The arden shakespeare co.., p.358
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works, page 358
For the most gentle Claudio.
Enter DUKE, disguised.
Welcome, father.
DUKE The best and wholesom’st spirits of the night
Envelop you, good Provost! Who call’d here of late?
PROVOST None since the curfew rung.
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DUKE Not Isabel?
PROVOST No.
DUKE They will then, ere’t be long.
PROVOST What comfort is for Claudio?
DUKE There’s some in hope.
PROVOST It is a bitter deputy.
DUKE Not so, not so; his life is parallel’d
Even with the stroke and line of his great justice.
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He doth with holy abstinence subdue
That in himself which he spurs on his power
To qualify in others: were he meal’d with that
Which he corrects, then were he tyrannous;
But this being so, he’s just.
[Knocking within. Provost goes to the door.]
– Now are they come.
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This is a gentle provost; seldom when
The steeled gaoler is the friend of men. [knocking]
How now? What noise? That spirit’s possess’d with haste
That wounds th’unsisting postern with these strokes.
[Provost returns.]
PROVOST There must he stay until the officer
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Arise to let him in. He is call’d up.
DUKE Have you no countermand for Claudio yet,
But he must die tomorrow?
PROVOST None, sir, none.
DUKE As near the dawning, Provost, as it is,
You shall hear more ere morning.
PROVOST Happily
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You something know: yet I believe there comes
No countermand. No such example have we.
Besides, upon the very siege of justice
Lord Angelo hath to the public ear
Profess’d the contrary.
Enter a Messenger.
This is his lordship’s man.
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DUKE And here comes Claudio’s pardon.
MESSENGER My lord hath sent you this note, and by me
this further charge: that you swerve not from the
smallest article of it, neither in time, matter, or other
circumstance. Good-morrow; for, as I take it, it is
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almost day.
PROVOST I shall obey him. Exit Messenger.
DUKE [aside] This is his pardon, purchas’d by such sin
For which the pardoner himself is in.
Hence hath offence his quick celerity,
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When it is borne in high authority.
When vice makes mercy, mercy’s so extended
That for the fault’s love is th’offender friended.
Now, sir, what news?
PROVOST I told you: Lord Angelo, belike thinking me
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remiss in mine office, awakens me with this unwonted
putting-on; methinks strangely, for he hath not used it
before.
DUKE Pray you, let’s hear.
PROVOST [Reads.] Whatsoever you may hear to the
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contrary, let Claudio be executed by four of the clock, and
in the afternoon, 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,
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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
th’afternoon?
PROVOST A Bohemian born, but here nursed up and
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bred; one that is a prisoner nine years old.
DUKE How came it that the absent Duke had not either
delivered him to his liberty, or executed him? I have
heard it was ever his manner to do so.
PROVOST His friends still wrought reprieves for him;
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and indeed, his fact till now in the government of
Lord Angelo came not to an undoubtful proof.
DUKE It is now apparent?
PROVOST Most manifest, and not denied by himself.
DUKE Hath he borne himself penitently in prison? How
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seems he to be touched?
PROVOST 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.
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DUKE He wants advice.
PROVOST 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 oft awaked him, as
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if to carry him to execution, and showed 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
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my cunning, I will lay myself in hazard. Claudio,
whom here you have 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
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are to do me both a present and a dangerous courtesy.
PROVOST Pray sir, in what?
DUKE In the delaying death.
PROVOST Alack, how may I do it? Having the hour
limited, and an express command under penalty to
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deliver his head in the view of Angelo? I may make my
case as Claudio’s to cross this in the smallest.
DUKE By the vow of mine order, I warrant you, if my
instructions may be your guide: let this Barnardine be
this morning executed, and his head borne to Angelo.
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PROVOST Angelo hath seen them both, and will discover
the favour.
DUKE O, death’s a great disguiser; and you may add to
it. Shave the head, and tie the beard, and say it was the
desire of the penitent to be so bared before his death:
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you know the course is common. If anything fall to
you upon this, more than thanks and good fortune, by
the saint whom I profess, I will plead against it with
my life.
PROVOST Pardon me, good father; it is against my oath.
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DUKE Were you sworn to the Duke, or to the Deputy?
PROVOST To him, and to his substitutes.
DUKE You will think you have made no offence if the
Duke avouch the justice of your dealing?
PROVOST But what likelihood is in that?
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DUKE Not a resemblance, but a certainty. Yet, since I
see you fearful, that neither my coat, integrity, nor
persuasion can with ease attempt you, I will go further
than I meant, to pluck all fears out of you. Look you,
sir, here is the hand and seal of the Duke: you know
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the character, I doubt not, and the signet is not strange to you?
PROVOST 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
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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 tenour, perchance of the
Duke’s death, perchance entering into some
monastery; but, by chance, nothing of what is writ.
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Look, th’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
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better place. Yet you are amazed; but this shall
absolutely resolve you. Come away; it is almost clear
dawn. Exeunt.
4.3 Enter POMPEY.
POMPEY I am as well acquainted here as I was in our
house of profession: one would think it were Mistress
Overdone’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, nine
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score 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-
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coloured satin, which now peaches him a beggar.
Then have we here young Dizie, and young Master
Deep-vow, and Master Copperspur, and Master
Starve-Lackey the rapier and dagger man, and young
Drop-heir that killed lusty Pudding, and Master
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Forthright the tilter, and brave Master Shoe-tie the
great traveller, and wild Half-can that stabbed pots,
and I think forty more, all great doers in our trade, and
are now ‘for the Lord’s sake’.
Enter ABHORSON.
ABHORSON Sirrah, bring Barnardine hither.
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POMPEY Master Barnardine! You must rise and be
hanged, Master Barnardine.
ABHORSON What hoa, Barnardine!
BARNARDINE [within] A pox o’ your throats! Who makes
that noise there? What are you?
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POMPEY Your friends, sir, the hangman. You must be so
good, sir, to rise and be put to death.
BARNARDINE [within] Away, you rogue, away; I am
sleepy.
ABHORSON Tell him he must awake, and that quickly
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too.
POMPEY Pray, Master Barnardine, awake till you are
executed, and sleep afterwards.
ABHORSON Go in to him and fetch him out.
POMPEY He is coming, sir, he is coming. I hear his straw
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rustle.
Enter BARNARDINE.
ABHORSON Is the axe upon the block, sirrah?
POMPEY Very ready, sir.
BARNARDINE How now, Abhorson? What’s the news
with you?
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ABHORSON Truly, sir, I would desire you to clap into
your prayers; for look you, the warrant’s come.
BARNARDINE You rogue, I have been drinking all night;
I am not fitted for’t.
POMPEY O, the better, sir; for he that drinks all night,
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and is hanged betimes in the morning, may sleep the
sounder all the next day.
Enter DUKE, disguised.
ABHORSON Look you, sir, here comes your ghostly
father. Do we jest now, think you?
DUKE Sir, induced by my charity, and hearing how
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hastily you are to depart, I am come to advise you,
comfort you, and pray with you.
BARNARDINE Friar, not I. I have been drinking hard all
night, and I will have more time to prepare me, or they
shall beat out my brains with billets. I will not consent
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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.
BARNARDINE I swear I will not die today for any man’s
persuasion.
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DUKE But hear you –
BARNARDINE Not a word. If you have anything to say to
me, come to my ward: for thence will not I today.
Exit.
Enter Provost.
DUKE Unfit to live or die! O gravel heart.
PROVOST After him, fellows, bring him to the block!
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Exeunt Abhorson and Pompey.
Now sir, how do you find the prisoner?
