GREMIO

O this learning, what a thing it is!

GRUMIO (aside)

O this woodcock, what an ass it is!

PETRUCCIO Peace, sirrah.

HORTENSIO

Grumio, mum. (Coming forward) God save you, Signor Gremio.

GREMIO

And you are well met, Signor Hortensio.

Trow you whither I am going?

To Baptista Minola.

I promised to enquire carefully

About a schoolmaster for the fair Bianca,

And by good fortune I have lighted well

On this young man, for learning and behaviour

Fit for her turn, well read in poetry

And other books—good ones, I warrant ye.

HORTENSIO

‘Tis well, and I have met a gentleman

Hath promised me to help me to another,

A fine musician, to instruct our mistress.

So shall I no whit be behind in duty

To fair Bianca, so beloved of me.

GREMIO

Beloved of me, and that my deeds shall prove.

GRUMIO (aside) And that his bags shall prove.

HORTENSIO

Gremio, ’tis now no time to vent our love.

Listen to me, and if you speak me fair

I’ll tell you news indifferent good for either.

Here is a gentleman whom by chance I met,

Upon agreement from us to his liking

Will undertake to woo curst Katherine,

Yea, and to marry her, if her dowry please.

GREMIO So said, so done, is well.

Hortensio, have you told him all her faults?

PETRUCCIO

I know she is an irksome brawling scold.

If that be all, masters, I hear no harm.

GREMIO

No, sayst me so, friend? What countryman?

PETRUCCIO

Born in Verona, old Antonio’s son.

My father dead, his fortune lives for me,

And I do hope good days and long to see.

GREMIO O sir, such a life with such a wife were strange.

But if you have a stomach, to’t, a’ God’s name.

You shall have me assisting you in all.

But will you woo this wildcat?

PETRUCCIO Will I live!

GRUMIO

Will he woo her? Ay, or I’ll hang her.

PETRUCCIO

Why came I hither but to that intent?

Think you a little din can daunt mine ears?

Have I not in my time heard lions roar?

Have I not heard the sea, puffed up with winds,

Rage like an angry boar chafed with sweat?

Have I not heard great ordnance in the field,

And heaven’s artillery thunder in the skies?

Have I not in a pitched battle heard

Loud ’larums, neighing steeds, and trumpets’ clang?

And do you tell me of a woman’s tongue,

That gives not half so great a blow to hear

As will a chestnut in a farmer’s fire ?

Tush, tush—fear boys with bugs.

GRUMIO For he fears none.

GREMIO Hortensio, hark.

This gentleman is happily arrived,

My mind presumes, for his own good and ours.

HORTENSIO

I promised we would be contributors,

And bear his charge of wooing, whatsoe’er.

GREMIO

And so we will, provided that he win her.

GRUMIO

I would I were as sure of a good dinner.

Enter Tranio, brave, as Lucentio, and Biondello

TRANIO Gentlemen, God save you. If I may be bold, tell me, I beseech you, which is the readiest way to the house of Signor Baptista Minola?

BIONDELLO He that has the two fair daughters—is’t he you mean?

TRANIO Even he, Biondello.

GREMIO

Hark you, sir, you mean not her to—

TRANIO

Perhaps him and her, sir. What have you to do?

PETRUCCIO

Not her that chides, sir, at any hand, I pray.

TRANIO

I love no chiders, sir. Biondello, let’s away.

LUCENTIO (aside)

Well begun, Tranio.

HORTENSIO Sir, a word ere you go.

Are you a suitor to the maid you talk of—yea or no?

TRANIO

And if I be, sir, is it any offence?

GREMIO

No, if without more words you will get you hence.

TRANIO

Why, sir, I pray, are not the streets as free

For me as for you?

GREMIO But so is not she.

TRANIO

For what reason, I beseech you?

GREMIO

For this reason, if you’ll know—

That she’s the choice love of Signor Gremio.

HORTENSIO

That she’s the chosen of Signor Hortensio.

TRANIO

Softly, my masters. If you be gentlemen,

Do me this right, hear me with patience.

Baptista is a noble gentleman

To whom my father is not all unknown,

And were his daughter fairer than she is

She may more suitors have, and me for one.

Fair Leda’s daughter had a thousand wooers;

Then well one more may fair Bianca have,

And so she shall. Lucentio shall make one,

Though Paris came, in hope to speed alone.

GREMIO

What, this gentleman will out-talk us all!

LUCENTIO

Sir, give him head, I know he’ll prove a jade.

PETRUCCIO

Hortensio, to what end are all these words?

HORTENSIO

Sir, let me be so bold as ask you,

Did you yet ever see Baptista’s daughter?

TRANIO

No, sir, but hear I do that he hath two,

The one as famous for a scolding tongue

As is the other for beauteous modesty.

PETRUCCIO

Sir, sir, the first’s for me. Let her go by.

GREMIO

Yea, leave that labour to great Hercules,

And let it be more than Alcides’ twelve.

PETRUCCIO

Sir, understand you this of me in sooth,

The youngest daughter whom you hearken for

Her father keeps from all access of suitors,

And will not promise her to any man

Until the elder sister first be wed.

The younger then is free, and not before.

TRANIO

If it be so, sir, that you are the man

Must stead us all, and me amongst the rest,

And if you break the ice and do this feat,

Achieve the elder, set the younger free

For our access, whose hap shall be to have her