And at her heels a huge infectious troop
Of pale diftemperatures, and foes to life.
In food, in fport, and life-preferving reft,
To be difturbed, would mad or man or beaft:
The confequence is then, thy jealous fits
Have scared thy husband from the use of wits.
Luc. She never reprehended him but mildly,
When he demeaned himself rough, rude and wildly;
Why bear you these rebukes, and answer not?
Adr. She did betray me to my own reproof.
Good people, enter, and lay hold on him,

Abb. No, not a creature enters in my house. Adr. Then let your fervants bring my husband 'forth.

Abb. Neither; he took this place for fanctuary,
And it shall privilege him from your hands;
'Till I have brought him to his wits again,
Or lofe my labour in aflaying it.

Adr. I will attend my husband, be his nurse,
Diet his ficknefs, for it is my office;
And will have no attorney but myfelf;

And therefore let me have him home with me,
Abb. Be patient, for I will not let him stir,
'Till I have used th' approved means I have,
With wholesome firups, drugs, and holy prayers i
To make of him a formal man again;

It is a branch and parcel of mine oath,
A charitable duty of my order;

Therefore depart, and leave him here with me.
Adr. I will not hence, and leave my husband here;
And ill it doth befeem your holiness
To feparate the husband and the wife.

Abb. Be quiet and depart, thou shalt not have him. Luc. Complain unto the Duke of this indignity. [Exit Abbefs

Adr. Come, go; I will fall proftrate at his feet,

And never rise until my tears and prayers
Have won his Grace to come in perfon hither,
And take perforce my husband from the Abbefs. !
Mer. By this, I think, the dial points at five:
Anon, I'm fure, the Duke himself in perfon
Comes this way to the melancholy vale;
The place of death and forry execution, (21)
Behind the ditches of the Abbey here.
Ang. Upon what caufe?

Mer. To fee a reverend Syracufan merchant,
Who put unluckily into this bay

Against the laws and ftatutes of this town,
Beheaded publicly for his offence.

Ang. See where they come; we will behold his

death.

Luc, Kneel to the Duke before he pass the Abbey.

Enter the Duke, and ÆGEON bare-beaded; with the
Headfman, and other Officers.

Duke. Yet once again proclaim it publicly,
If any friend will pay the fum for him,
He fhall not die, fo much we tender him.

Adr. Juftice, most facred Duke, against the Abbess.
Duke. She is a virtuous and reverend Lady:
It cannot be that fhe hath done thee wrong.
Adr. May it pleafe your Grace, Antipholis my
husband,

(Whom I made Lord of me and all I had,
At your important letters) this ill day
A most outrageous fit of madness took him;
That defperately he hurried through the street,
With him his bond-man all as mad as he,

(21) The place of death and forry execution ] i. e. dimal, lamentable, to be grieved at. In the like acceptations our Poet employs it again, where Macbeth, after the murder of Duncan, is looking on his own bloody hands:

This is a forry fight.

Doing difpleasure to the citizens,

By ruthing in their houses; bearing thence
Rings, jewels, any thing his rage did like.'
Once did I get him bound, and sent him home,
Whilft to take order for the wrongs, I went,
That here and there his fury had committed:
Anon, I wot not by what strong escape,

He broke from thofe that had the guard of him;
And, with his mad attendant and himself,
Each one with ireful paffion, with drawn words,
Met us again, and, madly bent on us,

Chaced us away; 'till, raifing of more aid,
We came again to bind them; then they fled
Into this abbey, whither we pursued them;
And here the Abbeis fhuts the gates on us,
And will not fuffer us to fetch him out,

[wars,

Nor fend him forth, that we may bear him hence...
Therefore, moft gracious Duke, with thy command,
Let him be brought forth, and borne hence for help.
Duke. Long fince thy husband served me in my
And I to thee engaged a Prince's word,
(When thou didit make him master of thy bed,)
To do him all the grace and good I could.
Go, fome of you, knock at the abbey-gate;
And bid the Lady Abbefs come to me.
I will determine this before I stir.

Enter a Meffenger.

Me O mistress, mistress, shift and fave yourself; My master and his man are both broke loose, Beaten the maids a-row, and bound the doctor, Whofe beard they have finged off with brands of And ever as it blazed, they threw on him [fire; Great pails of puddled mire to quench the hair; My maiter preaches patience to him, and the while His man with fciffars nicks him like a fool:

And, fure, unless you fend fome prefent help,
Between them they will kill the conjurer.

Adr. Peace, fool, thy master and his man are here, And that is falfe thou doft report to us.

Meff. Miftrefs, upon my life I tell you true; I have not breathed almoft fince I did fee it. He cries for you, and vows if he can take you, To fcorch your face, and to disfigure you.

[Gry within. Hark, hark, I hear him, Miftrefs; fly, be gone. Duke. Come, ftand by me, fear nothing: guard

with halberds.

Adr. Ay me, it is my husband; witnefs you,
That he is borne about invisible!

Even now we houfed him in the Abbey here,
And now he's there, past thought of human reason.
Enter ANTIPHOLIS and DROMIO of Ephesus.

t

E. Ant. Justice, moft gracious Duke, oh, grant me justice,

Even for the service that long fince I did thee,
When I beftrid thee in the wars, and took
Deep icars to fave thy life; even for the blood
That then I loft for thee now grant me justice.
Egeon. Unless the fear of death doth make me
I fee my fon Antipholis, and Dromio. [dote,
E. Ant. Juftice, fweet Prince, against that woman
there,

She whom thou gavest to me to be my wife,
That hath abufed and difhonoured me,

Even in the ftrength and height of injury :
Beyond imagination is the wrong

That the this day hath fhameless thrown on me.
Duke. Difcover how, and thou fhalt find me juft.
E. Ant. This day, great Duke, she shut the doors
upon me;

Whilst the with harlots feafted in my houfe. [fo?
Duke. A grievous fault; fay, woman, didit thou
Adr. No, my good Lord: myfelf, he; and my fifter,
To-day did dine together: fo befal my foul,
As this is falfe he burdens me withal!

Lac. Ne'er may I look on day, nor fleep on night,
But he tells to your Highness fimple truth!
Ang. O perjured women! they are both forfworn,
In this the madman juftly chargeth them.

E. Ant. My Liege, I am advised what I fay, Neither difturbed with the effect of wine, Nor, heady rath, provoked with raging ire; Albeit my wrongs might make one-wiler mad. This woman locked me out this day from dinner; That goldfmith there, were he not packed with her, Could witness it; for he was with me then, Who parted with me to go fetch a chain, Promifing to bring it to the Porcupine, Where Balthazar and I did dine together. Our dinner done, and he not coming thither, I went to feek him; in the street I met him, And in his company that gentleman:

There did this perjured goldfmith fwear me down, That I this day from him received the chain; Which, God he knows, I faw not; for the which, He did arreft me with an officer.

I did obey, and fent my peafant home

For certain ducats; he with none returned.
Then fairly I bespoke the officer,

Το go in perfon with me to my houfe.

By

the way we met my wife, her fifter, and:

A rabble more of vile confederates;

They brought one Pinch, a hungry lean-faced vil--
A mere anatomy, a mountebank,

A thread-bare juggler, and a fortune-teller,
A needy, hollow-eyed, fharp-looking wretch,-

VOL. IV.

Ef

[lain,