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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,
On serious business, craving quick despatch,
Importunes personal conference with his grace.
Haste, signify so much; while we attend,
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? a
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, solemnized
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 humours 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.

Ros. Another of these students at that time
Was there with him: ift I have heard a truth,
Biron they call him, but a merrier man,
Within the limit of becoming mirth,
I never spent an hour's talk withal:
His eye begets occasion for his wit;
For every object that the one doth catch,
The other turns to a mirth-moving jest;
Which his fair tongue (conceit's expositor)

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PRIN. Why, will shall break it; will, and nothing else.

KING. Your ladyship is ignorant what it is.

PRIN. Were my lord so, his ignorance were wise,
Where now his knowledge must prove ignorance.
I hear, your grace hath sworn-out house-keeping:
"T is deadly sin to keep that oath, my lord,
And sin to break it:

But pardon me, I am too sudden-bold;
To teach a teacher ill beseemeth me.
Vouchsafe to read the purpose of my coming,
And suddenly resolve me in suit.

my

[Gives a paper. KING. Madam, I will, if suddenly I may. PRIN. You will the sooner, that I were away;

b Well fitted in the arts.-] The older copies omit the article, which was supplied in the second folio.

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BIRON. Now fair befall your mask!
Ros. Fair fall the face it covers!
BIRON. And send you many lovers!
Ros. Amen, so you be none.

BIRON. Nay, then will I be gone.

KING. Madam, your father here doth intimate The payment of a hundred thousand crowns; Being but the one-half of an entire sum, Disbursed by my father in his wars.

But say, that he, or we, (as neither have,)
Receiv'd that sum; yet there remains unpaid
A hundred thousand more; in surety of the which,
One part of Aquitain is bound to us,
Although not valued to the money's worth.
If then the king your father will restore
But that one-half which is unsatisfied,

We will give up our right in Aquitain,
And hold fair friendship with his majesty.
But that, it seems, he little purposeth,
For here he doth demand to have repaid

An hundred thousand crowns; and not demands,
On payment of a hundred thousand crowns,
To have his title live in Aquitain;
Which we much rather had depart withal,
And have the money by our father lent,
Than Aquitain so gelded as it is.

a

Dear princess, were not his requests so far
From reason's yielding, your fair self should make
A yielding, 'gainst some reason, in my breast,
And go well satisfied to France again.

PRIN. You do the king my father too much wrong,

And wrong the reputation of your name,
In so unseeming to confess receipt
Of that which hath so faithfully been paid.
KING. I do protest, I never heard of it;
And, if you prove it, I'll repay it back,
Or yield up Aquitain.

PRIN.
We arrest your
Boyet, you can produce acquittances,
For such a sum, from special officers
Of Charles his father.

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word:

BOYET. So please your grace, the packet is not

come,

Where that and other specialties are bound;
To-morrow you shall have a sight of them.

KING. It shall suffice me: at which interview,
All liberal reason I will* yield unto.
Meantime, receive such welcome at my hand
As honour, without breach of honour, may
Make tender of to thy true worthiness:

You may not come, fair princess, in my gates;
But here without you shall be so receiv'd,
As you shall deem yourself lodg'd in my heart,
Though so denied fair+ harbour in my house.
Your own good thoughts excuse me, and farewell:
To-morrow we shall visit you again.

PRIN. Sweet health and fair desires consort your grace!

KING. Thy own wish wish I thee in every place! [Exeunt KING and his train. BIRON. Lady, I will commend you to my own heart.b

Ros. 'Pray you, do my commendations; I would be glad to see it.

BIRON. I Would heard it groan.

you

Ros. Is the fool sick?

BIRON. Sick at the heart.

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you saw her LONG. Perchance, light in the light: I desire

her name.

BOYET. She hath but one for herself; to desire that were a shame.

LONG. Pray you, sir, whose daughter?
BOYET. Her mother's, I have heard.
LONG. God's blessing on your beard!
BOYET. Good sir, be not offended:
She is an heir of Falconbridge.

LONG. Nay, my choler is ended.
She is a most sweet lady.

BOYET. Not unlike, sir; that may be.

[Exit LONG. BIRON. What's her name, in the cap? BOYET. Katharine, by good hap. BIRON. Is she wedded, or no? BOYET. To her will, sir, or so. BIRON. You are welcome, sir; adieu! BOYET. Farewell to me, sir, and welcome to you. [Exit BIRON.-Ladies unmask. MAR. That last is Biron, the merry madcap 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 as 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.

MAR.

[Offering to kiss her. Not so, gentle beast;

(*) First folio, if.

e No poynt,-] The same diminutive pun on the French negation, Non point, is repeated in Act V. Sc. 2:

"Dumain was at my service, and his sword;
No point, quoth I."

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BOYET. But to speak that in words, which his eye hath disclos'd:

I only have made a mouth of his eye,

BOYET. With that which we lovers entitle, By adding a tongue which I know will not lie.

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Ros. Thou art an old love-monger, and speak'st

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(1) Old editions, coate. as places devoted to pasture,-the one for general, the other for particular use,-the meaning is easy enough. Boyet asks permission to graze on her lips. "Not so," she answers; "my lips, though intended for the purpose, are not for general use."

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[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? (2)

ARM. How meanest 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 t feet, humour it with turning up your eyelids; sigh a note, and sing a note; sometime through

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b

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 humours; these betray nice wenches, that would be betrayed without these ; and make them men of note, (do you note, men?) that most are affected to these.

ARM. How hast thou purchased this experience?
Mотн. By my penny of observation.(3)
ARM. But 0,-but O-

MOTH. the hobby-horse is forgot.(4)

have thin belly-doublet; but surely thin-belly, "like a rabbit on a spit," is more humorous.

By my penny of observation.] The early copies read penne, which, with peny, penni, pennie, was an old form of spelling the word. "My penny,' " "his penny," "her penny," was a popular phrase formerly. See Note (3), Illustrative Comments on Act III.

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