Measure for Measure by William Shakespeare
Act 4 - Scene 2
A room in the prison.
Provost : Come hither, sirrah. Can you cut off a man's head?
Pompey : If the man be a bachelor, sir, I can; but if he be a
[p]married man,
he's his wife's head, and I can never
[p]cut off a woman's head.
Provost : Come, sir, leave me your snatches, and yield me a
[p]direct answer.
To-morrow morning are to die Claudio
[p]and Barnardine. Here is in our
prison a common
[p]executioner, who in his office lacks a helper:
if
[p]you will take it on you to assist him, it shall
[p]redeem you
from your gyves; if not, you shall have
[p]your full time of
imprisonment and your deliverance
[p]with an unpitied whipping, for
you have been a
[p]notorious bawd.
Pompey : Sir, I have been an unlawful bawd time out of mind;
[p]but yet I will
be content to be a lawful hangman. I
[p]would be glad to receive some
instruction from my
[p]fellow partner.
Provost : What, ho! Abhorson! Where's Abhorson, there?
Abhorson : Do you call, sir?
Provost : Sirrah, here's a fellow will help you to-morrow in
[p]your execution.
If you think it meet, compound with
[p]him by the year, and let him
abide here with you; if
[p]not, use him for the present and dismiss
him. He
[p]cannot plead his estimation with you; he hath been a bawd.
Abhorson : A bawd, sir? fie upon him! he will discredit our mystery.
Provost : Go to, sir; you weigh equally; a feather will turn
[p]the scale.
Pompey : Pray, sir, by your good favour,--for surely, sir, a
[p]good favour you
have, but that you have a hanging
[p]look,--do you call, sir, your
occupation a mystery?
Abhorson : Ay, sir; a mystery
Pompey : Painting, sir, I have heard say, is a mystery; and
[p]your whores,
sir, being members of my occupation,
[p]using painting, do prove my
occupation a mystery:
[p]but what mystery there should be in hanging,
if I
[p]should be hanged, I cannot imagine.
Abhorson : Sir, it is a mystery.
Pompey : Proof?
Abhorson : Every true man's apparel fits your thief: if it be
[p]too little for
your thief, your true man thinks it
[p]big enough; if it be too big
for your thief, your
[p]thief thinks it little enough: so every true
man's
[p]apparel fits your thief.
Provost : Are you agreed?
Pompey : Sir, I will serve him; for I do find your hangman is
[p]a more
penitent trade than your bawd; he doth
[p]oftener ask forgiveness.
Provost : You, sirrah, provide your block and your axe
[p]to-morrow four
o'clock.
Abhorson : Come on, bawd; I will instruct thee in my trade; follow.
Pompey : I do desire to learn, sir: and I hope, if you have
[p]occasion to use
me for your own turn, you shall find
[p]me yare; for truly, sir, for
your kindness I owe you
[p]a good turn.
Provost : Call hither Barnardine and Claudio:
[p][Exeunt POMPEY and
ABHORSON]
[p]The one has my pity; not a jot the other,
[p]Being a
murderer, though he were my brother.
[p][Enter CLAUDIO]
[p]Look,
here's the warrant, Claudio, for thy death:
[p]'Tis now dead midnight,
and by eight to-morrow
[p]Thou must be made immortal. Where's
Barnardine?
Claudio : As fast lock'd up in sleep as guiltless labour
[p]When it lies starkly
in the traveller's bones:
[p]He will not wake.
Provost : Who can do good on him?
[p]Well, go, prepare yourself.
[p][Knocking
within]
[p]But, hark, what noise?
[p]Heaven give your spirits
comfort!
[p][Exit CLAUDIO]
[p]By and by.
[p]I hope it is some pardon
or reprieve
[p]For the most gentle Claudio.
[p][Enter DUKE VINCENTIO
disguised as before]
[p]Welcome father.
Vincentio : The best and wholesomest spirts of the night
[p]Envelope you, good
Provost! Who call'd here of late?
Provost : None, since the curfew rung.
Vincentio : Not Isabel?
Provost : No.
Vincentio : They will, then, ere't be long.
Provost : What comfort is for Claudio?
Vincentio : There's some in hope.
Provost : It is a bitter deputy.
Vincentio : Not so, not so; his life is parallel'd
[p]Even with the stroke and
line of his great justice:
[p]He doth with holy abstinence
subdue
[p]That in himself which he spurs on his power
[p]To qualify in
others: were he meal'd with that
[p]Which he corrects, then were he
tyrannous;
[p]But this being so, he's just.
[p][Knocking
within]
[p]Now are they come.
[p][Exit Provost]
[p]This is a gentle
provost: seldom when
[p]The steeled gaoler is the friend of
men.
[p][Knocking within]
[p]How now! what noise? That spirit's
possessed with haste
[p]That wounds the unsisting postern with these
strokes.
Provost : There he must stay until the officer
[p]Arise to let him in: he is
call'd up.
Vincentio : Have you no countermand for Claudio yet,
[p]But he must die
to-morrow?
Provost : None, sir, none.
Vincentio : As near the dawning, provost, as it is,
[p]You shall hear more ere
morning.
Provost : Happily
[p]You something know; yet I believe there comes
[p]No
countermand; no such example have we:
[p]Besides, upon the very siege
of justice
[p]Lord Angelo hath to the public ear
[p]Profess'd the
contrary.
[p][Enter a Messenger]
[p]This is his lordship's man.
Vincentio : And here comes Claudio's pardon.
Messenger : [Giving a paper]
[p]My lord hath sent you this note; and by me
this
[p]further charge, that you swerve not from the
[p]smallest
article of it, neither in time, matter, or
[p]other circumstance. Good
morrow; for, as I take it,
[p]it is almost day.
Provost : I shall obey him.
Vincentio : [Aside] This is his pardon, purchased by such sin
[p]For which the
pardoner himself is in.
[p]Hence hath offence his quick
celerity,
[p]When it is born in high authority:
[p]When vice makes
mercy, mercy's so extended,
[p]That for the fault's love is the
offender friended.
[p]Now, sir, what news?
Provost : I told you. Lord Angelo, belike thinking me remiss
[p]in mine office,
awakens me with this unwonted
[p]putting-on; methinks strangely, for
he hath not used it before.
Vincentio : Pray you, let's hear.
Provost : [Reads]
[p]'Whatsoever you may hear to the contrary, let
[p]Claudio be
executed by four of the clock; and in the
[p]afternoon Barnardine: for
my better satisfaction,
[p]let me have Claudio's head sent me by five.
Let
[p]this be duly performed; with a thought that more
[p]depends on
it than we must yet deliver. Thus fail
[p]not to do your office, as
you will answer it at your peril.'
[p]What say you to this, sir?
Vincentio : What is that Barnardine who is to be executed in the
[p]afternoon?
Provost : A Bohemian born, but here nursed un and bred; one
[p]that is a
prisoner nine years old.
Vincentio : How came it that the absent duke had not either
[p]delivered him to
his liberty or executed him? I
[p]have heard it was ever his manner to
do so.
Provost : His friends still wrought reprieves for him: and,
[p]indeed, his fact,
till now in the government of Lord
[p]Angelo, came not to an
undoubtful proof.
Vincentio : It is now apparent?
Provost : Most manifest, and not denied by himself.
Vincentio : Hath he born himself penitently in prison? how
[p]seems he to be
touched?
Provost : A man that apprehends death no more dreadfully but
[p]as a drunken
sleep; careless, reckless, and fearless
[p]of what's past, present, or
to come; insensible of
[p]mortality, and desperately mortal.
Vincentio : He wants advice.
Provost : He will hear none: he hath evermore had the liberty
[p]of the prison;
give him leave to escape hence, he
[p]would not: drunk many times a
day, if not many days
[p]entirely drunk. We have very oft awaked him,
as if
[p]to carry him to execution, and showed him a
seeming
[p]warrant for it: it hath not moved him at all.
Vincentio : More of him anon. There is written in your brow,
[p]provost, honesty
and constancy: if I read it not
[p]truly, my ancient skill beguiles
me; but, in the
[p]boldness of my cunning, I will lay myself in
hazard.
[p]Claudio, whom here you have warrant to execute, is
[p]no
greater forfeit to the law than Angelo who hath
[p]sentenced him. To
make you understand this in a
[p]manifested effect, I crave but four
days' respite;
[p]for the which you are to do me both a present and
a
[p]dangerous courtesy.
Provost : Pray, sir, in what?
Vincentio : In the delaying death.
Provost : A lack, how may I do it, having the hour limited,
[p]and an express
command, under penalty, to deliver
[p]his head in the view of Angelo?
I may make my case
[p]as Claudio's, to cross this in the smallest.
Vincentio : By the vow of mine order I warrant you, if my
[p]instructions may be
your guide. Let this Barnardine
[p]be this morning executed, and his
head born to Angelo.
Provost : Angelo hath seen them both, and will discover the favour.
Vincentio : O, death's a great disguiser; and you may add to it.
[p]Shave the
head, and tie the beard; and say it was
[p]the desire of the penitent
to be so bared before his
[p]death: you know the course is common. If
any thing
[p]fall to you upon this, more than thanks and
good
[p]fortune, by the saint whom I profess, I will plead
[p]against
it with my life.
Provost : Pardon me, good father; it is against my oath.
Vincentio : Were you sworn to the duke, or to the deputy?
Provost : To him, and to his substitutes.
Vincentio : You will think you have made no offence, if the duke
[p]avouch the
justice of your dealing?
Provost : But what likelihood is in that?
Vincentio : Not a resemblance, but a certainty. Yet since I see
[p]you fearful,
that neither my coat, integrity, nor
[p]persuasion can with ease
attempt you, I will go
[p]further than I meant, to pluck all fears out
of you.
[p]Look you, sir, here is the hand and seal of the
[p]duke:
you know the character, I doubt not; and the
[p]signet is not strange
to you.
Provost : I know them both.
Vincentio : The contents of this is the return of the duke: you
[p]shall anon
over-read it at your pleasure; where you
[p]shall find, within these
two days he will be here.
[p]This is a thing that Angelo knows not;
for he this
[p]very day receives letters of strange
tenor;
[p]perchance of the duke's death; perchance entering
[p]into
some monastery; but, by chance, nothing of what
[p]is writ. Look, the
unfolding star calls up the
[p]shepherd. Put not yourself into
amazement how these
[p]things should be: all difficulties are but
easy
[p]when they are known. Call your executioner, and off
[p]with
Barnardine's head: I will give him a present
[p]shrift and advise him
for a better place. Yet you
[p]are amazed; but this shall absolutely
resolve you.
[p]Come away; it is almost clear dawn.
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Next: Act 4 - Scene 3
