I might sing it, madam, to a tune.
LUCETTA pulls the letter away teasingly.
JULIA
Let’s see your song.
LUCETTA offers the letter, but pulls it away again.
How now, minion!
JULIA sits and turns her back to LUCETTA.
LUCETTA
Keep tune there still, so you will sing it out:
And yet methinks I do not like this tune.
JULIA
You do not? (stands; turns to confront LUCETTA)
LUCETTA
No, madam; ’tis too sharp. (stands; turns to JULIA)
JULIA
You, minion, are too saucy. (steps closer)
LUCETTA (steps closer; they are nose to nose)
Nay, now you are too flat.
JULIA
This babble shall not henceforth trouble me:
JULIA tears the letter into several pieces.
Go get you gone, and let the papers lie:
Exit LUCETTA stage right.
O hateful hands, to tear such loving words!
I’ll kiss each several paper for amends. (kisses pieces of letter)
Look, here is writ—“kind Julia:”—unkind Julia!
And here is writ—“love-wounded Proteus:”—
Poor wounded name! My bosom, as a bed,
Shall lodge thee, till thy wound be throughly heal’d;
Lo, here in one line is his name twice writ,—
“Poor forlorn Proteus, passionate Proteus,
To the sweet Julia:”—that I’ll tear away;—
And yet I will not, sith so prettily
He couples it to his complaining names.
Thus will I fold them one upon another: (places pieces of letter together)
Now kiss, embrace, contend, do what you will. (puts pieces of letter down)
Enter LUCETTA from stage right.
LUCETTA
What, shall these papers lie like tell-tales here?
JULIA
If you respect them, best to take them up.
LUCETTA
Nay, I was taken up for laying them down: (pauses)
Yet here they shall not lie, for catching cold.
(picks up the pieces)
JULIA
I see you have a month’s mind to them.
LUCETTA
Ay, madam, you may say what sights you see;
I see things too, although you judge I wink.
JULIA
Come, come; will’t please you go?
Exit JULIA stage right; LUCETTA follows her.
STAGEHANDS remove table and chairs, then set bench center stage.
Verona. A street.
Enter NARRATOR from stage rear, coming downstage center.
NARRATOR
Launce grieves that he must part with his family to
travel with Proteus, his master. He chastises his dog,
Crab, for not sharing his grief.
Exit NARRATOR stage left.
Enter LAUNCE from stage rear, leading his dog. He ties CRAB to the bench and then sits next to him on the floor.
LAUNCE
I am going with Sir Proteus to the imperial’s court. I think Crab my dog be the sourest-natured dog that lives: my mother weeping, my father wailing, our cat wringing her hands, yet did not this cruel-hearted cur shed one tear: he is a very pebble-stone, and has no more pity in him than a dog. Nay, I’ll show you the manner of it. This shoe is my father. This shoe, with the hole in it, is my mother. I am the dog; no, the dog is himself, and I am the dog,—O, the dog is me, and I am myself. Now should I kiss my father; well, he weeps on. Now come I to my mother; well, I kiss her; why, there ’tis; here’s my mother’s breath up and down. Now the dog all this while sheds not a tear, nor speaks a word: but see how I lay the dust with my tears.
Enter SPEED from stage rear.
SPEED
Launce, away, away, aboard! Thy master is shipp’d, and thou art to post after with oars. What’s the matter? Why weep’st thou, man? Away, ass! You’ll lose the tide, if you tarry any longer.
LAUNCE
It is no matter if the tied were lost; for it is the unkindest tied that ever any man tied.
SPEED
What’s the unkindest tide?
LAUNCE
Why, he that’s tied here,—Crab, my dog.
SPEED
Tut, man, I mean thou’lt lose the flood: and, in losing the flood, lose thy voyage.
LAUNCE
Lose the tide, and the voyage, why, man, if the river were dry, I am able to fill it with my tears; if the wind were down, I could drive the boat with my sighs.
SPEED
Come, come away, man; I was sent to call thee.
LAUNCE
Sir, call me what thou darest. (draws sword)
SPEED
Wilt thou go?
LAUNCE takes leash and starts to walk with CRAB. He falls down because the leash is still tied to the bench, but he gets back up and tries to regain his composure.
LAUNCE
Well, I will go.
LAUNCE