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All’s Well That Ends Well
Contents:
Scene 2
Rousillon. The Count’s palace.
Enter COUNTESS and Clown
COUNTESSCome on, sir; I shall now put you to the height of
your breeding.
ClownI will show myself highly fed and lowly taught: I
know my business is but to the court.
COUNTESSTo the court! why, what place make you special,
when you put off that with such contempt? But to the court!
ClownTruly, madam, if God have lent a man any manners, he
may easily put it off at court: he that cannot make
a leg, put off’s cap, kiss his hand and say nothing,
has neither leg, hands, lip, nor cap; and indeed
such a fellow, to say precisely, were not for the
court; but for me, I have an answer will serve all
men.
COUNTESSMarry, that’s a bountiful answer that fits all
questions.
ClownIt is like a barber’s chair that fits all buttocks,
the pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawn
buttock, or any buttock.
COUNTESSWill your answer serve fit to all questions?
ClownAs fit as ten groats is for the hand of an attorney,
as your French crown for your taffeta punk, as Tib’s
rush for Tom’s forefinger, as a pancake for Shrove
Tuesday, a morris for May-day, as the nail to his
hole, the cuckold to his horn, as a scolding queen
to a wrangling knave, as the nun’s lip to the
friar’s mouth, nay, as the pudding to his skin.
COUNTESSHave you, I say, an answer of such fitness for all
questions?
ClownFrom below your duke to beneath your constable, it
will fit any question.
COUNTESSIt must be an answer of most monstrous size that
must fit all demands.
ClownBut a trifle neither, in good faith, if the learned
should speak truth of it: here it is, and all that
belongs to’t. Ask me if I am a courtier: it shall
do you no harm to learn.
COUNTESSTo be young again, if we could: I will be a fool in
question, hoping to be the wiser by your answer. I
pray you, sir, are you a courtier?
ClownO Lord, sir! There’s a simple putting off. More,
more, a hundred of them.
COUNTESSSir, I am a poor friend of yours, that loves you.
ClownO Lord, sir! Thick, thick, spare not me.
COUNTESSI think, sir, you can eat none of this homely meat.
ClownO Lord, sir! Nay, put me to’t, I warrant you.
COUNTESSYou were lately whipped, sir, as I think.
ClownO Lord, sir! spare not me.
COUNTESSDo you cry, ’O Lord, sir!’ at your whipping, and
’spare not me?’ Indeed your ’O Lord, sir!’ is very
sequent to your whipping: you would answer very well
to a whipping, if you were but bound to’t.
ClownI ne’er had worse luck in my life in my ’O Lord,
sir!’ I see things may serve long, but not serve ever.
COUNTESSI play the noble housewife with the time
To entertain’t so merrily with a fool.
ClownO Lord, sir! why, there’t serves well again.
COUNTESSAn end, sir; to your business. Give Helen this,
And urge her to a present answer back:
Commend me to my kinsmen and my son:
This is not much.
ClownNot much commendation to them.
COUNTESSNot much employment for you: you understand me?
ClownMost fruitfully: I am there before my legs.
COUNTESSHaste you again.
Exeunt severally
Contents:
Chicago: William Shakespeare, "Act 2, Scene 2," All’s Well That Ends Well in Original Sources, accessed April 18, 2024, http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=DCNV33K77QGW1VW.
MLA: Shakespeare, William. "Act 2, Scene 2." All’s Well That Ends Well, in , Original Sources. 18 Apr. 2024. http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=DCNV33K77QGW1VW.
Harvard: Shakespeare, W, 'Act 2, Scene 2' in All’s Well That Ends Well. cited in , . Original Sources, retrieved 18 April 2024, from http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=DCNV33K77QGW1VW.
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