Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare (ebooks that read to you .TXT) 📕

/> Of these most brisk and giddy-paced times.
Come, but one verse.

CURIO.
He is not here, so please your lordship, that should sing it.

DUKE.
Who was it?

CURIO.
Feste, the jester, my lord; a fool that the lady Olivia's father
took much delight in. He is about the house.

DUKE.
Go seek him out, and play the tune the while.

[Exit CURIO. Music plays]

Come hither, boy. If ever thou shalt love,
In the sweet pangs of it remember me;
For such as I am all true lovers are,
Unstaid and skittish in all motions else,
Save in the constant image of the creature
That is belov'd. How dost thou like this tune?

VIOLA.
It gives a very echo to the seat
Where Love is thron'd.

DUKE.
Thou dost speak masterly:
My life upon 't, young though thou art, thine eye
Hath stay'd upon some favour that it loves;
Hath it not, boy?

VIOLA.
A little, by your favour.

DUKE.
What kind of woman is 't?

VIOLA.
Of your complexion.

DUKE.
She is not worth thee, then. What years, i' faith?

VIOLA.
About your years, my lord.

DUKE.
Too old, by heaven! let still the woman take
An elder than herself; so wears she to him,
So sways she level in her husband's heart:
For, boy, however we do praise ourselves,
Our fancies are more giddy and unfirm,
More longing, wavering, sooner lost and worn,
Than women's are.

VIOLA.
I think it well, my lord.

DUKE.
Then let thy love be younger than thyself,
Or thy affection cannot hold the bent;
For women are as roses, whose fair flower,
Being once display'd, doth fall that very hour.

VIOLA.
And so they are: alas, that they are so;
To die, even when they to perfection grow!

[Re-enter CURIO and CLOWN.]

DUKE.
O, fellow, come, the song we had last night.
Mark it, Cesario, it is old and plain;
The spinsters and the knitters in the sun,
And the free maids that weave their thread with bones,
Do use to chant it: it is silly sooth,
And dallies with the innocence of love,
Like the old age.

CLOWN.
Are you ready, sir?

DUKE.
Ay; prithee, sing.

[Music]

SONG

CLOWN.
Come away, come away, death,
And in sad cypress let me be laid;
Fly away, fly away, breath;
I am slain by a fair cruel maid.
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,
O, prepare it!
My part of death, no one so true
Did share it.

Not a flower, not a flower sweet,
On my black coffin let there be strown;
Not a friend, not a friend greet
My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown.
A thousand thousand sighs to save,
Lay me, O, where
Sad true lover never find my grave,
To weep there!

DUKE.
There 's for thy pains.

CLOWN.
No pains, sir; I take pleasure in singing, sir.

DUKE.
I 'll pay thy pleasure, then.

CLOWN.
Truly, sir, and pleasure will be paid one time or another.

DUKE.
Give me now leave to leave thee.

CLOWN.
Now the melancholy god protect thee; and the tailor make thy
doublet of changeable taffeta, for thy mind is a very opal. I
would have men of such constancy put to sea, that their business
might be every thing, and their intent every where; for that 's
it that always makes a good voyage of nothing. Farewell.
[Exit.]

DUKE.
Let all the rest give place.

[CURIO and ATTENDANTS retire.]

Once more, Cesario,
Get thee to yond same sovereign cruelty.
Tell her my love, more noble than the world,
Prizes not quantity of dirty lands;
The parts that fortune hath bestow'd upon her,
Tell her, I hold as giddily as fortune;
But 't is that miracle and queen of gems
That Nature pranks her in attracts my soul.

VIOLA.
But if she cannot love you, sir?

DUKE.
I cannot be so answer'd.

VIOLA.
Sooth, but you must.
Say that some lady, as perhaps there is,
Hath for your love as great a pang of heart
As you have for Olivia: you cannot love her;
You tell her so; must she not, then, be answer'd?

DUKE.
There is no woman's sides
Can bide the beating of so strong a passion
As love doth give my heart; no woman's heart
So big to hold so much; they lack retention.
Alas, their love may be call'd appetite -
No motion of the liver, but the palate -
That suffer surfeit, cloyment, and revolt;
But mine is all as hungry as the sea,
And can digest as much. Make no compare
Between that love a woman can bear me
And that I owe Olivia.

VIOLA.
Ay, but I know -

DUKE.
What dost thou know?

VIOLA.
Too well what love women to men may owe;
In faith, they are as true of heart as we.
My father had a daughter lov'd a man,
As it might be, perhaps, were I a woman,
I should your lordship.

DUKE.
And what's her history?

VIOLA.
A blank, my lord. She never told her love,
But let concealment, like a worm i' th' bud,
Feed on her damask cheek; she pin'd in thought,
And with a green and yellow melancholy,
She sat, like patience on a monument,
Smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed?
We men may say more, swear more; but indeed
Our shows are more than will; for still we prove
Much in our vows, but little in our love.

DUKE.
But died thy sister of her love, my boy?

VIOLA.
I am all the daughters of my father's house,
And all the brothers too; and yet I know not.
Sir, shall I to this lady?

DUKE.
Ay, that's the theme.
To her in haste; give her this jewel; say,
My love can give no place, bide no denay.

[Exeunt.]


SCENE V.

OLIVIA'S garden.

[Enter SIR TOBY, SIR ANDREW, and FABIAN.]

SIR TOBY.
Come thy ways, Signior Fabian.

FABIAN.
Nay, I'll come: if I lose a scruple of this sport, let me be
boil'd to death with melancholy.

SIR TOBY.
Wouldst thou not be glad to have the niggardly rascally
sheep-biter come by some notable shame?

FABIAN.
I would exult, man; you know he brought me out o' favour with my
lady about a bear-baiting here.

SIR TOBY.
To anger him, we'll have the bear again; and we will fool him
black and blue: shall we not, Sir Andrew?

SIR ANDREW.
And we do not, it is pity of our lives.

[Enter MARIA.]

SIR TOBY.
Here comes the little villain.
How now, my metal of India!

MARIA.
Get ye all three into the box-tree; Malvolio's coming down this
walk. He has been yonder i' the sun practising behaviour to his
own shadow this half hour. Observe him, for the love of mockery;
for I know this letter will make a contemplative idiot of him.
Close, in the name of jesting! Lie thou there [throws down a
letter], for here comes the trout that must be caught with
tickling.
[Exit.]

[Enter MALVOLIO.]

MALVOLIO.
'T is but fortune; all is fortune. Maria once told me she did
affect me; and I have heard herself come thus near, that, should
she fancy, it should be one of my complexion. Besides, she uses
me with a more exalted respect than any one else that follows
her. What should I think on 't?

SIR TOBY.
Here 's an overweening rogue!

FABIAN.
O, peace! Contemplation makes a rare turkey-cock of him; how he
jets under his advanc'd plumes!

SIR ANDREW.
'Slight, I could so beat the rogue!

SIR TOBY.
Peace, I say.

MALVOLIO.
To be Count Malvolio!

SIR TOBY.
Ah, rogue!

SIR ANDREW.
Pistol him, pistol him.

SIR TOBY.
Peace, peace!

MALVOLIO.
There is example for't: the lady of the Strachy married the
yeoman of the wardrobe.

SIR ANDREW.
Fie on him, Jezebel!

FABIAN.
O, peace! now he's deeply in; look how imagination blows him.

MALVOLIO.
Having been three months married to her, sitting in my state, -

SIR TOBY.
O, for a stone-bow, to hit him in the eye!

MALVOLIO.
Calling my officers about me, in my branch'd velvet gown; having
come from a day-bed, where I have left Olivia sleeping, -

SIR TOBY.
Fire and brimstone!

FABIAN.
O, peace, peace!

MALVOLIO.
And then to have the humour of state; and, after a demure travel
of regard, telling them I know my place, as I would they should
do theirs, to ask for my kinsman Toby, -

SIR TOBY.
Bolts and shackles!

FABIAN.
O, peace, peace, peace! now, now.

MALVOLIO.
Seven of my people, with an obedient start, make out for him: I
frown the while; and perchance wind up my watch, or play with
my - some rich jewel. Toby approaches; curtsies there to me, -

SIR TOBY.
Shall this fellow live?

FABIAN.
Though our silence be drawn from us with cars, yet peace.

MALVOLIO.
I extend my hand to him thus, quenching my familiar smile with an
austere regard of control, -

SIR TOBY.
And does not Toby take you a blow o' the lips, then?

MALVOLIO.
Saying, 'Cousin Toby, my fortunes having cast me on your niece,
give me this prerogative of speech,' -

SIR TOBY.
What, what?

MALVOLIO.
'You must amend your drunkenness.' -

SIR TOBY.
Out, scab!

FABIAN.
Nay, patience, or we break the sinews of our plot.

MALVOLIO.
'Besides, you waste the treasure of your time with a foolish
knight,' -

SIR ANDREW.
That's me, I warrant you.

MALVOLIO.
'One Sir Andrew.'

SIR ANDREW.
I knew 't was I; for many do call me fool.

MALVOLIO.
What employment have we here?
[Taking up the letter.]

FABIAN.
Now is the woodcock near the gin.

SIR TOBY.
O, peace! and the spirit of humours intimate reading aloud to
him!

MALVOLIO.
By my life, this is my lady's hand: these be her very C's, her
U's, and her T's; and thus makes she her great P's. It is, in
contempt of question, her hand.

SIR ANDREW.
Her C's, her U's, and her T's; why that?

MALVOLIO.
[Reads]
To the unknown beloved, this, and my good wishes: - her very
phrases! By your leave, wax. Soft! and the impressure her
Lucrece, with which she uses to seal; 't is my lady. To whom
should this be?

FABIAN.
This wins him, liver and all.

MALVOLIO.
[Reads]
Jove knows I love;
But who?
Lips, do not move;