The Comedy of Errors | Page 5

go to my inn and dine with me?
MERCHANT.
I am invited, sir, to certain merchants,
Of whom I
hope to make much benefit:
I crave your pardon. Soon, at five o'clock,

Please you, I'll meet with you upon the mart,
And afterward
consort you till bed-time:
My present business calls me from you
now.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
Farewell till then: I will go lose
myself,
And wander up and down to view the city.
MERCHANT.
Sir, I commend you to your own content.
[Exit MERCHANT.]
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
He that commends me to mine
own content
Commends me to the thing I cannot get.
I to the world
am like a drop of water
That in the ocean seeks another drop;
Who,
failing there to find his fellow forth,
Unseen, inquisitive, confounds
himself:
So I, to find a mother and a brother,
In quest of them,
unhappy, lose myself.
[Enter DROMIO OF EPHESUS.]
Here comes the almanac of my true date.
What now? How chance

thou art return'd so soon?
DROMIO OF EPHESUS.
Return'd so soon! rather approach'd too
late.
The capon burns, the pig falls from the spit;
The clock hath
strucken twelve upon the bell--
My mistress made it one upon my
cheek:
She is so hot because the meat is cold;
The meat is cold
because you come not home,;
You come not home because you have
no stomach;
You have no stomach, having broke your fast;
But we,
that know what 'tis to fast and pray,
Are penitent for your default
to-day.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
Stop--in your wind, sir; tell me
this, I pray:
Where have you left the money that I gave you?
DROMIO OF EPHESUS.
O,--sixpence that I had o'Wednesday last

To pay the saddler for my mistress' crupper;--
The saddler had it,
sir, I kept it not.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
I am not in a sportive humour
now;
Tell me, and dally not, where is the money?
We being
strangers here, how dar'st thou trust
So great a charge from thine own
custody?
DROMIO OF EPHESUS.
I pray you jest, sir, as you sit at dinner:

I from my mistress come to you in post:
If I return, I shall be post
indeed;
For she will score your fault upon my pate.
Methinks your
maw, like mine, should be your clock,
And strike you home without a
messenger.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
Come, Dromio, come, these jests
are out of season;
Reserve them till a merrier hour than this.
Where
is the gold I gave in charge to thee?
DROMIO OF EPHESUS.
To me, sir? why, you gave no gold to me!

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
Come on, sir knave, have done
your foolishness,
And tell me how thou hast dispos'd thy charge.
DROMIO OF EPHESUS.
My charge was but to fetch you from the
mart
Home to your house, the Phoenix, sir, to dinner:
My mistress
and her sister stay for you.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
Now, as I am a Christian, answer
me,
In what safe place you have bestow'd my money:
Or I shall
break that merry sconce of yours,
That stands on tricks when I am
undispos'd;
Where is the thousand marks thou hadst of me?
DROMIO OF EPHESUS.
I have some marks of yours upon my
pate,
Some of my mistress' marks upon my shoulders,
But not a
thousand marks between you both.--
If I should pay your worship
those again,
Perchance you will not bear them patiently.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
Thy mistress' marks! what
mistress, slave, hast thou?
DROMIO OF EPHESUS.
Your worship's wife, my mistress at the
Phoenix;
She that doth fast till you come home to dinner,
And prays
that you will hie you home to dinner.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
What, wilt thou flout me thus
unto my face,
Being forbid? There, take you that, sir knave.
DROMIO OF EPHESUS.
What mean you, sir? for God's sake hold
your hands!
Nay, an you will not, sir, I'll take my heels.
[Exit DROMIO.]
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
Upon my life, by some device or
other,
The villain is o'er-raught of all my money.
They say this
town is full of cozenage;
As, nimble jugglers that deceive the eye,


Dark-working sorcerers that change the mind,
Soul-killing witches
that deform the body,
Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks,

And many such-like liberties of sin:
If it prove so, I will be gone the
sooner.
I'll to the Centaur to go seek this slave:
I greatly fear my
money is not safe.
[Exit.]
ACT II.
SCENE 1. A public place.
[Enter ADRIANA and LUCIANA.]
ADRIANA.
Neither my husband nor the slave return'd
That in such
haste I sent to seek his master!
Sure, Luciana, it is two o'clock.
LUCIANA.
Perhaps some merchant hath invited him,
And from
the mart he's somewhere gone to dinner.
Good sister, let us dine, and
never fret:
A man is master of his liberty;
Time is their master; and
when they see time,
They'll go or come. If so, be patient, sister.
ADRIANA.
Why should their liberty than ours be more?
LUCIANA.
Because their business still lies out o' door.
ADRIANA.
Look when I serve him so, he takes it ill.
LUCIANA.
O, know he is the bridle of your will.
ADRIANA.
There's none but asses will be bridled so.
LUCIANA.
Why, headstrong liberty is lash'd with woe.
There's
nothing situate under heaven's eye
But hath his bound in