Much Ado About Nothing Page #4

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which I mistrusted not.

Farewell, therefore, Hero!

- Count Claudio.

- Yea, the same.

- Come, will you go with me?

- Whither?

Even to the next willow,

about your own business.

What fashion will you wear

the garland of?

About your neck,

like an usurer's chain?

Or under your arm,

like a lieutenant's scarf?

You must wear it one way,

for the prince hath got your Hero.

- I wish him joy of her.

- Why, that's spoken like an honest drovier:

so they sell bullocks.

Did you think the prince

would have served you thus?

- I pray you, leave me.

- Hey! now you strike like the blind man:

'twas the boy that stole your meat,

and you'll beat the post.

If it will not be, I'll leave you.

Alas, poor hurt fowl!

Now will he creep into sedges.

But that my lady Beatrice

should know me, and not know me!

The prince's fool? Ha!

It may be I go

under that title because I am merry.

Yea.

So...

I am apt to do myself wrong,

I am not so reputed:

It is the base, though bitter,

disposition of Beatrice

that puts the world into her person,

and so gives me out.

Well...

I'll be revenged as I may.

Now, signior, where's the count?

Did you see him?

My lord, I told him,

and I think I told him true,

that your grace had got

the will of his Hero.

And I offered him my company

to a willow-tree,

either to make him a garland,

as being forsaken,

or to bind him up a rod,

as being worthy to be whipped.

To be whipped! What's his fault?

The flat transgression of a schoolboy,

who, being overjoyed with finding a birds' nest,

shows it his companion, and he steals it.

Wilt thou make a trust a transgression?

The transgression is in the stealer.

Yet it had not been amiss the rod

had been made, and the garland too;

for the garland he might have worn himself,

and the rod he might have bestowed on you,

who, as I take it,

have stolen his birds' nest.

I will but teach them to sing,

and restore them to the owner.

If their singing answer your saying,

by my faith, you say honestly.

The Lady Beatrice hath a quarrel to you.

The gentleman that danced with her

told her she is much wronged by you.

She misused me past

the endurance of a block!

an oak but with one green leaf on it

would have answered her;

my very visor began to assume life and

scold with her.

She told me, not thinking

I had been myself,

that I was the prince's jester,

that I was duller than a great thaw,

huddling jest upon jest

with impossible conveyance upon me

that I stood like a man at a mark

with a whole army shooting at me.

She speaks poniards,

and every word stabs.

If her breath were as terrible

as her terminations,

there were no living near her;

she would infect to the north star.

I would not marry her,

though she were endowed with all

that Adam had left him before he transgressed:

she would have made Hercules

have turned the spit,

yea, and have cleft his club

to make the fire too.

Come, talk not of her.

I would to God

some scholar would conjure her;

for certainly, while she is here, a man may live

as quiet in hell as in a sanctuary;

and people sin upon purpose,

because they would go thither;

So indeed, all disquiet, horror

and perturbation follow her.

Look, here she comes.

Will your grace command me

any service to the world's end?

I will go on the slightest errand now

to the Antipodes

that you can devise to send me on.

I will fetch you a tooth-picker now from the

furthest inch of Asia,

bring you the length of

Prester John's foot,

I will fetch you a hair

off the great Cham's beard,

do you any embassage to the pygmies,

rather than endure three words' conference

with this harpy!

You have no employment for me?

None, but to desire your good company.

Oh, God.

Sir, here's a dish I love not.

I cannot endure my Lady Tongue!

Come, lady, come. You have lost the heart

of Signior Benedick.

Indeed, my lord.

He lent it me awhile,

and I gave him use for it -

a double heart for his single one.

Marry, once before he won it of me

with false dice.

Therefore your grace may well say

I have lost it.

You have put him down, lady,

you have put him down.

So I would not he should do me, my lord,

lest I should prove the mother of fools.

I have brought you Count Claudio,

whom you sent me to seek.

- How now, count! Wherefore are you sad?

- Not sad, my lord.

- How then? Sick?

- Neither, my lord.

The count is neither sad, nor sick,

nor merry, nor well,

but civil count - civil as an orange,

and something of that

jealous complexion.

I' faith, lady,

I think your blazon to be true,

though I'll be sworn, if he be so,

his conceit is false.

Here, Claudio.

I have wooed in thy name,

and fair Hero is won.

I have broke with her father,

and his good will obtained.

Name the day of marriage,

and God give thee joy!

Count, take of me my daughter,

and with her my fortunes.

His grace hath made the match,

and all grace say amen to it.

Speak, Count. 'Tis your cue.

Silence is the perfectest herald of joy.

I were but little happy

if I could say how much.

Lady, as you are mine,

I am yours.

I give away myself for

you and dote upon the exchange.

Speak, cousin,

or if you cannot, stop his mouth with

a kiss, and let not him speak neither.

In faith, lady, you have a merry heart.

Yea, my lord, I thank it.

Poor fool, it keeps

on the windy side of care.

My cousin tells him in his ear

that he is in her heart.

And so she doth, cousin.

Good Lord, for alliance!

Thus goes everyone to the world

but I, and I am sunburnt.

I may sit in a corner and cry,

"Heigh-ho for a husband!"

Lady Beatrice, I will get you one.

I would rather have one

of your father's getting.

Hath your grace ne'er

a brother like you?

Your father got excellent husbands,

if only a maid could come by them.

Will you have me, lady?

No.

My lord...

Unless I might have another one

for working days.

Your grace is too costly

to wear every day.

But I beseech your grace, pardon me.

I was born to speak all mirth

and no matter.

Your silence most offends me,

and to be merry best becomes you,

for out of question,

you were born in a merry hour.

No, sure, my lord, my mother cried.

But then there was a star danced,

and under that was I born.

Cousins, God give you joy.

Niece, will you look to those things

I told you of?

I cry you mercy, uncle.

By your grace's pardon.

By my troth, a pleasant-spirited lady.

There's little of the

melancholy element in her, my lord.

She is never sad but when she sleeps,

and not ever sad then,

for I have heard my daughter say

she hath often dreamt of unhappiness

and waked herself with laughing.

She cannot endure

to hear tell of a husband.

Oh, by no means.

She mocks all her wooers out of suit.

She were an excellent wife

for Benedick.

My lord, if they were but a week married,

they would talk themselves mad.

How now, Claudio!

- When mean you to go to church?

- Tomorrow, my lord.

Time goes on crutches till love

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