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All's Well That Ends Well
ASCII text placed in the public domain by Moby Lexical Tools, 1992.SGML markup by Jon Bosak, 1992-1994.XML version by Jon Bosak, 1996-1999.The XML markup in this version is Copyright © 1999 Jon Bosak. This work may freely be distributed on condition that it not be modified or altered in any way.
Dramatis Personae
KING OF FRANCE.DUKE OF FLORENCE.BERTRAM, Count of Rousillon.LAFEU, an old lord.PAROLLES, a follower of Bertram.Steward.Clown.servants to the Countess of Rousillon.A Page.COUNTESS OF ROUSILLON, mother to Bertram.HELENA, a gentlewoman protected by the Countess.An old Widow of Florence.DIANA, daughter to the Widow.VIOLENTA.MARIANA.neighbours and friends to the Widow.Lords, Officers, Soldiers, &amp;c., French and Florentine.
SCENE Rousillon; Paris; Florence; Marseilles.
ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL
ACT I
SCENE I. Rousillon. The COUNT's palace.Enter BERTRAM, the COUNTESS of Rousillon, HELENA, and LAFEU, all in black
COUNTESS: In delivering my son from me, I bury a second husband.
BERTRAM: And I in going, madam, weep o'er my father's deathanew: but I must attend his majesty's command, towhom I am now in ward, evermore in subjection.
LAFEU: You shall find of the king a husband, madam; you,sir, a father: he that so generally is at all timesgood must of necessity hold his virtue to you; whoseworthiness would stir it up where it wanted ratherthan lack it where there is such abundance.
COUNTESS: What hope is there of his majesty's amendment?
LAFEU: He hath abandoned his physicians, madam; under whosepractises he hath persecuted time with hope, andfinds no other advantage in the process but only thelosing of hope by time.
COUNTESS: This young gentlewoman had a father,--O, that'had'! how sad a passage 'tis!--whose skill wasalmost as great as his honesty; had it stretched sofar, would have made nature immortal, and deathshould have play for lack of work. Would, for theking's sake, he were living! I think it would bethe death of the king's disease.
LAFEU: How called you the man you speak of, madam?
COUNTESS: He was famous, sir, in his profession, and it washis great right to be so: Gerard de Narbon.
LAFEU: He was excellent indeed, madam: the king verylately spoke of him admiringly and mourningly: hewas skilful enough to have lived still, if knowledgecould be set up against mortality.
BERTRAM: What is it, my good lord, the king languishes of?
LAFEU: A fistula, my lord.
BERTRAM: I heard not of it before.
LAFEU: I would it were not notorious. Was this gentlewomanthe daughter of Gerard de Narbon?
COUNTESS: His sole child, my lord, and bequeathed to myoverlooking. I have those hopes of her good thather education promises; her dispositions sheinherits, which makes fair gifts fairer; for wherean unclean mind carries virtuous qualities, therecommendations go with pity; they are virtues andtraitors too; in her they are the better for theirsimpleness; she derives her honesty and achieves her goodness.
LAFEU: Your commendations, madam, get from her tears.
COUNTESS: 'Tis the best brine a maiden can season her praisein. The remembrance of her father never approachesher heart but the tyranny of her sorrows takes alllivelihood from her cheek. No more of this, Helena;go to, no more; lest it be rather thought you affecta sorrow than have it.
HELENA: I do affect a sorrow indeed, but I have it too.
LAFEU: Moderate lamentation is the right of the dead,excessive grief the enemy to the living.
COUNTESS: If the living be enemy to the grief, the excessmakes it soon mortal.
BERTRAM: Madam, I desire your holy wishes.
LAFEU: How understand we that?
COUNTESS: Be thou blest, Bertram, and succeed thy fatherIn manners, as in shape! thy blood and virtueContend for empire in thee, and thy goodnessShare with thy birthright! Love all, trust a few,Do wrong to none: be able for thine enemyRather in power than use, and keep thy friendUnder thy own life's key: be cheque'd for silence,But never tax'd for speech. What heaven more will,That thee may furnish and my prayers pluck down,Fall on thy head! Farewell, my lord;'Tis an unseason'd courtier; good my lord,Advise him.
LAFEU: He cannot want the bestThat shall attend his love.
COUNTESS: Heaven bless him! Farewell, Bertram.Exit
BERTRAM: To HELENAThe best wishes that can be forged inyour thoughts be servants to you! Be comfortableto my mother, your mistress, and make much of her.
LAFEU: Farewell, pretty lady: you must hold the credit ofyour father.Exeunt BERTRAM and LAFEU
HELENA: O, were that all! I think not on my father;And these great tears grace his remembrance moreThan those I shed for him. What was he like?I have forgot him: my imaginationCarries no favour in't but Bertram's.I am undone: there is no living, none,If Bertram be away. 'Twere all oneThat I should love a bright particular starAnd think to wed it, he is so above me:In his bright radiance and collateral lightMust I be comforted, not in his sphere.The ambition in my love thus plagues itself:The hind that would be mated by the lionMust die for love. 'Twas pretty, though plague,To see him every hour; to sit and drawHis arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls,In our heart's table; heart too capableOf every line and trick of his sweet favour:But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancyMust sanctify his reliques. Who comes here?Enter PAROLLESAsideOne that goes with him: I love him for his sake;And yet I know him a notorious liar,Think him a great way fool, solely a coward;Yet these fixed evils sit so fit in him,That they take place, when virtue's steely bonesLook bleak i' the cold wind: withal, full oft we seeCold wisdom waiting on superfluous folly.
PAROLLES: Save you, fair queen!
HELENA: And you, monarch!
PAROLLES: No.
HELENA: And no.
PAROLLES: Are you meditating on virginity?
HELENA: Ay. You have some stain of soldier in you: let meask you a question. Man is enemy to virginity; howmay we barricado it against him?
PAROLLES: Keep him out.
HELENA: But he assails; and our virginity, though valiant,in the defence yet is weak: unfold to us somewarlike resistance.
PAROLLES: There is none: man, sitting down before you, willundermine you and blow you up.
HELENA: Bless our poor virginity from underminers andblowers up! Is there no military policy, howvirgins might blow up men?
PAROLLES: Virginity being blown down, man will quicklier beblown up: marry, in blowing him down again, withthe breach yourselves made, you lose your city. Itis not politic in the commonwealth of nature topreserve virginity. Loss of virginity is rationalincrease and there was never virgin got tillvirginity was first lost. That you were made of ismetal to make virgins. Virginity by being once lostmay be ten times found; by being ever kept, it isever lost: 'tis too cold a companion; away with 't!
HELENA: I will stand for 't a little, though therefore I die a virgin.
PAROLLES: There's little can be said in 't; 'tis against therule of nature. To speak on the part of virginity,is to accuse your mothers; which is most infallibledisobedience. He that hangs himself is a virgin:virginity murders itself and should be buried inhighways out of all sanctified limit, as a desperateoffendress against nature. Virginity breeds mites,much like a cheese; consumes itself to the veryparing, and so dies with feeding his own stomach.Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, idle, made ofself-love, which is the most inhibited sin in thecanon. Keep it not; you cannot choose but looseby't: out with 't! within ten year it will makeitself ten, which is a goodly increase; and theprincipal itself not much the worse: away with 't!
HELENA: How might one do, sir, to lose it to her own liking?
PAROLLES: Let me see: marry, ill, to like him that ne'er itlikes. 'Tis a commodity will lose the gloss withlying; the longer kept, the less worth: off with 'twhile 'tis vendible; answer the time of request.Virginity, like an old courtier, wears her cap outof fashion: richly suited, but unsuitable: justlike the brooch and the tooth-pick, which wear notnow. Your date is better in your pie and yourporridge than in your cheek; and your virginity,your old virginity, is like one of our Frenchwithered pears, it looks ill, it eats drily; marry,'tis a withered pear; it was formerly better;marry, yet 'tis a withered pear: will you anything with it?
HELENA: Not my virginity yetThere shall your master have a thousand loves,A mother and a mistress and a friend,A phoenix, captain and an enemy,A guide, a goddess, and a sovereign,A counsellor, a traitress, and a dear;His humble ambition, proud humility,His jarring concord, and his discord dulcet,His faith, his sweet disaster; with a worldOf pretty, fond, adoptious christendoms,That blinking Cupid gossips. Now shall he--I know not what he shall. God send him well!The court's a learning place, and he is one--
PAROLLES: What one, i' faith?
HELENA: That I wish well. 'Tis pity--
PAROLLES: What's pity?
HELENA: That wishing well had not a body in't,Which might be felt; that we, the poorer born,Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes,Might with effects of them follow our friends,And show what we alone must think, which neverReturn us thanks.Enter Page
Page: Monsieur Parolles, my lord calls for you.Exit
PAROLLES: Little Helen, farewell; if I can remember thee, Iwill think of thee at court.
HELENA: Monsieur Parolles, you were born under a charitable star.
PAROLLES: Under Mars, I.
HELENA: I especially think, under Mars.
PAROLLES: Why under Mars?
HELENA: The wars have so kept you under that you must needsbe born under Mars.
PAROLLES: When he was predominant.
HELENA: When he was retrograde, I think, rather.
PAROLLES: Why think you so?
HELENA: You go so much backward when you fight.
PAROLLES: That's for advantage.
HELENA: So is running away, when fear proposes the safety;but the composition that your valour and fear makesin you is a virtue of a good wing, and I like the wear well.
PAROLLES: I am so full of businesses, I cannot answer theeacutely. I will return perfect courtier; in thewhich, my instruction shall serve to naturalizethee, so thou wilt be capable of a courtier'scounsel and understand what advice shall thrust uponthee; else thou diest in thine unthankfulness, andthine ignorance makes thee away: farewell. Whenthou hast leisure, say thy prayers; when thou hastnone, remember thy friends; get thee a good husband,and use him as he uses thee; so, farewell.Exit
HELENA: Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie,Which we ascribe to heaven: the fated skyGives us free scope, only doth backward pullOur slow designs when we ourselves are dull.What power is it which mounts my love so high,That makes me see, and cannot feed mine eye?The mightiest space in fortune nature bringsTo join like likes and kiss like native things.Impossible be strange attempts to thoseThat weigh their pains in sense and do supposeWhat hath been cannot be: who ever stroveSo show her merit, that did miss her love?The king's disease--my project may deceive me,But my intents are fix'd and will not leave me.Exit
SCENE II. Paris. The KING's palace.Flourish of cornets. Enter the KING of France, with letters, and divers Attendants
KING: The Florentines and Senoys are by the ears;Have fought with equal fortune and continueA braving war.
First Lord: So 'tis reported, sir.
KING: Nay, 'tis most credible; we here received itA certainty, vouch'd from our cousin Austria,With caution that the Florentine will move usFor speedy aid; wherein our dearest friendPrejudicates the business and would seemTo have us make denial.
First Lord: His love and wisdom,Approved so to your majesty, may pleadFor amplest credence.
KING: He hath arm'd our answer,And Florence is denied before he comes:Yet, for our gentlemen that mean to seeThe Tuscan service, freely have they leaveTo stand on either part.
Second Lord: It well may serveA nursery to our gentry, who are sickFor breathing and exploit.
KING: What's he comes here?Enter BERTRAM, LAFEU, and PAROLLES
First Lord: It is the Count Rousillon, my good lord,Young Bertram.
KING: Youth, thou bear'st thy father's face;Frank nature, rather curious than in haste,Hath well composed thee. Thy father's moral partsMayst thou inherit too! Welcome to Paris.
BERTRAM: My thanks and duty are your majesty's.
KING: I would I had that corporal soundness now,As when thy father and myself in friendshipFirst tried our soldiership! He did look farInto the service of the time and wasDiscipled of the bravest: he lasted long;But on us both did haggish age steal onAnd wore us out of act. It much repairs meTo talk of your good father. In his youthHe had the wit which I can well observeTo-day in our young lords; but they may jestTill their own scorn return to them unnotedEre they can hide their levity in honour;So like a courtier, contempt nor bitternessWere in his pride or sharpness; if they were,His equal had awaked them, and his honour,Clock to itself, knew the true minute whenException bid him speak, and at this timeHis tongue obey'd his hand: who were below himHe used as creatures of another placeAnd bow'd his eminent top to their low ranks,Making them proud of his humility,In their poor praise he humbled. Such a manMight be a copy to these younger times;Which, follow'd well, would demonstrate them nowBut goers backward.
BERTRAM: His good remembrance, sir,Lies richer in your thoughts than on his tomb;So in approof lives not his epitaphAs in your royal speech.
KING: Would I were with him! He would always say--Methinks I hear him now; his plausive wordsHe scatter'd not in ears, but grafted them,To grow there and to bear,--'Let me not live,'--This his good melancholy oft began,On the catastrophe and heel of pastime,When it was out,--'Let me not live,' quoth he,'After my flame lacks oil, to be the snuffOf younger spirits, whose apprehensive sensesAll but new things disdain; whose judgments areMere fathers of their garments; whose constanciesExpire before their fashions.' This he wish'd;I after him do after him wish too,Since I nor wax nor honey can bring home,I quickly were dissolved from my hive,To give some labourers room.
Second Lord: You are loved, sir:They that least lend it you shall lack you first.
KING: I fill a place, I know't. How long is't, count,Since the physician at your father's died?He was much famed.
BERTRAM: Some six months since, my lord.
KING: If he were living, I would try him yet.Lend me an arm; the rest have worn me outWith several applications; nature and sicknessDebate it at their leisure. Welcome, count;My son's no dearer.
BERTRAM: Thank your majesty.Exeunt. Flourish
SCENE III. Rousillon. The COUNT's palace.Enter COUNTESS, Steward, and Clown
COUNTESS: I will now hear; what say you of this gentlewoman?
Steward: Madam, the care I have had to even your content, Iwish might be found in the calendar of my pastendeavours; for then we wound our modesty and makefoul the clearness of our deservings, when ofourselves we publish them.
COUNTESS: What does this knave here? Get you gone, sirrah:the complaints I have heard of you I do not allbelieve: 'tis my slowness that I do not; for I knowyou lack not folly to commit them, and have abilityenough to make such knaveries yours.
Clown: 'Tis not unknown to you, madam, I am a poor fellow.
COUNTESS: Well, sir.
Clown: No, madam, 'tis not so well that I am poor, thoughmany of the rich are damned: but, if I may haveyour ladyship's good will to go to the world, Isbelthe woman and I will do as we may.
COUNTESS: Wilt thou needs be a beggar?
Clown: I do beg your good will in this case.
COUNTESS: In what case?
Clown: In Isbel's case and mine own. Service is noheritage: and I think I shall never have theblessing of God till I have issue o' my body; forthey say barnes are blessings.
COUNTESS: Tell me thy reason why thou wilt marry.
Clown: My poor body, madam, requires it: I am driven onby the flesh; and he must needs go that the devil drives.
COUNTESS: Is this all your worship's reason?
Clown: Faith, madam, I have other holy reasons such as theyare.
COUNTESS: May the world know them?
Clown: I have been, madam, a wicked creature, as you andall flesh and blood are; and, indeed, I do marrythat I may repent.
COUNTESS: Thy marriage, sooner than thy wickedness.
Clown: I am out o' friends, madam; and I hope to havefriends for my wife's sake.
COUNTESS: Such friends are thine enemies, knave.
Clown: You're shallow, madam, in great friends; for theknaves come to do that for me which I am aweary of.He that ears my land spares my team and gives meleave to in the crop; if I be his cuckold, he's mydrudge: he that comforts my wife is the cherisherof my flesh and blood; he that cherishes my fleshand blood loves my flesh and blood; he that loves myflesh and blood is my friend: ergo, he that kissesmy wife is my friend. If men could be contented tobe what they are, there were no fear in marriage;for young Charbon the Puritan and old Poysam thePapist, howsome'er their hearts are severed inreligion, their heads are both one; they may jowlhorns together, like any deer i' the herd.
COUNTESS: Wilt thou ever be a foul-mouthed and calumnious knave?
Clown: A prophet I, madam; and I speak the truth the nextway:For I the ballad will repeat,Which men full true shall find;Your marriage comes by destiny,Your cuckoo sings by kind.
COUNTESS: Get you gone, sir; I'll talk with you more anon.
Steward: May it please you, madam, that he bid Helen come toyou: of her I am to speak.
COUNTESS: Sirrah, tell my gentlewoman I would speak with her;Helen, I mean.
Clown: Was this fair face the cause, quoth she,Why the Grecians sacked Troy?Fond done, done fond,Was this King Priam's joy?With that she sighed as she stood,With that she sighed as she stood,And gave this sentence then;Among nine bad if one be good,Among nine bad if one be good,There's yet one good in ten.
COUNTESS: What, one good in ten? you corrupt the song, sirrah.
Clown: One good woman in ten, madam; which is a purifyingo' the song: would God would serve the world so allthe year! we'ld find no fault with the tithe-woman,if I were the parson. One in ten, quoth a'! An wemight have a good woman born but one every blazingstar, or at an earthquake, 'twould mend the lotterywell: a man may draw his heart out, ere a' pluckone.
COUNTESS: You'll be gone, sir knave, and do as I command you.
Clown: That man should be at woman's command, and yet nohurt done! Though honesty be no puritan, yet itwill do no hurt; it will wear the surplice ofhumility over the black gown of a big heart. I amgoing, forsooth: the business is for Helen to come hither.Exit
COUNTESS: Well, now.
Steward: I know, madam, you love your gentlewoman entirely.
COUNTESS: Faith, I do: her father bequeathed her to me; andshe herself, without other advantage, may lawfullymake title to as much love as she finds: there ismore owing her than is paid; and more shall be paidher than she'll demand.
Steward: Madam, I was very late more near her than I thinkshe wished me: alone she was, and did communicateto herself her own words to her own ears; shethought, I dare vow for her, they touched not anystranger sense. Her matter was, she loved your son:Fortune, she said, was no goddess, that had putsuch difference betwixt their two estates; Love nogod, that would not extend his might, only wherequalities were level; Dian no queen of virgins, thatwould suffer her poor knight surprised, withoutrescue in the first assault or ransom afterward.This she delivered in the most bitter touch ofsorrow that e'er I heard virgin exclaim in: which Iheld my duty speedily to acquaint you withal;sithence, in the loss that may happen, it concernsyou something to know it.
COUNTESS: You have discharged this honestly; keep it toyourself: many likelihoods informed me of thisbefore, which hung so tottering in the balance thatI could neither believe nor misdoubt. Pray you,leave me: stall this in your bosom; and I thank youfor your honest care: I will speak with you further anon.Exit StewardEnter HELENAEven so it was with me when I was young:If ever we are nature's, these are ours; this thornDoth to our rose of youth rightly belong;Our blood to us, this to our blood is born;It is the show and seal of nature's truth,Where love's strong passion is impress'd in youth:By our remembrances of days foregone,Such were our faults, or then we thought them none.Her eye is sick on't: I observe her now.
HELENA: What is your pleasure, madam?
COUNTESS: You know, Helen,I am a mother to you.
HELENA: Mine honourable mistress.
COUNTESS: Nay, a mother:Why not a mother? When I said 'a mother,'Methought you saw a serpent: what's in 'mother,'That you start at it? I say, I am your mother;And put you in the catalogue of thoseThat were enwombed mine: 'tis often seenAdoption strives with nature and choice breedsA native slip to us from foreign seeds:You ne'er oppress'd me with a mother's groan,Yet I express to you a mother's care:God's mercy, maiden! does it curd thy bloodTo say I am thy mother? What's the matter,That this distemper'd messenger of wet,The many-colour'd Iris, rounds thine eye?Why? that you are my daughter?
HELENA: That I am not.
COUNTESS: I say, I am your mother.
HELENA: Pardon, madam;The Count Rousillon cannot be my brother:I am from humble, he from honour'd name;No note upon my parents, his all noble:My master, my dear lord he is; and IHis servant live, and will his vassal die:He must not be my brother.
COUNTESS: Nor I your mother?
HELENA: You are my mother, madam; would you were,--So that my lord your son were not my brother,--Indeed my mother! or were you both our mothers,I care no more for than I do for heaven,So I were not his sister. Can't no other,But, I your daughter, he must be my brother?
COUNTESS: Yes, Helen, you might be my daughter-in-law:God shield you mean it not! daughter and motherSo strive upon your pulse. What, pale again?My fear hath catch'd your fondness: now I seeThe mystery of your loneliness, and findYour salt tears' head: now to all sense 'tis grossYou love my son; invention is ashamed,Against the proclamation of thy passion,To say thou dost not: therefore tell me true;But tell me then, 'tis so; for, look thy cheeksConfess it, th' one to th' other; and thine eyesSee it so grossly shown in thy behaviorsThat in their kind they speak it: only sinAnd hellish obstinacy tie thy tongue,That truth should be suspected. Speak, is't so?If it be so, you have wound a goodly clew;If it be not, forswear't: howe'er, I charge thee,As heaven shall work in me for thine avail,Tell me truly.
HELENA: Good madam, pardon me!
COUNTESS: Do you love my son?
HELENA: Your pardon, noble mistress!
COUNTESS: Love you my son?
HELENA: Do not you love him, madam?
COUNTESS: Go not about; my love hath in't a bond,Whereof the world takes note: come, come, discloseThe state of your affection; for your passionsHave to the full appeach'd.
HELENA: Then, I confess,Here on my knee, before high heaven and you,That before you, and next unto high heaven,I love your son.My friends were poor, but honest; so's my love:Be not offended; for it hurts not himThat he is loved of me: I follow him notBy any token of presumptuous suit;Nor would I have him till I do deserve him;Yet never know how that desert should be.I know I love in vain, strive against hope;Yet in this captious and intenible sieveI still pour in the waters of my loveAnd lack not to lose still: thus, Indian-like,Religious in mine error, I adoreThe sun, that looks upon his worshipper,But knows of him no more. My dearest madam,Let not your hate encounter with my loveFor loving where you do: but if yourself,Whose aged honour cites a virtuous youth,Did ever in so true a flame of likingWish chastely and love dearly, that your DianWas both herself and love: O, then, give pityTo her, whose state is such that cannot chooseBut lend and give where she is sure to lose;That seeks not to find that her search implies,But riddle-like lives sweetly where she dies!
COUNTESS: Had you not lately an intent,--speak truly,--To go to Paris?
HELENA: Madam, I had.
COUNTESS: Wherefore? tell true.
HELENA: I will tell truth; by grace itself I swear.You know my father left me some prescriptionsOf rare and proved effects, such as his readingAnd manifest experience had collectedFor general sovereignty; and that he will'd meIn heedfull'st reservation to bestow them,As notes whose faculties inclusive wereMore than they were in note: amongst the rest,There is a remedy, approved, set down,To cure the desperate languishings whereofThe king is render'd lost.
COUNTESS: This was your motiveFor Paris, was it? speak.
HELENA: My lord your son made me to think of this;Else Paris and the medicine and the kingHad from the conversation of my thoughtsHaply been absent then.
COUNTESS: But think you, Helen,If you should tender your supposed aid,He would receive it? he and his physiciansAre of a mind; he, that they cannot help him,They, that they cannot help: how shall they creditA poor unlearned virgin, when the schools,Embowell'd of their doctrine, have left offThe danger to itself?
HELENA: There's something in't,More than my father's skill, which was the greatestOf his profession, that his good receiptShall for my legacy be sanctifiedBy the luckiest stars in heaven: and, would your honourBut give me leave to try success, I'ld ventureThe well-lost life of mine on his grace's cureBy such a day and hour.
COUNTESS: Dost thou believe't?
HELENA: Ay, madam, knowingly.
COUNTESS: Why, Helen, thou shalt have my leave and love,Means and attendants and my loving greetingsTo those of mine in court: I'll stay at homeAnd pray God's blessing into thy attempt:Be gone to-morrow; and be sure of this,What I can help thee to thou shalt not miss.Exeunt
ACT II
SCENE I. Paris. The KING's palace.Flourish of cornets. Enter the KING, attended with divers young Lords taking leave for the Florentine war; BERTRAM, and PAROLLES
KING: Farewell, young lords; these warlike principlesDo not throw from you: and you, my lords, farewell:Share the advice betwixt you; if both gain, allThe gift doth stretch itself as 'tis received,And is enough for both.
First Lord: 'Tis our hope, sir,After well enter'd soldiers, to returnAnd find your grace in health.
KING: No, no, it cannot be; and yet my heartWill not confess he owes the maladyThat doth my life besiege. Farewell, young lords;Whether I live or die, be you the sonsOf worthy Frenchmen: let higher Italy,--Those bated that inherit but the fallOf the last monarchy,--see that you comeNot to woo honour, but to wed it; whenThe bravest questant shrinks, find what you seek,That fame may cry you loud: I say, farewell.
Second Lord: Health, at your bidding, serve your majesty!
KING: Those girls of Italy, take heed of them:They say, our French lack language to deny,If they demand: beware of being captives,Before you serve.
Both: Our hearts receive your warnings.
KING: Farewell. Come hither to me.Exit, attended
First Lord: O, my sweet lord, that you will stay behind us!
PAROLLES: 'Tis not his fault, the spark.
Second Lord: O, 'tis brave wars!
PAROLLES: Most admirable: I have seen those wars.
BERTRAM: I am commanded here, and kept a coil with'Too young' and 'the next year' and ''tis too early.'
PAROLLES: An thy mind stand to't, boy, steal away bravely.
BERTRAM: I shall stay here the forehorse to a smock,Creaking my shoes on the plain masonry,Till honour be bought up and no sword wornBut one to dance with! By heaven, I'll steal away.
First Lord: There's honour in the theft.
PAROLLES: Commit it, count.
Second Lord: I am your accessary; and so, farewell.
BERTRAM: I grow to you, and our parting is a tortured body.
First Lord: Farewell, captain.
Second Lord: Sweet Monsieur Parolles!
PAROLLES: Noble heroes, my sword and yours are kin. Goodsparks and lustrous, a word, good metals: you shallfind in the regiment of the Spinii one CaptainSpurio, with his cicatrice, an emblem of war, hereon his sinister cheek; it was this very swordentrenched it: say to him, I live; and observe hisreports for me.
First Lord: We shall, noble captain.Exeunt Lords
PAROLLES: Mars dote on you for his novices! what will ye do?
BERTRAM: Stay: the king.Re-enter KING. BERTRAM and PAROLLES retire
PAROLLES: To BERTRAMUse a more spacious ceremony to thenoble lords; you have restrained yourself within thelist of too cold an adieu: be more expressive tothem: for they wear themselves in the cap of thetime, there do muster true gait, eat, speak, andmove under the influence of the most received star;and though the devil lead the measure, such are tobe followed: after them, and take a more dilated farewell.
BERTRAM: And I will do so.
PAROLLES: Worthy fellows; and like to prove most sinewy sword-men.Exeunt BERTRAM and PAROLLESEnter LAFEU
LAFEU: KneelingPardon, my lord, for me and for my tidings.
KING: I'll fee thee to stand up.
LAFEU: Then here's a man stands, that has brought his pardon.I would you had kneel'd, my lord, to ask me mercy,And that at my bidding you could so stand up.
KING: I would I had; so I had broke thy pate,And ask'd thee mercy for't.
LAFEU: Good faith, across: but, my good lord 'tis thus;Will you be cured of your infirmity?
KING: No.
LAFEU: O, will you eat no grapes, my royal fox?Yes, but you will my noble grapes, an ifMy royal fox could reach them: I have seen a medicineThat's able to breathe life into a stone,Quicken a rock, and make you dance canaryWith spritely fire and motion; whose simple touch,Is powerful to araise King Pepin, nay,To give great Charlemain a pen in's hand,And write to her a love-line.
KING: What 'her' is this?
LAFEU: Why, Doctor She: my lord, there's one arrived,If you will see her: now, by my faith and honour,If seriously I may convey my thoughtsIn this my light deliverance, I have spokeWith one that, in her sex, her years, profession,Wisdom and constancy, hath amazed me moreThan I dare blame my weakness: will you see herFor that is her demand, and know her business?That done, laugh well at me.
KING: Now, good Lafeu,Bring in the admiration; that we with theeMay spend our wonder too, or take off thineBy wondering how thou took'st it.
LAFEU: Nay, I'll fit you,And not be all day neither.Exit
KING: Thus he his special nothing ever prologues.Re-enter LAFEU, with HELENA
LAFEU: Nay, come your ways.
KING: This haste hath wings indeed.
LAFEU: Nay, come your ways:This is his majesty; say your mind to him:A traitor you do look like; but such traitorsHis majesty seldom fears: I am Cressid's uncle,That dare leave two together; fare you well.Exit
KING: Now, fair one, does your business follow us?
HELENA: Ay, my good lord.Gerard de Narbon was my father;In what he did profess, well found.
KING: I knew him.
HELENA: The rather will I spare my praises towards him:Knowing him is enough. On's bed of deathMany receipts he gave me: chiefly one.Which, as the dearest issue of his practise,And of his old experience the oily darling,He bade me store up, as a triple eye,Safer than mine own two, more dear; I have so;And hearing your high majesty is touch'dWith that malignant cause wherein the honourOf my dear father's gift stands chief in power,I come to tender it and my applianceWith all bound humbleness.
KING: We thank you, maiden;But may not be so credulous of cure,When our most learned doctors leave us andThe congregated college have concludedThat labouring art can never ransom natureFrom her inaidible estate; I say we must notSo stain our judgment, or corrupt our hope,To prostitute our past-cure maladyTo empirics, or to dissever soOur great self and our credit, to esteemA senseless help when help past sense we deem.
HELENA: My duty then shall pay me for my pains:I will no more enforce mine office on you.Humbly entreating from your royal thoughtsA modest one, to bear me back a again.
KING: I cannot give thee less, to be call'd grateful:Thou thought'st to help me; and such thanks I giveAs one near death to those that wish him live:But what at full I know, thou know'st no part,I knowing all my peril, thou no art.
HELENA: What I can do can do no hurt to try,Since you set up your rest 'gainst remedy.He that of greatest works is finisherOft does them by the weakest minister:So holy writ in babes hath judgment shown,When judges have been babes; great floods have flownFrom simple sources, and great seas have driedWhen miracles have by the greatest been denied.Oft expectation fails and most oft thereWhere most it promises, and oft it hitsWhere hope is coldest and despair most fits.
KING: I must not hear thee; fare thee well, kind maid;Thy pains not used must by thyself be paid:Proffers not took reap thanks for their reward.
HELENA: Inspired merit so by breath is barr'd:It is not so with Him that all things knowsAs 'tis with us that square our guess by shows;But most it is presumption in us whenThe help of heaven we count the act of men.Dear sir, to my endeavours give consent;Of heaven, not me, make an experiment.I am not an impostor that proclaimMyself against the level of mine aim;But know I think and think I know most sureMy art is not past power nor you past cure.
KING: Are thou so confident? within what spaceHopest thou my cure?
HELENA: The great'st grace lending graceEre twice the horses of the sun shall bringTheir fiery torcher his diurnal ring,Ere twice in murk and occidental dampMoist Hesperus hath quench'd his sleepy lamp,Or four and twenty times the pilot's glassHath told the thievish minutes how they pass,What is infirm from your sound parts shall fly,Health shall live free and sickness freely die.
KING: Upon thy certainty and confidenceWhat darest thou venture?
HELENA: Tax of impudence,A strumpet's boldness, a divulged shameTraduced by odious ballads: my maiden's nameSear'd otherwise; nay, worse--if worse--extendedWith vilest torture let my life be ended.
KING: Methinks in thee some blessed spirit doth speakHis powerful sound within an organ weak:And what impossibility would slayIn common sense, sense saves another way.Thy life is dear; for all that life can rateWorth name of life in thee hath estimate,Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage, allThat happiness and prime can happy call:Thou this to hazard needs must intimateSkill infinite or monstrous desperate.Sweet practiser, thy physic I will try,That ministers thine own death if I die.
HELENA: If I break time, or flinch in propertyOf what I spoke, unpitied let me die,And well deserved: not helping, death's my fee;But, if I help, what do you promise me?
KING: Make thy demand.
HELENA: But will you make it even?
KING: Ay, by my sceptre and my hopes of heaven.
HELENA: Then shalt thou give me with thy kingly handWhat husband in thy power I will command:Exempted be from me the arroganceTo choose from forth the royal blood of France,My low and humble name to propagateWith any branch or image of thy state;But such a one, thy vassal, whom I knowIs free for me to ask, thee to bestow.
KING: Here is my hand; the premises observed,Thy will by my performance shall be served:So make the choice of thy own time, for I,Thy resolved patient, on thee still rely.More should I question thee, and more I must,Though more to know could not be more to trust,From whence thou camest, how tended on: but restUnquestion'd welcome and undoubted blest.Give me some help here, ho! If thou proceedAs high as word, my deed shall match thy meed.Flourish. Exeunt
SCENE II. Rousillon. The COUNT's palace.Enter COUNTESS and Clown
COUNTESS: Come on, sir; I shall now put you to the height ofyour breeding.
Clown: I will show myself highly fed and lowly taught: Iknow my business is but to the court.
COUNTESS: To the court! why, what place make you special,when you put off that with such contempt? But to the court!
Clown: Truly, madam, if God have lent a man any manners, hemay easily put it off at court: he that cannot makea leg, put off's cap, kiss his hand and say nothing,has neither leg, hands, lip, nor cap; and indeedsuch a fellow, to say precisely, were not for thecourt; but for me, I have an answer will serve allmen.
COUNTESS: Marry, that's a bountiful answer that fits allquestions.
Clown: It is like a barber's chair that fits all buttocks,the pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawnbuttock, or any buttock.
COUNTESS: Will your answer serve fit to all questions?
Clown: As fit as ten groats is for the hand of an attorney,as your French crown for your taffeta punk, as Tib'srush for Tom's forefinger, as a pancake for ShroveTuesday, a morris for May-day, as the nail to hishole, the cuckold to his horn, as a scolding queento a wrangling knave, as the nun's lip to thefriar's mouth, nay, as the pudding to his skin.
COUNTESS: Have you, I say, an answer of such fitness for allquestions?
Clown: From below your duke to beneath your constable, itwill fit any question.
COUNTESS: It must be an answer of most monstrous size thatmust fit all demands.
Clown: But a trifle neither, in good faith, if the learnedshould speak truth of it: here it is, and all thatbelongs to't. Ask me if I am a courtier: it shalldo you no harm to learn.
COUNTESS: To be young again, if we could: I will be a fool inquestion, hoping to be the wiser by your answer. Ipray you, sir, are you a courtier?
Clown: O Lord, sir! There's a simple putting off. More,more, a hundred of them.
COUNTESS: Sir, I am a poor friend of yours, that loves you.
Clown: O Lord, sir! Thick, thick, spare not me.
COUNTESS: I think, sir, you can eat none of this homely meat.
Clown: O Lord, sir! Nay, put me to't, I warrant you.
COUNTESS: You were lately whipped, sir, as I think.
Clown: O Lord, sir! spare not me.
COUNTESS: Do you cry, 'O Lord, sir!' at your whipping, and'spare not me?' Indeed your 'O Lord, sir!' is verysequent to your whipping: you would answer very wellto a whipping, if you were but bound to't.
Clown: I ne'er had worse luck in my life in my 'O Lord,sir!' I see things may serve long, but not serve ever.
COUNTESS: I play the noble housewife with the timeTo entertain't so merrily with a fool.
Clown: O Lord, sir! why, there't serves well again.
COUNTESS: An end, sir; to your business. Give Helen this,And urge her to a present answer back:Commend me to my kinsmen and my son:This is not much.
Clown: Not much commendation to them.
COUNTESS: Not much employment for you: you understand me?
Clown: Most fruitfully: I am there before my legs.
COUNTESS: Haste you again.Exeunt severally
SCENE III. Paris. The KING's palace.Enter BERTRAM, LAFEU, and PAROLLES
LAFEU: They say miracles are past; and we have ourphilosophical persons, to make modern and familiar,things supernatural and causeless. Hence is it thatwe make trifles of terrors, ensconcing ourselvesinto seeming knowledge, when we should submitourselves to an unknown fear.
PAROLLES: Why, 'tis the rarest argument of wonder that hathshot out in our latter times.
BERTRAM: And so 'tis.
LAFEU: To be relinquish'd of the artists,--
PAROLLES: So I say.
LAFEU: Both of Galen and Paracelsus.
PAROLLES: So I say.
LAFEU: Of all the learned and authentic fellows,--
PAROLLES: Right; so I say.
LAFEU: That gave him out incurable,--
PAROLLES: Why, there 'tis; so say I too.
LAFEU: Not to be helped,--
PAROLLES: Right; as 'twere, a man assured of a--
LAFEU: Uncertain life, and sure death.
PAROLLES: Just, you say well; so would I have said.
LAFEU: I may truly say, it is a novelty to the world.
PAROLLES: It is, indeed: if you will have it in showing, youshall read it in--what do you call there?
LAFEU: A showing of a heavenly effect in an earthly actor.
PAROLLES: That's it; I would have said the very same.
LAFEU: Why, your dolphin is not lustier: 'fore me,I speak in respect--
PAROLLES: Nay, 'tis strange, 'tis very strange, that is thebrief and the tedious of it; and he's of a mostfacinerious spirit that will not acknowledge it to be the--
LAFEU: Very hand of heaven.
PAROLLES: Ay, so I say.
LAFEU: In a most weak--pausingand debile minister, great power, greattranscendence: which should, indeed, give us afurther use to be made than alone the recovery ofthe king, as to be--pausinggenerally thankful.
PAROLLES: I would have said it; you say well. Here comes the king.Enter KING, HELENA, and Attendants. LAFEU and PAROLLES retire
LAFEU: Lustig, as the Dutchman says: I'll like a maid thebetter, whilst I have a tooth in my head: why, he'sable to lead her a coranto.
PAROLLES: Mort du vinaigre! is not this Helen?
LAFEU: 'Fore God, I think so.
KING: Go, call before me all the lords in court.Sit, my preserver, by thy patient's side;And with this healthful hand, whose banish'd senseThou hast repeal'd, a second time receiveThe confirmation of my promised gift,Which but attends thy naming.Enter three or four LordsFair maid, send forth thine eye: this youthful parcelOf noble bachelors stand at my bestowing,O'er whom both sovereign power and father's voiceI have to use: thy frank election make;Thou hast power to choose, and they none to forsake.
HELENA: To each of you one fair and virtuous mistressFall, when Love please! marry, to each, but one!
LAFEU: I'ld give bay Curtal and his furniture,My mouth no more were broken than these boys',And writ as little beard.
KING: Peruse them well:Not one of those but had a noble father.
HELENA: Gentlemen,Heaven hath through me restored the king to health.
All: We understand it, and thank heaven for you.
HELENA: I am a simple maid, and therein wealthiest,That I protest I simply am a maid.Please it your majesty, I have done already:The blushes in my cheeks thus whisper me,'We blush that thou shouldst choose; but, be refused,Let the white death sit on thy cheek for ever;We'll ne'er come there again.'
KING: Make choice; and, see,Who shuns thy love shuns all his love in me.
HELENA: Now, Dian, from thy altar do I fly,And to imperial Love, that god most high,Do my sighs stream. Sir, will you hear my suit?
First Lord: And grant it.
HELENA: Thanks, sir; all the rest is mute.
LAFEU: I had rather be in this choice than throw ames-acefor my life.
HELENA: The honour, sir, that flames in your fair eyes,Before I speak, too threateningly replies:Love make your fortunes twenty times aboveHer that so wishes and her humble love!
Second Lord: No better, if you please.
HELENA: My wish receive,Which great Love grant! and so, I take my leave.
LAFEU: Do all they deny her? An they were sons of mine,I'd have them whipped; or I would send them to theTurk, to make eunuchs of.
HELENA: Be not afraid that I your hand should take;I'll never do you wrong for your own sake:Blessing upon your vows! and in your bedFind fairer fortune, if you ever wed!
LAFEU: These boys are boys of ice, they'll none have her:sure, they are bastards to the English; the Frenchne'er got 'em.
HELENA: You are too young, too happy, and too good,To make yourself a son out of my blood.
Fourth Lord: Fair one, I think not so.
LAFEU: There's one grape yet; I am sure thy father drunkwine: but if thou be'st not an ass, I am a youthof fourteen; I have known thee already.
HELENA: To BERTRAMI dare not say I take you; but I giveMe 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.
BERTRAM: My wife, my liege! I shall beseech your highness,In such a business give me leave to useThe help of mine own eyes.
KING: Know'st thou not, Bertram,What she has done for me?
BERTRAM: Yes, my good lord;But never hope to know why I should marry her.
KING: Thou know'st she has raised me from my sickly bed.
BERTRAM: But follows it, my lord, to bring me downMust answer for your raising? I know her well:She had her breeding at my father's charge.A poor physician's daughter my wife! DisdainRather corrupt me ever!
KING: 'Tis only title thou disdain'st in her, the whichI can build up. Strange is it that our bloods,Of colour, weight, and heat, pour'd all together,Would quite confound distinction, yet stand offIn differences so mighty. If she beAll that is virtuous, save what thou dislikest,A poor physician's daughter, thou dislikestOf virtue for the name: but do not so:From lowest place when virtuous things proceed,The place is dignified by the doer's deed:Where great additions swell's, and virtue none,It is a dropsied honour. Good aloneIs good without a name. Vileness is so:The property by what it is should go,Not by the title. She is young, wise, fair;In these to nature she's immediate heir,And these breed honour: that is honour's scorn,Which challenges itself as honour's bornAnd is not like the sire: honours thrive,When rather from our acts we them deriveThan our foregoers: the mere word's a slaveDebosh'd on every tomb, on every graveA lying trophy, and as oft is dumbWhere dust and damn'd oblivion is the tombOf honour'd bones indeed. What should be said?If thou canst like this creature as a maid,I can create the rest: virtue and sheIs her own dower; honour and wealth from me.
BERTRAM: I cannot love her, nor will strive to do't.
KING: Thou wrong'st thyself, if thou shouldst strive to choose.
HELENA: That you are well restored, my lord, I'm glad:Let the rest go.
KING: My honour's at the stake; which to defeat,I must produce my power. Here, take her hand,Proud scornful boy, unworthy this good gift;That dost in vile misprision shackle upMy love and her desert; that canst not dream,We, poising us in her defective scale,Shall weigh thee to the beam; that wilt not know,It is in us to plant thine honour whereWe please to have it grow. Cheque thy contempt:Obey our will, which travails in thy good:Believe not thy disdain, but presentlyDo thine own fortunes that obedient rightWhich both thy duty owes and our power claims;Or I will throw thee from my care for everInto the staggers and the careless lapseOf youth and ignorance; both my revenge and hateLoosing upon thee, in the name of justice,Without all terms of pity. Speak; thine answer.
BERTRAM: Pardon, my gracious lord; for I submitMy fancy to your eyes: when I considerWhat great creation and what dole of honourFlies where you bid it, I find that she, which lateWas in my nobler thoughts most base, is nowThe praised of the king; who, so ennobled,Is as 'twere born so.
KING: Take her by the hand,And tell her she is thine: to whom I promiseA counterpoise, if not to thy estateA balance more replete.
BERTRAM: I take her hand.
KING: Good fortune and the favour of the kingSmile upon this contract; whose ceremonyShall seem expedient on the now-born brief,And be perform'd to-night: the solemn feastShall more attend upon the coming space,Expecting absent friends. As thou lovest her,Thy love's to me religious; else, does err.Exeunt all but LAFEU and PAROLLES
LAFEU: AdvancingDo you hear, monsieur? a word with you.
PAROLLES: Your pleasure, sir?
LAFEU: Your lord and master did well to make hisrecantation.
PAROLLES: Recantation! My lord! my master!
LAFEU: Ay; is it not a language I speak?
PAROLLES: A most harsh one, and not to be understood withoutbloody succeeding. My master!
LAFEU: Are you companion to the Count Rousillon?
PAROLLES: To any count, to all counts, to what is man.
LAFEU: To what is count's man: count's master is ofanother style.
PAROLLES: You are too old, sir; let it satisfy you, you are too old.
LAFEU: I must tell thee, sirrah, I write man; to whichtitle age cannot bring thee.
PAROLLES: What I dare too well do, I dare not do.
LAFEU: I did think thee, for two ordinaries, to be a prettywise fellow; thou didst make tolerable vent of thytravel; it might pass: yet the scarfs and thebannerets about thee did manifoldly dissuade me frombelieving thee a vessel of too great a burthen. Ihave now found thee; when I lose thee again, I carenot: yet art thou good for nothing but taking up; andthat thou't scarce worth.
PAROLLES: Hadst thou not the privilege of antiquity upon thee,--
LAFEU: Do not plunge thyself too far in anger, lest thouhasten thy trial; which if--Lord have mercy on theefor a hen! So, my good window of lattice, fare theewell: thy casement I need not open, for I lookthrough thee. Give me thy hand.
PAROLLES: My lord, you give me most egregious indignity.
LAFEU: Ay, with all my heart; and thou art worthy of it.
PAROLLES: I have not, my lord, deserved it.
LAFEU: Yes, good faith, every dram of it; and I will notbate thee a scruple.
PAROLLES: Well, I shall be wiser.
LAFEU: Even as soon as thou canst, for thou hast to pull ata smack o' the contrary. If ever thou be'st boundin thy scarf and beaten, thou shalt find what it isto be proud of thy bondage. I have a desire to holdmy acquaintance with thee, or rather my knowledge,that I may say in the default, he is a man I know.
PAROLLES: My lord, you do me most insupportable vexation.
LAFEU: I would it were hell-pains for thy sake, and my poordoing eternal: for doing I am past: as I will bythee, in what motion age will give me leave.Exit
PAROLLES: Well, thou hast a son shall take this disgrace offme; scurvy, old, filthy, scurvy lord! Well, I mustbe patient; there is no fettering of authority.I'll beat him, by my life, if I can meet him withany convenience, an he were double and double alord. I'll have no more pity of his age than Iwould of--I'll beat him, an if I could but meet him again.Re-enter LAFEU
LAFEU: Sirrah, your lord and master's married; there's newsfor you: you have a new mistress.
PAROLLES: I most unfeignedly beseech your lordship to makesome reservation of your wrongs: he is my goodlord: whom I serve above is my master.
LAFEU: Who? God?
PAROLLES: Ay, sir.
LAFEU: The devil it is that's thy master. Why dost thougarter up thy arms o' this fashion? dost make hose ofsleeves? do other servants so? Thou wert best setthy lower part where thy nose stands. By minehonour, if I were but two hours younger, I'ld beatthee: methinks, thou art a general offence, andevery man should beat thee: I think thou wastcreated for men to breathe themselves upon thee.
PAROLLES: This is hard and undeserved measure, my lord.
LAFEU: Go to, sir; you were beaten in Italy for picking akernel out of a pomegranate; you are a vagabond andno true traveller: you are more saucy with lordsand honourable personages than the commission of yourbirth and virtue gives you heraldry. You are notworth another word, else I'ld call you knave. I leave you.Exit
PAROLLES: Good, very good; it is so then: good, very good;let it be concealed awhile.Re-enter BERTRAM
BERTRAM: Undone, and forfeited to cares for ever!
PAROLLES: What's the matter, sweet-heart?
BERTRAM: Although before the solemn priest I have sworn,I will not bed her.
PAROLLES: What, what, sweet-heart?
BERTRAM: O my Parolles, they have married me!I'll to the Tuscan wars, and never bed her.
PAROLLES: France is a dog-hole, and it no more meritsThe tread of a man's foot: to the wars!
BERTRAM: There's letters from my mother: what the import is,I know not yet.
PAROLLES: Ay, that would be known. To the wars, my boy, to the wars!He wears his honour in a box unseen,That hugs his kicky-wicky here at home,Spending his manly marrow in her arms,Which should sustain the bound and high curvetOf Mars's fiery steed. To other regionsFrance is a stable; we that dwell in't jades;Therefore, to the war!
BERTRAM: It shall be so: I'll send her to my house,Acquaint my mother with my hate to her,And wherefore I am fled; write to the kingThat which I durst not speak; his present giftShall furnish me to those Italian fields,Where noble fellows strike: war is no strifeTo the dark house and the detested wife.
PAROLLES: Will this capriccio hold in thee? art sure?
BERTRAM: Go with me to my chamber, and advise me.I'll send her straight away: to-morrowI'll to the wars, she to her single sorrow.
PAROLLES: Why, these balls bound; there's noise in it. 'Tis hard:A young man married is a man that's marr'd:Therefore away, and leave her bravely; go:The king has done you wrong: but, hush, 'tis so.Exeunt
SCENE IV. Paris. The KING's palace.Enter HELENA and Clown
HELENA: My mother greets me kindly; is she well?
Clown: She is not well; but yet she has her health: she'svery merry; but yet she is not well: but thanks begiven, she's very well and wants nothing i', theworld; but yet she is not well.
HELENA: If she be very well, what does she ail, that she'snot very well?
Clown: Truly, she's very well indeed, but for two things.
HELENA: What two things?
Clown: One, that she's not in heaven, whither God send herquickly! the other that she's in earth, from whenceGod send her quickly!Enter PAROLLES
PAROLLES: Bless you, my fortunate lady!
HELENA: I hope, sir, I have your good will to have mine owngood fortunes.
PAROLLES: You had my prayers to lead them on; and to keep themon, have them still. O, my knave, how does my old lady?
Clown: So that you had her wrinkles and I her money,I would she did as you say.
PAROLLES: Why, I say nothing.
Clown: Marry, you are the wiser man; for many a man'stongue shakes out his master's undoing: to saynothing, to do nothing, to know nothing, and to havenothing, is to be a great part of your title; whichis within a very little of nothing.
PAROLLES: Away! thou'rt a knave.
Clown: You should have said, sir, before a knave thou'rt aknave; that's, before me thou'rt a knave: this hadbeen truth, sir.
PAROLLES: Go to, thou art a witty fool; I have found thee.
Clown: Did you find me in yourself, sir? or were youtaught to find me? The search, sir, was profitable;and much fool may you find in you, even to theworld's pleasure and the increase of laughter.
PAROLLES: A good knave, i' faith, and well fed.Madam, my lord will go away to-night;A very serious business calls on him.The great prerogative and rite of love,Which, as your due, time claims, he does acknowledge;But puts it off to a compell'd restraint;Whose want, and whose delay, is strew'd with sweets,Which they distil now in the curbed time,To make the coming hour o'erflow with joyAnd pleasure drown the brim.
HELENA: What's his will else?
PAROLLES: That you will take your instant leave o' the kingAnd make this haste as your own good proceeding,Strengthen'd with what apology you thinkMay make it probable need.
HELENA: What more commands he?
PAROLLES: That, having this obtain'd, you presentlyAttend his further pleasure.
HELENA: In every thing I wait upon his will.
PAROLLES: I shall report it so.
HELENA: I pray you.Exit PAROLLESCome, sirrah.Exeunt
SCENE V. Paris. The KING's palace.Enter LAFEU and BERTRAM
LAFEU: But I hope your lordship thinks not him a soldier.
BERTRAM: Yes, my lord, and of very valiant approof.
LAFEU: You have it from his own deliverance.
BERTRAM: And by other warranted testimony.
LAFEU: Then my dial goes not true: I took this lark for a bunting.
BERTRAM: I do assure you, my lord, he is very great inknowledge and accordingly valiant.
LAFEU: I have then sinned against his experience andtransgressed against his valour; and my state thatway is dangerous, since I cannot yet find in myheart to repent. Here he comes: I pray you, makeus friends; I will pursue the amity.Enter PAROLLES
PAROLLES: To BERTRAMThese things shall be done, sir.
LAFEU: Pray you, sir, who's his tailor?
PAROLLES: Sir?
LAFEU: O, I know him well, I, sir; he, sir, 's a goodworkman, a very good tailor.
BERTRAM: Aside to PAROLLESIs she gone to the king?
PAROLLES: She is.
BERTRAM: Will she away to-night?
PAROLLES: As you'll have her.
BERTRAM: I have writ my letters, casketed my treasure,Given order for our horses; and to-night,When I should take possession of the bride,End ere I do begin.
LAFEU: A good traveller is something at the latter end of adinner; but one that lies three thirds and uses aknown truth to pass a thousand nothings with, shouldbe once heard and thrice beaten. God save you, captain.
BERTRAM: Is there any unkindness between my lord and you, monsieur?
PAROLLES: I know not how I have deserved to run into my lord'sdispleasure.
LAFEU: You have made shift to run into 't, boots and spursand all, like him that leaped into the custard; andout of it you'll run again, rather than sufferquestion for your residence.
BERTRAM: It may be you have mistaken him, my lord.
LAFEU: And shall do so ever, though I took him at 'sprayers. Fare you well, my lord; and believe thisof me, there can be no kernel in this light nut; thesoul of this man is his clothes. Trust him not inmatter of heavy consequence; I have kept of themtame, and know their natures. Farewell, monsieur:I have spoken better of you than you have or will todeserve at my hand; but we must do good against evil.Exit
PAROLLES: An idle lord. I swear.
BERTRAM: I think so.
PAROLLES: Why, do you not know him?
BERTRAM: Yes, I do know him well, and common speechGives him a worthy pass. Here comes my clog.Enter HELENA
HELENA: I have, sir, as I was commanded from you,Spoke with the king and have procured his leaveFor present parting; only he desiresSome private speech with you.
BERTRAM: I shall obey his will.You must not marvel, Helen, at my course,Which holds not colour with the time, nor doesThe ministration and required officeOn my particular. Prepared I was notFor such a business; therefore am I foundSo much unsettled: this drives me to entreat youThat presently you take our way for home;And rather muse than ask why I entreat you,For my respects are better than they seemAnd my appointments have in them a needGreater than shows itself at the first viewTo you that know them not. This to my mother:Giving a letter'Twill be two days ere I shall see you, soI leave you to your wisdom.
HELENA: Sir, I can nothing say,But that I am your most obedient servant.
BERTRAM: Come, come, no more of that.
HELENA: And ever shallWith true observance seek to eke out thatWherein toward me my homely stars have fail'dTo equal my great fortune.
BERTRAM: Let that go:My haste is very great: farewell; hie home.
HELENA: Pray, sir, your pardon.
BERTRAM: Well, what would you say?
HELENA: I am not worthy of the wealth I owe,Nor dare I say 'tis mine, and yet it is;But, like a timorous thief, most fain would stealWhat law does vouch mine own.
BERTRAM: What would you have?
HELENA: Something; and scarce so much: nothing, indeed.I would not tell you what I would, my lord:Faith yes;Strangers and foes do sunder, and not kiss.
BERTRAM: I pray you, stay not, but in haste to horse.
HELENA: I shall not break your bidding, good my lord.
BERTRAM: Where are my other men, monsieur? Farewell.Exit HELENAGo thou toward home; where I will never comeWhilst I can shake my sword or hear the drum.Away, and for our flight.
PAROLLES: Bravely, coragio!Exeunt
ACT III
SCENE I. Florence. The DUKE's palace.Flourish. Enter the DUKE of Florence attended; the two Frenchmen, with a troop of soldiers.
DUKE: So that from point to point now have you heardThe fundamental reasons of this war,Whose great decision hath much blood let forthAnd more thirsts after.
First Lord: Holy seems the quarrelUpon your grace's part; black and fearfulOn the opposer.
DUKE: Therefore we marvel much our cousin FranceWould in so just a business shut his bosomAgainst our borrowing prayers.
Second Lord: Good my lord,The reasons of our state I cannot yield,But like a common and an outward man,That the great figure of a council framesBy self-unable motion: therefore dare notSay what I think of it, since I have foundMyself in my incertain grounds to failAs often as I guess'd.
DUKE: Be it his pleasure.
First Lord: But I am sure the younger of our nature,That surfeit on their ease, will day by dayCome here for physic.
DUKE: Welcome shall they be;And all the honours that can fly from usShall on them settle. You know your places well;When better fall, for your avails they fell:To-morrow to the field.Flourish. Exeunt
SCENE II. Rousillon. The COUNT's palace.Enter COUNTESS and Clown
COUNTESS: It hath happened all as I would have had it, savethat he comes not along with her.
Clown: By my troth, I take my young lord to be a verymelancholy man.
COUNTESS: By what observance, I pray you?
Clown: Why, he will look upon his boot and sing; mend theruff and sing; ask questions and sing; pick histeeth and sing. I know a man that had this trick ofmelancholy sold a goodly manor for a song.
COUNTESS: Let me see what he writes, and when he means to come.Opening a letter
Clown: I have no mind to Isbel since I was at court: ourold ling and our Isbels o' the country are nothinglike your old ling and your Isbels o' the court:the brains of my Cupid's knocked out, and I begin tolove, as an old man loves money, with no stomach.
COUNTESS: What have we here?
Clown: E'en that you have there.Exit
COUNTESS: ReadsI have sent you a daughter-in-law: she hathrecovered the king, and undone me. I have weddedher, not bedded her; and sworn to make the 'not'eternal. You shall hear I am run away: know itbefore the report come. If there be breadth enoughin the world, I will hold a long distance. My dutyto you. Your unfortunate son,BERTRAM.This is not well, rash and unbridled boy.To fly the favours of so good a king;To pluck his indignation on thy headBy the misprising of a maid too virtuousFor the contempt of empire.Re-enter Clown
Clown: O madam, yonder is heavy news within between twosoldiers and my young lady!
COUNTESS: What is the matter?
Clown: Nay, there is some comfort in the news, somecomfort; your son will not be killed so soon as Ithought he would.
COUNTESS: Why should he be killed?
Clown: So say I, madam, if he run away, as I hear he does:the danger is in standing to't; that's the loss ofmen, though it be the getting of children. Herethey come will tell you more: for my part, I onlyhear your son was run away.ExitEnter HELENA, and two Gentlemen
First Gentleman: Save you, good madam.
HELENA: Madam, my lord is gone, for ever gone.
Second Gentleman: Do not say so.
COUNTESS: Think upon patience. Pray you, gentlemen,I have felt so many quirks of joy and grief,That the first face of neither, on the start,Can woman me unto't: where is my son, I pray you?
Second Gentleman: Madam, he's gone to serve the duke of Florence:We met him thitherward; for thence we came,And, after some dispatch in hand at court,Thither we bend again.
HELENA: Look on his letter, madam; here's my passport.ReadsWhen thou canst get the ring upon my finger whichnever shall come off, and show me a child begottenof thy body that I am father to, then call mehusband: but in such a 'then' I write a 'never.'This is a dreadful sentence.
COUNTESS: Brought you this letter, gentlemen?
First Gentleman: Ay, madam;And for the contents' sake are sorry for our pain.
COUNTESS: I prithee, lady, have a better cheer;If thou engrossest all the griefs are thine,Thou robb'st me of a moiety: he was my son;But I do wash his name out of my blood,And thou art all my child. Towards Florence is he?
Second Gentleman: Ay, madam.
COUNTESS: And to be a soldier?
Second Gentleman: Such is his noble purpose; and believe 't,The duke will lay upon him all the honourThat good convenience claims.
COUNTESS: Return you thither?
First Gentleman: Ay, madam, with the swiftest wing of speed.
HELENA: ReadsTill I have no wife I have nothing in France.'Tis bitter.
COUNTESS: Find you that there?
HELENA: Ay, madam.
First Gentleman: 'Tis but the boldness of his hand, haply, which hisheart was not consenting to.
COUNTESS: Nothing in France, until he have no wife!There's nothing here that is too good for himBut only she; and she deserves a lordThat twenty such rude boys might tend uponAnd call her hourly mistress. Who was with him?
First Gentleman: A servant only, and a gentlemanWhich I have sometime known.
COUNTESS: Parolles, was it not?
First Gentleman: Ay, my good lady, he.
COUNTESS: A very tainted fellow, and full of wickedness.My son corrupts a well-derived natureWith his inducement.
First Gentleman: Indeed, good lady,The fellow has a deal of that too much,Which holds him much to have.
COUNTESS: You're welcome, gentlemen.I will entreat you, when you see my son,To tell him that his sword can never winThe honour that he loses: more I'll entreat youWritten to bear along.
Second Gentleman: We serve you, madam,In that and all your worthiest affairs.
COUNTESS: Not so, but as we change our courtesies.Will you draw near!Exeunt COUNTESS and Gentlemen
HELENA: 'Till I have no wife, I have nothing in France.'Nothing in France, until he has no wife!Thou shalt have none, Rousillon, none in France;Then hast thou all again. Poor lord! is't IThat chase thee from thy country and exposeThose tender limbs of thine to the eventOf the none-sparing war? and is it IThat drive thee from the sportive court, where thouWast shot at with fair eyes, to be the markOf smoky muskets? O you leaden messengers,That ride upon the violent speed of fire,Fly with false aim; move the still-peering air,That sings with piercing; do not touch my lord.Whoever shoots at him, I set him there;Whoever charges on his forward breast,I am the caitiff that do hold him to't;And, though I kill him not, I am the causeHis death was so effected: better 'twereI met the ravin lion when he roar'dWith sharp constraint of hunger; better 'twereThat all the miseries which nature owesWere mine at once. No, come thou home, Rousillon,Whence honour but of danger wins a scar,As oft it loses all: I will be gone;My being here it is that holds thee hence:Shall I stay here to do't? no, no, althoughThe air of paradise did fan the houseAnd angels officed all: I will be gone,That pitiful rumour may report my flight,To consolate thine ear. Come, night; end, day!For with the dark, poor thief, I'll steal away.Exit
SCENE III. Florence. Before the DUKE's palace.Flourish. Enter the DUKE of Florence, BERTRAM, PAROLLES, Soldiers, Drum, and Trumpets
DUKE: The general of our horse thou art; and we,Great in our hope, lay our best love and credenceUpon thy promising fortune.
BERTRAM: Sir, it isA charge too heavy for my strength, but yetWe'll strive to bear it for your worthy sakeTo the extreme edge of hazard.
DUKE: Then go thou forth;And fortune play upon thy prosperous helm,As thy auspicious mistress!
BERTRAM: This very day,Great Mars, I put myself into thy file:Make me but like my thoughts, and I shall proveA lover of thy drum, hater of love.Exeunt
SCENE IV. Rousillon. The COUNT's palace.Enter COUNTESS and Steward
COUNTESS: Alas! and would you take the letter of her?Might you not know she would do as she has done,By sending me a letter? Read it again.
Steward: ReadsI am Saint Jaques' pilgrim, thither gone:Ambitious love hath so in me offended,That barefoot plod I the cold ground upon,With sainted vow my faults to have amended.Write, write, that from the bloody course of warMy dearest master, your dear son, may hie:Bless him at home in peace, whilst I from farHis name with zealous fervor sanctify:His taken labours bid him me forgive;I, his despiteful Juno, sent him forthFrom courtly friends, with camping foes to live,Where death and danger dogs the heels of worth:He is too good and fair for death and me:Whom I myself embrace, to set him free.
COUNTESS: Ah, what sharp stings are in her mildest words!Rinaldo, you did never lack advice so much,As letting her pass so: had I spoke with her,I could have well diverted her intents,Which thus she hath prevented.
Steward: Pardon me, madam:If I had given you this at over-night,She might have been o'erta'en; and yet she writes,Pursuit would be but vain.
COUNTESS: What angel shallBless this unworthy husband? he cannot thrive,Unless her prayers, whom heaven delights to hearAnd loves to grant, reprieve him from the wrathOf greatest justice. Write, write, Rinaldo,To this unworthy husband of his wife;Let every word weigh heavy of her worthThat he does weigh too light: my greatest grief.Though little he do feel it, set down sharply.Dispatch the most convenient messenger:When haply he shall hear that she is gone,He will return; and hope I may that she,Hearing so much, will speed her foot again,Led hither by pure love: which of them bothIs dearest to me. I have no skill in senseTo make distinction: provide this messenger:My heart is heavy and mine age is weak;Grief would have tears, and sorrow bids me speak.Exeunt
SCENE V. Florence. Without the walls. A tucket afar off.Enter an old Widow of Florence, DIANA, VIOLENTA, and MARIANA, with other Citizens
Widow: Nay, come; for if they do approach the city, weshall lose all the sight.
DIANA: They say the French count has done most honourable service.
Widow: It is reported that he has taken their greatestcommander; and that with his own hand he slew theduke's brother.TucketWe have lost our labour; they are gone a contraryway: hark! you may know by their trumpets.
MARIANA: Come, let's return again, and suffice ourselves withthe report of it. Well, Diana, take heed of thisFrench earl: the honour of a maid is her name; andno legacy is so rich as honesty.
Widow: I have told my neighbour how you have been solicitedby a gentleman his companion.
MARIANA: I know that knave; hang him! one Parolles: afilthy officer he is in those suggestions for theyoung earl. Beware of them, Diana; their promises,enticements, oaths, tokens, and all these engines oflust, are not the things they go under: many a maidhath been seduced by them; and the misery is,example, that so terrible shows in the wreck ofmaidenhood, cannot for all that dissuade succession,but that they are limed with the twigs that threatenthem. I hope I need not to advise you further; butI hope your own grace will keep you where you are,though there were no further danger known but themodesty which is so lost.
DIANA: You shall not need to fear me.
Widow: I hope so.Enter HELENA, disguised like a PilgrimLook, here comes a pilgrim: I know she will lie atmy house; thither they send one another: I'llquestion her. God save you, pilgrim! whither are you bound?
HELENA: To Saint Jaques le Grand.Where do the palmers lodge, I do beseech you?
Widow: At the Saint Francis here beside the port.
HELENA: Is this the way?
Widow: Ay, marry, is't.A march afarHark you! they come this way.If you will tarry, holy pilgrim,But till the troops come by,I will conduct you where you shall be lodged;The rather, for I think I know your hostessAs ample as myself.
HELENA: Is it yourself?
Widow: If you shall please so, pilgrim.
HELENA: I thank you, and will stay upon your leisure.
Widow: You came, I think, from France?
HELENA: I did so.
Widow: Here you shall see a countryman of yoursThat has done worthy service.
HELENA: His name, I pray you.
DIANA: The Count Rousillon: know you such a one?
HELENA: But by the ear, that hears most nobly of him:His face I know not.
DIANA: Whatsome'er he is,He's bravely taken here. He stole from France,As 'tis reported, for the king had married himAgainst his liking: think you it is so?
HELENA: Ay, surely, mere the truth: I know his lady.
DIANA: There is a gentleman that serves the countReports but coarsely of her.
HELENA: What's his name?
DIANA: Monsieur Parolles.
HELENA: O, I believe with him,In argument of praise, or to the worthOf the great count himself, she is too meanTo have her name repeated: all her deservingIs a reserved honesty, and thatI have not heard examined.
DIANA: Alas, poor lady!'Tis a hard bondage to become the wifeOf a detesting lord.
Widow: I warrant, good creature, wheresoe'er she is,Her heart weighs sadly: this young maid might do herA shrewd turn, if she pleased.
HELENA: How do you mean?May be the amorous count solicits herIn the unlawful purpose.
Widow: He does indeed;And brokes with all that can in such a suitCorrupt the tender honour of a maid:But she is arm'd for him and keeps her guardIn honestest defence.
MARIANA: The gods forbid else!
Widow: So, now they come:Drum and ColoursEnter BERTRAM, PAROLLES, and the whole armyThat is Antonio, the duke's eldest son;That, Escalus.
HELENA: Which is the Frenchman?
DIANA: He;That with the plume: 'tis a most gallant fellow.I would he loved his wife: if he were honesterHe were much goodlier: is't not a handsome gentleman?
HELENA: I like him well.
DIANA: 'Tis pity he is not honest: yond's that same knaveThat leads him to these places: were I his lady,I would Poison that vile rascal.
HELENA: Which is he?
DIANA: That jack-an-apes with scarfs: why is he melancholy?
HELENA: Perchance he's hurt i' the battle.
PAROLLES: Lose our drum! well.
MARIANA: He's shrewdly vexed at something: look, he has spied us.
Widow: Marry, hang you!
MARIANA: And your courtesy, for a ring-carrier!Exeunt BERTRAM, PAROLLES, and army
Widow: The troop is past. Come, pilgrim, I will bring youWhere you shall host: of enjoin'd penitentsThere's four or five, to great Saint Jaques bound,Already at my house.
HELENA: I humbly thank you:Please it this matron and this gentle maidTo eat with us to-night, the charge and thankingShall be for me; and, to requite you further,I will bestow some precepts of this virginWorthy the note.
BOTH: We'll take your offer kindly.Exeunt
SCENE VI. Camp before Florence.Enter BERTRAM and the two French Lords
Second Lord: Nay, good my lord, put him to't; let him have hisway.
First Lord: If your lordship find him not a hilding, hold me nomore in your respect.
Second Lord: On my life, my lord, a bubble.
BERTRAM: Do you think I am so far deceived in him?
Second Lord: Believe it, my lord, in mine own direct knowledge,without any malice, but to speak of him as mykinsman, he's a most notable coward, an infinite andendless liar, an hourly promise-breaker, the ownerof no one good quality worthy your lordship'sentertainment.
First Lord: It were fit you knew him; lest, reposing too far inhis virtue, which he hath not, he might at somegreat and trusty business in a main danger fail you.
BERTRAM: I would I knew in what particular action to try him.
First Lord: None better than to let him fetch off his drum,which you hear him so confidently undertake to do.
Second Lord: I, with a troop of Florentines, will suddenlysurprise him; such I will have, whom I am sure heknows not from the enemy: we will bind and hoodwinkhim so, that he shall suppose no other but that heis carried into the leaguer of the adversaries, whenwe bring him to our own tents. Be but your lordshippresent at his examination: if he do not, for thepromise of his life and in the highest compulsion ofbase fear, offer to betray you and deliver all theintelligence in his power against you, and that withthe divine forfeit of his soul upon oath, nevertrust my judgment in any thing.
First Lord: O, for the love of laughter, let him fetch his drum;he says he has a stratagem for't: when yourlordship sees the bottom of his success in't, and towhat metal this counterfeit lump of ore will bemelted, if you give him not John Drum'sentertainment, your inclining cannot be removed.Here he comes.Enter PAROLLES
Second Lord: Aside to BERTRAMO, for the love of laughter,hinder not the honour of his design: let him fetchoff his drum in any hand.
BERTRAM: How now, monsieur! this drum sticks sorely in yourdisposition.
First Lord: A pox on't, let it go; 'tis but a drum.
PAROLLES: 'But a drum'! is't 'but a drum'? A drum so lost!There was excellent command,--to charge in with ourhorse upon our own wings, and to rend our own soldiers!
First Lord: That was not to be blamed in the command of theservice: it was a disaster of war that Caesarhimself could not have prevented, if he had beenthere to command.
BERTRAM: Well, we cannot greatly condemn our success: somedishonour we had in the loss of that drum; but it isnot to be recovered.
PAROLLES: It might have been recovered.
BERTRAM: It might; but it is not now.
PAROLLES: It is to be recovered: but that the merit ofservice is seldom attributed to the true and exactperformer, I would have that drum or another, or'hic jacet.'
BERTRAM: Why, if you have a stomach, to't, monsieur: if youthink your mystery in stratagem can bring thisinstrument of honour again into his native quarter,be magnanimous in the enterprise and go on; I willgrace the attempt for a worthy exploit: if youspeed well in it, the duke shall both speak of it.and extend to you what further becomes hisgreatness, even to the utmost syllable of yourworthiness.
PAROLLES: By the hand of a soldier, I will undertake it.
BERTRAM: But you must not now slumber in it.
PAROLLES: I'll about it this evening: and I will presentlypen down my dilemmas, encourage myself in mycertainty, put myself into my mortal preparation;and by midnight look to hear further from me.
BERTRAM: May I be bold to acquaint his grace you are gone about it?
PAROLLES: I know not what the success will be, my lord; butthe attempt I vow.
BERTRAM: I know thou'rt valiant; and, to the possibility ofthy soldiership, will subscribe for thee. Farewell.
PAROLLES: I love not many words.Exit
Second Lord: No more than a fish loves water. Is not this astrange fellow, my lord, that so confidently seemsto undertake this business, which he knows is not tobe done; damns himself to do and dares better bedamned than to do't?
First Lord: You do not know him, my lord, as we do: certain itis that he will steal himself into a man's favour andfor a week escape a great deal of discoveries; butwhen you find him out, you have him ever after.
BERTRAM: Why, do you think he will make no deed at all ofthis that so seriously he does address himself unto?
Second Lord: None in the world; but return with an invention andclap upon you two or three probable lies: but wehave almost embossed him; you shall see his fallto-night; for indeed he is not for your lordship's respect.
First Lord: We'll make you some sport with the fox ere we casehim. He was first smoked by the old lord Lafeu:when his disguise and he is parted, tell me what asprat you shall find him; which you shall see thisvery night.
Second Lord: I must go look my twigs: he shall be caught.
BERTRAM: Your brother he shall go along with me.
Second Lord: As't please your lordship: I'll leave you.Exit
BERTRAM: Now will I lead you to the house, and show youThe lass I spoke of.
First Lord: But you say she's honest.
BERTRAM: That's all the fault: I spoke with her but onceAnd found her wondrous cold; but I sent to her,By this same coxcomb that we have i' the wind,Tokens and letters which she did re-send;And this is all I have done. She's a fair creature:Will you go see her?
First Lord: With all my heart, my lord.Exeunt
SCENE VII. Florence. The Widow's house.Enter HELENA and Widow
HELENA: If you misdoubt me that I am not she,I know not how I shall assure you further,But I shall lose the grounds I work upon.
Widow: Though my estate be fallen, I was well born,Nothing acquainted with these businesses;And would not put my reputation nowIn any staining act.
HELENA: Nor would I wish you.First, give me trust, the count he is my husband,And what to your sworn counsel I have spokenIs so from word to word; and then you cannot,By the good aid that I of you shall borrow,Err in bestowing it.
Widow: I should believe you:For you have show'd me that which well approvesYou're great in fortune.
HELENA: Take this purse of gold,And let me buy your friendly help thus far,Which I will over-pay and pay againWhen I have found it. The count he wooes your daughter,Lays down his wanton siege before her beauty,Resolved to carry her: let her in fine consent,As we'll direct her how 'tis best to bear it.Now his important blood will nought denyThat she'll demand: a ring the county wears,That downward hath succeeded in his houseFrom son to son, some four or five descentsSince the first father wore it: this ring he holdsIn most rich choice; yet in his idle fire,To buy his will, it would not seem too dear,Howe'er repented after.
Widow: Now I seeThe bottom of your purpose.
HELENA: You see it lawful, then: it is no more,But that your daughter, ere she seems as won,Desires this ring; appoints him an encounter;In fine, delivers me to fill the time,Herself most chastely absent: after this,To marry her, I'll add three thousand crownsTo what is passed already.
Widow: I have yielded:Instruct my daughter how she shall persever,That time and place with this deceit so lawfulMay prove coherent. Every night he comesWith musics of all sorts and songs composedTo her unworthiness: it nothing steads usTo chide him from our eaves; for he persistsAs if his life lay on't.
HELENA: Why then to-nightLet us assay our plot; which, if it speed,Is wicked meaning in a lawful deedAnd lawful meaning in a lawful act,Where both not sin, and yet a sinful fact:But let's about it.Exeunt
ACT IV
SCENE I. Without the Florentine camp.Enter Second French Lord, with five or six other Soldiers in ambush
Second Lord: He can come no other way but by this hedge-corner.When you sally upon him, speak what terriblelanguage you will: though you understand it notyourselves, no matter; for we must not seem tounderstand him, unless some one among us whom wemust produce for an interpreter.
First Soldier: Good captain, let me be the interpreter.
Second Lord: Art not acquainted with him? knows he not thy voice?
First Soldier: No, sir, I warrant you.
Second Lord: But what linsey-woolsey hast thou to speak to us again?
First Soldier: E'en such as you speak to me.
Second Lord: He must think us some band of strangers i' theadversary's entertainment. Now he hath a smack ofall neighbouring languages; therefore we must everyone be a man of his own fancy, not to know what wespeak one to another; so we seem to know, is toknow straight our purpose: choughs' language,gabble enough, and good enough. As for you,interpreter, you must seem very politic. But couch,ho! here he comes, to beguile two hours in a sleep,and then to return and swear the lies he forges.Enter PAROLLES
PAROLLES: Ten o'clock: within these three hours 'twill betime enough to go home. What shall I say I havedone? It must be a very plausive invention thatcarries it: they begin to smoke me; and disgraceshave of late knocked too often at my door. I findmy tongue is too foolhardy; but my heart hath thefear of Mars before it and of his creatures, notdaring the reports of my tongue.
Second Lord: This is the first truth that e'er thine own tonguewas guilty of.
PAROLLES: What the devil should move me to undertake therecovery of this drum, being not ignorant of theimpossibility, and knowing I had no such purpose? Imust give myself some hurts, and say I got them inexploit: yet slight ones will not carry it; theywill say, 'Came you off with so little?' and greatones I dare not give. Wherefore, what's theinstance? Tongue, I must put you into abutter-woman's mouth and buy myself another ofBajazet's mule, if you prattle me into these perils.
Second Lord: Is it possible he should know what he is, and bethat he is?
PAROLLES: I would the cutting of my garments would serve theturn, or the breaking of my Spanish sword.
Second Lord: We cannot afford you so.
PAROLLES: Or the baring of my beard; and to say it was instratagem.
Second Lord: 'Twould not do.
PAROLLES: Or to drown my clothes, and say I was stripped.
Second Lord: Hardly serve.
PAROLLES: Though I swore I leaped from the window of the citadel.
Second Lord: How deep?
PAROLLES: Thirty fathom.
Second Lord: Three great oaths would scarce make that be believed.
PAROLLES: I would I had any drum of the enemy's: I would swearI recovered it.
Second Lord: You shall hear one anon.
PAROLLES: A drum now of the enemy's,--Alarum within
Second Lord: Throca movousus, cargo, cargo, cargo.
All: Cargo, cargo, cargo, villiando par corbo, cargo.
PAROLLES: O, ransom, ransom! do not hide mine eyes.They seize and blindfold him
First Soldier: Boskos thromuldo boskos.
PAROLLES: I know you are the Muskos' regiment:And I shall lose my life for want of language;If there be here German, or Dane, low Dutch,Italian, or French, let him speak to me; I'llDiscover that which shall undo the Florentine.
First Soldier: Boskos vauvado: I understand thee, and can speakthy tongue. Kerely bonto, sir, betake thee to thyfaith, for seventeen poniards are at thy bosom.
PAROLLES: O!
First Soldier: O, pray, pray, pray! Manka revania dulche.
Second Lord: Oscorbidulchos volivorco.
First Soldier: The general is content to spare thee yet;And, hoodwink'd as thou art, will lead thee onTo gather from thee: haply thou mayst informSomething to save thy life.
PAROLLES: O, let me live!And all the secrets of our camp I'll show,Their force, their purposes; nay, I'll speak thatWhich you will wonder at.
First Soldier: But wilt thou faithfully?
PAROLLES: If I do not, damn me.
First Soldier: Acordo linta.Come on; thou art granted space.Exit, with PAROLLES guarded. A short alarum within
Second Lord: Go, tell the Count Rousillon, and my brother,We have caught the woodcock, and will keep him muffledTill we do hear from them.
Second Soldier: Captain, I will.
Second Lord: A' will betray us all unto ourselves:Inform on that.
Second Soldier: So I will, sir.
Second Lord: Till then I'll keep him dark and safely lock'd.Exeunt
SCENE II. Florence. The Widow's house.Enter BERTRAM and DIANA
BERTRAM: They told me that your name was Fontibell.
DIANA: No, my good lord, Diana.
BERTRAM: Titled goddess;And worth it, with addition! But, fair soul,In your fine frame hath love no quality?If quick fire of youth light not your mind,You are no maiden, but a monument:When you are dead, you should be such a oneAs you are now, for you are cold and stem;And now you should be as your mother wasWhen your sweet self was got.
DIANA: She then was honest.
BERTRAM: So should you be.
DIANA: No:My mother did but duty; such, my lord,As you owe to your wife.
BERTRAM: No more o' that;I prithee, do not strive against my vows:I was compell'd to her; but I love theeBy love's own sweet constraint, and will for everDo thee all rights of service.
DIANA: Ay, so you serve usTill we serve you; but when you have our roses,You barely leave our thorns to prick ourselvesAnd mock us with our bareness.
BERTRAM: How have I sworn!
DIANA: 'Tis not the many oaths that makes the truth,But the plain single vow that is vow'd true.What is not holy, that we swear not by,But take the High'st to witness: then, pray you, tell me,If I should swear by God's great attributes,I loved you dearly, would you believe my oaths,When I did love you ill? This has no holding,To swear by him whom I protest to love,That I will work against him: therefore your oathsAre words and poor conditions, but unseal'd,At least in my opinion.
BERTRAM: Change it, change it;Be not so holy-cruel: love is holy;And my integrity ne'er knew the craftsThat you do charge men with. Stand no more off,But give thyself unto my sick desires,Who then recover: say thou art mine, and everMy love as it begins shall so persever.
DIANA: I see that men make ropes in such a scarreThat we'll forsake ourselves. Give me that ring.
BERTRAM: I'll lend it thee, my dear; but have no powerTo give it from me.
DIANA: Will you not, my lord?
BERTRAM: It is an honour 'longing to our house,Bequeathed down from many ancestors;Which were the greatest obloquy i' the worldIn me to lose.
DIANA: Mine honour's such a ring:My chastity's the jewel of our house,Bequeathed down from many ancestors;Which were the greatest obloquy i' the worldIn me to lose: thus your own proper wisdomBrings in the champion Honour on my part,Against your vain assault.
BERTRAM: Here, take my ring:My house, mine honour, yea, my life, be thine,And I'll be bid by thee.
DIANA: When midnight comes, knock at my chamber-window:I'll order take my mother shall not hear.Now will I charge you in the band of truth,When you have conquer'd my yet maiden bed,Remain there but an hour, nor speak to me:My reasons are most strong; and you shall know themWhen back again this ring shall be deliver'd:And on your finger in the night I'll putAnother ring, that what in time proceedsMay token to the future our past deeds.Adieu, till then; then, fail not. You have wonA wife of me, though there my hope be done.
BERTRAM: A heaven on earth I have won by wooing thee.Exit
DIANA: For which live long to thank both heaven and me!You may so in the end.My mother told me just how he would woo,As if she sat in 's heart; she says all menHave the like oaths: he had sworn to marry meWhen his wife's dead; therefore I'll lie with himWhen I am buried. Since Frenchmen are so braid,Marry that will, I live and die a maid:Only in this disguise I think't no sinTo cozen him that would unjustly win.Exit
SCENE III. The Florentine camp.Enter the two French Lords and some two or three Soldiers
First Lord: You have not given him his mother's letter?
Second Lord: I have delivered it an hour since: there issomething in't that stings his nature; for on thereading it he changed almost into another man.
First Lord: He has much worthy blame laid upon him for shakingoff so good a wife and so sweet a lady.
Second Lord: Especially he hath incurred the everlastingdispleasure of the king, who had even tuned hisbounty to sing happiness to him. I will tell you athing, but you shall let it dwell darkly with you.
First Lord: When you have spoken it, 'tis dead, and I am thegrave of it.
Second Lord: He hath perverted a young gentlewoman here inFlorence, of a most chaste renown; and this night hefleshes his will in the spoil of her honour: he hathgiven her his monumental ring, and thinks himselfmade in the unchaste composition.
First Lord: Now, God delay our rebellion! as we are ourselves,what things are we!
Second Lord: Merely our own traitors. And as in the common courseof all treasons, we still see them revealthemselves, till they attain to their abhorred ends,so he that in this action contrives against his ownnobility, in his proper stream o'erflows himself.
First Lord: Is it not meant damnable in us, to be trumpeters ofour unlawful intents? We shall not then have hiscompany to-night?
Second Lord: Not till after midnight; for he is dieted to his hour.
First Lord: That approaches apace; I would gladly have him seehis company anatomized, that he might take a measureof his own judgments, wherein so curiously he hadset this counterfeit.
Second Lord: We will not meddle with him till he come; for hispresence must be the whip of the other.
First Lord: In the mean time, what hear you of these wars?
Second Lord: I hear there is an overture of peace.
First Lord: Nay, I assure you, a peace concluded.
Second Lord: What will Count Rousillon do then? will he travelhigher, or return again into France?
First Lord: I perceive, by this demand, you are not altogetherof his council.
Second Lord: Let it be forbid, sir; so should I be a great dealof his act.
First Lord: Sir, his wife some two months since fled from hishouse: her pretence is a pilgrimage to Saint Jaquesle Grand; which holy undertaking with most austeresanctimony she accomplished; and, there residing thetenderness of her nature became as a prey to hergrief; in fine, made a groan of her last breath, andnow she sings in heaven.
Second Lord: How is this justified?
First Lord: The stronger part of it by her own letters, whichmakes her story true, even to the point of herdeath: her death itself, which could not be heroffice to say is come, was faithfully confirmed bythe rector of the place.
Second Lord: Hath the count all this intelligence?
First Lord: Ay, and the particular confirmations, point frompoint, so to the full arming of the verity.
Second Lord: I am heartily sorry that he'll be glad of this.
First Lord: How mightily sometimes we make us comforts of our losses!
Second Lord: And how mightily some other times we drown our gainin tears! The great dignity that his valour hathhere acquired for him shall at home be encounteredwith a shame as ample.
First Lord: The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good andill together: our virtues would be proud, if ourfaults whipped them not; and our crimes woulddespair, if they were not cherished by our virtues.Enter a MessengerHow now! where's your master?
Servant: He met the duke in the street, sir, of whom he hathtaken a solemn leave: his lordship will nextmorning for France. The duke hath offered himletters of commendations to the king.
Second Lord: They shall be no more than needful there, if theywere more than they can commend.
First Lord: They cannot be too sweet for the king's tartness.Here's his lordship now.Enter BERTRAMHow now, my lord! is't not after midnight?
BERTRAM: I have to-night dispatched sixteen businesses, amonth's length a-piece, by an abstract of success:I have congied with the duke, done my adieu with hisnearest; buried a wife, mourned for her; writ to mylady mother I am returning; entertained my convoy;and between these main parcels of dispatch effectedmany nicer needs; the last was the greatest, butthat I have not ended yet.
Second Lord: If the business be of any difficulty, and thismorning your departure hence, it requires haste ofyour lordship.
BERTRAM: I mean, the business is not ended, as fearing tohear of it hereafter. But shall we have thisdialogue between the fool and the soldier? Come,bring forth this counterfeit module, he has deceivedme, like a double-meaning prophesier.
Second Lord: Bring him forth: has sat i' the stocks all night,poor gallant knave.
BERTRAM: No matter: his heels have deserved it, in usurpinghis spurs so long. How does he carry himself?
Second Lord: I have told your lordship already, the stocks carryhim. But to answer you as you would be understood;he weeps like a wench that had shed her milk: hehath confessed himself to Morgan, whom he supposesto be a friar, from the time of his remembrance tothis very instant disaster of his setting i' thestocks: and what think you he hath confessed?
BERTRAM: Nothing of me, has a'?
Second Lord: His confession is taken, and it shall be read to hisface: if your lordship be in't, as I believe youare, you must have the patience to hear it.Enter PAROLLES guarded, and First Soldier
BERTRAM: A plague upon him! muffled! he can say nothing ofme: hush, hush!
First Lord: Hoodman comes! Portotartarosa
First Soldier: He calls for the tortures: what will you saywithout 'em?
PAROLLES: I will confess what I know without constraint: ifye pinch me like a pasty, I can say no more.
First Soldier: Bosko chimurcho.
First Lord: Boblibindo chicurmurco.
First Soldier: You are a merciful general. Our general bids youanswer to what I shall ask you out of a note.
PAROLLES: And truly, as I hope to live.
First Soldier: Reads'First demand of him how many horse theduke is strong.' What say you to that?
PAROLLES: Five or six thousand; but very weak andunserviceable: the troops are all scattered, andthe commanders very poor rogues, upon my reputationand credit and as I hope to live.
First Soldier: Shall I set down your answer so?
PAROLLES: Do: I'll take the sacrament on't, how and which way you will.
BERTRAM: All's one to him. What a past-saving slave is this!
First Lord: You're deceived, my lord: this is MonsieurParolles, the gallant militarist,--that was his ownphrase,--that had the whole theoric of war in theknot of his scarf, and the practise in the chape ofhis dagger.
Second Lord: I will never trust a man again for keeping his swordclean. nor believe he can have every thing in himby wearing his apparel neatly.
First Soldier: Well, that's set down.
PAROLLES: Five or six thousand horse, I said,-- I will saytrue,--or thereabouts, set down, for I'll speak truth.
First Lord: He's very near the truth in this.
BERTRAM: But I con him no thanks for't, in the nature hedelivers it.
PAROLLES: Poor rogues, I pray you, say.
First Soldier: Well, that's set down.
PAROLLES: I humbly thank you, sir: a truth's a truth, therogues are marvellous poor.
First Soldier: Reads'Demand of him, of what strength they area-foot.' What say you to that?
PAROLLES: By my troth, sir, if I were to live this presenthour, I will tell true. Let me see: Spurio, ahundred and fifty; Sebastian, so many; Corambus, somany; Jaques, so many; Guiltian, Cosmo, Lodowick,and Gratii, two hundred and fifty each; mine owncompany, Chitopher, Vaumond, Bentii, two hundred andfifty each: so that the muster-file, rotten andsound, upon my life, amounts not to fifteen thousandpoll; half of the which dare not shake snow from offtheir cassocks, lest they shake themselves to pieces.
BERTRAM: What shall be done to him?
First Lord: Nothing, but let him have thanks. Demand of him mycondition, and what credit I have with the duke.
First Soldier: Well, that's set down.Reads'You shall demand of him, whether one Captain Dumainbe i' the camp, a Frenchman; what his reputation iswith the duke; what his valour, honesty, andexpertness in wars; or whether he thinks it were notpossible, with well-weighing sums of gold, tocorrupt him to revolt.' What say you to this? whatdo you know of it?
PAROLLES: I beseech you, let me answer to the particular ofthe inter'gatories: demand them singly.
First Soldier: Do you know this Captain Dumain?
PAROLLES: I know him: a' was a botcher's 'prentice in Paris,from whence he was whipped for getting the shrieve'sfool with child,--a dumb innocent, that could notsay him nay.
BERTRAM: Nay, by your leave, hold your hands; though I knowhis brains are forfeit to the next tile that falls.
First Soldier: Well, is this captain in the duke of Florence's camp?
PAROLLES: Upon my knowledge, he is, and lousy.
First Lord: Nay look not so upon me; we shall hear of yourlordship anon.
First Soldier: What is his reputation with the duke?
PAROLLES: The duke knows him for no other but a poor officerof mine; and writ to me this other day to turn himout o' the band: I think I have his letter in my pocket.
First Soldier: Marry, we'll search.
PAROLLES: In good sadness, I do not know; either it is there,or it is upon a file with the duke's other lettersin my tent.
First Soldier: Here 'tis; here's a paper: shall I read it to you?
PAROLLES: I do not know if it be it or no.
BERTRAM: Our interpreter does it well.
First Lord: Excellently.
First Soldier: Reads'Dian, the count's a fool, and full of gold,'--
PAROLLES: That is not the duke's letter, sir; that is anadvertisement to a proper maid in Florence, oneDiana, to take heed of the allurement of one CountRousillon, a foolish idle boy, but for all that veryruttish: I pray you, sir, put it up again.
First Soldier: Nay, I'll read it first, by your favour.
PAROLLES: My meaning in't, I protest, was very honest in thebehalf of the maid; for I knew the young count to bea dangerous and lascivious boy, who is a whale tovirginity and devours up all the fry it finds.
BERTRAM: Damnable both-sides rogue!
First Soldier: Reads'When he swears oaths, bid him drop gold, and take it;After he scores, he never pays the score:Half won is match well made; match, and well make it;He ne'er pays after-debts, take it before;And say a soldier, Dian, told thee this,Men are to mell with, boys are not to kiss:For count of this, the count's a fool, I know it,Who pays before, but not when he does owe it.Thine, as he vowed to thee in thine ear,PAROLLES.'
BERTRAM: He shall be whipped through the army with this rhymein's forehead.
Second Lord: This is your devoted friend, sir, the manifoldlinguist and the armipotent soldier.
BERTRAM: I could endure any thing before but a cat, and nowhe's a cat to me.
First Soldier: I perceive, sir, by the general's looks, we shall befain to hang you.
PAROLLES: My life, sir, in any case: not that I am afraid todie; but that, my offences being many, I wouldrepent out the remainder of nature: let me live,sir, in a dungeon, i' the stocks, or any where, so I may live.
First Soldier: We'll see what may be done, so you confess freely;therefore, once more to this Captain Dumain: youhave answered to his reputation with the duke and tohis valour: what is his honesty?
PAROLLES: He will steal, sir, an egg out of a cloister: forrapes and ravishments he parallels Nessus: heprofesses not keeping of oaths; in breaking 'em heis stronger than Hercules: he will lie, sir, withsuch volubility, that you would think truth were afool: drunkenness is his best virtue, for he willbe swine-drunk; and in his sleep he does littleharm, save to his bed-clothes about him; but theyknow his conditions and lay him in straw. I have butlittle more to say, sir, of his honesty: he hasevery thing that an honest man should not have; whatan honest man should have, he has nothing.
First Lord: I begin to love him for this.
BERTRAM: For this description of thine honesty? A pox uponhim for me, he's more and more a cat.
First Soldier: What say you to his expertness in war?
PAROLLES: Faith, sir, he has led the drum before the Englishtragedians; to belie him, I will not, and more ofhis soldiership I know not; except, in that countryhe had the honour to be the officer at a place therecalled Mile-end, to instruct for the doubling offiles: I would do the man what honour I can, but ofthis I am not certain.
First Lord: He hath out-villained villany so far, that therarity redeems him.
BERTRAM: A pox on him, he's a cat still.
First Soldier: His qualities being at this poor price, I need notto ask you if gold will corrupt him to revolt.
PAROLLES: Sir, for a quart d'ecu he will sell the fee-simpleof his salvation, the inheritance of it; and cut theentail from all remainders, and a perpetualsuccession for it perpetually.
First Soldier: What's his brother, the other Captain Dumain?
Second Lord: Why does be ask him of me?
First Soldier: What's he?
PAROLLES: E'en a crow o' the same nest; not altogether sogreat as the first in goodness, but greater a greatdeal in evil: he excels his brother for a coward,yet his brother is reputed one of the best that is:in a retreat he outruns any lackey; marry, in comingon he has the cramp.
First Soldier: If your life be saved, will you undertake to betraythe Florentine?
PAROLLES: Ay, and the captain of his horse, Count Rousillon.
First Soldier: I'll whisper with the general, and know his pleasure.
PAROLLES: AsideI'll no more drumming; a plague of alldrums! Only to seem to deserve well, and tobeguile the supposition of that lascivious young boythe count, have I run into this danger. Yet whowould have suspected an ambush where I was taken?
First Soldier: There is no remedy, sir, but you must die: thegeneral says, you that have so traitorouslydiscovered the secrets of your army and made suchpestiferous reports of men very nobly held, canserve the world for no honest use; therefore youmust die. Come, headsman, off with his head.
PAROLLES: O Lord, sir, let me live, or let me see my death!
First Lord: That shall you, and take your leave of all your friends.Unblinding himSo, look about you: know you any here?
BERTRAM: Good morrow, noble captain.
Second Lord: God bless you, Captain Parolles.
First Lord: God save you, noble captain.
Second Lord: Captain, what greeting will you to my Lord Lafeu?I am for France.
First Lord: Good captain, will you give me a copy of the sonnetyou writ to Diana in behalf of the Count Rousillon?an I were not a very coward, I'ld compel it of you:but fare you well.Exeunt BERTRAM and Lords
First Soldier: You are undone, captain, all but your scarf; thathas a knot on't yet
PAROLLES: Who cannot be crushed with a plot?
First Soldier: If you could find out a country where but women werethat had received so much shame, you might begin animpudent nation. Fare ye well, sir; I am for Francetoo: we shall speak of you there.Exit with Soldiers
PAROLLES: Yet am I thankful: if my heart were great,'Twould burst at this. Captain I'll be no more;But I will eat and drink, and sleep as softAs captain shall: simply the thing I amShall make me live. Who knows himself a braggart,Let him fear this, for it will come to passthat every braggart shall be found an ass.Rust, sword? cool, blushes! and, Parolles, liveSafest in shame! being fool'd, by foolery thrive!There's place and means for every man alive.I'll after them.Exit
SCENE IV. Florence. The Widow's house.Enter HELENA, Widow, and DIANA
HELENA: That you may well perceive I have not wrong'd you,One of the greatest in the Christian worldShall be my surety; 'fore whose throne 'tis needful,Ere I can perfect mine intents, to kneel:Time was, I did him a desired office,Dear almost as his life; which gratitudeThrough flinty Tartar's bosom would peep forth,And answer, thanks: I duly am inform'dHis grace is at Marseilles; to which placeWe have convenient convoy. You must knowI am supposed dead: the army breaking,My husband hies him home; where, heaven aiding,And by the leave of my good lord the king,We'll be before our welcome.
Widow: Gentle madam,You never had a servant to whose trustYour business was more welcome.
HELENA: Nor you, mistress,Ever a friend whose thoughts more truly labourTo recompense your love: doubt not but heavenHath brought me up to be your daughter's dower,As it hath fated her to be my motiveAnd helper to a husband. But, O strange men!That can such sweet use make of what they hate,When saucy trusting of the cozen'd thoughtsDefiles the pitchy night: so lust doth playWith what it loathes for that which is away.But more of this hereafter. You, Diana,Under my poor instructions yet must sufferSomething in my behalf.
DIANA: Let death and honestyGo with your impositions, I am yoursUpon your will to suffer.
HELENA: Yet, I pray you:But with the word the time will bring on summer,When briers shall have leaves as well as thorns,And be as sweet as sharp. We must away;Our wagon is prepared, and time revives us:All's well that ends well; still the fine's the crown;Whate'er the course, the end is the renown.Exeunt
SCENE V. Rousillon. The COUNT's palace.Enter COUNTESS, LAFEU, and Clown
LAFEU: No, no, no, your son was misled with a snipt-taffetafellow there, whose villanous saffron would havemade all the unbaked and doughy youth of a nation inhis colour: your daughter-in-law had been alive atthis hour, and your son here at home, more advancedby the king than by that red-tailed humble-bee I speak of.
COUNTESS: I would I had not known him; it was the death of themost virtuous gentlewoman that ever nature hadpraise for creating. If she had partaken of myflesh, and cost me the dearest groans of a mother, Icould not have owed her a more rooted love.
LAFEU: 'Twas a good lady, 'twas a good lady: we may pick athousand salads ere we light on such another herb.
Clown: Indeed, sir, she was the sweet marjoram of thesalad, or rather, the herb of grace.
LAFEU: They are not herbs, you knave; they are nose-herbs.
Clown: I am no great Nebuchadnezzar, sir; I have not muchskill in grass.
LAFEU: Whether dost thou profess thyself, a knave or a fool?
Clown: A fool, sir, at a woman's service, and a knave at a man's.
LAFEU: Your distinction?
Clown: I would cozen the man of his wife and do his service.
LAFEU: So you were a knave at his service, indeed.
Clown: And I would give his wife my bauble, sir, to do her service.
LAFEU: I will subscribe for thee, thou art both knave and fool.
Clown: At your service.
LAFEU: No, no, no.
Clown: Why, sir, if I cannot serve you, I can serve asgreat a prince as you are.
LAFEU: Who's that? a Frenchman?
Clown: Faith, sir, a' has an English name; but his fisnomyis more hotter in France than there.
LAFEU: What prince is that?
Clown: The black prince, sir; alias, the prince ofdarkness; alias, the devil.
LAFEU: Hold thee, there's my purse: I give thee not thisto suggest thee from thy master thou talkest of;serve him still.
Clown: I am a woodland fellow, sir, that always loved agreat fire; and the master I speak of ever keeps agood fire. But, sure, he is the prince of theworld; let his nobility remain in's court. I am forthe house with the narrow gate, which I take to betoo little for pomp to enter: some that humblethemselves may; but the many will be too chill andtender, and they'll be for the flowery way thatleads to the broad gate and the great fire.
LAFEU: Go thy ways, I begin to be aweary of thee; and Itell thee so before, because I would not fall outwith thee. Go thy ways: let my horses be welllooked to, without any tricks.
Clown: If I put any tricks upon 'em, sir, they shall bejades' tricks; which are their own right by the law of nature.Exit
LAFEU: A shrewd knave and an unhappy.
COUNTESS: So he is. My lord that's gone made himself muchsport out of him: by his authority he remains here,which he thinks is a patent for his sauciness; and,indeed, he has no pace, but runs where he will.
LAFEU: I like him well; 'tis not amiss. And I was about totell you, since I heard of the good lady's death andthat my lord your son was upon his return home, Imoved the king my master to speak in the behalf ofmy daughter; which, in the minority of them both,his majesty, out of a self-gracious remembrance, didfirst propose: his highness hath promised me to doit: and, to stop up the displeasure he hathconceived against your son, there is no fittermatter. How does your ladyship like it?
COUNTESS: With very much content, my lord; and I wish ithappily effected.
LAFEU: His highness comes post from Marseilles, of as ablebody as when he numbered thirty: he will be hereto-morrow, or I am deceived by him that in suchintelligence hath seldom failed.
COUNTESS: It rejoices me, that I hope I shall see him ere Idie. I have letters that my son will be hereto-night: I shall beseech your lordship to remainwith me till they meet together.
LAFEU: Madam, I was thinking with what manners I mightsafely be admitted.
COUNTESS: You need but plead your honourable privilege.
LAFEU: Lady, of that I have made a bold charter; but Ithank my God it holds yet.Re-enter Clown
Clown: O madam, yonder's my lord your son with a patch ofvelvet on's face: whether there be a scar under'tor no, the velvet knows; but 'tis a goodly patch ofvelvet: his left cheek is a cheek of two pile and ahalf, but his right cheek is worn bare.
LAFEU: A scar nobly got, or a noble scar, is a good liveryof honour; so belike is that.
Clown: But it is your carbonadoed face.
LAFEU: Let us go see your son, I pray you: I long to talkwith the young noble soldier.
Clown: Faith there's a dozen of 'em, with delicate finehats and most courteous feathers, which bow the headand nod at every man.Exeunt
ACT V
SCENE I. Marseilles. A street.Enter HELENA, Widow, and DIANA, with two Attendants
HELENA: But this exceeding posting day and nightMust wear your spirits low; we cannot help it:But since you have made the days and nights as one,To wear your gentle limbs in my affairs,Be bold you do so grow in my requitalAs nothing can unroot you. In happy time;Enter a GentlemanThis man may help me to his majesty's ear,If he would spend his power. God save you, sir.
Gentleman: And you.
HELENA: Sir, I have seen you in the court of France.
Gentleman: I have been sometimes there.
HELENA: I do presume, sir, that you are not fallenFrom the report that goes upon your goodness;An therefore, goaded with most sharp occasions,Which lay nice manners by, I put you toThe use of your own virtues, for the whichI shall continue thankful.
Gentleman: What's your will?
HELENA: That it will please youTo give this poor petition to the king,And aid me with that store of power you haveTo come into his presence.
Gentleman: The king's not here.
HELENA: Not here, sir!
Gentleman: Not, indeed:He hence removed last night and with more hasteThan is his use.
Widow: Lord, how we lose our pains!
HELENA: All's well that ends well yet,Though time seem so adverse and means unfit.I do beseech you, whither is he gone?
Gentleman: Marry, as I take it, to Rousillon;Whither I am going.
HELENA: I do beseech you, sir,Since you are like to see the king before me,Commend the paper to his gracious hand,Which I presume shall render you no blameBut rather make you thank your pains for it.I will come after you with what good speedOur means will make us means.
Gentleman: This I'll do for you.
HELENA: And you shall find yourself to be well thank'd,Whate'er falls more. We must to horse again.Go, go, provide.Exeunt
SCENE II. Rousillon. Before the COUNT's palace.Enter Clown, and PAROLLES, following
PAROLLES: Good Monsieur Lavache, give my Lord Lafeu thisletter: I have ere now, sir, been better known toyou, when I have held familiarity with fresherclothes; but I am now, sir, muddied in fortune'smood, and smell somewhat strong of her strongdispleasure.
Clown: Truly, fortune's displeasure is but sluttish, if itsmell so strongly as thou speakest of: I willhenceforth eat no fish of fortune's buttering.Prithee, allow the wind.
PAROLLES: Nay, you need not to stop your nose, sir; I spakebut by a metaphor.
Clown: Indeed, sir, if your metaphor stink, I will stop mynose; or against any man's metaphor. Prithee, getthee further.
PAROLLES: Pray you, sir, deliver me this paper.
Clown: Foh! prithee, stand away: a paper from fortune'sclose-stool to give to a nobleman! Look, here hecomes himself.Enter LAFEUHere is a purr of fortune's, sir, or of fortune'scat,--but not a musk-cat,--that has fallen into theunclean fishpond of her displeasure, and, as hesays, is muddied withal: pray you, sir, use thecarp as you may; for he looks like a poor, decayed,ingenious, foolish, rascally knave. I do pity hisdistress in my similes of comfort and leave him toyour lordship.Exit
PAROLLES: My lord, I am a man whom fortune hath cruellyscratched.
LAFEU: And what would you have me to do? 'Tis too late topare her nails now. Wherein have you played theknave with fortune, that she should scratch you, whoof herself is a good lady and would not have knavesthrive long under her? There's a quart d'ecu foryou: let the justices make you and fortune friends:I am for other business.
PAROLLES: I beseech your honour to hear me one single word.
LAFEU: You beg a single penny more: come, you shall ha't;save your word.
PAROLLES: My name, my good lord, is Parolles.
LAFEU: You beg more than 'word,' then. Cox my passion!give me your hand. How does your drum?
PAROLLES: O my good lord, you were the first that found me!
LAFEU: Was I, in sooth? and I was the first that lost thee.
PAROLLES: It lies in you, my lord, to bring me in some grace,for you did bring me out.
LAFEU: Out upon thee, knave! dost thou put upon me at onceboth the office of God and the devil? One bringsthee in grace and the other brings thee out.Trumpets soundThe king's coming; I know by his trumpets. Sirrah,inquire further after me; I had talk of you lastnight: though you are a fool and a knave, you shalleat; go to, follow.
PAROLLES: I praise God for you.Exeunt
SCENE III. Rousillon. The COUNT's palace.Flourish. Enter KING, COUNTESS, LAFEU, the two French Lords, with Attendants
KING: We lost a jewel of her; and our esteemWas made much poorer by it: but your son,As mad in folly, lack'd the sense to knowHer estimation home.
COUNTESS: 'Tis past, my liege;And I beseech your majesty to make itNatural rebellion, done i' the blaze of youth;When oil and fire, too strong for reason's force,O'erbears it and burns on.
KING: My honour'd lady,I have forgiven and forgotten all;Though my revenges were high bent upon him,And watch'd the time to shoot.
LAFEU: This I must say,But first I beg my pardon, the young lordDid to his majesty, his mother and his ladyOffence of mighty note; but to himselfThe greatest wrong of all. He lost a wifeWhose beauty did astonish the surveyOf richest eyes, whose words all ears took captive,Whose dear perfection hearts that scorn'd to serveHumbly call'd mistress.
KING: Praising what is lostMakes the remembrance dear. Well, call him hither;We are reconciled, and the first view shall killAll repetition: let him not ask our pardon;The nature of his great offence is dead,And deeper than oblivion we do buryThe incensing relics of it: let him approach,A stranger, no offender; and inform himSo 'tis our will he should.
Gentleman: I shall, my liege.Exit
KING: What says he to your daughter? have you spoke?
LAFEU: All that he is hath reference to your highness.
KING: Then shall we have a match. I have letters sent meThat set him high in fame.Enter BERTRAM
LAFEU: He looks well on't.
KING: I am not a day of season,For thou mayst see a sunshine and a hailIn me at once: but to the brightest beamsDistracted clouds give way; so stand thou forth;The time is fair again.
BERTRAM: My high-repented blames,Dear sovereign, pardon to me.
KING: All is whole;Not one word more of the consumed time.Let's take the instant by the forward top;For we are old, and on our quick'st decreesThe inaudible and noiseless foot of TimeSteals ere we can effect them. You rememberThe daughter of this lord?
BERTRAM: Admiringly, my liege, at firstI stuck my choice upon her, ere my heartDurst make too bold a herald of my tongueWhere the impression of mine eye infixing,Contempt his scornful perspective did lend me,Which warp'd the line of every other favour;Scorn'd a fair colour, or express'd it stolen;Extended or contracted all proportionsTo a most hideous object: thence it cameThat she whom all men praised and whom myself,Since I have lost, have loved, was in mine eyeThe dust that did offend it.
KING: Well excused:That thou didst love her, strikes some scores awayFrom the great compt: but love that comes too late,Like a remorseful pardon slowly carried,To the great sender turns a sour offence,Crying, 'That's good that's gone.' Our rash faultsMake trivial price of serious things we have,Not knowing them until we know their grave:Oft our displeasures, to ourselves unjust,Destroy our friends and after weep their dustOur own love waking cries to see what's done,While shame full late sleeps out the afternoon.Be this sweet Helen's knell, and now forget her.Send forth your amorous token for fair Maudlin:The main consents are had; and here we'll stayTo see our widower's second marriage-day.
COUNTESS: Which better than the first, O dear heaven, bless!Or, ere they meet, in me, O nature, cesse!
LAFEU: Come on, my son, in whom my house's nameMust be digested, give a favour from youTo sparkle in the spirits of my daughter,That she may quickly come.BERTRAM gives a ringBy my old beard,And every hair that's on't, Helen, that's dead,Was a sweet creature: such a ring as this,The last that e'er I took her at court,I saw upon her finger.
BERTRAM: Hers it was not.
KING: Now, pray you, let me see it; for mine eye,While I was speaking, oft was fasten'd to't.This ring was mine; and, when I gave it Helen,I bade her, if her fortunes ever stoodNecessitied to help, that by this tokenI would relieve her. Had you that craft, to reaveherOf what should stead her most?
BERTRAM: My gracious sovereign,Howe'er it pleases you to take it so,The ring was never hers.
COUNTESS: Son, on my life,I have seen her wear it; and she reckon'd itAt her life's rate.
LAFEU: I am sure I saw her wear it.
BERTRAM: You are deceived, my lord; she never saw it:In Florence was it from a casement thrown me,Wrapp'd in a paper, which contain'd the nameOf her that threw it: noble she was, and thoughtI stood engaged: but when I had subscribedTo mine own fortune and inform'd her fullyI could not answer in that course of honourAs she had made the overture, she ceasedIn heavy satisfaction and would neverReceive the ring again.
KING: Plutus himself,That knows the tinct and multiplying medicine,Hath not in nature's mystery more scienceThan I have in this ring: 'twas mine, 'twas Helen's,Whoever gave it you. Then, if you knowThat you are well acquainted with yourself,Confess 'twas hers, and by what rough enforcementYou got it from her: she call'd the saints to suretyThat she would never put it from her finger,Unless she gave it to yourself in bed,Where you have never come, or sent it usUpon her great disaster.
BERTRAM: She never saw it.
KING: Thou speak'st it falsely, as I love mine honour;And makest conjectural fears to come into meWhich I would fain shut out. If it should proveThat thou art so inhuman,--'twill not prove so;--And yet I know not: thou didst hate her deadly,And she is dead; which nothing, but to closeHer eyes myself, could win me to believe,More than to see this ring. Take him away.Guards seize BERTRAMMy fore-past proofs, howe'er the matter fall,Shall tax my fears of little vanity,Having vainly fear'd too little. Away with him!We'll sift this matter further.
BERTRAM: If you shall proveThis ring was ever hers, you shall as easyProve that I husbanded her bed in Florence,Where yet she never was.Exit, guarded
KING: I am wrapp'd in dismal thinkings.Enter a Gentleman
Gentleman: Gracious sovereign,Whether I have been to blame or no, I know not:Here's a petition from a Florentine,Who hath for four or five removes come shortTo tender it herself. I undertook it,Vanquish'd thereto by the fair grace and speechOf the poor suppliant, who by this I knowIs here attending: her business looks in herWith an importing visage; and she told me,In a sweet verbal brief, it did concernYour highness with herself.
KING: ReadsUpon his many protestations to marry mewhen his wife was dead, I blush to say it, he wonme. Now is the Count Rousillon a widower: his vowsare forfeited to me, and my honour's paid to him. Hestole from Florence, taking no leave, and I followhim to his country for justice: grant it me, Oking! in you it best lies; otherwise a seducerflourishes, and a poor maid is undone.DIANA CAPILET.
LAFEU: I will buy me a son-in-law in a fair, and toll forthis: I'll none of him.
KING: The heavens have thought well on thee Lafeu,To bring forth this discovery. Seek these suitors:Go speedily and bring again the count.I am afeard the life of Helen, lady,Was foully snatch'd.
COUNTESS: Now, justice on the doers!Re-enter BERTRAM, guarded
KING: I wonder, sir, sith wives are monsters to you,And that you fly them as you swear them lordship,Yet you desire to marry.Enter Widow and DIANAWhat woman's that?
DIANA: I am, my lord, a wretched Florentine,Derived from the ancient Capilet:My suit, as I do understand, you know,And therefore know how far I may be pitied.
Widow: I am her mother, sir, whose age and honourBoth suffer under this complaint we bring,And both shall cease, without your remedy.
KING: Come hither, count; do you know these women?
BERTRAM: My lord, I neither can nor will denyBut that I know them: do they charge me further?
DIANA: Why do you look so strange upon your wife?
BERTRAM: She's none of mine, my lord.
DIANA: If you shall marry,You give away this hand, and that is mine;You give away heaven's vows, and those are mine;You give away myself, which is known mine;For I by vow am so embodied yours,That she which marries you must marry me,Either both or none.
LAFEU: Your reputation comes too short for my daughter; youare no husband for her.
BERTRAM: My lord, this is a fond and desperate creature,Whom sometime I have laugh'd with: let your highnessLay a more noble thought upon mine honourThan for to think that I would sink it here.
KING: Sir, for my thoughts, you have them ill to friendTill your deeds gain them: fairer prove your honourThan in my thought it lies.
DIANA: Good my lord,Ask him upon his oath, if he does thinkHe had not my virginity.
KING: What say'st thou to her?
BERTRAM: She's impudent, my lord,And was a common gamester to the camp.
DIANA: He does me wrong, my lord; if I were so,He might have bought me at a common price:Do not believe him. O, behold this ring,Whose high respect and rich validityDid lack a parallel; yet for all thatHe gave it to a commoner o' the camp,If I be one.
COUNTESS: He blushes, and 'tis it:Of six preceding ancestors, that gem,Conferr'd by testament to the sequent issue,Hath it been owed and worn. This is his wife;That ring's a thousand proofs.
KING: Methought you saidYou saw one here in court could witness it.
DIANA: I did, my lord, but loath am to produceSo bad an instrument: his name's Parolles.
LAFEU: I saw the man to-day, if man he be.
KING: Find him, and bring him hither.Exit an Attendant
BERTRAM: What of him?He's quoted for a most perfidious slave,With all the spots o' the world tax'd and debosh'd;Whose nature sickens but to speak a truth.Am I or that or this for what he'll utter,That will speak any thing?
KING: She hath that ring of yours.
BERTRAM: I think she has: certain it is I liked her,And boarded her i' the wanton way of youth:She knew her distance and did angle for me,Madding my eagerness with her restraint,As all impediments in fancy's courseAre motives of more fancy; and, in fine,Her infinite cunning, with her modern grace,Subdued me to her rate: she got the ring;And I had that which any inferior mightAt market-price have bought.
DIANA: I must be patient:You, that have turn'd off a first so noble wife,May justly diet me. I pray you yet;Since you lack virtue, I will lose a husband;Send for your ring, I will return it home,And give me mine again.
BERTRAM: I have it not.
KING: What ring was yours, I pray you?
DIANA: Sir, much likeThe same upon your finger.
KING: Know you this ring? this ring was his of late.
DIANA: And this was it I gave him, being abed.
KING: The story then goes false, you threw it himOut of a casement.
DIANA: I have spoke the truth.Enter PAROLLES
BERTRAM: My lord, I do confess the ring was hers.
KING: You boggle shrewdly, every feather stars you.Is this the man you speak of?
DIANA: Ay, my lord.
KING: Tell me, sirrah, but tell me true, I charge you,Not fearing the displeasure of your master,Which on your just proceeding I'll keep off,By him and by this woman here what know you?
PAROLLES: So please your majesty, my master hath been anhonourable gentleman: tricks he hath had in him,which gentlemen have.
KING: Come, come, to the purpose: did he love this woman?
PAROLLES: Faith, sir, he did love her; but how?
KING: How, I pray you?
PAROLLES: He did love her, sir, as a gentleman loves a woman.
KING: How is that?
PAROLLES: He loved her, sir, and loved her not.
KING: As thou art a knave, and no knave. What anequivocal companion is this!
PAROLLES: I am a poor man, and at your majesty's command.
LAFEU: He's a good drum, my lord, but a naughty orator.
DIANA: Do you know he promised me marriage?
PAROLLES: Faith, I know more than I'll speak.
KING: But wilt thou not speak all thou knowest?
PAROLLES: Yes, so please your majesty. I did go between them,as I said; but more than that, he loved her: forindeed he was mad for her, and talked of Satan andof Limbo and of Furies and I know not what: yet Iwas in that credit with them at that time that Iknew of their going to bed, and of other motions,as promising her marriage, and things which wouldderive me ill will to speak of; therefore I will notspeak what I know.
KING: Thou hast spoken all already, unless thou canst saythey are married: but thou art too fine in thyevidence; therefore stand aside.This ring, you say, was yours?
DIANA: Ay, my good lord.
KING: Where did you buy it? or who gave it you?
DIANA: It was not given me, nor I did not buy it.
KING: Who lent it you?
DIANA: It was not lent me neither.
KING: Where did you find it, then?
DIANA: I found it not.
KING: If it were yours by none of all these ways,How could you give it him?
DIANA: I never gave it him.
LAFEU: This woman's an easy glove, my lord; she goes offand on at pleasure.
KING: This ring was mine; I gave it his first wife.
DIANA: It might be yours or hers, for aught I know.
KING: Take her away; I do not like her now;To prison with her: and away with him.Unless thou tell'st me where thou hadst this ring,Thou diest within this hour.
DIANA: I'll never tell you.
KING: Take her away.
DIANA: I'll put in bail, my liege.
KING: I think thee now some common customer.
DIANA: By Jove, if ever I knew man, 'twas you.
KING: Wherefore hast thou accused him all this while?
DIANA: Because he's guilty, and he is not guilty:He knows I am no maid, and he'll swear to't;I'll swear I am a maid, and he knows not.Great king, I am no strumpet, by my life;I am either maid, or else this old man's wife.
KING: She does abuse our ears: to prison with her.
DIANA: Good mother, fetch my bail. Stay, royal sir:Exit WidowThe jeweller that owes the ring is sent for,And he shall surety me. But for this lord,Who hath abused me, as he knows himself,Though yet he never harm'd me, here I quit him:He knows himself my bed he hath defiled;And at that time he got his wife with child:Dead though she be, she feels her young one kick:So there's my riddle: one that's dead is quick:And now behold the meaning.Re-enter Widow, with HELENA
KING: Is there no exorcistBeguiles the truer office of mine eyes?Is't real that I see?
HELENA: No, my good lord;'Tis but the shadow of a wife you see,The name and not the thing.
BERTRAM: Both, both. O, pardon!
HELENA: O my good lord, when I was like this maid,I found you wondrous kind. There is your ring;And, look you, here's your letter; this it says:'When from my finger you can get this ringAnd are by me with child,' &amp;c. This is done:Will you be mine, now you are doubly won?
BERTRAM: If she, my liege, can make me know this clearly,I'll love her dearly, ever, ever dearly.
HELENA: If it appear not plain and prove untrue,Deadly divorce step between me and you!O my dear mother, do I see you living?
LAFEU: Mine eyes smell onions; I shall weep anon:To PAROLLESGood Tom Drum, lend me a handkercher: so,I thank thee: wait on me home, I'll make sport with thee:Let thy courtesies alone, they are scurvy ones.
KING: Let us from point to point this story know,To make the even truth in pleasure flow.To DIANAIf thou be'st yet a fresh uncropped flower,Choose thou thy husband, and I'll pay thy dower;For I can guess that by thy honest aidThou keep'st a wife herself, thyself a maid.Of that and all the progress, more or less,Resolvedly more leisure shall express:All yet seems well; and if it end so meet,The bitter past, more welcome is the sweet.Flourish
EPILOGUE
KING: The king's a beggar, now the play is done:All is well ended, if this suit be won,That you express content; which we will pay,With strife to please you, day exceeding day:Ours be your patience then, and yours our parts;Your gentle hands lend us, and take our hearts.
Exeunt</doc>