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thou crushest the snake! that is the way to make an offence gracious 16; though few have the grace to do it.

Arm. For the rest of the worthies ?-
Hol. I will play three myself.
Moth. Thrice worthy gentleman!
Arm. Shall I tell you a thing?
Hol. We attend.

17

Arm. We will have, if this fadge 17 not, an antick. I beseech you, follow.

Hol. Via 18, goodman Dull! thou hast spoken no word all this while.

Dull. Nor understood none neither, sir.

Hol. Allons! we will employ thee.

Dull. I'll make one in a dance, or so; or I will play on the tabor to the worthies, and let them dance the hay.

Hol. Most dull, honest Dull, to our sport, away.

[Exeunt. SCENE II. Another part of the same. Before the Princess's Pavilion.

Enter the Princess, KATHARINE, ROSALINE, and MARIA.

Prin. Sweet hearts, we shall be rich ere we depart, If fairings thus come plentifully in:

A lady wall'd about with diamonds!

Look you, what I have from the loving king.

Ros. Madam, came nothing else along with that? Prin. Nothing but this? yes, as much love in rhyme,

16 That is, convert our offence against yourselves into a dramatic propriety,

17 i. e. suit not, go not,

18 An Italian exclamation signifying Courage! Come on! See Vol. i. p 221.

As would be cramm'd up in a sheet of paper,
Writ on both sides the leaf, margent and all;
That he was fain to seal on Cupid's name.

Ros. That was the way to make his god-head wax1:

For he hath been five thousand years a boy.

Kath. Ay, and a shrewd unhappy gallows too. Ros. You'll ne'er be friends with him; he kill'd your sister.

Kath. He made her melancholy, sad, and heavy; And so she died: had she been light, like you, Of such a merry, nimble, stirring spirit, She might have been a grandam ere she died: And so may you; for a light heart lives long. Ros. What's your dark meaning, mouse, of this light word?

Kath. A light condition in a beauty dark.

Ros. We need more light to find your meaning out. Kath. You'll mar the light, by taking it in snuff3; Therefore, I'll darkly end the argument.

Ros. Look, what you do, you do it still i' the
dark.

Kath. So do not you; for you are a light wench.
Ros. Indeed, I weigh not you; and therefore light.
Kath. You weigh me not,-O, that's you care not
for me.

Ros. Great reason; for, Past cure is still past care.
Prin. Well bandied both; a set of wit well
play'd.

But Rosaline, you have a favour too:

Who sent it? and what is it?

1 Grow.

2 This was a term of endearment formerly. So in Hamlet: 'Pinch wanton on your cheek; call you his mouse.'

3 Snuff is here used equivocally for anger, and the snuff of a candle. See King Henry IV. Act i. Sc. 3.

4 A set is a term at tennis for a game.

Ros.

I would, you knew:

And if my face were but as fair as yours,
My favour were as great: be witness this,
Nay, I have verses too, I thank Birón:
The numbers true; and, were the numb'ring too,
I were the fairest goddess on the ground:
I am compared to twenty thousand fairs.
O, he hath drawn my picture in his letter!
Prin. Any thing like?

Ros. Much, in the letters; nothing in the praise,
Prin. Beauteous as ink; a good conclusion.
Kath. Fair as a text B in a copy-book.

Ros. 'Ware pencils 5! How! let me not die

debtor,

My red dominical, my golden letter:

0,

that your face were not so full of O's!

6

your

Kath. A pox of that jest! and beshrew all shrows!

Prin. But what was sent to you from fair Du

main?

Kath. Madam, this glove.

Prin.

Did he not send

you twain.

Kath. Yes, madam; and moreover,

Some thousand verses of a faithful lover:

A huge translation of hypocrisy,

Vilely compil'd, profound simplicity.

Mar. This, and these pearls, to me sent Longaville; The letter is too long by half a mile.

5 She advises Katharine to beware of drawing likenesses, lest she should retaliate.

6 Theobald is scandalized at this language from a princess. But Dr. Farmer observes there need no alarm-the small-pox only is alluded to; with which it seems Katharine was pitted; or as it is quaintly expressed "her face was full of O's." Davison has a canzonet "on his lady's sicknesse of the poxe;" and Dr. Donne writes to his sister, "At my return from Kent, I found Pegge had the poxe." Such a plague was the small-pox formerly, that its name might well be used as an imprecation.

Prin. I think no less: Dost thou not wish in heart, The chain were longer, and the letter short?

Mar. Ay, or I would these hands might never part. Prin. We are wise girls, to mock our lovers so. Ros. They are worse fools to purchase mocking so. That same Birón I'll torture ere I go.

O, that I knew he were but in by the week?!
How I would make him fawn, and beg, and seek;
And wait the season, and observe the times,
And spend his prodigal wits in bootless rhymes;
And shape his service wholly to my behests;
And make him proud to make me proud that jests !
So potent-like9 would I o'ersway his state,

That he should be my fool, and I his fate.

Prin. None are so surely caught, when they are catch'd,

As wit turn'd fool: folly, in wisdom hatch'd,
Hath wisdom's warrant, and the help of school;
And wit's own grace to grace a learned fool 10.
Ros. The blood of youth burns not with such

excess,

As gravity's revolt to wantonness.

Mar. Folly in fools bears not so strong a note, As foolery in the wise, when wit doth dote; Since all the power thereof it doth apply, To prove, by wit, worth in simplicity.

7 This is an expression taken from the hiring of servants meaning 'I wish I knew that he was in love with me, or my servant,' as the phrase is.

8 The meaning of this obscure line seems to be,-I would make him proud to flatter me, who make a mock of his flattery.

9 The old copies read pertaunt-like. The modern editions read with Sir T. Hanmer, portent-like: of which Warburton has given an ingenious but unfounded explanation. The reading I have adopted may be explained tyrant-like. Potents is used for potentates in K. John, Act ii. Sc. 2.

10 Johnson remarks that these are observations worthy of a man who has surveyed human nature with the closest attention.'

Enter BOYET.

Prin. Here comes Boyet, and mirth is in his face. Boyet. O, I am stabb'd with laughter! Where's her grace?

Prin. Thy news, Boyet?

Boyet.

Prepare, madam, prepare!

Arm, wenches, arm! encounters mounted are
Against your peace: Love doth approach disguis'd,
Armed in arguments; you'll be surpris'd:
Muster your wits; stand in your own defence;
Or hide your heads like cowards, and fly hence.
Prin. Saint Dennis to saint Cupid! What are they,
That charge their breath against us? say, scout, say.
Boyet. Under the cool shade of a sycamore,
I thought to close mine eyes some half an hour:
When lo! to interrupt my purpos'd rest,
Toward that shade I might behold addrest
The king and his companions: warily
I stole into a neighbour thicket by,
And overheard what you shall overhear;
That, by and by, disguis'd they will be here.
Their herald is a pretty knavish page,

That well by heart hath conn'd his embassage;
Action, and accent, did they teach him there;
Thus must thou speak, and thus thy body bear;
And ever and anon they made a doubt,
Presence majestical would put him out;
For, quoth the king, an angel shalt thou see;
Yet fear not thou, but speak audaciously.
The boy reply'd, An angel is not evil;
I should have fear'd her, had she been a devil.
With that all laugh'd, and clapp'd him on the shoulder;
Making the bold wag by their praises bolder.
One rubb'd his elbow, thus; and fleer'd, and swore,
A better speech was never spoke before;

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