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Enter BIRON.

Biron. O, my good knave Costard! exceedingly well met.

Cost. Pray you, sir, how much carnation rib-' bon may a man buy for a remuneration? Biron. What is a remuneration?

Cost. Marry, sir, halfpenny farthing.

Biron. Why then, three-farthings-worth of silk.

Cost. I thank your worship: God be with you.
Biron. Stay, slave; I must employ thee:
As thou wilt win my favour, good my knave,
Do one thing for me that I shall entreat.

Cost. When would you have it done, sir?
Biron. This afternoon.

Cost. Well, I will do it, sir: fare you well.
Biron, Thou knowest not what it is.
Cost. I shall know, sir, when I have done it.
Biron. Why, villain, thou must know first.
Cost. I will come to your worship to-morrow
morning.

Biron. It must be done this afternoon. Hark,
slave, it is but this ;-

The princess comes to hunt here in the park,
And in her train there is a gentle lady;
When tongues speak sweetly, then they name

her name,

And Rosaline they call her: ask for her;
And to her white hand see thou do commend
This seal'd-up counsel. There's thy guerdon;
[Gives him money.

go. Cost. Gardon.-O sweet gardon! better than remuneration; eleven-pence farthing better: most sweet gardon!-I will do it, sir, in print. -Gardon-remuneration. [Exit.

Biron.

And I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been love's whip;

A very beadle to a humorous sigh;

A critic; nay, a night-watch constable;
A domineering pedant o'er the boy,
Than whom no mortal so magnificent!
This wimpled, whining, purblind, wayward boy;
This senior-junior, giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid;
Regent of love-rhymes, lord of folded arms,
The anointed sovereign of sighs and groans,
Liege of all loiterers and malcontents,
Dread prince of plackets, king of codpieces,
Sole imperator, and great general

Of trotting paritors. O my little heart!--
And I to be a corporal of his field,

And wear his colours like a tumbler's hoop!
What! I love! I sue! I seek a wife!
A woman, that is like a German clock,
Still a-repairing; ever out of frame;
And never going aright, being a watch,
But being watch'd that it
may still go right!
Nay, to be perjured, which is worst of all;
And, among three, to love the worst of all;
A wightly wanton with a velvet brow,

With two pitch-balls stuck in her face for eyes;
Ay, and, by heaven, one that will do the deed,
Though Argus were her eunuch and her guard!
And I to sigh for her! to watch for her!
To pray for her! Go to; it is a plague
That Cupid will impose for my neglect
Of his almighty dreadful little might.
Well, I will love, write, sigh, pray, sue, groan;
Some men must love my lady, and some Joan.

[Exit.

ACT IV.

SCENE I-Another part of the Park.

Enter the PRINCESS, ROSALINE, MARIA, KATHARINE, BOYET, Lords, Attendants, and a Forester.

W

Princess.

AS that the king, that spurred his horse so hard

Against the steep uprising of the hill? Boyet. I know not; but I think it was not he.

Prin. Whoe'er he was, he showed a mounting
mind.

Well, lords, to-day we shall have our despatch;
On Saturday we will return to France.-
Then, forester, my friend, where is the bush
That we must stand and play the murderer in?
For. Hereby, upon the edge of yonder coppice;
A stand where you may make the fairest shoot.

Prin. I thank my beauty, I am fair that shoot, And thereupon thou speakest, the fairest shoot. For. Pardon me, madam, for I meant not so. Prin. What, what! first praise me and then again say no?

O short-lived pride! Not fair? alack for woe! For. Yes, madam, fair.

Prin.

Where fair is not, praise cannot mend the brow.

Nay, never paint me now;

Here, good my glass, take this

for telling true; [Giving him money.

Fair payment for foul words is more than due.
For. Nothing but fair is that which you in-

herit.

Prin. See, see, my beauty will be saved by merit.

O heresy in fair, fit for these days!

A giving hand, though foul, shall have fair praise.

But come, the bow:-now mercy goes to kiil,
And shooting well is then accounted ill.

Thus will I save my credit in the shoot:
Not wounding, pity would not let me do't;
If wounding, then it was to show my skill,
That more for praise, than purpose, meant to kill.
And, out of question, so it is sometimes;
Glory grows guilty of detested crimes;

When, for fame's sake, for praise, an outward part,

We bend to that the working of the heart:

As I, for praise alone, now seek to spill

The poor deer's blood, that my heart means no ill.

Boyet. Do not curst wives hold, that self-sove

reignty

Only for praise' sake, when they strive to be

Lords o'er their lords?

Prin. Only for praise: and praise we
afford

To any lady that subdues a lord.

Enter COSTARD.

may

Boyet. Here comes a member of the commonwealth.

Cost. God dig-you-den all! Pray you, which is the head lady?

Prin. Thou shalt know her, fellow, by the rest that have no heads.

Cost. Which is the greatest lady, the highest ?
Prin. The thickest, and the tallest.

Cost. The thickest, and the tallest! it is so; truth is truth.

An your waist, mistress, were as slender as my wit,

One o' these maids' girdles for your waist should

be fit.

Are not you the chief woman? you are the thickest here.

Prin. What's your will, sir? what's your will? Cost. I have a letter from monsieur Biron, to one lady Rosaline.

Prin. O, thy letter, thy letter; he's a good friend of mine:

Stand aside, good bearer.-Boyet, you can carve; Break up this capon.

Boyet.

I am bound to serve.This letter is mistook, it importeth none here; It is writ to Jaquenetta.

Prin.

Break the neck of the

ear.

We will read it, I swear: wax, and every one give

Boyet. [reads] By heaven, that thou art fair is most infallible; true, that thou art beauteous; truth itself, that thou art lovely, more fairer than fair, beautiful than beauteous, truer than truth itself, have commiseration on thy heroical vassal! The magnanimous and most illustrate king Cophetua set eye upon the pernicious and indubitate beggar Zenelophon; and he it was that might rightly say veni, vidi, vici; which to annothanize, in the vulgar, (O base and obscure vulgar!) videlicet, he came, saw, and overcame: he came, one; saw, two; overcame, three. Who came? the king; why did he come? to see; why did he see? to overcome: to whom came he? to the beggar; what saw he? the beggar; who overc me he? the beggar: the conclusion is victory; on whose side? the king's; the captive is enrich'd: on whose side? the beggar's the catastrophe is a nuptial; on whose side? the king's-no, on both in one, or one in both, I am the king; for so stands the comparison: thou the beggar; for so witnesseth thy lowliness. Shall I command thy

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