ping, and spare not me? Indeed, your O Lord, sir, is very sequent to your whipping; you would answer very well to a whipping, if you were but bound to't. CLO. I ne'er had worse luck in my life, in my -O Lord, sir: I see things may serve long, but not serve ever. COUNT. I play the noble housewife with the time, to entertain it so merrily with a fool. CLO. O Lord, sir!-Why, there't serves well again. COUNT. An end, sir: to your business. Give And urge her to a present answer back : CLO. Not much commendation to them. COUNT. Not much employment for you: you understand me? CLO. Most fruitfully; I am there before my legs. COUNT. Haste you again. [Excunt severally. SCENE III.-Paris. A Room in the King's Palace. Enter BERTRAM, LAFEU, and PAROLLES. LAF. They say, miracles are past; and we have our philosophical persons, to make modern and familiar, things supernatural and causeless. Hence is it, that we make trifles of terrors, ensconcing ourselves into seeming knowledge, when we should submit ourselves to an unknown fear. PAR. Why, 't is the rarest argument of wonder, that hath shot out in our latter times. BER. And so 't is. LAF. To be relinquished of the artists,- LAF. That gave him out incurable,— PAR. Right: as 't were, a man assured of a— PAR. Just, you say well; so would I have said. LAF. I may truly say, it is a novelty to the world. PAR. It is, indeed: if you will have it in (*) First folio, And. Lustique,-] "An old play, that has a great deal of merit, call'd The weakest goeth to the Wall,' (printed in 1600, but how much earlier written, or by whom written, we are no where inform'd,) has in it a Dutchman, call'd-Jacob van Smelt, who speaks a jargon of Dutch and our language; and upon several occasions uses this very word, which in English is-lusty."-CAPELL. Let the white death sit on thy cheek for ever; HEL. Thanks, sir; all the rest is mute. LAF. I had rather be in this choice, than throw ames-ace for my life. [eyes, HEL. The honour, sir, that flames in your fair Before I speak, too threat'ningly replies: Love make your fortunes twenty times above Her that so wishes, and her humble love! 2 LORD. No better, if you please. HEL. My wish receive, Which great Love grant! and so I take my leave. LAF. Do all they deny her? An they were sons of mine, I'd have them whipped; or I would send them to the Turk, to make eunuchs of. HEL. Be not afraid [To a Lord.] that I I'll never do you wrong for your own sake: your LAF. These boys are boys of ice, they'll none have her: sure, they are bastards to the English; the French ne'er got them. [good, HEL. You are too young, too happy, and too To make yourself a son out of my blood. 4 LORD. Fair one, I think not so. LAF. There's one grape yet,-I am sure thy father drank wine. But if thou be'st not an ass, I am a youth of fourteen; I have known thee already. HEL. I dare not say, I take you; [To BERTRAM.] but I give Me and my service, ever whilst I live, Into your guiding power.-This is the man. KING. Why then, young Bertram, take her, she's thy wife. BER. My wife, my liege? I shall beseech your highness, In such a business give me leave to use The help of mine own eyes. KING. Know'st thou not, Bertram, What she has done for me? BER. Yes, my good lord; But never hope to know why I should marry her. KING. Thou know'st, she has rais'd me from my sickly bed. BER. But follows it, my lord, to bring me down, a There's one grape yet,-I am sure thy father drank wine.] We are to suppose that Lafeu, who has been in conversation with Parolles, had not heard the discourse between Helena and the young courtiers, but believed she had proposed to each, and been refused by all but the one now in question. The after-part of his Must answer for your raising? I know her well; KING. 'Tis only title thou disdain'st in her, the I can build up. Strange is it, that our bloods, All that is virtuous, (save what thou dislik'st, Is good, without a name; vileness is so : KING. My honour's at the stake; which to I must produce my power. Here, take her hand, a Into the staggers, and the careless lapse [hate, | KING. A balance more replete. BER. KING. Good fortune, and the favour of the Smile upon this contráct; whose ceremony Shall seem expedient on the now-born brief, And be perform'd to-night: the solemn feast Shall more attend upon the coming space, Expecting absent friends. As thou lov'st her, Thy love's to me religious; else, does err. I take her hand. [king, [Exeunt KING, BERTRAM, HELENA, Lords, and Attendants.d LAF. Do you hear, monsieur ? a word with you. PAR. Your pleasure, sir? LAF. Your lord and master did well to make his recantation. PAR. Recantation ?-My lord ?—my master ? LAF. Ay; is it not a language, I speak? PAR. A most harsh one; and not to be understood without bloody succeeding. My master? LAF. Are you companion to the count Rousillon? PAR. To any count; to all counts; to what is man. LAF. To what is count's man; count's master is of another style. PAR. You are too old, sir; let it satisfy you, you are too old. LAF. I must tell thee, sirrah, I write man; to which title age cannot bring thee. PAR. What I dare too well do, I dare not do. LAF. I did think thee, for two ordinaries, to be a pretty wise fellow; thou didst make tolerable vent of thy travel;. it might pass: yet the scarfs and the bannerets about thee, did manifoldly dis suade me from believing thee a vessel of too great a burthen. I have now found thee; when I lose thee again, I care not yet art thou good for nothing but taking up, and that thou art scarce worth. PAR. Hadst thou not the privilege of antiquity upon thee, e LAF. Do not plunge thyself too far in anger, lest thou hasten thy trial;-which if-Lord have mercy on thee for a hen! So, my good window of lattice, fare thee well; thy casement I need not open, for I look through thee. Give me thy hand. PAR. My lord, you give me most egregious indignity. LAF. Ay, with all my heart; and thou art worthy of it. PAR. I have not, my lord, deserved it. LAF. Yes, good faith, every dram of it: and I will not bate thee a scruple. PAR. Well, I shall be wiser. LAF. E'en as soon as thou canst, for thou hast to pull at a smack o' the contrary. If ever thou be'st bound in thy scarf, and beaten, thou shalt find what it is to be proud of thy bondage. I have a desire to hold my acquaintance with thee, or rather my knowledge; that I may say, in the default, he is a man I know. PAR. My lord, you do me most insupportable vexation. LAF. I would it were hell-pains for thy sake, and my poor doing eternal. for doing I am past; as I will by thee, in what motion age will give me leave. [Exit. PAR. Well, thou hast a son shall take this disgrace off me; scurvy, old, filthy, scurvy lord!Well, I must be patient; there is no fettering of authority. I'll beat him, by my life, if I can meet him with any convenience, an he were double and double a lord. I'll have no more pity of his age, than I would have of-I'll beat him, an if I could but meet him again. Re-enter LAFEU. LAF. Sirrah, your lord and master's married, there's news for you; you have a new mistress. PAR. I most unfeignedly beseech your lordship "Not sorting with a nuptial ceremony." Again, in "Julius Cæsar," Act I. Sc. 1,"If you do find them deckt with ceremonies." and, Act II. Sc. 2: "Cæsar, I never stood on ceremonies.' d Exeunt King, &c.] The stage-direction, in the original text, is, "Exeunt. Parolles and Lafeu stay behind, commenting of this wedding." e My good window of lattice,-] See note (2), p. 626, Vol. i. f For doing I am past; as I will by thee, in what motion age will give me leave.] If instead of as, we read, so, the conceit on the word past is then intelligible: "For doing I am past, so I will [pass] by thee," &c. to make some reservation of your wrongs: he is my good lord: whom I serve above, is my master. LAF. Who? God? PAR. Ay, sir. LAF. The devil it is, that's thy master. Why dost thou garter up thy arms o' this fashion? dost make hose of thy sleeves? do other servants so? Thou wert best set thy lower part where thy nose stands. By mine honour, if I were but two hours younger, I'd beat thee: methinks, thou art a general offence, and every man should beat thee. I think, thou wast created for men to breathe themselves upon thee. PAR. This is hard and undeserved measure, my lord. LAF. Go to, sir; you were beaten in Italy for picking a kernel out of a pomegranate; you are a vagabond, and no true traveller: you are more saucy with lords, and honourable personages, than the heraldry of your birth and virtue gives you commission." You are not worth another word, else I'd call you knave. I leave you. Enter BERTRAM. [Exit. PAR. Good, very good; it is so then.-Good, very good; let it be concealed a while. BER. Undone, and forfeited to cares for ever! Than the heraldry of your birth and virtue gives you commission.] This transposition of the words heraldry and commission, as they stand in the old text, was made by Hanmer. PAR. What is the matter, sweet-heart? BER. Although before the solemn priest I have sworn, I will not bed her. PAR. What? what, sweet-heart? BER. O my Parolles, they have married me :I'll to the Tuscan wars, and never bed her. [merits PAR. France is a dog-hole, and it no more The tread of a man's foot: to the wars! BER. There's letters from my mother; what the import is, I know not yet. PAR. Ay, that would be known. To the wars, my boy, to the wars! He wears his honour in a box unseen, BER. It shall be so; I'll send her to my house, (*) Old text, detected. |