William Shakespeare: Much Ado About Nothing

ACT 2.
3. Scene III. LEONATO'S Garden. (continued)

DON PEDRO.
Come, shall we hear this music?

CLAUDIO.
Yea, my good lord.
How still the evening is,
As hush'd on purpose to grace harmony!

DON PEDRO.
See you where Benedick hath hid himself?

CLAUDIO.
O! very well, my lord: the music ended,
We'll fit the kid-fox with a penny-worth.

DON PEDRO.
Come, Balthazar, we'll hear that song again.

BALTHAZAR.
O! good my lord, tax not so bad a voice
To slander music any more than once.

DON PEDRO.
It is the witness still of excellency,
To put a strange face on his own perfection.
I pray thee, sing, and let me woo no more.

BALTHAZAR.
Because you talk of wooing, I will sing;
Since many a wooer doth commence his suit
To her he thinks not worthy; yet he wooes;
Yet will he swear he loves.

DON PEDRO.
Nay, pray thee come;
Or if thou wilt hold longer argument,
Do it in notes.

BALTHAZAR.
Note this before my notes;
There's not a note of mine that's worth the noting.

DON PEDRO.
Why these are very crotchets that he speaks;
Notes, notes, forsooth, and nothing!

[Music.]

BENEDICK.
Now, divine air! now is his soul ravished! Is it not strange that
sheep's gutsshould hale souls out of men's bodies? Well, a horn for
my money, when all's done.

[Balthasar sings.]
   Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more,
     Men were deceivers ever;
   One foot in sea, and one on shore,
     To one thing constant never.
       Then sigh not so,
       But let them go,
     And be you blithe and bonny,
   Converting all your sounds of woe
     Into Hey nonny, nonny.

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