Albeit, my wrongs might make one wifer mad. This woman lock'd me out this day from dinner : That goldfmith there, were he not pack'd with

her,

Could witnefs it, for he was with me then;
Who parted with me to go fetch a chain,
Promifing to bring it to the Porcupine,
Where Balthazar and I did dine together.
Our dinner done, and he not coming thither,
I went to feek him: in the street I met him;
And in his company, that gentleman.

There did this perjur'd goldsmith fwear me down,
That I this day of him receiv'd the chain,
Which, God he knows, I faw not: for the which,
He did arreft me with an officer.

I did obey; and sent my peasant home

For certain ducats: he with none return'd. ·
Then fairly I bespoke the officer,

Το go in perfon with me to my house.

By the way we met

My wife, her fifter, and a rabble more

Of vile confederates; along with them

They brought one Pinch; a hungry lean-faced villain,

A meer anatomy, a mountebank,

A thread-bare juggler, and a fortune-teller ;
A needy, hollow-ey'd, fharp-looking wretch,
A living dead man: this pernicious flave,
Forfooth, took on him as a conjurer;

And, gazing in mine eyes, feeling my pulse,
And with no face, as 'twere, outfacing me,
Cries out, I was poffefs'd: then altogether

2 A living dead man:] This thought appears to have been bor rowed from Sackvil's Induction to the Mirror for Magiftrates: but as a lyuing death,

"So ded aline of life hee drew the breath." STEEVENS.

They fell upon me, bound me, bore me thence;
And in a dark and dankish vault at home
There left me and my man, both bound together;
Till gnawing with my teeth my bonds in funder,
I gain'd my freedom, and immediately

Ran hither to your grace; whom I beseech
To give me ample fatisfaction

For these deep fhames and great indignities.

ANG. My lord, in truth, thus far I witness with

him;

That he dined not at home, but was lock'd out. DUKE. But had he such a chain of thee, or no? ANG. He had, my lord: and when he ran in here,

These people faw the chain about his neck.

MER. Befides, I will be fworn, these ears of

mine

Heard you confefs, you had the chain of him,
After you firft forfwore it on the mart,
And, thereupon, I drew my fword on you;
And then you fled into this abbey here,

From whence, I think, you are come by miracle.
ANT. E. I never came within these abbey walls,
Nor ever didst thou draw thy fword on me:
I never faw the chain, fo help me heaven!
And this is falfe, you burden me withal.

DUKE. Why, what an intricate impeach is this!
I think, you all have drank of Circe's cup.
If here you hous'd him, here he would have been ;
If he were mad, he would not plead fo coldly :-
You fay, he dined at home; the goldsmith here
Denies that faying:-Sirrah, what say you?

DRO. E. Sir, he dined with her there, at the Por

cupine.

COUR. He did; and from my finger snatch'd that

ring.

ANT. E. 'Tis true, my liege, this ring I had of her.

DUKE, Saw'st thou him enter at the abbey here? COUR. As fure, my liege, as I do fee your grace.

DUKE. Why, this is ftrange :-Go call the abbefs hither;

I think, you are all mated,' or stark mad.

[Exit an Attendant. EGE. Moft mighty duke, vouchfafe me fpeak a

word;

Haply, I fee a friend will fave my life,
And pay the fum that may deliver me.

DUKE. Speak freely, Syracufan, what thou wilt. EGE. Is not your name, fir, call'd Antipholus ? And is not that your bondman Dromio?

DRO. E. Within this hour I was his bondman, fir,

But he, I thank him, gnaw'd in two my cords;
Now am I Dromio, and his man, unbound.

EGE. I am fure, you both of you remember me, DRO. E. Ourfelves we do remember, fir, by you;

For lately we were bound, as you are now.

You are not Pinch's patient, are you, fir?

EGE. Why look you ftrange on me? you know

me well.

ANT. E. I never faw you in my life, till now.

EGE. Oh! grief hath chang'd me,

me laft;

fince you
you faw

And careful hours, with Time's deformed hand
Have written ftrange defeatures in my face:
But tell me yet, doft thou not know my voice?

ANT. E. Neither.

EGE.

Dromio, nor thou?

DRO. E. No, trust me, fir, nor I.

EGE.

I am fure, thou doft.

DRO. E. Ay, fir? but I am fure, I do not; and whatsoever a man denies, you are now bound to believe him."

ÆGE. Not know my voice! O, time's extre

mity!

Haft thou fo crack'd and splitted my poor tongue, In seven short years, that here my only fon

4 — deformed —] For deforming. STEEVENS.

5 frange defeatures-] Defeature is the privative of feature. The meaning is, time hath cancelled my features. JOHNSON. Defeatures are undoings, miscarriages, misfortunes; from defaire, Fr. So, in Daniel's Complaint of Rofamond, 1599:

"The day before the night of my defeature, (i. e. undoing.) "He greets me with a casket richly wrought."

The fenfe is, I am deformed, undone, by mifery. Misfortune has left its impreffion on my face. STEEVENS.

Defeature is, I think, alteration of feature, marks of deformity, So, in our author's Venus and Adonis :

66

to cross the curious workmanship of nature, "To mingle beauty with infirmities,

"And pure perfection with impure defeature." MALONE. Defeatures are certainly neither more nor less than features; as demerits are neither more nor lefs than merits. Time, fays Ægeon, hath placed new and ftrange features in my face; i. e. given it quite a different appearance: no wonder therefore thou doft not know

me.

6

RITSON.

you are now bound to believe him.] Dromio is ftill quibbling on his favourite topick. See p. 308. MALONE,

8

Knows not my feeble key of untun'd cares?*
Though now this grained face of mine be hid
In fap-confuming winter's drizzled fnow,
And all the conduits of my blood froze up;
Yet hath my night of life fome memory,
My wafting lamps fome fading glimmer left,
My dull deaf ears a little use to hear:
All these old witneffes (I cannot err,)"
Tell me, thou art my fon Antipholus.

ANT. E. I never faw my father in my life.
EGE. But feven years fince, in Syracufa, boy,
Thou know'ft, we parted: but, perhaps, my fon,
Thou sham'ft to acknowledge me in mifery.

ANT. E. The duke, and all that know me in the city,

Can witnefs with me that it is not fo;

I ne'er faw Syracufa in my life.

. DUKE. I tell thee, Syracufan, twenty years Have I been patron to Antipholus,

my feeble key of untun'd cares?] i. e. the weak and difcordant tone of my voice that is changed by grief. DOUCE. this grained face —] i. e. furrow'd, like the grain of wood. So, in Coriolanus:

my grained ash." STEEVENS.

9 All these old witnesses (I cannot err,)] I believe fhould be read: All thefe hold witnesses I cannot err.

i. e. all these continue to teftify that I cannot err, and tell me, &c. WARBURTON.

The old reading is the true one, as well as the most poetical. The words I cannot err, fhould be thrown into a parenthesis. By old avitneffes I believe he means experienced, accuftom'd ones, which are therefore lefs likely to err. So, in The Tempeft:

"If thefe be true fpies that I wear in my head," &c.

Again, in Titus Andronicus, sc. ult:

"But if my frofty figns and chaps of age,

"Grave witnesses of true experience," &c, STEEVENS.