Beatrice and Benedick have courted in the past, and Beatrice’s viciousness stems from the fact that Benedick previously abandoned her. When she insists that Benedick “set up his bills here in Messina and challenged Cupid at the flight, and my uncle’s fool, reading the challenge, subscribed for Cupid,” she describes a “battle” of love between herself and Benedick that she has lost (I.i.32–34). The result is what Leonato describes as “a kind of merry war betwixt Sir Benedick and [Beatrice]. They never meet but there’s a skirmish of wit between them” (I.i.49–51).