[Enter SIR TOBY BELCH and SIR ANDREW AGUE-CHEEK.] SIR TOBY Approach, Sir Andrew; not to be a-bed after midnight is to
be up betimes; and diluculo surgere, thou know'st.
SIR ANDREW Nay; by my troth, I know not; but I know to be up late
is to be up late.
SIR TOBY A false conclusion; I hate it as an unfilled can. To be
up after midnight, and to go to bed then is early: so that to go
to bed after midnight is to go to bed betimes. Do not our lives
consist of the four elements?
SIR ANDREW Faith, so they say; but I think it rather consists of
eating and drinking.
SIR TOBY Thou art a scholar; let us therefore eat and drink.--
Marian, I say!--a stoup of wine.
[Enter CLOWN.] SIR ANDREW Here comes the fool, i' faith.
CLOWN How now, my hearts? Did you never see the picture of we three?
SIR TOBY Welcome, ass. Now let's have a catch.
SIR ANDREW By my troth, the fool has an excellent breast. I had
rather than forty shillings I had such a leg; and so sweet a
breath to sing, as the fool has. In sooth, thou wast in very
gracious fooling last night when thou spokest of Pigrogromitus,
of the Vapians passing the equinoctial of Queubus; 'twas very
good, i' faith. I sent thee sixpence for thy leman. Hadst it?
CLOWN I did impeticos thy gratillity; for Malvolio's nose is no
whipstock. My lady has a white hand, and the Myrmidons are no
bottle-ale houses.
SIR ANDREW Excellent! Why, this is the best fooling, when all is
done. Now, a song.
SIR TOBY Come on; there is sixpence for you: let's have a song.
SIR ANDREW There's a testril of me too: if one knight give a--
CLOWN Would you have a love-song, or a song of good life?
SIR TOBY A love-song, a love-song.
SIR ANDREW Ay, ay; I care not for good life.
CLOWN SONG
O, mistress mine, where are you roaming?
O, stay and hear; your true love's coming,
That can sing both high and low:
Trip no further, pretty sweeting;
Journeys end in lovers meeting,
Every wise man's son doth know.
SIR ANDREW Excellent good, i' faith.
SIR TOBY Good, good.
CLOWN What is love? 'tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure.
In delay there lies no plenty;
Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty;
Youth's a stuff will not endure.
SIR ANDREW A mellifluous voice, as I am true knight.
SIR TOBY A contagious breath.
SIR ANDREW Very sweet and contagious, i' faith.
SIR TOBY To hear by the nose, it is dulcet in contagion. But shall
we make the welkin dance indeed? Shall we rouse the night-owl in
a catch that will draw three souls out of one weaver? shall we do
that?
SIR ANDREW An you love me, let's do't: I am dog at a catch.
CLOWN By'r lady, sir, and some dogs will catch well.
SIR ANDREW Most certain: let our catch be, 'Thou knave.'
CLOWN 'Hold thy peace, thou knave' knight? I shall be constrain'd
in't to call thee knave, knight.
SIR ANDREW 'Tis not the first time I have constrained one to call
me knave. Begin, fool; it begins 'Hold thy peace.'
CLOWN I shall never begin if I hold my peace.
SIR ANDREW Good, i' faith! Come, begin.
[They sing a catch.] [Enter MARIA.] MARIA What a caterwauling do you keep here! If my lady have not
called up her steward Malvolio, and bid him turn you out of
doors, never trust me.
SIR TOBY My lady's a Cataian, we are politicians; Malvolio's a
Peg-a-Ramsey, and
[Singing.] 'Three merry men be we.'
Am not I consanguineous? am I not of her blood? Tilly-valley,
lady.
'There dwelt a man in Babylon, lady, lady.'
CLOWN Beshrew me, the knight's in admirable fooling.
SIR ANDREW Ay, he does well enough if he be disposed, and so do I
too; he does it with a better grace, but I do it more natural.
SIR TOBY [Singing] O, the twelfth day of December,--
MARIA For the love o' God, peace!
[Enter MALVOLIO] MALVOLIO My masters, are you mad? or what are you? Have you no
wit, manners, nor honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this
time of night? Do ye make an ale-house of my lady's house, that
ye squeak out your coziers' catches without any mitigation or
remorse of voice? Is there no respect of place, persons, nor
time, in you?
SIR TOBY We did keep time, sir, in our catches. Sneck up!
MALVOLIO Sir Toby, I must be round with you. My lady bade me tell
you that, though she harbours you as her kinsman she's nothing
allied to your disorders. If you can separate yourself and your
misdemeanours, you are welcome to the house; if not, an it would
please you to take leave of her, she is very willing to bid you
farewell.
SIR TOBY 'Farewell, dear heart, since I must needs be gone.'
MARIA Nay, good Sir Toby.
CLOWN 'His eyes do show his days are almost done.'
MALVOLIO Is't even so?
SIR TOBY 'But I will never die.'
CLOWN Sir Toby, there you lie.
MALVOLIO This is much credit to you.
SIR TOBY [Singing] 'Shall I bid him go?'
CLOWN 'What an if you do?'
SIR TOBY 'Shall I bid him go, and spare not?'
CLOWN 'O, no, no, no, no, you dare not.'
SIR TOBY Out o' tune? sir, ye lie. Art any more than a steward? Dost thou
think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes
and ale?
CLOWN Yes, by Saint Anne; and ginger shall be hot i' the mouth
too.
SIR TOBY Thou'art i' the right.--Go, sir, rub your chain with crumbs:
A stoup of wine, Maria!
MALVOLIO Mistress Mary, if you prized my lady's favour at anything
more than contempt, you would not give means for this uncivil
rule; she shall know of it, by this hand.
[Exit.] MARIA Go shake your ears.
SIR ANDREW 'Twere as good a deed as to drink when a man's a-hungry,
to challenge him the field, and then to break promise with him
and make a fool of him.
SIR TOBY Do't, knight; I'll write thee a challenge; or I'll
deliver thy indignation to him by word of mouth.
MARIA Sweet Sir Toby, be patient for to-night; since the youth of
the count's was to-day with my lady, she is much out of quiet.
For Monsieur Malvolio, let me alone with him: if I do not gull
him into a nayword, and make him a common recreation, do not
think I have wit enough to lie straight in my bed. I know I can
do it.
SIR TOBY Possess us, possess us; tell us something of him.
MARIA Marry, sir, sometimes he is a kind of Puritan.
SIR ANDREW O, if I thought that, I'd beat him like a dog.
SIR TOBY What, for being a Puritan? thy exquisite reason, dear knight?
SIR ANDREW I have no exquisite reason for't, but I have reason good enough.
MARIA The devil a Puritan that he is, or anything constantly but a
time-pleaser: an affectioned ass that cons state without book and
utters it by great swarths; the best persuaded of himself, so
crammed, as he thinks, with excellences, that it is his grounds
of faith that all that look on him love him; and on that vice in
him will my revenge find notable cause to work.
SIR TOBY What wilt thou do?
MARIA I will drop in his way some obscure epistles of love;
wherein, by the colour of his beard, the shape of his leg, the
manner of his gait, the expressure of his eye, forehead, and
complexion, he shall find himself most feelingly personated. I
can write very like my lady, your niece; on a forgotten matter we
can hardly make distinction of our hands.
SIR TOBY Excellent! I smell a device.
SIR ANDREW I have't in my nose too.
SIR TOBY He shall think, by the letters that thou wilt drop, that
they come from my niece, and that she is in love with him.
MARIA My purpose is, indeed, a horse of that colour.
SIR ANDREW And your horse now would make him an ass.
MARIA Ass, I doubt not.
SIR ANDREW O 'twill be admirable!
MARIA Sport royal, I warrant you. I know my physic will work with
him. I will plant you two, and let the fool make a third, where
he shall find the letter; observe his construction of it. For
this night, to bed, and dream on the event. Farewell.
[Exit.] SIR TOBY Good night, Penthesilea.
SIR ANDREW Before me, she's a good wench.
SIR TOBY She's a beagle true bred, and one that adores me. What o' that?
SIR ANDREW I was adored once too.
SIR TOBY Let's to bed, knight.--Thou hadst need send for more money.
SIR ANDREW If I cannot recover your niece I am a foul way out.
SIR TOBY Send for money, knight; if thou hast her not i' the end,
call me Cut.
SIR ANDREW If I do not, never trust me; take it how you will.
SIR TOBY Come, come; I'll go burn some sack; 'tis too late to go
to bed now: come, knight; come, knight.
[Exeunt.]