Act III, Scene 2

The same.

[Enter LUCIANA and ANTIPHOLUS of Syracuse]

• Luciana. And may it be that you have quite forgot
  A husband's office? shall, Antipholus.
  Even in the spring of love, thy love-springs rot? 765
  Shall love, in building, grow so ruinous?
  If you did wed my sister for her wealth,
  Then for her wealth's sake use her with more kindness:
  Or if you like elsewhere, do it by stealth;
  Muffle your false love with some show of blindness: 770
  Let not my sister read it in your eye;
  Be not thy tongue thy own shame's orator;
  Look sweet, be fair, become disloyalty;
  Apparel vice like virtue's harbinger;
  Bear a fair presence, though your heart be tainted; 775
  Teach sin the carriage of a holy saint;
  Be secret-false: what need she be acquainted?
  What simple thief brags of his own attaint?
  'Tis double wrong, to truant with your bed
  And let her read it in thy looks at board: 780
  Shame hath a bastard fame, well managed;
  Ill deeds are doubled with an evil word.
  Alas, poor women! make us but believe,
  Being compact of credit, that you love us;
  Though others have the arm, show us the sleeve; 785
  We in your motion turn and you may move us.
  Then, gentle brother, get you in again;
  Comfort my sister, cheer her, call her wife:
  'Tis holy sport to be a little vain,
  When the sweet breath of flattery conquers strife. 790

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Sweet mistress—what your name is else, I know not,
  Nor by what wonder you do hit of mine,—
  Less in your knowledge and your grace you show not
  Than our earth's wonder, more than earth divine.
  Teach me, dear creature, how to think and speak; 795
  Lay open to my earthy-gross conceit,
  Smother'd in errors, feeble, shallow, weak,
  The folded meaning of your words' deceit.
  Against my soul's pure truth why labour you
  To make it wander in an unknown field? 800
  Are you a god? would you create me new?
  Transform me then, and to your power I'll yield.
  But if that I am I, then well I know
  Your weeping sister is no wife of mine,
  Nor to her bed no homage do I owe 805
  Far more, far more to you do I decline.
  O, train me not, sweet mermaid, with thy note,
  To drown me in thy sister's flood of tears:
  Sing, siren, for thyself and I will dote:
  Spread o'er the silver waves thy golden hairs, 810
  And as a bed I'll take them and there lie,
  And in that glorious supposition think
  He gains by death that hath such means to die:
  Let Love, being light, be drowned if she sink!

• Luciana. What, are you mad, that you do reason so? 815

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Not mad, but mated; how, I do not know.

• Luciana. It is a fault that springeth from your eye.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. For gazing on your beams, fair sun, being by.

• Luciana. Gaze where you should, and that will clear your sight.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. As good to wink, sweet love, as look on night. 820

• Luciana. Why call you me love? call my sister so.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Thy sister's sister.

• Luciana. That's my sister.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. No;
  It is thyself, mine own self's better part, 825
  Mine eye's clear eye, my dear heart's dearer heart,
  My food, my fortune and my sweet hope's aim,
  My sole earth's heaven and my heaven's claim.

• Luciana. All this my sister is, or else should be.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Call thyself sister, sweet, for I am thee. 830
  Thee will I love and with thee lead my life:
  Thou hast no husband yet nor I no wife.
  Give me thy hand.

• Luciana. O, soft, air! hold you still:
  I'll fetch my sister, to get her good will. 835

[Exit]

[Enter DROMIO of Syracuse]

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Why, how now, Dromio! where runn'st thou so fast?

• Dromio of Syracuse. Do you know me, sir? am I Dromio? am I your man?
  am I myself? 840

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Thou art Dromio, thou art my man, thou art thyself.

• Dromio of Syracuse. I am an ass, I am a woman's man and besides myself.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. What woman's man? and how besides thyself? besides thyself?

• Dromio of Syracuse. Marry, sir, besides myself, I am due to a woman; one
  that claims me, one that haunts me, one that will have me. 845

• Antipholus of Syracuse. What claim lays she to thee?

• Dromio of Syracuse. Marry sir, such claim as you would lay to your
  horse; and she would have me as a beast: not that, I
  being a beast, she would have me; but that she,
  being a very beastly creature, lays claim to me. 850

• Antipholus of Syracuse. What is she?

• Dromio of Syracuse. A very reverent body; ay, such a one as a man may
  not speak of without he say 'Sir-reverence.' I have
  but lean luck in the match, and yet is she a
  wondrous fat marriage. 855

• Antipholus of Syracuse. How dost thou mean a fat marriage?

• Dromio of Syracuse. Marry, sir, she's the kitchen wench and all grease;
  and I know not what use to put her to but to make a
  lamp of her and run from her by her own light. I
  warrant, her rags and the tallow in them will burn a 860
  Poland winter: if she lives till doomsday,
  she'll burn a week longer than the whole world.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. What complexion is she of?

• Dromio of Syracuse. Swart, like my shoe, but her face nothing half so
  clean kept: for why, she sweats; a man may go over 865
  shoes in the grime of it.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. That's a fault that water will mend.

• Dromio of Syracuse. No, sir, 'tis in grain; Noah's flood could not do it.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. What's her name?

• Dromio of Syracuse. Nell, sir; but her name and three quarters, that's 870
  an ell and three quarters, will not measure her from
  hip to hip.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Then she bears some breadth?

• Dromio of Syracuse. No longer from head to foot than from hip to hip:
  she is spherical, like a globe; I could find out 875
  countries in her.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. In what part of her body stands Ireland?

• Dromio of Syracuse. Marry, in her buttocks: I found it out by the bogs.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Where Scotland?

• Dromio of Syracuse. I found it by the barrenness; hard in the palm of the hand. 880

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Where France?

• Dromio of Syracuse. In her forehead; armed and reverted, making war
  against her heir.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Where England?

• Dromio of Syracuse. I looked for the chalky cliffs, but I could find no 885
  whiteness in them; but I guess it stood in her chin,
  by the salt rheum that ran between France and it.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Where Spain?

• Dromio of Syracuse. Faith, I saw it not; but I felt it hot in her breath.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Where America, the Indies? 890

• Dromio of Syracuse. Oh, sir, upon her nose all o'er embellished with
  rubies, carbuncles, sapphires, declining their rich
  aspect to the hot breath of Spain; who sent whole
  armadoes of caracks to be ballast at her nose.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Where stood Belgia, the Netherlands? 895

• Dromio of Syracuse. Oh, sir, I did not look so low. To conclude, this
  drudge, or diviner, laid claim to me, call'd me
  Dromio; swore I was assured to her; told me what
  privy marks I had about me, as, the mark of my
  shoulder, the mole in my neck, the great wart on my 900
  left arm, that I amazed ran from her as a witch:
  And, I think, if my breast had not been made of
  faith and my heart of steel,
  She had transform'd me to a curtal dog and made
  me turn i' the wheel. 905

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Go hie thee presently, post to the road:
  An if the wind blow any way from shore,
  I will not harbour in this town to-night:
  If any bark put forth, come to the mart,
  Where I will walk till thou return to me. 910
  If every one knows us and we know none,
  'Tis time, I think, to trudge, pack and be gone.

• Dromio of Syracuse. As from a bear a man would run for life,
  So fly I from her that would be my wife.

[Exit]

• Antipholus of Syracuse. There's none but witches do inhabit here;
  And therefore 'tis high time that I were hence.
  She that doth call me husband, even my soul
  Doth for a wife abhor. But her fair sister,
  Possess'd with such a gentle sovereign grace, 920
  Of such enchanting presence and discourse,
  Hath almost made me traitor to myself:
  But, lest myself be guilty to self-wrong,
  I'll stop mine ears against the mermaid's song.

[Enter ANGELO with the chain]

• Angelo. Master Antipholus,—

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Ay, that's my name.

• Angelo. I know it well, sir, lo, here is the chain.
  I thought to have ta'en you at the Porpentine:
  The chain unfinish'd made me stay thus long. 930

• Antipholus of Syracuse. What is your will that I shall do with this?

• Angelo. What please yourself, sir: I have made it for you.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. Made it for me, sir! I bespoke it not.

• Angelo. Not once, nor twice, but twenty times you have.
  Go home with it and please your wife withal; 935
  And soon at supper-time I'll visit you
  And then receive my money for the chain.

• Antipholus of Syracuse. I pray you, sir, receive the money now,
  For fear you ne'er see chain nor money more.

• Angelo. You are a merry man, sir: fare you well. 940

[Exit]

• Antipholus of Syracuse. What I should think of this, I cannot tell:
  But this I think, there's no man is so vain
  That would refuse so fair an offer'd chain.
  I see a man here needs not live by shifts, 945
  When in the streets he meets such golden gifts.
  I'll to the mart, and there for Dromio stay
  If any ship put out, then straight away.

[Exit]