BEATRICE	Nor will you not tell me who you are?

BENEDICK	Not now.

BEATRICE	That I was disdainful, and that I had my good wit
	out of the 'Hundred Merry Tales:'--well this was
	Signior Benedick that said so.

BENEDICK	What's he?

BEATRICE	I am sure you know him well enough.

BENEDICK	Not I, believe me.

BEATRICE	Did he never make you laugh?

BENEDICK	I pray you, what is he?

BEATRICE	Why, he is the prince's jester: a very dull fool;
	only his gift is in devising impossible slanders:
	none but libertines delight in him; and the
	commendation is not in his wit, but in his villany;
	for he both pleases men and angers them, and then
	they laugh at him and beat him. I am sure he is in
	the fleet: I would he had boarded me.

BENEDICK	When I know the gentleman, I'll tell him what you say.

BEATRICE	Do, do: he'll but break a comparison or two on me;
	which, peradventure not marked or not laughed at,
	strikes him into melancholy; and then there's a
	partridge wing saved, for the fool will eat no
	supper that night.

	[Music]

	We must follow the leaders.

BENEDICK	In every good thing.

BEATRICE	Nay, if they lead to any ill, I will leave them at
	the next turning.

	[Dance. Then exeunt all except DON JOHN, BORACHIO,
	and CLAUDIO]

DON JOHN	Sure my brother is amorous on Hero and hath
	withdrawn her father to break with him about it.
	The ladies follow her and but one visor remains.

BORACHIO	And that is Claudio: I know him by his bearing.

DON JOHN	Are not you Signior Benedick?

CLAUDIO	You know me well; I am he.

DON JOHN	Signior, you are very near my brother in his love:
	he is enamoured on Hero; I pray you, dissuade him
	from her: she is no equal for his birth: you may
	do the part of an honest man in it.

CLAUDIO	How know you he loves her?

DON JOHN	I heard him swear his affection.

BORACHIO	So did I too; and he swore he would marry her to-night.

DON JOHN	Come, let us to the banquet.

	[Exeunt DON JOHN and BORACHIO]

CLAUDIO	Thus answer I in the name of Benedick,
	But hear these ill news with the ears of Claudio.
	'Tis certain so; the prince wooes for himself.
	Friendship is constant in all other things
	Save in the office and affairs of love:
	Therefore, all hearts in love use their own tongues;
	Let every eye negotiate for itself
	And trust no agent; for beauty is a witch
	Against whose charms faith melteth into blood.
	This is an accident of hourly proof,
	Which I mistrusted not. Farewell, therefore, Hero!

	[Re-enter BENEDICK]

BENEDICK	Count Claudio?

CLAUDIO	Yea, the same.

BENEDICK	Come, will you go with me?

CLAUDIO	Whither?

BENEDICK	Even to the next willow, about your own business,
	county. What fashion will you wear the garland of?
	about your neck, like an usurer's chain? or under
	your arm, like a lieutenant's scarf? You must wear
	it one way, for the prince hath got your Hero.

CLAUDIO	I wish him joy of her.