D. PEDRO. The sixth of July: Your loving friend, Benedick.

BENE. Nay, mock not, mock not. The body of your discourse is sometime guarded with fragments, and the guards are but slightly basted on neither:/ere you flout old ends any further, examine your conscience: and so I leave you.

[Exit. 251

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,
That liked, 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

246 The sixth of July] Midsummer day, according to the old reckoning; a fit date for midsummer madness.

249 guards... basted] trimmings or facings lightly stitched or tacked on.

250 old ends] conventional tags (of epistolary correspondence). Cf. Rich. III, I, iii, 337: "With old odd ends stol'n out of holy writ."

260

Come thronging soft and delicate desires,
All prompting me how fair young Hero is,
Saying, I liked 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 you do minister to love,
That know love's grief by his complexion!
But lest my liking might too sudden seem,
I would have salved it with a longer treatise.

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

The fairest grant is the necessity.

Look, what will serve is fit: 't is once, thou lovest,
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:

271 break] broach, open the matter, as in line 288, infra, I, ii, 13, II, i, 137, and III, ii, 67.

279 The fairest . necessity] That boon is the most welcome which precisely supplies a pressing need.

280 once] once for all, in fine. Cf. Com. of Errors, III, i, 89: "Once

270

280

this."

Then after to her father will I break;
And the conclusion is, she shall be thine.

In practice let us put it presently.

[Exeunt. 290

SCENE II-A ROOM IN LEONATO'S HOUSE

Enter LEONATO and ANTONIO, meeting.

LEON. How now, brother! Where is my cousin, your son? hath he provided this music?

ANT. He is very busy about it. But, brother, I can tell you strange news, that you yet dreamt 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-pleached alley in mine orchard, were thus much overheard by a man of mine: the prince discovered to Claudio that he loved 10 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.

288 break] broach, as in line 271, supra.

1-2 your son] Nothing further is heard of Antonio's son. His existence is implicitly denied in V, i, 276, infra. Shakespeare carelessly forgot this mention of him.

8 thick-pleached] with boughs thickly plaited or intertwined. Cf. III, i, 7, infra: "the pleached bower."

13 time by the top] time by the forelock. Cf. All's Well, V, iii, 39: "Let's take the instant by the forward top."

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. 20 [Enter attendants.] Cousins, you know what you have to do. O, I cry you mercy, friend; go you with me, and I will use your skill. Good cousin, have a care this busy time.

SCENE III- THE SAME

Enter DON JOHN and CONRADE

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

D. JOHN. There is no measure in the occasion that breeds; therefore the sadness is without limit.

CON. You should hear reason.

D. JOHN. And when I have heard it, what blessing brings it?

CON. If not a present remedy, at least a patient sufferance.

D. JOHN. I wonder that thou, being (as thou sayest thou art) born under Saturn, goest about to apply a 10

17-18 appear itself] make itself apparent or manifest.

1 What the good-year] See note on M. Wives, I, iv, 110.

10 born under Saturn] of Saturnine or melancholy temperament.

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 on 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 weather that you make yourself: it is needful that 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 but I am a plaindealing 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 meantime let me be that I am, and seek not to alter me.

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?

15 claw humour] flatter, curry favour with no man.

...

22-23 canker grace] The canker or wild "dog-rose" is contrasted with the cultivated garden rose, as in Sonnet liv, 5, 6: “The cankerblooms have full as deep a dye As the perfumed tincture of the roses."

21

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