SCENE II. A room in the prison. Measure for Measure  Shakespeare homepage  |  Measure for Measure  | Act 4, Scene 2 

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 Enter Provost and POMPEY  Provost  Come hither, sirrah. Can you cut off a man's head? 

 POMPEY  If the man be a bachelor, sir, I can; but if he be a 

 married man, he's his wife's head, and I can never 

 cut off a woman's head. 

 Provost  Come, sir, leave me your snatches, and yield me a 

 direct answer. To-morrow morning are to die Claudio 

 and Barnardine. Here is in our prison a common 

 executioner, who in his office lacks a helper: if 

 you will take it on you to assist him, it shall 

 redeem you from your gyves; if not, you shall have 

 your full time of imprisonment and your deliverance 

 with an unpitied whipping, for you have been a 

 notorious bawd. 

 POMPEY  Sir, I have been an unlawful bawd time out of mind; 

 but yet I will be content to be a lawful hangman. I 

 would be glad to receive some instruction from my 

 fellow partner. 

 Provost  What, ho! Abhorson! Where's Abhorson, there? 



 Enter ABHORSON  ABHORSON  Do you call, sir? 

 Provost  Sirrah, here's a fellow will help you to-morrow in 

 your execution. If you think it meet, compound with 

 him by the year, and let him abide here with you; if 

 not, use him for the present and dismiss him. He 

 cannot plead his estimation with you; he hath been a bawd. 

 ABHORSON  A bawd, sir? fie upon him! he will discredit our mystery. 

 Provost  Go to, sir; you weigh equally; a feather will turn 

 the scale. 



 Exit  POMPEY  Pray, sir, by your good favour,--for surely, sir, a 

 good favour you have, but that you have a hanging 

 look,--do you call, sir, your occupation a mystery? 

 ABHORSON  Ay, sir; a mystery 

 POMPEY  Painting, sir, I have heard say, is a mystery; and 

 your whores, sir, being members of my occupation, 

 using painting, do prove my occupation a mystery: 

 but what mystery there should be in hanging, if I 

 should be hanged, I cannot imagine. 

 ABHORSON  Sir, it is a mystery. 

 POMPEY  Proof? 

 ABHORSON  Every true man's apparel fits your thief: if it be 

 too little for your thief, your true man thinks it 

 big enough; if it be too big for your thief, your 

 thief thinks it little enough: so every true man's 

 apparel fits your thief. 



 Re-enter Provost  Provost  Are you agreed? 

 POMPEY  Sir, I will serve him; for I do find your hangman is 

 a more penitent trade than your bawd; he doth 

 oftener ask forgiveness. 

 Provost  You, sirrah, provide your block and your axe 

 to-morrow four o'clock. 

 ABHORSON  Come on, bawd; I will instruct thee in my trade; follow. 

 POMPEY  I do desire to learn, sir: and I hope, if you have 

 occasion to use me for your own turn, you shall find 

 me yare; for truly, sir, for your kindness I owe you 

 a good turn. 

 Provost  Call hither Barnardine and Claudio: 



 Exeunt POMPEY and ABHORSON  The one has my pity; not a jot the other, 

 Being a murderer, though he were my brother. 



 Enter CLAUDIO  Look, here's the warrant, Claudio, for thy death: 

 'Tis now dead midnight, and by eight to-morrow 

 Thou must be made immortal. Where's Barnardine? 

 CLAUDIO  As fast lock'd up in sleep as guiltless labour 

 When it lies starkly in the traveller's bones: 

 He will not wake. 

 Provost  Who can do good on him? 

 Well, go, prepare yourself. 



 Knocking within  But, hark, what noise? 

 Heaven give your spirits comfort! 



 Exit CLAUDIO  By and by. 

 I hope it is some pardon or reprieve 

 For the most gentle Claudio. 



 Enter DUKE VINCENTIO disguised as before  Welcome father. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  The best and wholesomest spirts of the night 

 Envelope you, good Provost! Who call'd here of late? 

 Provost  None, since the curfew rung. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Not Isabel? 

 Provost  No. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  They will, then, ere't be long. 

 Provost  What comfort is for Claudio? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  There's some in hope. 

 Provost  It is a bitter deputy. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Not so, not so; his life is parallel'd 

 Even with the stroke and line of his great justice: 

 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  Now are they come. 



 Exit Provost  This is a gentle provost: seldom when 

 The steeled gaoler is the friend of men. 



 Knocking within  How now! what noise? That spirit's possessed with haste 

 That wounds the unsisting postern with these strokes. 



 Re-enter Provost  Provost  There he must stay until the officer 

 Arise to let him in: he is call'd up. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Have you no countermand for Claudio yet, 

 But he must die to-morrow? 

 Provost  None, sir, none. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  As near the dawning, provost, as it is, 

 You shall hear more ere morning. 

 Provost  Happily 

 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. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  And here comes Claudio's pardon. 

 Messenger  [Giving a paper] 

 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 almost day. 

 Provost  I shall obey him. 



 Exit Messenger  DUKE VINCENTIO  [Aside]  This is his pardon, purchased by such sin 

 For which the pardoner himself is in. 

 Hence hath offence his quick celerity, 

 When it is born in high authority: 

 When vice makes mercy, mercy's so extended, 

 That for the fault's love is the offender friended. 

 Now, sir, what news? 

 Provost  I told you. Lord Angelo, belike thinking me remiss 

 in mine office, awakens me with this unwonted 

 putting-on; methinks strangely, for he hath not used it before. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Pray you, let's hear. 

 Provost  [Reads] 

 'Whatsoever you may hear to the 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, as you will answer it at your peril.' 

 What say you to this, sir? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  What is that Barnardine who is to be executed in the 

 afternoon? 

 Provost  A Bohemian born, but here nursed un and bred; one 

 that is a prisoner nine years old. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  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: and, 

 indeed, his fact, till now in the government of Lord 

 Angelo, came not to an undoubtful proof. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  It is now apparent? 

 Provost  Most manifest, and not denied by himself. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Hath he born himself penitently in prison? how 

 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. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  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 if 

 to carry him to execution, and showed him a seeming 

 warrant for it: it hath not moved him at all. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  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 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 are to do me both a present and a 

 dangerous courtesy. 

 Provost  Pray, sir, in what? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  In the delaying death. 

 Provost  A lack, how may I do it, having the hour limited, 

 and an express command, under penalty, to deliver 

 his head in the view of Angelo? I may make my case 

 as Claudio's, to cross this in the smallest. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  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 born to Angelo. 

 Provost  Angelo hath seen them both, and will discover the favour. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  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: you know the course is common. If any thing 

 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. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Were you sworn to the duke, or to the deputy? 

 Provost  To him, and to his substitutes. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  You will think you have made no offence, if the duke 

 avouch the justice of your dealing? 

 Provost  But what likelihood is in that? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  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 the character, I doubt not; and the 

 signet is not strange to you. 

 Provost  I know them both. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  The contents of this is the return of the duke: you 

 shall anon over-read it at your pleasure; where you 

 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 tenor; 

 perchance of the duke's death; perchance entering 

 into some monastery; but, by chance, nothing of what 

 is writ. Look, the 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 better place. Yet you 

 are amazed; but this shall absolutely resolve you. 

 Come away; it is almost clear dawn. 



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