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The beafts, the fishes, and the winged fowls,
Are their male's fubjects, and at their controls:
Men, more divine, the masters of all these,
Lords of the wide world, and wide wat'ry feas,
Endu'd with intellectual fenfe and foul,
Of more preheminence than fish and fowl,
Are masters to their females, and their lords:
Then let your will attend on their accords.

Adr. This fervitude makes you to keep unwed.
Luc. Not this, but troubles of the marriage-bed.

Adr. But, were you wedded, you would bear fome sway.
Luc. Ere I learn love I'll practise to obey.

Adr. How if your husband start some other where ?
Luc. 'Till he come home again I would forbear.

Adr. Patience unmov'd, no marvel though the pause;
They can be meek that have no other cause:
A wretched foul, bruis'd with adverfity,

We bid be quiet when we hear it cry;

But were we burden'd with like weight of pain,
As much, or more we should ourselves complain;
So thou, that haft no unkind mate to grieve thee,
With urging helpless patience would'st relieve me :
But if thou live to be 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.

SCENE II.

Enter Dromio Eph.

Adr. Say, is your tardy master now at hand?

E. Dro. Nay, he's at two hands with me, and that my two ears can witnefs.

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

E. Dro. Ay, ay, he told his mind upon mine ear;

Befhrew his hand, I fcarce could understand it.

Luc.

Luc. Spake he fo doubtfully, thou could'st not feel his meaning? E. Dro. Nay, he ftruck fo plainly, I could too well feel his blows; and withal fo doubtfully, that I could scarce understand

them.

Adr. But fay, I pr'ythee, is he coming home?

It seems, he hath great care to please his wife.

E. Dro. Why, mistress, fure, my master is horn-mad.
Adr. Horn-mad, thou villain?

E. Dro. I mean not, cuckold-mad; but, fure, stark mad: When I defir'd him to come home to dinner,

He ask'd me for a thousand marks in gold:

'Tis dinner-time, quoth I; my gold, quoth he:
Your meat doth burn, quoth I; my gold, quoth he:
Will you come home, quoth I? my gold, quoth he:
Where is the thousand marks I gave thee, villain?
The pig, quoth I, is burn'd; my gold, quoth he.
My mistress, fir, quoth I; hang up thy mistress;
Thy mistress I know not; out on thy mistress:
Luc. Quoth who?

E. Dro. Why, quoth my master:

I know, quoth he, no house, no wife, no mistress

So that my errand, due unto my tongue,

I thank him, I bare home upon my shoulders:

For in conclufion, he did beat me there.

;

Adr. Go back again, thou flave, and fetch him home.
E. Dro. Go back again, and be new beaten home?

For god's fake, fend fome other meffenger.

Adr. Back, flave, or I will break thy pate across.

E. Dro. And he will blefs that cross with other beating:
Between you I fhall have a holy head.

Adr. Hence, prating peasant, fetch thy master home.
E. Dro. Am I fo round with you as you with me,

That like a foot-ball you do fpurn me thus?
You fpurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither:
If I last in this service, you must case me in leather.

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[Exit.

SCENE

SCENE III.

Luc. Fie, how impatience loureth in your face!
Adr. His company must do his minions grace,
Whilft I at home ftarve for a merry look: .
Hath homely age th' alluring beauty took
From my poor cheek? then he hath wasted it.
Are my difcourfes dull? barren my wit?
If voluble and sharp discourse be marr'd,
Unkindness blunts it, more than marble hard.
Do their gay veftments his affections bait?
That's not my fault; he's master of my ftate.
What ruins are in me that can be found
By him not ruin'd? then is he the ground
Of
my defeatures. My decayed fair

A funny look of his would foon repair.

But, too unruly deer, he breaks the pale,

And feeds from home; poor I am but his ftale.
Luc. Self-harming jealoufy; fie, beat it hence.

Adr. Unfeeling fools can with fuch wrongs dispense:
I know, his eye doth homage other-where ;
Or else what lets it but he would be here?
Sister, you know he promis'd me a chain,
Would, that alone alas! he would detain,
So he would keep fair quarter with his bed.
I fee, the jewel best enameled

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 falfhood 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 ferve mad jealousy! [Exeunt.

SCENE

Ant.

T

SCENE IV.

The Street.

Enter Antipholis of Syracuse.

HE gold I gave to Dromio is lay'd up
Safe at the centaur; and the heedful flave

Is wander'd forth in care to feek me out.

By computation, and mine hoft's report,
I could not speak with Dromio, fince at first
I fent him from the mart. See, here he comes.

Enter Dromio of Syracufe.

How now,
fir? is your merry humour alter'd?
As you love ftrokes, fo jeft with me again.
You know no centaur? you receiv'd no gold?
Your mistress fent to have me home to dinner?
My house was at the phoenix? waft thou mad,
That thus fo madly thou didft answer me?

S. Dro. What answer, fir? when spake I such a word?
Ant. Even now, even here, not half an hour fince.
S. Dro. I did not fee you fince you sent me hence
Home to the centaur, with the gold you gave me.
Ant. Villain, thou didft deny the gold's receipt,
And told❜ft me of a mistress, and a dinner;
For which, I hope, thou felt'ft I was difpleas'd.

S. Dro. I'm glad to fee you in this merry vein:
What means this jeft? I pray you, master, tell me.
Ant. Yea, doft thou jeer, and flout me in the teeth?
Think'ft thou I jeft? hold, take thou that, and that. [Beats Dro.
S. Dro. Hold, fir, for god's fake, now your jeft is earnest;
Upon what bargain do you give it me?

Ant. Because that I familiarly fometimes Do ufe you for my fool, and chat with you, Your fauciness will jeft upon my love,

Ddd 2

And

And make a comedy of my serious hours.

But

When the fun fhines let foolish
fhines let foolish gnats make sport,
creep in crannies when he hides his beams:
If you
will jeft with me, know my aspect,
And fashion your demeanour to my looks;
Or I will beat this method in your sconce.
But foft; who wafts us yonder? *

awafts us yonder?

S. Dro. Sconce, call you it? fo you would leave battering, I had rather have it a head; an you use these blows long, I must get a fconce for my head, and enfconce it too, or else I fhall feek my wit in my fhoulders: but, I pray, fir, why am I beaten?

Ant. Doft thou not know?

S. Dro. Nothing, fir, but that I am beaten.

Ant. Shall I tell you why?

S. Dro. Ay, fir, and wherefore; for, they fay, every why hath a wherefore.

Ant. Why, firft, for flouting me; and then, wherefore, for urging it the second time to me, S. Dro. Was there ever any man thus beaten out of season,

When in the why and wherefore is neither rhime nor reason?

Well, fir, I thank you.

Ant. Thank me, fir, for what?

S. Dro. Marry, fir, for this fomething that you gave me for nothing.

Ant. I'll make you amends next, to give you nothing for fomething. But fay, fr, is it dinner-time?

S. Dro. No, fir; I think, the meat wants that I have.

Ant. In good time, fir, what's that?

S. Dro. Bafting.

Ant. Well, fir, then 'twill be dry.

S. Dro. If it be, fir, I pray you, eat not of it.

Ant. Your reason?

S. Dro. Left it make you cholerick, and purchase me another dry bafting.

Ant. Well, fir, learn to jeft in good time; there's a time for all things.

S. Dro. I durft have deny'd that, before you were so cholerick.

Ant. By what rule, fir?

S. Dro. Marry, fir, by a rule as plain as the plain bald pate of father Time himself.
Ant. Let's hear it.

S. Dro. There's no time for a man to recover his hair that grows bald by nature.
Ant. May he not do it by fine and recovery?

S. Dro. Yes, to pay a fine for a peruke, and recover the loft hair of another man.

Ant. Why is Time fuch a niggard of hair, being, as it is, fo plentiful an excrement?

S. Dro. Because it is a bleffing that he beftows on beafts; and what he hath fcanted them in hair, he hath given them in wit.

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

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

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

S. Dro. The plainer dealer, the fooner loft; yet he lofeth it in a kind of jollity.

Ant. For what reafon ?

S. Dro. For two, and found ones too.

Ant. Nay, not found ones, I pray you.

S. Dro. Sure ones then.

Ant. Nay, not fure in a thing falfing.

S. Dro. Certain ones then.

Ant. Name them.

S. Dro. The one, to fave the money that he fpends in tiring; the other, that at dinner they fhould not drop in his porridge.

Ant.

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