MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

PRELIMINARY REMARKS.

It is said that the main plot of this play is derived | Dogberry and Verges, relieve the serious parts of the from the story of Ariodante and Ginevra, in the fifth book of Ariosto's Orlando Furioso. Something similar may also be found in the fourth canto of the second book of Spenser's Faerie Queene; but a novel of Bandello's, copied by Belleforest in his Tragical Histories, seems to have furnished Shakspeare with the fable. It approaches nearer to the play in all particulars than any other performance hitherto discovered. No trans lation of it into English has, however, yet been met with.

The incidents of this play produce a striking effect on the stage, where it has ever been one of the most popular of Shakspeare's Comedies. The sprightly wit-encounters between Benedick and Beatrice, and the blun dering simplicity of those inimitable men in office,

Mess. I have already delivered him letters, and there appears much joy in him; even so much, that joy could not show itself modest enough, with lighted out a badge of bitterness.2

Mess. He hath done good service, lady, in these

wars.

Beat. You had musty victual, and ho hath holp to eat it: he is a very valiant trencher-man, he hath an excellent stomach.

Mess. And a good soldier too, lady.

Beat. And a good soldier to a lady;-But what is he to a lord?

Mess. A lord to a lord, a man to a man; stuffed1 with all honourable virtues.

Beat. It is so, indeed; he is no less than a stuffed man: but for the stuffing,-Well, we are all mortal. Leon. You must not, sir, mistake my niece: there is a kind of merry war betwixt signior Benedick and her: they never meet, but there is a skirmish of wit between them.

Beat. Alas, he gets nothing by that. In our last conffiet, four of his five wits went halting off, and now is the whole man governed with one: so that if he have wit enough to keep himself warm, let Lim bear it for a difference between himself and has horse: for it is all the wealth that he hath left, to be known a reasonable creature. Who is his companion now? He hath every month a new sworn brother.

Mess. Is it possible?

Beat. Very easily possible: he wears his faith but as the fashion of his hat, it ever changes with the next block.4

Mess. I see, lady, the gentleman is not in your books.

Beat. No: an he were, I would burn my study. But, I pray you, who is his companion? Is there he young squarer now, that will make a voyage with him to the devil?

Mess. He is most in the company of the right noble Claudio.

Beat. O Lord! he will hang upon him like a disease: he is sooner caught than the pestilence, and the taker runs presently mad. God help the noble Claudio! if he have caught the Benedick, it will cost him a thousand pound ere he be cured. Mess. I will hold friends with you, lady.

Beat. Do, good friend.

Leon. You will never run mad, nicce.
Beat. No, not till a hot January.
Mess. Don Pedro is approached.

Enter DON PEDRO, attended by BALTHAZAR and
others, DON JOHN, CLAUDIO, and BENEDICK.

D. Pedro, Good signior Leonato, you are come to meet your trouble: the fashion of the world is to avoid cost, and you encounter it.

Leon. Never came trouble to my house in the likeness of your grace: for trouble being gone, comfort should remain; but, when you depart from me,

sorrow abides, and happiness takes his leave.

D. Pedro. You embrace your charge too willingly. I think, this is your daughter.

Leon. Her mother hath many times told me so.
Bere. Were you in doubt, sir, that you asked her?
Lem. Signior Benedick, no; for then were you

a child,

D. Pedro. You have it full Benedick: we may

guess by this what you are, being a man. Truly, the lady fathers herself: -Be happy, lady! for you are like an honourable father.

1 Stuffed, in this first instance, has no ridiculous meaning. Mede, in his discourses on Scripture, quoted by Edwards, speaking of Adam, says, 'he whom God had stuffed with so many excellent quali Les. And in the Winter's Tale:

Of stuff d sutliciency."

Beatrice starts an idea at the words stuffed man, and prudently checks herself in the pursuit of it. A stuffed Laan appears to have been one of the many cant phrases for a cuckold.

Bene. If signior Leonato be her father, she would not have his head on her shoulders, for all Messina, as like him as she is.

Beat. I wonder, that you will still be talking, signior Benedick; no body marks you.

Bene. What, my dear lady Disdain! are you yet living?

2

Beat. Is it possible disdain should die, while sho hath such meet food to feed it, as signior Benedick? Courtesy itself must convert to disdain, if you come in her presence.

Bene. Then is courtesy a turn-coat:-But it is certain, I am loved of all ladies, only you excepted: and I would I could find in my heart that I had not a hard heart; for, truly, I love none.

Beat. A dear happiness to women; ; they would else have been troubled with a pernicious suitor. I thank God, and my cold blood, I am of your humour for that; I had rather hear my dog bark at a crow, than a man swear he loves me.

Bene. God keep your ladyship still in that mind! so some gentleman or other shali 'scape a predestinate scratched face.

Beat. Scratching could not make it worse, an 'twere such a face as yours were.

Bene. Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher.

Beat. A bird of my tongue is better than a beast of yours.

Bene. I would my horse had the speed of your tongue; and so good a continuer: But keep your way o'God's name; I have done.

Beat. You always end with a jade's trick; I know you of old.

D. Pedro. This is the sum of all: Leonato,-signior Claudio, and signior Benedick, -my dear friend Leonato hath invited you all. I tell him, we shall stay here at the least a month; and he heartily prays, some occasion may detain us longer: I dare swear he is no hypocrite, but prays from his heart.

Leon. If you swear, my lord, you shall not be forsworn.-Let me bid you welcome, my lord, being reconciled to the prince your brother, I owe you all

duty.

D. John. I thank you: I am not of many words, but I thank you.

Leon. Please it your grace lead on?

D. Pedro. Your hand, Leonato; we will go together. [Exeunt all but BENEDICK and CLAUDIO. Claud. Benedick, didst thou note the daughter of

signior Leonato ?

Bone. I noted her not; but I looked on her.
Claud. Is she not a modest young lady?

Bene. Do you question me, as an honest man should do, for my simple true judgment; or would you have me speak after my custom, as being a professed tyrant to their sex?

Claud. No, I pray thee, speak in sober judgment. Bene. Why, i'faith, methinks she is too low for a high praise, too brown for a fair praise, and too little for a great praise only this commendation I can afford her; that were she other than she is, she were unhandsome; and being no other but as she is, I do not like her.

Claud. Thou thinkest, I am in sport; I pray thee, tell me truly how thou likest her.

Bene. Would you buy her, that you inquire after her.

4 The mould on which a hat is formed. It is here used for shape or fashion. See note on Lear, Act iv. Sc. 6.

5 The origin of this phrase, which is still in common use, has not been clearly explained, though the sense of it is pretty generally understood. The most probable account derives it from the circumstance of servants and retainers being entered in the books of those to whom they were attached. To be in one's books was to be in favour. That this was the ancient sense of the phrase, and its origin, appears from Florio, in V.Casso. Cashier'd, crossed, cancelled, or or put out of booke and checke roule.'

L

150

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

Claud. Can the world buy such a jewel?

Bene. Yea, and a case to put it into. But speak you this with a sad brow? or do you play the flouting Jack; to tell us Cupid is a good hare-finder, and Vulcan a rare carpenter?1 Come, in what key shall a man take you to go in the song ?2

Claud. In mine eye, she is the sweetest lady that ever I looked on.

Bene. I can see yet without spectacles, and I see no such matter: there's her cousin, an she were not possessed with a fury, exceeds her as much in beauty, as the first of May does the last of December. But I hope, you have no intent to turn husband; have you?

Claud. I would scarce trust myself, though I had sworn the contrary, if Hero would be my wife.

Bene. Is it come to this, i'faith? Hath not the world one man, but he will wear his cap with suspicion? Shall I never see a bachelor of threescore again? Go to, i'faith; an thou wilt needs thrust thy neck into a yoke, wear the print of it, and sigh away Sundays. Look, Don Pedro is returned to seek you.

Re-enter DON PEDRO.

D. Pedro. What secret hath held you here, that you followed not to Leonato's? Bene. I would, your grace would constrain me to

tell.

D. Pedro. I charge thee on thy allegiance.

Bene. You hear, Count Claudio: I can be secret as a dumb man, I would have you think so; but on my allegiance,-mark you this, on my allegiance: -He is in love. With who?-now that is your grace's part.-Mark, how short his answer is:With Hero, Leonato's short daughter.

Claud. If this were so, so were it uttered.

Bene. Like the old tale, my lord: it is not so, nor 'twas not so; but, indeed, God forbid it should be so.

Claud. If my passion change not shortly, God forbid it should be otherwise.

D. Pedro. Amen, if you love her; for the lady is very well worthy.

humble thanks: but that I will have a recheat
winded in my forehead, or hang my bugles in an
invisible baldrick, all women shall pardon me:
Because I will not do them the wrong to mistrust
any, I will do myself the right to trust none: and
the fine1o is, (for the which I may go the finer,) I
will live a bachelor.

Claud. You speak this to fetch me in, my lord.
D. Pedro. By my troth, I speak my thought.
Claud. And, in faith, my lord, I spoke mine.
Bene. And, by my two faiths and troths, my lord,
I spoke mine.

Claud. That I love her, I feel.

D. Pedro. That she is worthy, I know.

D. Pedro. I shall see thee, ere I die, look pale with love.

Bene. That I neither feel how she should be loved, nor know how she should be worthy, is the opinion that fire cannot melt out of me; I will die in it at the stake.

D. Pedro. Thou wast ever an obstinate heretic in the despite of beauty.

Claud. And never could maintain his part, but in the force of his will.

Bene. With anger, with sickness, or with hunger, my lord; not with love: prove, that ever I lose more blood with love, than I will get again with drinking, pick out mine eyes with a ballad-maker's pen, and hang me up at the door of a brothel-house, for the sign of blind Cupid.

Bene. That a woman conceived me I thank her; that she brought me up, I likewise give her most

D. Pedro. Well, if ever thou dost fall from this faith, thou wilt prove a notable argument. 11

Bene. If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat, 12 and shoot at me; and he that hits me, let him be clapped on the shoulder, and called Adam.13 D. Pedro. Well, as time shall try: In time the savage bull doth bear the yoke.14

Bene. The savage bull may; but if ever the sensible Benedick bear it, pluck off the bull's horns, and set them in my forehead: and let me be vilely painted; and in such great letters as they write, Here is good horse to hire, let them signify under my sign-Here you may see Benedick the married Tran.

Claud. If this should ever happen, thou would'st be horn-mad.

5 The old tale, of which this is the burthen, has been traditionally preserved and recovered by Mr. Blakeway, and is perhaps one of the most happy illustrations of Shakspeare that has ever appeared.

D. Pedro. Nay, if Cupid have not spent all his quiver in Venice, 15 thou wilt quake for this shortly. Bene. I look for an earthquake too then. D. Pedro. Well, you will temporize with the hours. In the mean time, good signior Benedick, repair to Leonato's; commend me to him, and tell him, I will not fail him at supper; for, indeed, he hath made great preparation.

Bene. I have almost matter enough in me for such an embassage: and so I commit youClaud. To the tuition of God: From my house. (if I had it)

D. Pedro. The sixth of July: Your loving friend,

Benedick.

Bene. Nay, mock not, mock not: The body of your discourse is sometime guarded 16 with fragments, and the guards are but slightly basted on neither; ere you flout old ends any further, exa mine your conscience,1" and so I leave you.

[Exit BENEDICK.

Claud. My liege, your highness now may do me good.

D. Pedro. My love is thine to teach; teach it
but how,

And thou shalt see how apt it is to learn
Any hard lesson that may do thee good.

Claud. Hath Leonato any son, my lord!
D. Pedro. No child but Hero, she's his only

heir;

Dost thou affect her, Claudio?

Claud.

O my lord, When you went onward on this ended action, I look'd upon her with a soldier's eye,

10 The fine is the conclusion.

11 A capital subject for satire.

12 It seems to have been one of the inhuman sports of the time, to enclose a cat in a wooden tub or bottle suspended aloft to be shot at.

13 i. e. Adam Bell, 'a passing good archer, who, with Clym of the Cloughe and William of Cloudeslie, were outlaws as famous in the north of England, as Ro bin Hood and his fellows were in the midland counties.

14 This line is from The Spanish Tragedy, or Hiero nimo, &c.; and occurs, with a slight variation, in Wat son's Sonnets, 1581.

15 Venice is represented in the same light as Cyprus is this character of the people 6 Alluding to the definition of a heretic in the schools. 7 That is, wear a horn on my forehead, which the among the ancients, and it huntsman may blow. A recheat is the sound by which the dogs are called back. 8 i. e. bugle-horn.

9 A belt. The meaning seems to be 'or that I should be compelled to carry a horn on my forehead where there is nothing visible to support it."

D. John. There is no measure in the occasion that breeds it, therefore the sadness is without limit. Con. You should hear reason.

That lik'd, but had a rougher task in hand
Than to drive liking to the name of love:
But now I am return'd, and that war-thoughts
Have left their places vacant, in their rooms
Come thronging soft and delicate desires,
All prompting me how fair young Hero is,
Saving, I lik'd her ere I went to wars.

D. Pedro. Thou wilt be like a lover presently,
And tire the hearer with a book of words:
If thou dost love fair Hero, cherish it;
And I will break with her, and with her father,
And thou shalt have her: Was't not to this end,
That thou began'st to twist so fine a story?

Claud. How sweetly do you minister to love,
That know love's grief by his complexion!
But lest my liking might too sudden seem,
I would have salv'd it with a longer treatise.

D. Pedro. What need the bridge much broader
than the flood?

The fairest grant is the necessity:1

D. John. I wonder, that thou being (as thou say'st thou art) born under Saturn, goest about to apply a moral medicine to a mortifying mischief. I cannot hide what I am: I must be sad when I have cause, and smile at no man's jests; eat when I have stomach, and wait for no man's leisure; sleep when I am drowsy, and tend to no man's business; laugh when I am merry, and claw' no man in his humour.

Con. Yea, but you must not make the full show of this, till you may do it without controlment. You have of late stood out against your brother, and he hath ta'en you newly into his grace; where it is impossible you should take true root, but by the fair

Look, what will serve, is fit: 'tis once, thou lov'st; weather that you make yourself: it is needful that

And I will fit thee with the remedy.

I know we shall have revelling to-night;

I will assume thy part in some disguise,

And tell fair Hero I am Claudio;

And in her bosom I'll unclasp my heart,

And take her hearing prisoner with the force
And strong encounter of my amorous tale:
Then, after, to her father, will I break;
And, the conclusion is, she shall be thine:
In practice let us put it presently.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. A Room in Leonato's House. Enter LEONATO and ANΤΟΝΙΟ.

Leon. How now, brother? Where is my cousin, your son? Hath he provided this musick?

Ant. He is very busy about it. But, brother, I can tell you strange news that you yet dreamed not of.

Leon. Are they good?

Ant. As the event stamps them; but they have a good cover, they show well outward. The prince and Count Claudio, walking in a thick-pleashed alley in my orchard, were thus much overheard by a man of mine: The prince discovered to Claudio, that he loved my niece your daughter, and meant to acknowledge it this night in a dance; and, if he found her accordant, he meant to take the present time by the top, and instantly break with you of it. Leon. Hath the fellow any wit, that told you this? Ant. A good sharp fellow: I will send for him, and question him yourself.

Leon. No, no; we will hold it as a dream, till it appear itself:-but I will acquaint my daughter withal, that she may be the better prepared for an answer, if peradventure this be true. Go you, and tell her of it. [Several persons cross the stage.] Cousins, you know what you have to do.-O, I cry you mercy, friend; you go with me, and I will use your skill:-Good cousins, have a care this busy

time.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III. Another Room in Leonato's House.
Enter DON JOHN and CONRADE.

Con. What the good year, my lord! why are you thus out of measure sad?

1 Mr. Hayley, with great acuteness, proposed to read *The fairest grant is to necessity; i. e. 'necessitas quod cogit defendit. The meaning may however be-The fairest or most equitable concession is that which is needful only."

2 i. e. once for all. So, in Coriolanus: Once if he do require our voices, we ought not to deny him. See Comedy of Errors, Act iii. Sc. 1.

3 Thickly interwoven.

4 Cousins were formerly enrolled among the dependants, if not the domestics of great families, such as that of Leonato, Petruchio, while intent on the subjection of Katharine, calls out in terms imperative for his cousin Ferdinand.

you frame the season for your own harvest.

D. John. I had rather be a canker in a hedge, than a rose in his grace; and it better fits my blood to be disdained of all, than to fashion a carriage to rob love from any; in this, though I cannot be said to be a flattering honest man, it, must not be denied that I am a plain-dealing villain. I am trusted with a muzzle, and enfranchised with a clog; therefore I have decreed not to sing in my cage: If I had my mouth, I would bite; if I had my liberty, I would do my liking: in the mean time, let me be that I am, and seek not to alter me.

5 The commentators say, that the original form of this exclamation was the gougere, i. e. morbus gallicus;

Con. Can you make no use of your discontent? D. John. I make all use of it, for I use it only. Who comes here? What news, Borachio?

Enter BORACHIO.

Bora. I came yonder from a great supper; the prince, your brother, is royally entertained by Leonato; and I can give you intelligence of an intended marriage.

D. John. Will it serve for any model1 to build mischief on? What is he for a fool, that betroths himself to unquietness?

Bora. Marry, it is your brother's right hand.
D. John. Who? the most exquisite Claudio?
Bora. Even he.

D. John. A proper squire! And who, and who? which way looks he?

Bora. Marry, on Hero, the daughter and heir of Leonato.

D. John. A very forward March chick! How came you to this?

Bora. Being entertained for a perfumer, as I was smoking a musty room,11 comes me the prince and Claudio, hand in hand, in sad12 conference: I whipt me behind the arras; and there heard it agreed upon, that the prince should woo Hero for himself, and having obtained her, give her to count Claudio.

D. John. Come, come, let us thither; this may prove food to my displeasure: that young start-up hath all the glory of my overthrow; if I can cross him any way, I bless myself every way: You are both sure, 13 and will assist me?

which ultimately became obscure, and was corrupted into the good year, a very opposite form of expression.

6 This is one of Shakspeare's natural touches. An envious and unsocial mind, too proud to give pleasure, and too sullen to receive it, always endeavours to hide its malignity from the world and from itself, under the plainness of simple honesty, or the dignity of haughty independence. 7 Flatter.

8 A canker is the canker-rose, or dog-rose. I had rather be a neglected dog-rose in a hedge, than a garden-rose if it profited by his culture.'

9 i. e. for I make nothing else my counsellor."

10 Model is here used in an unusual sense, but Bullokar explains it, 'Model, the platforme, or form of any thing."

11 The neglect of cleanliness among our ancestors rendered such precautions too often necessary. 12 Serious. 13 i. e. to be depended on.

SCENÉ Í. A Hall in Leonato's House. Enter
LEONATO, ANTONIO, HERO, BEATRICE, and
others.

Leon. Was not count John here at supper?
Ant. I saw him not.

Beat. 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.

Beat. He were an excellent man, that were made just in the mid-way 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.

Leon. Then half signior Benedick's tongue in count John's mouth, and half count John's melancholy in signior Benedick's face,

Beat. 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 he could get her good will.

Leon. By my troth, niece, thou wilt never get thee a husband, if thou be so shrewd of thy tongue. Ant. In faith, she is too curst..

Beat. 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.

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

Beat. 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.

Leon. You may light upon a husband, that hath no beard. Beat. 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 bearherd, and lead his apes into hell.

Leon. Well then, go you into hell?

Beat. 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.

Ant. Well, niece, [TO HERO.] I trust, you will be ruled by your father.

Beat. Yes, faith; it is my cousin's duty to make courtesy, and say, Father, as it please you:--but yet for all that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else make another courtesy, and say, Father, as it please me.

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

Beat. Not till God make men of some other metal than earth. Would it not grieve a woman to be over-mastered with a piece 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.

1 Importunate.

2 A measure, in old language, bezides its ordinary meaning, signified also a dunce.

Leon. Daughter, remember what I told you; if the prince do solicit you in that kind, you know your answer.

Beat. The fault will be in the musick, cousin, if you be not woo'd 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.

Leon. Cousin, you apprehend passing shrewdly.
Beat. I have a good eye, uncle; I can see a

church by day-light.

Leon. The revellers are entering; brother, make good room.

Enter DON PEDRO, CLAUDIO, BENEDICK, BAL-
THAZAR; DON JOHN, BORACHIO, MARGARET,
URSULA, and others, masked.

D. Pedro. Lady, will you walk about with your

friend ?3

[Takes her aside.

Bene. Well, I would you did like me.

Marg. So would not I, for your own sake; for

I have many ill qualities.

Bene. Which is one?

Murg. I say my prayers aloud.

Bene. I love you the better; the hearers may cry, Amen.

Marg. God match me with a good dancer!
Balth. Amen.

Marg. And God keep him out of my sight, when the dance is done!-Answer, clerk.

Balth. No more words; the clerk is answered.
Urs. I know you well enough; you are signior

Antonio.

Ant. At a word, I am not.

Urs. I know you by the waggling of your head.
Ant. To tell you true, I counterfeit him.

Urs. 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.

Ant. At a word I am not.

Urs. 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.

Beat. Will you not tell me who told you so?
Bene. No, you shall pardon me.

Beat. Nor will you not tell me who you are?
Bene. Not now.

Beat. 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.
Bene. What's he?

Beat. I am sure, you know him well enough.

5 Alluding to the fable of Baucis and Philemon in

Ovid, who describes the old couple as living in a thatch

ed cottage.

Stipulis et canna tecta palustri,

which Golding renders:

The roofe thereof was thatched all with straw and fennish reede." 4 That is, God forbid that your face should be as time, from a popular collection of that name, about which 6 This was the term for a jest-book in Shakespeare's homely and coarse as your mask." the commentators were much puzzled, until a large frag