Chapter 3

(Enter ALCESIMUS and STALINO, from the house of the former.)

STALINO: Now, Alcesimus, I shall know whether you are the very picture of friend or foe to me; now is the proof upon view; now is the contest going on. But why do I do so; forbear to correct me; save yourself all that. With your hoary head, at an age unfit; save yourself that as well. One who has a wife; save yourself that like wise.

ALCESIMUS: I never saw a person more distracted with love than yourself.

STALINO: Do take care that the house is clear.

ALCESIMUS: Why, faith, men-servants, maid-servants, all of them I’m determined to send out of the house to yours.

STALINO: Heyday! with your adroitness you are very adroit! But only take care and remember the lines which Colax repeats; take care that every one comes with his own provisions, as if they were going to Sutrium.

ALCESIMUS: I’ll remember it.

STALINO: Why now there’s no public ordinance better ordered than yourself, in fact. Attend to this. I’m now going to the Forum; I shall be here just now.

ALCESIMUS: Luck go with you.

STALINO: Take care that your house gets a tongue.

ALCESIMUS: Why so?

STALINO: That when I come, it may invite me.

ALCESIMUS: Pooh, pooh! you area person that stands in good need of a basting; you’re making too free with your fun.

STALINO: Of what use is it for me to be in love, unless I’m quite ready and talkative?

But take you care that you haven’t to be sought for by me.

ALCESIMUS: I’ll be at home all the while. (Exit STALINO; ALCESIMUS goes into his house.)

(Enter CLEOSTRATA, from her house.)

CLEOSTRATA: (to herself.) This was the reason, then, i’ faith, why my husband entreated me, with such great earnestness, to make haste and invite my female neighbour to our house— that the house might be clear for him to be taking Casina there. Now, therefore, I shall by no means invite her, so that liberty of free range shan’t be any way given to worn-out bell-wethers. (ALCESIMUS is coming out of his house.) But look, the pillar of the Senate’s coming forward, the safeguard of the public, my neighbour, the person who is finding free range for my husband. I’ faith, the measure of wit that has been sold to him, was purchased at no cheap rate.

ALCESIMUS: (to himself.) I’m wondering that my wife, who’s already waiting at home, dressed out, to be sent for, hasn’t been invited by this to my neighbour’s here.

But see, here she is; she’s come to fetch her, I guess. (Going up to CLEOSTRATA.) Good day, Cleostrata!

CLEOSTRATA: And you the same, Alcesimus. Where’s your wife?

ALCESIMUS: She’s waiting in-doors for you to send for her; for your husband requested me to send her to help you. Do you wish me to call her? (Going towards the door.)

CLEOSTRATA: Let it alone; I don’t care; if she’s busy.

ALCESIMUS: She’s at leisure.

CLEOSTRATA: I don’t care about it; I don’t want to be troublesome to her; I’ll see her at a future time.

ALCESIMUS: Are you not getting ready for a wedding there at your house?

CLEOSTRATA: I am getting ready and making preparations.

ALCESIMUS: Don’t you require an assistant then?

CLEOSTRATA: We have enough at home. When the marriage has taken place, then I’ll call upon her; for the present, farewell, and bid her the same from me. (Goes into her house.)

ALCESIMUS: (to himself.) What am I to do now? To my sorrow. I’ve done a most disgraceful action for the sake of that vile and toothless goat, who has engaged me in this. I’ve promised the aid of my wife out of doors, as though to go lick dishes like a dog. A worthless fellow, to tell me that his wife was going to send for her, whereas she herself declares that she does not want her. And upon my faith, it’s a wonder if this female neighbour of mine hasn’t already her suspicions of this.

But yet, on the other hand, when I reflect with myself on this notion, if there were anything of that, there would have been enquiries of me. I’ll go in-doors, that I may lay up the ship again in the dockyard. (Goes into his house.) (Enter CLEOSTRATA, from her house.)

CLEOSTRATA: (to herself.) Now he has been finely made a fool of. In what a bustle are these unfortunate old fellows. Now I do wish that that good-for-nothing decrepit husband of mine would come, that I might make a fool of him in his turn, after I have thus fooled the other one. For I long to make a bit of a quarrel between these two. But look, he’s coming. Why, when you see him so serious, you’d think him a decent person. (She stands on one side, unseen.)

(Enter STALINO.)

STALINO: (aloud, to himself.) It’s a great folly, to my notion at least, for any man that’s in love to go to the Forum on that day on which the object which he loves is close at hand; as I in my folly have been doing; I’ve spent the day, standing pleading for a certain relative of mine, who, faith, I’m very delighted has lost his cause; so that he hasn’t for nothing chosen me as his advocate to-day.

He ought first to ask and make enquiry, whether his mind is at home or not at home, whom he’s choosing for his advocate; if he says it isn’t, without his mind he should send him off home. (Catches sight of his wife.) But look, there’s my wife before the house! Alas! wretch that I am!

I’m afraid that she isn’t deaf, and has heard this.

CLEOSTRATA: (apart.) By my troth, I have heard it to your great cost.

STALINO: I’ll go nearer to her. (Goes up to CLEOSTRATA.) What are you about, my delight?

CLEOSTRATA: I’ faith, I was waiting for you.

STALINO: Are the things ready now? Have you by this brought over here to our house this female neighbour of yours, who was to assist you?

CLEOSTRATA: I sent for her as you requested me; but this companion of yours, your very good friend, was in a pet with his wife about something, I don’t know what; he said, when I went to fetch her, that he wouldn’t send her.

STALINO: That’s your greatest fault; you are not courteous enough.

CLEOSTRATA: It’s not the part of matrons, but of harlots, to be showing courtesies, my husband, to the husbands of others. Go yourself and fetch her; I wish to attend in-doors, my husband, to what is requisite to be done.

STALINO: Make haste then.

CLEOSTRATA: Very well. (Aside.) Now, faith, I shall inspire some apprehensions in his heart.

I’ll this day render this lovesick man completely miserable. (She goes into the house.)

(Enter ALCESIMUS, from his house.)

ALCESIMUS: (to himself.) I’ll go see here if the lover has come back home from the Forum, who, an old ghost, has been making fools of myself and my wife. But see, there he is before his house. (Addressing STALINO.) I’ faith,’twas just in good time I was coming to your house.

STALINO: And, i’ faith, I to yours. How say you, you good-for-nothing fellow? What did I enjoin you? What did I beg of you?

ALCESIMUS: What’s the matter?

STALINO: How nicely you’ve had your house empty for me! How well you have sent your wife over to our house here! Isn’t it through yourself that I and the opportunity are lost, both of us?

ALCESIMUS: Why don’t you go hang yourself? Why,’twas you yourself said that your wife would come and fetch mine from our house?

STALINO: Then she declares that she has been to fetch her, and that you said you wouldn’t let her go.

ALCESIMUS: But she herself, of her own accord, said to me that she didn’t care for her assistance.

STALINO: But’tis she herself who has deputed me to come and fetch her.

ALCESIMUS: But I don’t care for that.

STALINO: But you are proving my ruin.

ALCESIMUS: But that’s as it should be. But I shall still go on delaying; but I very much long for—

STALINO: But—

ALCESIMUS: nothing but to do you some mischief;

but I’ll do it with pleasure. Never this day shall you have a but the more than I.

But, in fine, really, upon my faith, may the Gods confound you.

STALINO: What now? Are you going to send your wife to my house?

ALCESIMUS: You may take her, and be off to utter and extreme perdition, both with her and with that one of yours, and with that mistress of yours as well. A way with you, and attend to something else; I’ll at once bid my wife to pass thither through the garden to your wife.

STALINO: Now you are proving yourself a friend to me in genuine style! (ALCESIMUS goes into his house.) Under what auspices am I to say that this passion was inflicted upon me, or what have I ever done amiss towards Venus, that when I’m thus in love crosses so many should befall me in my path? (A noise is heard.) Hey day!

what’s that noise, prithee, that’s going on in our house?

(Enter PARDALISCA, running out of the house.)

PARDALISCA: (bawling out at the door.) I’m undone, I’m undone, I’m utterly, utterly ruined! My heart is deadened with fear. My limbs, in my misery, are all a-trembling! I know not whence to obtain or look for any assistance, safety, or refuge for myself, or any means of relief:

things so surprising, in a manner so surprisingly done, have I just now witnessed in-doors, a new and unusual piece of audacity. Be on your guard, Cleostrata! prithee do get away from her,lest amid such transports she may be doing you some mischief! Tear away that sword from her, who’s not in possession of her senses!

STALINO: Why, what is the matter—that she, frightened and half dead with fear, rushes hither out of doors? Pardalisca!

PARDALISCA: (looking wildly about her.) Whence do my ears catch the sound?

STALINO: Just look back at me.

PARDALISCA: My master!

STALINO: What’s the matter? What?

PARDALISCA: I’m undone.

STALINO: How undone?

PARDALISCA: I’m undone, and you are undone.

STALINO: Disclose it, what’s the matter with you?

PARDALISCA: Woe to you!

STALINO: Aye, and the same to yourself.

PARDALISCA: That I mayn’t fall down, prithee do hold, hold me. (Staggers, on which STALINO supports her.)

STALINO: Whatever it is, tell me quickly.

PARDALISCA: Do support my throbbing breast, prithee do make a little air with your cloak.

STALINO: (fanning her with the lappet of his cloak.) I’m in alarm as to what is the matter; (aside) unless this woman has been somewhere upsetting herself with the pure cream of Bacchus.

PARDALISCA: Hold my ears, pray do. (Her head falls on her shoulder.)

STALINO: Away to utter perdition; breast, ears, head, and yourself, may the Gods confound! For, unless I quickly learn from you this matter, whatever it is, I’ll forth with be knocking your brains out, you viper, you hussey, who have thus far been making a laughing-stock of me.

PARDALISCA: My master!

STALINO: What do you want, my servant?

PARDALISCA: You are too angry.

STALINO: You are saying so too soon. But whatever this is, tell it; relate in a few words what has been the disturbance in-doors.

PARDALISCA: You shall know.

Hear this most foul crime which just now in-doors at our house your female slave began to attempt after this fashion, a thing that does not befit the regulations lations of Attica.

STALINO: What is it?

PARDALISCA: Fever prevents the use of my tongue.

STALINO: What is it? Can I possibly learn from you what is the matter?

PARDALISCA: I’ll tell you. Your female slave, she whom you intend to give as a wife to your bailiff, in-doors she—

STALINO: In-doors what? What is it?

PARDALISCA: Is imitating the wicked practices of wicked women, in threatening her husband—

STALINO: What then?

PARDALISCA: Ah!

STALINO: What is it?

PARDALISCA: She says that she intends to take her husband’s life.

A sword—

STALINO: (starting.) Hah!

PARDALISCA: A sword—

STALINO: What about that sword?

PARDALISCA: She has got one.

STALINO: Ah! wretch that I am! Why has she got it?

PARDALISCA: She is pursuing them all at home all over the house, and she won’t allow any person to approach her; and so, all, hiding in chests and under beds, are mute with fear.

STALINO: I’m murdered and ruined outright! What malady is this that has so suddenly befallen her?

PARDALISCA: She is mad.

STALINO: I do think that I am the most unfortunate of men!

PARDALISCA: Aye, and if you were to know the speeches she uttered to-day.

STALINO: I long to know about what she said.

PARDALISCA: Listen.

By all the Gods and Goddesses she swore that she would murder the person with whom she should bed.

STALINO: Will she murder me?

PARDALISCA: Does that bear reference to yourself in any way?

STALINO: Pshaw!

PARDALISCA: What business have you with her?

STALINO: I made a mistake; him, the bailiff, I meant to say.

PARDALISCA: It’s on purpose that you are turning aside from the high road into bye-paths.

STALINO: Does she threaten anything against myself?

PARDALISCA: She is hostile to you individually more than any person.

STALINO: For what reason?

PARDALISCA: Because you have given her as a wife to Olympio; she says that she’ll neither suffer your life, nor her own, nor that of her husband, to be prolonged until the morrow. I have been sent hither to tell you this, that you might beware of her.

STALINO: (aside.) By my troth, to my misery I’m quite undone!

There neither is nor ever was any old man in love so wretched as I.

PARDALISCA: (aside, to the AUDIENCE.) Don’t I play him off cleverly? For everything that I’ve been telling him as taking place, I’ve been telling him falsely. My mistress and she who lives next door have concocted this scheme. I’ve been sent to fool him.

STALINO: Hark you, Pardalisca!

PARDALISCA: What is it?

STALINO: There is —

PARDALISCA: What?

STALINO: There is something that I want to enquire of you about.

PARDALISCA: You are causing me delay.

STALINO: Why, you are causing me sorrow. But has Casina got that sword even still?

PARDALISCA: She has; but two of them.

STALINO: Why two?

PARDALISCA: She says that this very day she’ll murder you with the one, the bailiff with the other.

STALINO: I am now the most utterly murdered of all people that do exist.

I’ll put on me a coat of mail; I think that’s the best. What did my wife do? Didn’t she go and take them away from her?

PARDALISCA: No person dares go near her.

STALINO: She should have prevailed on her.

PARDALISCA: She is entreating her. She declares that assuredly she will lay them down on no other terms, unless she understands that she shall not be given to the bailiff.

STALINO: But whether she likes it or no, because she refuses, she shall marry him this day. For why shouldn’t I carry this out that I’ve begun, for her to marry me?—that, indeed, I didn’t intend to say—but, our bailiff?

PARDALISCA: You’re making your mistakes pretty often.

STALINO: It’s alarm that impedes my words. But, prithee, do tell my wife, that I entreat her to prevail upon her to put down the sword, and allow me to return in-doors.

PARDALISCA: I’ll tell her.

STALINO: And do you entreat her.

PARDALISCA: And I’ll entreat her.

STALINO: And in soft language, in your usual way. But do you hear me? If you manage this, I’ll give you a pair of shoes and a gold ring for your finger, and plenty of nice things.

PARDALISCA: I’ll do my best.

STALINO: Take care and prevail.

PARDALISCA: Now then I’ll be off; unless you detain me for anything.

STALINO: Be off, and take care.

PARDALISCA: (aside.) Look, his assistant is returning, at last, with the provisions; he’s bringing a train after him. (She goes into the house.)

(Enter OLYMPIO, a COOK, and his ASSISTANTS, with provisions.)

OLYMPIO: (to the COOK.) See, you thief, that you lead on your briars beneath their banners.

A COOK: But how are they briars?

OLYMPIO: Because that which they have touched, they instantly seize hold of; if you go to snatch it from them, they instantly rend it; so, wherever they come, wherever they are, with a twofold loss do they mulct their masters.

A COOK: Heyday, indeed!

OLYMPIO: Well, well! This way I’m delaying to go meet my master with a magnificent, patrician, and patronizing air. (He struts along.)

STALINO: My good man, save you.

OLYMPIO: I admit that so I am.

STALINO: How goes it?

OLYMPIO: You are in love, but I’m hungering and thirsting.

STALINO: You have come capitally provided.

OLYMPIO: Pooh! pooh! (Goes towards the door.)

STALINO: But stop you, although you do hold me in contempt—

OLYMPIO: O dear, O dear! your converse has a bad smell to me. (Moving away.)

STALINO: What’s the matter?

OLYMPIO: (pointing to the baskets of provisions.) That’s the matter.

STALINO: Will you not stop there?

OLYMPIO: Why, really, you are causing me ennui.

STALINO: I shall be giving you a grand coup, I fancy, if you don’t stand still forthwith. (Catches hold of him.)

OLYMPIO: O mon Dieu! Can’t you get away from me, unless you would like me to be sick just now?

STALINO: Do stop a bit.

OLYMPIO: How’s this? (Staring at him.) What person’s this?

STALINO: I’m your master.

OLYMPIO: What master?

STALINO: He whose slave you are.

OLYMPIO: I, a slave?

STALINO: Aye, and mine.

OLYMPIO: Am I not a free man? Remember! remember!

STALINO: Stop and stay you there! (Catches hold of him.)

OLYMPIO: Let me alone.

STALINO: I am your slave.

OLYMPIO: That’s very good.

STALINO: My dear little Olympio, my father, my patron, I do beg of you—

OLYMPIO: Well, you certainly are in your senses.

STALINO: Of course I am your slave.

OLYMPIO: What need have I of so worthless a slave?

STALINO: Well now, how soon are you going to provide me some amusement?

OLYMPIO: If the dinner were but drest.

STALINO: Then let them be off this instant in-doors. (To the COOK and his ASSISTANTS.) Go you into the house and despatch with all haste.

I’ll come in just now. Have the dinner charmingly sauced up for me; I want to have a charming meal. I really don’t care, now, to be eating in the style of your sumptuous foreigners. Be off, will you; but for the present, however, I take up my abode here. (The COOK and his ASSISTANTS go into the house.)

OLYMPIO: Is there anything that detains you here?

STALINO: The servant-maid says that Casina has got a sword in-doors, to deprive you and me of life with it.

OLYMPIO: I understand it. Just let her alone with it. They are imposing on you: I know these worthless baggages. However, do you now go into the house with me.

STALINO: But, i’ faith, I’m fearful of mischief:

only do you go. Reconnoitre, first, what’s going on within.

OLYMPIO: My life’s as dear to me as yours is to you.

STALINO: But only do go now.

OLYMPIO: If you’ll go yourself, I’ll go in with you. (They go into the house.)