mad than you are; make the trial of it in any con-| stant question.' Clo. What is the opinion of Pythagoras, concerning wild-fowl? Mal. That the soul of our grandam might haply inhabit a bird. Clo. What thinkest thou of his opinion? Mal. I think nobly of the soul, and no way approve his opinion. : Clo. Fare thee well remain thou still in darkness: thou shalt hold the opinion of Pythagoras, ere I will allow of thy wits; and fear to kill a woodcock, lest thou dispossess the soul of thy grandam. Fare thee well. Mal. Sir Topas, sir Topas, Sir To. My most exquisite sir Topas! Mar. Thou might'st have done this without thy beard and gown; he sees thee not. I am gone, sir, And anon, sir, Like to the old vice, Who with dagger of lath, Pare thy nails, dad, [Exit. Sir To. To him in thine own voice, and bring SCENE III.-Olivia's garden. Enter Sebastian. me word how thou findest him: I would we were Seb. This is the air; that is the glorious sun; well rid of this knavery. If he may be conveni- This pearl she gave me, I do feel't, and see't: ently delivered, I would he were; for I am now so And though 'tis wonder that enwraps me thus, far in offence with my niece, that I cannot pursue Yet 'tis not madness. Where's Antonio then? with any safety this sport to the upshot. Come by could not find him at the Elephant: and by to my chamber. [Exe. Sir Toby and Mar. Clo. Hey, Robin, jolly Robin, Tell me how thy lady does. Mal. Fool, Clo. My lady is unkind, perdy. Clo. Alas, why is she so? Mal. Fool, I say; I Yet there he was; and there I found this credit,' Clo. She loves another-Who calls, ha? Mal. Good fool, as ever thou wilt deserve well thankful to thee for't. Clo. Master Malvolio! Clo. Alas, sir, how fell you beside your five wits? Mal. Fool, there was never man so notoriously abused: I am as well in my wits, fool, as thou art. Clo. But as well? then you are mad, indeed, if you be no better in your wits than a fool. Mal. They have here propertied me; keep me in darkness, send ministers to me, asscs, and do all they can to face me out of my wits. Clo. Advise you what you say; the minister is here.-Malvolio, Malvolio, thy wits the heavens restore! endeavour thyself to sleep, and leave thy vain bibble babble. Mal. Sir Topas,— Clo. Maintain no words with him, good fellow. Clo. Alas, sir, be patient. What say you, sir? Mal. Good fool, help me to some light, and some She could not sway her house, command her fol Take, and give back, affairs, and their despatch, Enter Olivia and a Priest. Oli. Blame not this haste of mine: if you mean Now go with me, and with this holy man, Seb. I'll follow this good man, and go with you; paper; I tell thee, I ain as well in my wits, as any That they may fairly note this act of mine! [Exe. man in Illyria. Clo. Well a-day,-that you were, sir! Mal. By this hand, I am: good fool, some ink, paper, and light, and convey what I will set down ACT V. to my lady; it shall advantage thee more than ever SCENE L-The street before Olivia's house. the bearing of letter did. Clo. I will help you to't. But tell me truc, are vou not mad, indeed? or do you but counterfeit ? (1) Regular conversation. (2) Any other gem as a topaz. M (3) Senses. Clo. Good master Fabian, grant me another re-I know not what 'twas, but distraction. quest. Fab. Any thing. Clo. Do not desire to see this letter. Fab. That is, to give a dog, and, in recompense, desire my dog again. Enter Duke, Viola, and attendants. Duke. Belong you to the lady Olivia, friends? Clo. Ay, sir; we are some of her trappings. Duke. know thee well; How dost thou, good fellow? Clo. Truly, sir, the better for my foes, and worse for my friends. Duke. Just the contrary; the better for friends. my Duke. Notable pirate! thou salt-water thief! Ant. the thy All his in dedication: for his sake, Did I expose myself, pure for his love, Clo. Marry, sir, they praise me, and make an ass Where being apprehended, his false cunning of me; now my foes tell me plainly I am an ass: so (Not meaning to partake with me in danger,) that by my foes, sir, I profit in the knowledge of Taught him to face me out of his acquaintance, myself; and by my friends I am abused: so that, And grew a twenty-years-removed thing, conclusions to be as kisses, if your four negatives While one would wink; denied me mine own make your two affirmatives, why, then the worse for my friends, and the better for my foes. Duke. Why, this is excellent. Clo. By my troth, sir, no; though it please you to be one of my friends. Duke. Thou shalt not be the worse for me; there's gold. Clo. But that it would be double-dealing, sir, would you could make it another. Duke. O, you give me ill counsel. Clo. Put your grace in your pocket, sir, for this once, and let your flesh and blood obey it. Duke. Well, I will be so much a sinner to be a double-dealer; there's another. Clo. Primo, secundo, tertio, is a good play; and the old saying is, the third pays for all: the triplex, sir, is a good tripping measure; or the bells of St. Bennet, sir, may put you in mind; One, two, three. Duke. You ean fool no more money out of me purse, Which I had recommended to his use at this throw: if you will let your lady know, I am here to speak with her, and bring her along with you, it may awake my bounty further. Clo. Marry, sir, lullaby to your bounty, till I come again. I go, sir; but I would not have you to think, that my desire of having is the sin of covetousness: but, as you say, sir, let your bounty take a nap, I will awake it anon. [Exit Clown. Enter Antonio and Officers. Vio. Here comes the man, sir, that did resene me. 2 from And this is he, that did the Tiger board, (1) Mischievous. come him. Duke. Why should I not, had I the heart to do i (3) Dull, gross. Where he sits crowned in his master's spite.- Sir And. Od's lifelings, here he is :-You broke Come boy, with me; my thoughts are ripe in mis-my head for nothing; and that that I did, I was chief: I'll sacrifice the lamb that I do love, To spite a raven's heart within a dove. [Going. [Following. Oli. Where goes Cesario ? Oli. Ah, me, detested! how am I beguil'd! Oli. Hast thou forgot thyself? Is it so long?- Oli. No, my lord, not I. Father, I charge thee, by thy reverence, Strengthen'd by interchangement of your rings; Since when, my watch hath told me, toward my grave, I have travelled but two hours. Duke. O, thou dissembling cub! what wilt thou be, Oli. set on to do't by sir Toby. Vio. Why do you speak to me? I never hurt you: You drew your sword upon me, without cause; But I bespake you fair, and hurt you not. Sir And. If a bloody coxcomb be a hurt, you have hurt me; I think, you set nothing by a bloody coxcomb. Enter Sir Toby Belch, drunk, led by the Clown. Here comes sir Toby halting, you shall hear more: but if he had not been in drink, he would have tickled you othergates than he did. Duke. How now, gentleman? how is't with you? Sir To. That's all one; he has hurt me, and there's the end on't.-Sot, did'st see Dick surgeon, sot? Clo. O he's drunk, sir Toby, an hour agone; his eyes were set at eight i' the morning. sure, or a pavin, I hate a drunken rogue. with them? be dressed together. Sir To. Will you help, an ass-head, and a coxcomb, and a knave? a thin-faced knave, a gull? Oli. Get him to bed, and let his hurt be look'd to. [Exeunt Clown, Sir Toby, and Sir Andrew. Enter Sebastian. Seb. I am sorry, madam, I have hurt your kins man; But, had it been the brother of my blood, Duke. One face, one voice, one habit, and two A natural perspective, that is, and is not. Seb. Seb. Do I stand there? I never had a brother: Sir And. For the love of God, a surgeon; send Vio. Of Messaline: Sebastian was my father; one presently to sir Toby. Oli. What's the matter? Sir And. He has broke my head across, and has given sir Toby a bloody coxcomb too: for the love of God, your help: I had rather than forty pound, I were at home. Oli. Who has done this, sir Andrew? Sir And. The count's gentleman, one Cesario: we took him for a coward, but he's the very devil incardinate. Duke. My gentleman, Cesario? Such a Sebastian was my brother too, Seb. I (5) Out of charity tell me. Vio. And died that day when Viola from her birth with the which I doubt not but to do myself much Had number'd thirteen years. Seb. O, that record is lively in my soul! He finished, indeed, his mortal act, That day that made my sister thirteen years. I'll bring you to a captain in this town, But nature to her bias drew in that. Duke. Be not amaz'd; right noble is his blood. [To Viola. Thou never should'st love woman like to me. Duke. hither: And yet, alas, now I remember me, Re-enter Clown, with a letter. A most extracting frenzy of mine own Oli. Open it, and read it. Clo. Look then to be wel! edified, when the fool delivers the madman:-By the Lord, madam,— Oli. How now! art thou mad? ~ Clo. No, madam, I do but read madness: your ladyship will have it as it ought to be, must allow vox.2 you right, or you much shame. Think of me as you please. I leave my duty a little unthought of, and speak out of my injury. The madly-used Malvolio. Oli. Did he write this? My lord, so please you, these things further thought on, To think me as well a sister as a wife, Duke. Madam, I am most apt to embrace your Your master quits you; [To Viola.] and, for your service done him, So much against the mettle of your sex, So far beneath your soft and tender breeding, Mal. Have I, Malvolio? no. You must not now deny it is your hand, Clo. Truly, madam, he holds Belzebub at the Kept in a dark house, visited by the priest, stave's end, as well as a man in his case may do:And made the most notorious geck, and gull, he has here writ a letter to you; I should have That e'er invention play'd on? tell me why. given it to you to-day morning; but as a madman's Oli. Alas, Malvolio, this is not my writing, epistles are no gospels, so it skills not much, when Though, I confess, much like the character: they are delivered. But, out of question, 'tis Maria's hand. And now I do bethink me, it was she First told me, thou wast mad; then cam'st in smiling, And in such forms which here were presuppos'd Upon thee in the letter. Pr'ythee be content: an This practice hath most shrewdly pass'd upon thee; But, when we know the grounds and authors of it, Thou shalt be both the plaintiff and the judge Oli. Pr'ythee, read i thy right wits. Of thine own cause. Clo. So I do, madonna; but to read his right Fab. Good madam, hear me speak; wits, is to read thus: therefore perpend,3 my prin-And let no quarrel, nor no brawl to come, cess, and give car. Taint the condition of this present hour, Oli. Read it you, sirrah. [To Fabian. Which I have wonder'd at. In hope it shalt not, Fab. [reads. By the Lord, madam, you wrong Most freely I confess, myself, and Toby, me, and the world shall know it: though you have Set this device against Malvolio here, put me into darkness, and given your drunken Upon some stubborn and uncourteous parts cousin rule over me, yet have I the benefit of my We had conceiv'd against him: Maria writ senses as well as your ladyship. I have your own The letter, at sir Toby's great importance ;* letter that induced me to the semblance I put on; In recompence whereof, he hath married her. How with a sportful malice it was follow'd, (3) Attend. (1) Hinders. (2) Voice. (6) Fool. (7) Importunacy. May rather pluck on laughter than revenge; Oli. Alas, poor fool! how have they baffled' thee! Clo. Why, some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrown upon them. I was one, sir, in this interlude; one sir Topas, sir; but that's all one:-By the Lord, fool, I am not mad;-But do you remember? Madam, why laugh you at such a barren rascal? an you smile not, he's gagg'd: And thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges. Mal. I'll be revenged on the whole pack of you. Of our dear souls-Meantime, sweet sister, Clo. When that I was and a little tiny boy, This play is in the graver part elegant and easy and in some of the lighter scenes exquisitely humorous. Ague-check is drawn with great propriety, but his character is, in a great measure, that of natural fatuity, and is therefore not the proper prey of a satirist. The soliloquy of Malvolio is truly comic; he is betrayed to ridicule merely by his pride. The marriage of Olivia, and the succeeding perplexity, though well enough contrived to divert on the stage, wants credibility, and fails to produce the proper instruction required in the dra ma, as it exhibifs no just picture of life. JOHNSON. |