ACT IV SCENE II

The Comedy of Errors

ACT IV SCENE II	The house of ANTIPHOLUS of Ephesus.
[Enter ADRIANA and LUCIANA]
ADRIANA	Ah, Luciana, did he tempt thee so?
	Mightst thou perceive austerely in his eye
	That he did plead in earnest? yea or no?
	Look’d he or red or pale, or sad or merrily?
	What observation madest thou in this case	5
	Of his heart’s meteors tilting in his face?
LUCIANA	First he denied you had in him no right.
ADRIANA	He meant he did me none; the more my spite.
LUCIANA	Then swore he that he was a stranger here.
ADRIANA	And true he swore, though yet forsworn he were.	10
LUCIANA	Then pleaded I for you.
ADRIANA	And what said he?
LUCIANA	That love I begg’d for you he begg’d of me.
ADRIANA	With what persuasion did he tempt thy love?
LUCIANA	With words that in an honest suit might move.	15
	First he did praise my beauty, then my speech.
ADRIANA	Didst speak him fair?
LUCIANA	Have patience, I beseech.
ADRIANA	I cannot, nor I will not, hold me still;
	My tongue, though not my heart, shall have his will.	20
	He is deformed, crooked, old and sere,
	Ill-faced, worse bodied, shapeless everywhere;
	Vicious, ungentle, foolish, blunt, unkind;
	Stigmatical in making, worse in mind.
LUCIANA	Who would be jealous then of such a one?	25
	No evil lost is wail’d when it is gone.
ADRIANA	Ah, but I think him better than I say,
	And yet would herein others’ eyes were worse.
	Far from her nest the lapwing cries away:
	My heart prays for him, though my tongue do curse.	30
[Enter DROMIO of Syracuse]
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	Here! go; the desk, the purse! sweet, now, make haste.
LUCIANA	How hast thou lost thy breath?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	By running fast.
ADRIANA	Where is thy master, Dromio? is he well?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	No, he’s in Tartar limbo, worse than hell.	35
	A devil in an everlasting garment hath him;
	One whose hard heart is button’d up with steel;
	A fiend, a fury, pitiless and rough;
	A wolf, nay, worse, a fellow all in buff;
	A back-friend, a shoulder-clapper, one that	40
	countermands
	The passages of alleys, creeks and narrow lands;
	A hound that runs counter and yet draws dryfoot well;
	One that before the judgement carries poor souls to hell.
ADRIANA	Why, man, what is the matter?	45
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	I do not know the matter: he is ‘rested on the case.
ADRIANA	What, is he arrested? Tell me at whose suit.
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	I know not at whose suit he is arrested well;
	But he’s in a suit of buff which ‘rested him, that can I tell.
	Will you send him, mistress, redemption, the money in his desk?	50
ADRIANA	Go fetch it, sister.
[Exit Luciana]
	This I wonder at,
	That he, unknown to me, should be in debt.
	Tell me, was he arrested on a band?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	Not on a band, but on a stronger thing;	55
	A chain, a chain! Do you not hear it ring?
ADRIANA	What, the chain?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	No, no, the bell: ’tis time that I were gone:
	It was two ere I left him, and now the clock
	strikes one.	60
ADRIANA	The hours come back! that did I never hear.
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	O, yes; if any hour meet a sergeant, a’ turns back for
	very fear.
ADRIANA	As if Time were in debt! how fondly dost thou reason!
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE	Time is a very bankrupt, and owes more than he’s	65
	worth, to season.
	Nay, he’s a thief too: have you not heard men say
	That Time comes stealing on by night and day?
	If Time be in debt and theft, and a sergeant in the way,
	Hath he not reason to turn back an hour in a day?	70
[Re-enter LUCIANA with a purse]
ADRIANA	Go, Dromio; there’s the money, bear it straight;
	And bring thy master home immediately.
	Come, sister: I am press’d down with conceit–
	Conceit, my comfort and my injury.
[Exeunt]

Next: The Comedy of Errors, Act 4, Scene 3