Egeon. Moft mighty Duke, vouchfafe me speak
a word;

Haply, I fee a friend, will fave my life;
And pay the fum that may deliver me.

Duke. Speak freely, Syracufan, what thou wilt. Egeon. Is not your name, fir, call'd Antipholis? And is not that your bondman Dromio ?

E. Dro. Within this hour I was his bond-man, fir, But he, I thank him, gnaw'd in two my cords; Now am I Dromio, and his man, unbound.

Egeon. I am fure, you both of you remember me, E. Dro. Ourfelves we do remember, fir, by you; For lately we were bound, as you are now. You are not Pinch's patient, are you, fir?

Egeon. Why look you strange on me? you know me well.

E. Ant. I never faw you in my life, 'till now. Egeon, Oh! grief hath chang'd me, fince you faw me laft;

2

And careful hours, with time's deformed hand
Have written strange defeatures in my face:
But tell me yet, doft thou not know my voice?
E. Ant. Neither.

Egeon. Dromio, nor thou?

E. Dro. No, truft me, fir, nor I.
Egeon. I am fure, thou doft.

E. Dro. Ay, fir? but I am fure, I do not; and whatfoever a man denies, you are now bound to be lieve him.

Egeon. Not know my voice! Oh, time's extre mity!

Haft thou fo crack'd and fplitted my poor tongue, In seven short years, that here my only fon

Knows not my feeble key of untun'd cares?

2

Strange defeatures.] Defeature is the privative of feature, The meaning is, time hath cancelled my features. JOHNSON.

Tho'

Tho' now this grained face of mine be hid
In fap.confuming winter's drizled fnow,
And all the conduits of my blood froze up;
Yet hath my night of life fome memory,
My wafting lamp fome fading glimmer left,
My dull deaf ears a little use to hear:
All these old witneffes, (I cannot err)
Tell me thou art my fon Antipholis.

E. Ant. I never faw my father in my life. Egeon. But feven years fince, in Syracufa, boy, Thou knoweft, we parted: but, perhaps, my fon, Thou fham'ft to acknowledge me in mifery.

E. Ant. The Duke, and all that know me in the city,

Can witnefs with me that it is not fo:

I ne'er faw Syracufa in my life.

Duke. I tell thee, Syracufan, twenty years
Have I been patron to Antipholis,

During which time he ne'er faw Syracufa :
I fee, thy age and dangers make thee doat.

Enter the Abbefs, with Antipholis Syracufan and Dromio
Syracufan.

wrong'd.

Abb. Molt mighty Duke, behold a man much [All gather to fee him. Adr. I fee two hufbands, or mine eyes deceive me, Duke. One of thefe men is genius to the other; And fo of thefe: Which is the natural man, And which the fpirit? who deciphers them?

3 All thofe OLD witnesses, I cannot err,] I believe fhould read, All thefe HOLD witnesses I cannot err,

i. e. all these continue to teftify that I cannot err, and tell me, &c. WARBURTON.

The old reading is the true one, as well as the most poetical. The words I cannot err fhould be thrown into a parenthefis. By old witneffes I believe he means experienced, accufiom'd ones, which are therefore lets likely to err.

STEEVENS.

S. Dro.

S. Dro. I, fir, am Dromio; command him away.
E. Dro. I, fir, am Dromio; pray, let me stay.
S. Ant. Egeon, art thou not? or else his ghost?
S. Dro. O, my old master! who hath bound him
here?

Abb. Whoever bound him, I will loose his bonds, And gain a husband by his liberty:

Speak, old Ægeon, if thou be'ft the man,
That hadft a wife once call'd Æmilia,

That bore thee at a burden two fair fons ?
Oh, if thou be'ft the fame Ægeon, speak,
And speak unto the fame Æmilia.

Duke. Why, here begins his morning story right:
These two Antipholis's, these two fo like,
And those two Dromio's, one in femblance;
Befides her urging of her wreck at sea,
These plainly are the parents of these children,
Which accidentally are met together.

Ægeon. If I dream not, thou art Æmilia;
If thou art fhe, tell me where is that son
That floated with thee on the fatal raft?

Abb. By men of Epidamnum, he and I,
And the twin Dromio, all were taken up;
But, by and by, rude fishermen of Corinth
By force took Dromio, and my son from them,
And me they left with thofe of Epidamnum.
What then became of them, I cannot tell;
I, to this fortune that you fee me in.

Duke. Antipholis, thou cam'ft from Corinth first.
S. Ant. No, fir, not I, I came from Syracuse.
Duke. Stay, stand apart; I know not which is which.
E. Ant. I came from Corinth, my most gracious
lord.

E. Dro. And I with him.

E. Ant. Brought to this town by that most famous

warrior,

Duke Menaphon, your most renowned uncle.

Adr.

Adr. Which of you two did dine with me to-day?

S. Ant. I, my gentle mistress.

Adr. And are you not my husband?

E. Ant. No, I fay, nay to that.

S. Ant. And fo do I, yet she did call me so:
And this fair gentlewoman, her fister here,
Did call me brother. What I told you then,
I hope, I shall have leisure to make good;
If this be not a dream, I fee and hear.

Ang. That is the chain, fir, which you had of me.
S. Ant. I think it be, fir; I deny it not.

E. Ant. And you, fir, for this chain arrefted me. Ang. I think, I did, fir; I deny it not. Adr. I fent you money, fir, to be your bail, By Dromio; but, I think, he brought it not. E. Dro. No, none by me.

S. Ant. This purfe of ducats I receiv'd from you,
And Dromio my man did bring them me:
I fee, we still did meet each other's man,
And I was ta'en for him, and he for me,
And thereupon these Errors all arose.

E. Ant. These ducats pawn I for my father here.
Duke. It shall not need, thy father hath his life.
Cour. Sir, I must have that diamond from you.
E. Ant. There, take it; and much thanks for my
good cheer.

Abb. Renowned duke, vouchsafe to take the pains To go with us into the abbey here,

And hear at large difcourfed all our fortunes:

And all that are affǝmbled in this place,
That by this fympathized one day's Error
Have fuffer'd wrong, go, keep us company,
And ye fhall have full fatisfaction.

5 Twenty-five years have I but

have I but gone in travel

5 Twenty-five years
Thirty-three years.

] In former editions,

Of

'Tis impoffible the poet could be fo forgetful, as to design this num

ber

Of you, my fons; nor, till this prefent hour,
My heavy burdens are delivered :-

The Duke, my hufband, and my children both,
And you the calendars of their nativity,
Go to a goflip's feaft, and go with me:
After fo long grief fuch nativity! 7

Duke. With all my heart, I'll goffip at this feat.
[Exeunt.
Manent the two Antipholis's, and two Dromio's.
S. Dro. Mafter, fhall I fetch your ftuff from fhip-

board?

E. Ant. Dromio, what stuff of mine haft thou im

bark'd?

ber here and therefore I have ventured to alter it to twenty-five, upon a proof, that, I think, amounts to demonftration. The number, I perfume, was at first wrote in figures, and, perhaps, blindly; and thence the mistake might arife. Egeon, in the first fcene of the firft act, is precife as to the time his fon left him, in quest of his brother:

My youngest boy, and yet my eldeft care,

At eighteen years became inquifitive
After bis brother, &c.

And how long it was from the fon's thus parting from his father, to their meeting again at Ephefus, where Ageon, mistakenly, recognizes the twin-brother, for him, we as precifely learn from another paffage in the fifth act.

Age. But leven years fince, in Syracusa-bay,
Thou knowest we parted;

So that these two numbers, put together, fettle the date of their birth beyond difpute. THEOBALD,

-and go with me:] We fhould read,

and GAUDE with me:

i. e. rejoice, from the French, gaudir. WARBURTON.' The fenfe is clear enough without the alteration. The Revifal offers to read, more plausibly, I think,

7

After fo long grief, fuch nativity.] We should furely read,

After fo long grief, fuch feftivity.

Nativity lying fo near, and the termination being the fame of both

words, the miftake was easy.

JOHNSON.

S. Dro.