meet me two hours since; and he was ever precise in promise-keeping. 2 Gent. Besides, you know, it draws something near to the speech we had to such a purpose. 1 Gent. But most of all, agreeing with the proclamation. Lucio. Away; let's go learn the truth of it. [Exeunt LUCIO and Gentlemen. Bawd. Thus, what with the war, what with the sweat, what with the gallows, and what with poverty, I am custom-shrunk. How now? what's the news with you? Enter Clown. Clo. Yonder man is carried to prison. Clo. A woman. Bawd. But what's his offence? Clo. Groping for trouts in a peculiar river. Bawd. What is there a maid with child by him? Clo. No; but there's a woman with maid by him: You have not heard of the proclamation, have you? Bawd. What proclamation, man? Clo. All houses in the suburbs of Vienna must be pluck'd down. Bawd. And what shall become of those in the city? Clo. They shall stand for seed: they had gone down too, but that a wise burgher put in for them. Bawd. But shall all our houses of resort in the suburbs be pull'd down5? Clo. To the ground, mistress. 4 The sweat; the consequences of the curative process then used for a certain disease. 5 In one of the Scotch Laws of James it is ordered, 'that common women be put at the utmost endes of townes, queire least Bawd. Why, here's a change, indeed, in the commonwealth! What shall become of me? Clo. Come, fear not you; good counsellors lack no clients though you change your place, you need not change your trade; I'll be your tapster still. Courage; there will be pity taken on you: you that have worn your eyes almost out in the service, you will be considered. Bawd. What's to do here, Thomas Tapster? Let's withdraw. Clo. Here comes signior Claudio, led by the provost to prison: and there's madam Juliet. [Exeunt. SCENE III. The same. Enter Provost1, CLAUDIO, JULIET, and Officers; LUCIO, and two Gentlemen. Claud. Fellow, why dost thou show me thus to the world? Bear me to prison where I am committed. Claud. Thus can the demi-god, Authority, Make us pay down for our offence by weight.The words of heaven ;-on whom it will, it will; On whom it will not, so; yet still 'tis just2. Lucio. Why, how now, Claudio? whence comes this restraint? peril of fire is.'-It is remarkable that the licensed houses of resort at Vienna, are at this time all in the suburbs, under the permission of the Committee of Chastity. 1 i. e. gaoler. 2 Authority being absolute in Angelo, is finely styled by Claudio, the demigod, whose decrees are as little to be questioned as the words of heaven. The poet alludes to a passage in St. Paul's Epist. to the Romans, ch. ix. v. 15-18: 'I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy.' Claud. From too much liberty, my Lucio, liberty; As surfeit is the father of much fast, So every scope by the immoderate use Lucio. If I could speak so wisely under an arrest, I would send for certain of my creditors: And yet, to say the truth, I had as lief have the foppery of freedom, as the morality of imprisonment.—What's thy offence, Claudio? Claud. What, but to speak of would offend again. Lucio. What is it? murder? Claud. No. Lucio. Lechery? Claud. Call it so. Prov. Away, sir; you must go. with you. Claud. One word, good friend:-Lucio, a word [Takes him aside. Lucio. A hundred if they'll do you any good.— Is lechery so look'd after? Claud. Thus stands it with me:-Upon a true contract, I got possession of Julietta's bed 5; You know the lady; she is fast my wife, 3 To ravin is to voraciously devour. 4 So, in Chapman's Revenge for Honour: Like poison'd rats, which, when they've swallowed And can rest then much less, until they burst. 5 This speech is surely too indelicate to be spoken concerning Juliet before her face. Claudio may therefore be supposed to speak to Lucio apart. VOL. II. C 6 Only for propagation of a dower Remaining in the coffer of her friends; From whom we thought it meet to hide our love, Till time had made them for us. But it chances, The stealth of our most mutual entertainment, With character too gross, is writ on Juliet. Claud. Unhappily, even so. And the new deputy now for the duke,- A horse whereon the governor doth ride, Or in his eminence that fills it up, I stagger in:-But this new governor Which have, like unscour❜d armour, hung by the wall Lucio. I warrant, it is: and thy head stands so tickle on thy shoulders, that a milk-maid, if she 6 This singular mode of expression has not been satisfactorily explained. The old sense of the word is 'promoting, inlarging, increasing, spreading.' It appears that Claudio would say: 'for the sake of promoting such a dower as her friends might hereafter bestow on her, when time had reconciled them to her clandestine marriage.' The verb is as obscurely used by Chapman in the Sixteenth book of the Odyssey: -' to try if we Alone may propagate to victory Our bold encounters.' Shakspeare uses To propagate their states,' for to improve or promote their conditions, in Timon of Athens, Act i. Sc. 1. 7 Zodiacs, yearly circles. 8 Tickle, for ticklish. Send after the duke, be in love, may sigh it off. and appeal to him. Claud. I have done so, but he's not to be found. Acquaint her with the danger of my state; art Lucio. I pray, she may: as well for the encouragement of the like, which else would stand under grievous imposition; as for the enjoying of thy life, who I would be sorry should be thus foolishly lost at a game of tick-tack 11. I'll to her. Claud. I thank you, good friend Lucio. Claud. Come, officer, away. SCENE IV. A Monastery. Enter DUKE and Friar Thomas. [Exeunt. Duke. No; holy Father; throw away that thought; Believe not that the dribbling dart of love Can pierce a cómplete bosom1: why I desire thee To give me secret harbour, hath a purpose More grave and wrinkled than the aims and ends Of burning youth. Fri. May your grace speak of it? 9 i. e. enter on her noviciate or probation. 10 Prone, is prompt or ready. 11 Jouer au tric trac is used in French in a wanton sense. 1 'A cómplete bosom' is a bosom completely armed. |