Rich. (Waving his hana.) Not quite so quick, friend Huguet;

Messire De Mauprat is a patient man,
And he can wait! (Huguet retires again.)
You have outrun your fortune;-

I blame you not, that you would be a beggar-
Each to his taste!-But I do charge you, sir,
That, being beggared, you would coin false

monies

170 Out of that crucible called DEBT.-To live
On means not yours-be brave in silks and
laces,

Gallant in steeds—splendid in banquets;—all
Not yours-ungiven-unherited-unpaid for ;-
This is to be a trickster; and to filch

Men's art and labour, which to them is wealth,
Life, daily bread,-quitting all scores with-
'Friend,

You're troublesome!'-Why this, forgive me,
Is what-when done with a less dainty grace-
Plain folks call Theft!' You owe eight
thousand pistoles,

180 Minus one crown, two liards!

De Mau. (Aside.) The old conjurer!—
Rich. This is scandalous,

Shaming your birth and blood- I tell you,

That

sir,

you must pay your debts. De Mau. With all my heart,

My lord. Where shall I borrow, then, the money?

Rich. (Aside and laughing.) A humorous
dare-devil!-The very man

To suit my purpose-ready, frank, and bold!
(Earnestly.) Adrien De Mauprat, men have
called me cruel;

190 I am not! I am just!-I found France rent asunder,

The rich men despots, and the poor banditti;—
Sloth in the mart, and schism within the

Thou hast dared to love my ward-my charge. De Mau. As rivers

May love the sunlight-basking in the beams, And hurrying on!

Rich. Thou hast told her of thy love?

De Mau. My lord, if I had dared to love a maid,

Lowliest in France, I would not so have wronged her,

As bid her link rich life and virgin hope With one, the deathman's gripe might, from her side,

Pluck at the nuptial altar.

Rich. (Sits.) I believe thee;

Yet since she knows not of thy love, renounce

her;

Take life and fortune with another!-Silent? De Mau. Your fate has been one triumph

You know not

How blest a thing it was in my dark hour To nurse the one sweet thought you bid me banish.

Love hath no need of words;-nor less within That holiest temple-the heaven-builded soulBreathes the recorded vow. - Base knight,

false lover

Were he, who bartered all that brightened grief,
Or sanctified despair, for life and gold.
Revoke your mercy;-I prefer the fate
I looked for!

Rich. Huguet!

Enter HUGUET.

To the tapestry chamber
Conduct your prisoner.

(To Mauprat.) You will there behold
The executioner:-your doom be private―
And heaven have mercy on you!-

De Mau. When I'm dead,

Tell her I loved her.

Rich. Keep such follies, sir, For fitter ears;-go

De Mau. Does he mock me?

[Exeunt DE MAUPRAT, HUGUET.

Rich. Joseph,

Enter JOSEPH.

Come forth.

Methinks your cheek hath lost its rubies;
I fear you have been too lavish of the flesh;

Rich. De Mauprat.

Joseph. Penniless husband!

Rich. Bah! the mate for beauty

Should be a man, and not a money-chest!
When her brave sire lay on his bed of death
I vowed to be a father to his Julie;-
270 And so he died-the smile upon his lips!—

And when I spared the life of her young lover,
Methought, I saw the smile again !—(Rises.)

Baffle their schemes?—I have tried him;-He
has honour

And courage; qualities that eagle-plume
Men's souls, and fit them for the fiercest sun,
Which ever melted the weak waxen minds
That flutter in the beams of gaudy Power!
Besides, he has taste, this Mauprat;-When
my play

Was acted to dull tiers of lifeless gapers,
280 Who had no soul for poetry, I saw him
Applaud in the proper places; trust me,
Joseph,

He is a man of an uncommon promise!
Joseph. And yet your foe.

Rich. Have I not foes enow?—

Great men gain doubly when they make foes
friends.

Remember my grand maxims;-First employ
All methods to conciliate.

Joseph. Failing these?—

Rich. (Fiercely.) All means to crush; as with the opening, and

290 The clenching of this little hand, I will Crush the small venom of these stinging courtiers.

Joseph. And when

Check the conspiracy?

Rich. Check, check? Full way to it.

Let it bud, ripen, flaunt i' the day, and burst To fruit,-the Dead Sea's fruit of ashes;-ashes Which I will scatter to the winds.

Go, Joseph;

(Sits.)

When you return, I have a feast for you;
The last great act of my great play.

[JOSEPH shrugs his shoulders, and exit. Enter DE MAUPRAT and JULIE. They kneel to RICHELIEU.

De Mau. Oh, speak, my lord-I dare not think you mock me,

And yet

Julie. Are we not both your children?
Rich. Eh!

How now! Oh! sir-you live!

De Mau. Why, no, methinks, Elysium is not life!

Julie. He smiles!--you smile,

My father! From my heart for ever, now,
I'll blot the name of orphan!

Rich. Rise, my children (They rise.)
For ye are mine-mine both;-and in your sweet
And young delight-your love--(life's first-born
glory)

My own lost youth breathes musical!
De Mau. I'll seek

Temple and priest henceforward!—were it but
To learn Heaven's choicest blessings.

Rich. Thou shalt seek

Temple and priest right soon; the morrow's sun Shall see across these barren thresholds pass The fairest bride in Paris.-Go, my children; (Richelieu rises.) Even I loved once!-Be lovers while ye may! How is it with you, sir? You bear it bravely; You know, it asks the courage of a lion.

[Exeunt JULIE and DE MAUPRAT. Rich. Oh! godlike power! Woe, rapture, penury, wealth,

Marriage and death, for one infirm old man Through a great empire to dispense-withhold

As the will whispers; and shall things-like

motes

That live in my daylight-lackeys of court

wages,

300

310

320

France,

-'is true liberty'

DUKE SENIOR, AMIENS, and two or three LORDS like Foresters.

Duke S. Now, my co-mates, and brothers in exile,

Hath not old custom made this life more sweet Than that of painted pomp? Are not these woods

More free from peril than the envious court?
Here feel we but the penalty of Adam,
The seasons' difference; as the icy fang
And churlish chiding of the winter's wind,
Which, when it bites and blows upon my body,
Even till I shrink with cold, I smile and

say

'This is no flattery: these are counsellors
That feelingly persuade me what I am.'
Sweet are the uses of adversity,

Which like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running
brooks,

Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.
I would not change it.

Ami.
Happy is your grace,
That can translate the stubbornness of fortune
Into so quiet and so sweet a style.

Duke S. Come, shall we go and kill us venison?

And yet it irks me, the poor dappled fools, Being native burghers of this desert city, Should, in their own confines, with forked

Coursed one another down his innocent nose
In piteous chase; and thus the hairy fool,
Much marked of the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift
brook,

Augmenting it with tears.
Duke S.

But what said Jaques? Did he not moralize this spectacle? 1st Lord. O, yes, into a thousand similes. First, for his weeping into the needless stream: 'Poor deer,' quoth he, thou mak'st a

testament

As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more To that which had too much:' then, being alone,

Left and abandoned of his velvet friends;
"'Tis right,' quoth he; 'thus misery doth
part

The flux of company:' anon, a careless herd
Full of the pasture, jumps along by him.
And never stays to greet him; Ay,' quoth
Jaques,

'Sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens;
'Tis just the fashion; Wherefore do you look
Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there?'
Thus most invectively he pierceth through
The body of the country, city, court,
Yea, and of this our life; swearing that we
Are mere usurpers, tyrants, and what's worse,
To fright the animals and to kill them up
In their assigned and native dwelling-place.
Duke S. And did you leave him in this
contemplation?

2nd Lord. We did, my lord, weeping and commenting Upon the sobbing deer.

Duke S.

Show me the place; 7

I love to cope him in these sullen fits, For then he's full of matter.

$100

110

And railed on Lady Fortune in good terms,
In good set terms, and yet a motley fool.
Good-morrow, fool,' quoth I: 'No, sir,'
quoth he,

'Call me not fool till heaven hath sent me fortune;'

And then he drew a dial from his poke,
And looking on it with lack-lustre eye,
Says very wisely, 'It is ten o'clock:

Thus may we see,' quoth he, how the world

wags:

Tis but an hour ago since it was nine,
And after one hour more 'twill be eleven;
And so from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then, from hour to hour, we rot and rot,
And thereby hangs a tale.' When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
That fools should be so deep-contemplative,
And I did laugh sans intermission,
An hour by his dial. O noble fool!"
A worthy fool! Motley's the only wear.
Duke S. What fool is this?

Jaq. O worthy fool! one that hath been a
courtier;

And says, if ladies be but young and fair,
They have the gift to know it; and in his
brain,

Which is as dry as the remainder biscuit
After a voyage, he hath strange places crammed
With observation, the which he vents
In mangled forms.-O, that I were a fool!
I am ambitious for a motley coat.

Duke S. Thou shalt have one.
Jaq.
It is my only suit;
Provided that you weed your better judgments
Of all opinion that grows rank in them
That I am wise. I must have liberty
Withal, as large a charter as the wind,
To blow on whom I please; for so fools have:
And they that are most galled with my folly,
They most must laugh. And why, sir, must
they so?

The 'why' is plain as way to parish-church:
He that a fool doth very wisely hit,

120 Doth very foolishly, although he smart,
Not to seem senseless of the bob; if not
The wise man's folly is anatomized.
Even by the squandering glances of the fool.
Invest me in my motley; give me leave
To speak my mind, and I will through and
through

130

Cleanse the foul body of the infected world, If they will patiently receive my medicine. [Duke S. Fy on thee! I can tell what thou would'st do.

Jaq. What, for a counter, would I do but good?

Duke S. Most mischievous foul sin, in chiding sin:

For thou thyself hast been a libertine,
As sensual as the brutish sting itself;

And all the embossed sores, and headed evils,

That thou with license of free foot hast caught,

Wouldst thus disgorge into the general world.
Jaq. Why, who cries out on pride,
That can therein tax any private party?
Doth it not flow as hugely as the sea,
Till that the weary very means do ebb?
What woman in the city do I name,
When that I say the city-woman bears
The cost of princes on unworthy shoulders?
Who can come in and say that I mean her,
When such a one as she, such is her neighbour?
Or what is he of basest function,
That says his bravery is not of my cost,
Thinking that I mean him, but therein suits
His folly to the mettle of my speech?

There then; how then? what then? Let me see

wherein

140

justice,

In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
His youthful hose well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice, 180
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness, and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans every
thing.

Men. What work's, my countrymen, in hand? where go you

With bats and clubs? The matter? Speak, I

pray you.

1st Cit. Our business is not unknown to the senate; they have had inkling this fortnight what we intend to do, which now we'll show 'em in deeds. They say poor suitors have strong breaths: they shall know we have strong arms too.

Men. Why, masters, my good friends, mine honest neighbours,

Will you undo yourselves?

1st Cit. We cannot, sir; we are undone already.

Men. I tell you, friends, most charitable

care

Have the patricians of you. For your wants, Your suffering in this dearth, you may as well Strike at the heaven with your staves, as lift them

Against the Roman state, whose course will

on

The way it takes, cracking ten thousand curbs Of more strong link asunder than can ever Appear in your impediment. For the dearth, The gods, not the patricians, make it; and Your knees to them, not arms, must help.

Rebelled against the belly; thus accused it:
That only like a gulf it did remain
I' the midst o' the body, idle and inactive,
Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing
Like labour with the rest, where the other
instruments

Did see, and hear, devise, instruct, walk, feel,
And, mutually participate, did minister
Unto the appetite and affection common
Of the whole body. The belly answered,-
Ist Cit. Well, sir, what answer made the
belly?

Men. Sir, I shall tell you.-With a kind of smile

Which ne'er came from the lungs, but even thus

For, look you, I may make the belly smile
As well as speak,-it tauntingly replied
To the discontented members, the mutinous
parts

That envied his receipt; even so most fitly
As you malign our senators for that
They are not such as you.

1st Cit. Your belly's answer? What!
The kingly-crownèd head, the vigilant eye,
The counsellor heart, the arm our soldier,
Our steed the leg, the tongue our trumpeter,
With other muniments and petty helps
In this our fabric, if that they-
Men.

What then?

'That I receive the general food at first, Which you do live upon; and fit it is, Because I am the store-house and the shop Of the whole body: but, if you do remember, I send it through the rivers of your blood, Even to the court, the heart, to the seat o' the brain;

And, through the cranks and offices of man, The strongest nerves and small inferior veins From me receive that natural competency