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. Cost. When would you have it done, sir? Cost. Well, I will do it, sir: fare you well. Biron. It must be done this afternoon. Hark, The princess comes to hunt here in the park, her name, And Rosaline they call her: ask for her; 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; Of trotting paritors. O my little heart!-- And wear his colours like a tumbler's hoop! With two pitch-balls stuck in her face for eyes; [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 Well, lords, to-day we shall have our despatch; 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. 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, Thus will I save my credit in the shoot: 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 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 ? 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 |