LUCIO.
I’ll be hanged first! Thou art deceived in me, friar. But no more of this. Canst thou tell if Claudio die tomorrow or no?
DUKE.
Why should he die, sir?
LUCIO.
Why? For filling a bottle with a tun-dish. I would the Duke we talk of were returned again. This ungenitured agent will unpeople the province with continency. Sparrows must not build in his house-eaves because they are lecherous. The Duke yet would have dark deeds darkly answered. He would never bring them to light. Would he were returned! Marry, this Claudio is condemned for untrussing. Farewell, good friar, I prithee pray for me. The Duke, I say to thee again, would eat mutton on Fridays. He’s now past it; yet, and, I say to thee, he would mouth with a beggar though she smelt brown bread and garlic. Say that I said so. Farewell.
[Exit.]
DUKE.
No might nor greatness in mortality
Can censure ’scape. Back-wounding calumny
The whitest virtue strikes. What king so strong
Can tie the gall up in the slanderous tongue?
But who comes here?
Enter Escalus, Provost and Officers with Mistress Overdone, a Bawd.
ESCALUS.
Go, away with her to prison.
BAWD.
Good my lord, be good to me. Your honour is accounted a merciful man, good my lord.
ESCALUS.
Double and treble admonition, and still forfeit in the same kind? This would make mercy swear and play the tyrant.
PROVOST.
A bawd of eleven years’ continuance, may it please your honour.