Call you this gamut? tut, I like it not :

Old fashions please me best; I am not so nice, 80 To change true rules for odd inventions.

Enter a Servant.

Serv. Mistress, your father prays you leave your books

And help to dress your sister's chamber up:
You know to-morrow is the wedding-day.

Bian. Farewell, sweet masters both; I must be [Exeunt Bianca and Servant.

gone. Luc. Faith, mistress, then I have no cause to stay. [Exit. Hor. But I have cause to pry into this pedant: Methinks he looks as though he were in love: Yet if thy thoughts, Bianca, be so humble To cast thy wandering eyes on every stale, Seize thee that list: if once I find thee ranging, Hortensio will be quit with thee by changing.

[Exit.

SCENE II. Padua. Before BAPTISTA's house. Enter BAPTISTA, GREMIO, TRANIO, KATHARINA, BIANCA, LUCENTIO, and others, attendants. Bap. [To Tranio] Signior Lucentio, this is the 'pointed day.

That Katharine and Petruchio should be married,
And yet we hear not of our son-in-law.

What will be said? what mockery will it be,

To want the bridegroom when the priest attends

80. nice, foolish.

81. odd; this is Theobald's

90

almost certain emendation of the old of Ff and Q.

90. stale, bait, alluring figure.

To speak the ceremonial rites of marriage!
What says Lucentio to this shame of ours?
Kath. No shame but mine: I must, forsooth,
be forced

To give my hand opposed against my heart

Unto a mad-brain rudesby full of spleen;

Who woo'd in haste and means to wed at leisure.

I told you, I, he was a frantic fool,

Hiding his bitter jests in blunt behaviour:

And, to be noted for a merry man,

He'll woo a thousand, 'point the day of marriage,
Make feasts, invite friends, and proclaim the banns;
Yet never means to wed where he hath woo'd.
Now must the world point at poor Katharine,
And say, 'Lo, there is mad Petruchio's wife,
If it would please him come and marry her!'
Tra. Patience, good Katharine, and Baptista

too.

Upon my life, Petruchio means but well,
Whatever fortune stays him from his word:
Though he be blunt, I know him passing wise;
Though he be merry, yet withal he's honest.

Kath. Would Katharine had never seen him
though!

[Exit weeping, followed by Bianca and others.
Bap. Go, girl; I cannot blame thee now to weep;
For such an injury would vex a very saint,
Much more a shrew of thy impatient humour.

Enter BIONDELLO.

Bion. Master, master! news, old news, and such news as you never heard of!

Bap. Is it new and old too? how may that be? Bion. Why, is it not news, to hear of Petruchio's coming?

10. rudesby, rude fellow.

30. old, extraordinary, 'rare.'

ΤΟ

20

30

Bap. Is he come?

Bion. Why, no, sir.

Bap. What then?

Bion. He is coming.

Bap. When will he be here?

Bion. When he stands where I am and sees 40 you there.

Tra. But say, what to thine old news?

Bion. Why, Petruchio is coming in a new hat and an old jerkin, a pair of old breeches thrice turned, a pair of boots that have been candlecases, one buckled, another laced, an old rusty sword ta'en out of the town-armoury, with a broken hilt, and chapeless; with two broken points his horse hipped with an old mothy saddle and stirrups of no kindred; besides, possessed 50 with the glanders and like to mose in the chine; troubled with the lampass, infected with the fashions, full of windgalls, sped with spavins, rayed with the yellows, past cure of the fives, stark spoiled with the staggers, begnawn with the bots, swayed in the back and shoulder-shotten; near-legged before and with a half-checked bit

48. chapeless, without a chape, i.e. the metal termination of the scabbard, protecting the swordpoint.

49. points, the tagged laces which supported the hose.

51. to mose in the chine, a disease of the spinal marrow. 52. lampass, a swelling of the palate.

53. fashions, 'farcy,' a skin disease.

53. spavins, a disease of the hock, producing lameness. 54. yellows, jaundice.

ib. fives (Fr. avives), an inVOL. II

and a head-stall of sheep's leather which, being restrained to keep him from stumbling, hath been often burst and now repaired with knots; one 60 girth six times pieced and a woman's crupper of velure, which hath two letters for her name fairly set down in studs, and here and there pieced with packthread.

Bap. Who comes with him?

Bion. O, sir, his lackey, for all the world caparisoned like the horse; with a linen stock on one leg and a kersey boot-hose on the other, gartered with a red and blue list; an old hat and 'the humour of forty fancies' pricked in 't for a feather: a monster, a very monster in apparel, and not like a Christian footboy or a

gentleman's lackey.

Tra. 'Tis some odd humour pricks him to this fashion;

Yet oftentimes he goes but mean-apparell'd.

Bap. I am glad he's come, howsoe'er he comes.
Bion. Why, sir, he comes not.

Bap. Didst thou not say he comes?

Bion. Who? that Petruchio came?

Bap. Ay, that Petruchio came.

Bion. No, sir; I say his horse comes, with

him on his back.

Bap. Why, that's all one.
Bion. Nay, by Saint Jamy,

I hold you a penny,
A horse and a man
Is more than one,

And yet not many.

62. velure, velvet. 67. stock, stocking. 68. boot-hose, stocking worn with top-boots.

70. the humour of forty

70

80

fancies, either some collection
of the short poems called
Fancies, or a bunch of ribbons,
also sometimes so called.
70. pricked in, stuck in.

Enter PETRUCHIO and GRUMIO.

Pet. Come, where be these gallants? who's at home?

Bap. You are welcome, sir.

Pet. Were it better, I should rush in thus.
But where is Kate? where is my lovely bride?
How does my father? Gentles, methinks you
frown:

And wherefore gaze this goodly company,
As if they saw some wondrous monument,
Some comet or unusual prodigy?

Bap. Why, sir, you know this is your weddingday:

First were we sad, fearing you would not come ;
Now sadder, that you come so unprovided.
Fie, doff this habit, shame to your estate,
An eye-sore to our solemn festival!

Tra. And tell us, what occasion of import

Hath all so long detain'd you from your wife,
And sent you hither so unlike yourself?

Pet. Tedious it were to tell, and harsh to hear:

Sufficeth, I am come to keep my word,

Though in some part enforced to digress;
Which, at more leisure, I will so excuse

As
you shall well be satisfied withal.
But where is Kate? I stay too long from her:
The morning wears, 'tis time we were at church.
Tra. See not your bride in these unreverent
robes:

109. digress, diverge (from my promise).