Twelfth Night, or What You Will
The History of Troilus and Cressida
William Shakespeare
THE COMEDY
OF ERRORS
( 1592–1594 )
First Folio, 1623
errors
¶
Act I
Sc. I Sc. II
Act II
Sc. I Sc. II
Act III
Sc. I Sc. II
Act IV
Act V
Sc. I
[Dramatis Personae
Solinus, Duke of Ephesus
Egeon, a merchant of Syracuse
Antipholus of Ephesus,
Antipholus of Syracuse, twin brothers, and sons to Egeon and Aemilia
Dromio of Ephesus,
Dromio of Syracuse, twin brothers, and bondmen to the two Antipholuses
Balthazar, a merchant
Angelo, a goldsmith
First Merchant of Ephesus, friend to Antipholus of Syracuse
Second Merchant of Ephesus, to whom Angelo is a debtor
Doctor Pinch, a conjuring schoolmaster
Aemilia, wife to Egeon, an abbess at Ephesus
Adriana, wife to Antipholus of Ephesus
Luciana, her sister
Luce, servant to Adriana (also known as Nell)
Courtezan
Jailer, Headsman, Messenger, Officers, and other Attendants
Scene: Ephesus]
ACT I
Scene I
Enter the Duke of Ephesus with [Egeon] the merchant of Syracusa, Jailer [with Officers], and other Attendants.
Ege.
Proceed, Solinus, to procure my fall,
And by the doom of death end woes and all.
Duke.
Merchant of Syracusa, plead no more.
I am not partial to infringe our laws;
The enmity and discord which of late
Sprung from the rancorous outrage of your Duke
To merchants, our well-dealing countrymen,
Who, wanting guilders to redeem their lives,
Have seal’d his rigorous statutes with their bloods,
Excludes all pity from our threat’ning looks:
For since the mortal and intestine jars
’Twixt thy seditious countrymen and us,
It hath in solemn synods been decreed,
Both by the Syracusians and ourselves,
To admit no traffic to our adverse towns:
Nay more, if any born at Ephesus be seen
At any Syracusian marts and fairs;
Again, if any Syracusian born
Come to the bay of Ephesus, he dies,
His goods confiscate to the Duke’s dispose,
Unless a thousand marks be levied
To quit the penalty and to ransom him.
Thy substance, valued at the highest rate,
Cannot amount unto a hundred marks,
Therefore by law thou art condemn’d to die.
Ege.
Yet this my comfort, when your words are done,
My woes end likewise with the evening sun.
Duke.
Well, Syracusian; say in brief the cause
Why thou departedst from thy native home,
And for what cause thou cam’st to Ephesus.
Ege.
A heavier task could not have been impos’d
Than I to speak my griefs unspeakable:
Yet that the world may witness that my end
Was wrought by nature, not by vile offense,
I’ll utter what my sorrow gives me leave.
In Syracusa was I born, and wed
Unto a woman, happy but for me,
And by me, had not our hap been bad:
With her I liv’d in joy; our wealth increas’d
By prosperous voyages I often made
To Epidamium, till my factor’s death,
And [the] great care of goods at randon left,
Drew me from kind embracements of my spouse;
From whom my absence was not six months old
Before herself (almost at fainting under
The pleasing punishment that women bear)
Had made provision for her following me,
And soon, and safe, arrived where I was.
There had she not been long but she became
A joyful mother of two goodly sons:
And, which was strange, the one so like the other
As could not be distinguish’d but by names.
That very hour, and in the self-same inn,
A mean woman was delivered
Of such a burthen male, twins both alike.
Those, for their parents were exceeding poor,
I