ACT V, SCENE II. Padua. LUCENTIO'S house.
[Enter BAPTISTA, VINCENTIO, GREMIO, the Pedant, LUCENTIO, BIANCA,
PETRUCHIO, KATHARINA, HORTENSIO, and Widow, TRANIO, BIONDELLO,
and GRUMIO the Serving-men with Tranio bringing in a banquet]
LUCENTIO:
- At last, though long, our jarring notes agree:
- And time it is, when raging war is done,
- To smile at scapes and perils overblown.
- My fair Bianca, bid my father welcome,
- While I with self-same kindness welcome thine.
- Brother Petruchio, sister Katharina,
- And thou, Hortensio, with thy loving widow,
- Feast with the best, and welcome to my house:
- My banquet is to close our stomachs up,
- After our great good cheer. Pray you, sit down;
- For now we sit to chat as well as eat.
PETRUCHIO:
- Nothing but sit and sit, and eat and eat!
BAPTISTA:
- Padua affords this kindness, son Petruchio.
PETRUCHIO:
- Padua affords nothing but what is kind.
HORTENSIO:
- For both our sakes, I would that word were true.
PETRUCHIO:
- Now, for my life, Hortensio fears his widow.
Widow:
- Then never trust me, if I be afeard.
PETRUCHIO:
- You are very sensible, and yet you miss my sense:
- I mean, Hortensio is afeard of you.
Widow:
- He that is giddy thinks the world turns round.
PETRUCHIO:
- Roundly replied.
KATHARINA:
- Mistress, how mean you that?
Widow:
- Thus I conceive by him.
PETRUCHIO:
- Conceives by me! How likes Hortensio that?
HORTENSIO:
- My widow says, thus she conceives her tale.
PETRUCHIO:
- Very well mended. Kiss him for that, good widow.
KATHARINA:
- 'He that is giddy thinks the world turns round:'
- I pray you, tell me what you meant by that.
Widow:
- Your husband, being troubled with a shrew,
- Measures my husband's sorrow by his woe:
- And now you know my meaning,
KATHARINA:
- A very mean meaning.
Widow:
- Right, I mean you.
KATHARINA:
- And I am mean indeed, respecting you.
HORTENSIO:
- To her, widow!
PETRUCHIO:
- A hundred marks, my Kate does put her down.
HORTENSIO:
- That's my office.
PETRUCHIO:
- Spoke like an officer; ha' to thee, lad!
-
[Drinks to HORTENSIO]
BAPTISTA:
- How likes Gremio these quick-witted folks?
GREMIO:
- Believe me, sir, they butt together well.
BIANCA:
- Head, and butt! an hasty-witted body
- Would say your head and butt were head and horn.
VINCENTIO:
- Ay, mistress bride, hath that awaken'd you?
BIANCA:
- Ay, but not frighted me; therefore I'll sleep again.
PETRUCHIO:
- Nay, that you shall not: since you have begun,
- Have at you for a bitter jest or two!
PETRUCHIO:
- She hath prevented me. Here, Signior Tranio.
- This bird you aim'd at, though you hit her not;
- Therefore a health to all that shot and miss'd.
TRANIO:
- O, sir, Lucentio slipp'd me like his greyhound,
- Which runs himself and catches for his master.
PETRUCHIO:
- A good swift simile, but something currish.
TRANIO:
- 'Tis well, sir, that you hunted for yourself:
- 'Tis thought your deer does hold you at a bay.
BAPTISTA:
- O ho, Petruchio! Tranio hits you now.
LUCENTIO:
- I thank thee for that gird, good Tranio.
HORTENSIO:
- Confess, confess, hath he not hit you here?
PETRUCHIO:
- A' has a little gall'd me, I confess;
- And, as the jest did glance away from me,
- 'Tis ten to one it maim'd you two outright.
BAPTISTA:
- Now, in good sadness, son Petruchio,
- I think thou hast the veriest shrew of all.
PETRUCHIO:
- Well, I say no: and therefore for assurance
- Let's each one send unto his wife;
- And he whose wife is most obedient
- To come at first when he doth send for her,
- Shall win the wager which we will propose.
HORTENSIO:
- Content. What is the wager?
PETRUCHIO:
- Twenty crowns!
- I'll venture so much of my hawk or hound,
- But twenty times so much upon my wife.
LUCENTIO:
- A hundred then.
PETRUCHIO:
- A match! 'tis done.
HORTENSIO:
- Who shall begin?
LUCENTIO:
- That will I.
- Go, Biondello, bid your mistress come to me.
BAPTISTA:
- Son, I'll be your half, Bianca comes.
LUCENTIO:
- I'll have no halves; I'll bear it all myself.
-
[Re-enter BIONDELLO]
- How now! what news?
BIONDELLO:
- Sir, my mistress sends you word
- That she is busy and she cannot come.
PETRUCHIO:
- How! she is busy and she cannot come!
- Is that an answer?
GREMIO:
- Ay, and a kind one too:
- Pray God, sir, your wife send you not a worse.
PETRUCHIO:
- I hope better.
HORTENSIO:
- Sirrah Biondello, go and entreat my wife
- To come to me forthwith.
-
[Exit BIONDELLO]
PETRUCHIO:
- O, ho! entreat her!
- Nay, then she must needs come.
HORTENSIO:
- I am afraid, sir,
- Do what you can, yours will not be entreated.
-
[Re-enter BIONDELLO]
- Now, where's my wife?
BIONDELLO:
- She says you have some goodly jest in hand:
- She will not come: she bids you come to her.
PETRUCHIO:
- Worse and worse; she will not come! O vile,
- Intolerable, not to be endured!
- Sirrah Grumio, go to your mistress;
- Say, I command her to come to me.
-
[Exit GRUMIO]
HORTENSIO:
- I know her answer.
PETRUCHIO:
- The fouler fortune mine, and there an end.
BAPTISTA:
- Now, by my holidame, here comes Katharina!
-
[Re-enter KATARINA]
KATHARINA:
- What is your will, sir, that you send for me?
PETRUCHIO:
- Where is your sister, and Hortensio's wife?
KATHARINA:
- They sit conferring by the parlor fire.
PETRUCHIO:
- Go fetch them hither: if they deny to come.
- Swinge me them soundly forth unto their husbands:
- Away, I say, and bring them hither straight.
-
[Exit KATHARINA]
LUCENTIO:
- Here is a wonder, if you talk of a wonder.
HORTENSIO:
- And so it is: I wonder what it bodes.
PETRUCHIO:
- Marry, peace it bodes, and love and quiet life,
- And awful rule and right supremacy;
- And, to be short, what not, that's sweet and happy?
BAPTISTA:
- Now, fair befal thee, good Petruchio!
- The wager thou hast won; and I will add
- Unto their losses twenty thousand crowns;
- Another dowry to another daughter,
- For she is changed, as she had never been.
Widow:
- Lord, let me never have a cause to sigh,
- Till I be brought to such a silly pass!
BIANCA:
- Fie! what a foolish duty call you this?
LUCENTIO:
- I would your duty were as foolish too:
- The wisdom of your duty, fair Bianca,
- Hath cost me an hundred crowns since supper-time.
BIANCA:
- The more fool you, for laying on my duty.
PETRUCHIO:
- Katharina, I charge thee, tell these headstrong women
- What duty they do owe their lords and husbands.
Widow:
- Come, come, you're mocking: we will have no telling.
PETRUCHIO:
- Come on, I say; and first begin with her.
PETRUCHIO:
- I say she shall: and first begin with her.
KATHARINA:
- Fie, fie! unknit that threatening unkind brow,
- And dart not scornful glances from those eyes,
- To wound thy lord, thy king, thy governor:
- It blots thy beauty as frosts do bite the meads,
- Confounds thy fame as whirlwinds shake fair buds,
- And in no sense is meet or amiable.
- A woman moved is like a fountain troubled,
- Muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty;
- And while it is so, none so dry or thirsty
- Will deign to sip or touch one drop of it.
- Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper,
- Thy head, thy sovereign; one that cares for thee,
- And for thy maintenance commits his body
- To painful labour both by sea and land,
- To watch the night in storms, the day in cold,
- Whilst thou liest warm at home, secure and safe;
- And craves no other tribute at thy hands
- But love, fair looks and true obedience;
- Too little payment for so great a debt.
- Such duty as the subject owes the prince
- Even such a woman oweth to her husband;
- And when she is froward, peevish, sullen, sour,
- And not obedient to his honest will,
- What is she but a foul contending rebel
- And graceless traitor to her loving lord?
- I am ashamed that women are so simple
- To offer war where they should kneel for peace;
- Or seek for rule, supremacy and sway,
- When they are bound to serve, love and obey.
- Why are our bodies soft and weak and smooth,
- Unapt to toil and trouble in the world,
- But that our soft conditions and our hearts
- Should well agree with our external parts?
- Come, come, you froward and unable worms!
- My mind hath been as big as one of yours,
- My heart as great, my reason haply more,
- To bandy word for word and frown for frown;
- But now I see our lances are but straws,
- Our strength as weak, our weakness past compare,
- That seeming to be most which we indeed least are.
- Then vail your stomachs, for it is no boot,
- And place your hands below your husband's foot:
- In token of which duty, if he please,
- My hand is ready; may it do him ease.
PETRUCHIO:
- Why, there's a wench! Come on, and kiss me, Kate.
LUCENTIO:
- Well, go thy ways, old lad; for thou shalt ha't.
VINCENTIO:
- 'Tis a good hearing when children are toward.
LUCENTIO:
- But a harsh hearing when women are froward.
HORTENSIO:
- Now, go thy ways; thou hast tamed a curst shrew.
LUCENTIO:
- 'Tis a wonder, by your leave, she will be tamed so.
-
[Exeunt]