Joyful congratulations and affectionate greetings between these long separated parents and their children, made them for a while forget that AEgeon was yet under sentence of death; but when they were become a little calm, Antipholis of Ephesus offered the duke the ransom-money for his father’s life; but the duke freely pardoned AEgeon, and would not take the money.  And the duke went with the abbess and her newly found husband and children into the convent, to hear this happy family discourse at leisure of the blessed ending of their adverse fortunes.  And the two Dromios’ humble joy must not be forgotten; they had their congratulations and greetings too, and each Dromio pleasantly complimented his brother on his good looks, being well pleased to see his own person (as in a glass) shew so handsome in his brother.

Adriana had so well profited by the good counsel of her mother-in-law, that she never after cherished unjust suspicions, or was jealous of her husband.

Antipholis of Syracuse married the fair Luciana, the sister of his brother’s wife; and the good old AEgeon, with his wife and sons, lived at Ephesus many years.  Nor did the unravelling of these perplexities so entirely remove every ground of mistake for the future, but that sometimes, to remind them of adventures past, comical blunders would happen, and the one Antipholis, and the one Dromio, be mistaken for the other, making altogether a pleasant and diverting Comedy of Errors.

MEASURE FOR MEASURE

(By Mary Lamb)

In the city of Vienna there once reigned a duke of such a mild and gentle temper, that he suffered his subjects to neglect the laws with impunity; and there was in particular one law, the existence of which was almost forgotten, the duke never having put it in force during his whole reign.  This was a law dooming any man to the punishment of death, who should live with a woman that was not his wife; and this law through the lenity of the duke being utterly disregarded, the holy institution of marriage became neglected, and complaints were every day made to the duke by the parents of the young ladies in Vienna, that their daughters had been seduced from their protection, and were living as the companions of single men.

The good duke perceived with sorrow this growing evil among his subjects; but he thought that a sudden change in himself from the indulgence he had hitherto shewn, to the strict severity requisite to check this abuse, would make his people (who had hitherto loved him) consider him as a tyrant:  therefore he determined to absent himself a while from his dukedom, and depute another to the full exercise of his power, that the law against these dishonourable lovers might be put in effect, without giving offence by an unusual severity in his own person.