero, cherish it,
351 And I will break with her, and with her father,
352 And thou shalt have her. Was’t not to this end
353 That thou began’st to twist so fine a story?
354 CLAUDIO.
355 How sweetly you do minister to love,
356 That know love’s grief by his complexion!
357 But lest my liking might too sudden seem,
358 I would have salv’d it with a longer treatise.
359 DON PEDRO.
360 What need the bridge much broader than the flood?
361 The fairest grant is the necessity.
362 Look, what will serve is fit: ’tis once, thou lov’st,
363 And I will fit thee with the remedy.
364 I know we shall have revelling tonight:
365 I will assume thy part in some disguise,
366 And tell fair Hero I am Claudio;
367 And in her bosom I’ll unclasp my heart,
368 And take her hearing prisoner with the force
369 And strong encounter of my amorous tale:
370 Then after to her father will I break;
371 And the conclusion is, she shall be thine.
372 In practice let us put it presently.
373 [Exeunt.]