with, should be once heard, and thrice beaten. God save you, captain! Ber. Is there any unkindness between my lord and you, monsieur? Par. I know not how I have deserved to run into my lord's displeasure. Laf. You have made shift to run into't, boots and spurs and all, like him that leaped into the custard; and out of it you'll run again, rather than suffer question for your residence. Ber. It may be, you have mistaken him, my lord. Luf. And shall do so ever, though I took him at his prayers. Fare you well, my lord; and believe this of me, there can be no kernel in this light nut; the soul of this man is his clothes: trust him not in matter of heavy consequence: I have kept of them tame, and know their natures.-Farewell, monsieur! I have spoken better of you, than you have or will deserve at my hand; but we must do good against evil. Par. An idle lord, I swear. Ber. I think so. Par. Why, do you not know him? [Exit. Ber. Yes, I do know him well; and common speech Gives him a worthy pass. Here comes my clog. Enter HELENA. Hel. I have, sir, as I was commanded from you, Spoke with the king, and have procured his leave For present parting; only, he desires Some private speech with you. Ber. I shall obey his will. You must not marvel, Helen, at my course, Which holds not color with the time, nor does The ministration and required office On my particular: prepar'd I was not For such a business; therefore am I found So much unsettled: This drives me to entreat you, My haste is very great: Farewell; hie home. Ber. What would you have? Hel. Something; and scarce so much:-nothing, indeed. I would not tell you what I would: my lord-'faith, yes; Strangers, and foes, do sunder, and not kiss. Bravely, coragio! [Exeunt. ACT III. Duke. SCENE I.-Florence. A Room in the Duke's Palace. Welcome shall they be; And all the honors, that can fly from us, Shall on them settle. You know your places well; Flourish. Enter the DUKE OF FLORENCE, attended; When better fall, for your avails they fall: two French Lords, and others. Duke. So that, from point to point, now have The fundamental reasons of this war; 1 Lord. Holy seems the quarrel Upon your grace's part; black and fearful On the opposer. Duke. Therefore we marvel much, our cousin Enter COUNTESS and Clown. Count. It hath happened all as I would have had it, save, that he comes not along with her. Clo. By my troth, I take my young lord to be a very melancholy man. Count. By what observance, I pray you? Clo. Why, he will look upon his boot, and sing; mend the ruff,' and sing; ask questions, and sing; pick his teeth, and sing; I know a man that had this trick of melancholy, sold a goodly manor for a BERTRAM. This is not well, rash and unbridled boy, Re-enter Clown. Clo. O madam, yonder is heavy news within, between two soldiers and my young lady. Count. What is the matter? Clo. Nay, there is some comfort in the news, some comfort; your son will not be kill'd so soon as I thought he would. Count. Why should he be killed? Clo. So say I, madam, if he run away, as I hear he does: the danger is in standing to't; that's the loss of men, though it be the getting of children. Here they come, will tell you more: for my part, I only hear, your son was run away. [Exit Clown. Enter HELENA and two Gentlemen. 1 Gent. Save you, good madam. Count. Think upon patience.-'Pray you, gen- I have felt so many quirks of joy and grief, 2 Gent. Madam, he's gone to serve the duke of We met him thither ward; from thence we came, My son corrupts a well-derived nature 1 Gent. Count. You are welcome, gentlemen, We serve you, madam, [Exeunt CoUNTESS and Gentlemen Hel. Look on this letter, madam; here's my Fly with false aim; move the still-piercing air, passport. [Reads.] When thou canst get the ring upon my finger, which never shall come off, and show me a child begotten of thy body, that I am father to, then call me husband: but in such a then I write a never. This is a dreadful sentence. Count. Brought you this letter, gentlemen? That sings with piercing, do not touch my lord! I am the caitiff, that do hold him to it; This very day, Great Mars, I put myself into thy file: Enter COUNTESS and Steward. Stew. Iam Saint Jaques' pilgrim, thither gone: Ambitious love hath so in me offended, That barefoot plod I the cold ground upon, With sainted vow my faults to have amended. Write, write, that from the bloody course of war, My dearest master, your dear son, may hie; Bless him at home in peace, whilst I from far, His name with zealous fervor sanctify: His taken labors bid him me forgive; I, his despiteful Juno, sent him forth From courtly friends, with camping foes to live, Where death and danger dog the heels of worth: He is too good and fair for death and me; Whom I myself embrace, to set him free. Count. Ah, what sharp stings are in her mildest words! Rinaldo, you did never lack advice' so much, Stew. Pardon me, madam : If I had given you this at over night, She might have been o'erta'en; and yet she writes, Pursuit would be in vain. Count. What angel shall Bless this unworthy husband? he cannot thrive, Unless her prayers, whom heaven delights to hear, And loves to grant, reprieve him from the wrath Of greatest justice,-Write, write, Rinaldo, To this unworthy husband of his wife; Let every word weigh heavy of her worth, That he does weigh too light: my greatest grief, Though little he do feel it, set down sharply. Despatch the most convenient messenger: When, haply, he shall hear that she is gone, He will return; and hope I may, that she, Hearing so much, will speed her foot again, and hither by pure love: which of them both 1: dearest to me, I have no skill in sense To make distinction:-Provide this messenger: Alluding to the story of Hercules. • Discretion or thought. My heart is heavy, and mine age is weak, Grief would have tears, and sorrow bids me speak. [Exeunt SCENE V. Without the Walls of Florence. A Tucket afar off. Enter an old Widow of Florence, DIANA, VIOLENTA, MARIANA, and other Citizens. Wid. Nay, come; for if they do approach the city, we shall lose all the sight. Dia. They say, the French count has done mosi honorable service. Wid. It is reported that he has taken their greatest commander; and that with his own hand he slew the duke's brother. We have lost our labor; they are gone a contrary way: hark! you may know by their trumpets. Mar. Come, let's return again, and suffice ourselves with the report of it. Well, Diana, take heed of this French earl; the honor of a maid is her name; and no legacy is so rich as honesty. Wid. I have told my neighbor, how you have been solicited by a gentleman, his companion. Mar. I know that knave; hang him! one Parolles: a filthy officer he is in those suggestions for the young earl.-Beware of them, Diana; their. promises, enticements, oaths, tokens, and all these engines of lust, are not the things they go under;' many a maid hath been seduced by them; and the misery is, example, that so terrible shows in the wreck of maidenhood, cannot for all that dissuade succession, but that they are limed with the twigs that threaten them. I hope, I need not to advise you further; but, I hope, your own grace will keep you where you are, though there were no further danger known, but the modesty which is so lost. Dia. You shall not need to fear me. Enter HELENA, in the dress of a Pilgrim.` Wid. I hope so. Look, here comes a pilgrim. I know she will lie at my house: thither they send one another: I'll question her. God save you, pilgrim! Whither are you bound? Where do the palmers' lodge, I do beseech you? Ay, marry, is it.-Hark you! [A march afar off. They come this way:-If you will tarry, holy pil grim, But till the troops come by, I will conduct you where you shall he lodg'd; The rather, for, I think, I know your hostess As ample as myself. Hel. Is it yourself? Wid. If you shall please so, pilgrim. Hel. I thank you, and will stay upon your leisure Wid. You came, I think, from France? Hel. I did so. Wid. Here you shall see a countryman of yours, That has done worthy service. Hel. His name, I pray you? Dia. The count Rousillon: Know you such a one? Hel. But by the ear, that hears most nobly of him: His face I know not. Dia. Whatsoe'er he is, He's bravely taken here. He stole from France, Temptations. Not what their names express. Pilgrims; so called from a staff or bough of palm they were wont to carry. SCENE VI.-Camp before Florence. 1 Lord. Nay, good my lord, put him to't; le him have his way. 2 Lord. If your lordship find him not a hilding." hold me no more in your respect. 1 Lord. On my life, my lord, a bubble. Ber. Do you think, I am so far deceived in him? 1 Lord. Believe it, my lord, in mine own direct knowledge, without any malice but to speak of him as my kinsman, he's a most notable coward, an infinite and endless liar, an hourly promise-breaker, the owner of no one good quality worthy your lordship's entertainment. 2 Lord. It were fit you knew him; lest, reposing too far in his virtue, which he hath not, he might at some great and trusty business, in a main danger, fail you. Ber. I would, I knew in what particular action to try him. 2 Lord. None better than to let him fetch off his drum, which you hear him so confidently undertake to do. 1 Lord. I, with a troop of Florentines, will suddenly surprise him; such I will have, whom, I am sure, he knows not from the enemy: we will bind other but that he is carried into the leaguer of the and hood-wink him so, that he shall suppose no adversaries, when we bring him to our tents: Be but your lordship present at his examination; if he do not, for the promise of his life, and in the highest compulsion of base fear, offer to betray you, and deliver all the intelligence in his power against you, and that with the divine forfeit of his soul upon oath, never trust my judgment in any thing. 2 Lord. O, for the love of laughter, let him fetch his drum; he says he has a stratagem for't: when your lordship sees the bottom of his success in't, and to what metal this counterfeit lump of ore will be melted, if you give him not John Drum's entertainment, your inclining cannot be removed. Here he comes. Enter PAROLLES. 1 Lord. O, for the love of laughter, hinder not Dia. That jack-an-apes with scarfs: Why is he the humor of his design; let him fetch off his melancholy? Hel. Perchance he's hurt i'the battle. Par. Lose our drum! well. Mar. He's shrewdly vexed at something: Look, he has spied us. Wid. Marry, hang you! Mar. And your courtesy, for a ring-carrier! [Exeunt BERTRAM, PAROLLES, Officers, and Soldiers. Wid. The troop is past: Come, pilgrim, I will bring you Where you shall host: of enjoin'd penitents There's four or five, to great Saint Jaques bound, Already at my house. Hel. I humbly thank you: Please it this matron, and this gentle maid, To eat with us to-night, the charge, and thanking, Shall be for me; and, to requite you further, I will bestow some precepts on this virgin, Wortny the note. Both. • Because. We'll take your offer kindly. [Exeunt. Deals. drum in any hand. Ber. How now, monsieur? this drum sticks sorely in your disposition. 2 Lord. A pox on't, let it go; 'tis but a drum. Par. But a drum! Is't but a drum? A drum so lost!-There was an excellent command! to charge in with our horse upon our own wings, and to rend our own soldiers. 2 Lord. That was not to be blamed in the command of the service; it was a disaster of war that Cæsar himself could not have prevented, if he had been there to command. Ber. Well, we cannot greatly condemn our success: some dishonor we had in the loss of that drum: but it is not to be recovered. Par. It might have been recovered. Par. It is to be recovered; but that the merit of service is seldom attributed to the true and exact performer, I would have that drum or another, oi hic jacet Ber. Why, if you have a stomach to't, monsieur, if you think your mystery in stratagem can bring this instrument of honor again into its native quarter, be magnanimous in the enterprize, and go on; I will grace the attempt for a worthy exploit; if you speed well in it, the duke shall both speak of it, and extend to you what further becomes his greatness, even to the utmost syllable of your worthiness. Pur. By the hand of a soldier, I will undertake it. Ber. But you must not now slumber in it. Par. I'll about it this evening: and I will pres. sently pen down my dilemmas, encourage myself in my certainty, put myself into my mortal preparation, and, by midnight, look to hear further from me. Ber. May I be bold to acquaint his grace, you are gone about it? Par. I know not what the success will be, my lord; but the attempt I vow. Ber. I know thou art valiant; and, to the possibility of thy, soldiership, will subscribe for thee. Farewell. Par. I love not many words. [Exit. 1 Lord. No more than a fish loves water.-Is not this a strange fellow, my lord? that so confidently seems to undertake this business, which he knows is not to be done; damns himself to do, and dares better be damned than to do't. 2 Lord. You do not know him, my lord, as we do: certain it is, that he will steal himself into a man's favor, and, for a week, escape a great deal of discoveries; but when you find him out, you have him ever after. Ber. Why, do you think he will make no deed at all of this that so seriously he does address himself unto? 1 Lord. None in the world; but return with an invention, and clap upon you two or three probable lies: but we have almost embossed him ;' you shall see his fall to-night; for, indeed, he is not for your lordship's respect. 2 Lord. We'll make you some sport with the fox, ere we case him. He was first smoked by the old lord Lafeu: when his disguise and he is parted, tell me what a sprat you shall find him; which you shall see this very night. 1 Lord. I must go look my twigs; he shall be caught. Ber. Your brother, he shall go along with me. 1 Lord. As't please your lordship: I'll leave you. [Exit. Ber. Now will I lead you to the house, and show you The lass I spoke of. With all my heart, my lord. To emboss a deer is to enclose him in a wood. You are great in fortune. proves Hel. Take this purse of gold, And let me buy your friendly help thus far, Which I will over-pay, and pay again, When I have found it. The count he woos your daughter, Lays down his wanton siege before her beauty, Resolves to carry her; let her, in fine, consent, As we'll direct her how 'tis best to hear it, Now, his important' blood will nought deny Since the first father wore it: this ring he holds The bottom of your purpose. Wid. Hel. You see it lawful then: It is no more, Hel. * Importunate. [Exeunt • Count. |