The Comedy of Errors

The Comedy of Errors
Act 3, scene 2

Synopsis:

Characters in the Play

Entire Play

Egeon’s remaining son, Antipholus of Syracuse, and his servant, Dromio of Syracuse, come to Ephesus, where—unknown to them—their lost twins…

Act 1, scene 1

Egeon, a merchant from Syracusae, is arrested for having illegally entered Ephesus. He tells the story of how he lost…

Act 1, scene 2

Antipholus of Syracuse lands in Ephesus with his servant, Dromio. He sends Dromio to an inn with their luggage and…

Act 2, scene 1

Adriana angrily awaits her husband, who is late for dinner. Dromio (of Ephesus) enters and tells about his meeting with…

Act 2, scene 2

Antipholus (of Syracuse) meets Dromio (of Syracuse), who denies having spoken of Antipholus’s wife. Adriana and her sister, Luciana, enter…

Act 3, scene 1

Antipholus of Ephesus brings a goldsmith and a merchant to his home for dinner. He finds the door locked and,…

Act 3, scene 2

Antipholus (of Syracuse) falls in love with Adriana’s sister, Luciana. Dromio (of Syracuse) is claimed by Adriana’s kitchen maid as…

Act 4, scene 1

Antipholus (of Ephesus) sends Dromio (of Ephesus) to buy a rope’s end to beat Adriana. The goldsmith demands the money…

Act 4, scene 2

Dromio (of Syracuse) tells Adriana about the arrest of Antipholus (of Ephesus). She gives him the money for Antipholus’s bail.

Act 4, scene 3

Dromio (of Syracuse) gives Antipholus (of Syracuse) the money sent by Adriana. The Courtesan enters and demands the chain that…

Act 4, scene 4

Antipholus (of Ephesus), under arrest, beats Dromio (of Ephesus) for bringing a rope’s end instead of the money for bail….

Act 5, scene 1

Adriana finds Antipholus (of Syracuse) with his sword drawn and orders that he and Dromio be bound. The Syracusans escape…

⌜Scene 2⌝

Enter ⌜Luciana⌝ with Antipholus of Syracuse.

⌜LUCIANA⌝
And may it be that you have quite forgot
  A husband’s office? Shall, Antipholus,
Even in the spring of love thy love-springs rot?
  Shall love, in ⌜building,⌝ grow so ⌜ruinous?⌝
5 If you did wed my sister for her wealth,
  Then for her wealth’s sake use her with more
  kindness.
Or if you like elsewhere, do it by stealth —
  Muffle your false love with some show of
10  blindness.
Let not my sister read it in your eye;
  Be not thy tongue thy own shame’s orator;
Look sweet, speak fair, become disloyalty;
  Apparel vice like virtue’s harbinger.
15 Bear a fair presence, though your heart be tainted.
  Teach sin the carriage of a holy saint.
Be secret-false. What need she be acquainted?
  What simple thief brags of his own ⌜attaint?⌝
’Tis double wrong to truant with your bed
20  And let her read it in thy looks at board.
Shame hath a bastard fame, well managèd;
  Ill deeds is doubled with an evil word.
Alas, poor women, make us ⌜but⌝ believe,
  Being compact of credit, that you love us.
25 Though others have the arm, show us the sleeve;
  We in your motion turn, and you may move us.

The Comedy of Errors

ACT 3. SC. 2

Then, gentle brother, get you in again.
  Comfort my sister, cheer her, call her ⌜wife.⌝
’Tis holy sport to be a little vain
30  When the sweet breath of flattery conquers strife.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Sweet mistress—what your name is else I know not,
  Nor by what wonder you do hit of mine—
Less in your knowledge and your grace you show not
  Than our Earth’s wonder, more than Earth divine.
35 Teach me, dear creature, how to think and speak.
  Lay open to my earthy gross conceit,
Smothered in errors, feeble, shallow, weak,
  The folded meaning of your words’ deceit.
Against my soul’s pure truth why labor you
40  To make it wander in an unknown field?
Are you a god? Would you create me new?
  Transform me, then, and to your power I’ll yield.
But if that I am I, then well I know
  Your weeping sister is no wife of mine,
45 Nor to her bed no homage do I owe.
  Far more, far more, to you do I decline.
O, train me not, sweet mermaid, with thy note
  To drown me in thy ⌜sister’s⌝ flood of tears.
Sing, Siren, for thyself, and I will dote.
50  Spread o’er the silver waves thy golden hairs,
And as a ⌜bed⌝ I’ll take ⌜them⌝ and there lie,
  And in that glorious supposition think
He gains by death that hath such means to die.
  Let love, being light, be drownèd if she sink.
LUCIANA
55 What, are you mad that you do reason so?
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Not mad, but mated—how, I do not know.
LUCIANA
It is a fault that springeth from your eye.

The Comedy of Errors

ACT 3. SC. 2

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
For gazing on your beams, fair sun, being by.
LUCIANA
Gaze when you should, and that will clear your
60 sight.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
As good to wink, sweet love, as look on night.
LUCIANA
Why call you me “love”? Call my sister so.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Thy sister’s sister.
LUCIANA That’s my sister.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE 65 No,
It is thyself, mine own self’s better part,
Mine eye’s clear eye, my dear heart’s dearer heart,
My food, my fortune, and my sweet hope’s aim,
My sole Earth’s heaven, and my heaven’s claim.
LUCIANA
70 All this my sister is, or else should be.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Call thyself “sister,” sweet, for I am thee.
Thee will I love, and with thee lead my life;
Thou hast no husband yet, nor I no wife.
Give me thy hand.
LUCIANA 75 O soft, sir. Hold you still.
I’ll fetch my sister to get her goodwill.She exits.

Enter Dromio ⌜of⌝ Syracuse, ⌜running.⌝

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Why, how now, Dromio.
Where runn’st thou so fast?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Do you know me, sir? Am I
80 Dromio? Am I your man? Am I myself?
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Thou art Dromio, thou art
my man, thou art thyself.
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE I am an ass, I am a woman’s
man, and besides myself.

The Comedy of Errors

ACT 3. SC. 2

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE 85What woman’s man? And
how besides thyself?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Marry, sir, besides myself I am
due to a woman, one that claims me, one that
haunts me, one that will have me.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE 90What claim lays she to thee?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Marry, sir, such claim as you
would lay to your horse, and she would have me as
a beast; not that I being a beast she would have me,
but that she, being a very beastly creature, lays
95 claim to me.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE What is she?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE A very reverend body, ay, such a
one as a man may not speak of without he say
“sir-reverence.” I have but lean luck in the match,
100 and yet is she a wondrous fat marriage.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE How dost thou mean a “fat
marriage”?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Marry, sir, she’s the kitchen
wench, and all grease, and I know not what use to
105 put her to but to make a lamp of her and run from
her by her own light. I warrant her rags and the
tallow in them will burn a Poland winter. If she lives
till doomsday, she’ll burn a week longer than the
whole world.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE 110What complexion is she of?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Swart like my shoe, but her face
nothing like so clean kept. For why? She sweats. A
man may go overshoes in the grime of it.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE That’s a fault that water will
115 mend.
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE No, sir, ’tis in grain; Noah’s flood
could not do it.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE What’s her name?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Nell, sir, but her name ⌜and⌝

The Comedy of Errors

ACT 3. SC. 2

120 three quarters—that’s an ell and three quarters—
will not measure her from hip to hip.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Then she bears some
breadth?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE No longer from head to foot than
125 from hip to hip. She is spherical, like a globe. I
could find out countries in her.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE In what part of her body
stands Ireland?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Marry, sir, in her buttocks. I
130 found it out by the bogs.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Where Scotland?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE I found it by the barrenness,
hard in the palm of the hand.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Where France?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE 135In her forehead, armed and
reverted, making war against her heir.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Where England?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE I looked for the chalky cliffs, but
I could find no whiteness in them. But I guess it
140 stood in her chin, by the salt rheum that ran
between France and it.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Where Spain?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Faith, I saw it not, but I felt it hot
in her breath.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE 145Where America, the Indies?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE O, sir, upon her nose, all o’erembellished
with rubies, carbuncles, sapphires,
declining their rich aspect to the hot breath of
Spain, who sent whole armadas of carracks to be
150 ballast at her nose.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Where stood Belgia, the
Netherlands?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE O, sir, I did not look so low. To
conclude: this drudge or diviner laid claim to me,

The Comedy of Errors

ACT 3. SC. 2

155 called me Dromio, swore I was assured to her, told
me what privy marks I had about me, as the mark
of my shoulder, the mole in my neck, the great wart
on my left arm, that I, amazed, ran from her as a
witch.
160 And, I think, if my breast had not been made of
faith, and my heart of steel,
She had transformed me to a curtal dog and made
me turn i’ th’ wheel.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Go, hie thee presently. Post to the road.
165 An if the wind blow any way from shore,
I will not harbor in this town tonight.
If any bark put forth, come to the mart,
Where I will walk till thou return to me.
If everyone knows us, and we know none,
170 ’Tis time, I think, to trudge, pack, and be gone.
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
As from a bear a man would run for life,
So fly I from her that would be my wife.He exits.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
There’s none but witches do inhabit here,
And therefore ’tis high time that I were hence.
175 She that doth call me husband, even my soul
Doth for a wife abhor. But her fair sister,
Possessed with such a gentle sovereign grace,
Of such enchanting presence and discourse,
Hath almost made me traitor to myself.
180 But lest myself be guilty to self wrong,
I’ll stop mine ears against the mermaid’s song.

Enter Angelo with the chain.

ANGELO
Master Antipholus.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE Ay, that’s my name.

The Comedy of Errors

ACT 3. SC. 2

ANGELO
I know it well, sir. Lo, here’s the chain.
185 I thought to have ta’en you at the Porpentine;
The chain unfinished made me stay thus long.
⌜He gives Antipholus a chain.⌝
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
What is your will that I shall do with this?
ANGELO
What please yourself, sir. I have made it for you.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Made it for me, sir? I bespoke it not.
ANGELO
190 Not once, nor twice, but twenty times you have.
Go home with it, and please your wife withal,
And soon at supper time I’ll visit you
And then receive my money for the chain.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
I pray you, sir, receive the money now,
195 For fear you ne’er see chain nor money more.
ANGELO
You are a merry man, sir. Fare you well.He exits.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
What I should think of this I cannot tell,
But this I think: there’s no man is so vain
That would refuse so fair an offered chain.
200 I see a man here needs not live by shifts
When in the streets he meets such golden gifts.
I’ll to the mart, and there for Dromio stay.
If any ship put out, then straight away.
He exits.

Synopsis:

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Contents

Characters in the Play

Entire Play

Act 1, scene 1

Act 1, scene 2

Act 2, scene 1

Act 2, scene 2

Act 3, scene 1

Act 3, scene 2

Act 4, scene 1

Act 4, scene 2

Act 4, scene 3

Act 4, scene 4

Act 5, scene 1