Speeches (Lines) for Fabian
in "Twelfth Night"
Total: 51

1

II,5,1030

Sir Toby Belch. Come thy ways, Signior Fabian.

Fabian. Nay, I'll come: if I lose a scruple of this sport,
let me be boiled to death with melancholy.

2

II,5,1034

Sir Toby Belch. Wouldst thou not be glad to have the niggardly
rascally sheep-biter come by some notable shame?

Fabian. I would exult, man: you know, he brought me out o'
favour with my lady about a bear-baiting here.

3

II,5,1059

Sir Toby Belch. Here's an overweening rogue!

Fabian. O, peace! Contemplation makes a rare turkey-cock
of him: how he jets under his advanced plumes!

4

II,5,1070

Sir Andrew Aguecheek. Fie on him, Jezebel!

Fabian. O, peace! now he's deeply in: look how
imagination blows him.

5

II,5,1079

Sir Toby Belch. Fire and brimstone!

Fabian. O, peace, peace!

6

II,5,1085

Sir Toby Belch. Bolts and shackles!

Fabian. O peace, peace, peace! now, now.

7

II,5,1091

Sir Toby Belch. Shall this fellow live?

Fabian. Though our silence be drawn from us with cars, yet peace.

8

II,5,1100

Sir Toby Belch. Out, scab!

Fabian. Nay, patience, or we break the sinews of our plot.

9

II,5,1108

(stage directions). [Taking up the letter]

Fabian. Now is the woodcock near the gin.

10

II,5,1119

Malvolio. [Reads] 'To the unknown beloved, this, and my good
wishes:'—her very phrases! By your leave, wax.
Soft! and the impressure her Lucrece, with which she
uses to seal: 'tis my lady. To whom should this be?

Fabian. This wins him, liver and all.

11

II,5,1133

Malvolio. [Reads]
I may command where I adore;
But silence, like a Lucrece knife,
With bloodless stroke my heart doth gore:
M, O, A, I, doth sway my life.

Fabian. A fustian riddle!

12

II,5,1137

Malvolio. 'M, O, A, I, doth sway my life.' Nay, but first, let
me see, let me see, let me see.

Fabian. What dish o' poison has she dressed him!

13

II,5,1147

Sir Toby Belch. O, ay, make up that: he is now at a cold scent.

Fabian. Sowter will cry upon't for all this, though it be as
rank as a fox.

14

II,5,1150

Malvolio. M,—Malvolio; M,—why, that begins my name.

Fabian. Did not I say he would work it out? the cur is
excellent at faults.

15

II,5,1154

Malvolio. M,—but then there is no consonancy in the sequel;
that suffers under probation A should follow but O does.

Fabian. And O shall end, I hope.

16

II,5,1157

Malvolio. And then I comes behind.

Fabian. Ay, an you had any eye behind you, you might see
more detraction at your heels than fortunes before
you.

17

II,5,1206

(stage directions). [Exit]

Fabian. I will not give my part of this sport for a pension
of thousands to be paid from the Sophy.

18

II,5,1212

Sir Andrew Aguecheek. Nor I neither.

Fabian. Here comes my noble gull-catcher.

19

III,2,1408

Sir Toby Belch. Thy reason, dear venom, give thy reason.

Fabian. You must needs yield your reason, Sir Andrew.

20

III,2,1414

Sir Andrew Aguecheek. As plain as I see you now.

Fabian. This was a great argument of love in her toward you.

21

III,2,1416

Sir Andrew Aguecheek. 'Slight, will you make an ass o' me?

Fabian. I will prove it legitimate, sir, upon the oaths of
judgment and reason.

22

III,2,1420

Sir Toby Belch. And they have been grand-jury-men since before Noah
was a sailor.

Fabian. She did show favour to the youth in your sight only
to exasperate you, to awake your dormouse valour, to
put fire in your heart and brimstone in your liver.
You should then have accosted her; and with some
excellent jests, fire-new from the mint, you should
have banged the youth into dumbness. This was
looked for at your hand, and this was balked: the
double gilt of this opportunity you let time wash
off, and you are now sailed into the north of my
lady's opinion; where you will hang like an icicle
on a Dutchman's beard, unless you do redeem it by
some laudable attempt either of valour or policy.

23

III,2,1441

Sir Toby Belch. Why, then, build me thy fortunes upon the basis of
valour. Challenge me the count's youth to fight
with him; hurt him in eleven places: my niece shall
take note of it; and assure thyself, there is no
love-broker in the world can more prevail in man's
commendation with woman than report of valour.

Fabian. There is no way but this, Sir Andrew.

24

III,2,1455

(stage directions). [Exit SIR ANDREW]

Fabian. This is a dear manikin to you, Sir Toby.

25

III,2,1458

Sir Toby Belch. I have been dear to him, lad, some two thousand
strong, or so.

Fabian. We shall have a rare letter from him: but you'll
not deliver't?

26

III,2,1466

Sir Toby Belch. Never trust me, then; and by all means stir on the
youth to an answer. I think oxen and wainropes
cannot hale them together. For Andrew, if he were
opened, and you find so much blood in his liver as
will clog the foot of a flea, I'll eat the rest of
the anatomy.

Fabian. And his opposite, the youth, bears in his visage no
great presage of cruelty.

27

III,4,1634

Sir Toby Belch. Which way is he, in the name of sanctity? If all
the devils of hell be drawn in little, and Legion
himself possessed him, yet I'll speak to him.

Fabian. Here he is, here he is. How is't with you, sir?
how is't with you, man?

28

III,4,1649

Maria. La you, an you speak ill of the devil, how he takes
it at heart! Pray God, he be not bewitched!

Fabian. Carry his water to the wise woman.

29

III,4,1656

Sir Toby Belch. Prithee, hold thy peace; this is not the way: do
you not see you move him? let me alone with him.

Fabian. No way but gentleness; gently, gently: the fiend is
rough, and will not be roughly used.

30

III,4,1671

Sir Toby Belch. Is't possible?

Fabian. If this were played upon a stage now, I could
condemn it as an improbable fiction.

31

III,4,1675

Maria. Nay, pursue him now, lest the device take air and taint.

Fabian. Why, we shall make him mad indeed.

32

III,4,1685

(stage directions). [Enter SIR ANDREW]

Fabian. More matter for a May morning.

33

III,4,1688

Sir Andrew Aguecheek. Here's the challenge, read it: warrant there's
vinegar and pepper in't.

Fabian. Is't so saucy?

34

III,4,1693

Sir Toby Belch. Give me.
[Reads]
'Youth, whatsoever thou art, thou art but a scurvy fellow.'

Fabian. Good, and valiant.

35

III,4,1696

Sir Toby Belch. [Reads] 'Wonder not, nor admire not in thy mind,
why I do call thee so, for I will show thee no reason for't.'

Fabian. A good note; that keeps you from the blow of the law.

36

III,4,1700

Sir Toby Belch. [Reads] 'Thou comest to the lady Olivia, and in my
sight she uses thee kindly: but thou liest in thy
throat; that is not the matter I challenge thee for.'

Fabian. Very brief, and to exceeding good sense—less.

37

III,4,1703

Sir Toby Belch. [Reads] 'I will waylay thee going home; where if it
be thy chance to kill me,'—

Fabian. Good.

38

III,4,1705

Sir Toby Belch. [Reads] 'Thou killest me like a rogue and a villain.'

Fabian. Still you keep o' the windy side of the law: good.

39

III,4,1738

(stage directions). [Re-enter OLIVIA, with VIOLA]

Fabian. Here he comes with your niece: give them way till
he take leave, and presently after him.

40

III,4,1805

Viola. Pray you, sir, do you know of this matter?

Fabian. I know the knight is incensed against you, even to a
mortal arbitrement; but nothing of the circumstance more.

41

III,4,1808

Viola. I beseech you, what manner of man is he?

Fabian. Nothing of that wonderful promise, to read him by
his form, as you are like to find him in the proof
of his valour. He is, indeed, sir, the most skilful,
bloody and fatal opposite that you could possibly
have found in any part of Illyria. Will you walk
towards him? I will make your peace with him if I
can.

42

III,4,1841

Sir Toby Belch. I'll make the motion: stand here, make a good show
on't: this shall end without the perdition of souls.
[Aside]
Marry, I'll ride your horse as well as I ride you.
[Re-enter FABIAN and VIOLA]
[To FABIAN]
I have his horse to take up the quarrel:
I have persuaded him the youth's a devil.

Fabian. He is as horribly conceited of him; and pants and
looks pale, as if a bear were at his heels.

43

III,4,1850

Viola. [Aside] Pray God defend me! A little thing would
make me tell them how much I lack of a man.

Fabian. Give ground, if you see him furious.

44

III,4,1869

(stage directions). [Enter Officers]

Fabian. O good Sir Toby, hold! here come the officers.

45

III,4,1945

Sir Toby Belch. A very dishonest paltry boy, and more a coward than
a hare: his dishonesty appears in leaving his
friend here in necessity and denying him; and for
his cowardship, ask Fabian.

Fabian. A coward, a most devout coward, religious in it.

46

III,4,1949

Sir Andrew Aguecheek. An I do not,—

Fabian. Come, let's see the event.

47

V,1,2190

(stage directions). [Enter Clown and FABIAN]

Fabian. Now, as thou lovest me, let me see his letter.

48

V,1,2192

Feste. Good Master Fabian, grant me another request.

Fabian. Any thing.

49

V,1,2194

Feste. Do not desire to see this letter.

Fabian. This is, to give a dog, and in recompense desire my
dog again.

50

V,1,2506

(stage directions). [To FABIAN]

Fabian. [Reads] 'By the Lord, madam, you wrong me, and the
world shall know it: though you have put me into
darkness and given your drunken cousin rule over
me, yet have I the benefit of my senses as well as
your ladyship. I have your own letter that induced
me to the semblance I put on; with the which I doubt
not but to do myself much right, or you much shame.
Think of me as you please. I leave my duty a little
unthought of and speak out of my injury.
THE MADLY-USED MALVOLIO.'

51

V,1,2568

Olivia. Alas, Malvolio, this is not my writing,
Though, I confess, much like the character
But out of question 'tis Maria's hand.
And now I do bethink me, it was she
First told me thou wast mad; then camest in smiling,
And in such forms which here were presupposed
Upon thee in the letter. Prithee, be content:
This practise hath most shrewdly pass'd upon thee;
But when we know the grounds and authors of it,
Thou shalt be both the plaintiff and the judge
Of thine own cause.

Fabian. Good madam, hear me speak,
And let no quarrel nor no brawl to come
Taint the condition of this present hour,
Which I have wonder'd at. In hope it shall not,
Most freely I confess, myself and Toby
Set this device against Malvolio here,
Upon some stubborn and uncourteous parts
We had conceived against him: Maria writ
The letter at Sir Toby's great importance;
In recompense whereof he hath married her.
How with a sportful malice it was follow'd,
May rather pluck on laughter than revenge;
If that the injuries be justly weigh'd
That have on both sides pass'd.