SCENE II-A Public Place.

Enter ANTIPHOLUS of Syracuse, DROMIO of Syracuse, and First Merchant.

In quest of them, unhappy, lose myself.Here comes the almanac of my true date.20 Enter DROMIO of Ephesus.

Lest that your goods too soon be confiscate.

This very day a Syracusan merchant

Is apprehended for arrival here;

And, not being able to buy out his life,

According to the statute of the town,
Dies ere the weary sun set in the west.
There is your money that I had to keep.

Ant. S. Go bear it to the Centaur, where we host,15

And stay there, Dromio, till I come to thee.
Within this hour it will be dinner-time:
Till that, I'll view the manners of the town,
Peruse the traders,16 gaze upon the buildings,
And then return, and sleep within mine inn;
For with long travel I am stiff and weary.

Get thee away.

Dro. E. Return'd so soon! rather approach'd

too late:

The capon burns, the pig falls from the spit;
The clock hath strucken twelve upon the bell,—
My mistress made it one upon my
cheek:

She is so hot, because the meat is cold;
The meat is cold, because you come not home;
You come not home, because you have no stomach;
You have no stomach, having broke your fast;
But we, that know what 'tis to fast and pray,
Are penitent for your default to-day.

Ant. S. Stop in your wind, sir: tell me this, 1

pray,

15. Where we host. To "host" was to take up quarters, as at a hostelry or inn.

16 Peruse the traders. 'Observe or examine the vendors of merchandise; in other words, 'look into the shop-windows.' 17. A trusty villain. A faithful bondman or vassal. The Dromios were bought servitors; and "villain" was often used thus, without any sense of wickedness in the term. 18. Soon at five o'clock. Towards five o'clock. formerly sometimes used as we now use 'by-and-by.'

"Soon" was

Ant. S. I am not in a sportive humour now: Tell me, and dally not, where is the money? We, being strangers here, how dar'st thou trust So great a charge from thine own custody?

Dro. E. I pray you, jest, sir, as you sit at dinner: I from my mistress come to you in post;22 If I return, I shall be post indeed,

For she will score your fault upon my pate. Methinks your maw, like mine, should be your clock,

And strike you home without a messenger.

Ant. S. Come, Dromio, come, these jests are

out of season;

Reserve them till a merrier hour than this.
Where is the gold I gave in charge to thee?
Dro. E. To me, sir! why, you gave no gold to

me.

Ant. S. Come on, sir knave, have done your foolishness,

And tell me how thou hast dispos'd thy charge.

Dro. E. My charge was but to fetch you from

the mart

Home to your house, the Phoenix, sir, to dinner : My mistress and her sister stay for you.

Ant. S. Now, as I am a Christian, answer me, In what safe place you have bestow'd 23 my money;

19. Consort you. In familiar parlance, 'keep you company.' 20. The almanac of my true date. Dromio being born in the same hour with his master, certifies the date of his birth. 21. Penitent. Doing penance.

22. In post. "In post" means, 'in post haste;' and Dromio's second use of the word refers to the practice of scoring up reckonings by chalk marks or notches on a "post" in the shop or warehouse.

23. Bestow'd. For stowed away, placed in safety.

With urging helpless patience would'st relieve me;
But, if thou live to see like right bereft,
This fool-begg'd patience in thee will be left."

Luc. Well, I will marry one day, but to try.Here comes your man; now is your husband nigh.

Enter DROMIO of Ephesus.

Adr. Say, is your tardy master now at hand? Dro. E. Nay, he's at two hands with me, and that my two ears can witness.

Adr. Say, didst thou speak with him? know'st thou his mind?

Dro. E. ear:

Act II. Scene I.

Ay, ay, he told his mind upon mine

Beshrew his hand, I scarce could understand' it. Luc. Spake he so doubtfully, thou couldst not feel his meaning?

Dro. E. Nay, he struck so plainly, I could too well feel his blows; and withal so doubtfully, that I could scarce understand them.

Adr. But say, I pr'ythee, is he coming home? It seems he hath great care to please his wife.

Dro. E. Why, mistress, sure my master is horn-mad.

7. Understand. A quibble on 'stand under' and 'comprehend.' 8. Doubtfully. Dromio uses this word punningly in reference to two that it sounds something like-' doughtily' and 'redoubtably;' meaning valorously, formidably.

tress."

So that my errand, due unto my tongue,

I thank him, I bear home upon my shoulders;
For, in conclusion, he did beat me there.

Adr. Go back again, thou slave, and fetch him home.

Dro. E. Go back again, and be new beaten home!

For Heaven's sake, send some other messenger.
Adr. Back, slave, or I will break thy pate across.
Dro. E. And he will bless that cross with other
beating:
Between you,
I shall have a holy head.
Adr. Hence, prating peasant! fetch thy master

home.

Dro. E. Am I so round with you as you with me,10

That like a football you do spurn me thus?
You spurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither:
If I last in this service, you must case me in leather."1
[Exit.
Luc. Fie, how impatience lowreth in your face!
Adr. His company must do his minions grace,
Whilst I at home starve for a merry look.
Hath homely age th' alluring beauty took
From my poor cheek? then he hath wasted it:

9. Bear. tense, 'bare.'

In some editions given in the [old form of] past 10. So round with you as you with me. "Round" is used here by Dromio in its sense of spherical (like a “ football"), and in that of outspoken, free, roughly remonstrative. 11. Case me in leather. Alluding to footballs made of bladder, and covered with leather.

12. Defeatures. Impaired looks, disfigurements. 13. Fair. Often used substantively by Shakespeare for loveliness, beauty.

14. Deer. Used punningly for 'dear,' to introduce the figurative context. 15. Stale. Here used in a double sense: as carrying out the metaphor of the pursuit of game by a "stale" or pretence;

I see the jewel best enamelled 19

Will lose his beauty; and though gold bides still,
That others touch, yet often touching will
Wear gold and so, no man that hath a name,
But falsehood and corruption doth it shame.
Since that my beauty cannot please his eye,
I'll weep what's left away, and weeping die.
Luc. How many fond fools serve mad jealousy!
[Exeunt.

SCENE II.-The same Public Place. Enter ANTIPHOLUS of Syracuse. Ant. S. The gold I gave to Dromio is laid up Safe at the Centaur; and the heedful slave Is wander'd forth, in care to seek me out. By computation and mine host's report, I could not speak with Dromio since at first I sent him from the mart.-See, here he comes. Enter DROMIO of Syracuse.

How now, sir! is your merry humour alter'd? As you love strokes, so jest with me again. You know no Centaur? you receiv'd no gold?

and as referring to that which has become "stale," flavourless, unpalatable, rejected. Adriana means that she, as his wife, forms a safe shelter whence he may aim at other "deer;" and that she herself has become unfresh, unattractive to him. 16. Otherwhere. See Note 2, Act ii.

17. What lets it but he would be here? 'What prevents his being here?' To "let" was formerly used for to prevent, to hinder.

18. Would that alone, alone he would detain. Misprinted in the first Folio, Would that alone, a loue he would detaine ;' but Shakespeare has elsewhere the repetition of "alone:' "Yet I alone, alone do me oppose," &c., "John," iii. 1; and, "But I alone, alone must sit and pine,' Lucrece," 114. 19. I see the jewel best enamelled, &c. This passage, down

Your mistress sent to have me home to dinner?
My house was at the Phoenix? Wast thou mad,
That thus so madly thou didst answer me?
Dro. S. What answer, sir? when spake I such
a word?

Well, sir, I thank you.

Ant. S. Dro. S. Marry, sir, for this something that you gave me for nothing.

Thank me, sir! for what?

Ant. S. I'll make you amends next, to give you

Dro. S. I did not see you since you sent me hence,

Home to the Centaur, with the gold you gave me. Ant. S. Villain, thou didst deny the gold's receipt,

And told'st me of a mistress and a dinner;
For which, I hope, thou felt'st I was displeas'd.

Dro. S. I am glad to see you in this merry vein: What means this jest? I pray you, master, tell me. Ant. S. Yea, dost thou jeer and flout me in the teeth?

Think'st thou I jest? Hold, take thou that, and [Beating him.

that.

Dro. S. Hold, sir, for Heaven's sake! now your jest is earnest:

Upon what bargain do you give it me?

Ant. S. Because that I familiarly sometimes Do use you for my fool, and chat with you, Your sauciness will jest upon my love, And make a common of my serious hours, 20 When the sun shines let foolish gnats make sport, But creep in crannies when he hides his beams. If you will jest with me, know my aspect, And fashion your demeanour to my looks, Or I will beat this method in your sconce. Dro. S. Sconce call you it? so you would leave battering, I had rather have it a head: an you use these blows long, I must get a sconce for my head, and ensconce it too; 21 or else I shall seek my wit in my shoulders. But, I pray, sir, why am I beaten ?

Ant. S. Dost thou not know?

Dro. S. Nothing, sir, but that I am beaten.
Ant. S. Shall I tell you why?

Dro. S. Ay, sir, and wherefore; for they say every why hath a wherefore.

Ant. S. Why, first,—for flouting me; and then, wherefore,

For urging it the second time to me.

Dro. S. Was there ever any man thus beaten out of season, When in the why and the wherefore is neither rhyme nor reason?

time?

Dro. S.

Let's hear it.

There's no time for a man to recover his hair that grows bald by nature.

Ant. S. May he not do it by fine and recovery ? 23 Dro. S. Yes, to pay a fine for a periwig, and recover the lost hair of another man.

Ant. S. Why is Time such a niggard of hair, being, as it is, so plentiful an excrement?

Dro. S. Because it is a blessing that he bestows on beasts: and what he hath scanted men in hair, he hath given them in wit.

Ant. S. Why, but there's many a man hath more hair than wit.

Dro. S. Not a man of those, but he hath the wit to lose his hair.

Ant. S. Why, thou didst conclude hairy men plain dealers, without wit.

Dro. S. The plainer dealer, the sooner lost: yet he loseth it in a kind of jollity. Ant. S. For what reason?

on the word "sconce" in its meaning of 'head,' and in its meaning of 'a protective fortification;' also he uses the word "ensconce" in its sense of 'hide,' and 'cover as with a fort.' 22. Lest it make you choleric, &c. It was a tenet of the time that "dry," or over-roasted meat, produced irritability and anger.

23. By fine and recovery. See Note 19, Act iv., "Merry Wives." 24. Falsing. To "false" is a verb used by Shakespeare ;