Enter SILVIUS.

SIL. My errand is to you, fair youth ;

My gentle Phebe bid me give you this: [Giving a letter.
I know not the contents; but, as I guess,

By the ftern brow, and wafpifh action
Which she did ufe as fhe was writing of it,
It bears an angry tenour: pardon me,
I am but as a guiltlefs meffenger.

Ros. Patience herfelf would ftartle at this letter,
And play the fwaggerer; bear this, bear all :
She fays, I am not fair; that I lack manners;
She calls me proud; and, that she could not love me
Were man as rare as phoenix; Od's my will!
Her love is not the hare that I do hunt :

Why writes fhe fo to me?-Well, fhepherd, well,
This is a letter of your own device.

SIL. No, I proteft, I know not the contents;
Phebe did write it.

Ros. Come, come, you are a fool,

And turn'd into the extremity of love.

I faw her hand: fhe has a leathern hand,

A freeftone-colour'd hand; I verily did think

That her old gloves were on, but 'twas her hands;
She has a hufwife's hand: but that's no matter:
I fay, fhe never did invent this letter;

This is a man's invention, and his hand,
SIL. Sure, it is hers.

Ros. Why, 'tis a boisterous and a cruel stile,
A ftile for challengers; why, fhe defies me,
Like Turk to Christian: woman's gentle brain
Could not drop forth fuch giant-rude invention,
Such Ethiop words, blacker in their effect

Than in their countenance :-Will you hear the letter?

SIL. So please you, for I never heard it yet; Yet heard too much of Phebe's cruelty.

Ros. She Phebes me: Mark how the tyrant writes. Art thou the god to fhepherd turn'd,

That a maiden's heart hath burn'd?

Can a woman rail thus ?

SIL. Call you this railing?

Ros. Why, thy godhead laid apart,

Warr'ft thou with a woman's heart?
Did you ever hear such railing ?—

Whiles the eye of man did woo me,
That could do no vengeance to me.-

Meaning me a beast.

If the fcorn of your bright eyne
Have power to raife fuch love in mine,
Alack, in me what strange effect
Would they work in mild afpéct ?
Whiles you chid me, I did love;
How then might your prayers move?
He, that brings this love to thee,
Little knows this love in me:

;

And by him feal up thy mind,
Whether that thy youth and kind
Will the faithful offer take
Of me, and all that I can make ;
Or else by him my love deny,
And then I'll study how to die,

SIL. Call

you this chiding?

CEL. Alas, poor shepherd!

[Reads.

Ros. Do you pity him? no, he deferves no pity.— Wilt thou love fuch a woman?-What, to make thee an instrument, and play false strains upon thee! not to be endured!-Well, go your way to her, (for, I fee, love

hath made thee a tame fnake,) and fay this to her;That if she love me, I charge her to love thee if the will not, I will never have her, unless thou entreat for her. If you be a true lover, hence, and not a word; for here comes more company. [Exit SILVIUS.

Enter OLIVER.

OLI. Good-morrow, fair ones: Pray you, if you know Where, in the purlieus of this forest, stands A fheep-cote, fenc'd about with olive-trees?

CEL. Weft of this place, down in the neighbour bottom, The rank of ofiers, by the murmuring ftream,

Left on your right hand, brings you to the place;
But at this hour the house doth keep itself,
There's none within.

OLI. If that an eye may profit by a tongue,
Then I fhould know you by description;
Such garments, and fuch years: The boy is fair,
Of female favour, and beflows himself
Like a ripe fifter: but the woman low,

And browner than her brother. Are not you
The owner of the house I did enquire for?
CEL. It is no boast, being afk'd, to fay, we are.
OLI. Orlando doth commend him to you both;
And to that youth, he calls his Rosalind,
He fends this bloody napkin; Are you he?

Ros. I am: What must we understand by this?
OLI. Some of my fhame; if you will know of me
What man I am, and how, and why, and where
This handkerchief was ftain'd.

CEL. I pray you, tell it.

OLI. When last the young Orlando parted from He left a promise to return again

Within an hour; and, pacing through the foreft,

you,

Chewing the food of sweet and bitter fancy,
Lo, what befel! he threw his eye afide,

And, mark, what object did present itself!
Under an oak, whose boughs were mofs'd with age,
And high top bald with dry antiquity,

A wretched ragged man, o'ergrown with hair,
Lay fleeping on his back: about his neck

A green and gilded fnake had wreath'd itself,
Who with her head, nimble in threats, approach'd
The opening of his mouth; but fuddenly
Seeing Orlando, it unlink'd itself,

And with indented glides did flip away
Into a bush: under which bufh's fhade

A lionefs, with udders all drawn dry,

Lay couching, head on ground, with catlike watch,
When that the fleeping man fhould stir; for 'tis
The royal difpofition of that beast,

To prey on nothing that doth feem as dead:

This feen, Orlando did approach the man,

And found it was his brother, his elder brother.

CEL. O, I have heard him speak of that fame brother; And he did render him the most unnatural

That liv'd 'mongst men.

OLI, And well he might fo do,

For well I know he was unnatural.

Ros. But, to Orlando ;-Did he leave him there,

Food to the fuck'd and hungry lionefs?

OLI. Twice did he turn his back, and purpos'd fo :

But kindness, nobler ever than revenge,

And nature, ftronger than his juft occafion,
Made him give battle to the lioness,

Who quickly fell before him; in which hurtling

From miferable flumber I awak'd.

CEL. Are you his brother?

Ros. Was it you he rescu'd?

CEL. Was't you that did so oft contrive to kill him?

OLI. 'Twas I; but 'tis not I: I do not fhame
To tell you what I was, fince my converfion
So fweetly, taftes, being the thing I am.
Ros. But, for the bloody napkin ?—

OLI. By, and by.

When from the first to last, betwixt us two,

Tears our recountments had most kindly bath'd,
As, how I came into that desert place;
In brief, he led me to the gentle duke,
Who gave me fresh array, and entertainment,
Committing me unto my brother's love;
Who led me instantly unto his cave,
There stripp'd himself, and here upon
The lionefs had torn fome flesh away,

his arm

Which all this while had bled; and now he fainted,
And cry'd, in fainting, upon Rofalind.

Brief, I recover'd him; bound up his wound;
And, after some small space, being strong at heart,
He fent me hither, ftranger as I am,

To tell this story, that you might excuse

His broken promife, and to give this napkin,
Dy'd in his blood, unto the fhepherd youth
That he in fport doth call his Rofalind.

CEL. Why, how now, Ganymede? fweet Ganymede ?

[ROSALIND faints.

OLI. Many will fwoon when they do look on blood. CEL. There is more in it :-Coufin-Ganymede! OLI. Look, he recovers.

Ros. I would, I were at home.

CEL. We'll lead you thither.