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So it is, besieged with sable-coloured melancholy, I did commend the black-oppressing humour to the most wholesome physic of thy health-giving air; and, as I am a gentleman, betook myself to walk. The time when? About the sixth hour; when beasts most graze, birds best peck, and men sit down to that nourishment which is called supper. So much for the time when : Now for the ground which; which, I mean, I walked upon: it is ycleped, thy park. Then for the place where ; where, I mean, I did encounter that obscene and most preposterous event, that draweth from my snow-white pen the ebon-coloured ink, which here thou viewest, beholdest, surveyest, or seest: But to the place where,—it standeth north-northeast and by east from the west corner of thy curious-knotted garden: there did I see that low-spirited swain, that base minnow of thy mirth,

COST. Me. KING.

-that unletter'd small-knowing soul,

COST. Me.

a Thy curious-knotted garden :] Ancient gardens, Steevens observes, abounded with figures, of which the lines intersected each other in many directions. Thus in "Richard II." Act III. Sc. 4:

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BIRON. This is not so well as I looked for, but the best that ever I heard.

KING. Ay, the best for the worst. But, sirrah, what say you to this?

COST. Sir, I confess the wench.

KING. Did you hear the proclamation?

COST. I do confess much of the hearing it, but little of the marking of it.

KING. It was proclaimed a year's imprisonment, to be taken with a wench.

COST. I was taken with none, sir; I was taken with a damosel.

KING. Well, it was proclaimed damosel.

COST. This was no damosel, neither, sir; she was a virgin.

KING. It is so varied too; for it was proclaimed virgin.

COST. If it were, I deny her virginity; I was taken with a maid.

KING. This maid will not serve your turn, sir. COST. This maid will serve my turn, sir. KING. Sir, I will pronounce your sentence: you shall fast a week with bran and water.

(*) Old copies, which with.

"Her fruit-trees all unprun'd, her hedges ruin'd, Her knots disorder'd," &c.

COST. I had rather pray a month with mutton and porridge.

KING. And don Armado shall be your keeper.My lord Biron, see him deliver❜d o'er.— And go we, lords, to put in practice that Which each to other hath so strongly sworn.

[Exeunt KING, LONGAVILLE, and DUMAIN. BIRON. I'll lay my head to any good man's hat, These oaths and laws will prove an idle scorn.-Sirrah, come on.

COST. I suffer for the truth, sir: for true it is, I was taken with Jaquenetta, and Jaquenetta is a true girl; and therefore, Welcome the sour cup of prosperity! Affliction may one day smile again, and till then, Sit thee down, sorrow!*

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.-Another part of the same. Armado's House.

Enter ARMADO and MoTH.

ARM. Boy, what sign is it, when a man of great spirit grows melancholy?

MOTH. A great sign, sir, that he will look sad. ARM. Why, sadness is one and the self-same thing, dear imp.

MOTH. No, no; O lord, sir, no.

ARM. How canst thou part sadness and melancholy, my tender juvenal?

MOTH. By a familiar demonstration of the working, my tough senior.+

ARM. Why tough senior?+ why tough senior? + MOTH. Why tender juvenal? why tender juvenal ?

ARM. I spoke it, tender juvenal, as a congruent epitheton, appertaining to thy young days, which we may nominate, tender.

MOTH. And I, tough senior,† as an appertinent title to old time, which we may name, tough. ARM. Pretty, and apt.

your

MOTH. How mean you, sir; I pretty, and my saying apt or I apt, and my saying pretty? ARM. Thou pretty, because little.

MOTH. Little pretty, because little: Wherefore apt?

ARM. And therefore apt, because quick. MOTH. Speak you this in my praise, master?

(*) First folio, until then sit down, &c.

(†) First folio, signeur.

a Armado.] Here and throughout the scene in the old copies we have Braggart, instead of Armado.

b Thou pretty, because little:] So in Ben Jonson's play of "The Fox," (Gifford's edition,) vol. iii. p. 236:

"First for your dwarf, he's little and witty,
And every thing, as it is little is pretty."

e Crosses love not him.] A punning allusion, very frequent in

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ARM. I have promised to study three years with the duke.

MOTH. You may do it in an hour, sir.
ARM. Impossible.

MOTH. How many is one thrice told?

ARM. I am ill at reckoning; it fitteth† the spirit of a tapster.

MOTH. You are a gentleman, and a gamester, sir.(3)

ARM. I confess both; they are both the varnish of a complete man.

MOTH. Then, I am sure, you know how much the gross sum of deuce-ace amounts to.

ARM. It doth amount to one more than two. MOTH. Which the base vulgar do call, three. ARM. True.

MOTH. Why, sir, is this such a piece of study? Now here's three studied, ere you'll thrice wink : and how easy it is to put years to the word three, and study three years in two words, the dancing horse (4) will tell you.

ARM. A most fine figure!
MOTH. To prove you a cipher.

[Aside.

ARM. I will hereupon confess, I am in love: and, as it is base for a soldier to love, so am I in love with a base wench. If drawing my sword against the humour of affection would deliver me from the reprobate thought of it, I would take Desire prisoner, and ransom him to any French courtier for a new devised courtesy. I think scorn to sigh; methinks, I should outswear Cupid. Comfort me, boy: What great men have been in love?

MOTH. Hercules, master.

ARM. Most sweet Hercules!-More authority, dear boy, name more; and, sweet my child, let them be men of good repute and carriage. MотH. Sampson, master; he was a man of

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(1) First folio, vulgar call. Shakespeare's day, probably to the ancient penny, which Stowe describes as having a double cross, with a crest stamped on it, so that it might easily be broken in half or into quarters. In "Henry IV. Part II." Act I. Sc. 2, we meet with the same quibble:

"Not a penny, not a penny; you are too impatient to bear crosses." And again, in "As You Like It," Act II. Sc. 4:"For my part, I had rather bear with you than bear you; yet I should bear no cross if I did bear you."

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good carriage, great carriage; for he carried the town-gates on his back, like a porter: and he was in love.

ARM. O well-knit Sampson! strong-jointed Sampson! I do excel thee in my rapier, as much as thou didst me in carrying gates. I am in love, too-Who was Sampson's love, my dear Moth?

MOTH. A woman, master.
ARM. Of what complexion?

MOTH. Of all the four, or the three, or the two; or one of the four.

ARM. Tell me precisely of what complexion? MOTH. Of the sea-water green, sir. ARM. Is that one of the four complexions? MOTH. As I have read, sir: and the best of them too.

ARM. Green, indeed, is the colour of lovers; but to have a love of that colour, methinks,

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Then, if she fear, or be to blame,

JAQ. Fair weather after you!

By this you shall not know;
For still her cheeks possess the same,
Which native she doth owe.

A dangerous rhyme, master, against the reason of white and red.

ARM. Is there not a ballad, boy, of the King and the Beggar? (5)

MOTH. The world was very guilty of such a ballad some three ages since: but, I think, now 't is not to be found; or, if it were, it would neither serve for the writing, nor the tune.

ARM. I will have that subject newly writ o'er, that I may example my digression by some mighty precedent. Boy, I do love that country girl that I took in the park with the rational hind · Costard; she deserves well.

MOTH. To be whipped; and yet a better love than my master. [Aside.

ARM. Sing, boy; my spirit grows heavy in love. MOTH. And that's great marvel, loving a light wench.

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DULL. Come, Jaquenetta, away.

[Exeunt DULL and JAQUENETTA. ARM. Villain, thou shalt fast for thy offences ere thou be pardoned.

COST. Well, sir, I hope, when I do it, I shall do it on a full stomach.

ARM. Thou shalt be heavily punished. COST. I am more bound to you than your fellows, for they are but lightly rewarded.

ARM. Take away this villain; shut him up. MоTH. Come, you transgressing slave; away. COST. Let me not be pent up, sir; I will fast, being loose.

MOTH. No, sir; that were fast and loose :a thou shalt to prison.

COST. Well, if ever I do see the merry days of desolation that I have seen, some shall see

MOTH. What shall some see?

COST. Nay, nothing, master Moth, but what they look upon. It is not for prisoners to be too * silent in their words; and, therefore, I will say nothing I thank God, I have as little patience as another man; and, therefore, I can be quiet.

Yet

[Exeunt MоTH and COSTARD. ARM. I do affect the very ground, which is base, where her shoe, which is baser, guided by her foot, which is basest, doth tread. I shall be forsworn (which is a great argument of falsehood) if I love and how can that be true love, which is falsely attempted? Love is a familiar; love is a devil: there is no evil angel but love. Sampson was so tempted; and he had an excellent strength: yet was Solomon so seduced; and he had a very good wit. Cupid's butt-shaft is too hard for Hercules' club, and therefore too much odds for a Spaniard's rapier. The first and second cause will not serve my turn; the passado he respects not, the duello he regards not: his disgrace is to be called boy; but his glory is to subdue men. Adieu, valour! rust, rapier! be still, drum for your managers is in love; yea, he loveth. Assist me, some extemporal god of rhyme, for, I am sure, I shall turn sonnets. Devise, wit; write, pen; for, I am for whole volumes in folio. [Exit.

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(*) Old copies, Enter Clowne, Constable, and Wench.
(+) First folio, he.

- for the day-woman.] A day-woman is a dairy-woman, a milk-woman. Johnson, in his Dictionary, derives dairy from day, which, he says, though without adducing any authority, was an old word for milk.

b That's hereby.] She means, scoffingly, that's as it may happen ; that's to be seen. Armado understands her in the literal sense, close by.

With that face?] An old bantering phrase, hardly obsolete now. The folio mars it by reading, "With what face?"

d That were fast and loose:] An allusion to a well-known game of the time, now called "pricking i' the garter."

e I do affect-] i.e. I do love, &c. Affect, in this sense, is so

(*) First folio omits too.

common an expression with the old writers, as scarcely to require explanation.

f The first and second cause will not serve my turn; the passado he respects not,-] These are terms borrowed from the school of fence, and the fantastical treatises on the Duello by Saviolo and Caranza. See the Illustrative Comments on Act II. of "Romeo and Juliet."

gfor your manager is in love;] The corrector of Mr. Collier's copy of the folio 1632, with much plausibility, suggests for manager that we should read armiger; and two lines lower, instead of sonnet, as in the old editions, sonnet-maker. In the latter case, I prefer sonnets, the happy emendation of an American critic, Dr. Verplanck.

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SCENE I.-Another part of the Park. A Pavilion and Tents at a distance.

Enter the PRINCESS OF FRANCE, ROSALINE, MARIA, KATHARINE, BOYET, Lords, and other Attendants.

BOYET. Now, madam, summon up your dearest" spirits ;

Consider who the king your father sends;
To whom he sends; and what's his embassy:
Yourself, held precious in the world's esteem,
To parley with the sole inheritor

Of all perfections that a man may owe,
Matchless Navarre: the plea, of no less weight
Than Aquitain, a dowry for a queen.
Be now as prodigal of all dear grace,

a Your dearest spirits;] That is, your choicest, rarest spirits.

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