ORSINO Give me now leave to leave thee.
FESTE 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 everything, and their intent everywhere, for that’s it that always makes a good voyage of nothing. Farewell. Exit
ORSINO
Let all the rest give place: Exeunt Curio and others
Once more, Cesario,
Get thee to yon same sovereign cruelty.
Tell her my love, more noble than the world,
Prizes not quantity of dirty lands.
The parts that fortune hath bestowed upon her
Tell her I hold as giddily as fortune;
But ’tis that miracle and queen of gems
That nature pranks her in attracts my soul.
VIOLA
But if she cannot love you, sir?
ORSINO
I cannot be so answered.
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 answered?
ORSINO
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 called 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—
ORSINO 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 loved a man
As it might be, perhaps, were I a woman
I should your lordship.
ORSINO
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 pined 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.
ORSINO
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?
ORSINO
Ay, that’s the theme,
To her in haste. Give her this jewel. Say
My love can give no place, bide no denay.
Exeunt severally
2.5 Enter Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, and Fabian
SIR TOBY Come thy ways, Signor Fabian.
FABIAN Nay, I’ll come. If I lose a scruple of this sport let me be boiled 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 An we do not, it is pity of our lives.
Enter Maria with a letter
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!
The men hide. Maria places the letter
Lie thou there, for here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling.
Exit
Enter Malvolio
MALVOLIO ’Tis 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 anyone else that follows her. What should I think on’t?
SIR TOBY Here’s an overweening rogue.
FABIAN O, peace! Contemplation makes a rare turkeycock of him—how he jets under his advanced 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 Strachey 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 branched 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—(touching his chain) 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 ’twas I, for many do call me fool.
MALVOLIO (seeing the letter) What employment have we here? FABIAN Now is the woodcock near the gin.
SIR TOBY O peace, and the spirit of humours intimate reading aloud to him.
MALVOLIO (taking up the letter) 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.