And wherefore are you gentle, ftrong, and valiant?
Why would you be fo fond to overcome

*

The boney prizer of the humorous † Duke?
Your praise is come too swiftly home before you.
Know you not, mafter, to fome kind of men,
Their graces ferve them but as enemies?
No more do yours; your virtues, gentle master,
Are fan&ified and holy traitors to you.

O what a world is this, when what is comely
Envenoms bim that bears it.

When Adam counfels him to fly from the perfecution of his cruel brother, his answer expreffes a noble and virtuous acquiefcence in any state of mifery or danger, rather than fubmit to fupport himself by base or dishonest means :

Orlando. What, would'ft thou have me
go
Or with a base and boisterous sword enforce
A thievish living on the common road?
This I must do, or know not what to do-
Yet this I cannot do, do how I can ;
I rather will fubject me to the malice
Of a diverted blood, and bloody brother.

and beg my

food?

There is a charming glow of affection, gratitude, and fpirit, in the reply made by Adam; with a pleafing defcription of the virtue and fobriety of the antient Peafantry of England; and the difference of manners and morals between thofe times and the more modern ones, is well remarked upon.

Adam. But do not fo-I have five hundred crowns,
The thrifty hire I faved under your father,
Which I did store, to be my foster- nurse,
When fervice should in my old limbs lie lame,
And unregarded age in corners thrown-
Take that, and He that doth the ravens feed,
Yea, providentially caters for the fparrow,
Be comfort to my age! Here is the gold,
All this I give you, let me be your fervant-
Tho' I look old, yet I am ftrong and lufty;
For in my youth I never did apply

Hot and rebellous liquors in my blood;

• Wreßler,

† For bumorfome.

For eftranged.

Nor

Nor did I with unbashful forehead woo
The means of weakness and debility;
Therefore my age is as a lufty winter,
Frofty, but kindly *. Let me go with you;
I'll do the bufinefs of a younger man,
In all your business and neceffities.

Orlando. Oh! good old man, how well in thee appeare
The conftant fervice of the antique world,
When service sweat for duty, not for meed!
Thou art not for the fashion of these times,
Where none will fweat, but for promotion;
And having that, do cloak their fervice up,
Even with the having. It is not fo with thee-
But, poor old man, thou prun'ft a rotten tree,
That cannot fo much as a bloffom yield,
In lieu of all thy pains and husbandry-
But come thy ways, we'll go along together;
And ere we have thy youthful wages fpent,
We'll light upon fome fettled low Content.
Adam. Mafter, go on; and I will follow thee,
To the laft gafp, with truth and loyalty-
From seventeen years 'till now almost fourfcore,
Here lived 1, but now live here no more.
At feventeen years many their fortune feek;
But at four core, it is too late a week;
Yet fortune cannot recompence me better,
Than to die well, and not my mafler's debtor.

The nature and follies of love are here extremely

'well defcribed, between the several speakers.

Silvius. O Corin, that thou kneweft how I do love her!

Corin. I partly guess; for I have loved, ere now.
Silvius. No, Corin, being old, thou canst not guefs;
Tho' in thy youth thou waft as true a lover
As ever fighed upon a midnight pillow;
But if thy love were ever like to mine,
(As, fure, I think, did never man love fo)
How many actions most ridiculous

Haft thou been drawn to by thy fantasy ?

Corin. Into a thousand that I have forgotten.
Silvius. O, thou didst then ne'er love fo heartily.
If thou remembereft not the flightest folly

Cicero fays, A well-spent youth forebodes an bealthy age.

That

That ever love did make thee run into ;
Thou haft not loved-

Or if thou haft not fate, as I do now,
Wearing the hearer in thy mistress' praise ;
Thou haft not loved-

Or if thou haft not broke from company,
Abruptly, as my paffion now makes me;
Thou haft not loved-

O Phebe! Phebe ! Phebe !

[Exit.]

Rofalind. Alas, poor fhepherd! Searching of thy wound, I have, by hard adventure, found my own.

Touchstone. And I mine. I remember, when I was in love, I broke my fword upon a ftone, and bid him take that for coming a-nights to Jane Smile; and I remember the kiffing of her batlet and the cow's dugs that her pretty chopt hands had milked; and remember the wooing a peafcod instead of her, from whom I took two peas, and giving her them again, faid, with weeping tears, Wear these for my fake. We that are true lovers run into strange capers; but as all is mortal in nature, fo is all nature in love mortal in folly.

There is a very pretty poem on the fame fubject, and which feems to have taken its hint from this paffage in Shakespeare, though the inftances are different and more in number, written by Mifs Aikin, among a collection of her's lately published, which I would infert here, but that I fuppofe every reader of taste must be in poffeffion of a work which fo well deferves a place in the most select libraries; as doing equal honour to literature, and her fex. (See page 66, of her Poems.)

SCENE V.

The common or modern modes of civility are well enough ridiculed, here; which, however, does not by any means reprove the fond expreffions of affection, or the warm returns of gratitude.

Jaques. Well, then, if ever I thank any man, I'll thank you ; but that they call compliments, is like the encounter of two dogapes. And when a man thanks me heartily, methinks I have giyen him a penny, and he renders me the beggarly thanks for it.

• Or Beatle, a fort of mallet, which wash-women beat the dirt out of coarse linens with, in a pond or ftream.

+ Merial, for abounding. Johnson,

In the fame place, the melancholy Jaques, as he is characterized, though he be of a gloomy and unfociable complexion himself, describes a character in one word, that, in my opinion, is ftill more unqualified for the converse of the world than his own.

When he is told that the Duke has been all the day to look for him, he replies,

And I have been all this day to avoid him. He is too difputable for my company. I think of as many matters as he; but I give heaven thanks, and make no boast of them .

There is fomething extremely pathetic and affecting in this fhort fcene between Orlando and Adam, on their pilgrimage.

Adam. Dear mafter, I can go no further. O, I die for food! Here lie I down, and measure out my grave. Farewell, kind master!

Orlando. Why, how now, Adam! no greater heart in thee? live a little; comfort a little; chear thyself a little. If this uncouth foreft yield any thing favage, I will be either food for it, or bring it for food to thee. Thy conceit is nearer death than thy powers. For my fake, be comfortablet; hold death a-while at the arm's end. I will be here with thee presently; and if I bring thee not fomething to eat, I'll give thee leave to die; but if thou diest before I come, thou art a mocker of my labour. Well faid-thou lookeft cheerly; and I'll be with you quickly. Yet thou lieft in the bleak air. Come, I will bear thee to fome fhelter, and thou fhall not die for the lack of a dinner, if there live any thing in this defert. Cheerly, good Adam.

SCENE

VII.

Trite obfervations and common-place morals are

well exposed here :

Jaques. As I do live by food, I met a fool,

others.

Who laid him down, and bafk'd him in the fun,

And railed on lady Fortune in good terms.

For difputatious.

--

That is, I enjoy my own reflections, but force not my thoughts or opinions upon

+ For comforted.

In good fet terms-and yet a motley fool.
Good morrow, fool, quoth I. No, Sir, quoth he
Call me not fool, 'till Heaven hath fent me fortune-
And then he drew a dial from his poke,
And looking on it with lack-luftre eye,
Says, very wifely, It is ten o'clock;
Thus we may fee, quoth he, how the world
'Tis but an hour ago, fince it was nine,
And, after one hour more, 'twill be eleven;
And fo from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then from hour to hour we rot and rot.
Duke. What fool is this?

wags:

Jaques. A worthy fool! one that hath been a courtier,
And fays, if ladies be but young and fair,

They have the gift to know i-And in his brain,
Which is as dry as the remainder bisket,

After a voyage, he hath ftrange places crammed
With obfervations, the which he vents

In mangled forms.

In the fame scene there is a good defence made for general fatire.

Jaques, being accused of flander,

Why who cries out on pride,

fays,

That can therein tax any private party?
Doth it not flow as hugely as the fea,
Till that the very very means do ebb?
What woman in the city do I name,
When that I fay the city-woman bears
The cost of princes on unworthy shoulders?
Who can come in, and fay, that I mean her,
When fuch a one as the, fuch is her neighbour ?

Or what is he of bafeft function,

That fays, his bravery is not on my cost,

Thinking that I mean him, but therein suits

His fully to the metal of my fpeech?

There then; how then? what then? let me fee wherein

My tongue hath wronged; for, if it do him right,

Then he bath auronged himself; if he be free,

Why then my taxing, like a wild goo e, flies,

Unclaim' of any man.

See the last remark on Scene IV. A&t I. of this

Play.

SCENE