ACT 4
Scene 2

...within. Sola, sola!
Enter Dull the Constable, Holofernes the Pedant, and Nathaniel the Curate.

...a good conscience.
The deer was, as you know, sanguis, in
blood, ripe as the pomewater, who now hangeth
like a jewel in the ear of caelo, the sky, the welkin,
the heaven, and anon falleth like a crab on the face
of terra, the soil, the land, the earth.

...the first head.
Sir Nathaniel, haud credo.

...’twas a pricket.
Most barbarous intimation! Yet a kind of
insinuation, as it were, in via, in way, of explication;
facere, as it were, replication, or rather, ostentare, to
show, as it were, his inclination, after his undressed,
unpolished, uneducated, unpruned, untrained, or
rather unlettered, or ratherest, unconfirmed fashion,
to insert again my haud credo for a deer.

...’twas a pricket.
Twice-sod simplicity, bis coctus!
O thou monster ignorance, how deformed dost thou look!

...old as yet?
Dictynna, goodman Dull, Dictynna,
goodman Dull.

...to the moon.
The moon was a month old when Adam was no more.
And raught not to five weeks when he came to fivescore.
Th’ allusion holds in the exchange.

...in the exchange.
God comfort thy capacity! I say, th’ allusion
holds in the exchange.

...the Princess killed.
Sir Nathaniel, will you hear an extemporal
epitaph on the death of the deer? And, to humor
the ignorant, call I the deer the Princess killed a
pricket.

...to abrogate scurrility.
I will something affect the letter, for it
argues facility.

The preyful princess pierced and pricked
a pretty pleasing pricket,

Some say a sore, but not a sore till now made
sore with shooting.

The dogs did yell. Put “l” to “sore,” then sorel
jumps from thicket,

Or pricket sore, or else sorel. The people fall
a-hooting.
If sore be sore, then “L” to “sore” makes fifty sores o’ sorel.
Of one sore I an hundred make by adding but one more “L.”

...with a talent.
This is a gift that I have, simple, simple—
a foolish extravagant spirit, full of forms,
figures, shapes, objects, ideas, apprehensions, motions,
revolutions. These are begot in the ventricle
of memory, nourished in the womb of pia mater,
and delivered upon the mellowing of occasion. But
the gift is good in those in whom it is acute, and I
am thankful for it.

...of the commonwealth.
Mehercle, if their sons be ingenious,
they shall want no instruction; if their daughters be
capable, I will put it to them. But Vir sapis qui pauca
loquitur. A soul feminine saluteth us.

...morrow, Master Person.
Master Person, quasi pierce one. And
if one should be pierced, which is the one?

...to a hogshead.
Of piercing a hogshead! A good luster
of conceit in a turf of earth; fire enough for a flint,
pearl enough for a swine. ’Tis pretty, it is well.

...he looks at.
Facile precor gelida quando peccas omnia sub umbra.
Ruminat—
and so forth. Ah, good old Mantuan! I may speak of
thee as the traveler doth of Venice:
Venetia, Venetia,
Chi non ti vede, non ti pretia.
Old Mantuan, old Mantuan! Who understandeth
thee not, loves thee not. (He sings.)
Ut, re, sol, la,
mi, fa. (To Nathaniel.)
Under pardon, sir, what are
the contents? Or rather, as Horace says in his—
(Looking at the letter.)
What, my soul, verses?

...and very learned.
Let me hear a staff, a stanza, a verse,
Lege, domine.

...an earthly tongue.
You find not the apostrophus, and so
miss the accent. Let me supervise the canzonet.
He takes the paper.
Here are only numbers ratified,
but, for the elegancy, facility, and golden cadence of
poesy—caret. Ovidius Naso was the man. And why
indeed “Naso,” but for smelling out the odoriferous
flowers of fancy, the jerks of invention? Imitari is
nothing: so doth the hound his master, the ape his
keeper, the tired horse his rider.—But damosella
virgin, was this directed to you?

...strange queen’s lords.
I will overglance the superscript: “To
the snow-white hand of the most beauteous Lady
Rosaline.” I will look again on the intellect of the
letter for the nomination of the party writing to
the person written unto: “Your Ladyship’s in all
desired employment, Berowne.” Sir Nathaniel, this
Berowne is one of the votaries with the King, and
here he hath framed a letter to a sequent of the
stranger queen’s: which accidentally, or by the way
of progression, hath miscarried. To Jaquenetta.
Trip and go, my sweet. Deliver this paper into the
royal hand of the King. It may concern much. Stay
not thy compliment. I forgive thy duty. Adieu.

...certain Father saith—
Sir, tell not me of the Father. I do fear
colorable colors. But to return to the verses: did
they please you, Sir Nathaniel?

...for the pen.
I do dine today at the father’s of a certain
pupil of mine, where if, before repast, it shall
please you to gratify the table with a grace, I will,
on my privilege I have with the parents of the
foresaid child or pupil, undertake your ben venuto;
where I will prove those verses to be very unlearned,
neither savoring of poetry, wit, nor invention.
I beseech your society.

...happiness of life.
And certes the text most infallibly concludes
it. To Dull.
Sir, I do invite you too. You shall
not say me nay. Pauca verba. Away! The gentles are
at their game, and we will to our recreation.
They exit.

ACT 5
Scene 1

...no better treasure.
Enter Holofernes the Pedant, Nathaniel the Curate, and Dull the Constable.
Satis quid sufficit.

...Adriano de Armado.
Novi hominem tanquam te. His humor
is lofty, his discourse peremptory, his tongue filed,
his eye ambitious, his gait majestical, and his general
behavior vain, ridiculous, and thrasonical. He is
too picked, too spruce, too affected, too odd, as it
were, too peregrinate, as I may call it.

...his table book.
He draweth out the thread of his verbosity
finer than the staple of his argument. I abhor
such fanatical phantasimes, such insociable and
point-devise companions, such rackers of orthography,
as to speak “dout,” fine, when he should
say “doubt”; “det” when he should pronounce
“debt”—d, e, b, t, not d, e, t. He clepeth a calf
“cauf,” half “hauf,” neighbor vocatur “nebor”;
neigh abbreviated ne. This is abhominable—which
he would call “abominable.” It insinuateth me of
insanie. Ne intelligis, domine? To make frantic,
lunatic.

...Deo, bone intelligo.
Bone? Bone for bene? Priscian a little
scratched; ’twill serve.

...Videsne quis venit?
Video, et gaudeo.

... Chirrah.
Quare “chirrah,” not “sirrah”?

...peace, well encountered.
Most military sir, salutation.

...on his head?
Ba, pueritia, with a horn added.

...hear his learning.
Quis, quis, thou consonant?

...fifth, if I.
I will repeat them: a, e, i—

...man—which is wit-old.
What is the figure? What is the figure?

... Horns.
Thou disputes like an infant. Go whip thy
gig.

...as they say.
Oh, I smell false Latin! Dunghill for
unguem.

...of the mountain?
Or mons, the hill.

...for the mountain.
I do, sans question.

...call the afternoon.
“The posterior of the day,” most generous
sir, is liable, congruent, and measurable for
“the afternoon”; the word is well culled, chose,
sweet, and apt, I do assure you, sir, I do assure.

...crave your assistance.
Sir, you shall present before her the Nine
Worthies.—Sir Nathaniel, as concerning some
entertainment of time, some show in the posterior
of this day, to be rendered by our assistance, the
King’s command, and this most gallant, illustrate,
and learned gentleman, before the Princess—I say,
none so fit as to present the Nine Worthies.

...to present them?
Joshua, yourself; myself; and this gallant
gentleman, Judas Maccabaeus. This swain, because
of his great limb or joint, shall pass Pompey
the Great; the page, Hercules—

...of his club!
Shall I have audience? He shall present
Hercules in minority. His enter and exit shall be
strangling a snake; and I will have an apology for
that purpose.

...of the Worthies?
I will play three myself.

...you a thing?
We attend.

...beseech you, follow.
Via, goodman Dull. Thou hast spoken no
word all this while.

...none neither, sir.
Allons! We will employ thee.

...dance the hay.
Most dull, honest Dull. To our sport!
Away.
They exit.

Scene 2

...some other sort.
Enter Pedant Holofernes for Judas, and the Boy for Hercules.

...aside, good Pompey.

Great Hercules is presented by this imp,

Whose club killed Cerberus, that three-headed canus,

And when he was a babe, a child, a shrimp,

Thus did he strangle serpents in his manus.

Quoniam he seemeth in minority,

Ergo I come with this apology.
To Boy.
Keep some state in thy exit, and vanish.

...Boy steps aside.
Judas I am—

... A Judas!
Not Iscariot, sir.
Judas I am, yclept Maccabaeus.

...thou proved Judas?
Judas I am—

...for you, Judas.
What mean you, sir?

...Judas hang himself.
Begin, sir, you are my elder.

...on an elder.
I will not be put out of countenance.

...hast no face.
What is this?
He points to his own face.

...thee in countenance.
You have put me out of countenance.

...given thee faces.
But you have outfaced them all.

...him.—Jud-as, away!
This is not generous, not gentle, not humble.

...may stumble.
Holofernes exits.

...so. Holla! Approach.
Enter all.

...we this way.
They all exit.