Biron. Lady, I will commend you to my own heart. Ros. 'Pray you, do my commendations; I would be glad to see it. Biron. I would you heard it groan. Ros. Is the fool sick? Biron. Sick at the heart. Ros. Alack, let it blood. Biron. Would that do it good? Ros. My physic says, "Ay." Biron. Will you prick 't with your eye? Long. Perchance, light in the light: I desire her name. Boyet. She hath but one for herself; to desire that were a shame. Long. Pray you, sir, whose daughter? Boyet. Not unlike, sir; that may be. The civil war of wits were much better used By the heart's still rhetoric, disclosed with eyes, Boyet. With that which we lovers entitle "affected." Prin. Your reason? Boyet. Why, all his behaviours did make their retire To the court of his eye, peeping thorough desire: Did point you to buy them, along as you passed. posed Boyet. But to speak that in words which his eye hath disclosed: I only have made a mouth of his eye, Arm. Sweet air!-Go, tenderness of years! take this key, give enlargement to the swain, bring him festinately hither: I must employ him in a letter to my love. Moth. Master, will you win your love with a French brawl? Arm. How mean'st thou ? brawling in French? Moth. No, my complete master: but to jig off a tune at the tongue's end, canary to it with your feet, humour it with turning up your eyelids; sigh a note, and sing a note; sometime through the throat, as if you swallowed love with singing love; sometime through the nose, as if you snuffed up love by smelling love: with your hat, penthouselike, o'er the shop of your eyes; with your arms crossed on your thin belly-doublet, like a rabbit on a spit; or your hands in your pocket, like a man after the old painting; and keep not too long in one tune, but a snip and away. These are complements, these are humours; these betray nice wenches that would be betrayed without these; and make them men of note (do you note, men?) that most are affected to these. Arm. How hast thou purchased this experience? Moth. By my penny of observation. Moth. the hobby-horse is forgot. Arm. Callest thou my love, hobby-horse? Moth. No, master; the hobby-horse is but a colt, and your love, perhaps, a hackney. But have you forgot your love? Arm. Almost I had. Moth. Negligent student! learn her by heart. Arm. By heart and in heart, boy. Moth. And out of heart, master: all those three I will prove. Arm. What wilt thou prove? Moth. A man, if I live; and this, by, in, and without, upon the instant:-By heart you love her, because your heart cannot come by her; in heart you love her, because your heart is in love with her; and out of heart you love her, being out of heart that you cannot enjoy her. Arm. I am all these three. Moth. And three times as much more, and yet nothing at all. Arm. Fetch hither the swain; he must carry me a letter. Moth. A message well sympathised; a horse to be ambassador for an ass! Arm. Ha, ha! what sayest thou? Moth. Marry, sir, you must send the ass upon the horse, for he is very slow-gaited: but I go. Arm. The way is but short; away. Moth. As swift as lead, sir. Arm. Thy meaning, pretty ingenious ? Is not lead a metal heavy, dull, and slow? Moth. Minimè, honest master; or rather, master, no. Arm. I say, lead is slow. Moth. You are too swift, sir, to say so: Is that lead slow which is fired from a gun? Arm. Sweet smoke of rhetoric! He reputes me a cannon; and the bullet, that's he: I shoot thee at the swain. Moth. Thump then, and I flee. [Exit. Arm. A most acute juvenal; voluble and free of grace! By thy favour, sweet welkin, I must sigh in thy face: Most rude melancholy, valour gives thee place. My herald is returned. Re-enter MoTH and CosTARD, Moth. A wonder, master; here's a Costard broken in a shin. Arm. Some enigma, some riddle: come, thy l'envoy; begin. Cost. No egma, no riddle, no l'envoy; no salve in them all, sir. O, sir, plantain, a plain plantain; no envoy, no で envoy; no salve, sir, but a plantain ! Arm. By virtue, thou enforcest laughter; thy silly thought, my spleen; the heaving of my lungs provokes me to ridiculous smiling: O, pardon me, my stars! Doth the inconsiderate take salve for l'envoy, and the word l'envoy for a salve? Moth. Do the wise think them other? is not l'envoy a salve? Arm. No, page : it is an epilogue or discourse, to make plain Some obscure precedence that hath tofore been sain. I will example it : The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee, There's the moral. Now the l'envoy. Moth. I will add the l'envoy: say the moral again. Arm. The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee, Were still at odds, being but three: Moth. Until the goose came out of door, And stayed the odds, by adding four. Now will I begin your moral, and do you follow with my l'envoy :— The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee, Were still at odds, being but three: Arm. Until the goose came out of door, Staying the odds by adding four. Moth. A good l'envoy, ending in the goose: would you desire more? Cost. The boy hath sold him a bargain, a goose: that's flat: Sir, your penuy worth is good, an your goose be fat. To sell a bargain well, is as cunning as fast and loose : Let me see a fat l'envoy; ay, that's a fat goose. Arm. Come hither, come hither: how did this argument begin? Moth. By saying that a Costard was broken in a shin. Then called you for the l'envoy. Cost. True, and I for a plantain. Thus came your argument in; Then the boy's fat l'envoy, the goose that you bought; And he ended the market. Arm. But tell me; how was there a Costard broken in a shin? Moth. I will tell you sensibly. Cost. Thou hast no feeling of it, Moth! I will speak that l'envoy. I, Costard, running out, that was safely within, Fell over the threshold, and broke my shin. Arm. We will talk no more of this matter. Cost. Till there be more matter in the shin. Arm. Sirrah Costard, I will enfranchise thee. Cost. O, marry me to one Frances;-I smell some l'envoy, some goose, in this. Arm. By my sweet soul, I mean, setting thee at liberty, enfreedoming thy person: thou wert immured, restrained, captivated, bound. Cost. True, true; and now you will be my purgation, and let me loose. Arm. I give thee thy liberty, set thee from durance; and, in lieu thereof, impose on thee nothing but this :-Bear this significant to the country maid Jaquenetta: there is remuneration [giving him money]; for the best ward of mine honour is rewarding my dependents. Moth, follow. [Exit. Moth. Like the sequel, I.—Signior Costard, Biron. What is a remuneration? Cost. I thank your worship: God be with you! Cost. When would you have it done, sir? Cost. Well, I will do it, sir: fare you well. Biron. It must be done this afternoon. Hark, slave, it is but this : The princess comes to hunt here in the park, When tongues speak sweetly, then they name her name, And Rosaline they call her: ask for her; And to her white hand see thou do commend This sealed-up counsel. There's thy guerdon; go. [Gives him money. Cost. Gardon,-O sweet gardon! better than remuneration; eleven-pence farthing better. Most sweet gardon!—I will do it, sir, in print.—Gardon-remuneration! [Exit. Biron. O!—And I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been love's whip; A very beadle to a humorous sigh; A woman, that is like a German clock, [Exit. SCENE I.-Another part of the Park. Enter the PRINCESS, ROSALINE, MARIA, KATHARINE, BoYET, Lords, Attendants, and a Forester. Prin. Was that the king, that spurred his horse so hard Against the steep uprising of the hill? Boyet. I know not; but I think it was not he. Prin. Whoe'er he was, he shewed a mounting mind. Well, lords, to-day we shall have our dispatch; For. Here by, upon the edge of yonder coppice; A stand where you may make the fairest shoot. Prin. I thank my beauty, I am fair, that shoot; And thereupon thou speak'st, the fairest shoot. For. Pardon me, madam, for I meant not so. Prin. What, what? first praise me, and again say, no? O short-lived pride! Not fair? alack for woe! For. Yes, madam, fair. Prin. Nay, never paint me now; A giving hand, though foul, shall have fair praise. And, out of question, so it is sometimes; We bend to that the working of the heart: Only for praise' sake, when they strive to be Prin. Only for praise: and praise we may afford To any lady that subdues a lord. |