her they are the better for their simpleness; That they take place, when virtue's steely bones she derives her honesty, and achieves her good-Look bleak in the cold wind: withal, full oft

ness.

Laf. Your commendations, madam, get from

her tears.

Count. 'Tis the best brine a maiden can season her praise in. The remembrance of her father never approaches her heart, but the tyranny of ber sorrows takes all livelihood + from her cheek. No more of this, Helena, go to, no more; lest it be rather thought you affect a sorrow, than to have. Hel. I do affect a sorrow, indeed, but I have it too.

Laf. Moderate lamentation is the right of the dead, excessive grief the enemy to the living.

Count. If the living be enemy to the grief, the excess makes it soon mortal.

Ber. Madam, I desire your holy wishes.
Laf. How understand we that?

Count. Be thou bless'd, Bertram! and succeed thy father

In manners, as in shape! thy blood and virtue,
Contend for empire in thee; and thy goodness
Share with thy birthright; Love all, trust a few,
Do wrong to none be able for thine enemy
Rather in power, than use; and keep thy friend
Under thy own life's key: be check'd for silence,
But never tax'd for speech. What heaven more
will,
That thee may furnish, and my prayers pluck
down,
Fall on thy head! Farewell.-My lord,
'Tis an unseason'd courtier; good my lord,
Advise bim.

Laf. He cannot want the best
That shall attend his love.

Count. Heaven bless him!-Farewell, Bertram. [Exit COUNTESS. Ber. The best wishes, that can be forged in your thoughts, [To HELENA] be servants to you ! Be comfortable to my mother, your mistress, and make much of her.

Laf. Farewell, pretty lady: You must hold the credit of your father.

[Exeunt BERTRAM and LA FEU. Hel. Oh were that all!-1 think not on my fatber; And these great tears grace his remembrance

Par. There is none; man, sitting down before you, will undermine you, and blow you up. Hel. Bless our poor virginity from widerminers and blowers up-Is there no military policy, how virgins might blow up mes !

Pur. Virginity, being blown down, was wil quicklier be blown up: marry, in blowing bum down again, with the breach yourselves made, you lose your city. It is not politic in the commonwealth of nature, to preserve virginity. L of virginity is rational increase; and there was never virgiu got, till virginity was first lest. That, you were made of, is metal to make vir gins. Virginity, by being once lost, may be ten times found: by being ever kept, it is ever lost: 'tis too cold a companion; away with it.

Hel. I will stand for't a little, though therefore I die a virgin.

Par. There's little can be said in't; 'tis against the rule of nature. To speak on the part of virginity, is to accuse your mothers; which is most infallible disobedience. He, that hangs himself, is a virgin virginity murders itsel; and should be buried in highways, out of all sanctified limit, as a desperate offendress against nature. Virginity breeds mites, much like a cheese; consumes itself to the very paring, and so dies with feeding his own stomach. Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, idle, made of sele love, which is the most inhibited sin in the case. Keep it not; you cannot choose but lose by: Out with't; within ten years it will make itself ten, which is a goodly increase; and the principal itself not much the worse: Away with.

Hel. How might one do, Sir, to lose it to ber own liking?

Par. Let me see: Marry, ill, to like him that ne'er it likes. 'Tis a commodity will lose the gloss with lying; the longer kept, the less worth: off with't, while 'tis vendible; answer the time of request. Virginity, like an old courtier, wears her cap out of fashion; richly suited, but ansuitable just like the brooch and tooth-pick, which wear not now: Your date is better your pie and your porridge, than in your cheek: a And your virginity, your old virginity, is like one

more
Than those I shed for him. What was he like?
I have forgot him: my imagination
Carries no favour in it, but Bertram's.
I am undone; there is no living, uone,
If Bertram be away. It were all one,
That I should love a bright particular star
And think to wed it, he is so above me :
In his bright radiance and collateral light
Must I be comforted, not in his sphere.
The ambition in my love thus plagues itself:
The bind, that would be mated by the lion,
Must die for love. 'Twas pretty, though
plague,

To see him every hour; to sit and draw
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls,
In our heart's table; || heart, too capable
Of every line and trick of his sweet favour :**
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous faucy
Must sanctify his relics. Who comes here?

we see

Cold wisdom waiting on superfluous folly.
Par. Save you, fair queen.

Hel. And you, monarch.
Par. No.

I. e. May you be mistress of your wishes, and have power to bring them to effect.

Helena considers her heart as the tablet on which his resemblance was pourtrayed.

feculiarity of feature.

Hel. And no.

Par. Are you meditating on virginity? Hel. Ay. You have some stain of soldier in you; let me ask you a question: Man is enemy to virginity; how may we barricado it against him?

Par. Keep him out.

Hel. But he assails; and our virginity, though valiant in the defence, yet is weak: unfold to us some warlike resistance.

of our French withered pears; it looks il, it eats dryly; marry, 'tis a withered pear; it was formerly better; marry, yet, 'tis a withered pear Will you any thing with it f

Hel. Not my virginity yet.

There shall your master have a thousand loves,
A mother, and a mistress, and a friend,
A phoenix, captain, and an enemy,
A guide, a goddess, and a sovereign,
A counsellor, a traitress, and a dear;
His humble ambition, proud humility,
His jarring concord, and his discord duleet,
His faith, bis sweet disaster; with a world
Of pretty, fond, adoptious christendomis,
That blinking Cupid gossips. Now shall be--
I know not what he shall:-God sead bin
well!-

The court's a learning-place;-and he is one-
Par. What one, i'faith?

A quibble on date, which means age, and caméad

• Countenance. i fruit.

Hel. The wars have so kept you under, that you must needs be born under Mars.

Par. When he was predominant.
Hel. When he was retrograde, I think, rather.
Par. Why think you so?

Hel. You go so much backward, when you
fight.

Par. That's for advantage.

Hel. So is running away, when fear proposes the safety: But the composition, that your valour and fear makes in you, is a virtue of a good wing, and I like the wear well.

Hel. Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie,
Which we ascribe to heaven: the fated sky
Gives us free scope; only, doth backward pull
Our slow designs, when we ourselves are dull.
What power is it, which mounts my love so
bigb;

That makes me see, and cannot feed mine eye?
The mightiest space in fortune nature brings
To join like likes, and kiss like native things.
Impossible be strange attempts, to those
That weigh their pains in sense; and do sup-

parts

May'st thou inherit too! Welcome to Paris.
Ber. My thanks and duty are your majesty's.
King. I would I had that corporal soundness
now,

As when thy father, and myself, in friendship
First tried our soldiership! He did look far
Into the service of the time, and was
Discipled of the bravest he lasted long;
But on us both did haggish age steal on,
And wore us out of act. It much repairs me
To talk of your good father: In his youth
Par. I am so full of businesses, I cannot answer He had the wit, which I can well observe
thee acutely: I will return perfect courtier; in To-day in our young lords; but they may jest,
the which, my instruction shall serve to natur-Till their own scorn return to them unnoted,
alize thee, so thou wilt be capable of a cour- Ere they can hide their levity in honour.
tier's counsel, and understand what advice shall So like a courtier, contempt not bitterness
thrust upon thee; else thou diest in thine un- Were in his pride or sharpness; if they were,
thankfulness, and thine ignorance makes thee His equal bad awak'd them; and his honour,
away: farewell. When thou hast leisure, say Clock to itself, knew the true minute when
thy prayers; when thou hast none, remember Exception bid him speak, and, at this time,
tby friends: get thee a good husband, and use His tongue obey'd his band: who were below
bim as he uses thee: so farewell.
[Exit. He used as creatures of another place; [him
And bow'd his eminent top to their low rauks,
Making them proud of his humility,

In their poor praise he humbled: Such a man
Might be a copy to these younger times;
Which, follow'd well, would demonstrate them
But goers backward.
[now

pose
What hath been cannot be: Who ever strove
To show her merit, that did miss her love?
The king's disease-my project may deceive me.
But my intents are fix'd, and will not leave me.
[Exit.
SCENE II-Paris.-A Room in the King's

Palace.

1 Lord. His love and wisdom, Approv'd so to your majesty, may plead For amplest credence.

King. The Florentines and Senoys are by

the ears;
Have fought with equal fortune, and continue
A braving war.

1 Lord. So 'tis reported, Sir.

King. Nay, 'tis most credible; we here re-
ceive it

King. He hath arm'd our answer,
And Florence is denied before he comès :
Yet, for our gentlemen, that mean to see
The Tuscan service, freely have they leave
To stand on either part.

2 Lord. It may well serve

A nursery to our gentry, who are sick
For breathing and exploit.

King. What's he comes here ?

Ber. His good remembrance, Sir,
Lies richer in your thoughts, than on his tomb;
So in approof lives not his epitaph,
As in your royal speech.

King. 'Would, I were with him! He would
always say,

(Methinks, I hear him now; his plausive words
He scatter'd not in ears, but grafted them,
To grow there, and to bear,)—Let me not live,-
Thus his good melancholy oft began,
On the catastrophe and heel of pastime,
When it was out,-Let me not live, quoth he,
After my flame lacks oil, to be the snuff
Of younger spirits, whose apprehensive senses
All but new things disdain ; whose judgments
Flourish of Cornets. Enter the KING OF
FRANCE, with letters; LORDs and others Mere fathers of their garments; § whose con
attending.

are

A certainty, vouch'd from our cousin Austria,
With caution, that the Florentine will move us
For speedy aid; wherein our dearest friend
Prejudicates the business, and would seein
To bave us take deuial.

I. e. And show by realities what we now must only

Enter BERTRAM, LAFEU, and PAROLLES.
1 Lord. It is the count Rousillon, my good
Young Bertram.
(lord,

King. Youth, thou bear'st thy father's face;
Frank nature, rather curious than in haste,
Hath well compos'd thee. Thy father's moral

think.

4. Thou wilt comprehend it.

Things formed by nature for each other.

The citizens of the small republic of which Sienna is the capital.

stancies

Expire before their fashions:---This he wish'd.
I, after him, do after him wish too,
Since I nor wax nor honey can bring home,
I quickly were dissolved from my hive,
To give some labourers room.
2 Lord. You are lov'd, Sir;

They, that least lend it you, shall lack you

first.

King. I fill a place, I know't.-How long is't, count,

Since the physician at your father's died?
He was much fam'd.

Ber. Some six months since, my lord.
King. If he were living, I would try him

yet;

+ Flis is put for its.

To repair here signifies to renovate. 1 Approbation. Who have no other use of their faculties than to inveat new modes of dress.

Lend me an arm; the rest have worn me out
With several applications :-nature and sickness
Debate it at their leisure. Welcome, count;
My son's no dearer.

Ber. Thank your majesty. [Exeunt. Flourish.
SCENE 111.-Rousillon.-A Room in the
Countess' Palace.

Enter COUNTESS, STEWARD, and CLOWN.. Count. I will now hear what say you of this gentlewoman?

Stew. Madam, the care I have had to even your content, I wish might be found in the calendar of my past endeavours; for then we wound our modesty, and make foul the clearness of our deservings, when of ourselves we publish them.

Count. What does this knave here! Get you gone, sirrah: The complaints, I have heard of you, I do not all believe; 'tis my slowness, that I do not for, I know, you lack not folly to commit them, and have ability enough to make such knaveries yours.

Clo. 'Tis not unknown to you, madam, I am a poor fellow.

Count. Well, Sir.

Clo. No, madam, 'tis not so well, that I am poor; though many of the rich are damned: But, if I may have your ladyship's good will to go to the world, Isbel the woman and I will

Service

Clo. In Isbel's case and mine own. is no heritage and I think I shall never bave the blessing of God, till I have issue of my body; for, they say, bearns are blessings.

Count. Tell me thy reason why thou wilt marry. Clo. My poor body, madam, requires it; I am driven on by the flesh; and he must needs go, that the devil drives.

Count. Is this all your worship's reason? Clo. Faith, madam, I have other holy reasons, such as they are.

Count. May the world know them?

Clo. I have been, madam, a wicked creature, as you and all flesh and blood are; and indeed, I do marry that I may repent.

Count. Thy marriage, sooner than thy wicked

For I the ballad will repeat,
Which men full true shall find;
Your marriage comes by destiny,
Your cuckoo sings by kind.

Licensed jesters were formerly maintained by every
great family to keep up merriment in the house.
To act up to your desires.

1 To be married.
Therefore.

§ Children.

Count. Ge more anon. Stew. May Helen come Count. Sir

speak with h Clo. Was

she,

Ploughs.
The nearest way.

ness.

Clo. I am out of friends, madam; and I hope to have friends for my wife's sake.

Count. Such friends are thine enemies, knave. Clo. You are shallow, madam; e'en great friends; for the knaves come to do that for ine, which an a-weary of. He, that ears my land, spares my team, and gives me leave to inn the crop if I be his cuckold, he's my drudge He, that comforts my wife, is the cherisher of my flesh and blood, he that cherishes my flesh and blood, loves my flesh and blood; he, that loves my flesh and blood, is my friend: ergo, he that kisses my wife, is my friend. If men could be contented to be what they are, there Count. Yo were no fear in marriage; for young Charbon keep it to yo the puritan, and old Poysam the papist, how-me of this soe'er their hearts are severed in religion, their the balance, heads are both one, they may joll horns to- misdoubt: gether, like any deer i'the herd.

her, they to matter was, said, was difference b god, that w where. quali of virgine, t be surprised, or rausom al most bitter virgin excla speedily to the loss that thing to kno

Count. Wilt thou ever be a foul-mouthed and

caluminious knave ?

Clo. A prophet I, madam; and I speak the truth the uext way : **

Count. W

Stew. I ki woman entir

Count. Fa her to me: vantage, ma love as she f is paid; and demand.

Stew. Ma than, I think

and did com to her own

your bosom, care: I will

Count. Ev your

If we are

thor Doth to our Our blood

• Foolis!

Hel. Then, I confess,

It is the show and seal of nature's truth,
Where love's strong passion is impress'd in Here on my knee, before high heaven and you,
That before you, and next unto high heaven,
youth:
I love you son :-

My friends were poor, but honest; so's my

By our remembrances of days foregone,
Such were our faults;-or then
them none.

Her eye is sick on't; I observe her now.
Hel. What is your pleasure, madam?
Count. You know, Helen,

I am a mother to you.

Hel. Mine honourable mistress.

we thought

Count. Nay, a mother;

Why not a mother? When I said a mother,
What's a mo-
Methought you saw a serpent:

ther,
That you start at it? I say, I am your mother;
And put you in the catalogue of those
That were enwombed mine: 'Tis often seen,
Adoption strives with nature; and choice breeds
A native slip to us from foreign seeds!
You ne'er oppress'd me with a mother's groan,
Yet I express to you a mother's care:-
God's mercy, maiden! does it curd thy blood,
To say, I am thy mother? What's the matter,
That this distemper'd messenger of wet,
The many-colour'd Iris, rounds thine eye?
Why that you are my daughter?

Hel. That I am not.

Count. I say, I am your mother.
Hel. Pardon, madam;

The count Rousillon cannot be my brother.
I am from humble, he from honour'd name;
No note upon my parents, his all noble :
My master, my dear lord he is; and I
His servant live, and will his vassal die :
He must not be my brother.

Count. Nor I your mother?

Hel. You are my mother, madam; 'Would

you were

love:

Be not offended; for it hurts not him,
That he is lov'd of me: I follow him not

By any token of presumptuous suit;
Nor would I have him, till I do deserve him;
Yet never know how that desert should be.
I know I love in vain, strive against hope:
Yet, in this captious and intenible sieve,
I still pour in the waters of my love,
And lack not to lose still: thus Indian-like,
Religious in mine error, I adore,

The sun, that looks upon his worshipper
But knows of him no more. My dearest ma-
dam,

Let not your hate encounter with my love,
For loving where you do: but, if yourself,
Whose aged honour cites a virtuous youth,
Did ever, in so true a flame of liking,
Wish chastely, and love dearly, that your Dian
Was both herself and love;t oh! then give

my

our

pity

To her, whose state is such, that cannot choose
But lend and give, where she is sure to lose :
That seeks not to find that her search implies,
But, riddle-like, lives sweetly where she dies.
Count. Had you not lately an intent, speak
truly,
To go to Paris ?

Hel. Madam, I had.

Count. Wherefore? tell true.

Hel. I will tell truth: by grace itself, I

swear.

You know my father left me some prescrip

(So that my lord, your son, were not
brother,)
Indeed, my mother!-or were you both
mothers,
I care no more for, than I do for heaven,
So I were not his sister: Can't no other,
But, I your daughter, he must be my brother?
Count. Yes, Helen, you might be my daugh-
ter-in-law;

God shield, you mean it not! daughter, and
mother,

So strive+ upon your pulse: What, pale again?
My fear hath catch'd your fondness: Now I see
The mystery of your loneliness, and find
Your salt tears' head. Now to all sense 'tis
gross,

You love my son; invention is asham'd,
Against the proclamation of thy passion,
To say thou dost not: therefore tell me true;
Bot tell me then, 'tis so :-for, look, thy cheeks
Confess it, one to the other; and thine eyes
See it so grossly shown in thy behaviours,
That in their kind they speak it only sin
And hellish obstinacy tie thy tongue,
That truth should be suspected: Speak, is't so?
If it be so, you have wound a goodly clue;
If it be not, forswear't: howe'er, I charge thee,
As heaven shall work in me for thine avail,
To tell me truly.

greatest

Hel. Good madam, pardon me!
Count. Do you love my son?

Of his profession, that his good receipt

Shall, for my legacy, be sanctified

Hel. Your pardon, noble mistress!
Count. Love you my son ?
Hel. Do not you love him, madam?

By the luckiest stars in heaven: and, would
your honour

But give me leave to try success, I'd venture

Count. Go not about; my love hath in't a The well-lost life of mine on his grace's cure,

dis

bond, Whereof the world takes note: come, come, close The state of your affection; for your passions Have to the full appeach'd.

tions

Of rare and prov'd effects, such as his reading,
And manifest experience, had collected
For general sovereignty; and that he will'd me
In heedfullest reservation to bestow them,
As notes, whose faculties inclusive were,
More than they were in note: amongst the

rest,

There is a remedy, approv'd, set down,
To cure the desperate languishes, whereof
The king is render'd lost.

Count. This was your motive

For Paris, was it? speak.

Hel, My lord, your son made me to think of
this;

Else Paris, and the medicine, and the king,
Had, from the conversation of my thoughts,
Haply, been absent then.

Count. But think you, Helen,

If you should tender your supposed aid,
He would receive it? He and his physicians
Are of a mind; he, that they cannot help him,
They, that they cannot help: How shall they
credit

A poor unlearned virgin, when the schools,
Embowell'd of their doctrine, have left off
The danger to itself?

Hel. There's something hints,

More than my father's skill, which was the

By such a day and hour.

Count. Dost thou believe it?

Hel. Ay, madam, knowingly.

Count. Why, Helen, thou shalt have my leave and love,

• 1. e. Whose respectable conduct in age proves that you were no less virtuous when young. 1 Receipts in which greater +f.e. Venus. virtues were enclosed than appeared. Exhausted of their skill.

Whether I live or die, be you the sons
Of worthy Frenchman: let higher Italy
(Those 'bated, that inherit but the fall
Of the last monarchy, *) see, that you come
Not to woo honour, but to wed it; when
The bravest questant + shrinks, find what you
seek,
That fame may cry yon lond: I say,

farewell.

2 Lord. Health, at your bidding, serve your
majesty !
King. Those girls of Italy, take heed
them ;

They say, our French lack language to deny,
If they demand: beware of being captives,
Before you serve. †

kin. Good sparks and lustrous, a word, good
metals:-You shall find in the regiment of the
Spinii, one captain Spurio, with his cicatrice,
an emblem of war, here on his sinister cheek;
it was this very sword entrenched it: say to
him, I live; and observe his reports for me.
2 Lord. We shall, noble captain.

Par. Mars dote on you for bis novices! [Exeunt LORDS.] What will you do?

Both. Our hearts receive your warnings.
King. Farewell.-Come hither to me.
[The KING retires to a couch.
1 Lord. O my sweet lord, that you will stay

behind us!
Par. 'Tis not his fault: the spark-
2 Lord. Oh ! 'tis brave wars!
Par. Most admirable : I have seen those

Ber. Stay; the king—— [Seeing him rISE. Par. Use a more spacious ceremony to the noble lords; you have restrained yourself within the list of too cold an adien: be more expressive to them; for they wear themselves in the cap of the time, there, do muster true gait, ↑ eat, speak, and move under the influence of the most received star; and though the devil lead the measure, such are to be followed: after them, and take a more dilated farewell. Ber. And I will do so.

Par. Worthy fellows; and like to prove most sinewy swordmen.

[Exeunt BERTRAM and PAROLLES,

Enter LAPEC.

Laf. Pardon, my lord, [Kneeling.] fæ me and for my tidings.

And ask'd thee mercy for't.

Laf. Goodfaith, across :ý

But my good lord, 'tis thus; Will you be car'd
Of your infirmity ?
King. No.

Laf. Oh! will you eat

of

No grapes, my royal fox ? yes, but you will,
My noble grapes, an if my royal fox
Could reach them: I have seen a medicine,
That's able to breathe life into a stone;
Quicken a rock, and make you dance canary,
With sprightly fire and motion; whose simple

touch

wars.

Ber. I am commanded here, and kept a coil § with;

Too young, and the next year, and 'tis too early.

Par. An thy mind stand to it, boy, steal away bravely.

Ber. I shall stay here the forehorse to a
smock,

Creaking my shoes on the plain masonry,
Till honour be bought up, and no sword worn,
But one to dance with! By heaven, I'll steal

away.

1 Lord. There's honour in the theft. Par. Commit it, count.

2 Lord. I am your accessary; and so farewell.

Ber. I grow to you, and our parting is a tortured body.

1 Lord. Farewell, captain.

2 Lord. Sweet monsieur Parolles !

Par. Noble heroes, my sword and your's are

I. e. Those excepted who possess modern Italy, the remains of the Roman empire.

King. I'll fee thee to stand up.
Laf. Then here's a man

Stands, that has brought his pardon. I would,

you

Had kneel'd, my lord, to ask me mercy; and
That at my bidding, you could so stand up.
King. I would I had; so I had broke thy
pate,

+ Seeker, inquirer.

Be not captives before you are soldiers.

With a noise, bustle.

In Shakspeare's time it was usual for gentlemen to dance with swords on.