SCENE I. Before LEONATO'S house. Much Ado About Nothing  Shakespeare homepage  |  Much Ado About Nothing  | Act 1, Scene 1 

 Next scene  SCENE I. Before LEONATO'S house. 

 Enter LEONATO, HERO, and BEATRICE, with a Messenger  LEONATO  I learn in this letter that Don Peter of Arragon 

 comes this night to Messina. 

 Messenger  He is very near by this: he was not three leagues off 

 when I left him. 

 LEONATO  How many gentlemen have you lost in this action? 

 Messenger  But few of any sort, and none of name. 

 LEONATO  A victory is twice itself when the achiever brings 

 home full numbers. I find here that Don Peter hath 

 bestowed much honour on a young Florentine called Claudio. 

 Messenger  Much deserved on his part and equally remembered by 

 Don Pedro: he hath borne himself beyond the 

 promise of his age, doing, in the figure of a lamb, 

 the feats of a lion: he hath indeed better 

 bettered expectation than you must expect of me to 

 tell you how. 

 LEONATO  He hath an uncle here in Messina will be very much 

 glad of it. 

 Messenger  I have already delivered him letters, and there 

 appears much joy in him; even so much that joy could 

 not show itself modest enough without a badge of 

 bitterness. 

 LEONATO  Did he break out into tears? 

 Messenger  In great measure. 

 LEONATO  A kind overflow of kindness: there are no faces 

 truer than those that are so washed. How much 

 better is it to weep at joy than to joy at weeping! 

 BEATRICE  I pray you, is Signior Mountanto returned from the 

 wars or no? 

 Messenger  I know none of that name, lady: there was none such 

 in the army of any sort. 

 LEONATO  What is he that you ask for, niece? 

 HERO  My cousin means Signior Benedick of Padua. 

 Messenger  O, he's returned; and as pleasant as ever he was. 

 BEATRICE  He set up his bills here in Messina and challenged 

 Cupid at the flight; and my uncle's fool, reading 

 the challenge, subscribed for Cupid, and challenged 

 him at the bird-bolt. I pray you, how many hath he 

 killed and eaten in these wars? But how many hath 

 he killed? for indeed I promised to eat all of his killing. 

 LEONATO  Faith, niece, you tax Signior Benedick too much; 

 but he'll be meet with you, I doubt it not. 

 Messenger  He hath done good service, lady, in these wars. 

 BEATRICE  You had musty victual, and he hath holp to eat it: 

 he is a very valiant trencherman; he hath an 

 excellent stomach. 

 Messenger  And a good soldier too, lady. 

 BEATRICE  And a good soldier to a lady: but what is he to a lord? 

 Messenger  A lord to a lord, a man to a man; stuffed with all 

 honourable virtues. 

 BEATRICE  It is so, indeed; he is no less than a stuffed man: 

 but for the stuffing,--well, we are all mortal. 

 LEONATO  You must not, sir, mistake my niece. There is a 

 kind of merry war betwixt Signior Benedick and her: 

 they never meet but there's a skirmish of wit 

 between them. 

 BEATRICE  Alas! he gets nothing by that. In our last 

 conflict four of his five wits went halting off, and 

 now is the whole man governed with one: so that if 

 he have wit enough to keep himself warm, let him 

 bear it for a difference between himself and his 

 horse; for it is all the wealth that he hath left, 

 to be known a reasonable creature. Who is his 

 companion now? He hath every month a new sworn brother. 

 Messenger  Is't possible? 

 BEATRICE  Very easily possible: he wears his faith but as 

 the fashion of his hat; it ever changes with the 

 next block. 

 Messenger  I see, lady, the gentleman is not in your books. 

 BEATRICE  No; an he were, I would burn my study. But, I pray 

 you, who is his companion? Is there no young 

 squarer now that will make a voyage with him to the devil? 

 Messenger  He is most in the company of the right noble Claudio. 

 BEATRICE  O Lord, he will hang upon him like a disease: he 

 is sooner caught than the pestilence, and the taker 

 runs presently mad. God help the noble Claudio! if 

 he have caught the Benedick, it will cost him a 

 thousand pound ere a' be cured. 

 Messenger  I will hold friends with you, lady. 

 BEATRICE  Do, good friend. 

 LEONATO  You will never run mad, niece. 

 BEATRICE  No, not till a hot January. 

 Messenger  Don Pedro is approached. 



 Enter DON PEDRO, DON JOHN, CLAUDIO, BENEDICK, and BALTHASAR  DON PEDRO  Good Signior Leonato, you are come to meet your 

 trouble: the fashion of the world is to avoid 

 cost, and you encounter it. 

 LEONATO  Never came trouble to my house in the likeness of 

 your grace: for trouble being gone, comfort should 

 remain; but when you depart from me, sorrow abides 

 and happiness takes his leave. 

 DON PEDRO  You embrace your charge too willingly. I think this 

 is your daughter. 

 LEONATO  Her mother hath many times told me so. 

 BENEDICK  Were you in doubt, sir, that you asked her? 

 LEONATO  Signior Benedick, no; for then were you a child. 

 DON PEDRO  You have it full, Benedick: we may guess by this 

 what you are, being a man. Truly, the lady fathers 

 herself. Be happy, lady; for you are like an 

 honourable father. 

 BENEDICK  If Signior Leonato be her father, she would not 

 have his head on her shoulders for all Messina, as 

 like him as she is. 

 BEATRICE  I wonder that you will still be talking, Signior 

 Benedick: nobody marks you. 

 BENEDICK  What, my dear Lady Disdain! are you yet living? 

 BEATRICE  Is it possible disdain should die while she hath 

 such meet food to feed it as Signior Benedick? 

 Courtesy itself must convert to disdain, if you come 

 in her presence. 

 BENEDICK  Then is courtesy a turncoat. But it is certain I 

 am loved of all ladies, only you excepted: and I 

 would I could find in my heart that I had not a hard 

 heart; for, truly, I love none. 

 BEATRICE  A dear happiness to women: they would else have 

 been troubled with a pernicious suitor. I thank God 

 and my cold blood, I am of your humour for that: I 

 had rather hear my dog bark at a crow than a man 

 swear he loves me. 

 BENEDICK  God keep your ladyship still in that mind! so some 

 gentleman or other shall 'scape a predestinate 

 scratched face. 

 BEATRICE  Scratching could not make it worse, an 'twere such 

 a face as yours were. 

 BENEDICK  Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher. 

 BEATRICE  A bird of my tongue is better than a beast of yours. 

 BENEDICK  I would my horse had the speed of your tongue, and 

 so good a continuer. But keep your way, i' God's 

 name; I have done. 

 BEATRICE  You always end with a jade's trick: I know you of old. 

 DON PEDRO  That is the sum of all, Leonato. Signior Claudio 

 and Signior Benedick, my dear friend Leonato hath 

 invited you all. I tell him we shall stay here at 

 the least a month; and he heartily prays some 

 occasion may detain us longer. I dare swear he is no 

 hypocrite, but prays from his heart. 

 LEONATO  If you swear, my lord, you shall not be forsworn. 



 To DON JOHN  Let me bid you welcome, my lord: being reconciled to 

 the prince your brother, I owe you all duty. 

 DON JOHN  I thank you: I am not of many words, but I thank 

 you. 

 LEONATO  Please it your grace lead on? 

 DON PEDRO  Your hand, Leonato; we will go together. 



 Exeunt all except BENEDICK and CLAUDIO  CLAUDIO  Benedick, didst thou note the daughter of Signior Leonato? 

 BENEDICK  I noted her not; but I looked on her. 

 CLAUDIO  Is she not a modest young lady? 

 BENEDICK  Do you question me, as an honest man should do, for 

 my simple true judgment; or would you have me speak 

 after my custom, as being a professed tyrant to their sex? 

 CLAUDIO  No; I pray thee speak in sober judgment. 

 BENEDICK  Why, i' faith, methinks she's too low for a high 

 praise, too brown for a fair praise and too little 

 for a great praise: only this commendation I can 

 afford her, that were she other than she is, she 

 were unhandsome; and being no other but as she is, I 

 do not like her. 

 CLAUDIO  Thou thinkest I am in sport: I pray thee tell me 

 truly how thou likest her. 

 BENEDICK  Would you buy her, that you inquire after her? 

 CLAUDIO  Can the world buy such a jewel? 

 BENEDICK  Yea, and a case to put it into. But speak you this 

 with a sad brow? or do you play the flouting Jack, 

 to tell us Cupid is a good hare-finder and Vulcan a 

 rare carpenter? Come, in what key shall a man take 

 you, to go in the song? 

 CLAUDIO  In mine eye she is the sweetest lady that ever I 

 looked on. 

 BENEDICK  I can see yet without spectacles and I see no such 

 matter: there's her cousin, an she were not 

 possessed with a fury, exceeds her as much in beauty 

 as the first of May doth the last of December. But I 

 hope you have no intent to turn husband, have you? 

 CLAUDIO  I would scarce trust myself, though I had sworn the 

 contrary, if Hero would be my wife. 

 BENEDICK  Is't come to this? In faith, hath not the world 

 one man but he will wear his cap with suspicion? 

 Shall I never see a bachelor of three-score again? 

 Go to, i' faith; an thou wilt needs thrust thy neck 

 into a yoke, wear the print of it and sigh away 

 Sundays. Look Don Pedro is returned to seek you. 



 Re-enter DON PEDRO  DON PEDRO  What secret hath held you here, that you followed 

 not to Leonato's? 

 BENEDICK  I would your grace would constrain me to tell. 

 DON PEDRO  I charge thee on thy allegiance. 

 BENEDICK  You hear, Count Claudio: I can be secret as a dumb 

 man; I would have you think so; but, on my 

 allegiance, mark you this, on my allegiance. He is 

 in love. With who? now that is your grace's part. 

 Mark how short his answer is;--With Hero, Leonato's 

 short daughter. 

 CLAUDIO  If this were so, so were it uttered. 

 BENEDICK  Like the old tale, my lord: 'it is not so, nor 

 'twas not so, but, indeed, God forbid it should be 

 so.' 

 CLAUDIO  If my passion change not shortly, God forbid it 

 should be otherwise. 

 DON PEDRO  Amen, if you love her; for the lady is very well worthy. 

 CLAUDIO  You speak this to fetch me in, my lord. 

 DON PEDRO  By my troth, I speak my thought. 

 CLAUDIO  And, in faith, my lord, I spoke mine. 

 BENEDICK  And, by my two faiths and troths, my lord, I spoke mine. 

 CLAUDIO  That I love her, I feel. 

 DON PEDRO  That she is worthy, I know. 

 BENEDICK  That I neither feel how she should be loved nor 

 know how she should be worthy, is the opinion that 

 fire cannot melt out of me: I will die in it at the stake. 

 DON PEDRO  Thou wast ever an obstinate heretic in the despite 

 of beauty. 

 CLAUDIO  And never could maintain his part but in the force 

 of his will. 

 BENEDICK  That a woman conceived me, I thank her; that she 

 brought me up, I likewise give her most humble 

 thanks: but that I will have a recheat winded in my 

 forehead, or hang my bugle in an invisible baldrick, 

 all women shall pardon me. Because I will not do 

 them the wrong to mistrust any, I will do myself the 

 right to trust none; and the fine is, for the which 

 I may go the finer, I will live a bachelor. 

 DON PEDRO  I shall see thee, ere I die, look pale with love. 

 BENEDICK  With anger, with sickness, or with hunger, my lord, 

 not with love: prove that ever I lose more blood 

 with love than I will get again with drinking, pick 

 out mine eyes with a ballad-maker's pen and hang me 

 up at the door of a brothel-house for the sign of 

 blind Cupid. 

 DON PEDRO  Well, if ever thou dost fall from this faith, thou 

 wilt prove a notable argument. 

 BENEDICK  If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat and shoot 

 at me; and he that hits me, let him be clapped on 

 the shoulder, and called Adam. 

 DON PEDRO  Well, as time shall try: 'In time the savage bull 

 doth bear the yoke.' 

 BENEDICK  The savage bull may; but if ever the sensible 

 Benedick bear it, pluck off the bull's horns and set 

 them in my forehead: and let me be vilely painted, 

 and in such great letters as they write 'Here is 

 good horse to hire,' let them signify under my sign 

 'Here you may see Benedick the married man.' 

 CLAUDIO  If this should ever happen, thou wouldst be horn-mad. 

 DON PEDRO  Nay, if Cupid have not spent all his quiver in 

 Venice, thou wilt quake for this shortly. 

 BENEDICK  I look for an earthquake too, then. 

 DON PEDRO  Well, you temporize with the hours. In the 

 meantime, good Signior Benedick, repair to 

 Leonato's: commend me to him and tell him I will 

 not fail him at supper; for indeed he hath made 

 great preparation. 

 BENEDICK  I have almost matter enough in me for such an 

 embassage; and so I commit you-- 

 CLAUDIO  To the tuition of God: From my house, if I had it,-- 

 DON PEDRO  The sixth of July: Your loving friend, Benedick. 

 BENEDICK  Nay, mock not, mock not. The body of your 

 discourse is sometime guarded with fragments, and 

 the guards are but slightly basted on neither: ere 

 you flout old ends any further, examine your 

 conscience: and so I leave you. 



 Exit  CLAUDIO  My liege, your highness now may do me good. 

 DON PEDRO  My love is thine to teach: teach it but how, 

 And thou shalt see how apt it is to learn 

 Any hard lesson that may do thee good. 

 CLAUDIO  Hath Leonato any son, my lord? 

 DON PEDRO  No child but Hero; she's his only heir. 

 Dost thou affect her, Claudio? 

 CLAUDIO  O, my lord, 

 When you went onward on this ended action, 

 I look'd upon her with a soldier's eye, 

 That liked, but had a rougher task in hand 

 Than to drive liking to the name of love: 

 But now I am return'd and that war-thoughts 

 Have left their places vacant, in their rooms 

 Come thronging soft and delicate desires, 

 All prompting me how fair young Hero is, 

 Saying, I liked her ere I went to wars. 

 DON PEDRO  Thou wilt be like a lover presently 

 And tire the hearer with a book of words. 

 If thou dost love fair Hero, cherish it, 

 And I will break with her and with her father, 

 And thou shalt have her. Was't not to this end 

 That thou began'st to twist so fine a story? 

 CLAUDIO  How sweetly you do minister to love, 

 That know love's grief by his complexion! 

 But lest my liking might too sudden seem, 

 I would have salved it with a longer treatise. 

 DON PEDRO  What need the bridge much broader than the flood? 

 The fairest grant is the necessity. 

 Look, what will serve is fit: 'tis once, thou lovest, 

 And I will fit thee with the remedy. 

 I know we shall have revelling to-night: 

 I will assume thy part in some disguise 

 And tell fair Hero I am Claudio, 

 And in her bosom I'll unclasp my heart 

 And take her hearing prisoner with the force 

 And strong encounter of my amorous tale: 

 Then after to her father will I break; 

 And the conclusion is, she shall be thine. 

 In practise let us put it presently. 



 Exeunt  Shakespeare homepage  |  Much Ado About Nothing  | Act 1, Scene 1 

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