The Two Gentlemen of Verona (12 page)

JULIA
    ’Twere false,
if
¹⁰⁷
I should speak it;

For I am sure she is not burièd.

SILVIA
    Say that she be: yet Valentine thy friend

Survives; to whom, thyself art witness,

I am betrothed. And art thou not ashamed

To wrong him with thy
importunacy?
¹¹²

PROTEUS
    I likewise hear that Valentine is dead.

SILVIA
    
And so suppose am I
¹¹⁴
: for in his grave

Assure thyself, my love is burièd.

PROTEUS
    Sweet lady, let me rake it from the earth.

SILVIA
    Go to thy lady’s grave and call
hers
¹¹⁷
thence,

Or at the least, in hers
sepulchre
¹¹⁸
thine.

JULIA
    He heard not that.

PROTEUS
    Madam, if your heart be so
obdurate,
¹²⁰

Vouchsafe
¹²¹
me yet your picture for my love,

The picture that is hanging in your chamber.

To that I’ll speak, to that I’ll sigh and weep:

For since the substance of your perfect self

Is
else
¹²⁵
devoted, I am but a shadow,

And to your
shadow
¹²⁶
will I make true love.

JULIA
    
If ’twere a substance, you would sure deceive it,
¹²⁷

And make it but a shadow, as I am.

SILVIA
    I am very loath to be your idol, sir;

But,
since your falsehood shall become you well
¹³⁰

To worship shadows and adore false shapes,

Send to me in the morning, and I’ll send it.

And so, good rest.

PROTEUS
    As wretches have o’ernight

That wait for execution in the morn.

JULIA
    Host, will you go?

HOST
    By my
halidom
¹³⁷
, I was fast asleep.

JULIA
    Pray you, where
lies
¹³⁸
Sir Proteus?

HOST
    Marry, at my
house.
¹³⁹
Trust me, I think ’tis almost

day.

JULIA
    Not so: but it hath been the longest night

That e’er I watched, and the most
heaviest.
¹⁴²

EGLAMOUR
    This is the hour that Madam Silvia

Entreated me to call and know her mind:

There’s some great matter she’d employ me in.

Madam, madam.

SILVIA
    Who calls?

EGLAMOUR
    Your servant and your friend;

One that attends your ladyship’s command.

SILVIA
    Sir Eglamour, a thousand times good morrow.

EGLAMOUR
    As many, worthy lady, to yourself:

According to your ladyship’s
impose,
¹⁰

I am thus early come to know what service

It is your pleasure to command me in.

SILVIA
    O, Eglamour, thou art a gentleman—

Think not I flatter, for I swear I do not—

Valiant, wise,
remorseful
¹⁵
, well accomplished.

Thou art not ignorant what dear good will

I bear unto the banished Valentine,

Nor how my father would enforce me marry

Vain
¹⁹
Turio, whom my very soul abhorred.

Thyself hast loved, and I have heard thee say

No grief did ever come so near thy heart

As when thy lady and thy true love died,

Upon whose grave thou vowed’st pure chastity.

Sir Eglamour, I
would
²⁴
to Valentine,

To Mantua, where I hear he makes abode;

And
for
²⁶
the ways are dangerous to pass,

I do desire thy worthy company,

Upon whose faith and honour I
repose.
²⁸

Urge not my father’s anger, Eglamour,

But think upon my grief, a lady’s grief,

And on the justice of my flying hence,

To keep me from a most unholy match,

Which heaven and fortune
still
³³
rewards with plagues.

I do desire thee, even from a heart

As full of sorrows as the sea of sands,

To bear me company and go with me:

If not, to hide what I have said to thee,

That I may venture to depart alone.

EGLAMOUR
    Madam, I pity much your
grievances,
³⁹

Which, since I know they virtuously are placed,

I give consent to go along with you,

Recking
as little what
betideth
⁴²
me

As much I wish all good
befortune
⁴³
you.

When will you go?

SILVIA
    This evening coming.

EGLAMOUR
    Where shall I meet you?

SILVIA
    At Friar Patrick’s
cell,
⁴⁷

Where I intend holy confession.

EGLAMOUR
    I will not fail your ladyship.

Good morrow, gentle lady.

SILVIA
    Good morrow, kind Sir Eglamour.

LANCE
    When a man’s servant shall
play the cur
¹
with him,

look you, it
goes hard
: one that I brought up
of
²
a puppy: one

that I saved from drowning, when three or four of his blind

brothers and sisters went to it. I have taught him, even as

one would say precisely, ‘thus I would teach a dog’. I was sent

to deliver him as a present to Mistress Silvia from my master,

and I came no sooner into the dining-chamber but he
steps
⁷

me to her
trencher
and steals her
capon’s
⁸
leg: O, ’tis a foul

thing when a cur cannot
keep
⁹
himself in all companies. I

would have, as one should say, one that
takes upon him
¹⁰
to be

a dog indeed, to be, as it were,
a dog at
¹¹
all things. If I had not

had more wit than he, to
take a fault upon me that he did
¹²
, I

think
verily
he
had
¹³
been hanged for’t: sure as I live, he had

suffered for’t, you shall judge. He
thrusts me
¹⁴
himself into the

company of three or four gentlemanlike dogs under the

duke’s table: he had not been there —
bless the mark
¹⁶
— a

pissing while
¹⁷
, but all the chamber smelt him. ‘Out with the

dog!’ says one. ‘What cur is that?’ says another. ‘Whip him

out’, says the third. ‘Hang him up’, says the duke. I, having

been acquainted with the smell before, knew it was Crab, and

goes me to the fellow that whips the dogs: ‘Friend,’ quoth I,

‘you mean to whip the dog?’ ‘Ay, marry, do I’, quoth he. ‘You

do him the more wrong,’ quoth I, ‘’twas I did the thing you

wot of
.’ He
makes me no more ado
²⁴
, but whips me out of the

chamber. How many masters would do this for his servant?

Nay, I’ll be sworn, I have sat in the
stocks
for
puddings
²⁶

he hath stolen, otherwise he had been executed: I have stood

on the
pillory
²⁸
for geese he hath killed, otherwise he had

suffered for’t.—Thou think’st not of this now. Nay,

I remember the trick you served me when I took my leave of

Madam Silvia: did not I bid thee
still mark
³¹
me and do as I do?

When didst thou see me
heave up
my leg and
make water
³²

against a gentlewoman’s farthingale? Didst thou ever see me

do such a trick?

PROTEUS
    Sebastian is thy name? I like thee well and will

employ thee in some service presently.

JULIA
    In what you please, I’ll do what I can.

PROTEUS
    I hope thou wilt.—How now, you whoreson

peasant, where have you been these two days loitering?

LANCE
    Marry, sir, I carried Mistress Silvia the dog you

bade me.

PROTEUS
    And what says she to my little
jewel?
⁴²

LANCE
    Marry, she says your dog was a
cur
⁴³
, and tells you

currish
⁴⁴
thanks is good enough for such a present.

PROTEUS
    But she received my dog?

LANCE
    No indeed did she not: here have I brought him back

again.

PROTEUS
    What, didst thou offer her this from me?

LANCE
    Ay, sir: the other
squirrel
⁴⁹
was stolen from me by the

hangman boys
⁵⁰
in the market-place, and then I offered her

mine own, who is a dog as big as ten of yours, and therefore

the gift the greater.

PROTEUS
    Go get thee hence, and find my dog again,

Or ne’er return again into my sight.

Away, I say: stay’st thou to vex me here?

A slave, that
still an end
⁵⁶
turns me to shame.

Sebastian, I have
entertained
⁵⁷
thee,

Partly that I have need of such a youth

That can with some discretion do my business,

For ’tis no trusting to
yond
⁶⁰
foolish lout,

But chiefly for thy face and thy
behaviour,
⁶¹

Which, if my
augury
⁶²
deceive me not,

Witness
⁶³
good bringing up, fortune and truth:

Therefore know thou, for this I entertain thee.

Go presently, and take this ring with thee,

Deliver it to Madam Silvia;

She loved me well
delivered
⁶⁷
it to me.

JULIA
    It seems you loved not her, to
leave
⁶⁸
her token:

She is dead, belike?

PROTEUS
    Not so: I think she lives.

JULIA
    Alas!

PROTEUS
    Why dost thou cry ‘Alas’?

JULIA
    I cannot choose but pity her.

PROTEUS
    Wherefore shouldst thou pity her?

JULIA
    Because methinks that she loved you as well

As you do love your lady Silvia:

She dreams on him that has forgot her love,

You dote on her that cares not for your love.

’Tis pity love should be so contrary:

And thinking on it makes me cry ‘Alas’.

PROTEUS
    Well, give her that ring and
therewithal
⁸¹

This letter. That’s her chamber. Tell my lady

I claim the promise for her heavenly picture.

Your message done, hie home unto my chamber,

Where thou shalt find me, sad and solitary.

JULIA
    How many women would do such a message?

Alas, poor Proteus, thou hast entertained

A fox to be the shepherd of thy lambs.

Alas,
poor fool
⁸⁹
, why do I pity him

That with his very heart despiseth me?

Because he loves her, he despiseth me:

Because I love him, I must pity him.

This ring I gave him when he parted from me,

To bind him to remember my good will.

And now am I, unhappy messenger,

To plead for that which I would not obtain,
⁹⁶

To carry that which I would have refused,

To praise his faith which I would have dispraised.

I am my master’s
true-confirmèd
⁹⁹
love,

But cannot be true servant to my master,

Unless I prove false traitor to myself.

Yet will I woo for him, but yet so coldly

As, heaven it knows, I would not have him
speed.
¹⁰³