Antipholis and Dromio were sold by them to duke Menaphon, a famous warrior, who was uncle to the duke of Ephesus, and he carried the boys to Ephesus, when he went to visit the duke his nephew.
The duke of Ephesus taking a liking to young Antipholis, when he grew up, made him an officer in his army, in which he distinguished himself by his great bravery in the wars, where he saved the life of his patron the duke, who rewarded his merit by marrying him to Adriana, a rich lady of Ephesus; with whom he was living (his slave Dromio still attending him) at the time his father came there.
Antipholis of Syracuse, when he parted with his friend, who advised him to say he came from Epidamnium, gave his slave Dromio some money to carry to the inn where he intended to dine, and in the mean time he said he would walk about and view the city, and observe the manners of the people.
Dromio was a pleasant fellow, and when Antipholis was dull and melancholy, he used to divert himself with the odd humours and merry jests of his slave, so that the freedoms of speech he allowed in Dromio were greater than is usual between masters and their servants.
When Antipholis of Syracuse had sent Dromio away, he stood a while thinking over his solitary wanderings in search of his mother and his brother, of whom in no place where he landed could he hear the least tidings; and he said sorrowfully to himself, "I am like a drop of water in the ocean, which seeking to find its fellow-drop, loses itself in the wide sea. So I unhappily, to find a mother and a brother, do lose myself."
While he was thus meditating on his weary travels, which had hitherto been so useless, Dromio (as he thought) returned. Antipholis, wondering that he came back so soon, asked him where he had left the money. Now it was not his own Dromio, but the twin-brother that lived with Antipholis of Ephesus, that he spoke to. The two Dromios and the two Antipholises were still as much alike as Ægeon had said they were in their infancy; therefore no wonder Antipholis thought it was his own slave returned, and asked him why he came back so soon. Dromio replied, "My mistress sent me to bid you come to dinner. The capon burns, and the pig falls from the spit, and the meat will be all cold if you do not come home." "These jests are out of season," said Antipholis: "where did you leave the money?" Dromio still answering, that his mistress had sent him to fetch Antipholis to dinner: "What mistress?" said Antipholis. "Why, your worship's wife, sir," replied Dromio. Antipholis having no wife, he was very angry with Dromio, and said, "Because I familiarly sometimes chat with you, you presume to jest with me in this free manner. I am not in a sportive humour now: where is the money? we being strangers here, how dare you trust so great a charge from your own custody?" Dromio hearing his master, as he thought him, talk of their being strangers, supposing Antipholis was jesting, replied merrily, "I pray you, sir, jest as you sit at dinner: I had no charge but to fetch you home, to dine with my mistress and her sister." Now Antipholis lost all patience, and beat Dromio, who ran home, and told his mistress that his master had refused to come to dinner, and said that he had no wife.