The Two Gentlemen Of Verona

1 Enter Valentine and Speed.
2 SPEED.
3 Sir, your glove.
4 VALENTINE.
5 Not mine. My gloves are on.
6 SPEED.
7 Why, then, this may be yours, for this is but one.
8 VALENTINE.
9 Ha? Let me see. Ay, give it me, it’s mine.
10 Sweet ornament that decks a thing divine!
11 Ah, Silvia, Silvia!
12 SPEED.
13 [_Calling_.] Madam Silvia! Madam Silvia!
14 VALENTINE.
15 How now, sirrah?
16 SPEED.
17 She is not within hearing, sir.
18 VALENTINE.
19 Why, sir, who bade you call her?
20 SPEED.
21 Your worship, sir, or else I mistook.
22 VALENTINE.
23 Well, you’ll still be too forward.
24 SPEED.
25 And yet I was last chidden for being too slow.
26 VALENTINE.
27 Go to, sir. Tell me, do you know Madam Silvia?
28 SPEED.
29 She that your worship loves?
30 VALENTINE.
31 Why, how know you that I am in love?
32 SPEED.
33 Marry, by these special marks: first, you have learned, like Sir
34 Proteus, to wreathe your arms like a malcontent; to relish a love-song,
35 like a robin redbreast; to walk alone, like one that had the
36 pestilence; to sigh, like a schoolboy that had lost his ABC; to weep,
37 like a young wench that had buried her grandam; to fast, like one that
38 takes diet; to watch, like one that fears robbing; to speak puling,
39 like a beggar at Hallowmas. You were wont, when you laughed, to crow
40 like a cock; when you walked, to walk like one of the lions; when you
41 fasted, it was presently after dinner; when you looked sadly, it was
42 for want of money. And now you are metamorphosed with a mistress, that,
43 when I look on you, I can hardly think you my master.
44 VALENTINE.
45 Are all these things perceived in me?
46 SPEED.
47 They are all perceived without ye.
48 VALENTINE.
49 Without me? They cannot.
50 SPEED.
51 Without you? Nay, that’s certain, for without you were so simple, none
52 else would. But you are so without these follies, that these follies
53 are within you, and shine through you like the water in an urinal, that
54 not an eye that sees you but is a physician to comment on your malady.
55 VALENTINE.
56 But tell me, dost thou know my lady Silvia?
57 SPEED.
58 She that you gaze on so as she sits at supper?
59 VALENTINE.
60 Hast thou observed that? Even she I mean.
61 SPEED.
62 Why, sir, I know her not.
63 VALENTINE.
64 Dost thou know her by my gazing on her, and yet know’st her not?
65 SPEED.
66 Is she not hard-favoured, sir?
67 VALENTINE.
68 Not so fair, boy, as well-favoured.
69 SPEED.
70 Sir, I know that well enough.
71 VALENTINE.
72 What dost thou know?
73 SPEED.
74 That she is not so fair as, of you, well-favoured.
75 VALENTINE.
76 I mean that her beauty is exquisite but her favour infinite.
77 SPEED.
78 That’s because the one is painted, and the other out of all count.
79 VALENTINE.
80 How painted? And how out of count?
81 SPEED.
82 Marry, sir, so painted to make her fair, that no man counts of her
83 beauty.
84 VALENTINE.
85 How esteem’st thou me? I account of her beauty.
86 SPEED.
87 You never saw her since she was deformed.
88 VALENTINE.
89 How long hath she been deformed?
90 SPEED.
91 Ever since you loved her.
92 VALENTINE.
93 I have loved her ever since I saw her, and still I see her beautiful.
94 SPEED.
95 If you love her, you cannot see her.
96 VALENTINE.
97 Why?
98 SPEED.
99 Because Love is blind. O, that you had mine eyes, or your own eyes had
100 the lights they were wont to have when you chid at Sir Proteus for
101 going ungartered!
102 VALENTINE.
103 What should I see then?
104 SPEED.
105 Your own present folly and her passing deformity; for he, being in
106 love, could not see to garter his hose; and you, being in love, cannot
107 see to put on your hose.
108 VALENTINE.
109 Belike, boy, then you are in love, for last morning you could not see
110 to wipe my shoes.
111 SPEED.
112 True, sir, I was in love with my bed. I thank you, you swinged me for
113 my love, which makes me the bolder to chide you for yours.
114 VALENTINE.
115 In conclusion, I stand affected to her.
116 SPEED.
117 I would you were set, so your affection would cease.
118 VALENTINE.
119 Last night she enjoined me to write some lines to one she loves.
120 SPEED.
121 And have you?
122 VALENTINE.
123 I have.
124 SPEED.
125 Are they not lamely writ?
126 VALENTINE.
127 No, boy, but as well as I can do them.
128 Peace, here she comes.
129 Enter Silvia.
130 SPEED.
131 [_Aside_.] O excellent motion! O exceeding puppet!
132 Now will he interpret to her.
133 VALENTINE.
134 Madam and mistress, a thousand good-morrows.
135 SPEED.
136 [_Aside_.] O, give ye good e’en! Here’s a million of manners.
137 SILVIA.
138 Sir Valentine and servant, to you two thousand.
139 SPEED.
140 [_Aside_.] He should give her interest, and she gives it him.
141 VALENTINE.
142 As you enjoined me, I have writ your letter
143 Unto the secret nameless friend of yours,
144 Which I was much unwilling to proceed in
145 But for my duty to your ladyship.
146 [_Gives her a letter._]
147 SILVIA.
148 I thank you, gentle servant, ’tis very clerkly done.
149 VALENTINE.
150 Now trust me, madam, it came hardly off,
151 For, being ignorant to whom it goes,
152 I writ at random, very doubtfully.
153 SILVIA.
154 Perchance you think too much of so much pains?
155 VALENTINE.
156 No, madam; so it stead you, I will write,
157 Please you command, a thousand times as much.
158 And yet—
159 SILVIA.
160 A pretty period. Well, I guess the sequel;
161 And yet I will not name it. And yet I care not.
162 And yet take this again.
163 [_Offers him the letter._]
164 And yet I thank you,
165 Meaning henceforth to trouble you no more.
166 SPEED.
167 [_Aside_.] And yet you will; and yet another “yet”.
168 VALENTINE.
169 What means your ladyship? Do you not like it?
170 SILVIA.
171 Yes, yes, the lines are very quaintly writ,
172 But, since unwillingly, take them again.
173 Nay, take them.
174 [_Offers the letter again._]
175 VALENTINE.
176 Madam, they are for you.
177 SILVIA.
178 Ay, ay, you writ them, sir, at my request,
179 But I will none of them. They are for you.
180 I would have had them writ more movingly.
181 VALENTINE.
182 Please you, I’ll write your ladyship another.
183 SILVIA.
184 And when it’s writ, for my sake read it over,
185 And if it please you, so; if not, why, so.
186 VALENTINE.
187 If it please me, madam? What then?
188 SILVIA.
189 Why, if it please you, take it for your labour.
190 And so good morrow, servant.
191 [_Exit._]
192 SPEED.
193 [_Aside_.] O jest unseen, inscrutable, invisible,
194 As a nose on a man’s face, or a weathercock on a steeple!
195 My master sues to her, and she hath taught her suitor,
196 He being her pupil, to become her tutor.
197 O excellent device! Was there ever heard a better?
198 That my master, being scribe, to himself should write the letter?
199 VALENTINE.
200 How now, sir? What are you reasoning with yourself?
201 SPEED.
202 Nay, I was rhyming. ’Tis you that have the reason.
203 VALENTINE.
204 To do what?
205 SPEED.
206 To be a spokesman from Madam Silvia.
207 VALENTINE.
208 To whom?
209 SPEED.
210 To yourself. Why, she woos you by a figure.
211 VALENTINE.
212 What figure?
213 SPEED.
214 By a letter, I should say.
215 VALENTINE.
216 Why, she hath not writ to me.
217 SPEED.
218 What need she, when she hath made you write to yourself? Why, do you
219 not perceive the jest?
220 VALENTINE.
221 No, believe me.
222 SPEED.
223 No believing you indeed, sir. But did you perceive her earnest?
224 VALENTINE.
225 She gave me none, except an angry word.
226 SPEED.
227 Why, she hath given you a letter.
228 VALENTINE.
229 That’s the letter I writ to her friend.
230 SPEED.
231 And that letter hath she delivered, and there an end.
232 VALENTINE.
233 I would it were no worse.
234 SPEED.
235 I’ll warrant you, ’tis as well.
236 For often have you writ to her, and she, in modesty
237 Or else for want of idle time, could not again reply,
238 Or fearing else some messenger that might her mind discover,
239 Herself hath taught her love himself to write unto her lover.
240 All this I speak in print, for in print I found it. Why muse you, sir?
241 ’Tis dinner time.
242 VALENTINE.
243 I have dined.
244 SPEED.
245 Ay, but hearken, sir, though the chameleon Love can feed on the air, I
246 am one that am nourished by my victuals, and would fain have meat. O,
247 be not like your mistress! Be moved, be moved.
248 [_Exeunt._]