That shall attend his love. Par. There's little can be said in't; 'tis against Count. Heaven bless him!-Farewell, Bertram. the rule of nature. To speak on the part of vir[Exit Countess. ginity, is to accuse your mothers: which is most Ber. The best wishes, that can be forged in your infallible disobedience. He, that hangs himself, is thoughts, [To Helena.] be servants to you! Be a virgin virginity murders itself; and should be comfortable to my mother, your inistress, and make buried in highways, out of all sanctified limit, as much of her. a desperate offendress against nature. Virginity

Laf. Farewell, pretty lady: You must hold the breeds mites, much like a cheese; consum.es itself credit of your father. [Exe. Bertram and Lafeu. to the very paring, and so dies with feeding his own Hel. O, were that all !-I think not on my father; stomach. Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, idle, And these great tears grace his remembrance more made of self-love, which is the most inhibited sin Than those I shed for him. What was he like?

I have forgot him: my imagination
Carries no favour in it, but Bertram's.
I am undone; there is no living, none,
If Bertram be away. It were all one,
That I should love a bright particular star,
And think to wed it, he is so above me:
In his bright radiance and collateral light
Must I be comforted, not in his sphere.
The ambition in my love thus plagues itself:
The hind, that would be mated by the lion,
Must die for love. 'Twas pretty, though a plague,
To see him every hour; to sit and draw
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls,
In our heart's table; heart, too capable
Of every line and trick of his sweet favour:4
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancy
Must sanctify his relics. Who comes here?
Enter Parolles.

One that goes with him: I love him for his sake;
And yet I know him a notorious liar,
Think him a great way fool, solely a coward;
Yet these fix'd evils sit so fit in him,

That they take place, when virtue's steely bones
Look bleak in the cold wind; withal, full oft we see
Cold wisdom waiting on superfluous folly.
Par. Save you, fair queen.

Hel. And you, monarch.

Par. No.

Hel. And no.

Par. Are you meditating on virginity?

Hel. Ay. You have some stain of soldier in you; let me ask you a question: Man is enemy to virginity; how may we barricado it against him? Par. Keep him out.

Hel. But he assails; and our virginity, though valiant in the defence, yet is weak: unfold to us some warlike resistance.

Par. There is none; man, sitting down before you, will undermine you, and blow you up.

Hel. Bless our poor virginity from underminers, and blowers up!-Is there no military policy, how virgins might blow up men?

Par. Virginity, being blown down, man will quicklier be blown up: marry, in blowing him down again, with the breach yourselves made, you lose your city. It is not politic in the commonwealth of nature, to preserve virginity. Loss of virginity is rational inerease; and there was never virgin got, till virginity was first lost. That, you were made of, is metal to make virgins. Virginity, by being once lost, may be ten times found: by being ever kept, it is ever lost: 'tis too cold a companion; away with it.

Hel. I will stand for't a little, though there fore I die a virgin.

(1) i. e. May you be mistress of your wishes, and have power to bring them to effect.

(2) Helena considers her heart as the tablet on which his resemblance was portrayed.

(3) Peculiarity of feature. (4) Countenance,

in the canon. Keep it not; you cannot choose but lose by't; Out with't: within ten years it will make itself ten, which is a goodly increase; and the principal itself not much the worse: Away with't.

Hel. How might one do, sir, to lose it to her own iliking?

Par. Let me see: Marry, ill, to like him that
ne'er it likes. "Tis a commodity will lose the gloss
with lying; the longer kept, the less worth of
with't, while 'tis vendible: answer the time of re-
quest. Virginity, like an old courtier, wears her
cap out of fashion; richly suited, but unsuitable :
just like the brooch and toothpick, which wear not
now: Your date is better in your pie and your
porridge, than in your cheek: And your virginity,
your old virginity, is like one of our French wither
ed pears; it looks ill, it eats dryly; marry, 'tis a
withered pear; it was formerly better; marry, yet,
'tis a withered pear: Will you any thing with it?
Hel. Not my virginity yet.

There shall your master have a thousand loves,
A mother, and a mistress, and a friend,
A phoenix, captain, and an enemy,
A guide, a goddess, and a sovereign,
A counsellor, a traitress, and a dear;
His humble ambition, proud humility,
His jarring concord, and his discord dulcet,
His faith, his sweet disaster; with a world'
Of pretty, fond, adoptious christendoms,
That blinking Cupid gossips. Now shall he-
I know not what he shall:-God send bim well!-
The court's a learning-place;-and he is one-
Par. What one, i'faith?

Hel. That I wish well.-'Tis pity-
Par. What's pity?

Hel. That wishing well had not a body in't,
Which might be felt; that we, the poorer born,
Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes,
Might with effects of them follow our friends,
And show what we alone must think; which never

Returns us thanks.

Hel. You go so much backward, when you fight.
Par. That's for advantage.

Hel. So is running away, when fear proposes the safety: But the composition, that your valour and fear makes in you, is a virtue of a good wing, and I like the wear well.

King. I would I had that corporal soundness now, As when thy father, and myself, in friendship First try'd our soldiership! He did look far Into the scrvice of the time, and was Discipled of the bravest: he lasted long; But on us both did haggish age steal on, Par. I am so full of businesses, I cannot answer And wore us out of act. It much repairs me thee acutely: I will return perfect courtier; in the To talk of your good father: In his youth which, my instruction shall serve to naturalize thee, He had the wit, which I can well observe so thou wilt be capable of a courtier's counsel, To-day in our young lords; but they may jest and understand what advice shall thrust upon thee; Till their own scorn return to them unnoted, else thou diest in thine unthankfulness, and thine Ere they can hide their levity in honour. ignorance makes thee away: farewell. When thou So like a courtier, contempt nor bitterness hast leisure, say thy prayers; when thou hast Were in his pride or sharpness; if they were, none, remember thy friends: get thee a good hus- His equal had awak'd them; and his honour, band, and use him as he uses thee: so farewell. Clock to itself, knew the true minute when [Exit. Exception bid him speak, and, at this time, His tongue obey'd his hand: who were below him He us'd as creatures of another place; And bow'd his eminent top to their low ranks, Making them proud of his humility,

Hel. Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie,
Which we ascribe to heaven: the fated sky
Gives us free scope; only, doth backward pull
Our slow designs, when we ourselves are dull.
What power is it, which mounts my love so high;
That makes me see, and cannot feed mine eye?
The mightiest space in fortune nature brings
To join like likes, and kiss like native things.
Impossible be strange attempts, to those
That weigh their pains in sense: and do suppose,
What hath been cannot be: Who ever strove
To show her merit, that did miss her love?
The king's disease-my project may deceive me,
But my intents are fix'd, and will not leave me.

[Exit.
SCENE II.-Paris. A room in the King's palace.
Flourish of cornets. Enter the King of France,
with letters; Lords and others attending.
King. The Florentines and Senoys are by the

In their poor praise he humbled: Such a man
Might be a copy to these younger times;
Which, follow'd well, would démonstrate them now
But goers backward.
His good remembrance, sir,
Lies richer in your thoughts, than on his tomb;
So in approof lives not his epitaph,
As in your royal speech.

Ber.

King. 'Would, I were with him! He would al

ways say,

(Methinks, I hear him now; his plausive words
He scatter'd not in ears, but grafted them,
To grow there, and to bear,)-Let me not live,-
Thus his good melancholy oft began,
On the catastrophe and heel of pastime,
When it was out,-let me not live, quoth he,
After my flame lacks oil, to be the snuff
Of younger spirits, whose apprehensive senses
All but new things disdain: whose judgments are
Mere fathers of their garments; whose constancies
Expire before their fashions:This he wish'd:
I, after him, do after him wish too,

Since I nor wax, nor honey, can bring home,
I quickly were dissolved from my hive,
To give some labourers room.

2 Lord.
You are lov'd, sir;
They, that least lend it you, shall lack you first.
King. I fill a place, I know't.-How long is't,

count,

Since the physician at your father's died?
He was much fam'd.

Ber.
Some six months since, my lord,
King. If he were living, I would try him yet;-
Lend me an arm;-the rest have worn me out
With several applications:-nature and sickness
Debate it at their leisure. Welcome, count;
My son's no dearer.

Ber.
What's he comes here?

Enter Bertram, Lafeu, and Parolles.

Thank your majesty.
[Exeunt. Flourish,

1 Lord. It is the count Rousillon, my good lord, SCENE III-Rousillon. A Room in the CounYoung Bertram.

;

King. Youth, thou bear'st thy father's face
Frank nature, rather curious than in haste,
Hath well compos'd thee. Thy father's moral parts
Mav'st thou inherit too! Welcome to Paris.

Ber. My thanks and duty are your majesty's.

(1) i. e. Thou wilt comprehend it. (2) Things formed by nature for each other. (3) The citizens of the small republic of which] Sienna is the capital.

(4) To repair, here signifies to renovate.

tess's Palace.

Clown.

Enter Countess, Steward, and

modesty, and make foul the clearness of our de-| servings, when of ourselves we publish them.

Count. What does this knave here? Get you gone, sirrah: The complaints, I have heard of you, do not all believe; 'tis my slowness, that I do not: for, I know, you lack not folly to commit them, and have ability enough to make such knaveries yours. Clo. 'Tis not unknown to you, madam, I am a poor fellow.

Count. Well, sir.

may

Clo. No, madam, 'tis not so well, that I am poor; though many of the rich are damned: But, if have your ladyship's good will to go to the world, Isbel the woman and I will do as we may. Count. Wilt thou needs be a beggar? Clo. I do beg your good will in this case. Count. In what case?

Clo. In Isbel's case, and mine own. Service is no heritage: and, I think, I shall never have the blessing of God, till I have issue of my body; for, they say, bearns are blessings.

Count. Tell me the reason why thou wilt marry. Clo. My poor body, madam, requires it: I am driven on by the flesh; and he must needs go, that the devil drives.

Count. Is this all your worship's reason?

Clo. Faith, madam, I have other holy reasons, such as they are.

Count. May the world know them?

Clo. I have been, madam, a wicked creature, as you and all flesh and blood are; and, indeed, I do marry, that I may repent.

Was this king Priam's joy?
With that she sighed as she stood,
With that she sighed as she stood,

And gave this sentence then;
Among nine bad if one be good,
Among nine bad if one be good,
There's yet one good in ten.

Count. What, one good in ten? you corrupt the song, sirrah.

Clo. One good woman in ten, madam; which is a purifying o' the song: 'Would God would serve the world so all the year! we'd find no fault with the tythe-woman, if I were the parson: One in ten, quoth a'! an we might have a good woman born but every blazing star, or at an earthquake, 'twould mend the lottery well; a man may draw his heart out, ere he pluck one.

Count. You'll be gone, sir knave, and do as I command you?

Clo. That man should be at woman's command, and yet no hurt done!-Though honesty be no pu ritan, yet it will do no hurt; it will wear the sur plice of humility over the black gown of a big heart.-I am going, forsooth: the business is for Helen to come hither. [Exit Clown.

Count. Well, now.

Stew. I know, madam, you love your gentlewoman entirely.

Count. Faith, I do: her father bequeathed her to me; and she herself, without other advantage, may lawfully make title to as much love as she finds: there is more owing her, than is paid; and

Count. Thy marriage, sooner than thy wicked-more shall be paid her, than she'll demand.

ness.

Stern, Madam, I was very late more near her

Clo. I am out of friends, madam; and I hope to than, I think, she wished me: alone she was, and have friends for my wife's sake. did communicate to herself, her own words to her own ears; she thought, I dare vow for her, they touched not any stranger sense. Her matter was,

Count. Such friends are thine enemies, knave. Clo. You are shallow, madam; e'en great friends; for the knaves come to do that for me, which I am she loved your son: Fortune, she said, was no a-weary of. He, that ears my land, spares my goddess, that had put such difference betwixt their team, and gives me leave to inn the crop: If I be two estates; Love, no god, that would not extend his cuckold, he's my drudge: He, that comforts his might, only where qualities were level; Diana, my wife, is the cherisher of my flesh and blood; no queen of virgins, that would suffer her poor he, that cherishes my flesh and blood, loves my knight to be surprised, without rescue, in the first flesh and blood; he, that loves my flesh and blood, assault, or ransome afterward: This she delivered is my friend: erge, he that kisses my wife, is my in the most bitter touch of sorrow, that e'er I heard friend. If men could be contented to be what they virgin exclaim in: which I held my duty, speedily are, there were no fear in marriage; for young to acquaint you withal; sithence, in the loss that Charbon the puritan, and old Poysam the papist, may happen, it concerns you something to know it. howsoe'er their hearts are severed in religion, their Count. You have discharged this honestly; keep heads are both one, they may joll horns together, it to yourself: many likelihoods informed me of like any deer i' the herd. this before, which hung so tottering in the balance Count. Wilt thou ever be a foul-mouthed and that I could neither believe, nor misdoubt: Pray calumnious knave? you, leave me: stall this in your bosom, and I Clo. A prophet I, madam; and I speak the thank you for your honest care: I will speak with truth the next way: you further anon.

For I the ballad will repeat,
Which men full true shall find;
Your marriage comes by destiny,
Your cuckoo sings by kind.

Count. Get you gone, sir; I'll talk with you

more anon.

Stew. May it please you, madam, that he bid Helen come to you; of her I am to speak.

Enter Helena.

[Exit Steward.

Count. Even so it was with me, when I was

young:

If we are nature's, these are ours; this thorn
Doth to our rose of youth rightly belong;

Our blood to us, this to our blood is born;
It is the show and seal of nature's truth,
Where love's strong passion is impress'd in youth.

Count. Sirrah, tell my gentlewoman, I would By our remembrances of days foregone,

speak with her; Helen I mean.

Clo. Was this fair face the cause, quoth she,

6

[Singing.

Why the Grecians sacked Troy?

Fond done, done fond,

I am a mother to you.

Hel. Mine honourable mistress.
Count.

Nay, a mother;
Why not a mother? When I said, a mother,
Me hought you saw a serpent: What's in mother,
That you start at it? I say, I am your mother;
And put you in the catalogue of those
That were enwombed mine: 'Tis often seen,
Adoption strives with nature; and choice breeds
A native slip to us from foreign seeds:
You ne'er oppress'd me with a mother's groan,
Yet I express to you a mother's care:-
God's mercy, maiden! does it curd thy blood,
To say, I am thy mother? What's the matter,
That this distemper'd messenger of wet,
The many-colour'd Iris, rounds thine eye?
Why?-
-that you are my daughter?
Hel.
Count. I say, I am your mother.
Hel.
Pardon, madam;
The count Rousillon cannot be my brother:
I am from humble, he from honour'd name;
No note upon my parents, his all noble:
My master, my dear lord, he is; and I
His servant live, and will his vassal die :
He must not be iny brother.

That I am not.

Count.
Nor I your mother?
Hel. You are my mother, madam; 'Would you

were

(So that my lord, your son, were not my brother,)
Indeed, my mother!-or were you both our mothers,
I care no more for,' than I do for heaven,
So I were not his sister: Can't no other,
But, I your daughter, he must be my brother?

I love your son :

My friends were poor, but honest; so's my love:
Be not offended; for it hurts not him,
That he is lov'd of me: I follow him not
By any token of presumptuous suit;
Nor would I have him, till I do deserve him;
Yet never know how that desert should be.
I know I love in vain, strive against hope;
Yet, in this captious and intenable sieve,
I still pour in the waters of my love,
And lack not to lose still: thus, Indian-like,
Religious in mine error, I adore

The sun, that looks upon his worshipper,
But knows of him no more. My dearest madam,
Let not your hate encounter with my love,
For loving where you do: but, if yourself,
Whose aged honour cites a virtuous youth,
Did ever, in so true a flame of liking,

Wish chastely, and love dearly, that your Dian
Was both herself and love; O then, give pity
To her, whose state is such, that cannot choose
But lend and give, where she is sure to lose;
That seeks not to find that her search implies,
But, riddle-like, lives sweetly where she dies.
Count. Had you not lately an intent, speak truly,
To go to Paris?

Madam, I had.

Hel.
Count.
Wherefore? tell true.
Hel. I will tell truth; by grace itself, I swear.
You know, my father left me some prescriptions
Of rare and prov'd effects, such as his reading,
And manifest experience, had collected
For general sovereignty; and that he will'd me
In heedfullest reservation to bestow them,

Count. Yes, Helen, you might be my daughter-As notes, whose faculties inclusive were,

in-law;

God shield, you mean it not! daughter, and mother,
So strive upon your pulse: What, pale again?
My fear hath catch'd your fondness: Now I see
The mystery of your loneliness, and find
Your salt tears' head. Now to all sense 'tis gross,
You love my son; invention is asham'd,
Against the proclamation of thy passion,
To say, thou dost not: therefore tell me true;
But tell me then, 'tis so:-for, look, thy cheeks
Confess it, one to the other; and thine eyes
See it so grossly shown in thy behaviours,
That in their kind they speak it: only sin
And hellish obstinacy tie thy tongue,

That truth should be suspected: Speak, is't so?
If it be so, you have wound a goodly clue;
If it be not, forswear't: howe'er, I charge thee,
As heaven shall work in me for thine avail,
To tell me truly.

Hel.

Good madam, pardon me!

Count. Do you love my son?
Hel.

Your pardon, noble mistress!
Count. Love you my son ?

Hel.

Do not you love him, madam?

More than they were in note: amongst the rest,
There is a remedy, approv'd, set down,
To cure the desperate languishes, whereof
The king is render'd lost.
Count.

For Paris, was it? speak.

This was your motive

Hel. My lord your son made me to think of this;
Else Paris, and the medicine, and the king,
Had, from the conversation of my thoughts,
Haply, been absent then.

Count.

But think you, Helen,

if you should tender your supposed aid,
He would receive it? He and his physicians
Are of a mind; he, that they cannot help him,
They, that they cannot help: How shall they credit
A poor unlearned virgin, when the schools,
Embowell'd of their doctrine, have left off
The danger to itself?

Hel.
There's something hints,
More than my father's skill, which was the greatest
Of his profession, that his good receipt
Shall, for my legacy, be sanctified

By the luckiest stars in heaven: and, would your
honour

Count. Go not about; my love hath in't a But give me leave to try success, I'd venture bond, The well-lost life of mine on his grace's cure, Whereof the world takes note: come, come, dis-By such a day, and hour.

close

The state of your affection; for your passions
Have to the full appeach'd."

Hel.
Then, I confess,
Here on my knee, before high heaven and you,
That before you, and next unto high heaven,

(1) i. e. I care as much for: I wish it equally.
(2) Contend.

(3) The source, the cause of your grief. (4) According to their nature.

(6) i. e. Whose respectable conduct in age proves

King. Farewell, young lord, these warlike principles,

Do not throw from you:-and you, my lord, fare-
well:-

Share the advice betwixt you; if both gain all,
The gift doth stretch itself as 'tis receiv❜d,
And is enough for both.

1 Lord.

It is our hope, sir,
After well-enter'd soldiers, to return
And find your grace in health.

King. No, no, it cannot be; and yet my heart
Will not confess he owes the malady

That doth my life besiege. Farewell, young lords;
Whether I live or die, be you the sons
Of worthy Frenchmen: let higher Italy
(Those 'bated, that inherit but the fall
Of the last monarchy,') see, that you come
Not to woo honour, but to wed it; when
The bravest questant2 shrinks, find what you seek,
That fame may cry you loud: I say, farewell.

2 Lord. Health, at your bidding, serve your
majesty !

King. Those girls of Italy, take heed of them;
They say, our French lack language to deny,
If they demand: beware of being captives,
Before you serve.❜
Both. Our hearts receive your warnings.
King. Farewell.-Come hither to me.
[The King retires to a couch.
1 Lord. O my sweet lord, that you will stay
behind us.

Par. 'Tis not his fault; the spark-
2 Lord.
O, 'tis brave wars!
Par. Most admirable: I have seen those wars.
Ber. I am commanded here, and kept a coil with;
Too young, and the next year, and 'tis too early.
Par. An thy mind stand to it, boy, steal away
bravely.

Ber. I shall stay here the forehorse to a smock,
Creaking my shoes on the plain masonry,
Till honour be bought up, and no sword worn,
But one to dance with! By heaven, I'll steal away.
1 Lord. There's honour in the theft.
Par.
Commit it, count.
2 Lord. I am your accessary; and so farewell.
Ber. I grow to you, and our parting is a tortured
body.

1 Lord. Farewell, captain.

2 Lord. Sweet monsieur Parolles!

Par. Noble heroes, my sword and yours are kin. Good sparks and lustrous, a word, good metals:You shall find in the regiment of the Spinii, one] captain Spurio, with his cicatrice, an emblem of war, here on his sinister cheek; it was this very

(1) i. e. Those excepted who possess modern Italy, the remains of the Roman empire. (2) Seeker, inquirer.

(3) Be not captives before you are soldiers. (4) With a noise, bustle.

(5) In Shakspeare's time it was usual for gentlemen to dance with swords on.

sword entrenched it: say to him, I live; and observe his reports for me.

2 Lord. We shall, noble captain.

Par. Mars dote on you for his novices! [Exeunt Lords.] What will you do?

Ber. Stay; the king-

[Seeing him rise.

Par. Use a more spacious ceremony to the noble of too cold an adicu: be more expressive to them; lords; you have restrained yourself within the list for they wear themselves in the cap of time, there, do muster true gait, eat, speak, and move under the influence of the most received star; and though the devil lead the measure, such are to be followed: after them, and take a more dilated farewell. Ber. And I will do so.

Par. Worthy fellows; and like to prove most sinewy sword-men. [Exe. Bertram and Parolles. Enter Lafeu.

Laf. Pardon, my lord, [Kneeling.] for me and
for my tidings.
King. I'll fee thee to stand up.
Laf.
'Then here's a man
Stands, that has brought his pardon. I would, you
Had kneel'd, my lord, to ask me mercy; and
That, at my bidding, you could so stand up.

King. I would I had; so I had broke thy pate,
And ask'd thee mercy for't.

Laf.
Good faith, across.
But, my good lord, 'tis thus; Will you be cur'd
Of your infirmity?"
King.
Laf

No.

O, will you eat
No grapes, my royal fox? yes, but you will,
My noble grapes, an if my royal fox
Could reach them: I have seen a medicine, 10
That's able to breathe life into a stone;
Quicken a rock, and make you dance canary,"
With sprightly fire and motion; whose simple touch
Is powerful to araise king Pepin, nay,
To give great Charlemain a pen in his hand,
And write to her a love-line."
King.
What her is this?
Laf. Why, doctor she: My lord, there's one
arriv'd,

If you will see her,-now, by my faith and honour,
If seriously I may convey my thoughts
In this my light deliverance, I have spoke
With one, that, in her sex, her years, profession,12
Wisdom, and constancy, hath amaz'd me more
Than I dare blame my weakness: Will you see her,
(For that is her demand,) and know her business?
That done, laugh well at me.

King.
Now, good Lafeu,
Bring in the admiration; that we with thee
May spend our wonder too, or take off thine,
By wond'ring how thou took'st it.
Laf.
Nay, I'll fit you,
And not be all day neither.
[Erit Lafeu.
King. Thus he his special nothing ever prologues
Re-enter Lafeu, with Helena.

Laf. Nay, come your ways.
King.

This haste hath wings indeed
Laf. Nay, come your ways;
This is his majesty, say your mind to him:

(6) They are the foremost in the fashion.
(7) Have the true military step. (8) The dance.
(9) Unskilfully; a phrase taken from the exer-
cise at a quintaine.

(10) A female physician. (11) A kind of dance. (12) By profession is meant her declaration of the object of her coming.