William Shakespeare - Ultimate Collection: Complete Plays & Poetry in One Volume. William Shakespeare
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But I will none of them; they are for you.
I would have had them writ more movingly.
VALENTINE.
Please you, I’ll write your ladyship another.
SILVIA.
And when it’s writ, for my sake read it over;
And if it please you, so; if not, why, so.
VALENTINE.
If it please me, madam, what then?
SILVIA.
Why, if it please you, take it for your labour.
And so good morrow, servant.
[Exit.]
SPEED.
O jest unseen, inscrutable, invisible,
As a nose on a man’s face, or a weathercock on a steeple!
My master sues to her; and she hath taught her suitor,
He being her pupil, to become her tutor.
O excellent device! Was there ever heard a better,
That my master, being scribe, to himself should write the letter?
VALENTINE.
How now, sir! What are you reasoning with yourself?
SPEED.
Nay, I was rhyming: ‘tis you that have the reason.
VALENTINE.
To do what?
SPEED.
To be a spokesman from Madam Silvia.
VALENTINE.
To whom?
SPEED.
To yourself; why, she woos you by a figure.
VALENTINE.
What figure?
SPEED.
By a letter, I should say.
VALENTINE.
Why, she hath not writ to me?
SPEED.
What need she, when she hath made you write to yourself?
Why, do you not perceive the jest?
VALENTINE.
No, believe me.
SPEED. No believing you indeed, sir. But did you perceive her earnest?
VALENTINE.
She gave me none except an angry word.
SPEED.
Why, she hath given you a letter.
VALENTINE.
That’s the letter I writ to her friend.
SPEED.
And that letter hath she delivered, and there an end.
VALENTINE.
I would it were no worse.
SPEED.
I’ll warrant you ‘tis as well.
‘For often have you writ to her; and she, in modesty,
Or else for want of idle time, could not again reply;
Or fearing else some messenger that might her mind discover,
Herself hath taught her love himself to write unto her lover.’
All this I speak in print, for in print I found it.
Why muse you, sir? ‘Tis dinner time.
VALENTINE.
I have dined.
SPEED. Ay, but hearken, sir; though the chameleon Love can feed on the air, I am one that am nourished by my victuals, and would fain have meat. O! be not like your mistress! Be moved, be moved.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE 2. Verona. A room in JULIA’S house.
[Enter PROTEUS and JULIA.]
PROTEUS.
Have patience, gentle Julia.
JULIA.
I must, where is no remedy.
PROTEUS.
When possibly I can, I will return.
JULIA.
If you turn not, you will return the sooner.
Keep this remembrance for thy Julia’s sake.
[Gives him a ring.]
PROTEUS.
Why, then, we’ll make exchange. Here, take you this.
[Gives her another.]
JULIA.
And seal the bargain with a holy kiss.
PROTEUS.
Here is my hand for my true constancy;
And when that hour o’erslips me in the day
Wherein I sigh not, Julia, for thy sake,
The next ensuing hour some foul mischance
Torment me for my love’s forgetfulness!
My father stays my coming; answer not;
The tide is now: nay, not thy tide of tears:
That tide will stay me longer than I should.
Julia, farewell!
[Exit JULIA.]
What, gone without a word?
Ay, so true love should do: it cannot speak;
For truth hath better deeds than words to grace it.
[Enter PANTHINO.]
PANTHINO.
Sir Proteus, you are stay’d for.
PROTEUS.
Go; I come, I come.
Alas! this parting strikes poor lovers dumb.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE 3. The same. A street
[Enter LAUNCE, leading a dog.]
LAUNCE. Nay, ‘twill be this hour ere I have done weeping; all the kind of the Launces have this very fault. I have received my proportion, like the prodigious son, and am going with Sir Proteus to the imperial’s court. I think Crab my dog be the sourest-natured dog that lives: my mother weeping, my father wailing, my sister crying, our maid howling, our cat wringing her hands, and all our house in a great perplexity; yet did not this cruel-hearted cur shed one tear. He is a stone, a very pebble stone, and has no more pity in him than a dog; a Jew would have wept to have seen our parting; why, my grandam having no eyes, look you, wept herself blind at my parting. Nay, I’ll show you the manner of it. This shoe is my father; no, this left shoe is my father; no, no, left shoe is my mother; nay, that cannot be so neither; yes, it is so, it is so, it hath the worser sole. This shoe with the hole in it is my mother, and this my father. A vengeance on ‘t! There ‘tis: now, sir, this staff is my sister, for, look you, she is as white as a lily and as small as a wand; this hat is Nan our maid; I am the dog; no, the dog is himself, and I am the dog—O! the dog is me, and I am myself; ay, so, so. Now come I to my father: ‘Father, your blessing.’ Now should not the shoe speak a word for weeping; now should I kiss my father; well, he weeps on. Now come I to my mother;—O, that she could speak now like a wood woman! Well, I kiss her; why there ‘tis; here’s my mother’s breath up and down. Now come I to my sister; mark the moan she makes. Now the dog all this while sheds not a tear, nor speaks a word; but see how I lay the dust with my tears.
[Enter PANTHINO.]
PANTHINO. Launce, away, away, aboard! Thy master is shipped, and thou art to post after with oars. What’s the matter? Why weep’st thou, man? Away, ass! You’ll lose the tide if you tarry any longer.
LAUNCE. It