Time is their master; and when they see time,
They'll go, or come. If so, be patient, sister.

Adr. Why should their liberty than ours be more?
Luc. Because their business still lies out o' door.
Adr. Look, when I serve him so, he takes it ill.
Luc. O, know, he is the bridle of your will.
Adr. There's none but asses, will be bridled so.
Luc. Why, headstrong liberty is lashed with woe.1
There's nothing, situate under Heaven's
eye,
But hath his bound, in earth, in sea, in sky.
The beasts, the fishes, and the winged fowls,
Are their males' subjects, and at their controls.
Men, more divine, the masters of all these,
Lords of the wide world, and wild watery seas,
Endued with intellectual sense and souls,
Of more pre-eminence than fish and fowls,
Are masters to their females, and their lords.
Then let your will attend on their accords.

Adr. This servitude makes you to keep unwed.
Luc. Not this, but troubles of the marriage bed.
Adr. But, were you wedded, you would bear some

sway.

Luc. Ere I learn love, I'll practise to obey.

Adr. How if your husband start some other where? Luc. Till he come home again, I would forbear. Adr. Patience, unmoved, no marvel though she

pause;

They can be meek, that have no other cause.3
A wretched soul, bruised with adversity,
We bid be quiet, when we hear it cry;

But were we burdened with like weight of pain,
As much, or more, we should ourselves complain:
So thou, that hast no unkind mate to grieve thee,
With urging helpless patience wouldst relieve me.
But, if thou live to see like right bereft,
This fool-begged patience in thee will be left.

Luc. Well, I will marry one day, but to try.-
Here comes your man; now is your husband nigh.

1 Steevens proposes to read leashed, i. e. coupled.

2 To pause is to rest, to be quiet. 3 i. e. no cause to be otherwise.

Enter DROMIO of Ephesus.

Adr. Say, is your tardy master now at hand? Dro. E. Nay, he is at two hands with me, and that my two ears can witness.

Adr. Say, didst thou speak with him? Know'st thou his mind?

Dro. E. Ay, ay, he told his mind upon mine ear. Beshrew his hand, I scarce could understand it.

Luc. Spake he so doubtfully, thou couldst not feel his meaning?

Dro. E. Nay, he struck so plainly, I could too well feel his blows; and withal so doubtfully, that I could scarce understand them.

Adr. But say, I pr'ythee, is he coming home?

It seems he hath great care to please his wife.

Dro. E. Why, mistress, sure my master is hornmad.

Adr. Horn-mad, thou villain?

Dro. E. I mean not cuckold-mad; but, sure, he's stark mad.

When I desired him to come home to dinner,
He asked me for a thousand marks in gold.
'Tis dinner-time, quoth I; My gold, quoth he:
Your meat doth burn, quoth I; My gold, quoth he:
Will you come home? quoth I; My gold, quoth he:
Where is the thousand marks I gave thee, villain?
The pig, quoth I, is burned; My gold, quoth he:
My mistress, sir, quoth I; Hang up thy mistress;
I know not thy mistress; out on thy mistress!
Luc. Quoth who?

Dro. E. Quoth my master.

I know, quoth he, no house, no wife, no mistress ;—
So that my errand, due unto my tongue,

I thank him, I bare home upon my shoulders;
For, in conclusion, he did beat me there.

Adr. Go back again, thou slave, and fetch him home.

1 Home is not in the old copy: it was supplied, to complete the verse, by Capell.

VOL. III.

16

Dro. E. Go back again, and be new beaten home? For God's sake, send some other messenger.

Adr. Back, slave, or I will break thy pate across. Dro. E. And he will bless that cross with other beating.

Between you I shall have a holy head.

Adr. Hence, prating peasant! fetch thy master

home.

Dro. E. Am I so round1 with you, as you with me, That like a football you do spurn me thus?

You spurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither.
If I last in this service, you must case me in leather.
[Exit.
Luc. Fie, how impatience low'reth 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 marred,
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 ruined? Then is he the ground
Of
my defeatures. My decayed fair 3

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.*

1 He plays upon the word round, which signifies spherical, as applied to himself; and unrestrained, or free in speech or action, as regards his mistress. The King, in Hamlet, desires the Queen to be round with her son.

2 Defeat and defeature were used for disfigurement or alteration of features. Cotgrave has "Un visage desfaict: Growne very leane, pale, wan, or decayed in feature and color."

3 Fair, strictly speaking, is not used here for fairness, as Steevens supposed; but for beauty. Shakspeare has often employed it in this sense, without any relation to whiteness of skin or complexion. The use of the adjective for the substantive, as in this instance, is not peculiar to him, but is the common practice of his contemporaries.

4 Adriana probably means she is thrown aside, forgotten, cast off, become stale to him.

Luc. Self-harming jealousy!-fie, beat it hence.
Adr. Unfeeling fools can with such wrongs dis-

pense.

I know his eye doth homage otherwhere;
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; and though gold 'bides still,
That others touch, yet often touching will
Wear gold; and so no man, that hath a name,
But 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.

SCENE II. The same.

Enter ANTIPHOLUS of Syracuse.

Ant. S. The gold I gave to Dromio is laid up
Safe at the Centaur; and the heedful slave
Is wandered forth, in care to seek me out.
By computation, and mine host's report,
I could not speak with Dromio, since at first
I sent him from the mart. See, here he comes.

As

Enter DROMIO of Syracuse.

How now, sir? is your merry humor altered?
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?

1 Hinders.

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, Your sauciness will jest upon my love,

And make a common of my serious hours.1

If

When the sun shines, let foolish gnats make sport, But creep in crannies when he hides his beams. you will jest with me, know my aspéct, And fashion your demeanor to my looks, Or I will beat this method in your sconce. Dro. S. Sconce, call you it? it? So 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.

1 i. e. intrude on them when you please.

2 To insconce was to hide, to protect as with a fort.