from me.”
“Then,” cried Katharine, losing patience, “let it be both, or one, or
anything thou wilt.”
“Why, then,” said the servant, “the mustard without the beef!”
Then Katharine saw he was making fun of her, and boxed his ears.
Just then Petruchio brought her some food--but she had scarcely begun
to satisfy her hunger, before he called for the tailor to bring her new
clothes, and the table was cleared, leaving her still hungry. Katharine
was pleased with the pretty new dress and cap that the tailor had made
for her, but Petruchio found fault with everything, flung the cap and
gown on the floor vowing his dear wife should not wear any such foolish
things.
“I will have them,” cried Katharine. “All gentlewomen wear such caps as
these--”
“When you are gentle you shall have one too,” he answered, “and not
till then.” When he had driven away the tailor with angry words--but
privately asking his friend to see him paid--Petruchio said--
“Come, Kate, let's go to your father's, shabby as we are, for as the
sun breaks through the darkest clouds, so honor peereth in the meanest
habit. It is about seven o'clock now. We shall easily get there by
dinner-time.”
“It's nearly two,” said Kate, but civilly enough, for she had grown to
see that she could not bully her husband, as she had done her father and
her sister; “it's nearly two, and it will be supper-time before we get
there.”
“It shall be seven,” said Petruchio, obstinately, “before I start. Why,
whatever I say or do, or think, you do nothing but contradict. I won't
go to-day, and before I do go, it shall be what o'clock I say it is.”
At last they started for her father's house.
“Look at the moon,” said he.
“It's the sun,” said Katharine, and indeed it was.
“I say it is the moon. Contradicting again! It shall be sun or moon, or
whatever I choose, or I won't take you to your father's.”
Then Katharine gave in, once and for all. “What you will have it named,”
she said, “it is, and so it shall be so for Katharine.” And so it was,
for from that moment Katharine felt that she had met her master, and
never again showed her naughty tempers to him, or anyone else.
So they journeyed on to Baptista's house, and arriving there, they found
all folks keeping Bianca's wedding feast, and that of another newly
married couple, Hortensio and his wife. They were made welcome, and sat
down to the feast, and all was merry, save that Hortensio's wife, seeing
Katharine subdued to her husband, thought she could safely say many
disagreeable things, that in the old days, when Katharine was free and
froward, she would not have dared to say. But Katharine answered with
such spirit and such moderation, that she turned the laugh against the
new bride.
After dinner, when the ladies had retired, Baptista joined in a laugh
against Petruchio, saying “Now in good sadness, son Petruchio, I fear
you have got the veriest shrew of all.”
“You are wrong,” said Petruchio, “let me prove it to you. Each of us
shall send a message to his wife, desiring her to come to him, and the
one whose wife comes most readily shall win a wager which we will agree
on.”
The others said yes readily enough, for each thought his own wife the
most dutiful, and each thought he was quite sure to win the wager.
They proposed a wager of twenty crowns.
“Twenty crowns,” said Petruchio, “I'll venture so much on my hawk or
hound, but twenty times as much upon my wife.”
“A hundred then,” cried Lucentio, Bianca's husband.
“Content,” cried the others.
Then Lucentio sent a message to the fair Bianca bidding her to come to
him. And Baptista said he was certain his daughter would come. But the
servant coming back, said--
“Sir, my mistress is busy, and she cannot come.”'
“There's an answer for you,” said Petruchio.
“You may think yourself fortunate if your wife does not send you a
worse.”
“I hope, better,” Petruchio answered. Then Hortensio said--
“Go and entreat my wife to come to me at once.”
“Oh--if you entreat her,” said Petruchio.
“I am afraid,” answered Hortensio, sharply, “do what you can, yours will
not be entreated.”
But now the servant came in, and said--
“She says you are playing some jest, she will not come.”
“Better and better,” cried Petruchio; “now go to your mistress and say I
command her to come to me.”
They all began to laugh, saying they knew what her answer would be, and
that she would not come.
Then suddenly Baptista cried--
“Here comes Katharine!” And sure enough--there she was.
“What do you wish, sir?” she asked her husband.
“Where are your sister and Hortensio's wife?”
“Talking by the parlor fire.”
“Fetch them here.”
When she was gone to fetch them, Lucentio said--
“Here is a wonder!”
“I wonder what it means,” said Hortensio.
“It means peace,” said Petruchio, “and love, and quiet life.”
“Well,” said Baptista, “you have won the wager, and I will add
another twenty thousand crowns to her dowry--another dowry for another
daughter--for she is as changed as if she were someone else.”
So Petruchio won his wager, and had in Katharine always a loving wife
and true, and now he had broken her proud and angry spirit he loved her
well, and there was nothing ever but love between those two. And so they
lived happy ever afterwards.
MEASURE FOR MEASURE
More centuries ago than I care to say, the people of Vienna were
governed too mildly. The reason was that the reigning Duke Vicentio was
excessively good-natured, and disliked to see offenders made unhappy.
The consequence was that the number of ill-behaved persons in Vienna
was enough to make the Duke shake his head in sorrow when his chief
secretary showed him it at the end of a list. He decided, therefore,
that wrongdoers must be punished. But popularity was dear to him. He
knew that, if he were suddenly strict after being lax, he would cause
people to call him a tyrant. For this reason he told his Privy Council
that he must go to Poland on important business of state. “I have chosen
Angelo to rule in my absence,” said he.
Now this Angelo, although he appeared to be noble, was really a mean
man. He had promised to marry a girl called Mariana, and now would have
nothing to say to her, because her dowry had been lost. So poor Mariana
lived forlornly, waiting every day for the footstep of her stingy lover,
and loving him still.
Having appointed Angelo his deputy, the Duke went to a friar called
Thomas and asked him for a friar's dress and instruction in the art of
giving religious counsel, for he did not intend to go to Poland, but to
stay at home and see how Angelo governed.
Angelo had not been a day in office when he condemned to death a young
man named Claudio for an act of rash selfishness which nowadays would
only be punished by severe reproof.
Claudio had a queer friend called Lucio, and Lucio saw a chance of
freedom for Claudio if Claudio's beautiful sister Isabella would plead
with Angelo.
Isabella was at that time living in a nunnery. Nobody had won her heart,
and she thought she would like to become a sister, or nun.
Meanwhile Claudio did not lack an advocate.
An ancient lord, Escalus, was for leniency. “Let us cut a little, but
not kill,” he said. “This gentleman had a most noble father.”
Angelo was unmoved. “If twelve men find me guilty, I ask no more mercy
than is in the law.”
Angelo then ordered the Provost to see that Claudio was executed at nine
the next morning.
After the issue of this order Angelo was told that the sister of the
condemned man desired to see him.
“Admit her,” said Angelo.
On entering with Lucio, the beautiful girl said, “I am a woeful suitor
to your Honor.”
“Well?” said Angelo.
She colored at his chill monosyllable and the ascending red increased
the beauty of her face. “I have a brother who is condemned to die,” she
continued. “Condemn the fault, I pray you, and spare my brother.”
“Every fault,” said Angelo, “is condemned before it is committed. A
fault cannot suffer. Justice would be void if the committer of a fault
went free.”
She would have left the court if Lucio had not whispered to her, “You
are too cold; you could not speak more tamely if you wanted a pin.”
So Isabella attacked Angelo again, and when he said, “I will not pardon
him,” she was not discouraged, and when he said, “He's sentenced; 'tis
too late,” she returned to the assault. But all her fighting was with
reasons, and with reasons she could not prevail over the Deputy.
She told him that nothing becomes power like mercy. She told him that
humanity receives and requires mercy from Heaven, that it was good to
have gigantic strength, and had to use it like a giant. She told him
that lightning rives the oak and spares the myrtle. She bade him look
for fault in his own breast, and if he found one, to refrain from making
it an argument against her brother's life.
Angelo found a fault in his breast at that moment. He loved Isabella's
beauty, and was tempted to do for her beauty what he would not do for
the love of man.
He appeared to relent, for he said, “Come to me to-morrow before noon.”
She had, at any rate, succeeded in prolonging her brother's life for a
few hours.'
In her absence Angelo's conscience rebuked him for trifling with his
judicial duty.
When Isabella called on him the second time, he said, “Your brother
cannot live.”
Isabella was painfully astonished, but all she said was, “Even so.
Heaven keep your Honor.”
But as she turned to go, Angelo felt that his duty and honor were slight
in comparison with the loss of her.
“Give me your love,” he said, “and Claudio shall be freed.”
“Before I would marry you, he should die if he had twenty heads to lay
upon the block,” said Isabella, for she saw then that he was not the
just man he pretended to be.
So she went to her brother in prison, to inform him that he must die.
At first he was boastful, and promised to hug the darkness of death.
But when he clearly understood that his sister could buy his life by
marrying Angelo, he felt his life more valuable than her happiness, and
he exclaimed, “Sweet sister, let me live.”
“O faithless coward! O dishonest wretch!” she cried.
At this moment the Duke came forward, in the habit of a friar, to
request some speech with Isabella. He called himself Friar Lodowick.
The Duke then told her that Angelo was affianced to Mariana, whose
love-story he related. He then asked her to consider this plan. Let
Mariana, in the dress of Isabella, go closely veiled to Angelo, and say,
in a voice resembling Isabella's, that if Claudio were spared she would
marry him. Let her take the ring from Angelo's little finger, that it
might be afterwards proved that his visitor was Mariana.
Isabella had, of course, a great respect for friars, who are as nearly
like nuns as men can be. She agreed, therefore, to the Duke's plan. They
were to meet again at the moated grange, Mariana's house.
In the street the Duke saw Lucio, who, seeing a man dressed like a
friar, called out, “What news of the Duke, friar?” “I have none,” said
the Duke.
Lucio then told the Duke some stories about Angelo. Then he told one
about the Duke. The Duke contradicted him. Lucio was provoked, and
called the Duke “a shallow, ignorant fool,” though he pretended to love
him. “The Duke shall know you better if I live to report you,” said the
Duke, grimly. Then he asked Escalus, whom he saw in the street, what he
thought of his ducal master. Escalus, who imagined he was speaking to a
friar, replied, “The Duke is a very temperate gentleman, who prefers to
see another merry to being merry himself.”
The Duke then proceeded to call on Mariana.
Isabella arrived immediately afterwards, and the Duke introduced the
two girls to one another, both of whom thought he was a friar. They
went into a chamber apart from him to discuss the saving of Claudio, and
while they talked in low and earnest tones, the Duke looked out of the
window and saw the broken sheds and flower-beds black with moss, which
betrayed Mariana's indifference to her country dwelling. Some women
would have beautified their garden: not she. She was for the town; she
neglected the joys of the country. He was sure that Angelo would not
make her unhappier.
“We are agreed, father,” said Isabella, as she returned with Mariana.
So Angelo was deceived by the girl whom he had dismissed from his love,
and put on her finger a ring he wore, in which was set a milky stone
which flashed in the light with secret colors.
Hearing of her success, the Duke went next day to the prison prepared
to learn that an order had arrived for Claudio's release. It had not,
however, but a letter was banded to the Provost while he waited. His
amazement was great when the Provost read aloud these words, “Whatsoever
you may hear to the contrary, let Claudio be executed by four of the
clock. Let me have his head sent me by five.”
But the Duke said to the Provost, “You must show the Deputy another
head,” and he held out a letter and a signet. “Here,” he said, “are the
hand and seal of the Duke. He is to return, I tell you, and Angelo knows
it not. Give Angelo another head.”
The Provost thought, “This friar speaks with power. I know the Duke's
signet and I know his hand.”
He said at length, “A man died in prison this morning, a pirate of the
age of Claudio, with a beard of his color. I will show his head.”
The pirate's head was duly shown to Angelo, who was deceived by its
resemblance to Claudio's.
The Duke's return was so popular that the citizens removed the city
gates from their hinges to assist his entry into Vienna. Angelo and
Escalus duly presented themselves, and were profusely praised for their
conduct of affairs in the Duke's absence.
It was, therefore, the more unpleasant for Angelo when Isabella,
passionately angered by his treachery, knelt before the Duke, and cried
for justice.
When her story was told, the Duke cried, “To prison with her for a
slanderer of our right hand! But stay, who persuaded you to come here?”
“Friar Lodowick,” said she.
“Who knows him?” inquired the Duke.
“I do, my lord,” replied Lucio. “I beat him because he spake against
your Grace.”
A friar called Peter here said, “Friar Lodowick is a holy man.”
Isabella was removed by an officer, and Mariana came forward. She took
off her veil, and said to Angelo, “This is the face you once swore was
worth looking on.”
Bravely he faced her as she put out her hand and said, “This is the hand
which wears the ring you thought to give another.”
“I know the woman,” said Angelo. “Once there was talk of marriage
between us, but I found her frivolous.”
Mariana here burst out that they were affianced by the strongest vows.
Angelo replied by asking the Duke to insist on the production of Friar
Lodowick.
“He shall appear,” promised the Duke, and bade Escalus examine the
missing witness thoroughly while he was elsewhere.
Presently the Duke re-appeared in the character of Friar Lodowick, and
accompanied by Isabella and the Provost. He was not so much examined as
abused and threatened by Escalus. Lucio asked him to deny, if he dared,
that he called the Duke a fool and a coward, and had had his nose pulled
for his impudence.
“To prison with him!” shouted Escalus, but as hands were laid upon him,
the Duke pulled off his friar's hood, and was a Duke before them all.
“Now,” he said to Angelo, “if you have any impudence that can yet serve
you, work it for all it's worth.”
“Immediate sentence and death is all I beg,” was the reply.
“Were you affianced to Mariana?” asked the Duke.
“I was,” said Angelo.
“Then marry her instantly,” said his master. “Marry them,” he said to
Friar Peter, “and return with them here.”
“Come hither, Isabel,” said the Duke, in tender tones. “Your friar is
now your Prince, and grieves he was too late to save your brother;” but
well the roguish Duke knew he had saved him.
“O pardon me,” she cried, “that I employed my Sovereign in my trouble.”
“You are pardoned,” he said, gaily.
At that moment Angelo and his wife re-entered. “And now, Angelo,” said
the Duke, gravely, “we condemn thee to the block on which Claudio laid
his head!”
“O my most gracious lord,” cried Mariana, “mock me not!”
“You shall buy a better husband,” said the Duke.
“O my dear lord,” said she, “I crave no better man.”
Isabella nobly added her prayer to Mariana's, but the Duke feigned
inflexibility.
“Provost,” he said, “how came it that Claudio was executed at an
unusual hour?”
Afraid to confess the lie he had imposed upon Angelo, the Provost said,
“I had a private message.”
“You are discharged from your office,” said the Duke. The Provost then
departed. Angelo said, “I am sorry to have caused such sorrow. I prefer
death to mercy.” Soon there was a motion in the crowd. The Provost
re-appeared with Claudio. Like a big child the Provost said, “I
saved this man; he is like Claudio.” The Duke was amused, and said to
Isabella, “I pardon him because he is like your brother. He is like my
brother, too, if you, dear Isabel, will be mine.”
She was his with a smile, and the Duke forgave Angelo, and promoted the
Provost.
Lucio he condemned to marry a stout woman with a bitter tongue.
TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA
Only one of them was really a gentleman, as you will discover later.
Their names were Valentine and Proteus. They were friends, and lived
at Verona, a town in northern Italy. Valentine was happy in his name
because it was that of the patron saint of lovers; it is hard for a
Valentine to be fickle or mean. Proteus was unhappy in his name, because
it was that of a famous shape-changer, and therefore it encouraged him
to be a lover at one time and a traitor at another.
One day, Valentine told his friend that he was going to Milan. “I'm
not in love like you,” said he, “and therefore I don't want to stay at
home.”
Proteus was in love with a beautiful yellow-haired girl called Julia,
who was rich, and had no one to order her about. He was, however, sorry
to part from Valentine, and he said, “If ever you are in danger tell me,
and I will pray for you.” Valentine then went to Milan with a servant
called Speed, and at Milan he fell in love with the Duke of Milan's
daughter, Silvia.
When Proteus and Valentine parted Julia had not acknowledged that she
loved Proteus. Indeed, she had actually torn up one of his letters in
the presence of her maid, Lucetta. Lucetta, however, was no simpleton,
for when she saw the pieces she said to herself, “All she wants is to be
annoyed by another letter.” Indeed, no sooner had Lucetta left her alone
than Julia repented of her tearing, and placed between her dress and her
heart the torn piece of paper on which Proteus had signed his name. So
by tearing a letter written by Proteus she discovered that she loved
him. Then, like a brave, sweet girl, she wrote to Proteus, “Be patient,
and you shall marry me.”
Delighted with these words Proteus walked about, flourishing Julia's
letter and talking to himself.
“What have you got there?” asked his father, Antonio.
“A letter from Valentine,” fibbed Proteus.
“Let me read it,” said Antonio.
“There is no news,” said deceitful Proteus; “he only says that he is
very happy, and the Duke of Milan is kind to him, and that he wishes I
were with him.”
This fib had the effect of making Antonio think that his son should go
to Milan and enjoy the favors in which Valentine basked. “You must go
to-morrow,” he decreed. Proteus was dismayed. “Give me time to get my
outfit ready.” He was met with the promise, “What you need shall be sent
after you.”
It grieved Julia to part from her lover before their engagement was two
days' old. She gave him a ring, and said, “Keep this for my sake,” and
he gave her a ring, and they kissed like two who intend to be true till
death. Then Proteus departed for Milan.
Meanwhile Valentine was amusing Silvia, whose grey eyes, laughing at him
under auburn hair, had drowned him in love. One day she told him that
she wanted to write a pretty letter to a gentleman whom she thought well
of, but had no time: would he write it? Very much did Valentine dislike
writing that letter, but he did write it, and gave it to her coldly.
“Take it back,” she said; “you did it unwillingly.”
“Madam,” he said, “it was difficult to write such a letter for you.”
“Take it back,” she commanded; “you did not write tenderly enough.”
Valentine was left with the letter, and condemned to write another;
but his servant Speed saw that, in effect, the Lady Silvia had allowed
Valentine to write for her a love-letter to Valentine's own self. “The
joke,” he said, “is as invisible as a weather-cock on a steeple.” He
meant that it was very plain; and he went on to say exactly what it was:
“If master will write her love-letters, he must answer them.”
On the arrival of Proteus, he was introduced by Valentine to Silvia and
afterwards, when they were alone, Valentine asked Proteus how his love
for Julia was prospering.
“Why,” said Proteus, “you used to get wearied when I spoke of her.”
“Aye,” confessed Valentine, “but it's different now. I can eat and drink
all day with nothing but love on my plate and love in my cup.”
“You idolize Silvia,” said Proteus.
“She is divine,” said Valentine.
“Come, come!” remonstrated Proteus.
“Well, if she's not divine,” said Valentine, “she is the queen of all
women on earth.”
“Except Julia,” said Proteus.
“Dear boy,” said Valentine, “Julia is not excepted; but I will grant
that she alone is worthy to bear my lady's train.”
“Your bragging astounds me,” said Proteus.
But he had seen Silvia, and he felt suddenly that the yellow-haired
Julia was black in comparison. He became in thought a villain without
delay, and said to himself what he had never said before--“I to myself
am dearer than my friend.”
It would have been convenient for Valentine if Proteus had changed, by
the power of the god whose name he bore, the shape of his body at the
evil moment when he despised Julia in admiring Silvia. But his body did
not change; his smile was still affectionate, and Valentine confided to
him the great secret that Silvia had now promised to run away with him.
“In the pocket of this cloak,” said Valentine, “I have a silken rope
ladder, with hooks which will clasp the window-bar of her room.”
Proteus knew the reason why Silvia and her lover were bent on flight.
The Duke intended her to wed Sir Thurio, a gentlemanly noodle for whom
she did not care a straw.
Proteus thought that if he could get rid of Valentine he might make
Silvia fond of him, especially if the Duke insisted on her enduring
Sir Thurio's tiresome chatter. He therefore went to the Duke, and said,
“Duty before friendship! It grieves me to thwart my friend Valentine,
but your Grace should know that he intends to-night to elope with your
Grace's daughter.” He begged the Duke not to tell Valentine the giver
of this information, and the Duke assured him that his name would not be
divulged.
Early that evening the Duke summoned Valentine, who came to him wearing
a large cloak with a bulging pocket.
“You know,” said the Duke, “my desire to marry my daughter to Sir
Thurio?”
“I do,” replied Valentine. “He is virtuous and generous, as befits a man
so honored in your Grace's thoughts.”
“Nevertheless she dislikes him,” said the Duke. “She is a peevish,
proud, disobedient girl, and I should be sorry to leave her a penny. I
intend, therefore, to marry again.”
Valentine bowed.
“I hardly know how the young people of to-day make love,” continued the
Duke, “and I thought that you would be just the man to teach me how to
win the lady of my choice.”
“Jewels have been known to plead rather well,” said Valentine.
“I have tried them,” said the Duke.
“The habit of liking the giver may grow if your Grace gives her some
more.”
“The chief difficulty,” pursued the Duke, “is this. The lady is promised
to a young gentleman, and it is hard to have a word with her. She is, in
fact, locked up.”
“Then your Grace should propose an elopement,” said Valentine. “Try a
rope ladder.”
“But how should I carry it?” asked the Duke.
“A rope ladder is light,” said Valentine; “You can carry it in a cloak.”
“Like yours?”
“Yes, your Grace.”
“Then yours will do. Kindly lend it to me.”
Valentine had talked himself into a trap. He could not refuse to lend
his cloak, and when the Duke had donned it, his Grace drew from the
pocket a sealed missive addressed to Silvia. He coolly opened it, and
read these words: “Silvia, you shall be free to-night.”