ORL. I swear to thee, youth, by the white hand of Rosalind, I am that he, that unfortunate he. Ros. But are you so much in love as your rhymes speak?

ORL. Neither rhyme nor reason can express how much.

Ros. Love is merely a madness; and, I tell you, deserves as well a dark house and a whip, as madmen do and the reason why they are not so punished and cured, is, that the lunacy is so ordinary, that the whippers are in love too: Yet I profess curing it by counsel.

ORL. Did you ever cure any so?

He was to

Ros. Yes, one; and in this manner. imagine me his love, his mistress; and I set him every day to woo me: At which time would I, being but a moonish youth, grieve, be effeminate, changeable, longing, and liking; proud, fantastical, apish, shallow, inconstant, full of tears, full of smiles; for every passion something, and for no passion truly any thing, as boys and women are for the most part cattle of this colour: would now like him, now loath him; then entertain him, then forswear him; now weep for him, then spit at him; that I drave my suitor from his mad humour of love, to a living humour of madness; b which was, to forswear the full stream of the world, and to live in a nook merely monastick: And thus I cured him; and this way will I take

moonish] Shifting and changing.

'from his mad humour of love, to a living humour of madness] "From those love-flights and extravagancies, which, to the imagination, present the image of madness, to others of a character so positive, as actually to constitute the character of madness itself:" thus conveying a sense in correspondence, as Mr. Whiter says, with "the phrases done or expressed to the life." Ib. p. 51. So it is also understood by Mr. Malone: but loving has been proposed, viz. a humour of loving to leave the world and live in a nook; which Rosalind calls madness; and that this should be substituted to preserve the antithesis.

❤ clear, 1632.

upon me to wash your liver as clean as a sound sheep's heart, that there shall not be one spot of love in't.

ORL. I would not be cured, youth.

Ros. I would cure you, if you would but call me Rosalind, and come every day to my cote, and woo

me.

ORL. Now, by the faith of my love, I will; tell me where it is.

Ros. Go with me to it, and I'll show it you: and, by the way, you shall tell me where in the forest you live: Will you go?

ORL. With all my heart, good youth.

Ros. Nay, you must call me Rosalind :-Come, sister, will you go?

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.

Enter TOUCHSTONE and AUDREY; (33) JAQUES at a distance, observing them.

TOUCH. Come apace, good Audrey; I will fetch up your goats, Audrey: And how, Audrey? am I the man yet? Doth my simple feature content you ?a

AUD. Your features! Lord warrant us! what features?

TOUCH. I am here with thee and thy goats, as

• Doth my simple feature content you] Mr. Steevens observes, that Audrey's answer shews, that she must have put the sense of feats upon features; the word she uses in answer.

the most capricious poet, honest Ovid, was among the Goths.

JAQ. O knowledge ill-inhabited !(34) worse than Jove in a thatch'd house! (35) [Aside.

TOUCH. When a man's verses cannot be understood, nor a man's good wit seconded with the forward child, understanding, it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning in a little room :Truly, I would the gods had made thee poetical.

AUD. I do not know what poetical is: Is it honest in deed, and word? Is it a true thing?

TOUCH. No, truly; for the truest poetry is the most feigning; and lovers are given to poetry; and what they swear in poetry, may be said, as lovers, they do feign.

AUD. Do you wish then, that the gods had made me poetical?

TOUCH. I do, truly: for thou swear'st to me, thou art honest; now, if thou wert a poet, I might have some hope thou didst feign.

AUD. Would you not have me honest?

TOUCH. No truly, unless thou wert hard-favour'd: for honesty coupled to beauty, is to have honey a sauce to sugar.

capricious poet, honest Ovid, was among the Goths] Caper, capri. caperitious, capricious, fantastical, capering, goatish: and by a similar sort of process are we to smooth Goths into goats. The Goths, Mr. Upton says, are the Getæ. Ov. Trist. V.7.

nor a man's good wit seconded with the forward child, understanding, it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning, &c.] "Not to have the good things we say, conceived or apprehended, is more disheartening and mortifying, than an exorbitant charge, and ill fare and accommodation.'

"

what they swear in poetry, &c.] As that is not a true thing which is feigned; if the truest poetry is the most feigning, "what is sworn in it by lovers, or others, must be false and feigned."

JAQ. A material fool!"

[Aside.

AUD. Well, I am not fair; and therefore I pray the gods make me honest!

TOUCH. Truly, and to cast away honesty upon a foul slut, were to put good meat into an unclean dish.

AUD. I am not a slut, though I thank the gods I am foul.(36)

TOUCH. Well, praised be the gods for thy foulness! sluttishness may come hereafter. But be it as it may be, I will marry thee: and to that end, I have been with Sir Oliver Mar-text, the vicar of the next village; who hath promised to meet me in this place of the forest, and to couple us.

JAQ. I would fain see this meeting.

AUD. Well, the gods give us joy!

[Aside.

TOUCH. Amen. A man may, if he were of a fearful heart, stagger in this attempt; for here we have no temple but the wood, no assembly but horn-beasts. But what though? Courage! As horns are odious, they are necessary. It is said, Many a man knows no end of his goods: right; many a man has good horns, and knows no end of them. Well, that is the dowry of his wife; 'tis none of his own getting. Horns? Even so: Poor men alone? No, no; the noblest deer hath them as huge as the rascal.(7) Is the single man therefore blessed? No: as a wall'd town is more worthier than a village, so is the forehead of a married man more honourable than the bare brow of a bachelor: and by how much defence is better than no skill, by so much is a horn more precious than to

want.

A material fool] A fool, says Johnson, with matter in him, stocked with notions.

b

and by how much defence is better, &c.] Any means of defence is better than the lack of science; in proportion as something is to nothing.

Enter Sir OLIVER MAR-TEXT.

Here comes sir Oliver :-Sir Oliver Martext, you are well met: Will you despatch us here under this tree, or shall we go with you to your chapel?

SIR OLI. Is there none here to give the woman? TOUCH. I will not take her on gift of any man. SIR OLI. Truly, she must be given, or the marriage is not lawful.

JAQ. [Discovering himself.] Proceed, proceed; I'll give her.

TOUCH. Good even, good master What ye call't: How do you, sir? You are very well met: God'ild you (38) for your last company: I am very glad to see you:-Even a toy in hand here, sir: -Nay; pray, be cover'd.

JAQ. Will you be married, motley?

TOUCH. As the ox hath his bow," sir, the horse his curb, and the faulcon her bells, so man hath his desires; and as pigeons bill, so wedlock would be nibbling.

с

JAQ. And will you, being a man of your breeding, be married under a bush, like a beggar? Get you to church, and have a good priest that can tell you what marriage is: this fellow will but join you together as they join wainscot; then one of you will prove a shrunk pannel, and, like green timber, warp, warp.

Sir Oliver] See the opening of M. W. of W. Sir Hugh. bow] Yoke. See M. W. of W. V. 5. " fair yokes," Mrs. Page.

ebe married under a bush-Get-a good priest] Biron, in L. L. L. speaks of a hedge priest, V. 2.