You spurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither:
If I last in this service, you must case me in leather.

Luc. Fie, how impatience loureth in your face!
ADR. His company must do his minions grace,
Whilst I at home starve for a merry look.
Hath homely age the alluring beauty took
From my poor cheek? then he hath wasted it:
Are my discourses dull? barren my wit?
If voluble and sharp discourse be marr'd,
Unkindness blunts it more than marble hard:
Do their gay vestments his affections bait?
That's not my fault; he's master of my state:
What ruins are in me that can be found,

By him not ruin'd? then is he the ground
Of my
my defeatures. My decayed fair

A sunny look of his would soon repair :

But, too unruly deer, he breaks the pale,

And feeds from home; poor I am but his stale.

Luc. Self-harming jealousy! fie, beat it hence!

[Exit.

ADR. Unfeeling fools can with such wrongs dispense.

I know his eye doth homage otherwhere;

88 starve for a merry look] Cf. Sonnets, xlvii, 3, "famish'd for a look," and lxxv, 10, "starved for a look."

98 defeatures] disfigurements. Shakespeare is the only Elizabethan writer who uses the word in this sense, and that only here, in V, i, 299, infra, and in Venus and Adonis, 736.

fair] beauty. This substantival use of the adjective is common in Shakespeare's Sonnets. Cf. Sonnets, xvi, 11; xviii, 7 and 10;

lxviii, 3; and lxxxiii, 2.

90

100

Or else what lets it but he would be here?
Sister, you know he promised me a chain;
Would that alone, alone he would detain,
So he would keep fair quarter with his bed!
I see the jewel best enamelled

Will lose his beauty; yet the gold bides still,
That others touch, and often touching will
Wear gold and no man that hath a name,
By falsehood and corruption doth it shame.
Since that my beauty cannot please his eye,
I'll weep what's left away, and weeping die.
Luc. How many fond fools serve mad jealousy!

[Exeunt.

110

SCENE II-A PUBLIC PLACE

Enter ANTIPHOLUS of Syracuse

ANT. S. The gold I gave to Dromio is laid up Safe at the Centaur; and the heedful slave

Is wander'd forth, in care to seek me out

By computation and mine host's report.

107 alone, alone] Thus the Second Folio, which substitutes the second alone for the two words a love of the First Folio. Though some emendation of the original text is essential, it is doubtful if the Second Folio reading be correct. Hanmer read alone, alas. 110-112 yet the gold... gold] Thus in the First Folio, save for Theobald's correction of Wear for Where (1. 112). The meaning seems to be that gold which is touched or tested lasts long, and at the same time much touching or handling wears gold down. 113 By falsehood] Theobald's reading, But falsehood, makes better

sense.

I could not speak with Dromio since at first
I sent him from the mart. See, here he comes.

Enter DROMIO of Syracuse

How now, sir! is your merry humour alter'd?
As you love strokes, so jest with me again.
You know no Centaur ? you received no gold?
Your mistress sent to have me home to dinner?
My house was at the Phoenix? Wast thou mad,
That thus so madly thou didst answer me?

DRO. S. What answer, sir? when spake I, such a word ?

ANT. S. Even now, even here, not half an hour since. DRO. S. I did not see you since you sent me hence, Home to the Centaur, with the gold you gave me. ANT. S. Villain, thou didst deny the gold's receipt, And told'st me of a mistress and a dinner; For which, I hope, thou felt'st I was displeased.

DRO. S. I am glad to see you in this merry vein : What means this jest? I pray you, master, tell me. ANT. S. Yea, dost thou jeer and flout me in the

teeth?

Think'st thou I jest? Hold, take thou that, and that. [Beating him. DRO. S. Hold, sir, for God's sake! now your jest is

earnest :

Upon what bargain do you give it me?

ANT. S. Because that I familiarly sometimes

Do use you for my fool, and chat with you,

10

20

Your sauciness will jest upon my love,

And make a common of my serious hours.

When the sun shines let foolish gnats make sport,
But creep in crannies when he hides his beams.
If you will jest with me, know my aspect,
And fashion your demeanour to my looks,
Or I will beat this method in your sconce.

DRO. S. Sconce call you it? so you would leave battering, I had rather have it a head: an you use these blows long, I must get a sconce for my head, and insconce it too; or else I shall seek my wit in my shoulders. But, I pray, sir, why am I beaten ?

ANT. S. Dost thou not know?

DRO. S. Nothing, sir, but that I am beaten.
ANT. S. Shall I tell you why?

DRO. S. Ay, sir, and wherefore; for they say every why hath a wherefore.

ANT. S. Why, first, for flouting me; and then,

wherefore,

For urging it the second time to me.

DRO. S. Was there ever any man thus beaten out of

season,

When in the why and the wherefore is neither rhyme nor reason?

Well, sir, I thank you.

ANT. S. Thank me, sir! for what?

29 make a common of] make ground open to all, intrude upon. 35-38 sconce insconce] Sconce is used at first for "head" then for "head covering," or "helmet." Cf. I, ii, 79, supra. wit in my back, i. e. run away.

38 seek shoulders] find

my

and

30

40

50

DRO. S. Marry, sir, for this something that you gave me for nothing.

ANT. S. I'll make you amends next, to give you nothing for something. But say, sir, is it dinner-time?

DRO. S. No, sir: I think the meat wants that I have. ANT. S. In good time, sir; what's that?

DRO. S. Basting.

ANT. S. Well, sir, then 't will be dry.

DRO. S. If it be, sir, I pray you, eat none of it.
ANT. S. Your reason?

DRO. S. Lest it make you choleric, and purchase me another dry basting.

ANT. S. Well, sir, learn to jest in good time: there's a time for all things.

DRO. S. I durst have denied that, before you were so choleric.

ANT. S. By what rule, sir?

DRO. S. Marry, sir, by a rule as plain as the plain bald pate of father Time himself.

ANT. S. Let's hear it.

DRO. S. There's no time for a man to recover his hair that grows bald by nature.

ANT. S. May he not do it by fine and recovery?

61 choleric] Cf. T. of Shrew, IV, i, 173–175, for a like reference to the choleric effects of overcooked meat.

62 dry basting] beating that does not draw blood. See L. L. L., V, ii, 263.

73 fine and recovery] This phrase is employed again in M. Wives, IV, ii, 225, and Hamlet, V, i, 115. It is somewhat loosely employed. "Fine" and "recovery" were names of legal processes which rendered ownership absolute and incontestable.

60

70