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The Duke, my husband, and my children both,
And you the calendars of their nativity,

Go to a gossips' feast, and go with me;

After so long grief, such nativity!

DUKE. With all my heart, I'll gossip at this feast. [Exeunt all but Ant. S., Ant. E., Dro. S., and Dro. E. DRO. S. Master, shall I fetch your stuff from shipboard?

ANT. E. Dromio, what stuff of mine hast thou embark'd?

DRO. S. Your goods that lay at host, sir, in the

Centaur.

ANT. S. He speaks to me. I am your master,

Dromio:

Come, go with us; we 'll look to that anon:

Embrace thy brother there; rejoice with him.

[Exeunt Ant. S. and Ant. E. DRO. S. There is a fat friend at your master's house, That kitchen'd me for you to-day at dinner:

She now shall be my sister, not my wife.

DRO. E. Methinks you are my glass, and not my brother:

404, 406 gossips' feast] feast given to the sponsors at a christening. 405 such nativity] Thus the old reading. Hanmer substituted felicity and later editors festivity, in the belief that " nativity" was a printer's repetition, through an error of vision, of "nativity," the last word of line 403. But "nativity" harmonises somewhat better with the twice repeated reference to "gossips," i. e. sponsors at a christening.

407-408 stuff] See note on IV, iv, 155, supra. 409 lay at host] were lodged or stored.

410

I see by you I am a sweet-faced youth.
Will you walk in to see their gossiping?

DRO. S. Not I, sir; you are my elder.

DRO. E. That's a question: how shall we try it? DRO. S. We'll draw cuts for the senior: till then lead thou first.

DRO. E. Nay, then, thus:

We came into the world like brother and brother;

And now let's go hand in hand, not one before another.

[Exeunt.

4.20

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