SCENE II. Padua. LUCENTIO'S house. The Taming of the Shrew  Shakespeare homepage  |  Taming of the Shrew  | Act 5, Scene 2 

 Previous scene  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. 

 PETRUCHIO  To her, Kate! 

 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! 

 BIANCA  Am I your bird? I mean to shift my bush; 

 And then pursue me as you draw your bow. 

 You are welcome all. 



 Exeunt BIANCA, KATHARINA, and Widow  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? 

 LUCENTIO  Twenty crowns. 

 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. 

 HORTENSIO  Content. 

 PETRUCHIO  A match! 'tis done. 

 HORTENSIO  Who shall begin? 

 LUCENTIO  That will I. 

 Go, Biondello, bid your mistress come to me. 

 BIONDELLO  I go. 



 Exit  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  What? 

 HORTENSIO  She will not. 

 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. 

 PETRUCHIO  Nay, I will win my wager better yet 

 And show more sign of her obedience, 

 Her new-built virtue and obedience. 

 See where she comes and brings your froward wives 

 As prisoners to her womanly persuasion. 



 Re-enter KATHARINA, with BIANCA and Widow  Katharina, that cap of yours becomes you not: 

 Off with that bauble, throw it under-foot. 

 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. 

 Widow  She shall not. 

 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. 

 PETRUCHIO  Come, Kate, we'll to bed. 

 We three are married, but you two are sped. 



 To LUCENTIO  'Twas I won the wager, though you hit the white; 

 And, being a winner, God give you good night! 



 Exeunt PETRUCHIO and KATHARINA  HORTENSIO  Now, go thy ways; thou hast tamed a curst shrew. 

 LUCENTIO  'Tis a wonder, by your leave, she will be tamed so. 



 Exeunt 