The saddler had it, sir; I kept it not.
ANT. S. 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?
DRO. E. 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.

ANT. S. 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?

DRO. E. To me, sir? why, you gave no gold to me.
ANT. S. Come on, sir knave; have done your foolishness,
And tell me how thou hast dispos'd thy charge.

DRO. E. 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.
ANT. S. Now, as I am a christian, answer me,

In what safe place you have bestow'dd 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?
DRO. E. 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.

ANT. S. Thy mistress' marks? what mistress, slave, hast thou?
DRO. E. 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.

ANT. S. What, wilt thou flout me thus unto my face,

Being forbid? There, take you that, sir knave.

DRO. E. What mean you, sir? for God's sake, hold your hands;

Nay, an you will not, sir, I'll take my heels.

ANT. S. Upon my life, by some device or other,

[Exit DRO. E.

• Post indeed. The post of a shop was used as the tally-board of a publican is now used, to keep

the score.

Clock. The original has cook. Pope made the necessary change.

• This is usually printed fro', but the original has fro; the typographical contraction of from,

to save space.

Bestow'd-stowed, deposited.

ADR. 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.

Luc. 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.
ADR. Why should their liberty than ours be more?
Luc. Because their business still lies out o' door.
ADR. Look, when I serve him so, he takes it illa.
Luc. O, know, he is the bridle of your will.
ADR. There's none but asses will be bridled so.
Luc. Why, headstrong liberty is lash'd with woe h.

Ill. This is the reading of the second folio, which is necessary for the rhyme. The original has thus.

Lash'd with woe. Steevens says, "Should it not rather be leash'd?"-coupled like a hound. But he turns from this solution, to suggest that "lash'd with woe" has the meaning of punished with woe. To lash, to be under the lash, are well-known expressions, which require no explanation. But a lace, a leash, a latch, a lash, is each a form of expressing what binds or fastens; and thus "headstrong liberty" and "woe" are bound together-are inseparable.

There's nothing situate under heaven's eye
But hath his bound, in earth, in sea, in sky:
The beasts, the fishes, and the winged fowls,
Are their males' subjects, and at their controls:
Men, more divine, the masters of all these,
Lords of the wide world, and wild watery seas,
Indued with intellectual sense and souls,
Of more pre-eminence than fish and fowls,
Are masters to their females, and their lords:
Then let your will attend on their accords.
ADR. This servitude makes you to keep unwed.
Luc. Not this, but troubles of the marriage-bed.
ADR. But were you wedded you would bear some sway.
Luc. Ere I learn love, I'll practise to obey.
ADR. How if your husband start some other where b?
Luc. Till he come home again, I would forbear.
ADR. Patience, unmov'd, no marvel though she pause;
They can be meek that have no other cause.
A wretched soul, bruis'd with adversity,
We bid be quiet when we hear it cry;

But were we burden'd with like weight of pain,
As much, or more, we should ourselves complain :
So thou, that hast no unkind mate to grieve thee,
With urging helpless patience would relieve me:
But, if thou live to see like right bereft,
This fool-begg'd patience in thee will be left.
Luc. Well, I will marry one day, but to try;—

Here comes your man, now is your husband nigh.

Enter DROMIO of Ephesus.

ADR. Say, is your tardy master now at hand?

DRO. E. Nay, he 's at two hands with me, and that my two ears can witness. ADR. Say, didst thou speak with him? know'st thou his mind?

DRO. E. Ay, ay, he told his mind upon mine ear.

Beshrew his hand! I scarce could understand it.

Luc. Spake he so doubtfully thou couldst not feel his meaning?

• In the original we have—

"Man, more divine, the master of all these,
Lord of the wide world," &c.

But the subsequent use of "souls," and of the plural verb, renders the change unavoidable. Johnson would read, "start some other hare." But where has here the power of a noun, and is used, as in 'Henry VIII.,'-" the king hath sent me otherwhere." We have lost this mode of using where in composition; but we retain otherwise, in a different guise: we understand otherwhile, at a different time; and we can therefore have no difficulty with otherwhere, in a different place.

• Johnson considers this an allusion to the practice of "begging a fool" for the guardianship of his fortune.

DRO. E. Nay, he struck so plainly I could too well feel his blows; and withal

so doubtfully that I could scarce understand thema.

ADR. But say, I prithee, is he coming home?

It seems he hath great care to please his wife. DRO. E. Why, mistress, sure my master is horn-mad. ADR. Horn-mad, thou villain?.

DRO. E.

But sure he is stark mad:

I mean not cuckold mad;

When I desir'd him to come home to dinner,

He ask'd me for a thousand marks in gold:

66

"T is dinner-time," quoth I; "My gold," quoth he: "Your meat doth burn," quoth I; "My gold," quoth he: "Will you come?"c quoth I; "My gold," quoth he: "Where is the thousand marks I gave thee, villain?" "The pig," quoth I, "is burn'd;" "My gold," quoth he:

66

My mistress, sir," quoth I; " Hang up thy mistress;

I know not thy mistress; out on thy mistress!"

Luc. Quoth who?

DRO. E. Quoth my master:

"I know," quoth he, "no house, no wife, no mistress;

So that my errand, due unto my tongue,

I thank him, I bare home upon my shoulders;
For, in conclusion, he did beat me there.

ADR. Go back again, thou slave, and fetch him home.
DRO. E. Go back again, and be new beaten home?
For God's sake send some other messenger.

ADR. Back, slave, or I will break thy pate across.
DRO. E. And he will bless that cross with other beating:
Between you I shall have a holy head.

ADR. Hence, prating peasant! fetch thy master home.

DRO. E. Am I so round with

you, as you

with me,

That like a football you do spurn me thus d?

You spurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither:
If I last in this service you must case me in leather.
Luc. Fie, how impatience loureth in your face!
ADR. His company must do his minions grace,

Whilst I at home starve for a merry look.
Hath homely age the alluring beauty took

19

[Exit.

• Understand them-stand under them. We have the same quibble in 'The Two Gentlemen of

Verona'-"My staff understands me."

b A thousand marks is the reading of the second folio-the first has "a hundred."

• This line is ordinarily printed, in correction of the supposed deficiency of metre

"Will you come home? quoth I; my gold, quoth he."

The retardation of the line, according to the original, is not a defect.

To be round with any one is to be plain-spoken; as in 'Hamlet'-"Let her be round with him." Dromio uses the word in a double sense, when he alludes to the football.