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SCENE:
A city in Illyria; and the sea-coast near it
ACT I. SCENE I.
The DUKE’S palace
Enter ORSINO, Duke of Illyria, CURIO, and other LORDS; MUSICIANS attending
DUKE. If music be the food of love, play on, Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken and so die.
That strain again! It had a dying fall; O, it came o’er my ear like the sweet sound That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing and giving odour! Enough, no more; ‘Tis not so sweet now as it was before. O spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou! That, notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there, Of what validity and pitch soe’er,
But falls into abatement and low price Even in a minute. So full of shapes is fancy, That it alone is high fantastical.
CURIO. Will you go hunt, my lord? DUKE. What, Curio?
CURIO. The hart.
DUKE. Why, so I do, the noblest that I have. O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first, Methought she purg’d the air of pestilence! That instant was I turn’d into a hart, And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds, E’er since pursue me.
Enter VALENTINE
How now! what news from her?
VALENTINE. So please my lord, I might not be admitted, But from her handmaid do return this answer: The element itself, till seven years’ heat, Shall not behold her face at ample view; But like a cloistress she will veiled walk, And water once a day her chamber round With eye-offending brine; all this to season A brother’s dead love, which she would keep fresh And lasting in her sad remembrance.
DUKE. O, she that hath a heart of that fine frame To pay this debt of love but to a brother, How will she love when the rich golden shaft Hath kill’d the flock of all affections else That live in her; when liver, brain, and heart, These sovereign thrones, are all supplied and fill’d, Her sweet perfections, with one self king! Away before me to sweet beds of flow’rs: Love-thoughts lie rich when canopied with bow’rs. Exeunt
SCENE II.
The sea-coast
Enter VIOLA, a CAPTAIN, and SAILORS
VIOLA. What country, friends, is this? CAPTAIN. This is Illyria, lady.
VIOLA. And what should I do in Illyria? My brother he is in Elysium.
Perchance he is not drown’d- what think you, sailors? CAPTAIN. It is perchance that you yourself were saved. VIOLA. O my poor brother! and so perchance may he be. CAPTAIN. True, madam, and, to comfort you with chance, Assure yourself, after our ship did split, When you, and those poor number saved with you, Hung on our driving boat, I saw your brother, Most provident in peril, bind himself- Courage and hope both teaching him the practice- To a strong mast that liv’d upon the sea; Where, like Arion on the dolphin’s back, I saw him hold acquaintance with the waves So long as I could see.
VIOLA. For saying so, there’s gold. Mine own escape unfoldeth to my hope,
Whereto thy speech serves for authority, The like of him. Know’st thou this country? CAPTAIN. Ay, madam, well; for I was bred and born Not three hours’ travel from this very place. VIOLA. Who governs here?
CAPTAIN. A noble duke, in nature as in name. VIOLA. What is his name?
CAPTAIN. Orsino.
VIOLA. Orsino! I have heard my father name him. He was a bachelor then.
CAPTAIN. And so is now, or was so very late; For but a month ago I went from hence, And then ’twas fresh in murmur- as, you know, What great ones do the less will prattle of- That he did seek the love of fair Olivia. VIOLA. What’s she?
CAPTAIN. A virtuous maid, the daughter of a count That died some twelvemonth since, then leaving her In the protection of his son, her brother, Who shortly also died; for whose dear love, They say, she hath abjur’d the company And sight of men.
VIOLA. O that I serv’d that lady,
And might not be delivered to the world, Till I had made mine own occasion mellow, What my estate is!
CAPTAIN. That were hard to compass, Because she will admit no kind of suit- No, not the Duke’s.
VIOLA. There is a fair behaviour in thee, Captain; And though that nature with a beauteous wall Doth oft close in pollution, yet of thee I will believe thou hast a mind that suits With this thy fair and outward character. I prithee, and I’ll pay thee bounteously, Conceal me what I am, and be my aid
For such disguise as haply shall become The form of my intent. I’ll serve this duke: Thou shalt present me as an eunuch to him; It may be worth thy pains, for I can sing And speak to him in many sorts of music, That will allow me very worth his service. What else may hap to time I will commit; Only shape thou silence to my wit.
CAPTAIN. Be you his eunuch and your mute I’ll be; When my tongue blabs, then let mine eyes not see. VIOLA. I thank thee. Lead me on. Exeunt
SCENE III.
OLIVIA’S house
Enter SIR TOBY BELCH and MARIA
SIR TOBY. What a plague means my niece to take the death of her brother thus? I am sure care’s an enemy to life. MARIA. By my troth, Sir Toby, you must come in earlier o’ nights;
your cousin, my lady, takes great exceptions to your ill hours.
SIR TOBY. Why, let her except before excepted. MARIA. Ay, but you must confine yourself within the modest limits
of order.
SIR TOBY. Confine! I’ll confine myself no finer than I am. These
clothes are good enough to drink in, and so be these boots too;
an they be not, let them hang themselves in their own straps. MARIA. That quaffing and drinking will undo you; I heard my lady
talk of it yesterday, and of a foolish knight that you brought in
one night here to be her wooer.
SIR TOBY. Who? Sir Andrew Aguecheek? MARIA. Ay, he.
SIR TOBY. He’s as tall a man as any’s in Illyria. MARIA. What’s that to th’ purpose?
SIR TOBY. Why, he has three thousand ducats a year. MARIA. Ay, but he’ll have but a year in all these ducats; he’s a
very fool and a prodigal.
SIR TOBY. Fie that you’ll say so! He plays o’ th’ viol-de-gamboys,
and speaks three or four languages word for word without book,
and hath all the good gifts of nature. MARIA. He hath indeed, almost natural; for, besides that he’s a fool, he’s a great quarreller; and but that he hath the gift of a
coward to allay the gust he hath in quarrelling, ’tis thought among the prudent he would quickly have the gift of a grave. SIR TOBY. By this hand, they are scoundrels and subtractors that
say so of him. Who are they?
MARIA. They that add, moreover, he’s drunk nightly in your company.
SIR TOBY. With drinking healths to my niece; I’ll drink to her as
long as there is a passage in my throat and drink in Illyria. He’s a coward and a coystrill that will not drink to my niece till his brains turn o’ th’ toe like a parish-top. What, wench!
Castiliano vulgo! for here comes Sir Andrew Agueface.
Enter SIR ANDREW AGUECHEEK
AGUECHEEK. Sir Toby Belch! How now, Sir Toby Belch! SIR TOBY. Sweet Sir Andrew!
AGUECHEEK. Bless you, fair shrew.
MARIA. And you too, sir.
SIR TOBY. Accost, Sir Andrew, accost. AGUECHEEK. What’s that?
SIR TOBY. My niece’s chambermaid.
AGUECHEEK. Good Mistress Accost, I desire better acquaintance. MARIA. My name is Mary, sir.
AGUECHEEK. Good Mistress Mary Accost- SIR Toby. You mistake, knight. ‘Accost’ is front her, board her,
woo her, assail her.
AGUECHEEK. By my troth, I would not undertake her in this company.
Is that the meaning of ‘accost’?
MARIA. Fare you well, gentlemen.
SIR TOBY. An thou let part so, Sir Andrew, would thou mightst never
draw sword again!
AGUECHEEK. An you part so, mistress, I would I might never draw sword again. Fair lady, do you think you have fools in hand? MARIA. Sir, I have not you by th’ hand. AGUECHEEK. Marry, but you shall have; and here’s my hand. MARIA. Now, sir, thought is free. I pray you, bring your hand to
th’ buttry-bar and let it drink.
AGUECHEEK. Wherefore, sweetheart? What’s your metaphor? MARIA. It’s dry, sir.
AGUECHEEK. Why, I think so; I am not such an ass but I can keep my
hand dry. But what’s your jest?
MARIA. A dry jest, sir.
AGUECHEEK. Are you full of them?
MARIA. Ay, sir, I have them at my fingers’ ends; marry, now I let
go your hand, I am barren. Exit MARIA SIR TOBY. O knight, thou lack’st a cup of canary! When did I see
thee so put down?
AGUECHEEK. Never in your life, I think; unless you see canary put
me down. Methinks sometimes I have no more wit than a Christian
or an ordinary man has; but I am great eater of beef, and I believe that does harm to my wit.
SIR TOBY. No question.
AGUECHEEK. An I thought that, I’d forswear it. I’ll ride home to-morrow, Sir Toby.
SIR TOBY. Pourquoi, my dear knight? AGUECHEEK. What is ‘pourquoi’- do or not do? I would I had bestowed
that time in the tongues that I have in fencing, dancing, and bear-baiting. Oh, had I but followed the arts! SIR TOBY. Then hadst thou had an excellent head of hair. AGUECHEEK. Why, would that have mended my hair? SIR TOBY. Past question; for thou seest it will not curl by nature.
AGUECHEEK. But it becomes me well enough, does’t not? SIR TOBY. Excellent; it hangs like flax on a distaff, and I hope to
see a huswife take thee between her legs and spin it off. AGUECHEEK. Faith, I’ll home to-morrow, Sir Toby. Your niece will
not be seen, or if she be, it’s four to one she’ll none of me;
the Count himself here hard by woos her. SIR TOBY. She’ll none o’ th’ Count; she’ll not match above her degree, neither in estate, years, nor wit; I have heard her swear’t. Tut, there’s life in’t, man.
AGUECHEEK. I’ll stay a month longer. I am a fellow o’ th’ strangest
mind i’ th’ world; I delight in masques and revels sometimes altogether.
SIR TOBY. Art thou good at these kickshawses, knight? AGUECHEEK. As any man in Illyria, whatsoever he be, under the degree of my betters; and yet I will not compare with an old man.
SIR TOBY. What is thy excellence in a galliard, knight? AGUECHEEK. Faith, I can cut a caper.
SIR TOBY. And I can cut the mutton to’t. AGUECHEEK. And I think I have the back-trick simply as strong as
any man in Illyria.
SIR TOBY. Wherefore are these things hid? Wherefore have these gifts a curtain before ’em? Are they like to take dust, like Mistress Mall’s picture? Why dost thou not go to church in a galliard and come home in a coranto? My very walk should be a jig; I would not so much as make water but in a sink-a-pace. What
dost thou mean? Is it a world to hide virtues in? I did think, by
the excellent constitution of thy leg, it was form’d under the
star of a galliard.
AGUECHEEK. Ay, ’tis strong, and it does indifferent well in flame-colour’d stock. Shall we set about some revels? SIR TOBY. What shall we do else? Were we not born under Taurus? AGUECHEEK. Taurus? That’s sides and heart. SIR TOBY. No, sir; it is legs and thighs. Let me see the caper. Ha,
higher! Ha, ha, excellent! Exeunt
SCENE IV.
The DUKE’S palace
Enter VALENTINE, and VIOLA in man’s attire
VALENTINE. If the Duke continue these favours towards you, Cesario,
you are like to be much advanc’d; he hath known you but three days, and already you are no stranger. VIOLA. You either fear his humour or my negligence, that you call
in question the continuance of his love. Is he inconstant, sir,
in his favours?
VALENTINE. No, believe me.
Enter DUKE, CURIO, and ATTENDANTS
VIOLA. I thank you. Here comes the Count. DUKE. Who saw Cesario, ho?
VIOLA. On your attendance, my lord, here. DUKE. Stand you awhile aloof. Cesario,
Thou know’st no less but all; I have unclasp’d To thee the book even of my secret soul. Therefore, good youth, address thy gait unto her; Be not denied access, stand at her doors, And tell them there thy fixed foot shall grow Till thou have audience.
VIOLA. Sure, my noble lord,
If she be so abandon’d to her sorrow As it is spoke, she never will admit me. DUKE. Be clamorous and leap all civil bounds, Rather than make unprofited return.
VIOLA. Say I do speak with her, my lord, what then? DUKE. O, then unfold the passion of my love, Surprise her with discourse of my dear faith! It shall become thee well to act my woes: She will attend it better in thy youth Than in a nuncio’s of more grave aspect. VIOLA. I think not so, my lord.
DUKE. Dear lad, believe it,
For they shall yet belie thy happy years That say thou art a man: Diana’s lip
Is not more smooth and rubious; thy small pipe Is as the maiden’s organ, shrill and sound, And all is semblative a woman’s part.
I know thy constellation is right apt For this affair. Some four or five attend him- All, if you will, for I myself am best When least in company. Prosper well in this, And thou shalt live as freely as thy lord To call his fortunes thine.
VIOLA. I’ll do my best
To woo your lady. [Aside] Yet, a barful strife! Whoe’er I woo, myself would be his wife.
SCENE V.
OLIVIA’S house
Enter MARIA and CLOWN
MARIA. Nay, either tell me where thou hast been, or I will not open
my lips so wide as a bristle may enter in way of thy excuse; my
lady will hang thee for thy absence. CLOWN. Let her hang me. He that is well hang’d in this world needs
to fear no colours.
MARIA. Make that good.
CLOWN. He shall see none to fear.
MARIA. A good lenten answer. I can tell thee where that saying was
born, of ‘I fear no colours.’
CLOWN. Where, good Mistress Mary?
MARIA. In the wars; and that may you be bold to say in your foolery.
CLOWN. Well, God give them wisdom that have it; and those that are
fools, let them use their talents. MARIA. Yet you will be hang’d for being so long absent; or to be
turn’d away- is not that as good as a hanging to you? CLOWN. Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage; and for turning
away, let summer bear it out.
MARIA. You are resolute, then?
CLOWN. Not so, neither; but I am resolv’d on two points. MARIA. That if one break, the other will hold; or if both break,
your gaskins fall.
CLOWN. Apt, in good faith, very apt! Well, go thy way; if Sir Toby
would leave drinking, thou wert as witty a piece of Eve’s flesh
as any in Illyria.
MARIA. Peace, you rogue, no more o’ that. Here comes my lady. Make
your excuse wisely, you were best. Exit
Enter OLIVIA and MALVOLIO
CLOWN. Wit, an’t be thy will, put me into good fooling! Those wits
that think they have thee do very oft prove fools; and I that am
sure I lack thee may pass for a wise man. For what says Quinapalus? ‘Better a witty fool than a foolish wit.’ God bless
thee, lady!
OLIVIA. Take the fool away.
CLOWN. Do you not hear, fellows? Take away the lady. OLIVIA. Go to, y’are a dry fool; I’ll no more of you. Besides, you
grow dishonest.
CLOWN. Two faults, madonna, that drink and good counsel will amend;
for give the dry fool drink, then is the fool not dry. Bid the
dishonest man mend himself: if he mend, he is no longer dishonest; if he cannot, let the botcher mend him. Anything that’s mended is but patch’d; virtue that transgresses is but patch’d with sin, and sin that amends is but patch’d with virtue.
If that this simple syllogism will serve, so; if it will not, what remedy? As there is no true cuckold but calamity, so beauty’s a flower. The lady bade take away the fool; therefore, I
say again, take her away.
OLIVIA. Sir, I bade them take away you. CLOWN. Misprision in the highest degree! Lady, ‘Cucullus non facit
monachum’; that’s as much to say as I wear not motley in my brain. Good madonna, give me leave to prove you a fool. OLIVIA. Can you do it?
CLOWN. Dexteriously, good madonna. OLIVIA. Make your proof.
CLOWN. I must catechize you for it, madonna. Good my mouse of virtue, answer me.
OLIVIA. Well, sir, for want of other idleness, I’ll bide your proof.
CLOWN. Good madonna, why mourn’st thou? OLIVIA. Good fool, for my brother’s death. CLOWN. I think his soul is in hell, madonna. OLIVIA. I know his soul is in heaven, fool. CLOWN. The more fool, madonna, to mourn for your brother’s soul being in heaven. Take away the fool, gentlemen. OLIVIA. What think you of this fool, Malvolio? Doth he not mend?
MALVOLIO. Yes, and shall do, till the pangs of death shake him. Infirmity, that decays the wise, doth ever make the better fool.
CLOWN. God send you, sir, a speedy infirmity, for the better increasing your folly! Sir Toby will be sworn that I am no fox;
but he will not pass his word for twopence that you are no fool.
OLIVIA. How say you to that, Malvolio? MALVOLIO. I marvel your ladyship takes delight in such a barren rascal; I saw him put down the other day with an ordinary fool
that has no more brain than a stone. Look you now, he’s out of
his guard already; unless you laugh and minister occasion to him,
he is gagg’d. I protest I take these wise men that crow so at these set kind of fools no better than the fools’ zanies. OLIVIA. O, you are sick of self-love, Malvolio, and taste with a
distemper’d appetite. To be generous, guiltless, and of free disposition, is to take those things for bird-bolts that you deem
cannon bullets. There is no slander in an allow’d fool, though he
do nothing but rail; nor no railing in known discreet man, though
he do nothing but reprove.
CLOWN. Now Mercury endue thee with leasing, for thou speak’st well
of fools!
Re-enter MARIA
MARIA. Madam, there is at the gate a young gentleman much desires
to speak with you.
OLIVIA. From the Count Orsino, is it? MARIA. I know not, madam; ’tis a fair young man, and well attended.
OLIVIA. Who of my people hold him in delay? MARIA. Sir Toby, madam, your kinsman.
OLIVIA. Fetch him off, I pray you; he speaks nothing but madman.
Fie on him! [Exit MARIA] Go you, Malvolio: if it be a suit from
the Count, I am sick, or not at home- what you will to dismiss
it. [Exit MALVOLIO] Now you see, sir, how your fooling grows old,
and people dislike it.
CLOWN. Thou hast spoke for us, madonna, as if thy eldest son should
be a fool; whose skull Jove cram with brains! For- here he comes-
one of thy kin has a most weak pia mater.
Enter SIR TOBY
OLIVIA. By mine honour, half drunk! What is he at the gate, cousin?
SIR TOBY. A gentleman.
OLIVIA. A gentleman! What gentleman? SIR TOBY. ‘Tis a gentleman here. [Hiccups] A plague o’ these pickle-herring! How now, sot!
CLOWN. Good Sir Toby!
OLIVIA. Cousin, cousin, how have you come so early by this lethargy?
SIR TOBY. Lechery! I defy lechery. There’s one at the gate. OLIVIA. Ay, marry; what is he?
SIR TOBY. Let him be the devil an he will, I care not; give me faith, say I. Well, it’s all one. Exit OLIVIA. What’s a drunken man like, fool? CLOWN. Like a drown’d man, a fool, and a madman: one draught above
heat makes him a fool; the second mads him; and a third drowns
him.
OLIVIA. Go thou and seek the crowner, and let him sit o’ my coz;
for he’s in the third degree of drink, he’s drown’d; go look after him.
CLOWN. He is but mad yet, madonna, and the fool shall look to the
madman. Exit
Re-enter MALVOLIO
MALVOLIO. Madam, yond young fellow swears he will speak with you. I
told him you were sick; he takes on him to understand so much,
and therefore comes to speak with you. I told him you were asleep; he seems to have a foreknowledge of that too, and therefore comes to speak with you. What is to be said to him, lady? He’s fortified against any denial. OLIVIA. Tell him he shall not speak with me. MALVOLIO. Has been told so; and he says he’ll stand at your door
like a sheriff’s post, and be the supporter to a bench, but he’ll
speak with you.
OLIVIA. What kind o’ man is he?
MALVOLIO. Why, of mankind.
OLIVIA. What manner of man?
MALVOLIO. Of very ill manner; he’ll speak with you, will you or no.
OLIVIA. Of what personage and years is he? MALVOLIO. Not yet old enough for a man, nor young enough for a boy;
as a squash is before ’tis a peascod, or a codling when ’tis almost an apple; ’tis with him in standing water, between boy and
man. He is very well-favour’d, and he speaks very shrewishly; one
would think his mother’s milk were scarce out of him. OLIVIA. Let him approach. Call in my gentlewoman. MALVOLIO. Gentlewoman, my lady calls. Exit
Re-enter MARIA
OLIVIA. Give me my veil; come, throw it o’er my face; We’ll once more hear Orsino’s embassy.
Enter VIOLA
VIOLA. The honourable lady of the house, which is she? OLIVIA. Speak to me; I shall answer for her. Your will? VIOLA. Most radiant, exquisite, and unmatchable beauty- I pray you
tell me if this be the lady of the house, for I never saw her. I
would be loath to cast away my speech; for, besides that it is
excellently well penn’d, I have taken great pains to con it. Good
beauties, let me sustain no scorn; I am very comptible, even to
the least sinister usage.
OLIVIA. Whence came you, sir?
VIOLA. I can say little more than I have studied, and that question’s out of my part. Good gentle one, give me modest assurance if you be the lady of the house, that I may proceed in
my speech.
OLIVIA. Are you a comedian?
VIOLA. No, my profound heart; and yet, by the very fangs of malice
I swear, I am not that I play. Are you the lady of the house?
OLIVIA. If I do not usurp myself, I am. VIOLA. Most certain, if you are she, you do usurp yourself; for what is yours to bestow is not yours to reserve. But this is from
my commission. I will on with my speech in your praise, and then
show you the heart of my message. OLIVIA. Come to what is important in’t. I forgive you the praise.
VIOLA. Alas, I took great pains to study it, and ’tis poetical. OLIVIA. It is the more like to be feigned; I pray you keep it in. I
heard you were saucy at my gates, and allow’d your approach rather to wonder at you than to hear you. If you be not mad, be
gone; if you have reason, be brief; ’tis not that time of moon
with me to make one in so skipping dialogue. MARIA. Will you hoist sail, sir? Here lies your way. VIOLA. No, good swabber, I am to hull here a little longer. Some mollification for your giant, sweet lady. OLIVIA. Tell me your mind.
VIOLA. I am a messenger.
OLIVIA. Sure, you have some hideous matter to deliver, when the courtesy of it is so fearful. Speak your office. VIOLA. It alone concerns your ear. I bring no overture of war, no
taxation of homage: I hold the olive in my hand; my words are as
full of peace as matter.
OLIVIA. Yet you began rudely. What are you? What would you? VIOLA. The rudeness that hath appear’d in me have I learn’d from my
entertainment. What I am and what I would are as secret as maidenhead- to your cars, divinity; to any other’s, profanation.
OLIVIA. Give us the place alone; we will hear this divinity. [Exeunt MARIA and ATTENDANTS] Now, sir, what is your text? VIOLA. Most sweet lady-
OLIVIA. A comfortable doctrine, and much may be said of it. Where lies your text?
VIOLA. In Orsino’s bosom.
OLIVIA. In his bosom! In what chapter of his bosom? VIOLA. To answer by the method: in the first of his heart. OLIVIA. O, I have read it; it is heresy. Have you no more to say?
VIOLA. Good madam, let me see your face. OLIVIA. Have you any commission from your lord to negotiate with my
face? You are now out of your text; but we will draw the curtain
and show you the picture. [Unveiling] Look you, sir, such a one I
was this present. Is’t not well done? VIOLA. Excellently done, if God did all. OLIVIA. ‘Tis in grain, sir; ’twill endure wind and weather. VIOLA. ‘Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white Nature’s own sweet and cunning hand laid on. Lady, you are the cruell’st she alive, If you will lead these graces to the grave, And leave the world no copy.
OLIVIA. O, sir, I will not be so hard-hearted; I will give out divers schedules of my beauty. It shall be inventoried, and every
particle and utensil labell’d to my will: as- item, two lips indifferent red; item, two grey eyes with lids to them; item, one
neck, one chin, and so forth. Were you sent hither to praise me?
VIOLA. I see you what you are: you are too proud; But, if you were the devil, you are fair. My lord and master loves you- O, such love Could be but recompens’d though you were crown’d The nonpareil of beauty!
OLIVIA. How does he love me?
VIOLA. With adorations, fertile tears, With groans that thunder love, with sighs of fire. OLIVIA. Your lord does know my mind; I cannot love him. Yet I suppose him virtuous, know him noble, Of great estate, of fresh and stainless youth; In voices well divulg’d, free, learn’d, and valiant, And in dimension and the shape of nature A gracious person; but yet I cannot love him. He might have took his answer long ago. VIOLA. If I did love you in my master’s flame, With such a suff’ring, such a deadly life, In your denial I would find no sense;
I would not understand it.
OLIVIA. Why, what would you?
VIOLA. Make me a willow cabin at your gate, And call upon my soul within the house; Write loyal cantons of contemned love
And sing them loud even in the dead of night; Halloo your name to the reverberate hals, And make the babbling gossip of the air Cry out ‘Olivia!’ O, you should not rest Between the elements of air and earth But you should pity me!
OLIVIA. You might do much.
What is your parentage?
VIOLA. Above my fortunes, yet my state is well: I am a gentleman.
OLIVIA. Get you to your lord.
I cannot love him; let him send no more- Unless perchance you come to me again
To tell me how he takes it. Fare you well. I thank you for your pains; spend this for me. VIOLA. I am no fee’d post, lady; keep your purse; My master, not myself, lacks recompense. Love make his heart of flint that you shall love; And let your fervour, like my master’s, be Plac’d in contempt! Farewell, fair cruelty. Exit OLIVIA. ‘What is your parentage?’
‘Above my fortunes, yet my state is well: I am a gentleman.’ I’ll be sworn thou art; Thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, actions, and spirit, Do give thee five-fold blazon. Not too fast! Soft, soft! Unless the master were the man. How now! Even so quickly may one catch the plague? Methinks I feel this youth’s perfections With an invisible and subtle stealth
To creep in at mine eyes. Well, let it be. What ho, Malvolio!
Re-enter MALVOLIO
MALVOLIO. Here, madam, at your service. OLIVIA. Run after that same peevish messenger, The County’s man. He left this ring behind him, Would I or not. Tell him I’ll none of it. Desire him not to flatter with his lord, Nor hold him up with hopes; I am not for him. If that the youth will come this way to-morrow, I’ll give him reasons for’t. Hie thee, Malvolio. MALVOLIO. Madam, I will. Exit OLIVIA. I do I know not what, and fear to find Mine eye too great a flatterer for my mind. Fate, show thy force: ourselves we do not owe; What is decreed must be; and be this so! Exit
<
ACT II. SCENE I.
The sea-coast
Enter ANTONIO and SEBASTIAN
ANTONIO. Will you stay no longer; nor will you not that I go with
you?
SEBASTIAN. By your patience, no. My stars shine darkly over me; the
malignancy of my fate might perhaps distemper yours; therefore I
shall crave of you your leave that I may bear my evils alone. It
were a bad recompense for your love to lay any of them on you.
ANTONIO. Let me know of you whither you are bound. SEBASTIAN. No, sooth, sir; my determinate voyage is mere extravagancy. But I perceive in you so excellent a touch of modesty that you will not extort from me what I am willing to keep in; therefore it charges me in manners the rather to express
myself. You must know of me then, Antonio, my name is Sebastian,
which I call’d Roderigo; my father was that Sebastian of Messaline whom I know you have heard of. He left behind him myself and a sister, both born in an hour; if the heavens had been pleas’d, would we had so ended! But you, sir, alter’d that;
for some hour before you took me from the breach of the sea was
my sister drown’d.
ANTONIO. Alas the day!
SEBASTIAN. A lady, sir, though it was said she much resembled me,
was yet of many accounted beautiful; but though I could not with
such estimable wonder overfar believe that, yet thus far I will
boldly publish her: she bore mind that envy could not but call
fair. She is drown’d already, sir, with salt water, though I seem
to drown her remembrance again with more. ANTONIO. Pardon me, sir, your bad entertainment. SEBASTIAN. O good Antonio, forgive me your trouble. ANTONIO. If you will not murder me for my love, let me be your servant.
SEBASTIAN. If you will not undo what you have done- that is, kill
him whom you have recover’d-desire it not. Fare ye well at once;
my bosom is full of kindness, and I am yet so near the manners of
my mother that, upon the least occasion more, mine eyes will tell
tales of me. I am bound to the Count Orsino’s court. Farewell.
Exit
ANTONIO. The gentleness of all the gods go with thee! I have many cnemies in Orsino’s court, Else would I very shortly see thee there. But come what may, I do adore thee so
That danger shall seem sport, and I will go. Exit
SCENE II.
A street
Enter VIOLA and MALVOLIO at several doors
MALVOLIO. Were you not ev’n now with the Countess Olivia? VIOLA. Even now, sir; on a moderate pace I have since arriv’d but
hither.
MALVOLIO. She returns this ring to you, sir; you might have saved
me my pains, to have taken it away yourself. She adds, moreover,
that you should put your lord into a desperate assurance she will
none of him. And one thing more: that you be never so hardy to
come again in his affairs, unless it be to report your lord’s taking of this. Receive it so.
VIOLA. She took the ring of me; I’ll none of it. MALVOLIO. Come, sir, you peevishly threw it to her; and her will is
it should be so return’d. If it be worth stooping for, there it
lies in your eye; if not, be it his that finds it. Exit
VIOLA. I left no ring with her; what means this lady? Fortune forbid my outside have not charm’d her! She made good view of me; indeed, so much That methought her eyes had lost her tongue, For she did speak in starts distractedly. She loves me, sure: the cunning of her passion Invites me in this churlish messenger. None of my lord’s ring! Why, he sent her none. I am the man. If it be so- as ’tis-
Poor lady, she were better love a dream. Disguise, I see thou art a wickedness
Wherein the pregnant enemy does much. How easy is it for the proper-false
In women’s waxen hearts to set their forms! Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we! For such as we are made of, such we be. How will this fadge? My master loves her dearly, And I, poor monster, fond as much on him; And she, mistaken, seems to dote on me. What will become of this? As I am man, My state is desperate for my master’s love; As I am woman- now alas the day!-
What thriftless sighs shall poor Olivia breathe! O Time, thou must untangle this, not I; It is too hard a knot for me t’ untie! Exit
SCENE III.
OLIVIA’S house
Enter SIR TOBY and SIR ANDREW
SIR TOBY. Approach, Sir Andrew. Not to be abed after midnight is to
be up betimes; and ‘diluculo surgere’ thou know’st- AGUECHEEK. Nay, by my troth, I know not; but I know to be up late
is to be up late.
SIR TOBY. A false conclusion! I hate it as an unfill’d can. To be
up after midnight and to go to bed then is early; so that to go
to bed after midnight is to go to bed betimes. Does not our lives
consist of the four elements?
AGUECHEEK. Faith, so they say; but I think it rather consists of
eating and drinking.
SIR TOBY. Th’art a scholar; let us therefore eat and drink. Marian, I say! a stoup of wine.
Enter CLOWN
AGUECHEEK. Here comes the fool, i’ faith. CLOWN. How now, my hearts! Did you never see the picture of ‘we
three’?
SIR TOBY. Welcome, ass. Now let’s have a catch. AGUECHEEK. By my troth, the fool has an excellent breast. I had rather than forty shillings I had such a leg, and so sweet a breath to sing, as the fool has. In sooth, thou wast in very gracious fooling last night, when thou spok’st of Pigrogromitus,
of the Vapians passing the equinoctial of Queubus; ’twas very good, i’ faith. I sent thee sixpence for thy leman; hadst it? CLOWN. I did impeticos thy gratillity; for Malvolio’s nose is no
whipstock. My lady has a white hand, and the Myrmidons are no bottle-ale houses.
AGUECHEEK. Excellent! Why, this is the best fooling, when all is
done. Now, a song.
SIR TOBY. Come on, there is sixpence for you. Let’s have a song.
AGUECHEEK. There’s a testril of me too; if one knight give a- CLOWN. Would you have a love-song, or a song of good life? SIR TOBY. A love-song, a love-song.
AGUECHEEK. Ay, ay; I care not for good life.
CLOWN sings
O mistress mine, where are you roaming? O, stay and hear; your true love’s coming, That can sing both high and low.
Trip no further, pretty sweeting; Journeys end in lovers meeting,
Every wise man’s son doth know.
AGUECHEEK. Excellent good, i’ faith! SIR TOBY. Good, good!
CLOWN sings
What is love? ‘Tis not hereafter; Present mirth hath present laughter; What’s to come is still unsure.
In delay there lies no plenty, Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty; Youth’s a stuff will not endure.
AGUECHEEK. A mellifluous voice, as I am true knight. SIR TOBY. A contagious breath.
AGUECHEEK. Very sweet and contagious, i’ faith. SIR TOBY. To hear by the nose, it is dulcet in contagion. But shall
we make the welkin dance indeed? Shall we rouse the night-owl in
a catch that will draw three souls out of one weaver? Shall we do
that?
AGUECHEEK. An you love me, let’s do’t. I am dog at a catch. CLOWN. By’r lady, sir, and some dogs will catch well. AGUECHEEK. Most certain. Let our catch be ‘Thou knave.’ CLOWN. ‘Hold thy peace, thou knave’ knight? I shall be constrain’d
in’t to call thee knave, knight.
AGUECHEEK. ‘Tis not the first time I have constrained one to call
me knave. Begin, fool: it begins ‘Hold thy peace.’ CLOWN. I shall never begin if I hold my peace. AGUECHEEK. Good, i’ faith! Come, begin. [Catch sung]
Enter MARIA
MARIA. What a caterwauling do you keep here! If my lady have not
call’d up her steward Malvolio, and bid him turn you out of doors, never trust me.
SIR TOBY. My lady’s a Cataian, we are politicians, Malvolio’s a Peg-a-Ramsey, and [Sings] Three merry men be we.
Am not I consanguineous? Am I not of her blood? Tilly-vally, lady. [Sings]
There dwelt a man in Babylon, Lady, lady.
CLOWN. Beshrew me, the knight’s in admirable fooling. AGUECHEEK. Ay, he does well enough if he be dispos’d, and so do I
too; he does it with a better grace, but I do it more natural.
SIR TOBY. [Sings] O’ the twelfth day of December- MARIA. For the love o’ God, peace!
Enter MALVOLIO
MALVOLIO. My masters, are you mad? Or what are you? Have you no wit, manners, nor honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night? Do ye make an ale-house of my lady’s house, that
ye squeak out your coziers’ catches without any mitigation or
remorse of voice? Is there no respect of place, persons, nor time, in you?
SIR TOBY. We did keep time, sir, in our catches. Sneck up! MALVOLIO. Sir Toby, I must be round with you. My lady bade me tell
you that, though she harbours you as her kins-man, she’s nothing
allied to your disorders. If you can separate yourself and your
misdemeanours, you are welcome to the house; if not, and it would
please you to take leave of her, she is very willing to bid you
farewell.
SIR TOBY. [Sings] Farewell, dear heart, since I must needs be gone.
MARIA. Nay, good Sir Toby.
CLOWN. [Sings] His eyes do show his days are almost done. MALVOLIO. Is’t even so?
SIR TOBY. [Sings] But I will never die. [Falls down] CLOWN. [Sings] Sir Toby, there you lie. MALVOLIO. This is much credit to you.
SIR TOBY. [Sings] Shall I bid him go? CLOWN. [Sings] What an if you do?
SIR TOBY. [Sings] Shall I bid him go, and spare not? CLOWN. [Sings] O, no, no, no, no, you dare not. SIR TOBY. [Rising] Out o’ tune, sir! Ye lie. Art any more than a
steward? Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall
be no more cakes and ale?
CLOWN. Yes, by Saint Anne; and ginger shall be hot i’ th’ mouth too.
SIR TOBY. Th’ art i’ th’ right. Go, sir, rub your chain with crumbs.
A stoup of wine, Maria!
MALVOLIO. Mistress Mary, if you priz’d my lady’s favour at anything
more than contempt, you would not give means for this uncivil rule; she shall know of it, by this hand. Exit
MARIA. Go shake your ears.
AGUECHEEK. ‘Twere as good a deed as to drink when a man’s ahungry,
to challenge him the field, and then to break promise with him
and make a fool of him.
SIR TOBY. Do’t, knight. I’ll write thee a challenge; or I’ll deliver thy indignation to him by word of mouth. MARIA. Sweet Sir Toby, be patient for to-night; since the youth of
the Count’s was to-day with my lady, she is much out of quiet.
For Monsieur Malvolio, let me alone with him; if I do not gull
him into a nayword, and make him a common recreation, do not think I have wit enough to lie straight in my bed. I know I can
do it.
SIR TOBY. Possess us, possess us; tell us something of him. MARIA. Marry, sir, sometimes he is a kind of Puritan. AGUECHEEK. O, if I thought that, I’d beat him like a dog. SIR TOBY. What, for being a Puritan? Thy exquisite reason, dear knight?
AGUECHEEK. I have no exquisite reason for’t, but I have reason good
enough.
MARIA. The devil a Puritan that he is, or anything constantly but a
time-pleaser; an affection’d ass that cons state without book and
utters it by great swarths; the best persuaded of himself, so
cramm’d, as he thinks, with excellencies that it is his grounds
of faith that all that look on him love him; and on that vice in
him will my revenge find notable cause to work. SIR TOBY. What wilt thou do?
MARIA. I will drop in his way some obscure epistles of love; wherein, by the colour of his beard, the shape of his leg, the
manner of his gait, the expressure of his eye, forehead, and complexion, he shall find himself most feelingly personated. I
can write very like my lady, your niece; on forgotten matter we
can hardly make distinction of our hands. SIR TOBY. Excellent! I smell a device.
AGUECHEEK. I have’t in my nose too. SIR TOBY. He shall think, by the letters that thou wilt drop, that
they come from my niece, and that she’s in love with him. MARIA. My purpose is, indeed, a horse of that colour. AGUECHEEK. And your horse now would make him an ass. MARIA. Ass, I doubt not.
AGUECHEEK. O, ’twill be admirable! MARIA. Sport royal, I warrant you. I know my physic will work with
him. I will plant you two, and let the fool make a third, where
he shall find the letter; observe his construction of it. For this night, to bed, and dream on the event. Farewell. Exit
SIR TOBY. Good night, Penthesilea. AGUECHEEK. Before me, she’s a good wench. SIR TOBY. She’s a beagle true-bred, and one that adores me. What o’ that?
AGUECHEEK. I was ador’d once too. SIR TOBY. Let’s to bed, knight. Thou hadst need send for more money.
AGUECHEEK. If I cannot recover your niece, I am a foul way out. SIR TOBY. Send for money, knight; if thou hast her not i’ th’ end,
call me Cut.
AGUECHEEK. If I do not, never trust me; take it how you will. SIR TOBY. Come, come, I’ll go burn some sack; ’tis too late to go
to bed now. Come, knight; come, knight. Exeunt
SCENE IV.
The DUKE’S palace
Enter DUKE, VIOLA, CURIO, and OTHERS
DUKE. Give me some music. Now, good morrow, friends. Now, good Cesario, but that piece of song, That old and antique song we heard last night; Methought it did relieve my passion much, More than light airs and recollected terms Of these most brisk and giddy-paced times. Come, but one verse.
CURIO. He is not here, so please your lordship, that should sing
it.
DUKE. Who was it?
CURIO. Feste, the jester, my lord; a fool that the Lady Olivia’s
father took much delight in. He is about the house. DUKE. Seek him out, and play the tune the while. Exit CURIO. [Music plays] Come hither, boy. If ever thou shalt love, In the sweet pangs of it remember me;
For such as I am all true lovers are, Unstaid and skittish in all motions else Save in the constant image of the creature That is belov’d. How dost thou like this tune? VIOLA. It gives a very echo to the seat Where Love is thron’d.
DUKE. Thou dost speak masterly.
My life upon’t, young though thou art, thine eye Hath stay’d upon some favour that it loves; Hath it not, boy?
VIOLA. A little, by your favour.
DUKE. What kind of woman is’t?
VIOLA. Of your complexion.
DUKE. She is not worth thee, then. What years, i’ faith? VIOLA. About your years, my lord.
DUKE. Too old, by heaven! Let still the woman take An elder than herself; so wears she to him, So sways she level in her husband’s heart. For, boy, however we do praise ourselves, Our fancies are more giddy and unfirm, More longing, wavering, sooner lost and won, Than women’s are.
VIOLA. I think it well, my lord.
DUKE. Then let thy love be younger than thyself, Or thy affection cannot hold the bent; For women are as roses, whose fair flow’r Being once display’d doth fall that very hour. VIOLA. And so they are; alas, that they are so! To die, even when they to perfection grow!
Re-enter CURIO and CLOWN
DUKE. O, fellow, come, the song we had last night. Mark it, Cesario; it is old and plain; The spinsters and the knitters in the sun, And the free maids that weave their thread with bones, Do use to chant it; it is silly sooth, And dallies with the innocence of love, Like the old age.
CLOWN. Are you ready, sir?
DUKE. Ay; prithee, sing. [Music]
FESTE’S SONG
Come away, come away, death;
And in sad cypress let me be laid; Fly away, fly away, breath,
I am slain by a fair cruel maid. My shroud of white, stuck all with yew, O, prepare it!
My part of death no one so true Did share it.
Not a flower, not a flower sweet, On my black coffin let there be strown; Not a friend, not a friend greet
My poor corpse where my bones shall be thrown; A thousand thousand sighs to save,
Lay me, O, where
Sad true lover never find my grave, To weep there!
DUKE. There’s for thy pains.
CLOWN. No pains, sir; I take pleasure in singing, sir. DUKE. I’ll pay thy pleasure, then.
CLOWN. Truly, sir, and pleasure will be paid one time or another.
DUKE. Give me now leave to leave thee. CLOWN. Now the melancholy god protect thee; and the tailor make thy
doublet of changeable taffeta, for thy mind is a very opal. I would have men of such constancy put to sea, that their business
might be everything, and their intent everywhere: for that’s it
that always makes a good voyage of nothing. Farewell. Exit CLOWN
DUKE. Let all the rest give place. Exeunt CURIO and ATTENDANTS Once more, Cesario,
Get thee to yond same sovereign cruelty. Tell her my love, more noble than the world, Prizes not quantity of dirty lands;
The parts that fortune hath bestow’d upon her, Tell her I hold as giddily as Fortune; But ’tis that miracle and queen of gems That Nature pranks her in attracts my soul. VIOLA. But if she cannot love you, sir? DUKE. I cannot be so answer’d.
VIOLA. Sooth, but you must.
Say that some lady, as perhaps there is, Hath for your love as great a pang of heart As you have for Olivia. You cannot love her; You tell her so. Must she not then be answer’d? DUKE. There is no woman’s sides
Can bide the beating of so strong a passion As love doth give my heart; no woman’s heart So big to hold so much; they lack retention. Alas, their love may be call’d appetite- No motion of the liver, but the palate- That suffer surfeit, cloyment, and revolt; But mine is all as hungry as the sea,
And can digest as much. Make no compare Between that love a woman can bear me
And that I owe Olivia.
VIOLA. Ay, but I know-
DUKE. What dost thou know?
VIOLA. Too well what love women to men may owe. In faith, they are as true of heart as we. My father had a daughter lov’d a man,
As it might be perhaps, were I a woman, I should your lordship.
DUKE. And what’s her history?
VIOLA. A blank, my lord. She never told her love, But let concealment, like a worm i’ th’ bud, Feed on her damask cheek. She pin’d in thought; And with a green and yellow melancholy She sat like Patience on a monument,
Smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed? We men may say more, swear more, but indeed Our shows are more than will; for still we prove Much in our vows, but little in our love. DUKE. But died thy sister of her love, my boy? VIOLA. I am all the daughters of my father’s house, And all the brothers too- and yet I know not. Sir, shall I to this lady?
DUKE. Ay, that’s the theme.
To her in haste. Give her this jewel; say My love can give no place, bide no denay. Exeunt
SCENE V.
OLIVIA’S garden
Enter SIR TOBY, SIR ANDREW, and FABIAN
SIR TOBY. Come thy ways, Signior Fabian. FABIAN. Nay, I’ll come; if I lose a scruple of this sport let me be
boil’d to death with melancholy.
SIR TOBY. Wouldst thou not be glad to have the niggardly rascally
sheep-biter come by some notable shame? FABIAN. I would exult, man; you know he brought me out o’ favour
with my lady about a bear-baiting here. SIR TOBY. To anger him we’ll have the bear again; and we will fool
him black and blue- shall we not, Sir Andrew? AGUECHEEK. And we do not, it is pity of our lives.
Enter MARIA
SIR TOBY. Here comes the little villain. How now, my metal of India!
MARIA. Get ye all three into the box-tree. Malvolio’s coming down
this walk. He has been yonder i’ the sun practising behaviour to
his own shadow this half hour. Observe him, for the love of mockery, for I know this letter will make a contemplative idiot
of him. Close, in the name of jesting! [As the men hide she drops
a letter] Lie thou there; for here comes the trout that must be
caught with tickling.
Exit
Enter MALVOLIO
MALVOLIO. ‘Tis but fortune; all is fortune. Maria once told me she
did affect me; and I have heard herself come thus near, that, should she fancy, it should be one of my complexion. Besides, she
uses me with a more exalted respect than any one else that follows her. What should I think on’t? SIR TOBY. Here’s an overweening rogue!
FABIAN. O, peace! Contemplation makes a rare turkey-cock of him;
how he jets under his advanc’d plumes! AGUECHEEK. ‘Slight, I could so beat the rogue- SIR TOBY. Peace, I say.
MALVOLIO. To be Count Malvolio!
SIR TOBY. Ah, rogue!
AGUECHEEK. Pistol him, pistol him. SIR TOBY. Peace, peace!
MALVOLIO. There is example for’t: the Lady of the Strachy married
the yeoman of the wardrobe.
AGUECHEEK. Fie on him, Jezebel!
FABIAN. O, peace! Now he’s deeply in; look how imagination blows
him.
MALVOLIO. Having been three months married to her, sitting in my
state-
SIR TOBY. O, for a stone-bow to hit him in the eye! MALVOLIO. Calling my officers about me, in my branch’d velvet gown,
having come from a day-bed- where I have left Olivia sleeping-
SIR TOBY. Fire and brimstone!
FABIAN. O, peace, peace!
MALVOLIO. And then to have the humour of state; and after a demure
travel of regard, telling them I know my place as I would they
should do theirs, to ask for my kinsman Toby- SIR TOBY. Bolts and shackles!
FABIAN. O, peace, peace, peace! Now, now. MALVOLIO. Seven of my people, with an obedient start, make out for
him. I frown the while, and perchance wind up my watch, or play
with my- some rich jewel. Toby approaches; curtsies there to me-
SIR TOBY. Shall this fellow live?
FABIAN. Though our silence be drawn from us with cars, yet peace.
MALVOLIO. I extend my hand to him thus, quenching my familiar smile
with an austere regard of control- SIR TOBY. And does not Toby take you a blow o’ the lips then? MALVOLIO. Saying ‘Cousin Toby, my fortunes having cast me on your
niece give me this prerogative of speech’- SIR TOBY. What, what?
MALVOLIO. ‘You must amend your drunkenness’- SIR TOBY. Out, scab!
FABIAN. Nay, patience, or we break the sinews of our plot. MALVOLIO. ‘Besides, you waste the treasure of your time with a foolish knight’-
AGUECHEEK. That’s me, I warrant you. MALVOLIO. ‘One Sir Andrew.’
AGUECHEEK. I knew ’twas I; for many do call me fool. MALVOLIO. What employment have we here? [Taking up the letter] FABIAN. Now is the woodcock near the gin. SIR TOBY. O, peace! And the spirit of humours intimate reading aloud to him!
MALVOLIO. By my life, this is my lady’s hand: these be her very C’s, her U’s, and her T’s; and thus makes she her great P’s. It
is, in contempt of question, her hand. AGUECHEEK. Her C’s, her U’s, and her T’s. Why that? MALVOLIO. [Reads] ‘To the unknown belov’d, this, and my good wishes.’ Her very phrases! By your leave, wax. Soft! And the impressure her Lucrece with which she uses to seal; ’tis my lady.
To whom should this be?
FABIAN. This wins him, liver and all. MALVOLIO. [Reads]
Jove knows I love,
But who?
Lips, do not move;
No man must know.’
‘No man must know.’ What follows? The numbers alter’d! ‘No man must know.’ If this should be thee, Malvolio? SIR TOBY. Marry, hang thee, brock!
MALVOLIO. [Reads]
‘I may command where I adore;
But silence, like a Lucrece knife, With bloodless stroke my heart doth gore; M. O. A. I. doth sway my life.’
FABIAN. A fustian riddle!
SIR TOBY. Excellent wench, say I.
MALVOLIO. ‘M. O. A. I. doth sway my life.’ Nay, but first let me see, let me see, let me see. FABIAN. What dish o’ poison has she dress’d him! SIR TOBY. And with what wing the staniel checks at it! MALVOLIO. ‘I may command where I adore.’ Why, she may command me: I
serve her; she is my lady. Why, this is evident to any formal capacity; there is no obstruction in this. And the end- what should that alphabetical position portend? If I could make that
resemble something in me. Softly! M. O. A. I.- SIR TOBY. O, ay, make up that! He is now at a cold scent. FABIAN. Sowter will cry upon’t for all this, though it be as rank
as a fox.
MALVOLIO. M- Malvolio; M- why, that begins my name. FABIAN. Did not I say he would work it out? The cur is excellent at faults.
MALVOLIO. M- But then there is no consonancy in the sequel; that
suffers under probation: A should follow, but O does. FABIAN. And O shall end, I hope.
SIR TOBY. Ay, or I’ll cudgel him, and make him cry ‘O!’ MALVOLIO. And then I comes behind.
FABIAN. Ay, an you had any eye behind you, you might see more detraction at your heels than fortunes before you. MALVOLIO. M. O. A. I. This simulation is not as the former; and yet, to crush this a little, it would bow to me, for every one of
these letters are in my name. Soft! here follows prose. [Reads]
‘If this fall into thy hand, revolve. In my stars I am above
thee; but be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some
achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon ’em. Thy
Fates open their hands; let thy blood and spirit embrace them;
and, to inure thyself to what thou art like to be, cast thy humble slough and appear fresh. Be opposite with a kinsman, surly
with servants; let thy tongue tang arguments of state; put thyself into the trick of singularity. She thus advises thee that
sighs for thee. Remember who commended thy yellow stockings, and
wish’d to see thee ever cross-garter’d. I say, remember, Go to,
thou art made, if thou desir’st to be so; if not, let me see thee
a steward still, the fellow of servants, and not worthy to touch
Fortune’s fingers. Farewell. She that would alter services with
thee,
THE FORTUNATE-UNHAPPY.’
Daylight and champain discovers not more. This is open. I will be
proud, I will read politic authors, I will baffle Sir Toby, I will wash off gross acquaintance, I will be point-devise the very
man. I do not now fool myself to let imagination jade me; for every reason excites to this, that my lady loves me. She did commend my yellow stockings of late, she did praise my leg being
cross-garter’d; and in this she manifests herself to my love, and
with a kind of injunction drives me to these habits of her liking. I thank my stars I am happy. I will be strange, stout, in
yellow stockings, and cross-garter’d, even with the swiftness of
putting on. Jove and my stars be praised! Here is yet a postscript.
[Reads] ‘Thou canst not choose but know who I am. If thou entertain’st my love, let it appear in thy smiling; thy smiles
become thee well. Therefore in my presence still smile, dear my
sweet, I prithee.’
Jove, I thank thee. I will smile; I will do everything that thou
wilt have me. Exit FABIAN. I will not give my part of this sport for a pension of thousands to be paid from the Sophy.
SIR TOBY. I could marry this wench for this device. AGUECHEEK. So could I too.
SIR TOBY. And ask no other dowry with her but such another jest.
Enter MARIA
AGUECHEEK. Nor I neither.
FABIAN. Here comes my noble gull-catcher. SIR TOBY. Wilt thou set thy foot o’ my neck? AGUECHEEK. Or o’ mine either?
SIR TOBY. Shall I play my freedom at tray-trip, and become thy bond-slave?
AGUECHEEK. I’ faith, or I either?
SIR TOBY. Why, thou hast put him in such a dream that when the image of it leaves him he must run mad. MARIA. Nay, but say true; does it work upon him? SIR TOBY. Like aqua-vita! with a midwife. AIARIA. If you will then see the fruits of the sport, mark his first approach before my lady. He will come to her in yellow stockings, and ’tis a colour she abhors, and cross-garter’d, a
fashion she detests; and he will smile upon her, which will now
be so unsuitable to her disposition, being addicted to a melancholy as she is, that it cannot but turn him into a notable
contempt. If you will see it, follow me. SIR TOBY. To the gates of Tartar, thou most excellent devil of wit!
AGUECHEEK. I’ll make one too. Exeunt
<
ACT III. SCENE I.
OLIVIA’S garden
Enter VIOLA, and CLOWN with a tabor
VIOLA. Save thee, friend, and thy music! Dost thou live by thy tabor?
CLOWN. No, sir, I live by the church. VIOLA. Art thou a churchman?
CLOWN. No such matter, sir: I do live by the church; for I do live
at my house, and my house doth stand by the church. VIOLA. So thou mayst say the king lies by a beggar, if a beggar dwell near him; or the church stands by thy tabor, if thy tabor
stand by the church.
CLOWN. You have said, sir. To see this age! A sentence is but a chev’ril glove to a good wit. How quickly the wrong side may be
turn’d outward!
VIOLA. Nay, that’s certain; they that dally nicely with words may
quickly make them wanton.
CLOWN. I would, therefore, my sister had had name, sir. VIOLA. Why, man?
CLOWN. Why, sir, her name’s a word; and to dally with that word
might make my sister wanton. But indeed words are very rascals
since bonds disgrac’d them.
VIOLA. Thy reason, man?
CLOWN. Troth, sir, I can yield you none without words, and words
are grown so false I am loath to prove reason with them. VIOLA. I warrant thou art a merry fellow and car’st for nothing.
CLOWN. Not so, sir; I do care for something; but in my conscience,
sir, I do not care for you. If that be to care for nothing, sir,
I would it would make you invisible. VIOLA. Art not thou the Lady Olivia’s fool? CLOWN. No, indeed, sir; the Lady Olivia has no folly; she will keep
no fool, sir, till she be married; and fools are as like husbands
as pilchers are to herrings- the husband’s the bigger. I am indeed not her fool, but her corrupter of words. VIOLA. I saw thee late at the Count Orsino’s. CLOWN. Foolery, sir, does walk about the orb like the sun- it shines everywhere. I would be sorry, sir, but the fool should be
as oft with your master as with my mistress: think I saw your wisdom there.
VIOLA. Nay, an thou pass upon me, I’ll no more with thee. Hold, there’s expenses for thee. [Giving a coin] CLOWN. Now Jove, in his next commodity of hair, send the a beard!
VIOLA. By my troth, I’ll tell thee, I am almost sick for one; [Aside] though I would not have it grow on my chin.- Is thy lady
within?
CLOWN. Would not a pair of these have bred, sir? VIOLA. Yes, being kept together and put to use. CLOWN. I would play Lord Pandarus of Phrygia, sir, to bring a Cressida to this Troilus.
VIOLA. I understand you, sir; ’tis well begg’d. [Giving another coin] CLOWN. The matter, I hope, is not great, sir, begging but a beggar:
Cressida was a beggar. My lady is within, sir. I will construe to
them whence you come; who you are and what you would are out of
my welkin- I might say ‘element’ but the word is overworn. Exit CLOWN
VIOLA. This fellow is wise enough to play the fool; And to do that well craves a kind of wit. He must observe their mood on whom he jests, The quality of persons, and the time; And, like the haggard, check at every feather That comes before his eye. This is a practice As full of labour as a wise man’s art; For folly that he wisely shows is fit; But wise men, folly-fall’n, quite taint their wit.
Enter SIR TOBY and SIR ANDREW
SIR TOBY. Save you, gentleman!
VIOLA. And you, sir.
AGUECHEEK. Dieu vous garde, monsieur. VIOLA. Et vous aussi; votre serviteur.
AGUECHEEK. I hope, sir, you are; and I am yours. SIR TOBY. Will you encounter the house? My niece is desirous you
should enter, if your trade be to her. VIOLA. I am bound to your niece, sir; I mean, she is the list of my
voyage.
SIR TOBY. Taste your legs, sir; put them to motion. VIOLA. My legs do better understand me, sir, than I understand what
you mean by bidding me taste my legs. SIR TOBY. I mean, to go, sir, to enter. VIOLA. I will answer you with gait and entrance. But we are prevented.
Enter OLIVIA and MARIA
Most excellent accomplish’d lady, the heavens rain odours on you!
AGUECHEEK. That youth’s a rare courtier- ‘Rain odours’ well! VIOLA. My matter hath no voice, lady, but to your own most pregnant
and vouchsafed car.
AGUECHEEK. ‘Odours,’ ‘pregnant,’ and ‘vouchsafed’- I’ll get ’em all
three all ready.
OLIVIA. Let the garden door be shut, and leave me to my hearing.
[Exeunt all but OLIVIA and VIOLA] Give me your hand, sir. VIOLA. My duty, madam, and most humble service. OLIVIA. What is your name?
VIOLA. Cesario is your servant’s name, fair Princess. OLIVIA. My servant, sir! ‘Twas never merry world Since lowly feigning was call’d compliment. Y’are servant to the Count Orsino, youth. VIOLA. And he is yours, and his must needs be yours: Your servant’s servant is your servant, madam. OLIVIA. For him, I think not on him; for his thoughts, Would they were blanks rather than fill’d with me! VIOLA. Madam, I come to whet your gentle thoughts On his behalf.
OLIVIA. O, by your leave, I pray you: I bade you never speak again of him;
But, would you undertake another suit, I had rather hear you to solicit that
Than music from the spheres.
VIOLA. Dear lady-
OLIVIA. Give me leave, beseech you. I did send, After the last enchantment you did here, A ring in chase of you; so did I abuse Myself, my servant, and, I fear me, you. Under your hard construction must I sit, To force that on you in a shameful cunning Which you knew none of yours. What might you think? Have you not set mine honour at the stake, And baited it with all th’ unmuzzled thoughts That tyrannous heart can think? To one of your receiving Enough is shown: a cypress, not a bosom, Hides my heart. So, let me hear you speak. VIOLA. I Pity YOU.
OLIVIA. That’s a degree to love.
VIOLA. No, not a grize; for ’tis a vulgar proof That very oft we pity enemies.
OLIVIA. Why, then, methinks ’tis time to smile again. O world, how apt the poor are to be proud! If one should be a prey, how much the better To fall before the lion than the wolf! [Clock strikes] The clock upbraids me with the waste of time. Be not afraid, good youth; I will not have you; And yet, when wit and youth is come to harvest, Your wife is like to reap a proper man. There lies your way, due west.
VIOLA. Then westward-ho!
Grace and good disposition attend your ladyship! You’ll nothing, madam, to my lord by me? OLIVIA. Stay.
I prithee tell me what thou think’st of me. VIOLA. That you do think you are not what you are. OLIVIA. If I think so, I think the same of you. VIOLA. Then think you right: I am not what I am. OLIVIA. I would you were as I would have you be! VIOLA. Would it be better, madam, than I am? I wish it might, for now I am your fool. OLIVIA. O, what a deal of scorn looks beautiful In the contempt and anger of his lip!
A murd’rous guilt shows not itself more soon Than love that would seem hid: love’s night is noon. Cesario, by the roses of the spring,
By maidhood, honour, truth, and every thing, I love thee so that, maugre all thy pride, Nor wit nor reason can my passion hide. Do not extort thy reasons from this clause, For that I woo, thou therefore hast no cause; But rather reason thus with reason fetter: Love sought is good, but given unsought is better. VIOLA. By innocence I swear, and by my youth, I have one heart, one bosom, and one truth, And that no woman has; nor never none
Shall mistress be of it, save I alone. And so adieu, good madam; never more
Will I my master’s tears to you deplore. OLIVIA. Yet come again; for thou perhaps mayst move That heart which now abhors to like his love. Exeunt
SCENE II.
OLIVIA’S house
Enter SIR TOBY, SIR ANDREW and FABIAN
AGUECHEEK. No, faith, I’ll not stay a jot longer. SIR TOBY. Thy reason, dear venom, give thy reason. FABIAN. You must needs yield your reason, Sir Andrew. AGUECHEEK. Marry, I saw your niece do more favours to the Count’s
servingman than ever she bestow’d upon me; I saw’t i’ th’ orchard.
SIR TOBY. Did she see thee the while, old boy? Tell me that. AGUECHEEK. As plain as I see you now.
FABIAN. This was a great argument of love in her toward you. AGUECHEEK. ‘Slight! will you make an ass o’ me? FABIAN. I will prove it legitimate, sir, upon the oaths of judgment
and reason.
SIR TOBY. And they have been grand-jurymen since before Noah was a
sailor.
FABIAN. She did show favour to the youth in your sight only to exasperate you, to awake your dormouse valour, to put fire in your heart and brimstone in your liver. You should then have accosted her; and with some excellent jests, fire-new from the
mint, you should have bang’d the youth into dumbness. This was
look’d for at your hand, and this was baulk’d. The double gilt of
this opportunity you let time wash off, and you are now sail’d
into the north of my lady’s opinion; where you will hang like an
icicle on Dutchman’s beard, unless you do redeem it by some laudable attempt either of valour or policy. AGUECHEEK. An’t be any way, it must be with valour, for policy I
hate; I had as lief be a Brownist as a politician. SIR TOBY. Why, then, build me thy fortunes upon the basis of valour. Challenge me the Count’s youth to fight with him; hurt
him in eleven places. My niece shall take note of it; and assure
thyself there is no love-broker in the world can more prevail in
man’s commendation with woman than report of valour. FABIAN. There is no way but this, Sir Andrew. AGUECHEEK. Will either of you bear me a challenge to him? SIR TOBY. Go, write it in a martial hand; be curst and brief; it is
no matter how witty, so it be eloquent and full of invention. Taunt him with the license of ink; if thou thou’st him some thrice, it shall not be amiss; and as many lies as will lie in
thy sheet of paper, although the sheet were big enough for the
bed of Ware in England, set ’em down; go about it. Let there be
gall enough in thy ink, though thou write with a goose-pen, no
matter. About it.
AGUECHEEK. Where shall I find you? SIR TOBY. We’ll call thee at the cubiculo. Go. Exit SIR ANDREW FABIAN. This is a dear manakin to you, Sir Toby. SIR TOBY. I have been dear to him, lad- some two thousand strong,
or so.
FABIAN. We shall have a rare letter from him; but you’ll not deliver’t?
SIR TOBY. Never trust me then; and by all means stir on the youth
to an answer. I think oxen and wainropes cannot hale them together. For Andrew, if he were open’d and you find so much blood in his liver as will clog the foot of a flea, I’ll eat the
rest of th’ anatomy.
FABIAN. And his opposite, the youth, bears in his visage no great
presage of cruelty.
Enter MARIA
SIR TOBY. Look where the youngest wren of nine comes. MARIA. If you desire the spleen, and will laugh yourselves into stitches, follow me. Yond gull Malvolio is turned heathen, a very
renegado; for there is no Christian that means to be saved by believing rightly can ever believe such impossible passages of
grossness. He’s in yellow stockings. SIR TOBY. And cross-garter’d?
MARIA. Most villainously; like a pedant that keeps a school i’ th’
church. I have dogg’d him like his murderer. He does obey every
point of the letter that I dropp’d to betray him. He does smile
his face into more lines than is in the new map with the augmentation of the Indies. You have not seen such a thing as ’tis; I can hardly forbear hurling things at him. I know my lady
will strike him; if she do, he’ll smile and take’t for a great
favour.
SIR TOBY. Come, bring us, bring us where he is. Exeunt
SCENE III.
A street
Enter SEBASTIAN and ANTONIO
SEBASTIAN. I would not by my will have troubled you; But since you make your pleasure of your pains, I will no further chide you.
ANTONIO. I could not stay behind you: my desire, More sharp than filed steel, did spur me forth; And not all love to see you- though so much As might have drawn one to a longer voyage- But jealousy what might befall your travel, Being skilless in these parts; which to a stranger, Unguided and unfriended, often prove
Rough and unhospitable. My willing love, The rather by these arguments of fear, Set forth in your pursuit.
SEBASTIAN. My kind Antonio,
I can no other answer make but thanks, And thanks, and ever thanks; and oft good turns Are shuffl’d off with such uncurrent pay; But were my worth as is my conscience firm, You should find better dealing. What’s to do? Shall we go see the reliques of this town? ANTONIO. To-morrow, sir; best first go see your lodging. SEBASTIAN. I am not weary, and ’tis long to night; I pray you, let us satisfy our eyes
With the memorials and the things of fame That do renown this city.
ANTONIO. Would you’d pardon me.
I do not without danger walk these streets: Once in a sea-fight ‘gainst the Count his galleys I did some service; of such note, indeed, That, were I ta’en here, it would scarce be answer’d. SEBASTIAN. Belike you slew great number of his people. ANTONIO.Th’ offence is not of such a bloody nature; Albeit the quality of the time and quarrel Might well have given us bloody argument. It might have since been answer’d in repaying What we took from them; which, for traffic’s sake, Most of our city did. Only myself stood out; For which, if I be lapsed in this place, I shall pay dear.
SEBASTIAN. Do not then walk too open. ANTONIO. It doth not fit me. Hold, sir, here’s my purse; In the south suburbs, at the Elephant, Is best to lodge. I will bespeak our diet, Whiles you beguile the time and feed your knowledge With viewing of the town; there shall you have me. SEBASTIAN. Why I your purse?
ANTONIO. Haply your eye shall light upon some toy You have desire to purchase; and your store, I think, is not for idle markets, sir. SEBASTIAN. I’ll be your purse-bearer, and leave you for An hour.
ANTONIO. To th’ Elephant.
SEBASTIAN. I do remember. Exeunt
SCENE IV.
OLIVIA’S garden
Enter OLIVIA and MARIA
OLIVIA. I have sent after him; he says he’ll come. How shall I feast him? What bestow of him? For youth is bought more oft than begg’d or borrow’d. I speak too loud.
Where’s Malvolio? He is sad and civil, And suits well for a servant with my fortunes. Where is Malvolio?
MARIA. He’s coming, madam; but in very strange manner. He is sure possess’d, madam.
OLIVIA. Why, what’s the matter? Does he rave? MARIA. No, madam, he does nothing but smile. Your ladyship were best to have some guard about you if he come; for sure the man is
tainted in’s wits.
OLIVIA. Go call him hither. Exit MARIA I am as mad as he,
If sad and merry madness equal be.
Re-enter MARIA with MALVOLIO
How now, Malvolio!
MALVOLIO. Sweet lady, ho, ho.
OLIVIA. Smil’st thou?
I sent for thee upon a sad occasion. MALVOLIO. Sad, lady? I could be sad. This does make some obstruction in the blood, this cross-gartering; but what of that?
If it please the eye of one, it is with me as the very true sonnet is: ‘Please one and please all.’ OLIVIA. Why, how dost thou, man? What is the matter with thee? MALVOLIO. Not black in my mind, though yellow in my legs. It did come to his hands, and commands shall be executed. I think we do know the sweet Roman hand. OLIVIA. Wilt thou go to bed, Malvolio?
MALVOLIO. To bed? Ay, sweetheart, and I’ll come to thee. OLIVIA. God comfort thee! Why dost thou smile so, and kiss thy hand
so oft?
MARIA. How do you, Malvolio?
MALVOLIO. At your request? Yes, nightingales answer daws! MARIA. Why appear you with this ridiculous boldness before my lady?
MALVOLIO. ‘Be not afraid of greatness.’ ‘Twas well writ. OLIVIA. What mean’st thou by that, Malvolio? AIALVOLIO. ‘Some are born great,’-
OLIVIA. Ha?
MALVOLIO. ‘Some achieve greatness,’- OLIVIA. What say’st thou?
MALVOLIO. ‘And some have greatness thrust upon them.’ OLIVIA. Heaven restore thee!
MALVOLIO. ‘Remember who commended thy yellow stockings,’- OLIVIA. ‘Thy yellow stockings?’
MALVOLIO. ‘And wish’d to see thee cross-garterd.’ OLIVIA. ‘Cross-garter’d?’