LEONATO

AS NOT COUNT JOHN

here at supper?

ANT. I saw him not.

BEAT. HOW tartly that gen

How

tleman looks! I never can see
him but I am heart-burned an
hour after.

HERO. He is of a very melan-
choly disposition.

BEAT. He were an excellent man that were made just in the midway between him and Benedick: the one is too like an image and says nothing, and the other too like my lady's eldest son, evermore tattling.

4 heart-burned] "Heart burn" is medically attributed to acidity of the stomach; hence "tart looks" might be able to produce it.

LEON. Then half Signior Benedick's tongue in Count 10 John's mouth, and half Count John's melancholy in Signior Benedick's face,

BEAT. With a good leg and a good foot, uncle, and money enough in his purse, such a man would win any woman in the world, if a' could get her good-will.

LEON. By my troth, niece, thou wilt never get thee a husband, if thou be so shrewd of thy tongue.

ANT. In faith, she's too curst.

BEAT. TOO curst is more than curst: I shall lessen God's sending that way; for it is said, "God sends a curst cow short horns"; but to a cow too curst he sends

none.

LEON. So, by being too curst, God will send you no horns.

BEAT. Just, if he send me no husband; for the which blessing I am at him upon my knees every morning and evening. Lord, I could not endure a husband with a beard on his face: I had rather lie in the woollen.

LEON. You may light on a husband that hath no beard.

20

BEAT. What should I do with him? dress him in my apparel, and make him my waiting-gentlewoman? He that hath a beard is more than a youth; and he that hath 30

17-18 shrewd . . . curst] Both words have the meaning of vicious in the modern colloquial sense of bad-tempered.

20-21 God... horns] A common English proverb, implying that an evil-disposed person has little means of doing an injury.

26 the woollen] a reference to the commonly used woollen or flannel shroud; Beatrice means that she would rather die.

no beard is less than a man: and he that is more than a youth is not for me; and he that is less than a man, I am not for him: therefore I will even take sixpence in earnest of the bear-ward, and lead his apes into hell. LEON. Well, then, go you into hell?

BEAT. No, but to the gate; and there will the devil meet me, like an old cuckold, with horns on his head, and say "Get you to heaven, Beatrice, get you to heaven; here's no place for you maids: '' so deliver I up my apes, and away to Saint Peter for the heavens; he 40 shows me where the bachelors sit, and there live we as

merry as the day is long.

ANT. [To Hero] Well, niece, I trust you will be ruled by your father.

BEAT. Yes, faith; it is my cousin's duty to make courtesy, and say, "Father, as it please you." But yet for all that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else make another courtesy, and say, “Father, as it please me."

34 bear-ward] The Quarto and the First and Second Folios read Berrord; the Third and Fourth, bearherd, which seems formed on the analogy of "shep-herd" or "goat-herd." But it is objected that the keeper of bears does not tend them in flocks, and hence bear-ward (i. e., bear-keeper) has been adopted, as in 2 Hen. VI, V, i, 210. Beatrice uses the word loosely in the sense of "animal keeper," with a view to lightly punning on the word "beard" and to introducing an allusion to the old maid's traditional function of leading apes in hell.

40 for the heavens] before heaven, in heaven's name. Gobbo's exclamation in Merch. of Ven., II, ii, 10: rouse up a brave mind,' says the fiend, and run.'

Cf. Launcelot ،، For the heavens

.

LEON. Well, niece, I hope to see you one day fitted with a husband.

BEAT. Not till God make men of some other metal 50 than earth. Would it not grieve a woman to be overmastered with a piece of valiant dust? to make an account of her life to a clod of wayward marl? No, uncle, I'll none: Adam's sons are my brethren; and, truly, I hold it a sin to match in my kindred.

LEON. Daughter, remember what I told you: if the prince do solicit you in that kind, you know your answer. BEAT. The fault will be in the music, cousin, if you be not wooed in good time: if the prince be too important, tell him there is measure in every thing, and so 60 dance out the answer. For, hear me, Hero: wooing, wedding, and repenting, is as a Scotch jig, a measure, and a cinque pace: the first suit is hot and hasty, like a Scotch jig, and full as fantastical; the wedding, mannerly-modest, as a measure, full of state and ancientry; and then comes repentance, and, with his bad legs, falls into the cinque pace faster and faster, till he sink into his grave.

LEON. Cousin, you apprehend passing shrewdly. BEAT. I have a good eye, uncle; I can see a church by daylight.

62, 66 cinque pace] The French dance called "cinq pas" or "galliard,” which each complete movement consisted of five steps. The pace quickened as the dance continued. The word is often written "sink-a-pace."

68 you apprehend] you are quick-witted. Cf. III, iv, 60, infra, where apprehension means "quickness of wit in repartee."

70

LEON. The revellers are entering, brother: make good [All put on their masks.

room.

Enter DON PEDRO, CLAUDIO, BENEDICK, BALTHASAR, DON JOHN, BORACHIO, MARGARET, URSULA, and others, masked

D. PEDRO. Lady, will you walk about with your friend?

HERO. So you walk softly, and look sweetly, and say nothing, I am yours for the walk; and especially when I walk away.

D. PEDRO. With me in your company?

HERO. I may say so, when I please.

D. PEDRO. And when please you to say so?

HERO. When I like your favour; for God defend 80 the lute should be like the case!

D. PEDRO. My visor is Philemon's roof; within the house is Jove.

HERO. Why, then, your visor should be thatched.
D. PEDRO. Speak low, if you speak love.

[Drawing her aside.

BALTH. Well, I would you did like me.

80 God defend] God forbid. The expression is used again, IV, ii, 18, infra. 82-84 My visor. . . thatched] The reference is to the thatched roof of the rustic cottage of the peasants Philemon and Baucis, who, according to Ovid, Metam., VIII, 630, seq., unsuspectingly entertained Jove and Mercury while wandering on earth in human form. The story is again referred to in As you like it, III, iii, 8: "0 knowledge ill-inhabited, worse than Jove in a thatched house."