country, as the behaviour of the country is most mockable at the court. You told me, you salute not at the court, bat you kiss your hands; that courtesy would be uncleanly, if courtiers were shepherds. Clo. Instance,, briefly; come, instance, Cor. Why, we are still handling our ewes; and their fells you know are greasy. 5 Clo. Why, do not your courtiers' hands sweat? and is not the grease of a mutton as wholesome as 10 the sweat of a man? Shallow, shallow: A better instance, I say; come. Cor. Besides, our hands are hard. Clo. Your lips will feel them the sooner. Shallow again: A more sounder instance, come. Cor. And they are often tarr'd over with the surgery of our sheep; And would you have us kiss tar? The courtier's hands are perfumed with ci vet. 15 Clo. Most shallow man! Thou worm's-meat, in 20| respect of a good piece of flesh:-indeed!-Learn of the wise, and perpend: Civet is of a baser birth than tar; the very uncleanly flux of a cat, Mend the instance, shepherd. dinners, and suppers, and sleeping hours excepteda Clo. For a taste: "If a hart do lack a hind, "They that reap, must sheaf and bind; He that sweetest rose will find, "Must find love's prick, and Rosalind.” This is the very false gallop of verses; Why do you infect yourself with them? Ros. Peace, you dull fool; I found them on a tree. Cor. You have too courtly a wit for me: I'25' rest. Clo. Wilt thou rest damn'd? God help thee, shallow man! God make incision in thee! thou art raw. Cor. Sir, I am a true labourer; I earn that 130 eat, get that I wear; owe no man hate; envy no man's happiness; glad of other men's good, content with my harm; and the greatest of my pride is, to see my ewes graze, and my lambs suck. Clo. That is another simple sin in you; to bring 35 the ewes and rams together, and to offer to get your living by the copulation of cattle: to be bawd to a bell-wether; and to betray a she-lamb of a twelvemonth to a crooked-pated, old, cuckoldly ram, out of all reasonable match. If thou 40 be'st not damn'd for this, the devil himself will have no shepherds; I cannot see else how thou should'st 'scape. Cor. Here comes young Mr, Ganimed, my new mistress's brother." Enter Rosalind with a paper. "Her worth, being mounted on the wind, Ros. "From the east to western Ind, "No jewel is like Rosalind. Through all the world bears Rosalind, "All the pictures, fairest limn'd, "Are but black to Rosalind, "Let no face be kept in mind, "But the fair of Rosalind. 1451 50 Clo. I'll rhime you so, eight years together;|55| Clo. Truly, the tree yields bad fruit. Ros. I'll graft it with you, and then I shall graft it with a medlar: then it will be the earliest fruit the country; for you'll be rotten ere you be half ripe, and that's the right virtue of the medlar. Clo. You have said; but whether wisely or no let the forest judge. Enter Celia, with a writing. Ros. Peace! Here comes my sister, reading; stand aside. ""Twixt the souls of friend and friend: "But upon the fairest boughs, "Or at every sentence' end, "Teaching all that read, to know Dr. Warburton says, To make incision was a proverbial expression then in vogue for, to make to understand; while Mr. Steevens thinks, that it alludes to the common expression, of cutting such a one for the simples. 'Fair means beauty, complexion. 3 Civil is here used in the same sense as when we say civil life, in opposition to the state of nature. + The commentators are much divided in their opinions on our author's meaning in this line. Dr. Johnson is of opinion, that Shakspeare seems here to have mistaken some other character for that of Atalanta. Mr. Tollet thinks, the port may perhaps mean her beauty, and graceful elegance of shape, which he would prefer to her swiftness; or that it may allude probably to her being a maiden; while Mr. Farmer supposes Atalanta's better part is her wit, i. e. the swiftness of her mind. i. e. grace or suber. "Thus "And I to live and die her slave." Ros. O most gentle Jupiter!--what tedious homily of love have you wearied your parishioners withal, and never cry'd, "Have patience, good 10 people!" Cel. How now! back-friends?-Shepherd, go off a little-Go with him, sirrah. Clo. Come,shepherd,led us make an honourable retreat; though not with bag and baggage, yet 15 with scrip and scrippage. [Exeunt Corin and Clo. Cel. Didst thou hear these verses? Ros. O, yes, I heard them all, and more too; for some of them had in them more feet than the verses would bear. Cel. That's no matter; the feet might bear the verses. Ros. Ay, but the feet were lame, and could not bear themselves without the verse, and therefore stood lamely in the verse. Cel. But didst thou hear, without wondering how thy name should be hang'd and carv'd upon these trees? Cel. So you may put a man in your belly. Cel. Nay, he hath but a little beard. Ros. Why, God will send more, if the man will be thankful: let me stay the growth of his beard, if thou delay me not the knowledge of his chin. Cel. It is young Orlando, that tripp'd up the wrestler's heels, and your heart, both in an instant. Ros. Nay, but the devil take mocking; speak sad brow, and true maid. Cel. I'faith, coz, 'tis he. Cel. Orlando. Ros. Alas the day! what shall I do with my doublet and hose?-What did he, when thou saw'st him? What said he? How look'd he? Wherein went he? What makes he here? Did he ask for 20 me? Where remains he? How parted he with thee? And when shalt thou see him again? Answer me in one word. 25 Ros. I was seven of the nine days out of wonder, before you came; for look here what I found on 30 a palm-tree: I was never so be-rhimed since Pythagoras' time, that I was an Irish rat', which I can hardly remember. Cel. Trow you, who hath done this? Ros. Is it a man? Cel. You must borrow me Garagantua's' mouth first: 'tis a word too great for any mouth of this age's size: To say, ay, and no, to these particulars, is more than to answer in a catechism." Ros. But doth he know that I am in this forest, in man's apparel? Looks he as freshly as he did the day he wrestled? Cel. It is as easy to count atomies, as to resolve the propositions of a lover:-but take a taste of my finding him, and relish it with good observance. I found him under a tree, like a dropp'd acorn. Ros. It may well be call'd Jove's tree, when it 35 drops forth such fruit. Cel. O lord, lord! it is a hard matter for friends to meet; but mountains may be remov'd with 40 earthquakes, and so encounter. Ros. Nay, but who is it? Cel. Is it possible? Ros. Nay, I pr'ythee now, with most petitionary vehemence, tell me who it is. Cel. O wonderful,wonderful, and most wonderful wonderful, and yet again wonderful, and after that out of all whooping! 45 Ros. Good my complexion'! dost thou think, though I am caparison'd like a man, I have a dou-50 blet and hose in my disposition? One inch of delay more is a South-sea off discovery. I pr'ythee, tell me, who is it? quickly, and speak apace: 1 would thou couldst stammer, that thou might'st pour this concealed man out of thy mouth, as wine 55 comes out of a narrow-mouth'd bottle; either too Inuch at once, or none at all. I pr'ythee take the cork out of thy mouth,that I may drink thy tidings. 2 Cel. Give me audience, good madam. Ros. Proceed. Cl. There lay he, stretch'd along, like a wounded knight. Ros. Though it be pity to see such a sight, it well becomes the ground. Cel. Cry, holloa! to thy tongue, I pr'ythee; it curvets uirseasonably. He was furnish'd like Ja hunter. I Ros. Oh ominous! he comes to kill my heart. Cel. I would sing my song without a burden: thou bring'st me out of tune. I Ros. Do you not know I am a woman? when think, I must speak. Sweet, say on. Enter Orlando and Jaques. Cel. You bring me out:-Soft! comes he not here? [Celia and Rosalind retire. Jay. God be with you; let's meet as little as 1i. e. features. Rosalind here alludes to the Pythagorean doctrine, which teaches that souls transmigrate from one animal to another, and says, that in his time she was an Irish rat, and by some metrical charm was rhymed to death. The power of killing rats with rhymes is mentioned by Donne in his Satires. Warburton conjectures the meaning to be, hold good my complexion, i. e. let me That is, a discovery as far off as the South-sea. Garagantua is the giant of Rabelais, and said to have swallowed five pilgrims, their staves and all, in a sallad. not blush. Orla. Orla. I do desire we may be better strangers. Jaq. I pray you, mar no more trees with writing love-songs in their barks. Orla. I pray you, mar no more of my verses with reading thein ill-favouredly. Jaq. Rosalind is your love's name? Orla. Yes, just. Jaq. I do not like her name. Orla. There was no thought of pleasing you, when she was christen'd. Jaq. What stature is she of? Orla. Just as high as my heart. Jaq. You are full of pretty answers: Have you not been acquainted with goldsmiths' wives, and conn'd them out of rings? Orlu. Not so: but I answer you right painted cloth', from whence you have studied your questions. Orla. Who ambles time withal? Ros. With a priest that lacks Latin, and a rich man that hath not the gout: for the one sleeps easily, because he cannot study; and the other lives 5 merrily, because he feels no pain; the one lacking the burden of lean and wasteful learning; the other knowing no burden of heavy tedious penury: These time ambles withal. 10 15 Jaq. You have a nimble wit; I think it was made of Atalanta's heels. Will you sit down with 20 me; and we two will rail against our mistress, the world, and all our misery? Orla. I will chide no breather in the world, but myself, against whom I know most faults. Jaq. The worst fault you have, is to be in love. 25 Orla. 'Tis a fault I would not change for your best virtue. I am weary of you. Jaq. By my troth, I was seeking for a fool, when I found you. Orla. He is drown'd in the brook; look but in, and shall see him. you Juq. There I shall see mine own figure. Orla. Which I take to be either a fool, or a cypher. Orla. Whom doth he gallop withal? Ros. With a thief to the gallows: for though he go as softly as foot can fall, he thinks himself too soon there. Orla. Who stays it still withal? Ros. With lawyers in the vacation: for they sleep between term and term, and then they perceive not how time moves. Orla. Where dwell you, pretty youth? Ros. With this shepherdess, my sister; here in the skirts of the forest, like fringe upon a petticoat. Orla. Are you a native of this place? Ros. As the coney, that you see dwell where she is kindled. Orla. Your accent is something finer than you could purchase in so removed a dwelling. Ros. I have been told so of many; but, indeed, an old religious uncle of mine taught me to speak, who was in his youth an in-land man; one that knew courtship too well, for there he fell in love. I have heard him read many lectures against it; 30 and I thank God I am not a woman, to be touch'd with so many giddy offences as he hath generally tax'd their whole sex withal. Jaq. I'll tarry no longer with you: farewel, 35 [Exit. good signior Love. Orla. I am glad of your departure: adieu, good monsieur Melancholy.[Cel.andRos.come forward Ros. I will speak to him like a saucy lacquey, and under that habit play the knave with him.Do you hear, forester? Orla. Very well; what would you? Ros. Then there is no true lover in the forest; else sighing every minute, and groaning every hour, would detect the lazy foot of time, as well as a clock. 401 Orla. Can you remember any of the principal evils, that he laid to the charge of women? Ros. There were none principal; they were all like one another, as half-pence are: every one fault seeming monstrous, 'till his fellow fault came to match it. Orla. I pr'ythee, recount some of them. Ros. No; I will not cast away my physick, but on those that are sick. There is a man haunts the forest, that abuses our young plants with carving Rosalind on their barks; hangs odes upon hawthorns, and elegies on brambles; all, forsooth, 45 deifying the name of Rosalind: if I could meet that fancy-monger, I would give him some good counsel, for he seems to have the quotidian of love upon him. Orla. And why not the swift foot of time? had 50 not that been as proper? Ros. By no means, sir: Time travels in divers paces with divers persons: I'll tell you who time ambles withal, who time trots withal, who time gallops withal, and who he stands still withal. 55 Oria. I pr'ythee, whom doth he trot withal? Ros. Marry, he trots hard with a young maid, between the contract of her marriage and the day it is solemniz'e: if the interim be but a se'nnight, time's pace is so hard that it seems the length of 60 seven years. Orla. I am he that is so love-shak'd; I pray you, tell me your remedy. Ros. There is none of my uncle's marks upon you, he taught me how to know a man in love; in which cage of rushes, I am sure, you are not prisoner. Orla. What are his marks? Ros. A lean cheek; which you have not: a blue eye, and sunken; which you have not: an unquestionable' spirit; which you have not; a beard neglected; which you have not:-but I pardon you for that; for, simply, your having a beard is la younger brother's revenue:-Then your hose Alluding to the fashion; in old tapestry hangings, of mottos and moral sentences issuing from the 2 Inland is here used to mean a civilized person, in opposition to a mouths of the figures in them. rustick. i. e. a spirit not inquisitive. should should be ungarter'd, your bonuet unbanded, yourf sleeve unbuttoned, your shoe untied', and every thing about you demonstrating a careless desolation. But you are no such man; you are rather point-device in your accoutrements: as loying yourself, than seeming the lover of any other. Orb. Fair youth, I would I could make thee believe I love. Ros. Me believe it? you may as soon make her that love believe it; which, I warrant, she is 10 you apter to do, than to confess she does; that is one of the points in the which women still give the lye to their consciences. But, in good sooth, are you he that hangs the verses on the trees, wherein Rosalind is so admired? Orla. I swear to thee, youth, by the white hand of Rosalind, I am that he, that unfortunate he. Ros. But are you so much in love, as your rhimes speak? [15] Orla. Neither rhime nor reason can express 20 how much. Ros. Love is merely a madness; and, I tell you, deserves as well a dark house and a whip, as madmen do: and the reason why they are not so punish'd and cured, is, that the lunacy is so ordinary, 25 that the whippers are in love too: Yet I profess curing it by counsel, Orla. Did you ever cure any so? 35 Ros. Yes, one; and in this manner. He was to imagine me his love, his mistress; and I set 30 bin every day to woo me: At which time would I, being but a moonish youth, grieve, be effeminate, changeable, longing, and liking: proud, fantastical, apish, shallow, inconstant, full of tears, full of smiles; for every passion something, and for no passion truly any thing, as boys and women are for the most part cattle of this colour: would now like him, now loath him; then entertain him, then forswear him; now weep for him, then spit at him: that I drave my suitor from his mad 40 humour of love, to a living humour of madness; which was, to forswear the full stream of the world, and to live in a nook merely monastick: And thus I cur'd him; and this way will I take upon me to wash your liver as clear as a sound 45 sheep's heart, that there shall not be one spot of love in't. Orla. I would not be cured, youth. Ros. I would cure you, if you would but call me Rosalind; and coine every day to my cote, 50 and woo me. Orla. Now, by the faith of my love, I will; tell me where it is. Ros. Go with me to it, and I will shew it you: and, by the way, you shall tell me where in the 55 forest you live: Will you go? Orla. With all my heart, good youth. I Clo. I am here with thee and thy goats, as the most capricious poet, honest Ovid, was among the Goths. Jaq. [aside.] O knowledge ill-inhabited! worse than Jove in a thatch'd house! Clo. When a man's verses cannot be understood, nor a man's good wit seconded with the forward child Understanding, it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning in a little room': Truly, would the gods had made thee poetical. Aud. I do not know what poetical is: Is it honest in deed and word? Is it a true thing? Clo. No, truly; for the truest poetry is the most feigning; and lovers are given to poetry ; and what they swear in poetry, may be said, as lovers, they do feign. Aud. Do you wish then,that the gods had made me poetical? Clo. I do, truly: for thou swear'st to me, thou art honest; now if thou wert a poet, I might have some hope thou didst feign. Aud. Would you not have me honest ? Clo. No, truly, unless thou wert hard-favour'd for honesty coupled to beauty, is to have honey a sauce to sugar. Jag. [aside.] A material fool! Aud. Well, I am not fair; and therefore I pray the gods make me honest! Clo. Truly, and to cast away honesty upon a foul slut, were to put good meat into an unclean dish. Aud. I am not a slut, though I thank the gods I am foul. Clo. Well, praised be the gods for thy foulness! sluttishness may come hereafter. But be it as it may be, I will marry thee: and to that end, I have been with Sir Oliver Mar-text, the vicar of the next village; who hath promis'd to meet me in this place of the forest, and to couple us. Jaq. [aside.] I would fain see this meeting. Aud. Well, the gods give us joy! Clo. Amen. A man may, if he were of a fearful heart, stagger in this attempt; for here we have no temple but the wood, no assembly but horn-beasts. B.. what though? Courage! As horns are odious, they are necessary. It is said,Many a man knows no end of his goods: right; 'These seem to have been the marks by which the votaries of love were usually characterised in the time of Shakspeare. Meaning, perhaps, a lasting, permanent humour of madness. Nothing (Warburton says) was ever wrote in higher humour than this simile. A great reckoning in a little room, implies that the entertainment was mean, and the bill extravagant. The poet here alluded to the French proverbial phrase of the quarter of hour of Rabelais; who said, there was only one quarter of an hour in human life passed ill, and that was between the calling for the reckoning and paying tie. fool with matter in him; a fool stocked with ideas, i. e. what then? mary it. Act 3. Scene 4.] AS YOU LIKE IT. many a man has good horns, and knows no end] Enter Sir Oliver Mar-text. Jag. [discovering himself.] Proceed, proceed; 20 I'll give her. call't: ye Clo. Good even, good master What How do you, sir? You are very well met: God 'ild you for your last company: I am very glad to see you:-Even a toy in hand here, sir: Nay;25 pray, be covered. Jaq. Will you be married, motley? Clo. As the ox hath his bow, sir, the horse his curb, and the falcon her beils, so man hath his desires; and as pigeons bill, so wedlock would be 30 nibbling. Jug. And will you, being a man of your breeding, be married under a bush, like a beggar? Get you to church, and have a good priest that can tell you what marriage is: this fellow will but 35 jom you together as they join wainscot; then one of you will prove a shrunk pannel, and, like green timber, warp, warp. But-Wind away; I will not to wedding with thee'. Clo. I am not in the mind but I were better to be married of him than of another: for he is not 40 like to marry me well; and not being well married, it will be a good excuse for me hereafter to leave my wife. Jaq. Go thou with me, and let me counse thee. Clo. Come, sweet Audrey; We must be married, or we must live in bawdry. Not- O sweet Oliver, O brave Oliver, Leave me not behind thee; A Cottage in the Forest. [Exeunt. Enter Rosalind and Celia.. Ros. His very hair is of the dissembling colour. Ros. L'faith, his hair is of a good colour. Cel. An excellent colour: your chesnut was ever the only colour. Ros. And his kissing is as full of sanctity as the touch of holy beard. Cel. He hath bought a pair of cast lips of Diana: a nun of winter's sisterhood' kisses not more religiously; the very ice of chastity is in them. Ros. But why did he swear he would come this morning, and comes not? C Nay, certainly, there is no truth in him. Cel. Yes, I think he is not a pick-purse, nor a horse-stealer; but for his verity in love, I do think him as concave as a cover'd goblet, or a worm-eaten nut. Ros. Not true in love? Cel. Yes, when he is in; but, I think, he is not in. Ros. You have heard him swear downright, he was. Cel. Was, is not is: besides, the oath of a lover is no stronger than the word of a tapster; they are both the confirmers of false reckonings. He attends here in the forest on the duke your father. Ros. I met the duke yesterday, and had much 45 question with him: He asked me, of what parentage I was; I told him, of as good as he; so But what talk we of The laugh'd, and let me go. fathers, when there is such a man as Orlando? Cel. O, that's a brave man! he writes brave 50 verses, speaks brave words, swears brave oaths, and breaks them bravely, quite traverse, athwart 1o 6 the 'He who has taken his first degree in the university, is in the academical style called Dominus, and 2 i. e God yield you, God reward you. i. e. his in common language was heretofore termed Sir. Dr. Johnson thinks these are two quotations put in opposition to each yoke. * Part of an old ballad. 7 Dr. Warburton says, other, and for wind proposes to read wend, the old word for go; though it must be observed, that wind See note 5, p. 50. away and wind off are stili used in some counties. that Shakspeare here means an unfruitful sisterhood, which had devoted itself to chastity. For as those who were of the sisterhood of the spring, were the votaries of Venus; those of summer the votaries of Ceres; those of autumn, of Pomona; so those of the sisterhood of winter were the votaries of Diana; called, of winter, because that quarter is not, like the other three, productive of fruit or increase. Q. Does not a nun of winter's sisterhood convey the same meaning as a nun of Windsor's sisterhood? Meaning 10 Warburton explains this passage as follows: An 9 i. e. conversation. perhaps au empty goblet. nexperienced lover is here compared to apuny tilter, to whom it was a disgrace to have his lance broken across, |