Enter Panthino

PANTHINO Lance, away, away, aboard. Thy master is shipped, and thou art to post after with oars. What’s the matter? Why weep’st thou, man? Away, ass, you’ll lose the tide if you tarry any longer.

LANCE It is no matter if the tied were lost, for it is the unkindest tied that ever any man tied.

PANTHINO What’s the unkindest tide?

LANCE Why, he that’s tied here, Crab my dog.

PANTHINO Tut, man, I mean thou’lt lose the flood, and in losing the flood, lose thy voyage, and in losing thy voyage, lose thy master, and in losing thy master, lose thy service, and in losing thy service—

Lance puts his hand over Panthino’s mouth

Why dost thou stop my mouth?

LANCE For fear thou shouldst lose thy tongue.

PANTHINO Where should I lose my tongue?

LANCE In thy tale.

PANTHINO In thy tail!

LANCE Lose the tide, and the voyage, and the master, and the service, and the tied? Why, man, if the river were dry, I am able to fill it with my tears. If the wind were down, I could drive the boat with my sighs.

PANTHINO Come, come away, man. I was sent to call thee.

LANCE Sir, call me what thou darest.

PANTHINO Wilt thou go?

LANCE Well, I will go. Exeunt

2.4 Enter Valentine, Silvia, Thurio, and Speed

SILVIA Servant!

VALENTINE Mistress?

SPEED (to Valentine) Master, Sir Thurio frowns on you.

VALENTINE Ay, boy, it’s for love.

SPEED Not of you. 5

VALENTINE Of my mistress, then.

SPEED ‘Twere good you knocked him.

SILVIA (to Valentine) Servant, you are sad.

VALENTINE Indeed, madam, I seem so.

THURIO Seem you that you are not?

VALENTINE Haply I do.

THURIO So do counterfeits.

VALENTINE So do you.

THURIO What seem I that I am not?

VALENTINE Wise.

THURIO What instance of the contrary?

VALENTINE Your folly.

THURIO And how quote you my folly?

VALENTINE I quote it in your jerkin.

THURIO My ‘jerkin’ is a doublet.

VALENTINE Well then, I’ll double your folly.

THURIO How!

SILVIA What, angry, Sir Thurio? Do you change colour?

VALENTINE Give him leave, madam, he is a kind of chameleon.

THURIO That hath more mind to feed on your blood than live in your air.

VALENTINE You have said, sir.

THORIO Ay, sir, and done too, for this time.

VALENTINE I know it well, sir, you always end ere you begin.

SILVIA A fine volley of words, gentlemen, and quickly shot off.

VALENTINE ‘Tis indeed, madam, we thank the giver. SILVIA Who is that, servant?

VALENTINE Yourself, sweet lady, for you gave the fire. Sir Thurio borrows his wit from your ladyship’s looks, and spends what he borrows kindly in your company.

THURIO Sir, if you spend word for word with me, I shall make your wit bankrupt.

VALENTINE I know it well, sir. You have an exchequer of words, and, I think, no other treasure to give your followers. For it appears by their bare liveries that they live by your bare words.

SILVIA No more, gentlemen, no more. Here comes my father.

Enter the Duke

DUKE

Now, daughter Silvia, you are hard beset.

Sir Valentine, your father is in good health,

What say you to a letter from your friends

Of much good news?

VALENTINE My lord, I will be thankful

To any happy messenger from thence.

DUKE

Know ye Don Antonio, your countryman?

VALENTINE

Ay, my good lord, I know the gentleman

To be of worth, and worthy estimation,

And not without desert so well reputed.

DUKE Hath he not a son?

VALENTINE

Ay, my good lord, a son that well deserves

The honour and regard of such a father.

DUKE You know him well?

VALENTINE

I knew him as myself, for from our infancy

We have conversed, and spent our hours together.

And though myself have been an idle truant,

Omitting the sweet benefit of time

To clothe mine age with angel-like perfection,

Yet hath Sir Proteus—for that’s his name—

Made use and fair advantage of his days:

His years but young, but his experience old;

His head unmellowed, but his judgement ripe.

And in a word—for far behind his worth

Comes all the praises that I now bestow—

He is complete, in feature and in mind,

With all good grace to grace a gentleman.

DUKE

Beshrew me, sir, but if he make this good

He is as worthy for an empress’ love

As meet to be an emperor’s counsellor.

Well, sir, this gentleman is come to me

With commendation from great potentates,

And here he means to spend his time awhile.

I think ’tis no unwelcome news to you.

VALENTINE

Should I have wished a thing it had been he.

DUKE

Welcome him then according to his worth.

Silvia, I speak to you, and you, Sir Thurio;

For Valentine, I need not cite him to it.

I will send him hither to you presently.

Exit

VALENTINE

This is the gentleman I told your ladyship

Had come along with me, but that his mistress

Did hold his eyes locked in her crystal looks.

SILVIA

Belike that now she hath enfranchised them

Upon some other pawn for fealty.

VALENTINE

Nay, sure, I think she holds them prisoners still.

SILVIA

Nay, then he should be blind, and being blind

How could he see his way to seek out you?

VALENTINE

Why, lady, love hath twenty pair of eyes.

THURIO

They say that love hath not an eye at all.

VALENTINE

To see such lovers, Thurio, as yourself.

Upon a homely object love can wink.

SILVIA

Have done, have done. Here comes the gentleman.

Enter Proteus

VALENTINE

Welcome, dear Proteus. Mistress, I beseech you

Confirm his welcome with some special favour.

SILVIA

His worth is warrant for his welcome hither,

If this be he you oft have wished to hear from.

VALENTINE

Mistress, it is. Sweet lady, entertain him

To be my fellow-servant to your ladyship.

SILVIA

Too low a mistress for so high a servant.

PROTEUS

Not so, sweet lady, but too mean a servant

To have a look of such a worthy mistress.

VALENTINE

Leave off discourse of disability.

Sweet lady, entertain him for your servant.

PROTEUS

My duty will I boast of, nothing else.

SILVIA

And duty never yet did want his meed.

Servant, you are welcome to a worthless mistress.