The Taming of the Shrew

epub:type="z3998:persona">A Player So please your lordship to accept our duty. Lord

With all my heart. This fellow I remember,
Since once he play’d a farmer’s eldest son:
’Twas where you woo’d the gentlewoman so well:
I have forgot your name; but, sure, that part
Was aptly fitted and naturally perform’d.

A Player I think ’twas Soto that your honour means. Lord

’Tis very true: thou didst it excellent.
Well, you are come to me in a happy time;
The rather for I have some sport in hand
Wherein your cunning can assist me much.
There is a lord will hear you play to-night:
But I am doubtful of your modesties;
Lest over-eyeing of his odd behavior⁠—
For yet his honour never heard a play⁠—
You break into some merry passion
And so offend him; for I tell you, sirs,
If you should smile he grows impatient.

A Player

Fear not, my lord: we can contain ourselves,
Were he the veriest antic in the world.

Lord

Go, sirrah, take them to the buttery,
And give them friendly welcome every one:
Let them want nothing that my house affords. Exit one with the Players.
Sirrah, go you to Barthol’mew my page,
And see him dress’d in all suits like a lady:
That done, conduct him to the drunkard’s chamber;
And call him “madam,” do him obeisance.
Tell him from me, as he will win my love,
He bear himself with honourable action,
Such as he hath observed in noble ladies
Unto their lords, by them accomplished:
Such duty to the drunkard let him do
With soft low tongue and lowly courtesy,
And say “What is’t your honour will command,
Wherein your lady and your humble wife
May show her duty and make known her love?”
And then with kind embracements, tempting kisses,
And with declining head into his bosom,
Bid him shed tears, as being overjoy’d
To see her noble lord restored to health,
Who for this seven years hath esteemed him
No better than a poor and loathsome beggar:
And if the boy have not a woman’s gift
To rain a shower of commanded tears,
An onion will do well for such a shift,
Which in a napkin being close convey’d
Shall in despite enforce a watery eye.
See this dispatch’d with all the haste thou canst:
Anon I’ll give thee more instructions. Exit a Servingman.
I know the boy will well usurp the grace,
Voice, gait and action of a gentlewoman:
I long to hear him call the drunkard husband,
And how my men will stay themselves from laughter
When they do homage to this simple peasant.
I’ll in to counsel them; haply my presence
May well abate the over-merry spleen
Which otherwise would grow into extremes. Exeunt.

Scene II

A bedchamber in the Lord’s house.

	Enter aloft Sly, with Attendants; some with apparel, others with basin and ewer and other appurtenances; and Lord.
Sly	For God’s sake, a pot of small ale.
First Servant	Will’t please your lordship drink a cup of sack?
Second Servant	Will’t please your honour taste of these conserves?
Third Servant	What raiment will your honour wear to-day?
Sly	I am Christophero Sly; call not me “honour” nor “lordship:” I ne’er drank sack in my life; and if you give me any conserves, give me conserves of beef: ne’er ask me what raiment I’ll wear; for I have no more doublets than backs, no more stockings than legs, nor no more shoes than feet; nay, sometimes more feet than shoes, or such shoes as my toes look through the over-leather.
Lord	Heaven cease this idle humour in your honour! O, that a mighty man of such descent, Of such possessions and so high esteem, Should be infused with so foul a spirit!
Sly	What, would you make me mad? Am not I Christopher Sly, old Sly’s son of Burton-heath, by birth a pedlar, by education a card-maker, by transmutation a bear-herd, and now by present profession a tinker? Ask Marian Hacket, the fat ale-wife of Wincot, if she know me not: if she say I am not fourteen pence on the score for sheer ale, score me up for the lyingest knave in Christendom. What! I am not bestraught: here’s⁠—
Third Servant	O, this it is that makes your lady mourn!
Second Servant	O, this is it that makes your servants droop!
Lord	Hence comes it that your kindred shuns your house, As beaten hence by your strange lunacy. O noble lord, bethink thee of thy birth, Call home thy ancient thoughts from banishment And banish hence these abject lowly dreams. Look how thy servants do attend on thee, Each in his office ready at thy beck. Wilt thou have music? hark! Apollo plays Music. And twenty caged nightingales do sing: Or wilt thou sleep? we’ll have thee to a couch Softer and sweeter than the lustful bed On purpose trimm’d up for Semiramis. Say thou wilt walk; we will bestrew the ground: Or wilt thou ride? thy horses shall be trapp’d, Their harness studded all with gold and pearl. Dost thou love hawking? thou hast hawks will soar Above the morning lark: or wilt thou hunt? Thy hounds shall make the welkin answer them And fetch shrill echoes from the hollow earth.
First Servant	Say thou wilt course; thy greyhounds are as swift As breathed stags, ay, fleeter than the roe.
Second Servant	Dost thou love pictures? we will fetch thee straight Adonis painted by a running brook, And Cytherea all in sedges hid, Which seem to move and wanton with her breath, Even as the waving sedges play with wind.
Lord	We’ll show thee Io as she was a maid, And how she was beguiled and surprised, As lively painted as the deed was done.
Third Servant	Or Daphne roaming through a thorny wood, Scratching her legs that one shall swear she bleeds, And at that sight shall sad Apollo weep, So workmanly the blood and tears are drawn.
Lord	Thou art a lord and nothing but a lord: Thou hast a lady far more beautiful Than any woman in this waning age.
First Servant	And till the tears that she hath shed for thee Like envious floods o’er-run her lovely face, She was the fairest creature in the world; And yet she is inferior to none.
Sly	Am I a lord? and have I such a lady? Or do I dream? or have I dream’d till now? I do not sleep: I see, I hear, I speak; I smell sweet