SCENE II. The Same. An Apartment in the DUKE'S Palace.

Enter DUKE and THURIO; PROTEUS behind. Duke. Sir Thurio, fear not but that she will love you,

Now Valentine is banish'd from her sight.

Thu. Since his exile she hath despis'd me most; Forsworn my company, and rail'd at me, That I am desperate of obtaining her.

Duke. This weak impress of love is as a figure Trenched in ice, which with an hour's heat Dissolves to water, and doth lose his form. A little time will melt her frozen thoughts, And worthless Valentine shall be forgot.-How now, sir Proteus! Is your countryman, According to our proclamation, gone?

Pro. Gone, my good lord.

Duke. My daughter takes his going grievously. Pro. A little time, my lord, will kill that grief. Duke. So I believe; but Thurio thinks not so. Proteus, the good conceit I hold of thee, (For thou hast shown some sign of good desert,) Makes me the better to confer with thee.

Pro. Longer than I prove loyal to your grace, Let me not live to look upon your grace..

Duke. Thou know'st how willingly I would effect The match between sir Thurio and my daughter. Pro. I do, my lord.

Duke. And also, I think, thou art not ignorant How she opposes her against my will.

Pro. She did, my lord, when Valentine was here. Duke. Ay, and perversely she persevers so. What might we do to make the girl forget The love of Valentine, and love sir Thurio?

Pro. The best way is, to slander Valentine With falsehood, cowardice, and poor descent; Three things that women highly hold in hate.

Duke. Ay, but she'll think that it is spoke in hate. Pro. Ay, if his enemy deliver it:

Therefore, it must, with circumstance, be spoken By one whom she esteemeth as his friend.

Duke. Then you must undertake to slander him. Pro. And that, my lord, I shall be loth to do: 'Tis an ill office for a gentleman,

Especially, against his very friend.

Duke. Where your good word cannot advantage him,

Your slander never can endamage him:
Therefore, the office is indifferent,

Being entreated to it by your friend.

Pro. You have prevail'd, my lord. If I can do it, By aught that I can speak in his dispraise,

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She shall not long continue love to him.
But say, this weed her love from Valentine,
It follows not that she will love sir Thurio.
Thu. Therefore, as you unwind her love from him,
Lest it should ravel and be good to none,
You must provide to bottom it on me;
Which must be done, by praising me as much
As you in worth dispraise sir Valentine.

Duke. And, Proteus, we dare trust you in this kind,

Because we know, on Valentine's report,
You are already love's firm votary,

And cannot soon revolt, and change your mind.
Upon this warrant shall you have access
Where you with Silvia may confer at large;
For she is lumpish, heavy, melancholy,
And for your friend's sake will be glad of you,
Where you may temper her, by your persuasion,
To hate young Valentine, and love my friend.
Pro. As much as I can do I will effect.
But you, sir Thurio, are not sharp enough;
You must lay lime to tangle her desires
By wailful sonnets, whose composed rhymes
Should be full fraught with serviceable vows.

Duke. Ay, much is the force of heaven-bred poesy.
Pro. Say, that upon the altar of her beauty
You sacrifice your tears, your sighs, your heart.
Write, till your ink be dry, and with your tears
Moist it again; and frame some feeling line,
That may discover such integrity:

For Orpheus' lute was strung with poets' sinews,
Whose golden touch could soften steel and stones,
Make tigers tame, and huge leviathans
Forsake unsounded deeps to dance on sands.
After your dire-lamenting elegies,

Visit by night your lady's chamber window
With some sweet consort: to their instruments
Tune a deploring dump; the night's dead silence
Will well become such sweet complaining grievance.
This, or else nothing will inherit her.

Duke. This discipline shows thou hast been in love.

Thu. And thy advice this night I'll put in practice. Therefore, sweet Proteus, my direction-giver, Let us into the city presently,

To sort some gentlemen well skill'd in music.

I have a sonnet that will serve the turn

To give the onset to thy good advice.
Duke. About it, gentlemen.

Pro. We'll wait upon your grace till after supper,
And afterward determine our proceedings.
Duke. Even now about it: I will pardon you.

[Exeunt.

Val. From Milan.

3 Out. Have you long sojourn'd there?

have stay'd,

If crooked fortune had not thwarted me.

2 Out. What! were you banish'd thence? Val. I was.

2 Out. For what offence?

But yet I slew him manfully, in fight,
Without false vantage, or base treachery.

1 Out. Why, ne'er repent it, if it were done so. But were you banish'd for so small a fault? Val. I was, and held me glad of such a doom.

1 Out. Have you the tongues? Val. My youthful travel therein made me happy, Or else I had been often miserable.

3 Out. By the bare scalp of Robin Hood's fat friar, This fellow were a king for our wild faction. 1 Out. We'll have him. Sirs, a word. Speed. Master, be one of them:

It is an honourable kind of thievery.
Val. Peace, villain!

2 Out. Tell us this: have you any thing to take to?

Val. Nothing, but my fortune.

3 Out. Know then, that some of us are gentlemen, Such as the fury of ungovern'd youth Thrust from the company of awful men: Myself was from Verona banished, For practising to steal away a lady,

An heir, and near allied unto the duke.

2 Out. And I from Mantua, for a gentleman, Who, in my mood, I stabb'd unto the heart.

1 Out. And I, for such like petty crimes as these.
But to the purpose; for we cite our faults,
That they may hold excus'd our lawless lives;
And, partly, seeing you are beautify'd

With goodly shape; and by your own report
A linguist, and a man of such perfection,

As we do in our quality much want

2 Out. Indeed, because you are a banish'd man, Therefore, above the rest, we parley to you. Are you content to be our general?

To make a virtue of necessity,

And live, as we do, in this wilderness?

3 Out. What say'st thou wilt thou be of our consort?

Say, ay, and be the captain of us all.
We'll do thee homage, and be rul'd by thee,
Love thee as our commander, and our king.

1 Out. But if thou scorn our courtesy, thou diest.

2 Out. Thou shalt not live to brag what we have offer'd.

Val. I take your offer, and will live with you; Provided that you do no outrages

On silly women, or poor passengers.

3 Out. No; we detest such vile, base practices. Come, go with us: we'll bring thee to our crews, And show thee all the treasure we have got, Which, with ourselves, all rest at thy dispose.

SCENE II.-Milan.

[Exeunt.

The Court of the Palace.
Enter PROTEUS.

Pro. Already have I been false to Valentine,
And now I must be as unjust to Thurio.
Under the colour of commending him,
I have access my own love to prefer;
But Silvia is too fair, too true, too holy,
To be corrupted with my worthless gifts.
When I protest true loyalty to her,

She twits me with my falsehood to my friend;
When to her beauty I commend my vows,
She bids me think how I have been forsworn,
In breaking faith with Julia whom I lov'd:
And, notwithstanding all her sudden quips,
The least whereof would quell a lover's hope,
Yet, spaniel-like, the more she spurns my love,
The more it grows, and fawneth on her still.
But here comes Thurio. Now must we to her

window,

And give some evening music to her ear.

Who is Silvia? what is she,

That all our swains commend her?
Holy, fair, and wise is she;

The heaven such grace did lend her,
That she might admired be.

Is she kind, as she is fair,

For beauty lives with kindness?
Love doth to her eyes repair,

To help him of his blindness;
And, being help'd, inhabits there.
Then to Silvia let us sing,

That Silvia is excelling;
She excels each mortal thing,

Upon the dull earth dwelling:
To her let us garlands bring.

Host. How now! are you sadder than you were before? How do you, man? the music likes you

not.

Jul. You mistake: the musician likes me not. Host. Why, my pretty youth?

Jul. He plays false, father.

Host. How? out of tune on the strings?

Jul. Not so; but yet so false, that he grieves my very heart-strings.

Host. You have a quick ear.

Jul. Ay; I would I were deaf! it makes me have

a slow heart.

Host. I perceive, you delight not in music.

Jul. Not a whit, when it jars so.

Host. Hark! what fine change is in the music. Jul. Ay, that change is the spite.

Host. You would have them always play but one thing?

Jul. I would always have one play but one thing. But, Host, doth this sir Proteus, that we talk on, Often resort unto this gentlewoman? told me,

Host. I tell you what Launce, his man, he lov'd her out of all nick.

Jul. Where is Launce?

Host. Gone to seek his dog; which, to-morrow, by his master's command, he must carry for a present to his lady.

Jul. Peace! stand aside: the company parts.
Pro. Sir Thurio, fear not you: I will so plead,
That you shall say my cunning drift excels.
Thu. Where meet we?

Pro. At saint Gregory's well.
Thu. Farewell.

[Exeunt THURIO and Musicians.

Enter SILVIA above, at her window.

Pro. Madam, good even to your ladyship. Sil. I thank you for your music, gentlemen. Who is that, that spake ?

Pro. One, lady, if you knew his pure heart's truth, You would quickly learn to know him by his voice. Sil. Sir Proteus, as I take it.

Pro. Sir Proteus, gentle lady, and your servant.
Sil. What is your will?
Pro.

That I may compass yours.

Sil. You have your wish my will is even this,
That presently you hie you home to bed.
Thou subtle, perjur'd, false, disloyal man!
Think'st thou, I am so shallow, so conceitless,
To be seduced by thy flattery,

That hast deceiv'd so many with thy vows?
Return, return, and make thy love amends.
For me, by this pale queen of night I swear,
I am so far from granting thy request,
That I despise thee for thy wrongful suit,
And by and by intend to chide myself,
Even for this time I spend in talking to thee.
Pro. I grant, sweet love, that I did love a lady;
But she is dead.

Jul. [Aside.] "Twere false, if I should speak it; For, I am sure, she is not buried.

Sil. Say, that she be; yet Valentine, thy friend, Survives, to whom thyself art witness I am betroth'd; and art thou not asham'd To wrong him with thy importunacy?

Pro. I likewise hear, that Valentine is dead. Sil. And so, suppose, am I; for in his grave, Assure thyself, my love is buried.

Pro. Sweet lady, let me rake it from the earth. Sil. Go to thy lady's grave, and call her's thence; Or, at the least, in her's sepulchre thine.

Jul. [Aside.] He heard not that.

Pro. Madam, if your heart be so obdurate, Vouchsafe me yet your picture for my love, The picture that is hanging in your chamber: To that I'll speak, to that I'll sigh and weep; For, since the substance of your perfect self Is else devoted, I am but a shadow, And to your shadow will I make true love. Jul. [Aside.] If 'twere a substance, you would, sure, deceive it,

And make it but a shadow, as I am.

Sil. I am very loth to be your idol, sir;

But, since your falsehood shall become you well
To worship shadows, and adore false shapes,
Send to me in the morning, and I'll send it.
And so, good rest.

Pro.
As wretches have o'er night,
That wait for execution in the morn.

[Exeunt PROTEUS, and SILVIA.

Egl. As many, worthy lady, to yourself.
According to your ladyship's impose,

I am thus early come, to know what service
It is your pleasure to command me in.

Sil. O Églamour, thou art a gentleman,
Think not I flatter, for I swear I do not,
Valiant, wise, remorseful, well accomplish'd.
Thou art not ignorant what dear good will
I bear unto the banish'd Valentine;
Nor how my father would enforce me marry
Vain Thurio, whom my very soul abhorr'd.
Thyself hast lov'd; and I have heard thee say,
No grief did ever come so near thy heart,
As when thy lady and thy true love died,
Upon whose grave thou vow'dst pure chastity.
Sir Eglamour, I would to Valentine,
To Mantua, where, I hear, he makes abode;
And, for the ways are dangerous to pass,
I do desire thy worthy company,
Upon whose faith and honour Í repose.
Urge not my father's anger, Eglamour,
But think upon my grief, a lady's grief;
And on the justice of my flying hence,
To keep me from a most unholy match,
Which heaven and fortune still reward with plagues.
I do desire thee, even from a heart
As full of sorrows as the sea of sands,
To bear me company, and go with me:
If not, to hide what I have said to thee,
That I may venture to depart alone.

Egl. Madam, I pity much your grievances;
Which since I know they virtuously are plac'd,
I give consent to go along with you;
Recking as little what betideth me,

As much I wish all good befortune you.
When will you go?

At friar Patrick's cell,

Sil. This evening coming. Egl. Where shall I meet you? Sil. Where I intend holy confession. Egl. I will not fail your ladyship. Good morrow, Gentle lady. Sil.

Good morrow, kind sir Eglamour.

[Exeunt.

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