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Orla. O, but she is wife.

Rof. Or else she could not have the wit to do this: the wifer, the waywarder: Make the 7 doors upon a woman's wit, and it will out at the cafement; fhut that, and 'twill out at the key-hole; ftop that, it will fly with the fmoak out at the chimney.

Orla. A man that had a wife with fuch a wit, he might fay, Wit, whither wilt?

Rof. Nay, you might keep that check for it, 'till you met your wife's wit going to your neighbour's bed.

Orla. And what wit could wit have to excuse that?

Rof. Marry, to fay, fhe came to feek you there. You fhall never take her without her answer, unless you take her without her tongue. O that woman, that cannot make her fault her husband's occafion, let her never nurse her child herself, for fhe will breed it like a fool!

Orla. For thefe two hours, Rofalind, I will leave thee.

make the doors] This is an expreffion used in several of the midland counties, inftead of bar the doors. So in the Comedy of Errors,

"The doors are made against you."

The modern editors read, "make the doors fa" in this play, and “the doors are barr'd against you" in the other.

STEEVENS.

Wit, whither wilt?] This must be fome allufion to a ftory well known at that time, though now perhaps irretrievable. JOHNSON.

This was an exclamation much in ufe, when any one was either talking nonfenfe, or ufurping a greater fhare in conversation than juftly belonged to him. So in Decker's Satiromaftix, 1602: "My fweet, Wit whither wilt thou, my delicate poetical fury, &c." The fame expreffion occurs more than once in Taylor the waterpoet, and feems to have been the title of fome ludicrous performance. STEEVENS.

-make her fault her bufband's occafion,] That is, represent her fault as occafioned by her husband, Sir T. Hanmer reads, ber bufband's accufation. JOHNSON,

Ref.

Rof. Alas, dear love, I cannot lack thee two hours. Orla. I must attend the Duke at dinner. By two o'clock I will be with thee again.

Rof. Ay, go your ways, go your ways;-I knew what you would prove; my friends told me as much, and I thought no lefs:-that flattering tongue of yours won me :-'tis but one caft away, and fo, come death-Two o'the clock is your hour! Orla. Ay, fweet Rofalind.

Rof. By my troth, and in good earneft, and fo God mend me, and by all pretty oaths that are not dangerous, if you break one jot of your promife, or come one minute behind your hour, I will think you the most pathetical break-promife,' and the most hollow lover, and the most unworthy of her you call Rofalind, that may be chofen out of the grofs band of the unfaithful; therefore beware my cenfure, and keep your promise.

Orla. With no less religion, than if thou wert indeed my Rosalind: So adieu.

Rof. Well, time is the old juftice that examines all fuch offenders, and let time try. Adieu!

[Exit Orla. Cel. You have fimply mifus'd our fex in your loveprate; we must have your doublet and hofe pluck'd over your head, and fhew the world what the bird hath done to her own neft.

Rof. O coz', coz', coz', my pretty little coz', that thou didst know how many fathom deep I am in love!

I will think you the most PATHETICAL break-promife,] There is neither fenfe nor humour in this expreffion. We should certainly read, ATHEISTICAL break-promife. His answer confirms it, that he would keep his promife with no less religion, than―― WARBURTON.

I do not fee but that pathetical may ftand, which seems to afford as much fenfe and as much humour as atheistical. JOHNSON.

But

315

But it cannot be founded: my affection hath an unknown bottom, like the bay of Portugal.

Cel. Or rather, bottomlefs; that as fast as you pour affection in, it runs out.

Rof. No, that fame wicked bastard of Venus, that was begot of thought, conceiv'd of fpleen, and born of madness, that blind rafcally boy, that abuses every one's eyes, because his own are out, let him be judge, how deep I am in love: I'll tell thee, Aliena, I cannot be out of fight of Orlando: I'll go find a fha dow, and figh 'till he come.

Cel. And I'll fleep.

[blocks in formation]

Enter Jaques, Lords, and Forefters.

Jaq. Which is he that kill'd the deer?
Lord. Sir, it was I.

Exeunt

Jaq. Let's prefent him to the Duke, like a Roman conqueror and it would do well to fet the deer's horns upon his head, for a branch of victory: Have you no fong, Forefter, for this purpose ?

For. Yes, fir.

Faq. Sing it: 'tis no matter how it be in tune, so it make noife enough.

Mufick, Song.

1. What shall be have that kill'd the deer?

2. His leather fkin and horns to wear.

1. Then fing him home:

Take thou no fcorn2

To wear the horn, the horn, the born:
It was a creft, ere thou waft born.

The reft

fhall bear

this bur den.

1. Thy

Take thou no fcorn] In former editions: Then fing him home, the reft fhall hear his burden. This is an admirable instance of the fagacity of our preceding editors, to fay nothing worse. One

fhould

1. Thy father's father wore it;

2. And thy father bore it:

The born, the born, the lufty born,
Is not a thing to laugh to fcorn.

4SCENE

[Exeunt.

III.

Enter Rofalind and Celia.

Rof. How fay you now? Is it not past two o'clock? And here's 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 fleep: 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 I guess,

fhould expect, when they were poets, they would at leaft have taken care of the rbimes, and not foifted in what has nothing to answer it. Now, where is the rhime to, the reft shall bear this burden? Or, to ask another queftion, where is the fenfe of it? Does the poet mean, that He, that kill'd the deer, fhall be fung home, and the reft shall bear the deer on their backs? This is laying a burden on the poet, that we must help him to throw off. In short, the myftery of the whole is, that a marginal note is wifely thrust into the text: the fong being defign'd to be fung by a fingle voice, and the ftanzas to close with a burden to be fung by the whole company. THEOBALD.

This note I have given as a fpecimen of Mr. Theobald's jocularity, and the eloquence with which he recommends his emendations. JOHNSON.

The foregoing noisy scene was introduced only to fill up an interval, which is to reprefent two hours This contraction of the time we might impute to poor Rofalind's'impatience, but that a few minutes after we find Orlando fending his excufe. I do not fee that by any probable divifion of the acts this abfurdity can be. obviated. JOHNSON.

And here's much Orlando!] Thus the old copy. The modern leditors read, but without the least authority,

I wonder much, Qr-ando is not bere. STEEVENS.

By

By the ftern brow, and wafpifh action
Which fhe did ufe as fhe was writing of it,
Pardon me,

It bears an angry tenour.

I am but as a guiltless meffenger.

Rof. [reading] Patience herself would startle at this letter,

And play the swaggerer :-bear this, bear all ;-
She fays, 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 fhe fo to me? Well, fhepherd, well,
This is a letter of your own device.

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

Rof. Come, come, you're a fool,

And turn'd into the extremity of love.

I saw her hand: fhe has a leathern hand,

A free-ftone-coloured hand; I verily did think,
That her old gloves were on, but 'twas her hands;
She has a hufwife's hand: but that's no matter-
I fay, fhe never did invent this letter-

This is a man's invention, and his hand.
Sil. Sure, it is hers.

Rof. Why, 'tis a boisterous and a cruel stile,
A ftile for challengers; why, fhe defies me,
Like Turk to Chriftian: woman's gentle brain
Could not drop forth fuch giant rude invention;
Such Ethiop words, blacker in their effect

Than in their countenance. Will you hear the let

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ter?

Sil. So please you, for I never heard it yet;

Yet heard too much of Phebe's cruelty.

Rof. She Phebe's me :-Mark, how the tyrant

writes.

[Reads.] Art thou God to fhepherd turn'd, That a maiden's heart hath burn'd?

Can

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