The Plays of Shakespeare

Some obscure precedence that hath tofore been sain.
I will example it :

The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,
Were still at odds, being but three.

There's the moral: now the l'envoy.

Moth. I will add the l'envoy. Say the moral again. Arm. The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,

Were still at odds, being but three. Moth. Until the goose came out of door,

And stay'd the odds by making four.

Now will I begin your moral, and do you follow with my l'envoy.

The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee, Were still at odds, being but three. Arm. Until the goose came out of door, Staying the odds by making four.

A good l'envoy.

Sir, your pennyworth is good, an your goose be fat.
To sell a bargain well is as cunning as fast and loose:
Let me see, a fat l'envoy; ay, that's a fat goose.
Arm. Come hither, come hither. How did this
argument begin?

Moth. By saying that a Costard was broken in a shin. Then call'd you for the l'envoy.

Cost. True, and I for a plantain: thus came your argument in ;

Then the boy's fat l'envoy, the goose that you bought, And he ended the market.

Enter BIRON.

Biron. O, my good knave Costard! exceedingly well met.

Cost. Pray you, sir, how much carnation ribbon may a man buy for a remuneration?

Biron. What is a remuneration?

Cost. Marry, sir, half-penny farthing. [Showing it.
Biron. O! why then, three-farthing-worth of silk.
Cost. I thank your worship. God be wi' you.
Biron. O, stay, slave! I must employ thee:
As thou wilt win my favour, good my knave,
Do one thing for me that I shall entreat.

Cost. When would you have it done, sir?
Biron. O! this afternoon.

Cost. Well, I will do it, sir. Fare you well.
Biron. O! thou knowest not what it is.
Cost. I shall know, sir, when I have done it.
Biron. Why, villain, thou must know first.
Cost. I will come to your worship to-morrow morning.
Biron. It must be done this afternoon. Hark, slave,
It is but this.-

The princess comes to hunt here in the park,
And in her train there is a gentle lady;
When tongues speak sweetly, then they name her name,
And Rosaline they call her: ask for her,
And to her white hand see thou do commend
This seal'd-up counsel. There's thy guerdon: go.
[Gives him money.

Cost. Guerdon.-O, sweet guerdon! better than remuneration; eleven-pence farthing better. Most sweet guerdon!—I will do it, sir, in print.—Guerdon [Exit.

Arm. But tell me; how was there a Costard broken-remuneration! in a shin?

Moth. I will tell you sensibly.

Cost. Thou hast no feeling of it, Moth: I will speak that l'envoy.

I, Costard, running out, that was safely within, Fell over the threshold, and broke my shin. Arm. We will talk no more of this matter. Cost. Till there be more matter in the shin. Arm. Sirrah Costard, marry, I will enfranchise thee. Cost. O marry me to one Frances?—I smell some l'envoy, some goose, in this.

Arm. By my sweet soul, I mean, setting thee at liberty, enfreedoming thy person: thou wert immured, restrained, captivated, bound.

Cost. True, true; and now you will be my purgation, and let me be loose.

Arm. I give thee thy liberty, set thee free from durance; and, in lieu thereof, impose on thee nothing but this bear this significant [Giving a letter.] to the country maid Jaquenetta. There is remuneration; for the best ward of mine honour is rewarding my dependents. Moth, follow. [Exit. Moth. Like the sequel, I.-Signior Costard, adieu. [Exit. Cost. My sweet ounce of man's flesh! my incony

Jew!

Now will I look to his remuneration. Remuneration! O! that's the Latin word for three farthings: three farthings, remuneration.-"What's the price of this inkle? A penny.-No, I'll give you a remuneration:" why, it carries it.-Remuneration!-why, it is a fairer name than French crown. I will never buy and sell

out of this word.

Biron. O! And I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been love's whip;

A very beadle to a humorous sigh;
A critic, nay, a night-watch constable,
A domineering pedant o'er the boy,
Than whom no mortal so magnificent!
This whimpled, whining, purblind, wayward boy;
This senior-junior, giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid;
Regent of love-rhymes, lord of folded arms,
Th' anointed sovereign of sighs and groans,
Liege of all loiterers and malcontents,
Dread prince of plackets, king of cod-pieces,
Sole imperator, and great general
Of trotting paritors, (O my little heart!)
And I to be a corporal of his field,
And wear his colours like a tumbler's hoop!
What? I love! I sue! I seek a wife!
A woman, that is like a German clock,
Still a repairing, ever out of frame,
And never going aright; being a watch,
But being watch'd that it may still go right?
Nay, to be perjur'd, which is worst of all;
And, among three, to love the worst of all;
A witty wanton with a velvet brow,
With two pitch balls stuck in her face for eyes;
Ay, and, by heaven, one that will do the deed,
Though Argus were her eunuch and her guard:
And I to sigh for her! to watch for her!
To pray for her! Go to; it is a plague
That Cupid will impose for my neglect
Of his almighty dreadful little might.
Well, I will love, write, sigh, pray, sue, and
groan:
Some men must love my lady, and some Joan. [Exit.

ACT IV.

SCENE I.-Another part of the Same.
Enter the PRINCESS, ROSALINE, MARIA, KATHARINE,
BOYET, Lords, Attendants, and a Forester.
Prin. Was that the king, that spurr'd his horse so hard
Against the steep uprising of the hill?

Boyet. I know not; but, I think, it was not he.
Prin. Whoe'er a' was, a' show'd a mounting mind.
Well, lords, to-day we shall have our despatch;
On Saturday we will return to France.-
Then, forester, my friend, where is the bush,
That we must stand and play the murderer in?
For. Hereby, upon the edge of yonder coppice;
A stand where you may make the fairest shoot.
Prin. I thank my beauty, I am fair that shoot,
And thereupon thou speak st the fairest shoot.

This letter is mistook; it importeth none here:
It is writ to Jaquenetta.
We will read it, I swear.
Break the neck of the wax, and every one give ear.

Prin.

Boyet. [Reads.] "By heaven, that thou art fair, is most infallible; true, that thou art beauteous; truth itself, that thou art lovely. More fairer than fair, beautiful than beauteous, truer than truth itself, have commiseration on thy heroical vassal! The magnanimous and most illustrate king Cophetua set eye upon the pernicious and indubitate beggar Penelophon; and he it was that might rightly say, veni, vidi, vici; which to anatomize in the vulgar, (0 base and obscure vulgar!) videlicet, he came, saw, and overcame: he came, one; saw, two; overcame, three. Who came? the king; Why did he come? to see; Why did he see? to overcome: To whom came he?

For. Pardon me, madam, for I meant not so.
Prin. What, what? first praise me, and again say, no? to the beggar; What saw he? the beggar; Whom
O, short-liv'd pride! Not fair? alack for woe!

For. Yes, madam, fair.
Prin.
Nay, never paint me now:
Where fair is not, praise cannot mend the brow.
Here, good my glass, take this for telling true.

[Giving him money.
Fair payment for foul words is more than due.
For. Nothing but fair is that which you inherit.
Prin. See, see! my beauty will be sav'd by merit.
O heresy in faith, fit for these days!

A giving hand, though foul, shall have fair praise.-
But come, the bow:-now mercy goes to kill,

And shooting well is then accounted ill.

Thus will I save my credit in the shoot:
Not wounding, pity would not let me do't;
If wounding, then it was to show my skill,
That more for praise than purpose meant to kill.
And, out of question, so it is sometimes:
Glory grows guilty of detested crimes,

When, for fame's sake, for praise, an outward part,
We bend to that the working of the heart;
As I for praise alone now seek to spill

The poor deer's blood, that my heart means no ill.
Boyet. Do not curst wives hold that self-sovereignty
Only for praise' sake, when they strive to be
Lords o'er their lords?

Prin. Only for praise; and praise we may afford
To any lady that subdues a lord.
Enter COSTARD.

Prin. Here comes a member of the commonwealth. Cost. God dig-you-den all. Pray you, which is the head lady?

Prin. Thou shalt know her, fellow, by the rest that have no heads.

Cost. Which is the greatest lady, the highest?
Prin. The thickest, and the tallest.

Cost. The thickest, and the tallest? it is so; truth
is truth.

An your waist, mistress, were as slender as my wit,
One o' these maids' girdles for your waist should be fit.
Are not you the chief woman? you are the thickest here.
Prin. What's your will, sir? what's your will?
Cost. I have a letter, from monsieur Biron to one
lady Rosaline.
[Giving it.

Prin. O, thy letter, thy letter! he's a good friend

of mine.

overcame he? the beggar. The conclusion is victory:
on whose side? the king's: the captive is enriched :
on whose side? the beggar's. The catastrophe is a
nuptial on whose side? the king's ?-no, on both in
one, or one in both. I am the king, for so stands the
comparison; thou the beggar, for so witnesseth thy
lowliness. Shall I command thy love? I may. Shall
I enforce thy love? I could. Shall I entreat thy
love? I will. What shalt thou exchange for rags?
robes; for tittles? titles; for thyself? me. Thus,
expecting thy reply, I profane my lips on thy foot, my
eyes on thy picture, and my heart on thy every part.
"Thine, in the dearest design of industry,
"DON ADRIANO DE ARMADO."
"Thus dost thou hear the Nemean lion roar

'Gainst thee, thou lamb, that standest as his prey; Submissive fall his princely feet before,

And he from forage will incline to play:

But if thou strive, poor soul, what art thou then?
Food for his rage, repasture for his den."

Prin. What plume of feathers is he that indited

this letter?

Ros.
Shall I teach you to know?
Boyet. Ay, my continent of beauty.
Ros.
Finely put off!

Why, she that bears the bow.

Boyet. My lady goes to kill horns; but if thou

marry,

Ros. Boyet.

Thou canst not hit it, hit it, hit it, Thou canst not hit it, my good man. An I cannot, cannot, cannot, An I cannot, another can. [Exeunt Ros. and KATH. Cost. By my troth, most pleasant: how both did fit it!

Mar. A mark marvellous well shot, for they both did hit it.

Boyet. A mark! O! mark but that mark: a mark, says my lady.

Let the mark have a prick in't, to mete at, if it may be.

Mar. Wide o' the bow hand: i'faith, your hand is out. Cost. Indeed, a' must shoot nearer, or he'll ne'er hit the clout.

Boyet. An if my hand be out, then belike your hand is in.

Cost. Then will she get the upshot by cleaving the pin. Mar. Come, come, you talk greasily; your lips grow foul.

Cost. She's too hard for you at pricks, sir: challenge her to bowl.

Boyet. I fear too much rubbing. Good night, my good owl. [Exeunt BOYET and MARIA. Cost. By my soul, a swain! a most simple clown! Lord, lord! how the ladies and I have put him down! O' my troth, most sweet jests! most incony vulgar wit! When it comes so smoothly off, so obscenely, as it were, so fit.

Armado o' the one side,-O, a most dainty man!
To see him walk before a lady, and to bear her fan!
To see him kiss his hand! and how most sweetly a'
will swear;

Looking babies in her eyes, his passion to declare.
And his page o' t' other side, that handful of small wit!
Ah, heavens, it is a most pathetical nit!
Sola, sola!

[Shouting within. [Exit COSTARD.

SCENE II.-The Same.

Enter HOLOFERNES, Sir NATHANIEL, and DULL. Nath. Very reverend sport, truly; and done in the testimony of a good conscience.

Hol. The deer was, as you know, sanguis,-in blood; ripe as the pome water, who now hangeth like a jewel in the ear of cœlo,-the sky, the welkin, the heaven; and anon falleth like a crab, on the face of terra,-the soil, the land, the earth.

Nath. Truly, master Holofernes, the epithets are sweetly varied, like a scholar at the least: but, sir, I assure ye, it was a buck of the first head.

Hol. Sir Nathaniel, haud credo.

The allusion holds in the exchange.

Dull. 'Tis true indeed: the collusion holds in the exchange.

Hol. God comfort thy capacity! I say, the allusion holds in the exchange.

Dull. And I say the pollusion holds in the exchange, for the moon is never but a month old; and I say beside, that 'twas a pricket that the princess kill'd. Hol. Sir Nathaniel, will you hear an extemporal epitaph on the death of the deer? and, to humour the ignorant, I have call'd the deer the princess kill'd, a pricket.

Nath. Perge, good master Holofernes, perge; so it shall please you to abrogate scurrility.

Hol. I will something affect the letter, for it argues facility. [Reads. The preyful princess pierc'd and prick'd a pretty pleasing pricket;

Some say, a sore; but not a sore, till now made sore with shooting.

The dogs did yell; put l to sore, then sorel jumps from thicket;

Or pricket sore, or else sorel; the people fall a hooting. If sore be sore, then I to sore makes fifty sores; O sore l! Of one sore I an hundred make, by adding but one more l. Nath. A rare talent!

Dull. If a talent be a claw, look how he claws him with a talent. [Aside. Hol. This is a gift that I have, simple, simple; a

foolish extravagant spirit, full of forms, figures, shapes, objects, ideas, apprehensions, motions, revolutions: these are begot in the ventricle of memory, nourished in the womb of pia mater, and delivered upon the mellowing of occasion. But the gift is good in those in whom it is acute, and I am thankful for it.

Nath. Sir, I praise the Lord for you, and so may my parishioners; for their sons are well tutored by you, and their daughters profit very greatly under you: you are a good member of the commonwealth.

Hol. Mehercle! if their sons be ingenious, they shall want no instruction: if their daughters be capable, I will put it to them; but, vir sapit, qui pauca loquitur. A soul feminine saluteth us.

Enter JAQUENETTA and COSTard.

Jaq. God give you good morrow, master person. Hol. Master person,-quasi pers-on. An if one should be pierced, which is the one?

Cost. Marry, master schoolmaster, he that is likest to a hogshead.

Hol. Of piercing a hogshead! a good lustre of conceit in a turf of earth; fire enough for a flint, pearl enough for a swine: 'tis pretty; it is well.

Jaq. Good master parson, be so good as read me this letter it was given me by Costard, and sent me from Don Armado: I beseech you, read it.

Hol. Fauste, precor gelida quando pecus omne sub umbrá

Ruminat, and so forth. Ah, good old Mantuan! may speak of thee as the traveller doth of Venice: -Venegia, Venegia,

Chi non te vede, non te pregia. Old Mantuan! old Mantuan! Who understandeth thee not, loves thee not.-Ut, re, sol, la, mi, fa.Under pardon, sir, what are the contents? or, rather, as Horace says in his-What, my soul, verses? Nath. Ay, sir, and very learned.

Hol. Let me hear a staff, a stanza, a verse: lege, domine.

Nath. If love make me forsworn, how shall I swear

to love?

Ah, never faith could hold, if not to beauty vowed! Though to myself forsworn, to thee I'll faithful prove; Those thoughts to me were oaks, to thee like osiers

bowed.

Study his bias leaves, and makes his book thine eyes, Where all those pleasures live, that art would comprehend:

If knowledge be the mark, to know thee shall suffice.
Well learned is that tongue, that well can thee com-
mend;

All ignorant that soul, that sees thee without wonder;
Which is to me some praise, that I thy parts admire.
Thy eye Jove's lightning bears, thy voice his dreadful
thunder,

Which, not to anger bent, is music, and sweet fire.
Celestial, as thou art, O! pardon, love, this wrong,
That sings heaven's praise with such an earthly
tongue!

Hol. You find not the apostrophes, and so miss the accent: let me supervise the canzonet. Here are only numbers ratified; but, for the elegancy, facility, and golden cadence of poesy, caret. Ovidius Naso was the man and why, indeed, Naso, but for smelling out the odoriferous flowers of fancy, the jerks of invention? Imitating is nothing: so doth the hound his master, the ape his keeper, the trained horse his rider. But damosella, virgin, was this directed to you?

Jaq. Ay, sir, from one Monsieur Biron, one of the strange queen's lords.

Hol. I will overglance the superscript. "To the snow-white hand of the most beauteous Lady Rosaline." I will look again on the intellect of the letter, for the nomination of the party writing to the person written unto: "Your ladyship's, in all desired employment, Biron." Sir Nathaniel, this Biron is one of the votaries with the king; and here he hath framed a letter to a sequent of the stranger queen's, which, accidentally, or by the way of progression, hath miscarried.-Trip and go, my sweet: deliver this paper into the royal hand of the king; it may concern much. Stay not thy compliment; I forgive thy duty adieu. Jaq. Good Costard, go with me.-Sir, God save your life!

Cost. Have with thee, my girl.

[Exeunt CosT. and JAQ. Nath. Sir, you have done this in the fear of God, very religiously; and, as a certain father saith

Hol. Sir, tell not me of the father; I do fear colourable colours. But, to return to the verses: did they please you, sir Nathaniel?

Nath. Marvellous well for the pen.

Hol. I do dine to-day at the father's of a certain pupil of mine; where, if before repast it shall please you to gratify the table with a grace, I will, on my privilege I have with the parents of the foresaid child or pupil, undertake your ben venuto; where I will prove those verses to be very unlearned, neither savouring of poetry, wit, nor invention. I beseech your society.

Nath. And thank you too; for society (saith the text) is the happiness of life.

Hol. And, certes, the text most infallibly concludes it.-Sir, [To DULL,] I do invite you too: you shall not say me nay: pauca verba. Away! the gentles are at their game, and we will to our recreation. [Exeunt. SCENE III.-Another part of the Same. Enter BIRON, with a paper.

Biron. The king he is hunting the deer; I am coursing myself: they have pitch'd a toil; am toiling in a pitch-pitch that defiles. Defile? a foul word. Well, set thee down, sorrow! for so, they say, the fool said, and so say I, and I the fool. Well proved, wit! By the lord, this love is as mad as Ajax: it kills sheep; it kills me, I a sheep. Well proved again o' my side! I will not love; if I do, hang me: i'faith, I will not. O! but her eye,-by this light, but for her eye, I would not love her! yes, for her two eyes. Well, I do nothing in the world but lie, and lie in my throat. By heaven, I do love, and it hath taught me to rhyme, and to be melancholy; and here is part of my rhyme, and here my melancholy. Well, she hath one o' my sonnets already: the clown bore it, the fool sent it, and the lady hath it: sweet clown, sweeter fool, sweetest lady! By the world, I would not care a pin, if the other three were in. Here comes one with a paper: God give him grace to groan!

[Gets up into a tree. Enter the KING, with a paper.

King. Ay me!
Biron. [Aside.] Shot, by heaven!-Proceed, sweet
Cupid: thou hast thump'd him with thy bird-bolt
under the left pap.-In faith, secrets!—

King. [Reads.] So sweet a kiss the golden sun gives not
To those fresh morning drops upon the rose,
As thine eye-beams, when their fresh rays have smote
The dew of night that on my cheeks down flows:
Nor shines the silver moon one half so bright

Through the transparent bosom of the deep,

As doth thy face through tears of mine give light;
Thou shin'st in every tear that I do weep:
No drop but as a coach doth carry thee ;
So ridest thou triumphing in my woe.
Do but behold the tears that swell in me,

And they thy glory through my grief will show :
But do not love thyself; then thou wilt keep
My tears for glasses, and still make me weep.
O queen of queens, how far thou dost excel,
No thought can think, nor tongue of mortal tell.
How shall she know my griefs? I'll drop the paper.
Sweet leaves, shade folly. Who is he comes here?
Enter LONGAVILLE, with a paper.

What, Longaville! and reading? listen, ear.

[Steps aside. Biron. [Aside in the tree.] Now, in thy likeness, one more fool appear!

Long. Ay me! I am forsworn.

Biron. [Aside.] Why, he comes in like a perjure, wearing papers.

King. [Aside.] In love, I hope. Sweet fellowship

Disfigure not his slop.

Long. This same shall go. [He reads the sonnet. Did not the heavenly rhetoric of thine eye,

'Gainst whom the world cannot hold argument, Persuade my heart to this false perjury?

Vows for thee broke deserve not punishment.
A woman I forswore; but I will prove,

Thou being a goddess, I forswore not thee:
My vow was earthly, thou a heavenly love;
Thy grace, being gain'd, cures all disgrace in me.
Vows are but breath, and breath a vapour is :
Then thou, fair sun, which on my earth dost shine,
Exhal'st this vapour-vow; in thee it is:

If broken, then, it is no fault of mine.
If by me broke, what fool is not so wise,
To lose an oath, to win a paradise?

Biron. [Aside.] This is the liver vein, which makes flesh a deity;

A green goose, a goddess: pure, pure idolatry.
God amend us! God amend us! we are much out o'

the way.

Enter DUMAINE, with a paper. Long. By whom shall I send this?-Company! stay. [Steps aside. Biron. [Aside.] All hid, all hid; an old infant play.

Like a demi-god here sit I in the sky,
And wretched fools' secrets heedfully o'er-eye.
More sacks to the mill! O heavens! I have my wish:
Dumaine transform'd? four woodcocks in a dish.
Dum. O most divine Kate!

Biron. [Aside.] O most profane coxcomb!
Dum. By heaven, the wonder of a mortal eye!
Biron. [Aside.] By earth, she is most corporal; there
you lie.

Dum. Her amber hairs for foul have amber quoted.

a good word?

Dum. I would forget her; but a fever she Reigns in my blood, and will remember'd be. Biron. [Aside.] A fever in your blood? why, then incision Would let her out in saucers: sweet misprision!

Dum. Once more I'll read the ode that I have writ. Biron. [Aside.] Once more I'll mark how love can vary wit.

Dum. On a day, alack the day!

Love, whose month is ever May,
Spied a blossom, passing fair,
Playing in the wanton air:
Through the velvet leaves the wind,
All unseen, 'gan passage find;
That the lover, sick to death,
Wish'd himself the heaven's breath.
Air, quoth he, thy cheeks may blow;
Air, would I might triumph so!
But alack! my hand is sworn,
Ne'er to pluck thee from thy thorn:
Vow, alack! for youth unmeet,
Youth so apt to pluck a sweet.
Do not call it sin in me,

That I am forsworn for thee;

Thou for whom great Jove would swear
Juno but an Ethiop were;
And deny himself for Jove,
Turning mortal for thy love.

This will I send, and something else more plain,
That shall express my true love's lasting pain.
O, would the King, Biron, and Longaville,
Were lovers too! Ill, to example ill,
Would from my forehead wipe a perjur'd note;
For none offend, where all alike do dote.

Long. [Advancing.] Dumaine, thy love is far from charity,

That in love's grief desir'st society:
You may look pale, but I should blush, I know,
To be o'erheard, and taken napping so.

King. [Advancing.] Come, sir, blush you: as his your case is such;

You chide at him, offending twice as much:
You do not love Maria; Longaville
Did never sonnet for her sake compile,
Nor never lay his wreathed arms athwart
His loving bosom, to keep down his heart.
I have been closely shrouded in this bush,
And mark'd you both, and for you both did blush.
I heard your guilty rhymes, observ'd your fashion,
Saw sighs reek from you, noted well your passion:
Ay me! says one; O Jove! the other cries;
One, her hairs were gold, crystal the other's eyes:
You would for paradise break faith and troth;

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The Plays of Shakespeare: The Text Regulated by the Old Copies, and by the ...