| ACT IV SCENE II | The house of ANTIPHOLUS of Ephesus. | |
| [Enter ADRIANA and LUCIANA] |
| ADRIANA | Ah, Luciana, did he tempt thee so? |
| Mightst thou perceive austerely in his eye |
| That he did plead in earnest? yea or no? |
| Look'd he or red or pale, or sad or merrily? |
| What observation madest thou in this case | 5 |
| Of his heart's meteors tilting in his face? |
| LUCIANA | First he denied you had in him no right. |
| ADRIANA | He meant he did me none; the more my spite. |
| LUCIANA | Then swore he that he was a stranger here. |
| ADRIANA | And true he swore, though yet forsworn he were. | 10 |
| LUCIANA | Then pleaded I for you. |
| ADRIANA | And what said he? |
| LUCIANA | That love I begg'd for you he begg'd of me. |
| ADRIANA | With what persuasion did he tempt thy love? |
| LUCIANA | With words that in an honest suit might move. | 15 |
| First he did praise my beauty, then my speech. |
| ADRIANA | Didst speak him fair? |
| LUCIANA | Have patience, I beseech. |
| ADRIANA | I cannot, nor I will not, hold me still; |
| My tongue, though not my heart, shall have his will. | 20 |
| He is deformed, crooked, old and sere, |
| Ill-faced, worse bodied, shapeless everywhere; |
| Vicious, ungentle, foolish, blunt, unkind; |
| Stigmatical in making, worse in mind. |
| LUCIANA | Who would be jealous then of such a one? | 25 |
| No evil lost is wail'd when it is gone. |
| ADRIANA | Ah, but I think him better than I say, |
| And yet would herein others' eyes were worse. |
| Far from her nest the lapwing cries away: |
| My heart prays for him, though my tongue do curse. | 30 |
| [Enter DROMIO of Syracuse] |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | Here! go; the desk, the purse! sweet, now, make haste. |
| LUCIANA | How hast thou lost thy breath? |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | By running fast. |
| ADRIANA | Where is thy master, Dromio? is he well? |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | No, he's in Tartar limbo, worse than hell. | 35 |
| A devil in an everlasting garment hath him; |
| One whose hard heart is button'd up with steel; |
| A fiend, a fury, pitiless and rough; |
| A wolf, nay, worse, a fellow all in buff; |
| A back-friend, a shoulder-clapper, one that | 40 |
| countermands |
| The passages of alleys, creeks and narrow lands; |
| A hound that runs counter and yet draws dryfoot well; |
| One that before the judgement carries poor souls to hell. |
| ADRIANA | Why, man, what is the matter? | 45 |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | I do not know the matter: he is 'rested on the case. |
| ADRIANA | What, is he arrested? Tell me at whose suit. |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | I know not at whose suit he is arrested well; |
| But he's in a suit of buff which 'rested him, that can I tell. |
| Will you send him, mistress, redemption, the money in his desk? | 50 |
| ADRIANA | Go fetch it, sister. |
[Exit Luciana] |
| This I wonder at, |
| That he, unknown to me, should be in debt. |
| Tell me, was he arrested on a band? |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | Not on a band, but on a stronger thing; | 55 |
| A chain, a chain! Do you not hear it ring? |
| ADRIANA | What, the chain? |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | No, no, the bell: 'tis time that I were gone: |
| It was two ere I left him, and now the clock |
| strikes one. | 60 |
| ADRIANA | The hours come back! that did I never hear. |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | O, yes; if any hour meet a sergeant, a' turns back for |
| very fear. |
| ADRIANA | As if Time were in debt! how fondly dost thou reason! |
| DROMIO OF SYRACUSE | Time is a very bankrupt, and owes more than he's | 65 |
| worth, to season. |
| Nay, he's a thief too: have you not heard men say |
| That Time comes stealing on by night and day? |
| If Time be in debt and theft, and a sergeant in the way, |
| Hath he not reason to turn back an hour in a day? | 70 |
| [Re-enter LUCIANA with a purse] |
| ADRIANA | Go, Dromio; there's the money, bear it straight; |
| And bring thy master home immediately. |
| Come, sister: I am press'd down with conceit-- |
| Conceit, my comfort and my injury. |
| [Exeunt] |