SONG.

1. What shall he have, that kill'd the deer? 2. His leather skin, and horns to wear.

1. Then sing him home:

Take thou no scorn, to wear the horn;
It was a crest ere thou wast born;

1. Thy father's father wore it;
2. And thy father bore it:

All. The horn, the horn, the lusty horn,
Is not a thing to laugh to scorn.

The rest' shall bear this burden.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.-The Forest. Enter Rosalind and

Celia.

Ros. How say you now? Is it not past two o'clock? and here much Orlando!

Cel. I warrant

you, with pure love, and troubled brain, he hath ta'en his bow and arrows, and is gone forth to sleep: Look, who comes here.

Enter Silvius.

Sil. My errand is to you, fair youth;

My gentle Phebe bid me give you

this:

[Giving a letter. I know not the contents; but, as guess, By the stern brow, and waspish action Which she did use as she was writing of it, It bears an angry tenor: pardon me,

I am but as a guiltless messenger.

Ros. Patience herself would startle at this letter, And play the swaggerer; bear this, bear all: She says, I am not fair; that I lack manners; She calls me proud; and, that she could not love me Were man as rare as phoenix; Od's my will! Her love is not the hare that I do hunt: Why writes she so to me?-Well, shepherd, well, This is a letter of your own device.

Sil. No, I protest, I know not the contents; Phebe did write it.

Ros.

Come, come, you are a tool, And turn'd into the extremity of love.

I saw her hand: she has a leathern hand,
A freestone-colour'd hand; I verily did think
That her old gloves were on, but 'twas her hands;
She has a huswife's hand: but that's no matter:
she never did invent this letter;

say,

This is a man's invention, and his hand.

Sil. Sure, it is hers.

Ros. Why, 'tis a boisterous and cruel style, A style for challengers; why, she defies me, Like Turk to Christian: woman's gentle brain Could not drop forth such giant rude invention, Such Ethiop words, blacker in their effect Than in their countenance :-Will you hear the letter?

Sil. So please you, for I never heard it yet; Yet heard too much of Phebe's cruelty.

Ros. She Phebes me: Mark how the tyrant writes.

Art thou god to shepherd turn'd,

[Reads.

That a maiden's heart hath burn'd?—

Can a woman rail thus?

Sil. Call you this railing?

Ros. Why, thy godhead laid apart,

Did

Warr'st thou with a woman's heart?

you ever hear such railing?

While the eye of man did woo me,
That could do no vengeancel to me.

Meaning me a beast.—

If the scorn of your bright eyne2·
Have power to raise such love in mine,

Alack, in me what strange effect
Would they work in mild aspect?
Whiles you chid me, I did love;
How then might your prayers move?
He, that brings this love to thee,
Little knows this love in me:
And by him seal up thy mind;
Whether that thy youth and kind
Will the faithful offer take
Of me, and all that I can make;
Or else by him my love deny,
And then I'll study how to die.

Sil. Call you this chiding?
Cel. Alas, poor shepherd!

Ros. Do you pity him? no, he deserves no pity. -Wilt thou love such a woman?-What, to make thee an instrument, and play false strains upon thee! not to be endured!-Well, go your way to her (for I see, love hath made thee a tame snake,) and say this to her :-That if she love me, I charge her to love thee: if she will not, I will never have her, unless thou entreat for her.-If you be a true lover, hence, and not a word; for here comes more company. [Exit Silvius.

Enter Oliver.

Oli. Good-morrow, fair ones: Pray you, if you know

Where, in the purlieus2 of this forest, stands
A sheepcote, fenc'd about with olive-trees?

Cel. West of this place, down in the neighbour bottom,

The rank of osiers, by the murmuring stream, Left on your right hand, brings you to the place; But at this hour the house doth keep itself, There's none within.

(1) Nature.

(2) Environs of a forest.

Oli. If that an eye may profit by a tongue,
Then I should know you by description;
Such garments, and such years: The boy is fair,
Of female favour, and bestows himself
Like a ripe sister: but the woman low,
And browner than her brother.
Are not you

The owner of the house I did inquire for?
Cel. It is no boast, being ask'd, to say, we are.
Oli. Orlando doth commend him to you both;
And to that youth, he calls his Rosalind,
He sends this bloody napkin ; Are you he?

Ros. I am: What must we understand by this? Oli. Some of my shame; if you will know of me What man I am, and how, and why, and where This handkerchief was stain'd.

Cel.

I pray you, tell it. Oli. When last the young Orlando parted from

you,

He left a promise to return again

Within an hour; and, pacing through the forest,
Chewing the food of sweet and bitter fancy,
Lo, what befel! he threw his eye aside,
And, mark, what object did present itself!
Under an oak, whose boughs were moss'd with age,
And high top bald with dry antiquity,

A wretched ragged man, o'ergrown with hair,
Lay sleeping on his back: about his neck
A green and gilded snake had wreath'd itself,
Who with her head, nimble in threats, approach'd
The opening of his mouth; but suddenly
Seeing Orlando, it unlink'd itself,

And with indented glides did slip away
Into a bush: under which bush's shade
A lioness, with udders all drawn dry,

Lay couching, head on ground, with cat-like watch,
When that the sleeping man should stir; for 'tis
The royal disposition of that beast,

To prey on nothing that doth seem as dead:

(1) Handkerchief.

This seen, Orlando did approach the man,
And found it was his brother, his elder brother.
Cel. O, I have heard him speak of that same
brother;

And he did render him the most unnatural,

That liv'd 'mongst men.

Oli.

And well he might do so,

For well I know he was unnatural.

Ros. But, to Orlando ;-Did he leave him there, Food to the suck'd and hungry lioness?

Oli. Twice did he turn his back, and purpos'd so: But kindness, nobler ever than revenge, And nature, stronger than his just occasion, Made him give battle to the lioness,

Who quickly fell before him; in which hurtling,2 From miserable slumber I awak'd.

Cel. Are you his brother?

Ros.

Was it you he rescu'd? Cel. Was't you that did so oft contrive to kill him? Oli. 'Twas I; but 'tis not I: I do not shame To tell you what I was, since my conversion So sweetly tastes, being the thing I am.

Ros. But, for the bloody napkin ?—

Oli.
By and by.
When from the first to last, betwixt us two,
Tears our recountments had most kindly bath'd,
As, how I came into that desert place :-
In brief, he led me to the gentle duke,
Who gave me fresh array, and entertainment,
Committing me unto my brother's love;
Who led me instantly unto his cave,

There stripp'd himself, and here upon his arm
The lioness had torn some flesh away,

Which all this while had bled; and now he fainted,

And cry'd, in fainting, upon Rosalind.

I

Brief, I recover'd him; bound up his wound;

And, after some small space, being strong at heart, He sent me hither, stranger as I am,

(1) Describe.

(2) Scuffle.