Part 6
VIOLA. Of Messaline: Sebastian was my father; Such a Sebastian was my brother too: So went he suited to his watery tomb. If spirits can assume both form and suit, You come to fright us.
SEBASTIAN. A spirit I am indeed, But am in that dimension grossly clad, Which from the womb I did participate. Were you a woman, as the rest goes even, I should my tears let fall upon your cheek, And say, ‘Thrice welcome, drowned Viola.’
VIOLA. My father had a mole upon his brow.
SEBASTIAN. And so had mine.
VIOLA. And died that day when Viola from her birth Had numbered thirteen years.
SEBASTIAN. O, that record is lively in my soul! He finished indeed his mortal act That day that made my sister thirteen years.
VIOLA. If nothing lets to make us happy both But this my masculine usurp’d attire, Do not embrace me till each circumstance Of place, time, fortune, do cohere and jump That I am Viola; which to confirm, I’ll bring you to a captain in this town, Where lie my maiden weeds; by whose gentle help I was preserv’d to serve this noble count. All the occurrence of my fortune since Hath been between this lady and this lord.
SEBASTIAN. [_To Olivia._] So comes it, lady, you have been mistook. But nature to her bias drew in that. You would have been contracted to a maid; Nor are you therein, by my life, deceived: You are betroth’d both to a maid and man.
DUKE. Be not amazed; right noble is his blood. If this be so, as yet the glass seems true, I shall have share in this most happy wreck. [_To Viola._] Boy, thou hast said to me a thousand times Thou never shouldst love woman like to me.
VIOLA. And all those sayings will I over-swear, And all those swearings keep as true in soul As doth that orbed continent the fire That severs day from night.
DUKE. Give me thy hand, And let me see thee in thy woman’s weeds.
VIOLA. The captain that did bring me first on shore Hath my maid’s garments. He, upon some action, Is now in durance, at Malvolio’s suit, A gentleman and follower of my lady’s.
OLIVIA. He shall enlarge him. Fetch Malvolio hither. And yet, alas, now I remember me, They say, poor gentleman, he’s much distract.
Enter Clown, with a letter and Fabian.
A most extracting frenzy of mine own From my remembrance clearly banished his. How does he, sirrah?
CLOWN. Truly, madam, he holds Belzebub at the stave’s end as well as a man in his case may do. Has here writ a letter to you. I should have given it you today morning, but as a madman’s epistles are no gospels, so it skills not much when they are delivered.
OLIVIA. Open ’t, and read it.
CLOWN. Look then to be well edified, when the fool delivers the madman. _By the Lord, madam,—_
OLIVIA. How now, art thou mad?
CLOWN. No, madam, I do but read madness: an your ladyship will have it as it ought to be, you must allow _vox_.
OLIVIA. Prithee, read i’ thy right wits.
CLOWN. So I do, madonna. But to read his right wits is to read thus; therefore perpend, my princess, and give ear.
OLIVIA. [_To Fabian._] Read it you, sirrah.
FABIAN. [_Reads._] _By the Lord, madam, you wrong me, and the world shall know it. Though you have put me into darkness and given your drunken cousin rule over me, yet have I the benefit of my senses as well as your ladyship. I have your own letter that induced me to the semblance I put on; with the which I doubt not but to do myself much right or you much shame. Think of me as you please. I leave my duty a little unthought of, and speak out of my injury. The madly-used Malvolio._
OLIVIA. Did he write this?
CLOWN. Ay, madam.
DUKE. This savours not much of distraction.
OLIVIA. See him delivered, Fabian, bring him hither.
[_Exit Fabian._]
My lord, so please you, these things further thought on, To think me as well a sister, as a wife, One day shall crown th’ alliance on’t, so please you, Here at my house, and at my proper cost.
DUKE. Madam, I am most apt t’ embrace your offer. [_To Viola._] Your master quits you; and for your service done him, So much against the mettle of your sex, So far beneath your soft and tender breeding, And since you call’d me master for so long, Here is my hand; you shall from this time be Your master’s mistress.
OLIVIA. A sister? You are she.
Enter Fabian and Malvolio.
DUKE. Is this the madman?
OLIVIA. Ay, my lord, this same. How now, Malvolio?
MALVOLIO. Madam, you have done me wrong, Notorious wrong.
OLIVIA. Have I, Malvolio? No.
MALVOLIO. Lady, you have. Pray you peruse that letter. You must not now deny it is your hand, Write from it, if you can, in hand, or phrase, Or say ’tis not your seal, not your invention: You can say none of this. Well, grant it then, And tell me, in the modesty of honour, Why you have given me such clear lights of favour, Bade me come smiling and cross-garter’d to you, To put on yellow stockings, and to frown Upon Sir Toby, and the lighter people; And acting this in an obedient hope, Why have you suffer’d me to be imprison’d, Kept in a dark house, visited by the priest, And made the most notorious geck and gull That e’er invention played on? Tell me why?
OLIVIA. Alas, Malvolio, this is not my writing, Though I confess, much like the character: But out of question, ’tis Maria’s hand. And now I do bethink me, it was she First told me thou wast mad; then cam’st in smiling, And in such forms which here were presuppos’d Upon thee in the letter. Prithee, be content. This practice hath most shrewdly pass’d upon thee. But when we know the grounds and authors of it, Thou shalt be both the plaintiff and the judge Of thine own cause.
FABIAN. Good madam, hear me speak, And let no quarrel, nor no brawl to come, Taint the condition of this present hour, Which I have wonder’d at. In hope it shall not, Most freely I confess, myself and Toby Set this device against Malvolio here, Upon some stubborn and uncourteous parts We had conceiv’d against him. Maria writ The letter, at Sir Toby’s great importance, In recompense whereof he hath married her. How with a sportful malice it was follow’d May rather pluck on laughter than revenge, If that the injuries be justly weigh’d That have on both sides passed.
OLIVIA. Alas, poor fool, how have they baffled thee!
CLOWN. Why, ‘some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrown upon them.’ I was one, sir, in this interlude, one Sir Topas, sir, but that’s all one. ‘By the Lord, fool, I am not mad.’ But do you remember? ‘Madam, why laugh you at such a barren rascal? And you smile not, he’s gagged’? And thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges.
MALVOLIO. I’ll be revenged on the whole pack of you.
[_Exit._]
OLIVIA. He hath been most notoriously abus’d.
DUKE. Pursue him, and entreat him to a peace: He hath not told us of the captain yet. When that is known, and golden time convents, A solemn combination shall be made Of our dear souls.—Meantime, sweet sister, We will not part from hence.—Cesario, come: For so you shall be while you are a man; But when in other habits you are seen, Orsino’s mistress, and his fancy’s queen.
[_Exeunt._]
Clown sings.
_ When that I was and a little tiny boy, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, A foolish thing was but a toy, For the rain it raineth every day._
_ But when I came to man’s estate, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, ’Gainst knaves and thieves men shut their gate, For the rain it raineth every day._
_ But when I came, alas, to wive, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, By swaggering could I never thrive, For the rain it raineth every day._
_ But when I came unto my beds, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, With toss-pots still had drunken heads, For the rain it raineth every day._
_ A great while ago the world begun, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, But that’s all one, our play is done, And we’ll strive to please you every day._
[_Exit._]