Small have continual plod fers ever won,
Save base authority from others books.
These earthly godfathers of heaven's lights,
That give a name to ever fixed star,
Have no more profit of their shining nights,

Than those that walk, and wot not what they are. Too much to know, is, to know nought but faine; And every godfather can give a name.

King. How well he's read, to reason against reading!

Dum. Proceeded well, to stop all good proceeding! Long. He weeds the corn, and still let's grow the weeding.

Biron. The spring is near, when green geese are a breeding.

Dum. How follows that?
Biron.
Dum. In reason nothing.
Biron.

Fit in his place and time. Something then in rhyme. Long. Birón is like an envious sneaping frost, That bates the first-born infants of the spring.

Biron. Well, say I am; why should proud summer boast,

Before the birds have any cause to sing?
Why should I joy in an abortive birth?
At Christmas I no more desire a rose

Than wish a snow in May's new-fangled shows;
But like of each thing, that in season grows.
So you, to study now it is too late,
Climb o'er the house t' unlock the little gate.
King. Well, sit you out: go home, Birón; adieu!
Biron. No, my good lord; I have sworn to stay
with you:

And, though I have for barbarism spoke more,

Than for that angel knowledge you can say, Yet confident I'll keep what I have swore,

And bide the penance of each three years' day. Give me the paper, let me read the same; And to the strict'st decrees I'll write my name. King. How well this yielding rescues thee from shame!

Biron. [Reads] Item, That no woman shall come within a mile of my court.And hath this been proclaim'd? Long.

Biron. Let's see the penalty.

Reads.

Four days ago.

On pain of losing her tongue.-
Who devis'd this?

Long. Marry, that did I.

Biron. Sweet lord, and why?

King. Ay, tua. Lieke is. our court, you know, is haunted

With a refined traveller of Spain;

A man in all the world's new fashion planted,
That hath a mint of phrases in his brain:
One, whom the music of his own vain tongue
Doth ravish, like enchanting harmony;
A man of compliments, whom right and wrong
Have chose as umpire of their mutiny:
This child of fancy, that Armado hight,

For interim to our studies, shall relate,
In high-born words, the worth of many a knight
From tawny Spain, lost in the world's debate.
How you delight, my lords, I know not, I;
But, I protest, I love to hear him he,
And I will use him for my minstrelsy.

Biron. Armado is a most illustrious wight, A man of fire-new words, fashion's own knight. Long. Costard the swain, and he, shall be our sport:

And, so to study, three years is but short.

Enter DULL, with a letter, and COSTARD. Dull. Which is the duke's own person? Biron. This, fellow; What would'st? Dull. I myself reprehend his own person, for I am his grace's tharborough: but I would see his own person in flesh and blood.

Biron. This is he.

Dall. Signior Arme-Arme-commends you.There's villany abroad; this letter will tell you more.

Cost. Sir, the contempts thereof are as touching me.

King. A letter from the magnificent Armado. Biron. How low soever the matter, I hope in God for high words.

Long. A high hope for a low having: God grant us patience!

Biron. To hear? or forbear hearing?

Long. To hear meekly, sir, and to laugh moderately; or to forbear both.

Biron. Well, sir, be it as the style shall give us cause to climb in the merriness.

Cost. The matter is to me, sir, as concerning Jaquenetta. The manner of it is, I was taken with the manner.

Biron. In what manner?

nalty.

Biron. A dangerous law against gentility. [Reads.] Item, If any man be seen to talk with a woman within the ferm of three years, he shall endure such public shame as the rest of the court can possibly devise.

This article, my liege, yourself must break;

For, well you know, here comes in embassy The French king's daughter, with yourself to

forgot.

Biron. So study evermore is overshot; While it doth study to have what it would,

It doth forget to do the thing it should:

And when it hath the thing it hunteth most,
'Tis won, as towns with fire; so won, so lost.
King. We must of force, dispense with this decree;
She must lie here on mere necessity.

Biron. Necessity will make us all forsworn Three thousand times within this three years' space:

For every man with his affects is born;

Not by might master'd, but by special grace:
If I break faith, this word shall speak for me,
I am forsworn on mere necessity.-

So to the laws at large I write my name: [Subscribes.
And he, that breaks them in the least degree,
Stands in attainder of eternal shaine:

Suggestions are to others, as to me;
But, I believe, although I seem so loath,
Am the last that will last keep his oath.
But is there no quick recreation granted?
1 Nipping. 2 Reside. • Temptations.

following her into the park; which, put together, is, in manner and form following. Now, sir, for the manner,-it is the manner of a man to speak to a woman'; for the form,-in some form. Biron. For the following, sir?

Cost. As it shall follow in my correction; and God defend the right!

King. Will you hear this letter with attention? Biron. As we would hear an oracle.

Cost. Such is the simplicity of man to hearken after the flesh.

King. [Rends.] Great deputy, the welkin's vicegerent, and sole dominator of Navarre, my soul's earth's God, and body's fostering patron,— Cost. Not a word of Costard yet.

King. So it is,

Cost. It may be so: but if he say it is so, he is, in telling true, but so, so. King, Peace.

Cost. -be to me, and every man that dares not fight!

King. No words.

Cost. of other men's secrets, I beseech you. King. So it is, besieged with sable-colored melancholy, I did commend the black-oppressing humor to the most wholesome physic of thy healthgiving 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-colored ink, which here thou viewest, beholdest, urveyest, or seest: but to • Called. 5 i. e. Third-borough, a peace officer. In the fact.

King. -with a child of our grandmother Eve, a female; or, for thy more sweet understanding, a woman. Him I (as my ever-esteemed duty pricks me on) have sent to thee, to receive the meed of punishment, by thy sweet gruce's officer, Antony Dull; a man of good repute, carriage, bearing, and estimation.

Dull. Me, an't shall please you; I am Antony Dull.

King. For Jaquenetta, (so is the weaker vessel called, which I apprehended with the aforesaid swain,) I keep her as a vessel of thy law's fury; and shall, at the least of thy sweet notice, bring her to trial. Thine, in all compliments of devoted and heart-burning heat of duty.

DON ADRIANO DE ARAMADO. 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. Sír, 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.

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

King, And Don Armado shall be your keeper. My lord Birón, 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.-Armado's House.

Enter ARMADO and Moтн.

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.

• Young man.

Moth. And 1, tough senior, as an appertinent title to your old time, which we may name tough. Arm. Pretty and apt.

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?
Arm. In thy condign praise.

Moth. I will praise an eel with the same praise.
Arm. What that an eel is ingenious?
Moth. That an eel is quick.

Arm. I do say, thou art quick in answer: Thou heatest my blood.

Moth. I am answered, sir.

Arm. I love not to be crossed.

Moth. He speaks the mere contrary, crosses love not him. [Aside. 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. 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 is 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 will tell you.

Arm. A most fine figure!
Moth. To prove you a cipher.

Asile.

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 humor 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 out-swear 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.

Moth. Samson, master: he was a man of good carriage, great carriage; for he carried the towngates on his back, like a porter: and he was in love.

Arm. O well-knit Samson! strong-jointed Samson! I do excel thee in my rapier, as much as thou didst me in carrying gates. I am in love too,Who was Samson'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 color of lovers: but to have a love of that color, methinks, Samson had small reason for it. He, surely, affected her for her wit.

Moth. It was so, sir; for she had a green wit. Arm. My love is most immaculate white and red. Moth. Most maculate thoughts, master, are masked under such colors.

Arm. Define, define, well-educated infant. Moth. My father's wit and my mother's tongue assist me.

Arm. Sweet invocation of a child; most pretty, and pathetical!

Moth. If she be made of white and red,

Her faults will ne'er be known;
For blushing cheeks by faults are bred,
And fears by pale white shown:
Then, if she fear, or be to blame,
By this you shall not know;

The name of a coin once current.

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?

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

Arm. I will have the 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.

Arm. I say, sing.

Moth. Forbear till this company be past.

Enter DULL, COSTARD, and JAQUENETTA. Dull. Sir, the duke's pleasure is, that you keep Costard safe: and you must let him take no delight, nor no penance; but a' must fast three days a week: For this damsel I must keep her at the park; she is allowed for the day-woman. Fare you well. Arm. I do betray myself with blushing.-- Maid. Jaq. Man.

Arm. I will visit thee at the lodge.
Jaq. That's hereby.

Arm. I know where it is situate.

Jaq. Lord, how wise you are!

Arm. I will tell thee wonders.

Jaq. With that face?

Arm. I love thee.

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. Moth. 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: thou shalt to prison.

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

[Exeunt MoтH 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. Yet Samson 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, valor! rust, rapier: be still, drum! for your manager is in love; yea, he loveth. Assist me, some extemporal god of rhyme, for, I am sure, I shall turn sonnetteer. Devise, wit; write, pen; for I am for whole_volumes in folio. [Exit.

SCENE I-A Pavilion and Tents at a distance. Enter the PRINCESS OF FRANCE, ROSALINE, MARIA, KATHERINE, 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,
As nature was in making graces dear,
When she did starve the general world beside,
And prodigally gave them all to you.

Prin. Good lord Boyet, my beauty though but

mean,

Needs not the painted flourish of your praise;
Beauty is bought by judgment of the eye,
Not utter'd by base sale of chapmen's tongues:
I am less proud to hear you tell my worth,
Than you much willing to be counted wise
In spending your wit in the praise of mine.
But now to task the tasker.-Good Boyet,
You are not ignorant, all-telling fame
Doth noise abroad Navarre hath made a vow,
Till painful study shall out-wear three years,
No woman may approach his silent court:
Therefore to us seemeth it a needful course,
Before we enter his forbidden gates,
To know his pleasure; and, in that behalf,
Bold of your worthiness, we single you
As our best-moving fair solicitor:

Tell him, the daughter of the king of France,

•Of which she is naturally possessed.

Dairy-woman.

On serious business, craving quick despatch,
Haste, signify so much; while we attend,
Importunes personal conference with his grace.
Like humble-visag'd suitors, his high will.
Boyet. Proud of employment, willingly I go.
Exit.
Prin. All pride is willing pride, and yours is so.-
Who are the votaries, my loving lords,
That are vow-fellows with this virtuous duke?
1 Lord. Longaville is one.
Prin.
Know you the man?
Mar. I know him, madam; at a marriage feast,
Between lord Perigort and the beauteous heir
Of Jaques Falconbridge solémnized,
In Normandy saw I this Longaville:
A man of sovereign parts he is esteem'd;
Well fitted in the arts, glorious in arms:
Nothing becomes him ill, that he would well.
The only soil of his fair virtue's gloss,
(If virtue's gloss will stain with any soil,)
Is a sharp wit match'd with too blunt a will;
Whose edge hath power to cut, whose will still wills
It should none spare that come within his power.
Prin. Some merry mocking lord, belike; is't so?
Mar. They say so most, that most his humors
know.

Prin. Such short-liv'd wits do wither as they grow. Who are the rest?

Kath. The young Dumain, a well-accomplish'd youth,

Of all that virtue love for virtue lov'd:
Most power to do most harm, least knowing ill;
For he hath wit to make an ill shape good,
And shape to win grace though he had no wit.
I saw him at the duke Alençon's once;
And much too little of that good I saw,
Is my report to his great worthiness.

Boyet. Farewell to me, sir, and welcome to you. Exit BIRON.-Ladies unmask. Mar. That last is Biron, the merry mad-cap lord; Not a word with him but a jest.. Boyet. And every jest but a word. Prin. It was well done of you to take him at his word.

Boyet. I was willing to grapple, as he was to board.

Mar. Two hot sheeps, marry!
Boyet.

And wherefore not ships! No sheep, sweet lamb, unless we feed on your lips. Mar. You sheep, and I pasture; Shall that finish the jest?

Boyet. So you grant pasture for me. Offering to kiss her. Mar. Not so, gentle beast; My lips are no common, though several they be. Boyet. Belonging to whom? Mar.

To my fortunes and me. Prin. Good wits will be jangling: but, gentles, agree;

The civil war of wits were much better used
On Navarre and his bookmen; for here 'tis abused.
Boyet. If my observation, (which very seldom
lies,)

By the heart's still rhetoric, disclosed with eyes,
Deceive me not now, Navarre is infected.

Prin. With what?

Boyet. With that which we lovers entitle, affected. Prin. Your reason?

Boyet. Why all his behaviors did make their retire To the court of his eye, peeping thorough desire:

His heart, like an agate, with your print impressed,
Proud with his form, in his eye pride expressed:
His tongue all impatient to speak and not see,
Did stumble with haste in his eyesight to be;
All senses to that sense did make their repair,
To feel only looking on fairest of fair:
Methought, all his senses were locked in his eye
As jewels in crystal for some prince to buy ;
Who, tendering their own worth, from where they
were glass'd,

Did point you to buy them, along as you pass'd.
His face's own margent did quote such amazes,
That all eyes saw his eyes enchanted with gazes:
I'll give you Aquitain, and all that is his,
An you give him for my sake but one loving kiss.
Prin. Come, to our pavilion: Boyet is dispos'd--
Boyet. But to speak that in words, which his
eye hath disclos'd:

I only have made a mouth of his eye,
By adding a tongue which I know will not lie.
Ros. Thou art an old love-monger, and speak'st
skilfully.

Man. He is Cupid's grandfather, and learns news of him. Ros. Then was Venus like her mother; for her father is but grim.

No.

Boyet. Do you hear, my mad wenches?
Mar.
Boyet.
What then, do you see?
Ros. Ay, our way to be gone.
Boyet.
You are too hard for me.
[Exeunt.

SCENE I.- The Park, near the Palace.

Enter ARMADO and Mотн.

Arm. Warble, child; make passionate my sense of hearing. Moth. Concolinel[Singing. Arm. Sweet air!-Go, tenderness of years; take this key, give enlargement to the swain, bring him festinately! hither; I must employ him in a letter to my love.

Moth. Master, will you win your love with a French brawl?a

Arm. How mean'st thou? brawling in French? Moth. No, my complete master: but to jig off a tune at the tongue's end, canary" to it with your feet, humor it with turning up your eye-lids; sigh a note and sing a note; sometime through the throat, as if you swallowed love with singing love; sometime through the nose, as if you snuffed up love by smelling love; with your hat penthouselike, o'er the shop of your eyes; with your arms crossed on your thin belly-doublet, like a rabbit on a spit; or your hands in your pocket, like a man after the old painting; and keep not too long in one tune, but a snip and away: These are complements, these are humors; these betray nice wenches-that would be betrayed without these; and make them men of note (do you note, men ?)

that are most affected to these.

Arm. How hast thou purchased this experience?
Moth. By my penny of observation.
Arm. But 0,- but 0,-

Moth-the hobby-horse is forgot.

Arm. Callest thou my love, hobby-horse? Moth. No master; the hobby-horse is but a colt; and your love, perhaps, a hackney. But have you forgot your love?

Ärm. Almost I had.

Moth. Negligent studen! learn her by heart.
Arm. By heart, and in heart, boy.

Moth. And out of heart, master: all those three I will prove.

Arm. What will that prove?

Moth. A man, if I live; and this, by, in, and without, upon the instant: By heart you love her, A quibble, several signified unenclosed lands. 1 Hastily. 2 A kind of dance. Canary was the name of a sprightly dance.

because your heart cannot come by her: in heart you love her, because your heart is in love with her: and out of heart you love her, being out of heart that you cannot enjoy her.

Arm. I am all these three.

Moth. And three times as much more, and yet nothing at all.

Arm. Fetch hither the swain; he must carry me a letter.

Moth. A message well sympathised; a horse to be ambassador for an ass!

Arm. Ha, ha! what sayest thou?

Moth. Marry, sir, you must send the ass upon the horse, for he is very slow gaited: But I go." Arm. The way is but short; away. Moth. As swift as lead, sir.

Arm. Thy meaning, pretty ingenious? Is not lead a metal heavy, dull, and slow? Moth. Minime,honest master; or rather, master,no. Arm. I say, lead is slow.

Moth.

You are too swift, sir, to say so: Is that lead slow which is fired from a gun?

Arm. Sweet smoke of rhetoric: He reputes me a cannon; and the bullet, that's he :I shoot thee at the swain. Moth.

Thump then, and I flee. [Exit. Arm. A most acute juvenal; voluble and free of grace!

By thy favor, sweet welkin, I must sigh in thy face:
Most rude melancholy, valor gives thee place.
My herald is return'd."

Re-enter MOTH and CoSTARD.

Moth. A wonder, master; here's a costard broken in a shin.

Arm. Some enigma, some riddle: come,-thy l'envoy-begin.

Cost. No egma, no riddle, no l'envoy; no salve in the mail, sir: O, sir, plantain, a plain plantain; no l'envoy, no l'envoy no salve, sir, but a plantain!

Arm. By virtue, thou enforcest laughter; thy silly thought, my spleen; the heaving of my lungs provokes me to ridiculous smiling: O, pardon me,