Tales from Shakespeare. Charles Lamb
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“Give me your hand, before this holy friar. I am your husband, if you will marry me.”
“And when I lived I was your other wife,” said this unknown lady; and, taking off her mask, she proved to be no niece (as was pretended), but Leonato’s very daughter, the lady Hero herself. We may be sure that this proved a most agreeable surprise to Claudio, who thought her dead, so that be could scarcely for joy believe his eyes; and the prince, who was equally amazed at what he saw, exclaimed:
“Is not this Hero, Hero that was dead?” ’
Leonato replied, “She died, my lord, but while her slander lived.”
The friar promised them an explanation of this seeming miracle, after the ceremony was ended, and was proceeding to marry them when he was interrupted by Benedick, who desired to be married at the same time to Beatrice. Beatrice making some demur to this match, and Benedick challenging her with her love for him, which he had learned from Hero, a pleasant explanation took place; and they found they had both been tricked into a belief of love, which had never existed, and had become lovers in truth by the power of a false jest. But the affection which a merry invention had cheated them into was grown too powerful to be shaken by a serious explanation; and since Benedick proposed to marry, he was resolved to think nothing to the purpose that the world could say against it; and he merrily kept up the jest and swore to Beatrice that he took her but for pity, and because he heard she was dying of love for him; and Beatrice protested that she yielded but upon great persuasion, and partly to save his life, for she heard he was in a consumption. So these two mad wits were reconciled and made a match of it, after Claudio and Hero were married; and to complete the history, Don John, the contriver of the villainy, was taken in his flight and brought back to Messina; and a @@brave punishment it was to this gloomy, discontented man to see the joy and feastings which, by the disappointment of his plots, took place in the palace in Messina.
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