I will determine this before I stir.
Enter a MESSENGER
MESSENGER. O mistress, mistress, shift and save yourself!
My master and his man are both broke loose,
Beaten the maids a-row and bound the doctor,
Whose beard they have sing'd off with brands of fire;
And ever, as it blaz'd, they threw on him
Great pails of puddled mire to quench the hair.
My master preaches patience to him, and the while
His man with scissors nicks him like a fool;
And sure, unless you send some present help,
Between them they will kill the conjurer.
ADRIANA. Peace, fool! thy master and his man are here,
And that is false thou dost report to us.
MESSENGER. Mistress, upon my life, I tell you true;
I have not breath'd almost since I did see it.
He cries for you, and vows, if he can take you,
To scorch your face, and to disfigure you.
[Cry within]
Hark, hark, I hear him, mistress; fly, be gone!
DUKE. Come, stand by me; fear nothing. Guard with halberds.
ADRIANA. Ay me, it is my husband! Witness you
That he is borne about invisible.
Even now we hous'd him in the abbey here,
And now he's there, past thought of human reason.
Enter ANTIPHOLUS OFEPHESUS and DROMIO OFEPHESUS
ANTIPHOLUS OFEPHESUS. Justice, most gracious Duke; O, grant me
justice!
Even for the service that long since I did thee,
When I bestrid thee in the wars, and took
Deep scars to save thy life; even for the blood
That then I lost for thee, now grant me justice.
AEGEON. Unless the fear of death doth make me dote,
I see my son Antipholus, and Dromio.
ANTIPHOLUS OFEPHESUS. Justice, sweet Prince, against that woman
there!
She whom thou gav'st to me to be my wife,
That hath abused and dishonoured me
Even in the strength and height of injury.
Beyond imagination is the wrong
That she this day hath shameless thrown on me.
DUKE. Discover how, and thou shalt find me just.
ANTIPHOLUS OFEPHESUS. This day, great Duke, she shut the doors
upon me,
While she with harlots feasted in my house.
DUKE. A grievous fault. Say, woman, didst thou so?
ADRIANA. No, my good lord. Myself, he, and my sister,
To-day did dine together. So befall my soul
As this is false he burdens me withal!
LUCIANA. Ne'er may I look on day nor sleep on night
But she tells to your Highness simple truth!
ANGELO. O pejur'd woman! They are both forsworn.
In this the madman justly chargeth them.
ANTIPHOLUS OF EPHESUS. 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 Porpentine,
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.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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