Luc. Ne'er may I look on day, nor sleep on night,

But she tells to your highness simple truth!
ANG. O perjur'd woman! they are both for-

sworn.

In this the madman justly chargeth them.

ANT. E. My liege, I am advised what I say; Neither disturbed with the effect of wine, Nor, heady-rash, provok'd with raging ire, Albeit my wrongs might make one wiser mad. This woman lock'd me out this day from dinner:That goldsmith there, were he not pack'd with her, Could witness it, for he was with me then; Who parted with me to go fetch a chain, Promising to bring it to the Porcupine, Where Balthazar and I did dine together. Our dinner done, and he not coming thither, I went to seek him: in the street I met him, And, in his company, that gentleman. There did this perjur'd goldsmith swear me down, That I this day of him receiv'd the chain, Which, God he knows, I saw not; for the which, He did arrest me with an officer.

I did obey, and sent my peasant home

For certain ducats: he with none return'd.
Then fairly I bespoke the officer

To go in person with me to my house.

By the way we met

My wife, her sister, and a rabble more

Of vile confederates; along with them,

They brought one Pinch, a hungry lean-fac'd villain,

A mere anatomy, a mountebank,

A thread-bare juggler, and a fortune-teller;
A needy, hollow-ey'd, sharp-looking wretch,-
A living dead man: this pernicious slave,
Forsooth, took on him as a conjurer,
And, gazing in mine eyes, feeling my pulse,
And with no face, as 't were, out-facing me,
Cries out I was possess'd: then, all together,
They fell upon me, bound me, bore me thence,
And, in a dark and dankish vault at home,
There left me and my man both bound together;
Till, gnawing with my teeth my bonds in sunder,
I gain'd my freedom, and immediately
Ran hither to your grace, whom I beseech
To give me ample satisfaction

For these deep shames and great indignities.

ANG. My lord, in truth, thus far I witness with him,

That he dined not at home, but was lock'd out.

DUKE. But had he such a chain of thee or no? ANG. He had, my lord; and when he ran in here These people saw the chain about his neck.

MER. Besides, I will be sworn these ears of mine

a And careful hours,-] Painful, anxious hours.

Heard you confess you had the chain of him,
After you first forswore it on the mart:
And thereupon I drew my sword on you;
And then you fled into this abbey here,
From whence, I think, you are come by miracle.
ANT. E. I never came within these abbey walls,
Nor ever didst thou draw thy sword on me;
I never saw the chain, so help me Heaven!
And this is false you burden me withal.

DUKE. Why, what an intricate impeach is this!
I think you all have drunk of Circe's cup.
If here you hous'd him, here he would have been.
If he were mad, he would not plead so coldly.
You say he dined at home; the goldsmith here
Denies that saying. Sirrah, what say you?

DRO. E. Sir, he dined with her there, at the Porcupine.

COUR. He did; and from my finger snatch'd that ring.

ANT. E. 'Tis true, my liege, this ring I had of her.

DUKE. Saw'st thou him enter at the abbey here?

COUR. As sure, my liege, as I do see your

grace.

DUKE. Why, this is strange. Go, call the abbess hither.

I think you are all mated or stark mad.

[Exit an Attendant. EGE. Most mighty duke, vouchsafe me speak a word:

Haply I see a friend will save my life,
And pay the sum that may deliver me.

DUKE. Speak freely, Syracusian, what thou wilt. EGE. Is not your name, sir, call'd Antipholus? And is not that your bondman, Dromio?

DRO. E. Within this hour I was his bondman,

sir,

But he, I thank him, gnaw'd in two my cords.
Now am I Dromio, and his man, unbound.

EGE. I am sure you both of you remember me.
DRO. E. Ourselves we do remember, sir, by you;
For lately we were bound as you are now.
You are not Pinch's patient,-are you, sir?

EGE. Why look you strange on me? You know me well.

ANT. E. I never saw you in my life, till now. EGE. Oh! grief hath chang'd me since you

a

DRO. E. Ay, sir, but I am sure I do not; and whatsoever a man denies, you are now bound to believe him.

ÆGE. Not know my voice? Oh, Time's extremity!

Hast thou so crack'd and splitted my poor tongue,
In seven short years, that here my only son
Knows not my feeble key of untun'd cares?
Though now this grained face of mine be hid
In sap-consuming winter's drizzled snow,
And all the conduits of my blood froze up;
Yet hath my night of life some memory—
My wasting lamps some fading glimmer left-
My dull deaf ears a little use to hear:
All these old witnesses (I cannot err)
Tell me, thou art my son, Antipholus.

ANT. E. I never saw my father in my life. EGE. But seven years since, in Syracusa, boy, Thou know'st we parted; but, perhaps, my son, Thou sham'st to acknowledge me in misery.

ANT, E. The duke, and all that know me in the city,

Can witness with me that it is not so;

I ne'er saw Syracusa in my life.

DUKE. I tell thee, Syracusian, twenty years

a You are now bound, &c.] Of course, a quibble on poor Egeon's bonds.

Have I been patron to Antipholus,
During which time he ne'er saw Syracusa.
I see, thy age and dangers make thee dote.

Enter the Abbess, with ANTIPHOLUS of Syracuse, and DROMIO of Syracuse.

ABB. Most mighty duke, behold a man much wrong'd. [All gather to see them. ADR. I see two husbands, or mine eyes de

ceive me.

DUKE. One of these men is Genius to the other; And so of these, which is the natural man, And which the spirit? Who deciphers them? DRO. S. I, sir, am Dromio; command him

away.

DRO. E. I. sir, am Dromio, pray let me stay. ANT. S. Ægeon, art thou not? or else his ghost!

DRO. S. Oh, my old master! who hath bound him here?

ABB. Whoever bound him, I will loose his bonds, And gain a husband by his liberty! Speak, old geon, if thou be'st the man That hadst a wife once call'd Emilia, That bore thee at a burden two fair sons! Oh, if thou be'st the same Egeon, speak!

And speak unto the same Emilia!

a

ÆGE. If I dream not, thou art Æmilia!
If thou art she, tell me, where is that son
That floated with thee on the fatal raft?

ABB. By men of Epidamnum he and I,
And the twin Dromio, all were taken up.
But, by and by, rude fishermen of Corinth,
By force, took Dromio and my son from them,
And me they left with those of Epidamnum.
What then became of them I cannot tell;
I, to this fortune that you see me in.

DUKE. Why, here begins his morning story right;

These two Antipholus',-these two so like,
And these two Dromios, one in semblance;
Besides her urging of her wreck at sea:
These are the parents to these children,"
Which accidentally are met together.
Antipholus, thou cam'st from Corinth first.

ANT. S. No, sir, not I; I came from Syracuse. DUKE. Stay, stand apart; I know not which is which.

ANT. E. I came from Corinth, my most gracious

ADR. I sent you money, sir, to be your bail, By Dromio; but I think he brought it not. DRO. E. No; none by me.

ANT. S. This purse of ducats I receiv'd from

you,

And Dromio, my man, did bring them me:
I see, we still did meet each other's man,
And I was ta'en for him and he for me,
And thereupon these Errors rare arose.
ANT. E. These ducats pawn I for my father

Το

here.

d

DUKE. It shall not need,-thy father hath his life.

COUR. Sir, I must have that diamond from

you.

ANT. E. There, take it, and much thanks for my good cheer.

ABB. Renowned duke, vouchsafe to take the pains

go
And hear at large discoursed all our fortunes;
And all that are assembled in this place,
That, by this sympathized one day's error,
Have suffer'd wrong, go, keep us company,
And we shall make full satisfaction.
Twenty-five years have I but gone in travail
Of you, my sons; and, till this present hour,
My heavy burden ne'er delivered.

with us into the abbey here,

The duke, my husband, and my children both,
And you the calendars of their nativity,
Go to a gossip's feast, and go with me;"
After so long grief, such festivity!

DUKE. With all my heart, I'll gossip at this feast.

[Exeunt DUKE, Abbess, ÆGEON, Courtezan, Merchant, ANGELO, and Attendants. DRO. S. Master, shall I fetch your stuff from ship-board?

ANT. E. Dromio, what stuff of mine hast thou embark'd?

DRO. S. Your goods, that lay at host, sir, in the Centaur.

ANT. S. He speaks to me; I am your master, Dromio:

a If I dream not,-] In the folio, 1623, this speech of Ægeon, and the subsequent one of the Abbess, are misplaced, and come after the Duke's speech, commencing,-" Why, here begins," &c. Malone made the necessary transposition.

b To these children,-] Children must be pronounced as a trisyllable.

e What I told you then, &c.] This, and the two lines following, are addressed to Luciana, and should perhaps be spoken aside to

her.

d These Errors rare arose.] The ancient copy has errors are, and this incontestable misprint is faithfully followed by modern editors. Mr. Collier's old corrector endeavours, not very successfully, to rectify it by reading all for are. I venture to substitute

rare, which, besides being closer to the original, appears to give a better meaning.

Twenty-five years have I but gone in travail
Of you, my sons; and, till this present hour,
My heavy burden ne'er delivered.]

The original copy has "thirtie three yeares." The rectification of time was made by Theobald, who pointed out that as Ægeon had related how at eighteen years his youngest boy "became inquisitive after his brother;" and, in the present Scene, says it is but seven years since they parted, the date of their birth is settled indisputably. For the emendation, ne'er for are, we are indebted to Mr. Dyce.

(1) SCENE II. They say this town is full of cozenage, &c.] This was the character attributed to Ephesus in remote ages. Steevens suggests that Shakespeare might have got the hint for this description from Warner's translation of the "Menæchmi," 1595. "For this assure yourselfe, this Towne Epidamnum is a place of outragious expences, exceeding in all ryot and lasciviousnesse: and (I heare) as full of Ribaulds, Parasites, Drunkards, Catchpoles, Cony-catchers, and Sycophants, as it can hold," &c. But it is observable that Shakespeare, with great propriety, makes Antipholus attach to the Ephesians higher and more poetical qualities of cozenage than those enumerated by the old translator. It is not merely as catchpoles," cony-catchers," and the like, but as "darkworking sorcerers," and " soul-killing witches," that he speaks of them. And hence we are prepared to find him

66

attribute the cross-purposes of the scene to supernatura agency, and see no inconsistency in his wooing Luciana as an enchantress :

"Teach me, dear creature! how to think and speak;
Lay open to my earthy gross conceit,
Smother'd in errors-feeble-shallow-weak-
The folded meaning of your words' deceit.
Against my soul's pure truth, why labour you
To make it wander in an unknown field?"

Or in his imagining that, to win the sibyl, he must lose himself:

"Sing, syren, for thyself, and I will dote:

Spread o'er the silver waves thy golden hairs,
And as a bride I'll take thee, and there lie;
And, in that glorious supposition, think
He gains by death, that hath such means to die!"

(1) SCENE I.-Once this.] The following note in Gifford's "Ben Jonson" (vol. iii. p. 218) helps to confirm our opinion that once in this place, and in many other instances, is only another form of nonce, and means for the occasion, for the time being, &c. For the nonce, is simply for the once, for the one thing in question, whatever it may be. This is invariably its meaning. The aptitude of many of our monosyllables beginning with a vowel to assume the a is well known; but the progress of this expression is distinctly marked in our early writers, 'a ones,'' an anes,' 'for the anes,' 'for the nanes,' 'for the nones,' 'for the nonce.'

Borne on a foamy-crested wave,
She reach'd amain the bounding prow,
Then clasping fast the Chieftain brave,
She, plunging, sought the deep below."

The reader desirous of particular information concerning the supposed existence and habits of these seductive beings, may consult Maillet's "Telliamed," Pontopiddan's "Natural History of Norway," and Waldron's "Account of the Isle of Man."

(3) SCENE II.

ANT. S. Where France?

DRO. S. In her forehead; arm'd and reverted, making war against her heir.]

As Theobald first observed, an equivoque was, no doubt, intended between the words hair and heir; and by the latter, was meant Henry IV. the heir of France, concerning whose succession to the throne there was a civil war in the country from 1589 for several years. Henry, after struggling long against the League, extricated himself from all his difficulties by embracing the Roman Catholic religion at St. Denis, on Sunday, the 25th of July, 1593, and was crowned King of France in February, 1594. In 1591, Lord Essex was dispatched with 4,000 troops to the French king's assistance, and his brother Walter was killed before Rouen, in Normandy. From that time till Henry was peaceably settled on the throne, many bodies of troops were sent by Queen Elizabeth to his aid so that his situation must at that period have been a matter of notoriety, and a subject of conversation in England. From the reference to this circumstance, Malone imagines the "Comedy of Errors" to have been written before 1594.