Lucio.

Enter LUCIO.

Friar, where is the Provost ?
Duke.

Good even!

Not within, sir.

Lucio. O, pretty Isabella, I am pale at mine heart, to see thine eyes so red: thou must be patient: I am fain to dine and sup with water and bran; I dare not for my head fill my belly; one fruitful meal would set me to't: But they say the duke will be here to-morrow. By my troth, Isabel, I lov'd thy brother: if the old fantastical duke of dark corners had been at home, he had lived. [Exit ISABELLA.

Duke. Sir, the duke is marvellous little beholden to your reports; but the best is, he lives not in them.

Laucio. Friar, thou knowest not the duke so well as I do: he's a better woodman than thou takest him for.

Duke. Well, you'll answer this one day. Fare ye well.

Lucio. Nay, tarry; I'll go along with thee; I can tell thee pretty tales of the duke.

Duke. You have told me too many of him already, sir, if they be true; if not true, none were enough.

Lucio. I was once before him for getting a wench with child.

Duke. Did you such a thing?

Lucio. Yes, marry, did I; but was fain to forswear it; they would else have married me to the rotten medlar.

Duke. Sir, your company is fairer than honest: Rest you well.

Lucio. By my troth, I'll go with thee to the lane's end: If bawdy talk offend you, we'll have very little of it: Nay, friar, I am a kind of burr, I shall stick. [Exeunt.

SCENE IV. A Room in Angelo's House.

Enter ANGELO and ESCALUS.

Escal. Every letter he hath writ hath disvouch'd other.

Ang. In most uneven and distracted manner. His actions show much like to madness: 'pray

heaven, his wisdom be not tainted! And why meet him at the gates, and re-deliver our authorities there?

Escal. I guess not.

Ang. And why should we proclaim it in an hour before his entering, that, if any crave redress of injustice, they should exhibit their petitions in the street?

Escal. He shows his reason for that: to have a despatch of complaints; and to deliver us from devices hereafter, which shall then have no power to stand against us.

Ang. Well, I beseech you, let it be proclaim'd: Betimes i' the morn, I'll call you at your house: Give notice to such men of sort and suit,

As are to meet him.

Escal.

I shall, sir: fare you well.

[Exit. Ang. Good night.[pregnant, This deed unshapes me quite, makes me unAnd dull to all proceedings. A deflower'd maid! And by an eminent body, that enforc'd

The law against it!-But that her tender shame Will not proclaim against her maiden loss, How might she tongue me? Yet reason dares her?-no:

For my authority bears a credent bulk,

That no particular scandal once can touch, But it confounds the breather. He should have liv'd, [sense, Save that his riotous youth, with dangerous Might, in the times to come, have ta'en revenge, By so receiving a dishonour'd life,

With ransom of such shame. 'Would yet he had liv'd!

Alack, when once our grace we have forgot, Nothing goes right; we would, and we would

not.

SCENE V. Fields without the Town.

[Exit.

Enter Duke in his own habit, and FRIAR PETER. Duke. These letters at fit time deliver me. [Giving letters. The provost knows our purpose, and our plot. The matter being afoot, keep your instruction,

And hold you ever to our special drift; Though sometimes you do blench from this to that,

As cause doth minister. Go, call at Flavius' house,

And tell him where I stay: give the like notice To Valentinus, Rowland, and to Crassus,

And bid them bring the trumpets to the gate; › But send me Flavius first.

F. Peter.

It shall be speeded well. [Exit Friar.

Enter VARRIUS.

Duke. I thank thee, Varrius; thou hast made good haste:

Come, we will walk : There's other of our friends Will greet us here anon, my gentle Varrius.

[Exeunt. SCENE VI. Street near the City Gate.

Enter ISABELLA and MARIANĄ.

Isab. To speak so indirectly, I am loath;, I would say the truth; but to accuse him so, That is your part: Yet I'm advis'd to do it; He says, to 'vailfull purpose.

Mari.

Be rul'd by him.
Isab. Besides, he tells me, that, if peradventure
He speak against me on the adverse side,
I should not think it strange; for 'tis a physick,
That's bitter to sweet end.

Mari. I would, friar Peter
Isab.

O, peace; the friar is come.

Enter FRIAR PETER.

F. Peter. Come, I have found you out a stand most fit,

Where you may have such vantage on the duke, He shall not pass you; Twice have the trumpets sounded;

The generous and gravest citizens

Have hent the gates, and very near upon

The duke is ent'ring; therefore hence, away.

[Exeunt.

ACT V.

SCENE I. A publick Place near the City Gate. MARIANA (veil'd), ISABELLA, and PETER, at a distance. Enter at opposite doors, Duke, VARRIUS, Lords; ANGELO, ESCALUS, LUCIO, Provost, Officers, and Citizens.

Duke. My very worthy cousin, fairly met:Our old and faithful friend, we are glad to see you. Ang. and Escal. Happy return be to your royal grace!

Duke. Many and hearty thankings to you both. We have made inquiry of you; and we hear Such goodness of your justice, that our soul Cannot but yield you forth to publick thanks, Forerunning more requital.

Ang.

You make my bonds still greater. Duke. O, your desert speaks loud; and I should wrong it,

To lock it in the wards of covert bosom,
When it deserves with characters of brass
A forted residence, 'gainst the tooth of time,
And razure of oblivion: Give me your hand,
And let the subject see, to make them know
That outward courtesies would fain proclaim
Favours that keep within.-Come, Escalus;
You must walk by us on our other hand;-
And good supporters are you.

PETER and ISABELLA come forward.

F. Peter. Now is your time; speak loud, and kneel before him.

Isab. Justice, O royal duke! Vail your regard
Upon a wrong'd, I'd fain have said, a maid!
O worthy prince, dishonour not your eye
By throwing it on any other object,

Till you have heard me in my true complaint,
And given me, justice, justice, justice, justice!
Duke. Relate your wrongs: In what? By
whom? Be brief:
Here is Lord Angelo shall give you justice!
Reveal yourself to him.

Isab.

O, worthy duke,

You bid me seek redemption of the devil:

Hear me yourself; for that which I must speak
Must either punish me, not being believ'd,
Or wring redress from you; hear me, O, hear
me, here.

Ang. My lord, her wits, I fear me, are not firm: She hath been a suitor to me for her brother, Cut off by course of justice.

Isab.
By course of justice!
Ang. And she will speak most bitterly, and

strange. [speak: Isab. Most strange, but yet most truly, will I 'That Angelo's forsworn; is it not strange? That Angelo's a murderer; is't not strange? That Angelo is an adulterous thief,

A hypocrite, a virgin-violator;

Is it not strange, and strange?

Duke.

Nay, ten times strange. Isab. It is not truer he is Angelo, Than this is all as true as it is strange : Nay, it is ten times true; for truth is truth To the end of reckoning.

Duke. Away with her :-Poor soul, She speaks this in the infirmity of sense.

Isab. O prince, I conjure thee, as thou believ'st There is another comfort than this world, That thou neglect me not, with that opinion That I am touch'd with madness: make not impossible

That which but seems unlike: 'tis not impossible,
But one, the wicked'st caitiff on the ground,
May seem as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute,
As Angelo; even so may Angelo,

In all his dressings, characts, titles, forms,
Be an archvillain: believe it, royal prince,
If he be less, he's nothing; but he's more,
Had I more name for badness.

Duke.
By mine honesty,
If she be mad (as I believe no other),
Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense,
Such a dependency of thing on thing,

As e'er I heard in madness.

Isab.

O, gracious duke,

Harp not on that; nor do not banish reason
For inequality: but let your reason serve
To make the truth appear, where it seems hid;
And hide the false, seems true.