Twelfth Night; Or, What You Will

1 Enter Sir Toby and Sir Andrew.
2 SIR TOBY.
3 Approach, Sir Andrew; not to be abed after midnight, is to be up
4 betimes; and _diluculo surgere_, thou know’st.
5 SIR ANDREW.
6 Nay, by my troth, I know not; but I know to be up late is to be up
7 late.
8 SIR TOBY.
9 A false conclusion; I hate it as an unfilled can. To be up after
10 midnight, and to go to bed then is early: so that to go to bed after
11 midnight is to go to bed betimes. Does not our lives consist of the
12 four elements?
13 SIR ANDREW.
14 Faith, so they say, but I think it rather consists of eating and
15 drinking.
16 SIR TOBY.
17 Th’art a scholar; let us therefore eat and drink.
18 Marian, I say! a stoup of wine.
19 Enter Clown.
20 SIR ANDREW.
21 Here comes the fool, i’ faith.
22 CLOWN.
23 How now, my hearts? Did you never see the picture of “we three”?
24 SIR TOBY.
25 Welcome, ass. Now let’s have a catch.
26 SIR ANDREW.
27 By my troth, the fool has an excellent breast. I had rather than forty
28 shillings I had such a leg, and so sweet a breath to sing, as the fool
29 has. In sooth, thou wast in very gracious fooling last night when thou
30 spok’st of Pigrogromitus, of the Vapians passing the equinoctial of
31 Queubus; ’twas very good, i’ faith. I sent thee sixpence for thy leman.
32 Hadst it?
33 CLOWN.
34 I did impeticos thy gratillity; for Malvolio’s nose is no whipstock. My
35 lady has a white hand, and the Myrmidons are no bottle-ale houses.
36 SIR ANDREW.
37 Excellent! Why, this is the best fooling, when all is done. Now, a
38 song.
39 SIR TOBY.
40 Come on, there is sixpence for you. Let’s have a song.
41 SIR ANDREW.
42 There’s a testril of me too: if one knight give a—
43 CLOWN.
44 Would you have a love-song, or a song of good life?
45 SIR TOBY.
46 A love-song, a love-song.
47 SIR ANDREW.
48 Ay, ay. I care not for good life.
49 CLOWN. [_sings._]
50 _O mistress mine, where are you roaming?
51 O stay and hear, your true love’s coming,
52 That can sing both high and low.
53 Trip no further, pretty sweeting.
54 Journeys end in lovers meeting,
55 Every wise man’s son doth know._
56 SIR ANDREW.
57 Excellent good, i’ faith.
58 SIR TOBY.
59 Good, good.
60 CLOWN.
61 _What is love? ’Tis not hereafter,
62 Present mirth hath present laughter.
63 What’s to come is still unsure.
64 In delay there lies no plenty,
65 Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty.
66 Youth’s a stuff will not endure._
67 SIR ANDREW.
68 A mellifluous voice, as I am true knight.
69 SIR TOBY.
70 A contagious breath.
71 SIR ANDREW.
72 Very sweet and contagious, i’ faith.
73 SIR TOBY.
74 To hear by the nose, it is dulcet in contagion. But shall we make the
75 welkin dance indeed? Shall we rouse the night-owl in a catch that will
76 draw three souls out of one weaver? Shall we do that?
77 SIR ANDREW.
78 And you love me, let’s do’t: I am dog at a catch.
79 CLOWN.
80 By’r lady, sir, and some dogs will catch well.
81 SIR ANDREW.
82 Most certain. Let our catch be, “Thou knave.”
83 CLOWN.
84 “Hold thy peace, thou knave” knight? I shall be constrain’d in’t to
85 call thee knave, knight.
86 SIR ANDREW.
87 ’Tis not the first time I have constrained one to call me knave. Begin,
88 fool; it begins “Hold thy peace.”
89 CLOWN.
90 I shall never begin if I hold my peace.
91 SIR ANDREW.
92 Good, i’ faith! Come, begin.
93 [_Catch sung._]
94 Enter Maria.
95 MARIA.
96 What a caterwauling do you keep here! If my lady have not called up her
97 steward Malvolio, and bid him turn you out of doors, never trust me.
98 SIR TOBY.
99 My lady’s a Cataian, we are politicians, Malvolio’s a Peg-a-Ramsey, and
100 [_Sings._] _Three merry men be we._ Am not I consanguineous? Am I not
101 of her blood? Tilly-vally! “Lady”! _There dwelt a man in Babylon, Lady,
102 Lady._
103 CLOWN.
104 Beshrew me, the knight’s in admirable fooling.
105 SIR ANDREW.
106 Ay, he does well enough if he be disposed, and so do I too; he does it
107 with a better grace, but I do it more natural.
108 SIR TOBY.
109 [_Sings._] _O’ the twelfth day of December—_
110 MARIA.
111 For the love o’ God, peace!
112 Enter Malvolio.
113 MALVOLIO.
114 My masters, are you mad? Or what are you? Have you no wit, manners, nor
115 honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night? Do ye make
116 an ale-house of my lady’s house, that ye squeak out your coziers’
117 catches without any mitigation or remorse of voice? Is there no respect
118 of place, persons, nor time, in you?
119 SIR TOBY.
120 We did keep time, sir, in our catches. Sneck up!
121 MALVOLIO.
122 Sir Toby, I must be round with you. My lady bade me tell you that,
123 though she harbours you as her kinsman she’s nothing allied to your
124 disorders. If you can separate yourself and your misdemeanours, you are
125 welcome to the house; if not, and it would please you to take leave of
126 her, she is very willing to bid you farewell.
127 SIR TOBY.
128 [_Sings._] _Farewell, dear heart, since I must needs be gone._
129 MARIA.
130 Nay, good Sir Toby.
131 CLOWN.
132 [_Sings._] _His eyes do show his days are almost done._
133 MALVOLIO.
134 Is’t even so?
135 SIR TOBY.
136 [_Sings._] _But I will never die._
137 CLOWN.
138 [_Sings._] _Sir Toby, there you lie._
139 MALVOLIO.
140 This is much credit to you.
141 SIR TOBY.
142 [_Sings._] _Shall I bid him go?_
143 CLOWN.
144 [_Sings._] _What and if you do?_
145 SIR TOBY.
146 [_Sings._] _Shall I bid him go, and spare not?_
147 CLOWN.
148 [_Sings._] _O, no, no, no, no, you dare not._
149 SIR TOBY.
150 Out o’ tune? sir, ye lie. Art any more than a steward? Dost thou think,
151 because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?
152 CLOWN.
153 Yes, by Saint Anne, and ginger shall be hot i’ the mouth too.
154 SIR TOBY.
155 Th’art i’ the right. Go, sir, rub your chain with crumbs. A stoup of
156 wine, Maria!
157 MALVOLIO.
158 Mistress Mary, if you prized my lady’s favour at anything more than
159 contempt, you would not give means for this uncivil rule; she shall
160 know of it, by this hand.
161 [_Exit._]
162 MARIA.
163 Go shake your ears.
164 SIR ANDREW.
165 ’Twere as good a deed as to drink when a man’s a-hungry, to challenge
166 him the field, and then to break promise with him and make a fool of
167 him.
168 SIR TOBY.
169 Do’t, knight. I’ll write thee a challenge; or I’ll deliver thy
170 indignation to him by word of mouth.
171 MARIA.
172 Sweet Sir Toby, be patient for tonight. Since the youth of the Count’s
173 was today with my lady, she is much out of quiet. For Monsieur
174 Malvolio, let me alone with him. If I do not gull him into a nayword,
175 and make him a common recreation, do not think I have wit enough to lie
176 straight in my bed. I know I can do it.
177 SIR TOBY.
178 Possess us, possess us, tell us something of him.
179 MARIA.
180 Marry, sir, sometimes he is a kind of Puritan.
181 SIR ANDREW.
182 O, if I thought that, I’d beat him like a dog.
183 SIR TOBY.
184 What, for being a Puritan? Thy exquisite reason, dear knight?
185 SIR ANDREW.
186 I have no exquisite reason for’t, but I have reason good enough.
187 MARIA.
188 The devil a Puritan that he is, or anything constantly but a
189 time-pleaser, an affectioned ass that cons state without book and
190 utters it by great swarths; the best persuaded of himself, so crammed
191 (as he thinks) with excellencies, that it is his grounds of faith that
192 all that look on him love him. And on that vice in him will my revenge
193 find notable cause to work.
194 SIR TOBY.
195 What wilt thou do?
196 MARIA.
197 I will drop in his way some obscure epistles of love, wherein by the
198 colour of his beard, the shape of his leg, the manner of his gait, the
199 expressure of his eye, forehead, and complexion, he shall find himself
200 most feelingly personated. I can write very like my lady your niece; on
201 a forgotten matter we can hardly make distinction of our hands.
202 SIR TOBY.
203 Excellent! I smell a device.
204 SIR ANDREW.
205 I have’t in my nose too.
206 SIR TOBY.
207 He shall think, by the letters that thou wilt drop, that they come from
208 my niece, and that she is in love with him.
209 MARIA.
210 My purpose is indeed a horse of that colour.
211 SIR ANDREW.
212 And your horse now would make him an ass.
213 MARIA.
214 Ass, I doubt not.
215 SIR ANDREW.
216 O ’twill be admirable!
217 MARIA.
218 Sport royal, I warrant you. I know my physic will work with him. I will
219 plant you two, and let the fool make a third, where he shall find the
220 letter. Observe his construction of it. For this night, to bed, and
221 dream on the event. Farewell.
222 [_Exit._]
223 SIR TOBY.
224 Good night, Penthesilea.
225 SIR ANDREW.
226 Before me, she’s a good wench.
227 SIR TOBY.
228 She’s a beagle true bred, and one that adores me. What o’ that?
229 SIR ANDREW.
230 I was adored once too.
231 SIR TOBY.
232 Let’s to bed, knight. Thou hadst need send for more money.
233 SIR ANDREW.
234 If I cannot recover your niece, I am a foul way out.
235 SIR TOBY.
236 Send for money, knight; if thou hast her not i’ th’ end, call me cut.
237 SIR ANDREW.
238 If I do not, never trust me, take it how you will.
239 SIR TOBY.
240 Come, come, I’ll go burn some sack, ’tis too late to go to bed now.
241 Come, knight, come, knight.
242 [_Exeunt._]