"And deny himself for Jove,

Turning mortal for thy love."

This will I fend, and fomething else more plain,
That fhall expreis my true love's fafting pain:
O, would the King, Biron, and Longaville,
Were lovers too! Ill, to example ill,

Would from my forehead wipe a perjured note:
For none offend where all alike do dore.

Long Dumain, thy love is far from charity, That in love's grief defireft fociety: [Coming forward. You may look pale; but I fhould bluth, I know, To be o'erheard and taken napping so..

King, Come, Sir, you bluth, as his your cafe is fuch; Coming for war di You chide at him, offending twice as much. You do not love Maria? Longaville: Did never fonnet for her fake compile. Nor never laid his wreathed arms athwart His loving bofom, to keep down his heart? I have been closely fhrouded in this bush,. And mark'd you both, and for you both did blush. I heard your guilty rhimes, obferved your fathion; Saw fighs reek from you,.noted well your paffion. Ah me! fays one; O Jove! the other cries; Her hairs were gold, cryftal the other's eyes. You would for Paradife break faith and troth; And Jove for your love would infringe an oath, What will Biron fay, when that he thall bear A faith infringed, which fuch zeal did fwear? How will he fcorn? how will he spend his wit? How will be triumph, leap, and laugh at it? For all the wealth that ever I did fee,

I would not have him know so much by me. Ah, good my Liege, I pray thee pardon me. [Coming forward

Biron. Now ftep I forth to whip hypocrify. A Good heart, what grace haft thou thus to reprove Thefe worms for loving, that art most in love? Your eyes do make no coaches in your tears, There is no certain princefs that appears? You'll not be perjured, 'tis a hateful thing; Tufh; none but minstrels like of fønneting. But are you not afhamed? nay, are you not All three of you, to be thus much o'erfhot? You found his mote, the King your mote did fee, But I a beam do find in each of three. O, what a fcene of foolery have I seen, Of fighs, of groans, of forrow, and of teen! O me, with what strict patience have I fat, To fee a king transformed to a knot! To fee great Hercules whipping a gigg, And profound Solomon tuning a jigg? And Neftor play at pufh-pin with the boys, And critic Timon laugh at idle tøys?

Where lyes thy grief? O tell me, good Dumain;
And gentle Longaville, where lyes thy pain?
And where my Liege's? all about the breaft?
A candle, hoa!

King. Too bitter is thy jeft.

Are we betrayed thus to thy overview?

Biron. Not you by me, but I betrayed by you.
I, that am honeft; I, that hold it fin
To break the vow I am engaged in:

I am betrayed by keeping company
With men, like men, of Itrange inconftancy.
When fhall you fee me write a thing in rhime?
Or groan for Joan? or fpend a minute's time
In pruning me? when fhall you hear that I
Will praife a hand, a foot, a face, an eye,
A gate, a state, a brow, a breast, a waist,
A leg, a limb?

King. Soft, whither away so fast?

A true man or a thief, that gallops fo?

W

Biron. I post from love; good lover, let me go.

Enter JAQUENETTA and COSTARD.

Jaq. God bless the King!

King. What present haft thou there?
Coft. Some certain treason..
King. What makes treafon here?
Coft. Nay, it makes nothing, Sir.
King. If it mar nothing neither,

The treafon and you go in peace away together.
Jaq. I beseech your Grace, let this letter be read,
Our parfon misdoubts it: it was treason, he said.
King. Biron, read it over. [He heads the letter.
Where hadft thou it?

Jaq. Of Coftard.

King. Where hadft thou it?

Caft. Of Dun Adramadio, Dun Adramadio. I King. How now, what is in you? why doft thou tear it?

Biron. A toy, my Liege, a toy: your Grace needs not fear it.

Long. It did move him to paffion, and therefore let's hear it.

Dum. It is Biron's writing, and here is his name. Biren. Ah, you whorefon loggerhead, you were born to do me shame. [To Coftard. Guilty, my Lord, guilty: I confefs, I confefs. King. What?

Biran. That you three fools lacked me fool to

make up the mess.

He, he, and you; and you, my Liege, and I
Are pick-purfes in love, and we deferve to die.
O difmifs this audience, and I fhall tell you more.
Dum. Now the number is even.

Biron. True, true; we are four:

Will these turtles be gone?

• King. Hence, Sirs, away.

Coft. Walk afide the true folk, and let the trai[Exeunt Coft. and Jaquen.

tors stay.

Biron. Sweet Lords, fweet lovers, O let us embrace:..

As true we are, as flesh and blood can be. The fea will ebb and flow, Heaven will fhew his face: Young blood doth not obey an old decree. We cannot cross the cause why we were born, Therefore of all hands muft we be forfworn.

King. What, did these rent lines thew fome love of thine?

...Biron. Did they, quoth you? Who fees the heavenly Rofaline,

That (like a rude and favage man of Inde,

At the first opening of the gorgeous Eaft) Bows not his vaffal head, and, strucken blind,

Kifles the bafe ground with obedient breast?`` What peremptory eagle-fighted eye

Dares look upon the heaven of her brow," That is not blinded by her majesty?

King. What zeal, what fury, hath infpired thee now?

My love (her miftrefs) is a gracious moon;

She (an attending ftar) fcarce feen a light. Biran. My eyes are then no eyes, nor I Biron O, but for my love, day would turn to night Of all complexions the culled fovereignty,

Do meet, as at a fair, in her fair check; Where feveral worthies make one dignity;

Where nothing wants that want itself doth feel Lend me the flourish of all gentle tongues;

Fy, painted rhetoric! Ö, the needs it not: To things of fale, a feller's praife belongs:

She paffes praife, the praife to fhort doth blot.

A withered hermit, fivefcore winters worn,.

Might thake off fifty, looking in her eye; Beauty doth varnish age, as if new-born,

And gives the crutch the cradle's infancy; O, 'tis the fun that maketh all things fhine. King. By heaven, thy love is black as ebony.. Biron. Is ebony like her? O wood divine! (29) A wife of fuch wood were felicity..

O, who can give an oath? where is a book, That I may fwear, beauty doth beauty lack; If that she learn not of her eye, to look?

No face is fair, that is not full fo black! King. O paradox, black is the badge of hell, The hue of dungeons, and the fcowl of night; (30)

And beauty's creft becomes the heavens well.. Biron. Devils faoneft tempt, refembling spirits of light:

if in black my lady's brow be deckt,

It mourns that painting and ufurping hair Should ravifh doters with a falfe afpect:

And therefore is the born to make black fair, Her favour turns the fashion of the days,

For native blood is counted painting now: And therefore red, that would avoid difpraise, Paints itself black to imitate her brow.

(29) Is ebony like her ? ̧0 word divine !] This is the reading of all the editions that I have feen; but both Dr Thirlby and Mr Warburton concurred in reading, (as I had likewise conjectured)-O wood divinė.

(30) -black is the badge of hell,

The hue of dungeons, and the school of night.] Black being the fchool of night, is a piece of mystery above my comprehenfion. I had gueffed it fhould be the Role of night-but have preferred the conjecture of my friend Mr Warburton, as it comes nearer in pronunciation to the corrupted reading, as well as agrees better with the other images.