Enter ISABELLA.

Duke. I do constantly believe you :-The time is come, even now. I shall crave your forbearance a little may be, I will call upon you anon, for some advantage to yourself.

[Exit.

Mari. I am always bound to you.
Duke. Very well met, and welcome.
What is the news from this good deputy?
Isab. He hath a garden circummur'd⚫ with
brick,

Whose western side is with a vineyard back'd;
And to that vineyard is a planched + gate,
That makes his opening with this bigger key:
This other doth command a little door,
Which from the vineyard to the garden leads;
There have I made my promise to call on him,
Upon the heavy middle of the night.
Duke. But shall you on your knowledge find
this way?

Isab. I have ta'en a due and wary note
upon't ;

With whispering and most guilty diligence,
In action all of precept, he did show me
The way twice o'er.

Duke. Are there no other tokens
Between you 'greed, concerning her observance ?
Isab. No, none, but only a repair i' the dark;
And that I have possess'd him, my most stay
Can be but brief: for I have made him know,
I bave a servant comes with me along,
That stays upon me; whose persuasion is,
I come about my brother.

Duke. 'Tis well borne up.

I have not yet made known to Mariana
A word of this :-What, ho! within!
forth !

Re-enter MARIANA.

I pray yon, be acquainted with this maid;
She comes to do you good.

Isab. I do desire the like.

Duke. Do you persuade yourself that I respect you?

Mari. Good friar, I know you do; and have found it.

Duke. Take then this your companion by the

haud,

Who bath a story ready for your ear:
I shall attend your leisure; but make haste;
The vaporous night approaches.

come

Mari. Will't please you walk aside?
[Exeunt MARIANA and ISABELLA.
Duke. O place and greatness, millions of false

eyes

Are struck upon thee! volumes of report
Run with these false and most contrarious
quests |

Upon thy doings! thousand 'scapes ¶ of wit
Make thee the father of their idle dream,
And rack thee in their fancies !-Welcome! How
agreed?

He is your husband on a pre-contract:
To bring you thus together, 'tis no sin;
Sith that the justice of your title to him
Doth flourish ++ the deceit. Come, let us go;
Our corn's to reap, før yet our tithe's to sow.
[Excunt.

• Walled round. + Planked, wooden. & Waits.

Sallies.

↑ Informed. Inquisitions, inquiries. .. Since.

+ Gild, or varnish over.

SCENE II.—A Room in the Prison.
Enter PROVOST and CLOWN.

Prov. Come hither, sirrah: Can you ent a man's head?

Prov. Are you agreed?

Clo. Sir, I will serve him; for I do find your hangman is a more penitent trade than your bawd; he doth oftener ask forgiveness.

Re-enter MARIANA and ISABELLA.

Prov. You, sirrah, provide your block at your axe, to-morrow four o'clock.

Isab. She'll take the enterprise upon her, fa ther, If you advise it.

Abkor. Come on, bawd; I will instruct ther in my trade; follow.

Duke. It is not my consent, But my entreaty too.

Clo. I do desire to learn, Sir; and, I hope, f you have occasion to use me for your own turn, you shall find me yare: for, truly Sar, for your kindness, I owe you a good tørn.

Isab. Little have you to say,

When you depart from him, but, soft and low,
Remember now my brother.

Prov. Call bither Barnardine and Credio :
[Exeunt CLOWN and ASHOESOS.
One has my pity; not a jot the other,

Mari. Fear me not.

Duke. Nor, gentle daughter, fear you not at Being a murderer, though he were my brother. all:

Enter CLAUDIO.

Look, here's the warrant, Claudio, for the death:
'Tis now dead midnight, and by eight to mot
Thou must be made immortal. "Where's Bar-
nardine?
Claud. As fast lock'd up in sleep, as guiltless
labour

Clo. If the man be a bachelor, Sir, I em: but if he be a married man, he is his wi head, and I can never cut off a woman's beat.

Prov. Come, Sir, leave me your snatches, and yield me a direct answer. To-morrow mong are to die Claudio and Barnardine: Hete s n our prison a common executioner, who is is office lacks a helper: if you will take it on m to assist him, it shall redeem you from you gyves; if not, you shall have your fal use of imprisonment, and your deliverance with an pitied whipping; for you have been a notariom bawd.

Clo. Sir, I have been an unlawful band, 6 out of mind: but yet I will be content to be lawful bangman. I would be glad to recesse some instruction from my fellow-partner. "Prov. What ho, Abborson! Where's Abbarson, there ?

Enter ABHORSON.

Abhor. Do you call, Sir?

Prov. Sirrah, here's a fellow will help yo to-morrow in your execution: If you think t meet, compound with him by the year, and et him abide here with you; if not, use bun for the present, and dismiss him: He cannot pirat his estimation with you; he hath been a bund. Abhor. A bawd, Sir? Fie upon him, he #tl discredit our mystery. +

Prov. Go to, Sir; you weigh eqszy: 1 feather will turn the scale. 2-2.

Clo. Pray, Sir, by your good favour, far, surely, Sir, a good favour; you have, bet its you have a hanging look,) do you call, Sir, yout occupation a mystery?

Abhor. Ay, Sir; a mystery.

Clo. Painting, Sir, I have beard say, is i mystery; and your whores, Sir, being members of my occupation, using painting, do prose my occupation a mystery: but what mystery there should be in hanging, if I should be hang'd, I cannot imagine.

Abhor. Sir, it is a mystery.

Clo. Proof.

Abhor. Every true ý man's apparel fits your thief: If it be too lite for your thief, your m man thinks it big enough; if it be too big int your thief, your thief thinks it little enough: every true man's apparel fits your thief.

Re-enter PROVOST.

Barnardine: for my better satisfaction, let
me have Claudio's head sent me by five. Let
this be duly performed; with a thought, that
more depends on it than we must yet deliver.
Thus fail not to do your office, as you will
answer it at your peril.
What say you to this, Sir?

Duke. What is that Barnardine, who is to be executed in the afternoon?

Prov. A Bohemian born; but here nursed np and bred one that is a prisoner nine years old.

Duke. How cane it, that the absent duke had not either deliver'd him to his liberty, or executed him? I bave heard, it was ever his manner to do so.

Prov. His friends still wrought reprieves for him And, indeed, his fact, till now in the government of lord Angelo, came not to an undoubtful proof.

Duke. Is it now apparent ?

Prov. Most manifest, and not denied by him. self.

Duke. Hath be borne himself penitently in prison? How seems he to be touch'd?

Prov. A man that apprehends death no more dreadfully, but as a drunken sleep; careless, reckless, and fearless of what's past, present, or to come; insensible of mortality, and desperately

mortal.

Duke. He wants advice.

Prov. He will hear none: he hath evermore had the liberty of the prison; give him leave to escape hence, he would not: drunk many times a day, if not many days entirely drunk. We have very often awaked him, as if to carry him to execution, and show'd him a seeming warrant for it: it hath not moved him at all.

Duke. More of him anon. There is written in your brow, Provost, honesty and constancy: if I read it not truly, my ancient skill beguiles me; but in the boldness of my cunning, I will lay myself in hazard. Claudio, whom here you have a warrant to execute, is no greater forfeit to the law than Angelo who hath sentenced him: To make you understand this in a manifested effect, I crave but four days respite; for the which you are to do me both a present and a dangerous courtesy.

Duke. Pray you, let's hear.

Prov. [Reads.] Whatsoever you may hear to the contrary, let Claudio be executed by four of the clock; and, in the afternoon,

For which the pardoner himself is in:
Hence bath offence his quick celerity,
When it is borne in high authority:
When vice makes mercy, mercy's so extended,
That for the fault's love, is the offender friend-
[ed.-deputy?
Now, Sir, what news?

Prov. I told you: Lord Angelo, be-like,
thinking me remiss in mine office, awakens me
with this unwonted putting on: methinks,
strangely; for he hath not used it before.

you, Sir, here s the hand and seal of the duke. You know the character, I doubt not; and the signet is not strange to you.

Prov. I know them both.

Duke. The contents of this is the return of the duke; you shall anon over-read it at your pleasure; where you shall find, within these two days he will be here. This is a thing, that Angelo knows not: for he this very day receives letters of strange tenor; perchance, of the duke's death; perchance, entering into some monastery: but, by chance, nothing of what is writ. Look, the unfolding star calls up the shepherd; Put not yourself into amazement, how these things should be: all difficulties are but easy when they are known. Call your executioner, and off with Barnardine's head: I will give him a present shrift, and advise him for a better place. Yet you are amazed; but this shall absolutely resolve you. Come away; it is almost clear dawn. [Exeunt. SCENE III.-Another Room in the same. Enter CLOWN.

Clo. I am as well acquainted here, as I was in our house of profession: one would think, it were mistress Over-done's own house, for here be many of her old customers. First, here's young master Rash; he's in for a commodity of brown paper and old ginger, ninescore and seventeen pounds; of which he made five marks ready money: marry, then, ginger was not much in request, for the old women were all dead. Then is there here one master Caper, at the suit of master Three-pile the mercer, for some four suits of peach-colour'd satia, which now peaches him a beggar. Then have we bere young Dizy, and young master Deep-vow, and master Copper-spur, and master Starvelackey the rapier and dagger-man, and young Drop-heir that kill'd lusty Pudding, and master Forthright the tilter, and brave master Shoe-tie the great traveller, and wild Half can that stabb'd Pots, and, I think, forty more; all great doers in our trade, and are now for the Lord's sake.

Abhor. What, ho, Barnardine!
Barnar. [Within.] A pox o' your threats!
Who makes that noise there? What are you?

Clo. Your friends, Sir; the hangman: You must be so good, Sir, to rise and be put to death.

Barnar. [Within.] Away, you rogue, away; I am sleepy.

Abhor. Tell him, he must awake, and that quickly too.

Clo. Pray, master Barnardine, awake till you are executed, and sleep afterwards.

Abhor. Go in to him, and fetch him out. Clo. He is coming, Sir, he is coming; I hear his straw rustle.

Enter BARNARDINE.

Abhor. Is the axe upon the block, sirrah ?
Clo. Very ready, Sir.

Barnar. How now, Abhorson? what's the news with you?

Abhor. Truly, Sir, I would desire you to clap into your prayers; for, look you, the warrant's

come.

Barnar. You rogue, I have been drinking all night, I am not fitted for't.

Clo. Oh! the better, Sir; for he that drinks all night, and is hang'd betimes in the morning, may sleep the sounder all the next day.

Duke. Sir, induced by my charity, and bearing how hastily you are to depart, I am come t advise you, comfort you, and pray with you.

Barnar. Friar, not I; I have been dr king hard all night, and I will have more trae t prepare me, or they shal! beat out my brass with billets: I will not consent to die this day, that's certain.

Duke. O Sir, you must: and therefore, I beseech you,

Look forward on the journey you shall go. Barnar. I swear I will not die to-day for any man's persuasion.

Duke. But hear you,-

Barnar. Not a word; if you have any ther to say to me, come to my ward; for thence wi not I to-day. (East.

Enter DUKE.

Abhor. Look yon, Sir, here comes your ghostly father; Do we jest now, think you?

Enter PROVOST.

Duke. Unfit to live or die: O gravel heat (→
After him, fellows; bring him to the block.
[Exeunt ABHORSON and CLOWY
Prov. Now, Sir, how do you find the po

Enter ABHORSON.

Abhor. Sirrah, bring Barnardine hither.

Clo. Master Barnardine! you must rise and The sun hath made his journal greeting to
be hang'd, master Barnardine!
The under generation, you shall find
Your safety manifested.

Prov. I am your free dependant.
Duke. Quick, despatch,
And send the head to Augelo. [Exit PROVOST.
Now will I write letters to Angelo,-
The provost, he shall bear them, whose can-

soner ?

Duke. A creature unprepar'd, unmeet ke death:

And, to transport him in the mind be is,
Were damnable.

Prov. Here in the prison, father,
There died this morning of a cruel fever
One Ragozine, a most notorious pirate,
A man of Claudio's years; his beard and brad,
Just of his colour: What if we do omit
This reprobate, till he were well inclia'd;
And satisfy the deputy with the visage
Of Ragozine, more like to Claudio?

Duke. Oh! 'tis an accident that heaven pro-
vides ;

Despatch it presently; the hour draws on
Prefix'd by Angelo: See this be done,
And sent according to command; while I
Persuade this rude wretch willingly to die.
Prov. This shail be done, good father, pre-
sently.

But Barnardine must die this afternoon:
And how shall we continue Claudio,

To save him from the danger that might come,
If he were known alive?

Duke. Let this be done;-Put them in seITHĖ Both Barnardine and Claudio; Ere twice

it,

tents
Shall witness to him, I am near at home;
And that, by great injunctions, I am bound
To enter publicly: him, I'll desire
To meet me at the consecrated fount,
A league below the city; and from thence,
By cold gradation and weal-balanced form,
We shall proceed with Angelo.

Re-enter PROVOST.

Prov. Here is the head; I'll carry it myself. Duke. Convenient is it: Make a swift retura; For I would commune with you of such things, That want no ear but yours.

Prov. I'll make all speed.

[Erd. Isab. [Within.] Peace, bo, be here! Duke. The tongue of Isabel :-She's come to know,

If yet her brother's pardon be come hither:
But I will keep ber ignorant of her good,
To make her heavenly comforts of despair,
When it is least expected.

Enter ISABELLA.
Isab. Ho, by your leave.

• The antipodea.

Duke. Good morning to you, fair and gra-
cious daughter.

Isab. The better given me by so holy a man.
Fra Hath yet the deputy sent my brother's pardon?
Duke. He hath releas'd him, Isabel, from the
world;

His head is off, and sent to Angelo.

Isab. Nay, but it is not so.
Duke. It is no other;
Show your wisdom,
patience.

daughter, in your close

Isab. Oh! I will to him, and pluck out his

In that good path that I would wish it go;
And you shall have your bosom on this wretch,
Grace of the duke, revenges to your heart,
And general honour.

Isab. I am directed by you.

eyes.

Duke. You shall not be admitted to his sight.
Isab. Unhappy Claudio! Wretched Isabel!
Injurious world! Most damned Angelo !

Duke. This nor hurts him, nor profits you a
jot :
Forbear it therefore; give your cause to heaven.
Mark what I say; which you shall find
By every syllable, a faithful verity:

Escul. He shows his reason for that: to have

The duke coines home to-morrow ;-nay, dry a despatch of complaints; and to deliver us from
devices hereafter, which shall then have no power
your eyes;
to stand against us.
One of our convent, and his confessor,

Gives me this instance: Already he hath carried
Notice to Escalus and Angelo;
Who do prepare to meet him at the gates,
There to give up their power. If you can, pace

your wisdom

Duke. This letter then to friar Peter give;
'Tis that he sent me of the duke's return:
Say, by this token, I desire his company
Her cause, and
At Mariana's house to night.

Lucio. By my troth, I'll go with thee to the lane's end: If bawdy talk offend you, we'll have very little of it: Nay, friar, I am a kind of burr, [Exeunt. I shall stick. SCENE IV.-A Room in ANGELO's House. Enter ANGELO and ESCALUS.

yours,
1' perfect him withal; and he shall bring you
Before the duke; and to the head of Angelo
Accuse him home, and home. For my poor self,
I am combined by a sacred vow,

And shall be absent. Wend you with this

letter:

Command these fretting waters from your eyes
With a light heart; trust not mine holy order,
If I pervert your course.-Who's here?

Enter LUCIO.

Escal. Every letter he hath writ bath disvouch'd⚫ other.

Ang. In most uneven and distracted manner. His actions show much like to madness: pray heaven, bis wisdom be not tainted! And why meet him at the gates, and re-deliver our authorities there?

Lucio. Good even!

Friar, where is the provost ?

Duke. Not within, Sir.

Lucio. O pretty Isabella, I am pale at mine
heart, to see thine eyes so red: thou must be
patient; I am fain to dine and sup with water
and bran; I dare not for my head till my belly;
one fruitful meal would set me to't: But they say
By my troth,
the duke will be here to-morrow.
Isabel, I lov'd thy brother: if the old fantastical
duke of dark coruers had been at home, he had
(Erit ISABELLA.
lived.
Duke. Sir, the duke is marvellous little be-
holden to your reports; but the best is, he lives
not in them.

Lucio. Friar, thou knowest not the duke so
well as I do: he's a better woodman than thou
takest him for.

Escal. I guess not.

Ang. And why should we proclaim it in an hour before bis entering, that if any crave redress of injustice, they should exbibit their petitions in the street?

Your heart's desire.

Ang. Well, I beseech you, let it be proclaim'd :
Betimes i'the morn, I'll call you at your house:
Give notice to such men of sort and suit, †
As are to meet him.

[Exit.

Escal. I shall, Sir, fare you well.
Ang. Good night.-

This deed unshapes me quite, makes me unpreg

Duke. Well, you'll answer this one day. Fare ye well.

† Go

nant,

And dull to all proceedings. A deflower'd maid!
And by an eminent body, that enforc'd

The law against it!-But that her tender shame
Will not proclaim against her maiden loss,
How might she tongue me? Yet reason dares t
her?-no;

For my authority bears a credent§ bulk,
That no particular scandal once can touch,

But it confounds the breather. He should have

liv'd,

Save that his riotous youth, with dangerous

Lucio. Nay, tarry; I'll go along with thee; I can tell thee pretty tales of the duke.

Duke. You have told me too many of him already, Sir, if they be true; if not true, none were enough.

sense,

Might, in the times to come, have ta'en revenge
By so receiving a dishonour'd life,

With ransom of such shame. 'Would yet he had
liv'd!

not.

Alack, when once our grace we have forgot,
Nothing goes right; we would, aud we would
[Exit.
SCENE V.-Fields without the Town.
Enter DUKE in his own habit, and Friar
PETER.
Duke. These letters at fit time deliver me.
[Giving letters.
The provost knows our purpose, and our plot.
The matter being afoot, keep your instruction,
And hold you ever to our special drift;
Though sometimes you do blench¶ from this to

Lucio. I was once before him for getting a wench with child.

Duke. Did you such a thing?

Lucio. Yes, marry, did I but was fain to forswear it: they would else have married me to the rotten medlar.

Duke. Sir, your company is fairer than honest;
Rest you well.

you.

Ang. and Escal. Happy return be to
royal grace!
Duke. Many and hearty thankings to
both.

We have made inquiry of you; and we hear
Such goodness of your justice, that our soul
Cannot but yield you forth to public thanks,
Forerunning more requital.

Ang. You make my bonds still greater.

your

you

regard
Upon a wrong'd, I'd fain have said, a maid!
O worthy prince, dishonour not your eye
By throwing it on any other object,
Till you have heard me in my true complaint
And give me justice, justice, justice, justice !
Duke. Relate your wrongs: In
what? By

whom? Be brief:

• Availful.

Ang. And she will speak most bitterly, and
strange.

Isab. Most strange, but yet most truly, wil
I speak :

That Angelo's forsworn; is it not strange?
That Angelo's a murderer; is't not strange ?
That Angelo is an adulterous thief,
Au hypocrite, a virgin violator;
Is it not strange, and strange ?

+ Most noble.
§ Lower.

Duke. Many that are not mad,

Have, sure, more lack of reason.-What woul

you say?

Isab. I am the sister of one Claudio.
Condemn'd upon the act of fornication

Duke. Oh! your desert speaks loud; and I To lose his head condemn'd by Angelo:
should wrong it,
I, in probation of a sisterhood,

Was sent to by my brother: One Lucio
As then the messenger;—

Lucio. That's I, an't like your grace:

To lock it in the wards of covert bosom,
When it deserves with characters of brass
A forted residence, 'gainst the tooth of time,
And razure of oblivion: Give me your hand,
And let the subjects see, to make them know
That outward courtesies would fain proclaim
Favours that keep within.-Come, Escalns ;
You must walk by us on our other hand ;-
And good supporters are you,

I come to her from Claudio, and desir'd her
To try her gracious fortune with lord Angem,
For her poor brother's pardon.

Isab. That's he, indeed.

Duke. You were not bid to speak.

Lucio. No, my good lord;

PETER and ISABELLA come forward. F. Peter. Now is your time; speak loud, and kneel before him.

Isab. Justice, O royal duke! Vail

your

Here is lord Angelo shall give you justice;
Reveal yourself to him.

Isab. O worthy duke,

You bid me seek redemption of the devil :
Hear me yourself; for that which I must speak
Must either punish me, not being believ'd,
Or wring redress from you hear me, O bear
me, here.

Ang. My lord, her wits, I fear me, are not

firm :
She hath been a suitor to me for her brother,
Cut off by course of justice.
Isab. By course of justice!

Duke. Nay, ten times strange.
Isab. It is not truer he is Angelo,
Than this is all as true as it is strange :
Nay, it is ten times true; for truth is truth
To the end of reckoning.

Duke. Away with her :-Poor soul.
She speaks this in the infirmity of seese.
Isab. O prince, I conjure thee, as then be
liev'st

z Seized.

There is another comfort than this world,
That thou neglect me not, with that opinion
That I am toucb'd with madness: make t
impossible

That which but seems unlike: 'tis not impossi-
ble,

But one, the wicked'st caitiff on the ground.
May seem as shy, as grave, as just, as abestute,
As Angelo; even so may Angelo,
In all his dressings, characts, titles, forms,
Be an arch-villain: believe it, roval primer,
If he be less, he's nothing; bat be's more,
Had I more name for badness.

Duke. By mine honesty,

If she be mad, (as I believe no other,)
Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense,
Such a dependency of thing on thing,
As e'er I heard in madness.

Isab. O gracious duke,

Harp not on that; nor do not banish reason
For inequality: but let your reason serve
To make the truth appear, where it seems brid;
And hide the false, seems true.

Nor wish'd to hold my peace.

Duke. I wish you now then;

Pray you, take note of it: and when you have
A business for yourself, pray heaven, you then
Be perfect.

Lucio. I warrant your honour.

Duke. The warrant's for yourself; take heed to it.

Isab. This gentleman told somewhat of my tale.