ACT II.

SCENE I. The Forest of Arden.

Enter Duke senior, AMIENS, and other Lords, in the dress of Foresters.

Duke S. Now, my co-mates, and brothers in exíle,
Hath not old custom made this life more sweet
Than that of painted pomp? Are not these woods
More free from peril than the envious court?
Here feel we but1 the penalty of Adam,
The seasons' difference; as, the icy fang,
And churlish chiding of the winter's wind,
Which when it bites and blows upon my body,
Even till I shrink with cold, I smile, and say,-
This is no flattery; these are counsellors
That feelingly persuade me what I am.
Sweet are the uses of adversity;

Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head 2;
And this our life, exempt from publick haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.

1 The old copy reads 'not the penalty,' Theobald proposed to read but, and has been followed by subsequent editors. Surely the old reading is right,' says Mr. Boswell; 'here we feel not, do not suffer, from the penalty of Adam; for when the winter's wind blows upon my body, I smile and say'

2 It was currently believed in the time of Shakspeare that the toad had a stone contained in its head which was endued with singular virtues. This was called the toad-stone. Fenton in his Secrete Wonders of Nature, 1569, says :-'There is founde in the heades of olde and great toades, a stone, which they call borax or stelon: it is most commonly found in the head of an hee toad, of power to repulse poysons, and that it is a most sovereigne medicine for the stone.' Lupton, in his One Thousand Notable Things, and other writers mention it.

Ami. I would not change it: Happy is your grace, That can translate the stubbornness of fortune Into so quiet and so sweet a style.

Duke S. Come, shall we go and kill us venison? And yet it irks3 me, the poor dappled fools,Being native burghers of this desert city,— Should in their own confínes, with forked heads 4 Have their round haunches gor'd.

you.

1 Lord. Indeed, my lord, The melancholy Jaques grieves at that; And, in that kind, swears you do more usurp Than doth your brother that hath banish'd To-day, my lord of Amiens, and myself, Did steal behind him, as he lay along Under an oak, whose antique root peeps out Upon the brook that brawls along this wood5: To the which place a poor sequester'd stag, That from the hunter's aim had ta'en a hurt, Did come to languish; and, indeed, my lord, The wretched animal heav'd forth such groans, That their discharge did stretch his leathern coat Almost to bursting; and the big round tears Cours'd one another down his innocent nose 6

3 It irks me, i. e. it gives me pain. Mi rincresce, mi fà male.-Torriano's Dict.

4 Barbed arrows.

5 Gray, in his Elegy, has availed himself of this passage:-
'There at the foot of yonder nodding beech
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.'

6 Saucius at quadrupes nota intra tecta refugit
Successitque gemens stabulis; questuque cruentus
Atque imploranti similis, tectum omne replevit.'

Virg.

In a note on a similar passage in the Polyolbion it is said:The harte weepeth at his dying: his tears are held to be precious in medicine.'

In piteous chase; and thus the hairy fool,
Much marked of the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift brook,
Augmenting it with tears.

Duke S.

But what said Jaques?

Did he not moralize this spectacle?

1 Lord. O, yes, into a thousand similes.
First, for his weeping in the needless? stream;
Poor deer, quoth he, thou makʼst a testament
As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more
To that which had too much: Then, being alone,
Left and abandon'd of his velvet friends;
'Tis right, quoth he; this misery doth part
The flux of company: Anon, a careless herd,
Full of the pasture, jumps along by him,
And never stays to greet him; Ay, quoth Jaques,
Sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens ;
'Tis just the fashion: Wherefore do you look
Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there?
Thus most invectively he pierceth through
The body of country, city, court,

Yea, and of this our life; swearing, that we
Are mere usurpers, tyrants, and what's worse,
To fright the animals, and to kill them up,
In their assign'd and native dwelling-place.

Duke S. And did you leave him in this contemplation?

7 i. e. the stream that needed not such a supply of moisture. 8 So in Shakspeare's Lover's Complaint:

in a river

Upon whose weeping margin she was set
Like usury applying wet to wet.'

Again in King Henry VI. Part III. Act v. Sc. 4:-
With tearful eyes add water to the sea,

And give more strength to that which hath too much.'

2 Lord. We did, my lord, weeping and commenting

Upon the sobbing deer.

Duke S.

Show me the place;

I love to cope9 him in these sullen fits,

For then he's full of matter.

2 Lord. I'll bring you to him straight. [Exeunt.

SCENE II. A Room in the Palace.

Enter DUKE FREDERICK, Lords, and Attendants. Duke F. Can it be possible that no man saw them? It cannot be some villains of my court

Are of consent and sufferance in this.

1 Lord. I cannot hear of any that did see her. The ladies, her attendants of her chamber, Saw her a-bed; and, in the morning early, They found the bed untreasur'd of their mistress. 2 Lord. My lord, the roynish1 clown, at whom so oft

Your grace was wont to laugh, is also missing.
Hesperia, the princess' gentlewoman,
Confesses, that she secretly o'er-heard
Your daughter and her cousin much commend
The parts and graces of the wrestler 2
That did but lately foil the sinewy Charles;
And she believes, wherever they are gone,

That youth is surely in their company.

Duke F. Send to his brother; fetch that gallant

hither;

If he be absent, bring his brother to me,

9 i. e. to encounter him. Thus in K. Henry VIII. Act i. Sc. 2: cope malicious censurers.'

1 The roynish clown,' mangy or scurvy, from roigneux, French. The word is used by Chaucer.

2 Wrestler is here to be sounded as a trisyllable.

3

I'll make him find him: do this suddenly;
And let not search and inquisition quail 3
To bring again these foolish run-aways.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III. Before Oliver's House.
Enter ORLANDO and ADAM, meeting.

Orl. Who's there?

Adam. What! my young master?--O, my gentle

master,

O, my sweet master, O you memory1

Of old Sir Rowland! why, what make you here?
Why are you virtuous? Why do people love you?
And wherefore are you gentle, strong, and valiant?
Why would
be so fond 2 to overcome
The bony priser 3 of the humorous duke?

you

Your praise is come too swiftly home before you.
Know you not, master, to some kind of men
Their graces serve them but as enemies?
No more do yours; your virtues, gentle master,
Are sanctified and holy traitors to you.

3To quail,' says Steevens, 'is to faint, to sink into dejection.' It may be so, but in neither of these senses is the word here used by Shakspeare. Cotgrave will lead us to the meaning of it in this place, to quaile, fade, faile,' are among the interpretations he gives of the word Alachir, and fail is the sense required by the context of the above passage. So in Tancred and Gis

munda:

For as the world wore on and waxed old, So virtue quail'd, and vice began to grow.' 1 Shakspeare uses memory for memorial.

Sc. 7:

So in Lear, Act iv.

'Those weeds are memories of those worser hours."' And in The Atheist's Tragedy, by C. Turner, 1611:

And with his body place that memory

Of noble Charlemont.'

2 i. e. rash, foolish.

3 I suspect that a priser was the term for a wrestler, a prise was a term in that sport for a grappling or hold taken.