The Two Gentlemen Of Verona

1 Enter Valentine, Silvia, Thurio and Speed.
2 SILVIA.
3 Servant!
4 VALENTINE.
5 Mistress?
6 SPEED.
7 Master, Sir Thurio frowns on you.
8 VALENTINE.
9 Ay, boy, it’s for love.
10 SPEED.
11 Not of you.
12 VALENTINE.
13 Of my mistress, then.
14 SPEED.
15 ’Twere good you knocked him.
16 SILVIA.
17 Servant, you are sad.
18 VALENTINE.
19 Indeed, madam, I seem so.
20 THURIO.
21 Seem you that you are not?
22 VALENTINE.
23 Haply I do.
24 THURIO.
25 So do counterfeits.
26 VALENTINE.
27 So do you.
28 THURIO.
29 What seem I that I am not?
30 VALENTINE.
31 Wise.
32 THURIO.
33 What instance of the contrary?
34 VALENTINE.
35 Your folly.
36 THURIO.
37 And how quote you my folly?
38 VALENTINE.
39 I quote it in your jerkin.
40 THURIO.
41 My jerkin is a doublet.
42 VALENTINE.
43 Well, then, I’ll double your folly.
44 THURIO.
45 How!
46 SILVIA.
47 What, angry, Sir Thurio? Do you change colour?
48 VALENTINE.
49 Give him leave, madam, he is a kind of chameleon.
50 THURIO.
51 That hath more mind to feed on your blood than live in your air.
52 VALENTINE.
53 You have said, sir.
54 THURIO.
55 Ay, sir, and done too, for this time.
56 VALENTINE.
57 I know it well, sir. You always end ere you begin.
58 SILVIA.
59 A fine volley of words, gentlemen, and quickly shot off.
60 VALENTINE.
61 ’Tis indeed, madam, we thank the giver.
62 SILVIA.
63 Who is that, servant?
64 VALENTINE.
65 Yourself, sweet lady, for you gave the fire. Sir Thurio borrows his wit
66 from your ladyship’s looks, and spends what he borrows kindly in your
67 company.
68 THURIO.
69 Sir, if you spend word for word with me, I shall make your wit
70 bankrupt.
71 VALENTINE.
72 I know it well, sir. You have an exchequer of words and, I think, no
73 other treasure to give your followers, for it appears by their bare
74 liveries that they live by your bare words.
75 SILVIA.
76 No more, gentlemen, no more. Here comes my father.
77 Enter Duke.
78 DUKE.
79 Now, daughter Silvia, you are hard beset.
80 Sir Valentine, your father is in good health.
81 What say you to a letter from your friends
82 Of much good news?
83 VALENTINE.
84 My lord, I will be thankful
85 To any happy messenger from thence.
86 DUKE.
87 Know ye Don Antonio, your countryman?
88 VALENTINE.
89 Ay, my good lord, I know the gentleman
90 To be of worth and worthy estimation,
91 And not without desert so well reputed.
92 DUKE.
93 Hath he not a son?
94 VALENTINE.
95 Ay, my good lord, a son that well deserves
96 The honour and regard of such a father.
97 DUKE.
98 You know him well?
99 VALENTINE.
100 I knew him as myself, for from our infancy
101 We have conversed and spent our hours together.
102 And though myself have been an idle truant,
103 Omitting the sweet benefit of time
104 To clothe mine age with angel-like perfection,
105 Yet hath Sir Proteus, for that’s his name,
106 Made use and fair advantage of his days:
107 His years but young, but his experience old;
108 His head unmellowed, but his judgement ripe;
109 And in a word, for far behind his worth
110 Comes all the praises that I now bestow,
111 He is complete in feature and in mind,
112 With all good grace to grace a gentleman.
113 DUKE.
114 Beshrew me, sir, but if he make this good,
115 He is as worthy for an empress’ love
116 As meet to be an emperor’s counsellor.
117 Well, sir, this gentleman is come to me
118 With commendation from great potentates,
119 And here he means to spend his time awhile.
120 I think ’tis no unwelcome news to you.
121 VALENTINE.
122 Should I have wished a thing, it had been he.
123 DUKE.
124 Welcome him then according to his worth.
125 Silvia, I speak to you, and you, Sir Thurio.
126 For Valentine, I need not cite him to it.
127 I will send him hither to you presently.
128 [_Exit._]
129 VALENTINE.
130 This is the gentleman I told your ladyship
131 Had come along with me but that his mistresss
132 Did hold his eyes locked in her crystal looks.
133 SILVIA.
134 Belike that now she hath enfranchised them
135 Upon some other pawn for fealty.
136 VALENTINE.
137 Nay, sure, I think she holds them prisoners still.
138 SILVIA.
139 Nay, then, he should be blind, and being blind
140 How could he see his way to seek out you?
141 VALENTINE.
142 Why, lady, Love hath twenty pair of eyes.
143 THURIO.
144 They say that Love hath not an eye at all.
145 VALENTINE.
146 To see such lovers, Thurio, as yourself.
147 Upon a homely object, Love can wink.
148 SILVIA.
149 Have done, have done. Here comes the gentleman.
150 Enter Proteus.
151 VALENTINE.
152 Welcome, dear Proteus! Mistress, I beseech you
153 Confirm his welcome with some special favour.
154 SILVIA.
155 His worth is warrant for his welcome hither,
156 If this be he you oft have wished to hear from.
157 VALENTINE.
158 Mistress, it is. Sweet lady, entertain him
159 To be my fellow-servant to your ladyship.
160 SILVIA.
161 Too low a mistress for so high a servant.
162 PROTEUS.
163 Not so, sweet lady, but too mean a servant
164 To have a look of such a worthy mistress.
165 VALENTINE.
166 Leave off discourse of disability.
167 Sweet lady, entertain him for your servant.
168 PROTEUS.
169 My duty will I boast of, nothing else.
170 SILVIA.
171 And duty never yet did want his meed.
172 Servant, you are welcome to a worthless mistress.
173 PROTEUS.
174 I’ll die on him that says so but yourself.
175 SILVIA.
176 That you are welcome?
177 PROTEUS.
178 That you are worthless.
179 Enter Servant.
180 SERVANT.
181 Madam, my lord your father would speak with you.
182 SILVIA.
183 I wait upon his pleasure.
184 [_Exit Servant._]
185 Come, Sir Thurio,
186 Go with me.—Once more, new servant, welcome.
187 I’ll leave you to confer of home affairs;
188 When you have done, we look to hear from you.
189 PROTEUS.
190 We’ll both attend upon your ladyship.
191 [_Exeunt Silvia and Thurio._]
192 VALENTINE.
193 Now, tell me, how do all from whence you came?
194 PROTEUS.
195 Your friends are well and have them much commended.
196 VALENTINE.
197 And how do yours?
198 PROTEUS.
199 I left them all in health.
200 VALENTINE.
201 How does your lady? And how thrives your love?
202 PROTEUS.
203 My tales of love were wont to weary you;
204 I know you joy not in a love-discourse.
205 VALENTINE.
206 Ay, Proteus, but that life is altered now.
207 I have done penance for contemning Love,
208 Whose high imperious thoughts have punished me
209 With bitter fasts, with penitential groans,
210 With nightly tears, and daily heart-sore sighs;
211 For in revenge of my contempt of love,
212 Love hath chased sleep from my enthralled eyes
213 And made them watchers of mine own heart’s sorrow.
214 O gentle Proteus, Love’s a mighty lord,
215 And hath so humbled me as I confess
216 There is no woe to his correction,
217 Nor to his service no such joy on earth.
218 Now, no discourse, except it be of love;
219 Now can I break my fast, dine, sup, and sleep
220 Upon the very naked name of love.
221 PROTEUS.
222 Enough; I read your fortune in your eye.
223 Was this the idol that you worship so?
224 VALENTINE.
225 Even she; and is she not a heavenly saint?
226 PROTEUS.
227 No, but she is an earthly paragon.
228 VALENTINE.
229 Call her divine.
230 PROTEUS.
231 I will not flatter her.
232 VALENTINE.
233 O, flatter me, for love delights in praises.
234 PROTEUS.
235 When I was sick, you gave me bitter pills,
236 And I must minister the like to you.
237 VALENTINE.
238 Then speak the truth by her; if not divine,
239 Yet let her be a principality,
240 Sovereign to all the creatures on the earth.
241 PROTEUS.
242 Except my mistress.
243 VALENTINE.
244 Sweet, except not any,
245 Except thou wilt except against my love.
246 PROTEUS.
247 Have I not reason to prefer mine own?
248 VALENTINE.
249 And I will help thee to prefer her too:
250 She shall be dignified with this high honour,
251 To bear my lady’s train, lest the base earth
252 Should from her vesture chance to steal a kiss,
253 And, of so great a favour growing proud,
254 Disdain to root the summer-swelling flower
255 And make rough winter everlastingly.
256 PROTEUS.
257 Why, Valentine, what braggartism is this?
258 VALENTINE.
259 Pardon me, Proteus, all I can is nothing
260 To her, whose worth makes other worthies nothing;
261 She is alone.
262 PROTEUS.
263 Then let her alone.
264 VALENTINE.
265 Not for the world! Why, man, she is mine own,
266 And I as rich in having such a jewel
267 As twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl,
268 The water nectar, and the rocks pure gold.
269 Forgive me that I do not dream on thee,
270 Because thou seest me dote upon my love.
271 My foolish rival, that her father likes
272 Only for his possessions are so huge,
273 Is gone with her along, and I must after,
274 For love, thou know’st, is full of jealousy.
275 PROTEUS.
276 But she loves you?
277 VALENTINE.
278 Ay, and we are betrothed; nay more, our marriage hour,
279 With all the cunning manner of our flight,
280 Determined of: how I must climb her window,
281 The ladder made of cords, and all the means
282 Plotted and ’greed on for my happiness.
283 Good Proteus, go with me to my chamber,
284 In these affairs to aid me with thy counsel.
285 PROTEUS.
286 Go on before; I shall enquire you forth.
287 I must unto the road to disembark
288 Some necessaries that I needs must use,
289 And then I’ll presently attend you.
290 VALENTINE.
291 Will you make haste?
292 PROTEUS.
293 I will.
294 [_Exit Valentine._]
295 Even as one heat another heat expels,
296 Or as one nail by strength drives out another,
297 So the remembrance of my former love
298 Is by a newer object quite forgotten.
299 Is it mine eye, or Valentine’s praise,
300 Her true perfection, or my false transgression,
301 That makes me reasonless to reason thus?
302 She is fair; and so is Julia that I love—
303 That I did love, for now my love is thawed,
304 Which like a waxen image ’gainst a fire
305 Bears no impression of the thing it was.
306 Methinks my zeal to Valentine is cold,
307 And that I love him not as I was wont.
308 O, but I love his lady too too much,
309 And that’s the reason I love him so little.
310 How shall I dote on her with more advice
311 That thus without advice begin to love her?
312 ’Tis but her picture I have yet beheld,
313 And that hath dazzled my reason’s light;
314 But when I look on her perfections,
315 There is no reason but I shall be blind.
316 If I can check my erring love, I will;
317 If not, to compass her I’ll use my skill.
318 [_Exit._]