The Taming of the Shrew Read Online Free PDF Page B

Gremio, Tranio, Katherina, Bianca,
[
Lucentio
]
and others, Attendants
    BAPTISTA     Signior Lucentio, this is the ’pointed day.
    To Tranio
        That Katherine and Petruchio should be married,
    And yet we hear not of our son-in-law.
    What will be said? What mockery will it be,
    To want 5 the bridegroom when the priest attends
    To speak the ceremonial rites of marriage?
    What says Lucentio to this shame of ours?
    KATE     No shame but mine: I must forsooth 8 be forced
    To give my hand opposed against my heart
    Unto a mad-brain rudesby 10 full of spleen,
    Who wooed in haste and means to wed at leisure 11 .
    I told you, I, he was a frantic 12 fool,
    Hiding his bitter jests in blunt behaviour.
    And to be noted for 14 a merry man,
    He’ll woo a thousand, ’point the day of marriage,
    Make feasts, invite friends, and proclaim the banns,
    Yet never means to wed where he hath wooed.
    Now must the world point at poor Katherine,
    And say, ‘ Lo 19 , there is mad Petruchio’s wife,
    If it would please him come and marry her.’
    TRANIO     Patience, good Katherine, and Baptista too.
    Upon my life, Petruchio means but well,
    Whatever fortune stays him from his word 23 .
    Though he be blunt, I know him passing wise,
    Though he be merry, yet withal he’s honest.
    KATE     Would Katherine had never seen him though!
    Exit weeping
[
followed by Bianca and others
]
    BAPTISTA     Go, girl. I cannot blame thee now to weep,
    For such an injury would vex a very saint,
    Much more a shrew of thy impatient humour 29 .
    Enter Biondello
    BIONDELLO     Master, master, news! Old 30 news, and such news as
    you never heard of!
    BAPTISTA     Is it new and old too? How may that be?
    BIONDELLO     Why, is it not news to hear of Petruchio’s coming?
    BAPTISTA     Is he come?
    BIONDELLO     Why, no, sir.
    BAPTISTA     What then?
    BIONDELLO     He is coming.
    BAPTISTA     When will he be here?
    BIONDELLO     When he stands where I am and sees you there.
    TRANIO     But say, what to 40 thine old news?
    BIONDELLO     Why, Petruchio is coming in a new hat and an old
     jerkin 42 : a pair of old breeches thrice turned: a pair of boots
    that have been candle-cases 43 , one buckled, another laced, an
    old rusty sword ta’en out of the town armoury, with a
    broken hilt, and chapeless 45 : with two broken points: his horse
     hipped 46 , with an old mothy saddle and stirrups of no kindred:
    besides, possessed with the glanders 47 and like to mose in the
    chine, troubled with the lampass 48 , infected with the fashions,
    full of windgalls 49 , sped with spavins, rayed with yellows, past
    cure of the fives 50 , stark spoiled
    with the staggers, begnawn with the bots 51 , swayed in the back and shoulder-shotten, near-
    legged before and with a half-checked bit 52 and a head-stall of
     sheep’s leather 53 which, being restrained to keep him from
    stumbling, hath been often burst and now repaired with
    knots, one girth 55 six times pieced, and a woman’s crupper of
     velure 56 , which hath two letters for her name fairly set down in
    studs, and here and there pieced with packthread 57 .
    BAPTISTA     Who comes with him?
    BIONDELLO     O, sir, his lackey 59 , for all the world caparisoned like
    the horse: with a linen stock 60 on one leg and a kersey boot-
    hose on the other, gartered with a red and blue list 61 ; an old hat
    and the humour of forty fancies 62 pricked in’t for a feather —
    a monster, a very monster in apparel, and not like a Christian
     footboy 64 or a gentleman’s lackey.
    TRANIO     ’Tis some odd humour pricks 65 him to this fashion.
    Yet