SCENE II. A bedchamber in the Lord's house. The Taming of the Shrew  Shakespeare homepage  |  Taming of the Shrew  | Induction, Scene 2 

 Previous scene  |  Next scene  SCENE II. A bedchamber in the Lord's house. 

 Enter aloft SLY, with Attendants; some with apparel, others with basin and ewer and appurtenances; and Lord  SLY  For God's sake, a pot of small ale. 

 First Servant  Will't please your lordship drink a cup of sack? 

 Second Servant  Will't please your honour taste of these conserves? 

 Third Servant  What raiment will your honour wear to-day? 

 SLY  I am Christophero Sly; call not me 'honour' nor 

 'lordship:' I ne'er drank sack in my life; and if 

 you give me any conserves, give me conserves of 

 beef: ne'er ask me what raiment I'll wear; for I 

 have no more doublets than backs, no more stockings 

 than legs, nor no more shoes than feet; nay, 

 sometimes more feet than shoes, or such shoes as my 

 toes look through the over-leather. 

 Lord  Heaven cease this idle humour in your honour! 

 O, that a mighty man of such descent, 

 Of such possessions and so high esteem, 

 Should be infused with so foul a spirit! 

 SLY  What, would you make me mad? Am not I Christopher 

 Sly, old Sly's son of Burtonheath, by birth a 

 pedlar, by education a cardmaker, by transmutation a 

 bear-herd, and now by present profession a tinker? 

 Ask Marian Hacket, the fat ale-wife of Wincot, if 

 she know me not: if she say I am not fourteen pence 

 on the score for sheer ale, score me up for the 

 lyingest knave in Christendom. What! I am not 

 bestraught: here's-- 

 Third Servant  O, this it is that makes your lady mourn! 

 Second Servant  O, this is it that makes your servants droop! 

 Lord  Hence comes it that your kindred shuns your house, 

 As beaten hence by your strange lunacy. 

 O noble lord, bethink thee of thy birth, 

 Call home thy ancient thoughts from banishment 

 And banish hence these abject lowly dreams. 

 Look how thy servants do attend on thee, 

 Each in his office ready at thy beck. 

 Wilt thou have music? hark! Apollo plays, 



 Music  And twenty caged nightingales do sing: 

 Or wilt thou sleep? we'll have thee to a couch 

 Softer and sweeter than the lustful bed 

 On purpose trimm'd up for Semiramis. 

 Say thou wilt walk; we will bestrew the ground: 

 Or wilt thou ride? thy horses shall be trapp'd, 

 Their harness studded all with gold and pearl. 

 Dost thou love hawking? thou hast hawks will soar 

 Above the morning lark or wilt thou hunt? 

 Thy hounds shall make the welkin answer them 

 And fetch shrill echoes from the hollow earth. 

 First Servant  Say thou wilt course; thy greyhounds are as swift 

 As breathed stags, ay, fleeter than the roe. 

 Second Servant  Dost thou love pictures? we will fetch thee straight 

 Adonis painted by a running brook, 

 And Cytherea all in sedges hid, 

 Which seem to move and wanton with her breath, 

 Even as the waving sedges play with wind. 

 Lord  We'll show thee Io as she was a maid, 

 And how she was beguiled and surprised, 

 As lively painted as the deed was done. 

 Third Servant  Or Daphne roaming through a thorny wood, 

 Scratching her legs that one shall swear she bleeds, 

 And at that sight shall sad Apollo weep, 

 So workmanly the blood and tears are drawn. 

 Lord  Thou art a lord, and nothing but a lord: 

 Thou hast a lady far more beautiful 

 Than any woman in this waning age. 

 First Servant  And till the tears that she hath shed for thee 

 Like envious floods o'er-run her lovely face, 

 She was the fairest creature in the world; 

 And yet she is inferior to none. 

 SLY  Am I a lord? and have I such a lady? 

 Or do I dream? or have I dream'd till now? 

 I do not sleep: I see, I hear, I speak; 

 I smell sweet savours and I feel soft things: 

 Upon my life, I am a lord indeed 

 And not a tinker nor Christophero Sly. 

 Well, bring our lady hither to our sight; 

 And once again, a pot o' the smallest ale. 

 Second Servant  Will't please your mightiness to wash your hands? 

 O, how we joy to see your wit restored! 

 O, that once more you knew but what you are! 

 These fifteen years you have been in a dream; 

 Or when you waked, so waked as if you slept. 

 SLY  These fifteen years! by my fay, a goodly nap. 

 But did I never speak of all that time? 

 First Servant  O, yes, my lord, but very idle words: 

 For though you lay here in this goodly chamber, 

 Yet would you say ye were beaten out of door; 

 And rail upon the hostess of the house; 

 And say you would present her at the leet, 

 Because she brought stone jugs and no seal'd quarts: 

 Sometimes you would call out for Cicely Hacket. 

 SLY  Ay, the woman's maid of the house. 

 Third Servant  Why, sir, you know no house nor no such maid, 

 Nor no such men as you have reckon'd up, 

 As Stephen Sly and did John Naps of Greece 

 And Peter Turph and Henry Pimpernell 

 And twenty more such names and men as these 

 Which never were nor no man ever saw. 

 SLY  Now Lord be thanked for my good amends! 

 ALL  Amen. 

 SLY  I thank thee: thou shalt not lose by it. 



 Enter the Page as a lady, with attendants  Page  How fares my noble lord? 

 SLY  Marry, I fare well for here is cheer enough. 

 Where is my wife? 

 Page  Here, noble lord: what is thy will with her? 

 SLY  Are you my wife and will not call me husband? 

 My men should call me 'lord:' I am your goodman. 

 Page  My husband and my lord, my lord and husband; 

 I am your wife in all obedience. 

 SLY  I know it well. What must I call her? 

 Lord  Madam. 

 SLY  Al'ce madam, or Joan madam? 

 Lord  'Madam,' and nothing else: so lords 

 call ladies. 

 SLY  Madam wife, they say that I have dream'd 

 And slept above some fifteen year or more. 

 Page  Ay, and the time seems thirty unto me, 

 Being all this time abandon'd from your bed. 

 SLY  'Tis much. Servants, leave me and her alone. 

 Madam, undress you and come now to bed. 

 Page  Thrice noble lord, let me entreat of you 

 To pardon me yet for a night or two, 

 Or, if not so, until the sun be set: 

 For your physicians have expressly charged, 

 In peril to incur your former malady, 

 That I should yet absent me from your bed: 

 I hope this reason stands for my excuse. 

 SLY  Ay, it stands so that I may hardly 

 tarry so long. But I would be loath to fall into 

 my dreams again: I will therefore tarry in 

 despite of the flesh and the blood. 



 Enter a Messenger  Messenger  Your honour's players, heating your amendment, 

 Are come to play a pleasant comedy; 

 For so your doctors hold it very meet, 

 Seeing too much sadness hath congeal'd your blood, 

 And melancholy is the nurse of frenzy: 

 Therefore they thought it good you hear a play 

 And frame your mind to mirth and merriment, 

 Which bars a thousand harms and lengthens life. 

 SLY  Marry, I will, let them play it. Is not a 

 comondy a Christmas gambold or a tumbling-trick? 

 Page  No, my good lord; it is more pleasing stuff. 

 SLY  What, household stuff? 

 Page  It is a kind of history. 

 SLY  Well, well see't. Come, madam wife, sit by my side 

 and let the world slip: we shall ne'er be younger. 



 Flourish  Shakespeare homepage  |  Taming of the Shrew  | Induction, Scene 2 

 Previous scene  |  Next scene 