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ACT IV, SCENE i
PETRUS THE PEDAGOGUE, STRAGALCIUS THE SERVANT

PET. Hey, hey, Stragalcius.
STRA. Who’s calling me?
PET. Ho there, to me.
STRA. Must I listen to you? Why do you want me to obey you?
PET. You’re a fine servant! When you are following your master, you’re all devoted to “either hit the bottle or hit the road.”
STRA. Would that this fellow were covered in pitch and gunpowder and I had a torch in my hand! How cheerfully I’d blow up the pedagogue!
PET. What are you saying, you who don’t know the Greek alphabet?
STRA. This what you hear.
PET. Drunkard! Drunkard!
STRA. Preceptor! Preceptor!
PET. If you don’t keep silent about that “preceptor,” you’ll get a whipping.
STRA. I beg you, preceptor —
PET. Let me find your master.
STRA. Let me find his father.
PET. What father? He can’t help or hinder me.
STRA. Nor can you reveal anything to my master.
PET. Except for your thefts, your plundering, and your drunkenness.
STRA. Shall I not tell the old man what a whoremaster, a dicer, a liar, a show-off, an impostor you are?
PET. Whew, literature is held as valueless or of no account. Do you remember whom you said I was just now? I am well known, thanks be to the gods, nor am I minded to squabble any further with the likes of yourself.
STRA. Of course the son of a stable-boy doesn’t want to squabble with the likes of myself! Nowadays if someone can discern a masculine and a feminine, even if his father is a common worker, a butcher or a fishmonger, suddenly he rises up a great man, and everybody greets him as “excellent master.”
PET. Oh you unhappy philosophy, who have appeared in the mouth of a donkey. Drunkard, now I see that there’s need for you to betake yourself to Scipio’s dream. If you don’t do so, there’s a place in the jail called the Tullianum.
STRA. How learned the rascal is!
PET. I’m leaving here. This man must be pardoned, for he’s sick.
STRA. How similar this pedagogue is to my mother! I remember, when I was once a little boy, when my father was angry she was always more fawning than a dog, but if my father were to become deferent, with voice and vigor she’d strike like a snake. Unless I had paid back like with like, the pedagogue would have made me his whipping-boy. But he’s of a reasonably mild disposition, for after an hour he’s never angry at me.
PET. Now I’ll follow after Fabricius towards the Cathedral, where this morning he told the innkeeper he was going.

ACT IV, SCENE ii
GERARDUS, VIRGINIUS, THE PEDAGOGUE

GER. Is there nothing more I should say about the dowry, Virginius?
VIR. Nothing.
GER. But you’ll give me a thousand florins unless your son returns. You remember?
VIR. So much so that you needn’t remind me.
PET. I’ll keep an eye out to see if I can find Fabricius anywhere.
GER. Who’s that man with a long tunic and dangling dagger? Pray, is he a soothsayer or a cutpurse? The more I look him over, the less I like the man’s face. How he peers and looks around at each thing! I imagine he’s scouting out places where he can soon come to steal.
PET. Either I’m mistaken, or I’m not seeing this man for the first time.
VIR. Why are you staring at me so fixedly, my man?
GER. Be sure he’s not staring more fixedly at your wallet.
PET. I wished to ask you, good sir, to ask quickly or to inquire where a certain Virginius dwells.
VIR. If I point out the man whom you are seeking, will I receive any thanks from you? But perhaps you wish to be entertained by him, and if your doing this, don’t waste your effort. For I, who am a close friend of his, avow on his behalf that at this time he has no time for entertaining guests.
PET. [Aside.] Am I seeing clearly with my eyes? Is this him himself? Isn’t it? Surely it’s him, it’s him for certain. Gods of sea and sky! [Aloud.] Oh my most longed-for patron, greetings.
VIR. Who may you be? Not Petrus the pedagogue? Oh, a man’s happy day! Greetings, friend, there’s nobody in the world whom I’d rather see now. But where’s my son? [Aside.] Good Hope, I beg you, come to my aid. [Aloud.] Where did you leave him? Where was he killed. Oh me, a poor, unfortunate old man! Was I not born for bereavement?
PET. Don’t mourn, patron.
VIR. Why should I not mourn? Ah, Gerardus my son-in-law, this is the man who went away and lived together with my son. But where is my son? Ah, master Petrus! Ah my son, why am I your survivor? I’m an ungrateful father. I’ll go there where you died, I’ll be buried together with you, unless by an unhappy lot you lack a tomb. Tell me, Petrus, whether my son is buried?
PET. But why is he buried?
VIR. Ah, you ask? Rather, give me a dagger. I’m a Roman, I’ll die in the Roman way.
PET. But better to calm your heaving commotions. Fabricius is alive, and he breathes the air of the sky.
VIR. He’s alive? Hurray, you’ve splashed me with water!
GER. What do I hear? Haven’t I lost a thousand florins.
VIR. He’s healthy, too?
PET. He’s healthy and he takes very good care of his constitution.
VIR. With good reason I’ve always valued you most greatly, Petrus. You’ve given me back my mind. There’s great joy in your news.
GER. But not for me. But, Virginius, do you know this man well enough? Beware of flatteries.
VIR. Come, continue, I pray. My mind’s eager to learn how the thing happened, after my son was taken captive.
GER. Will you trust what this man says?
VIR. Petrus, the gods want me to be saved.
GER. But me to be ruined.
VIR. But you continue, I pray you. How was he treated by the enemy, those dogs? Very unkindly?
PET. He couldn’t have been treated better by his friends.
VIR. May the gods treat them well! And where is he right now?
PET. He came into the city with me.
VIR. He came?
GER. That’s the thing. Didn’t I tell you he’s a deceptor?
PET. But I tell you, whoever you are, I’m a preceptor, not a deceptor.
VIR. Now I’m lucky. With this pleasure I put to sleep the miseries of many years. All you gods and goddesses, deservedly I am most grateful to you, since you have visited me with so much happiness and such joys that my son would return into my power. But at what place in the city is he?
PET. At the inn of The Fool.
GER. It’s all over. Now farewell, you thousand florins. Today I think of you for the last time. But the pretty bride I’m going marry consoles me.
VIR. Let’s go, I pray, to see him, so I may hold him in my embrace.
PET. Let’s go.
VIR He’s grown much, hasn’t he?
PET. Somewhat.
VIR. But, master, my friend, I’ve not yet shaken your hand.
PET. I’ll tell you, and tell you truly, I’ve done your son many services, of which this not the time to tell you.
VIR. You won’t find me ungrateful.
PET. I scarcely fear that. Certainly he is possessed of a quite acute and docile mind.
VIR. So I imagine.
PET. If he were to continue in his study of literature up to my age, he wouldn’t be much my inferior in learning.
VIR. Really? Hercules, I’m happy for my son’s sake.
PET. I have not employed the common method of instruction. Whenever he did something well I always used to remind him of you, and told him to be like his father; when he did something amiss, I immediately called him degenerate.
VIR. What then?
PET. Why do you ask. He straightway broke into tears. For him, this word was as good as six hundred lashes.
VIR. How noble he is! I give you thanks, preceptor.
PET. Pish, dismiss, dismiss these things, you’ve not yet heard everything. But behold the inn.
VIR. You’ll call him out so I can see whether he recognizes me.
PET. It’s not long since he went out of the inn. I’ll look inside to see if he’s come back.
GER. Because of the happiness that’s befalling him this gentleman does not remember to invite his friends along. But I’ll go along, since he’s my future father-in-law.

ACT IV, SCENE iii
PETRUS, STRAGALCIUS, GERARDUS, VIRGINIUS, BRULIO

PET. Hey Stragalcius, Stragalcius, has Fabricius come back?
STRA. Not yet.
PET. Come here, here’s somebody that wants to meet you.
STRA. There’s also a convenient place he can take a walk.
PET. But I’ve found the old man, I tell you, the father of your master.
STRA. That’s good. And has your anger come off its boil?
PET. I can’t sustain my anger against you for long.
STRA. Where is he?
VIR. Stragalcius, are you in good health?
STRA. What are you? Are you a physician, pray tell?
PET. A physician? I tell you, he’s Master’s father. Give him your hand.
STRA. Is this our master’s father? How old is he?
PET. Go out, silly, and greet him dutifully.
STRA. Old man, I greet you dutifully. By Hercules, you’ve come along at just the right moment to pay the innkeeper on our behalf.
PET. Indeed this man was a good and faithful servant to your son, as good as the best.
STRA. How so? Am I not so?
PET I don’t say that.
VIR. May the gods treat you well, my Stragalcius. Ask any gift of me you want and you’ll get your wish.
STRA. Rather tell me, you are my master’s father?
VIR. I am.
STRA. I love you, give me any command you wish, I’ll do it for you.
VIR. I’m grateful, Stragalcius. And I promise the same to you.
STRA. So are you willing to do one thing for my sake?
VIR. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do happily. Say what you want.
STRA. That you pay money to this innkeeper.
VIR. Nothing more?
STRA. What can be more than to repay such an innkeeper, than whom no man alive is more kind and honest. Here I eat and drink what I want, as much as I want. If I wished to swap this Fool for a hundred Mirrors, may I spend a hundred days in hunger!
GER. This fellow is a dedicated drinker.
VIR. Have you eaten yet, Stragalcius?
STRA. A little.
VIR. What have you eaten, pray tell?
STRA. Eleven sausages and ten doves.
VIR. Indeed, that is a little. Brulio, don’t deny him anything he asks for. I don’t want to spare my money, let him eat amply.
STRA. Really? You’ll be my master’s father no longer.
VIR. Why so?
STRA. You’ll be my master. Certainly you act as befits a good, kindly man. Do you hear this, pedagogue? You’re so greedy that you always order a trifle of wine to be poured out, a trifle of food to be served, while in the meanwhile my gullet and belly damn you with all curses.
PET. This is not my plan, but that of the Schola Salerna.
STRA. Schola Salerna is a mendacious witch. Nobody’s healthier than I myself am, and I eat and drink more than three Schola Salernas.
GER. This man ought to be servant to a king, not to a commoner. He could out-consume two men of my rank, one by eating, the other by drinking.
STRA. Guess what’s in this goblet of mine.
VIR. Perhaps it’s wine.
STRA. Because you’re such an accurate guesser, have a drink with me.
VIR. I’ll do so without difficulty, Stragalcius. I drink to you.
STRA. I accept that with pleasure. Come, you’re drinking like Schola Salerna. Drink deeper.
VIR. But I’ve left some wine which you can entrust to the care of this old man, my friend.
STRA. But first to you, Master Petrus, so that peace can be cemented between ourselves.
PET. I accept your condition.
STRA. Indeed, and you should treat this man well, for he loves his son more than his eyes.
VIR. May the gods treat him well, I’ll not fail him.
STRA. If you treat him well first, the gods will scarcely fail him. Do you want to drink too, old man?
GER. Young man, there’s no need.
STRA. Patron, what if we retire inside here until my master returns?
PET. Not bad advice.
GER. But I’m leaving you. Another item of business awaits me at home.
VIR. If you’re going home, Gerardus, take care lest she run away.
GER. I’m going for no other purpose.
VIR. She’s yours, do as you will wish, I give her to you. In future she’ll be in your legal power, no longer in mine.
GER. You act amicably, farewell. Who am I seeing? [Exit Virginius. Enter Laelia.] Isn’t this Laelia? Certainly it is. My maid kept a careful watch on her! But when I get home, I’ll —

ACT IV, SCENE iv
LAELIA, CLEMENS, GERARDUS

LAE. I don’t know what plan I should adopt, thus all my ideas are confused, thus many bad things have joined together for my evil. I’m banished from my father, from my relatives, from my Flaminius, and what pleasure is there in living without Flaminius, without my soul? Ah, nurse, if have I shown myself undutiful towards my father or the gods, these things would befall me with fair justice.
CLE. Don’t torment yourself, my daughter. Just take off this man’s costume. Entrust the rest to my faithfulness.
GER. I wish to greet you, to find out how she fled. Greetings, Clemens, and you too, my darling bride Laelia. How did you sneak out of my house? Who opened the door? Hercules, I to not take it amiss that you came to the nurse, but for you to be seen in that attire is honorable neither to you or to myself.
LAE. [Aside.] Poor me, how did he recognize me? [Aloud.] Who do you think you’re talking to, you crazy old man? I’m not Laelia.
GER. Why this? Just now you confessed, when I and your father locked you inside together with Isabella. Now you deny it? Do you think that within such a small time we don’t understand the same things? My wife, my pleasure, I pray you, take off that costume.
LAE. Thus may the gods help you. Me your wife! Let the woman who marries you have a lot of help, and a desire to get married!
CLE. Go home, go home, Gerardus. Every girl slips, and your eyes ought not to be too lynx-like in scrutinizing women’s morals.
GER. Nobody will hear about these things from me. But, good gods, how was she able to escape when she was locked up so tightly?
CLE. Who?
GER. This one.
CLE. Where?
GER. In my house.
CLE. When did this happen?
GER. Today.
CLE. Today? Your head is not sound. She hasn’t crossed your threshold today, up to now.
GER. So you make out that I’m stricken either in the eyes or the mind. I tell you that today I’ve locked up this girl with my daughter Isabella.
CLE. So where have you come from now?
GER. From the inn of The Fool, where I went with Virginius.
CLE. It certainly seems so. But how much did you drink?
GER. I had one drink, no more.
CLE. So go sleep it off, for you need to.
GER. Just let me have a look at Laelia before I go way. I have some news to tell.
CLE. What news?
GER. Her brother has come home safe.
CLE. Fabricius?
GER. He himself.
CLE. If I knew this for sure, I’d give you a kiss.
GER. No, rather let Laelia kiss me. What happiness is in her eyes! I’d be surprised unless her good nature was in her kiss. Let me kiss you, my dear heart.
LAE. Can you keep your hand off me?
GER. How chaste she is! She doesn’t want to kiss before her marriage. Farewell, my light, I’ll betake myself home to rebuke the woman who let you go.

ACT IV, SCENE v
PAQUETTAalone

The ridiculous folly of stupid old men to leave a boy with a girl! Or do the imagine we women are as bloodless and moribund, so that the fresh ardor of youth shouldn’t move our hearts? They are indeed mistaken if they think so. Today I found out this was very true, though it was brought home to me by the example of somebody else. For I came to my mistress’s door. Since I couldn’t come in, I peeked through the keyhole. There I saw embraces and much else, not without envy. Thus, by Hercules, I saw, but I’m ashamed to say what. But I saw, and I laughed to perceive that the ship is on the high seas that the old men imagine to be safe in shallow water.

ACT IV, SCENE vi
PAQUETTA, GERARDUS

GER. A fine job you did of caring for what was entrusted to you! I’m close to tearing your hair out by the roots, you worst of women.
PACQ. Why, Master?
GER. You’re a bad beast. Why did you allow Laelia to depart? Didn’t I tell you in advance not to let her?
PACQ. But where? She’s never moved a foot out of the bedchamber.
GER. You lie too, you slut?
PACQ. As far as I’m concerned, she’s there where she was left by you.
GER. I fancy so, in the nurse’s house.
PACQ. So you have deeded your house over to the nurse, for she’s in yours, if this is yours.
GER. Do you persist, liar?
PACQ. See for yourself inside, if you don’t trust me.
GER. Where’s the key?
PACQ. Here it is.
GER. Unless it is so, I’ll teach you what it is to neglect what has been seriously entrusted to you.
PACQ. Oh how I’m afraid lest he barges in on them while they are sporting!

ACT IV, SCENE vii
FLAMINIUS, PACQUETTA, GERARDUS

FLA. How long has it been since Fabius was with you?
PACQ. Why do you ask that?
FLA. Oh, it just seemed good to me. How many exemplary punishments I’ve invented for this treacherous lad! But this good man never makes an appearance. Is it honorable and praiseworthy for your mistress to be taken with love of your servant?
PACQ. How you take in the wrong way what she did! If in some way her kindness to the boy has waxed greater, I know it has done so for your sake.
FLA. By heaven, I know it is as you say. But now I’ll hunt for him. [Exit Flaminius, enter Gerardus.]
GER. I’m thoroughly ruined. Give me your aid, fellow-citizens, and destroy this evil specimen. Alas, I’ve been swindled. I’ve been miserably deluded and defrauded by this criminal old man’s schemings. I’ve been wiped out in every kind of way, I’ve perished by every kind of death.
PACQ. What’s the trouble, my patron?
GER. What’s the trouble, you wicked woman?
PACQ. What have I done to deserve that you call me wicked? Isn’t she in her bedchamber.
GER. Yes she is. And who is the man with her?
PACQ. I could better ask this of you, whose sole responsibility this is, yet you ask me? Is it not a girl dressed in a man’s costume?
GER. Please the gods, a girl! What kind of a girl! A girl who can make it so my daughter may have either a girl or a boy.
PACQ. Don’t say this, master. She’s Laelia, daughter of Virginius. Isn’t she a girl?
GER. I tell you she’s masculine.
PACQ. How do you know this?
GER. I saw.
PACQ. It’s impossible.
GER. I saw, I tell you, with these eyes. He drew his hand to her breasts, he never withdrew his lips from her lips, he lay upon her, I’m embarrassed to remember the rest he did.
PACQ. You’re mistaken. They were playing together.
GER. Yes indeed, they were playing very seriously.
PACQ. Why don’t you let him go away, if he’s masculine?
GER. I should let him go away? First I’ll bring him to the magistrate, then he’ll go away where he deserves.
PACQ. In the meantime he’ll escape.
GER. If he should be able, then I’ll put no more trust in iron or in the blacksmith. [Enter Virginius with Petrus.] But Virginius has come, good heavens, in the nick of time.

ACT IV, SCENE viii
THE PEDAGOGUE, VIRGINIUS, GERARDUS

PET. I do not know what I should suspect to be responsible for the fact that he hasn’t returned to the inn.
VIR. Was he perhaps girded with a sword?
PET. Why ask?
VIR. Then doubtless he’s in jail, if the bailiffs have arrested him.
PET. Will they not receive foreigners here in the evening (bailiffs being so-called from arresting people in bales)?
GER. Greetings, Virginius. Is this kindly done, or a friend’s dutifulness to deceive his friend in such unworthy ways? Or do you think I’m a man of no account, who can endure such a notable injury?
VIR. What’s this? What injury have I done to you? Why are you complaining? I know, you regret your undertaking. You manufacture excuses for not proceeding, as if my salvation is placed in having you for a son-in-law. I didn’t hope for this in the first place, that you’d be my son-in-law. If you regret your undertaking, as far as I am concerned your choice is as free now as it was before. I am scarcely asking you over and over if you will take her, nor am I begging you not to let her go.
GER. Is your audacity so great that you dare defend yourself? Most accursed man, I don’t want to be cheated so easily.
VIR. These words hardly suit you, nor have I deserved them. You’re too irate, Gerardus.
GER. But do you know how irate I am? Truly your face is not far removed from injury, you fellow most full of fraud, crime, parricide, and perjury.
VIR. You should keep your foolish talk more restrained, if you’re wise.
GER. Woe to your head, lawbreaker, wanton, unclean, most untruthful man.
PET. “You should often be on guard what you say about any man, and to whom you say it.”
VIR. Abandon this quarrel, you madman, or I won’t stand this insulting any more.
GER. Impostor.
VIR. Deceiver.
GER. You lie, gallows-bait? Wait a minute.
VIR. I’m waiting.
PET. What are you two doing? “Arms abroad are of no avail, unless there’s counsel at home.”
GER. Don’t restrain me, don’t restrain me, I say.
PET. “Dress yourself with a tunic or put the tunic on yourself.”
GER. With whom does this man think he has any business?
VIR. With you. Return to me my daughter, whom you are detaining at your house.
GER. I’ll detain your daughter well enough, and you too, along with what you deserve —
VIR. Me? I’m hardly afraid of you, but I’m very afraid for my daughter. If I learn she’s received even the slightest injury from you —
GER. What then, fool?
PET. Old man, old man, by no means, by no means, with steel, with steel. [Exit Virginius.]
GER. He’s run away. It was high time. If he were here now, unless I’d fill his treacherous breast with more holes than there are in a sieve —
PET. I wonder what the reason was for this quarrel.
GER. Go inside and you’ll hear about something disgraceful enough for him and much more so for me. You are the man who was given by him to his son as a preceptor?
PET. Yes I am.
GER. Come inside with me.
PET. On condition that you swear nothing unpleasant will befall me inside.
GER. You’re afraid? On my faith, I swear.

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