Now take them up, quoth he, if any list.
Tronio. What said the wench when he rose up again?
Gremio. Trembled and shook; for why, he stamp'd and swore,
As if the vicar meant to cozen him.
But after many ceremonies done,
He calls for wine; a health, quoth he; as if
He'd been aboard carousing with his mates
After a storm; quaft off the muscadel,
And threw the sops all in the sexton's face;
Having no other cause but that his beard
Grew thin and hungerly, and seem'd to ask
His sops as he was drinking. This done, he took
The bride about the neck, and kiss'd her lips
With such a clamorous smack, that at their parting
All the church echoed; and I seeing this,
Came thence for very shame; and after me,
I know, the rout is coming;--
Such a mad marriage never was before.
The most striking and at the same time laughable feature in the
character of Petruchio throughout, is the studied approximation to
the intractable character of real madness, his apparent
insensibility to all external considerations, and utter indifference
to everything but the wild and extravagant freaks of his own self-
will. There is no contending with a person on whom nothing makes any
impression but his own purposes, and who is bent on his own whims
just in proportion as they seem to want common-sense.
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