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Adr. [within.] Who is that at the door that keeps all this noise?
S. Dro. By my troth, your town is troubled with unruly boys.
E. Ant. Are you there, wife? you might have come before.
Adr. Your wife, fir knave! go, get you from the gate.*
E. Ant. Go, get thee gone, fetch me an iron crow.
Bal. Have patience, fir: o, let it not be thus.
Herein you war against your reputation,
And draw within the compafs of fufpect
Th' unviolated honour of your wife.

Once, this; your long experience of her wisdom,
Her fober virtue, years, and modefty,

Plead on her part fome caufe to you unknown;
And doubt not, fir, but fhe will well excufe
Why at this time the doors are barr'd against you.
Be rul'd by me, depart in patience,

And let us to the tiger all to dinner,

And about evening come yourself alone,
To know the reason of this strange restraint.

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go, get you from the gate.

S. Dro. If you went in pain, mafter, this knave would go fore.

Ang. Here is neither cheer, fir, nor welcome; we would fain have either.
Bal. In debating which was beft, we fhall part with neither.

E. Dro. They ftand at the door, master; bid them welcome hither.

E. Ant. There's fomething in the wind that we cannot get in.

S. Dro. You would fay fo, mafter, if your garments were thin.

Your cake here is warm within: you ftand here in the cold.
It would make a man as mad as buck to be so bought and fold.

E. Ant. Go, fetch me fomething, I'll break ope the gate.

S. Dro. Break any breaking here, and I'll break your knave's pate.

E. Dro. A man may break a word with you, fir, and words are but wind;

Ay, and break it in your face, fo he break it not behind.

S. Dro. It feems, thou wanteft breaking; out upon thee, hind!

E. Dro. Here's too much out upon thee; I pray thee, let me in.

E. Dro. Ay, when fowls have no feathers, and fish have no fin.

E. Ant. Well, I'll break in; gc, borrow me a crow.
E. Dro. A crow without feather, mafter, mean you fo?
For a fish without a fin, there's a fowl without a feather:
If a crow help us in, firrah, we'll pluck a crow together.
E. Ant. Go, get thee gone. &c.

If by ftrong hand you offer to break in
Now in the stirring paffage of the day,
A vulgar comment will be made of it;
And that fuppofed by the common rout,
Against your yet ungalled eftimation,
That may with foul intrufion enter in,

And dwell upon your grave when you are dead :
For flander lives upon fucceffion,

For ever hous'd where it once gets poffeffion.

E. Ant. You have prevail'd; I will depart in quiet,
And, in despite of wrath, mean to be merry.
I know a wench of excellent discourse,
Pretty, and witty, wild, and yet too, gentle;
There will we dine: this woman that I mean,
My wife (but, I proteft, without defert)
Hath oftentimes upbraided we withal;
To her will we to dinner. Get you home,
And fetch the chain; by this, I know, 'tis made;
Bring it, I pray you, to the porcupine;

For there's the houfe: that chain I will beftow,
(Be it for nothing but to fpite my wife).

Upon mine hoftefs there. Good fir, make hafte :
Since my own doors refufe to entertain me,

I'll knock elsewhere, to see if they'll difdain me.

Ang. I'll meet you at that place, fome hour, fir, hence.
E. Ant. Do fo; this jeft fhall coft me fome expence. [Exe.

Luc.

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The Houfe of Antipholis of Ephefus.
Enter Luciana, with Antipholis of Syracufe.

ND may it be, that you have quite forgot
A husband's office? fhall, Antipholis, hate
Ev'n in the spring of love, thy love-springs rot?

Eee 2

Shall

If

Shall love, in building, grow fo ruinate?

you did wed my fifter for her wealth,

Then for her wealth's-fake ufe her with more kindness;

Or, if you like elsewhere, do it by stealth,

Muffle your falfe love with fome fhow of blindness; Let not my fifter read it in your eye;

Be not thy tongue thy own fhame's orator;
Look fweet, fpeak fair; become disloyalty:
Apparel vice like virtue's harbinger;

Bear a fair presence, though your heart be tainted;
Teach fin the carriage of a holy faint;
Be fecret falfe: what need fhe be acquainted?
What fimple thief brags of his own attaint?
'Tis double wrong, to truant with your bed,
And let her read it in thy looks at board:
Shame hath a bastard-fame, well managed;

Ill deeds are doubled with an evil word:
Alas, poor women! make us but believe

(Being compact of credit) that you love us; Though others have the arm, fhow us the fleeve : We in your motion turn, and you may move us. Then, gentle brother, get you in again;

Comfort my fifter, cheer her, call her wife:

'Tis holy sport, to be a little vain,

When the sweet breath of flattery conquers ftrife.

S. Ant. Sweet mistress; what your name is else I know not, Nor by what wonder you do hit of mine:

Lefs in your knowledge and your grace you show not
Than our earth's wonder, more than earth divine.
Teach me, dear creature, how to think, and speak ;
Lay open to my earthy grofs conceit,
Smother'd in errors, feeble, fhallow, weak,

The folded meaning of your words deceit ;
Against my foul's pure truth why labour you,
To make it wander in an unknown field?

Are

Are you a god? would you create me new ?

Transform me then, and to your pow'r I'll yield. But if that I am I, then, well I know,

Your weeping fifter is no wife of mine,
Nor to her bed a homage do I owe;

Far more, far more to you do I decline:
O, train me not, fweet mermaid, with thy note,
To drown me in thy fifter's flood of tears;
Sing, firen, for thyfelf, and I will dote;

Spread o'er the filver waves thy golden hairs,
And as a bed I'll take thee, and there lye:
And, in that glorious fuppofition, think
He gains by death that hath fuch means to die;
Let love, being light, be drowned if she fink.
Luc. What, are you mad, that do you reason so?
S. Ant. Not mad, but mated; how, I do not know.
Luc. It is a fault that springeth from your eye.

S. Ant. For gazing on your beams, fair fun, being by.
Luc. Gaze where you fhould, and that will clear your fight.
S. Ant. As good to wink, fweet love, as look on night.
Luc. Why call you me love? call my sister fo.
S. Ant. Thy fifter's fifter.

Luc. That's my sister.

S. Ant. No;

It is thyself, mine own felf's better part:

Mine eye's clear eye, my dear heart's dearer heart,
My food, my fortune, and my fweet hope's aim,
My fole earth's heaven, and my heaven's claim.

Luc. All this my fifter is, or else should be.
S. Ant. Call thyfelf fifter, fweet; for I mean thee:
Thee will I love, and with thee lead my life.
Thou haft no husband yet, nor I no wife;
Give me thy hand.

Luc. O, foft, fir, hold you ftill;

I'll fetch my fifter, to get her good will.

[Exit Luc.

SCENE

SCENE III.

Enter Dromio of Syracuse.

S. Ant. Why, how now, Dromio, where runn'ft thou so fast? S. Dro. Do you know me, fir? am I Dromio? am I your man? am I myself?

S. Ant. Thou art Dromio, thou art my man, thou art thyfelf. S. Dro. I am an ass, I am a woman's man, and befides myself. S. Ant. What woman's man? and how befides thyfelf? S. Dro. Marry, fir, befides myself, I am due to a woman; one that claims me, one that haunts me, one that will have me. S. Ant. What claim lays fhe to thee?

S. Dro. Marry, fir, fuch claim as you would lay to your horse; and she would have me as a beaft: not that, I being a beast, fhe would have me; but that fhe, being a very beaftly creature, lays claim to me.

S. Ant. What is she?

S. Dro. A very reverent body; ay, such a one as a man may not speak of, without he fay, fir reverence: I have but lean luck in the match; and yet is the a wond'rous fat marriage.

S. Ant. How doft thou mean, a fat marriage?

S. Dro. Marry, fir, fhe's the kitchen-wench, and all greafe, and I know not what use to put her to, but to make a lamp of her, and run from her by her own light. I warrant, her rags, and the tallow in them, will burn a Poland winter: if the lives 'till doomsday, fhe'll burn a week longer than the whole world. S. Ant. What complexion is the of?

S. Dro. Swart, like my fhoe, but her face nothing like fo clean kept; for why? fhe fweats, a man may go over-shoes in the grime of it.

S. Ant. That's a fault that water will mend.

S. Dro. No, fir, 'tis in grain; Noah's flood could not do it. S. Ant. What's her name?

S. Dro. Nell, fir; but her name and three quarters, that is, an ell and three quarters, will not measure her from hip to hip.

S. Ant.

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