Hero.”
“Give her a week, my dear son,” said Leonato, and Claudio's heart
thumped with joy.
“And now,” said the amiable Don Pedro, “we must find a wife for Signor
Benedick. It is a task for Hercules.”
“I will help you,” said Leonato, “if I have to sit up ten nights.”
Then Hero spoke. “I will do what I can, my lord, to find a good husband
for Beatrice.”
Thus, with happy laughter, ended the masquerade which had given Claudio
a lesson for nothing.
Borachio cheered up Don John by laying a plan before him with which he
was confident he could persuade both Claudio and Don Pedro that Hero was
a fickle girl who had two strings to her bow. Don John agreed to this
plan of hate.
Don Pedro, on the other hand, had devised a cunning plan of love.
“If,” he said to Leonato, “we pretend, when Beatrice is near enough to
overhear us, that Benedick is pining for her love, she will pity him,
see his good qualities, and love him. And if, when Benedick thinks we
don't know he is listening, we say how sad it is that the beautiful
Beatrice should be in love with a heartless scoffer like Benedick, he
will certainly be on his knees before her in a week or less.”
So one day, when Benedick was reading in a summer-house, Claudio sat
down outside it with Leonato, and said, “Your daughter told me something
about a letter she wrote.”
“Letter!” exclaimed Leonato. “She will get up twenty times in the night
and write goodness knows what. But once Hero peeped, and saw the words
'Benedick and Beatrice' on the sheet, and then Beatrice tore it up.”
“Hero told me,” said Claudio, “that she cried, 'O sweet Benedick!'”
Benedick was touched to the core by this improbable story, which he was
vain enough to believe. “She is fair and good,” he said to himself.
“I must not seem proud. I feel that I love her. People will laugh, of
course; but their paper bullets will do me no harm.”
At this moment Beatrice came to the summerhouse, and said, “Against my
will, I have come to tell you that dinner is ready.”
“Fair Beatrice, I thank you,” said Benedick.
“I took no more pains to come than you take pains to thank me,” was the
rejoinder, intended to freeze him.
But it did not freeze him. It warmed him. The meaning he squeezed out of
her rude speech was that she was delighted to come to him.
Hero, who had undertaken the task of melting the heart of Beatrice, took
no trouble to seek an occasion. She simply said to her maid Margaret one
day, “Run into the parlor and whisper to Beatrice that Ursula and I are
talking about her in the orchard.”
Having said this, she felt as sure that Beatrice would overhear what was
meant for her ears as if she had made an appointment with her cousin.
In the orchard was a bower, screened from the sun by honeysuckles, and
Beatrice entered it a few minutes after Margaret had gone on her errand.
“But are you sure,” asked Ursula, who was one of Hero's attendants,
“that Benedick loves Beatrice so devotedly?”
“So say the Prince and my betrothed,” replied Hero, “and they wished me
to tell her, but I said, 'No! Let Benedick get over it.'”
“Why did you say that?”
“Because Beatrice is unbearably proud. Her eyes sparkle with disdain and
scorn. She is too conceited to love. I should not like to see her making
game of poor Benedick's love. I would rather see Benedick waste away
like a covered fire.”
“I don't agree with you,” said Ursula. “I think your cousin is too
clear-sighted not to see the merits of Benedick.” “He is the one man in
Italy, except Claudio,” said Hero.
The talkers then left the orchard, and Beatrice, excited and tender,
stepped out of the summer-house, saying to herself, “Poor dear Benedick,
be true to me, and your love shall tame this wild heart of mine.”
We now return to the plan of hate.
The night before the day fixed for Claudio's wedding, Don John entered
a room in which Don Pedro and Claudio were conversing, and asked Claudio
if he intended to be married to-morrow.
“You know he does!” said Don Pedro.
“He may know differently,” said Don John, “when he has seen what I will
show him if he will follow me.”
They followed him into the garden; and they saw a lady leaning out of
Hero's window talking love to Borachio.
Claudio thought the lady was Hero, and said, “I will shame her for it
to-morrow!” Don Pedro thought she was Hero, too; but she was not Hero;
she was Margaret.
Don John chuckled noiselessly when Claudio and Don Pedro quitted the
garden; he gave Borachio a purse containing a thousand ducats.
The money made Borachio feel very gay, and when he was walking in the
street with his friend Conrade, he boasted of his wealth and the giver,
and told what he had done.
A watchman overheard them, and thought that a man who had been paid a
thousand ducats for villainy was worth taking in charge. He therefore
arrested Borachio and Conrade, who spent the rest of the night in
prison.
Before noon of the next day half the aristocrats in Messina were at
church. Hero thought it was her wedding day, and she was there in her
wedding dress, no cloud on her pretty face or in her frank and shining
eyes.
The priest was Friar Francis.
Turning to Claudio, he said, “You come hither, my lord, to marry this
lady?” “No!” contradicted Claudio.
Leonato thought he was quibbling over grammar. “You should have said,
Friar,” said he, “'You come to be married to her.'”
Friar Francis turned to Hero. “Lady,” he said, “you come hither to be
married to this Count?” “I do,” replied Hero.
“If either of you know any impediment to this marriage, I charge you to
utter it,” said the Friar.
“Do you know of any, Hero?” asked Claudio. “None,” said she.
“Know you of any, Count?” demanded the Friar. “I dare reply for him,
'None,'” said Leonato.
Claudio exclaimed bitterly, “O! what will not men dare say! Father,”
he continued, “will you give me your daughter?” “As freely,” replied
Leonato, “as God gave her to me.”
“And what can I give you,” asked Claudio, “which is worthy of this
gift?” “Nothing,” said Don Pedro, “unless you give the gift back to the
giver.”
“Sweet Prince, you teach me,” said Claudio. “There, Leonato, take her
back.”
These brutal words were followed by others which flew from Claudio, Don
Pedro and Don John.
The church seemed no longer sacred. Hero took her own part as long as
she could, then she swooned. All her persecutors left the church, except
her father, who was befooled by the accusations against her, and cried,
“Hence from her! Let her die!”
But Friar Francis saw Hero blameless with his clear eyes that probed the
soul. “She is innocent,” he said; “a thousand signs have told me so.”
Hero revived under his kind gaze. Her father, flurried and angry, knew
not what to think, and the Friar said, “They have left her as one dead
with shame. Let us pretend that she is dead until the truth is declared,
and slander turns to remorse.”
“The Friar advises well,” said Benedick. Then Hero was led away into a
retreat, and Beatrice and Benedick remained alone in the church.
Benedick knew she had been weeping bitterly and long. “Surely I do
believe your fair cousin is wronged,” he said. She still wept.
“Is it not strange,” asked Benedick, gently, “that I love nothing in the
world as well as you?”
“It were as possible for me to say I loved nothing as well as you,” said
Beatrice, “but I do not say it. I am sorry for my cousin.”
“Tell me what to do for her,” said Benedick. “Kill Claudio.”
“Ha! not for the wide world,” said Benedick. “Your refusal kills me,”
said Beatrice. “Farewell.”
“Enough! I will challenge him,” cried Benedick.
During this scene Borachio and Conrade were in prison. There they were
examined by a constable called Dogberry.
The watchman gave evidence to the effect that Borachio had said that he
had received a thousand ducats for conspiring against Hero.
Leonato was not present at this examination, but he was nevertheless now
thoroughly convinced Of Hero's innocence. He played the part of bereaved
father very well, and when Don Pedro and Claudio called on him in a
friendly way, he said to the Italian, “You have slandered my child to
death, and I challenge you to combat.”
“I cannot fight an old man,” said Claudio.
“You could kill a girl,” sneered Leonato, and Claudio crimsoned.
Hot words grew from hot words, and both Don Pedro and Claudio were
feeling scorched when Leonato left the room and Benedick entered.
“The old man,” said Claudio, “was like to have snapped my nose off.”
“You are a villain!” said Benedick, shortly. “Fight me when and with
what weapon you please, or I call you a coward.”
Claudio was astounded, but said, “I'll meet you. Nobody shall say I
can't carve a calf's head.”
Benedick smiled, and as it was time for Don Pedro to receive officials,
the Prince sat down in a chair of state and prepared his mind for
justice.
The door soon opened to admit Dogberry and his prisoners.
“What offence,” said Don Pedro, “are these men charged with?”
Borachio thought the moment a happy one for making a clean breast of it.
He laid the whole blame on Don John, who had disappeared. “The lady Hero
being dead,” he said, “I desire nothing but the reward of a murderer.”
Claudio heard with anguish and deep repentance.
Upon the re-entrance of Leonato be said to him, “This slave makes clear
your daughter's innocence. Choose your revenge.
“Leonato,” said Don Pedro, humbly, “I am ready for any penance you may
impose.”
“I ask you both, then,” said Leonato, “to proclaim my daughter's
innocence, and to honor her tomb by singing her praise before it. As for
you, Claudio, I have this to say: my brother has a daughter so like Hero
that she might be a copy of her. Marry her, and my vengeful feelings
die.”
“Noble sir,” said Claudio, “I am yours.” Claudio then went to his room
and composed a solemn song. Going to the church with Don Pedro and his
attendants, he sang it before the monument of Leonato's family. When he
had ended he said, “Good night, Hero. Yearly will I do this.”
He then gravely, as became a gentleman whose heart was Hero's, made
ready to marry a girl whom he did not love. He was told to meet her in
Leonato's house, and was faithful to his appointment.
He was shown into a room where Antonio (Leonato's brother) and several
masked ladies entered after him. Friar Francis, Leonato, and Benedick
were present.
Antonio led one of the ladies towards Claudio.
“Sweet,” said the young man, “let me see your face.”
“Swear first to marry her,” said Leonato.
“Give me your hand,” said Claudio to the lady; “before this holy friar I
swear to marry you if you will be my wife.”
“Alive I was your wife,” said the lady, as she drew off her mask.
“Another Hero!” exclaimed Claudio.
“Hero died,” explained Leonato, “only while slander lived.”
The Friar was then going to marry the reconciled pair, but Benedick
interrupted him with, “Softly, Friar; which of these ladies is
Beatrice?”
Hereat Beatrice unmasked, and Benedick said, “You love me, don't you?”
“Only moderately,” was the reply. “Do you love me?”
“Moderately,” answered Benedick.
“I was told you were well-nigh dead for me,” remarked Beatrice.
“Of you I was told the same,” said Benedick.
“Here's your own hand in evidence of your love,” said Claudio, producing
a feeble sonnet which Benedick had written to his sweetheart. “And
here,” said Hero, “is a tribute to Benedick, which I picked out of the
pocket of Beatrice.”
“A miracle!” exclaimed Benedick. “Our hands are against our hearts!
Come, I will marry you, Beatrice.”
“You shall be my husband to save your life,” was the rejoinder.
Benedick kissed her on the mouth; and the Friar married them after he
had married Claudio and Hero.
“How is Benedick the married man?” asked Don Pedro.
“Too happy to be made unhappy,” replied Benedick. “Crack what jokes you
will. As for you, Claudio, I had hoped to run you through the body, but
as you are now my kinsman, live whole and love my cousin.”
“My cudgel was in love with you, Benedick, until to-day,” said Claudio;
but, “Come, come, let's dance,” said Benedick.
And dance they did. Not even the news of the capture of Don John was
able to stop the flying feet of the happy lovers, for revenge is not
sweet against an evil man who has failed to do harm.
ROMEO AND JULIET
Once upon a time there lived in Verona two great families named Montagu
and Capulet. They were both rich, and I suppose they were as sensible,
in most things, as other rich people. But in one thing they were
extremely silly. There was an old, old quarrel between the two families,
and instead of making it up like reasonable folks, they made a sort of
pet of their quarrel, and would not let it die out. So that a Montagu
wouldn't speak to a Capulet if he met one in the street--nor a Capulet
to a Montagu--or if they did speak, it was to say rude and unpleasant
things, which often ended in a fight. And their relations and
servants were just as foolish, so that street fights and duels and
uncomfortablenesses of that kind were always growing out of the
Montagu-and-Capulet quarrel.
Now Lord Capulet, the head of that family, gave a party-- a grand supper
and a dance--and he was so hospitable that he said anyone might come to
it except (of course) the Montagues. But there was a young Montagu named
Romeo, who very much wanted to be there, because Rosaline, the lady he
loved, had been asked. This lady had never been at all kind to him, and
he had no reason to love her; but the fact was that he wanted to love
somebody, and as he hadn't seen the right lady, he was obliged to love
the wrong one. So to the Capulet's grand party he came, with his friends
Mercutio and Benvolio.
Old Capulet welcomed him and his two friends very kindly--and young
Romeo moved about among the crowd of courtly folk dressed in their
velvets and satins, the men with jeweled sword hilts and collars, and
the ladies with brilliant gems on breast and arms, and stones of price
set in their bright girdles. Romeo was in his best too, and though he
wore a black mask over his eyes and nose, everyone could see by his
mouth and his hair, and the way he held his head, that he was twelve
times handsomer than anyone else in the room.
Presently amid the dancers he saw a lady so beautiful and so lovable
that from that moment he never again gave one thought to that Rosaline
whom he had thought he loved. And he looked at this other fair lady, as
she moved in the dance in her white satin and pearls, and all the world
seemed vain and worthless to him compared with her. And he was saying
this, or something like it, when Tybalt, Lady Capulet's nephew, hearing
his voice, knew him to be Romeo. Tybalt, being very angry, went at
once to his uncle, and told him how a Montagu had come uninvited to the
feast; but old Capulet was too fine a gentleman to be discourteous to
any man under his own roof, and he bade Tybalt be quiet. But this young
man only waited for a chance to quarrel with Romeo.
In the meantime Romeo made his way to the fair lady, and told her in
sweet words that he loved her, and kissed her. Just then her mother sent
for her, and then Romeo found out that the lady on whom he had set his
heart's hopes was Juliet, the daughter of Lord Capulet, his sworn foe.
So he went away, sorrowing indeed, but loving her none the less.
Then Juliet said to her nurse:
“Who is that gentleman that would not dance?”
“His name is Romeo, and a Montagu, the only son of your great enemy,”
answered the nurse.
Then Juliet went to her room, and looked out of her window, over the
beautiful green-grey garden, where the moon was shining. And Romeo was
hidden in that garden among the trees--because he could not bear to go
right away without trying to see her again. So she--not knowing him to
be there--spoke her secret thought aloud, and told the quiet garden how
she loved Romeo.
And Romeo heard and was glad beyond measure. Hidden below, he looked
up and saw her fair face in the moonlight, framed in the blossoming
creepers that grew round her window, and as he looked and listened, he
felt as though he had been carried away in a dream, and set down by some
magician in that beautiful and enchanted garden.
“Ah--why are you called Romeo?” said Juliet. “Since I love you, what
does it matter what you are called?”
“Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized--henceforth I never will be
Romeo,” he cried, stepping into the full white moonlight from the shade
of the cypresses and oleanders that had hidden him.
She was frightened at first, but when she saw that it was Romeo himself,
and no stranger, she too was glad, and, he standing in the garden below
and she leaning from the window, they spoke long together, each one
trying to find the sweetest words in the world, to make that pleasant
talk that lovers use. And the tale of all they said, and the sweet music
their voices made together, is all set down in a golden book, where you
children may read it for yourselves some day.
And the time passed so quickly, as it does for folk who love each other
and are together, that when the time came to part, it seemed as though
they had met but that moment-- and indeed they hardly knew how to part.
“I will send to you to-morrow,” said Juliet.
And so at last, with lingering and longing, they said good-bye.
Juliet went into her room, and a dark curtain bid her bright window.
Romeo went away through the still and dewy garden like a man in a dream.
The next morning, very early, Romeo went to Friar Laurence, a priest,
and, telling him all the story, begged him to marry him to Juliet
without delay. And this, after some talk, the priest consented to do.
So when Juliet sent her old nurse to Romeo that day to know what he
purposed to do, the old woman took back a message that all was well,
and all things ready for the marriage of Juliet and Romeo on the next
morning.
The young lovers were afraid to ask their parents' consent to their
marriage, as young people should do, because of this foolish old quarrel
between the Capulets and the Montagues.
And Friar Laurence was willing to help the young lovers secretly,
because he thought that when they were once married their parents
might soon be told, and that the match might put a happy end to the old
quarrel.
So the next morning early, Romeo and Juliet were married at Friar
Laurence's cell, and parted with tears and kisses. And Romeo promised to
come into the garden that evening, and the nurse got ready a rope-ladder
to let down from the window, so that Romeo could climb up and talk to
his dear wife quietly and alone.
But that very day a dreadful thing happened.
Tybalt, the young man who had been so vexed at Romeo's going to the
Capulet's feast, met him and his two friends, Mercutio and Benvolio, in
the street, called Romeo a villain, and asked him to fight. Romeo had no
wish to fight with Juliet's cousin, but Mercutio drew his sword, and
he and Tybalt fought. And Mercutio was killed. When Romeo saw that this
friend was dead, he forgot everything except anger at the man who had
killed him, and he and Tybalt fought till Tybalt fell dead.
So, on the very day of his wedding, Romeo killed his dear Juliet's
cousin, and was sentenced to be banished. Poor Juliet and her young
husband met that night indeed; he climbed the rope-ladder among the
flowers, and found her window, but their meeting was a sad one, and they
parted with bitter tears and hearts heavy, because they could not know
when they should meet again.
Now Juliet's father, who, of course, had no idea that she was married,
wished her to wed a gentleman named Paris, and was so angry when she
refused, that she hurried away to ask Friar Laurence what she should do.
He advised her to pretend to consent, and then he said:
“I will give you a draught that will make you seem to be dead for two
days, and then when they take you to church it will be to bury you, and
not to marry you. They will put you in the vault thinking you are dead,
and before you wake up Romeo and I will be there to take care of you.
Will you do this, or are you afraid?”
“I will do it; talk not to me of fear!” said Juliet. And she went home
and told her father she would marry Paris. If she had spoken out and
told her father the truth . . . well, then this would have been a
different story.
Lord Capulet was very much pleased to get his own way, and set about
inviting his friends and getting the wedding feast ready. Everyone
stayed up all night, for there was a great deal to do, and very little
time to do it in. Lord Capulet was anxious to get Juliet married because
he saw she was very unhappy. Of course she was really fretting about her
husband Romeo, but her father thought she was grieving for the death of
her cousin Tybalt, and he thought marriage would give her something else
to think about.
Early in the morning the nurse came to call Juliet, and to dress her
for her wedding; but she would not wake, and at last the nurse cried out
suddenly--
“Alas! alas! help! help! my lady's dead! Oh, well-a-day that ever I was
born!”
Lady Capulet came running in, and then Lord Capulet, and Lord Paris, the
bridegroom. There lay Juliet cold and white and lifeless, and all their
weeping could not wake her. So it was a burying that day instead of a
marrying. Meantime Friar Laurence had sent a messenger to Mantua with a
letter to Romeo telling him of all these things; and all would have been
well, only the messenger was delayed, and could not go.
But ill news travels fast. Romeo's servant who knew the secret of the
marriage, but not of Juliet's pretended death, heard of her funeral, and
hurried to Mantua to tell Romeo how his young wife was dead and lying in
the grave.
“Is it so?” cried Romeo, heart-broken. “Then I will lie by Juliet's side
to-night.”
And he bought himself a poison, and went straight back to Verona. He
hastened to the tomb where Juliet was lying. It was not a grave, but a
vault. He broke open the door, and was just going down the stone steps
that led to the vault where all the dead Capulets lay, when he heard a
voice behind him calling on him to stop.
It was the Count Paris, who was to have married Juliet that very day.
“How dare you come here and disturb the dead bodies of the Capulets, you
vile Montagu?” cried Paris.
Poor Romeo, half mad with sorrow, yet tried to answer gently.
“You were told,” said Paris, “that if you returned to Verona you must
die.”
“I must indeed,” said Romeo. “I came here for nothing else. Good, gentle
youth--leave me! Oh, go--before I do you any harm! I love you better
than myself--go--leave me here--”
Then Paris said, “I defy you, and I arrest you as a felon,” and Romeo,
in his anger and despair, drew his sword. They fought, and Paris was
killed.
As Romeo's sword pierced him, Paris cried--
“Oh, I am slain! If thou be merciful, open the tomb, and lay me with
Juliet!”
And Romeo said, “In faith I will.”
And he carried the dead man into the tomb and laid him by the dear
Juliet's side. Then he kneeled by Juliet and spoke to her, and held
her in his arms, and kissed her cold lips, believing that she was dead,
while all the while she was coming nearer and nearer to the time of her
awakening. Then he drank the poison, and died beside his sweetheart and
wife.
Now came Friar Laurence when it was too late, and saw all that had
happened--and then poor Juliet woke out of her sleep to find her husband
and her friend both dead beside her.
The noise of the fight had brought other folks to the place too, and
Friar Laurence, hearing them, ran away, and Juliet was left alone. She
saw the cup that had held the poison, and knew how all had happened, and
since no poison was left for her, she drew her Romeo's dagger and thrust
it through her heart--and so, falling with her head on her Romeo's
breast, she died. And here ends the story of these faithful and most
unhappy lovers.
* * * * * * *
And when the old folks knew from Friar Laurence of all that had
befallen, they sorrowed exceedingly, and now, seeing all the mischief
their wicked quarrel had wrought, they repented them of it, and over the
bodies of their dead children they clasped hands at last, in friendship
and forgiveness.
PERICLES