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Much Ado About Nothing: Act 2 Scene 1

Scene I A hall in LEONATO'S house.

[Enter LEONATO, ANTONIO, HERO, BEATRICE, and others]

LEONATO

Was not Count John here at supper?

ANTONIO

I saw him not.

BEATRICE

How tartly that gentleman looks! I never can see

him but I am heart-burned an hour after.

HERO

He is of a very melancholy disposition.

BEATRICE

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.

LEONATO

Then half Signior Benedick's tongue in Count John's

mouth, and half Count John's melancholy in Signior

Benedick's face,--

BEATRICE

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.

LEONATO

By my troth, niece, thou wilt never get thee a

husband, if thou be so shrewd of thy tongue.

ANTONIO

In faith, she's too curst.

BEATRICE

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.

LEONATO

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

BEATRICE

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.

LEONATO

You may light on a husband that hath no beard.

BEATRICE

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 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.

LEONATO

Well, then, go you into hell?

BEATRICE

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 shows me where the bachelors sit, and

there live we as merry as the day is long.

ANTONIO

[To HERO] Well, niece, I trust you will be ruled

by your father.

BEATRICE

Yes, faith; it is my cousin's duty to make curtsy

and say 'Father, as it please you.' But yet for all

that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else

make another curtsy and say 'Father, as it please

me.'

LEONATO

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

BEATRICE

Not till God make men of some other metal than

earth. Would it not grieve a woman to be

overmastered with a pierce 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.

LEONATO

Daughter, remember what I told you: if the prince

do solicit you in that kind, you know your answer.

BEATRICE

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 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.

LEONATO

Cousin, you apprehend passing shrewdly.

BEATRICE

I have a good eye, uncle; I can see a church by daylight.

LEONATO

The revellers are entering, brother: make good room.

[All put on their masks]

[Enter DON PEDRO, CLAUDIO, BENEDICK, BALTHASAR,

DON JOHN, BORACHIO, MARGARET, URSULA and others, masked]

DON 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.

DON PEDRO

With me in your company?

HERO

I may say so, when I please.

DON PEDRO

And when please you to say so?

HERO

When I like your favour; for God defend the lute

should be like the case!

DON PEDRO

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

HERO

Why, then, your visor should be thatched.

DON PEDRO

Speak low, if you speak love.

[Drawing her aside]

BALTHASAR

Well, I would you did like me.

MARGARET

So would not I, for your own sake; for I have many

ill-qualities.

BALTHASAR

Which is one?

MARGARET

I say my prayers aloud.

BALTHASAR

I love you the better: the hearers may cry, Amen.

MARGARET

God match me with a good dancer!

BALTHASAR

Amen.

MARGARET

And God keep him out of my sight when the dance is

done! Answer, clerk.

BALTHASAR

No more words: the clerk is answered.

URSULA

I know you well enough; you are Signior Antonio.

ANTONIO

At a word, I am not.

URSULA

I know you by the waggling of your head.

ANTONIO

To tell you true, I counterfeit him.

URSULA

You could never do him so ill-well, unless you were

the very man. Here's his dry hand up and down: you

are he, you are he.

ANTONIO

At a word, I am not.

URSULA

Come, come, do you think I do not know you by your

excellent wit? can virtue hide itself? Go to,

mum, you are he: graces will appear, and there's an

end.

BEATRICE

Will you not tell me who told you so?

BENEDICK

No, you shall pardon me.

BEATRICE

Nor will you not tell me who you are?

BENEDICK

Not now.

BEATRICE

That I was disdainful, and that I had my good wit

out of the 'Hundred Merry Tales:'--well this was

Signior Benedick that said so.

BENEDICK

What's he?

BEATRICE

I am sure you know him well enough.

BENEDICK

Not I, believe me.

BEATRICE

Did he never make you laugh?

BENEDICK

I pray you, what is he?

BEATRICE

Why, he is the prince's jester: a very dull fool;

only his gift is in devising impossible slanders:

none but libertines delight in him; and the

commendation is not in his wit, but in his villany;

for he both pleases men and angers them, and then

they laugh at him and beat him. I am sure he is in

the fleet: I would he had boarded me.

BENEDICK

When I know the gentleman, I'll tell him what you say.

BEATRICE

Do, do: he'll but break a comparison or two on me;

which, peradventure not marked or not laughed at,

strikes him into melancholy; and then there's a

partridge wing saved, for the fool will eat no

supper that night.

[Music]

We must follow the leaders.

BENEDICK

In every good thing.

BEATRICE

Nay, if they lead to any ill, I will leave them at

the next turning.

[Dance. Then exeunt all except DON JOHN, BORACHIO,

and CLAUDIO]

DON JOHN

Sure my brother is amorous on Hero and hath

withdrawn her father to break with him about it.

The ladies follow her and but one visor remains.

BORACHIO

And that is Claudio: I know him by his bearing.

DON JOHN

Are not you Signior Benedick?

CLAUDIO

You know me well; I am he.

DON JOHN

Signior, you are very near my brother in his love:

he is enamoured on Hero; I pray you, dissuade him

from her: she is no equal for his birth: you may

do the part of an honest man in it.

CLAUDIO

How know you he loves her?

DON JOHN

I heard him swear his affection.

BORACHIO

So did I too; and he swore he would marry her to-night.

DON JOHN

Come, let us to the banquet.

[Exeunt DON JOHN and BORACHIO]

CLAUDIO

Thus answer I in the name of Benedick,

But hear these ill news with the ears of Claudio.

'Tis certain so; the prince wooes for himself.

Friendship is constant in all other things

Save in the office and affairs of love:

Therefore, all hearts in love use their own tongues;

Let every eye negotiate for itself

And trust no agent; for beauty is a witch

Against whose charms faith melteth into blood.

This is an accident of hourly proof,

Which I mistrusted not. Farewell, therefore, Hero!

[Re-enter BENEDICK]

BENEDICK

Count Claudio?

CLAUDIO

Yea, the same.

BENEDICK

Come, will you go with me?

CLAUDIO

Whither?

BENEDICK

Even to the next willow, about your own business,

county. 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.

CLAUDIO

I wish him joy of her.

BENEDICK

Why, that's spoken like an honest drovier: so they

sell bullocks. But did you think the prince would

have served you thus?

CLAUDIO

I pray you, leave me.

BENEDICK

Ho! now you strike like the blind man: 'twas the

boy that stole your meat, and you'll beat the post.

CLAUDIO

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

[Exit]

BENEDICK

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, but 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.

[Re-enter DON PEDRO]

DON PEDRO

Now, signior, where's the count? did you see him?

BENEDICK

Troth, my lord, I have played the part of Lady Fame.

I found him here as melancholy as a lodge in a

warren: I told him, and I think I told him true,

that your grace had got the good will of this young

lady; 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.

DON PEDRO

To be whipped! What's his fault?

BENEDICK

The flat transgression of a schoolboy, who, being

overjoyed with finding a birds' nest, shows it his

companion, and he steals it.

DON PEDRO

Wilt thou make a trust a transgression? The

transgression is in the stealer.

BENEDICK

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.

DON PEDRO

I will but teach them to sing, and restore them to

the owner.

BENEDICK

If their singing answer your saying, by my faith,

you say honestly.

DON PEDRO

The Lady Beatrice hath a quarrel to you: the

gentleman that danced with her told her she is much

wronged by you.

BENEDICK

O, 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 such 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 bad left him before

he transgressed: she would have made Hercules have

turned spit, yea, and have cleft his club to make

the fire too. Come, talk not of her: you shall find

her the infernal Ate in good apparel. 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 follows her.

DON PEDRO

Look, here she comes.

[Enter CLAUDIO, BEATRICE, HERO, and LEONATO]

BENEDICK

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, fetch you a hair off the great

Cham's beard, do you any embassage to the Pigmies,

rather than hold three words' conference with this

harpy. You have no employment for me?

DON PEDRO

None, but to desire your good company.

BENEDICK

O God, sir, here's a dish I love not: I cannot

endure my Lady Tongue.

[Exit]

DON PEDRO

Come, lady, come; you have lost the heart of

Signior Benedick.

BEATRICE

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.

DON PEDRO

You have put him down, lady, you have put him down.

BEATRICE

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

should prove the mother of fools. I have brought

Count Claudio, whom you sent me to seek.

DON PEDRO

Why, how now, count! wherefore are you sad?

CLAUDIO

Not sad, my lord.

DON PEDRO

How then? sick?

CLAUDIO

Neither, my lord.

BEATRICE

The count is neither sad, nor sick, nor merry, nor

well; but civil count, civil as an orange, and

something of that jealous complexion.

DON PEDRO

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!

LEONATO

Count, take of me my daughter, and with her my

fortunes: his grace hath made the match, and an

grace say Amen to it.

BEATRICE

Speak, count, 'tis your cue.

CLAUDIO

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.

BEATRICE

Speak, cousin; or, if you cannot, stop his mouth

with a kiss, and let not him speak neither.

DON PEDRO

In faith, lady, you have a merry heart.

BEATRICE

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.

CLAUDIO

And so she doth, cousin.

BEATRICE

Good Lord, for alliance! Thus goes every one to the

world but I, and I am sunburnt; I may sit in a

corner and cry heigh-ho for a husband!

DON PEDRO

Lady Beatrice, I will get you one.

BEATRICE

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 a maid could come by them.

DON PEDRO

Will you have me, lady?

BEATRICE

No, my lord, unless I might have another 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.

DON PEDRO

Your silence most offends me, and to be merry best

becomes you; for, out of question, you were born in

a merry hour.

BEATRICE

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!

LEONATO

Niece, will you look to those things I told you of?

BEATRICE

I cry you mercy, uncle. By your grace's pardon.

[Exit]

DON PEDRO

By my troth, a pleasant-spirited lady.

LEONATO

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 dreamed of unhappiness and waked

herself with laughing.

DON PEDRO

She cannot endure to hear tell of a husband.

LEONATO

O, by no means: she mocks all her wooers out of suit.

DON PEDRO

She were an excellent wife for Benedict.

LEONATO

O Lord, my lord, if they were but a week married,

they would talk themselves mad.

DON PEDRO

County Claudio, when mean you to go to church?

CLAUDIO

To-morrow, my lord: time goes on crutches till love

have all his rites.

LEONATO

Not till Monday, my dear son, which is hence a just

seven-night; and a time too brief, too, to have all

things answer my mind.

DON PEDRO

Come, you shake the head at so long a breathing:

but, I warrant thee, Claudio, the time shall not go

dully by us. I will in the interim undertake one of

Hercules' labours; which is, to bring Signior

Benedick and the Lady Beatrice into a mountain of

affection the one with the other. I would fain have

it a match, and I doubt not but to fashion it, if

you three will but minister such assistance as I

shall give you direction.

LEONATO

My lord, I am for you, though it cost me ten

nights' watchings.

CLAUDIO

And I, my lord.

DON PEDRO

And you too, gentle Hero?

HERO

I will do any modest office, my lord, to help my

cousin to a good husband.

DON PEDRO

And Benedick is not the unhopefullest husband that

I know. Thus far can I praise him; he is of a noble

strain, of approved valour and confirmed honesty. I

will teach you how to humour your cousin, that she

shall fall in love with Benedick; and I, with your

two helps, will so practise on Benedick that, in

despite of his quick wit and his queasy stomach, he

shall fall in love with Beatrice. If we can do this,

Cupid is no longer an archer: his glory shall be

ours, for we are the only love-gods. Go in with me,

and I will tell you my drift.

[Exeunt]