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Moth. You may do it in an hour, sir. Arm. Impossible.

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Moth. How many is one thrice told ? Avia. I am ill at reckoning; it fitteth the spirit of a tapster.

Moth. You are a gentleman and a gamester, sir.

Arm, I confess both they are both the varnish of a complete man.

Moth. Then, I am sure, you know how much the gross sum of deuce-ace amounts to. Arm. It doth amount to one more than two. Moth. Which the base vulgar do call three. Arm. True.

Moth, Why, sir, is this such a piece of study? Now here is three studied, ere ye'll thrice wink: and how easy it is to put years' to the word 'three,' and study three years in two words, the dancing horse will tell you. Arm. A most fine figure!

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Moth. To prove you a cipher. Arm. I will hereupon confess I am in love : and as it is base for a soldier to love, so am I in love with a base wench. If drawing my sword against the humor of affection would deiver me from the reprobate thought of it, I would take Desire prisoner, and ransom him to any French courtier for a new-devised courtesy. I think scorn to sigh: methinks I should outSwear Cupid. Comfort me, boy: what great men have been in love?

Moth. Hercules, master.

Arm. Most sweet Hercules! More authordy, dear boy, name more; and, sweet my child, let them be men of good repute and cardage.

Moth. Samson, master: he was a man of

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Arm. My love is most immaculate white and red.

Moth. Most maculate thoughts, master, are masked under such colors.

Arm. Define, define, well-educated infant. Moth. My father's wit and my mother's tongue, assist me !

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Arm. Sweet invocation of a child; most pretty and pathetical! Moth. If she be made of white and red, Her faults will ne'er be known, For blushing cheeks by faults are bred And fears by pale white shown: Then if she fear, or be to blame,

By this you shall not know,

For still her cheeks possess the same 110
Which native she doth owe.

A dangerous rhyme, master, against the reason of white and red.

Arm. Is there not a ballad, boy, of the King and the Beggar?

Moth. The world was very guilty of such a ballad some three ages since: but I think now 'tis not to be found; or, if it were, it would neither serve for the writing nor the tune.

Arm. I will have that subject newly writ o'er, that I may example my digression by some mighty precedent. Boy, I do love that country girl that I took in the park with the rational hind Costard she deserves well,

Moth. [Aside] To be whipped; and yet a better love than my master.

Arm. Sing, boy; my spirit grows heavy in. love.

Moth. And that's great marvel, loving a light wench.

Arm. I say, sing.

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Moth. Forbear till this company be past. Enter DULL, COSTARD, and JAQUENETTA.

Dull. Sir, the duke's pleasure is, that you keep Costard safe and you must suffer him to take no delight nor no penance; but a' must

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Cost. Let me not be pent up, sir: I will fast, being loose.

Moth. No, sir; that were fast and loose : thou shalt to prison.

Cost. Well, if ever I do see the merry days of desolation that I have seen, some shall see. Moth. What shall some see ?

Cost. Nay, nothing, Master Moth, but what they look upon. It is not for prisoners to be too silent in their words; and therefore I will say nothing: I thank God I have as little patience as another man; and therefore I can be quiet.

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「Exeunt Moth and Costard.

Arm. I do affect the very ground, which is base, where her shoe, which is baser, guided by her foot, which is basest, doth tread. I shall be forsworn, which is a great argument of falsehood, if I love. And how can that be true love which is falsely attempted? Love is a familiar; Love is a devil: there is no evil angel but Love. Yet was Samson so tempted, and he had an excellent strength; yet was Solomon so seduced, and he had a very good wit. Cupid's butt-shaft is too hard for Hercules' club; and therefore too much odds for a Spaniard's rapier. The first and second cause will not serve my turn; the passado he respects not, the duello he regards not: his disgrace is to be called boy; but his glory is to subdue men. Adieu, valor! rust, rapier! be still, drum for your manager is in love; yea, he loveth. Assist me, some extemporal god of rhyme, for I am sure I shall turn sonnet. Devise, wit; write, pen; for I am for whole volumes in folio. [Exit.

ACT II.

SCENE I. The same.

Enter the Princess of France, ROSALINE, MARIA, KATHARINE, BOYET, Lords, and other Attendants.

Boyet. Now, madam, summon up your dearest spirits :

Consider who the king your father sends,
To whom he sends, and what's his embassy :
Yourself, held precious in the world's esteem,
To parley with the sole inheritor

Of all perfections that a man may owe,
Matchless Navarre; the plea of no less weight
Than Aquitaine, a dowry for a queen.
Be now as prodigal of all dear grace
As Nature was in making graces dear
When she did starve the general world beside
And prodigally gave them all to you.

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Prin. Good Lord Boyet, my beauty, though but mean,

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Needs not the painted flourish of your praise:
Beauty is bonght by judgement of the eye,
Not utter'd by base sale of chapmen's tongues:
I am less proud to hear you tell my worth
Than you much willing to be counted wise
In spending your wit in the praise of mine.
But now to task the tasker good Boyet,
You are not ignorant, all-telling fame
Doth noise abroad, Navarre hath made a vow,
Till painful study shall ontwear three years,
No woman may approach his silent court:
Therefore to's seemeth it a needful course,
Before we enter his forbidden gates,
To know his pleasure; and in that behalf,
Bold of your worthiness, we single you
As our best-moving fair solicitor.
Tell him, the daughter of the King of France,
On serious business, craving quick dispatch,
Importunes personal conference with his
grace:

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Haste, signify so much; while we attend,
Like humble-visaged suitors, his high will.
Boyet. Proud of employment, willingly I go.
Prin. All pride is willing pride, and yours
[Exit Boyet.

is so.

Who are the votaries, my loving lords,
That are vow-fellows with this virtuous duke?
First Lord. Lord Longaville is one.
Prin.

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Know you the man? Mar. I know him, madam: at a marriagefeast, Between Lord Perigort and the beauteous heir Of Jaques Falconbridge, solemnized In Normandy, saw I this Longaville: A man of sovereign parts he is esteem'd; Well fitted in arts, glorious in arms: Nothing becomes him ill that he would well. The only soil of his fair virtue's gloss, If virtue's gloss will stain with any soil, Is a sharp wit match'd with too blunt a will; Whose edge hath power to cut, whose will still

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For he hath wit to make an ill shape good,
And shape to win grace though he had no wit.
I saw him at the Duke Alençon's once;
And much too little of that good I saw
Is my report to his great worthiness.

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Ros. Another of these students at that time Was there with him, if I have heard a truth. Biron they call him; but a merrier man, Within the limit of becoming mirth, I never spent an hour's talk withal : His eye begets occasion for his wit; For every object that the one doth catch The other turns to a mirth-moving jest, Which his fair tongue, conceit's expositor, Delivers in such apt and gracious words That aged ears play truant at his tales And younger hearings are quite ravished; So sweet and voluble is his discourse.

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But pardon me, I am too sudden-bold :
To teach a teacher ill bescemeth me.
Vouchsafe to read the purpose of my coming,
And suddenly resolve me in my suit.
King. Madam, I will, if suddenly I may.
Prin. You will the sooner, that I were

away;

once ?

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For you'll prove perjured if you make me stay.
Biron. Did not I dance with you in Brabant
[once?
Ros. Did not I dance with you in Brabant
Biron. I know you did.
Ros. How needless was it then to ask the

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Ros. Not till it leave the rider in the mire.
Biron. What time o' day?

Ros. The hour that fools should ask.
Biron. Now fair befall your mask!
Ros. Fair fall the face it covers!

Biron. And send you many lovers!
Ros. Amen, so you be none.

Biron. Nay, then will I be gone.

mate

King. Madam, your father here doth inti

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The payment of a hundred thousand crowns;
Being but the one half of an entire sum
Disbursed by my father in his wars.
But say that he or we, as neither have,
Received that sum, yet there remains unpaid
A hundred thousand more; in surety of the

which,

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One part of Aquitaine is bound to us,
Although not valued to the money's worth.
If then the king your father will restore
But that one half which is unsatisfied.
We will give up our right in Aquitaine,
And hold fair friendship with his majesty.
But that, it seems, he little purposeth,
For here he doth demand to have repaid
A hundred thousand crowns; and not demands,
On payment of a hundred thousand crowns,
To have his title live in Aquitaine;

Which we much rather had depart withal
And have the money by our father lent
Than Aquitaine so gelded as it is.
Dear princess, were not his requests so far 150
From reason's yielding, your fair self should

make

A yielding 'gainst some reason in my breast And go well satisfied to France again.

Prin. You do the king my father too much wrong

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Arm. Warble, child; make passionate my sense of hearing.

Moth.

Concolinel.

[Singing. Arm. Sweet air! Go, tenderness of years; take this key, give enlargement to the swain, bring him festinately hither: I must employ him in a letter to my love.

Moth. Master, will you win your love with a French brawl?

Arm. How meanest thou? brawling in
French ?

Moth. No, my complete master: but to jig off a tune at the tongue's end, canary to it with your feet, humor it with turning up your erelids, sigh a note and sing a note, sometime through the throat, as if you swallowed love with singing love, sometime through the nose, as if you snuffed up love by smelling love; with your hat penthouse-like o'er the shop of your eyes; with your arms crossed on your thin-belly doublet like a rabbit on a spit; or your hands in your pocket like a man after the old painting; and keep not too long in one time, but a snip and away. These are complements, these are humors; these betray ice wenches, that would be betrayed without these; and make them men of note-do you note me?- that most are affected to these. Arm. How hast thou purchased this ex

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yet nothing at all.

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Arm. Fetch hither the swain: he must carry me a letter.

Moth. A message well sympathized; a horse to be ambassador for an ass.

Arm. Ha, ha! what sayest thou?

Moth. Marry, sir, you must send the ass upon the horse, for he is very slow-gaited. But I go.

Arm. The way is but short: away!
Moth. As swift as lead, sir.

Arm. The meaning, pretty ingenious?

Is not lead a metal heavy, dull, and slow? 60 Moth. Minimè, honest master; or rather,

master, no.

Arm. I say lead is slow.
Moth.

You are too swift, sir, to say so :

Is that lead slow which is fired from a gun ? Arm. Sweet smoke of rhetoric!

He reputes me a cannon; and the bullet, that's he:

I shoot thee at the swain.
Moth.

Thump then and I flee. [Exit. Arm. A most acute juvenal; voluble and free of grace! [face:

By thy favor, sweet welkin, I must sigh in thy Most rude melancholy, valor gives thee place. My herald is return'd.

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Re-enter Mоти with COSTARD. Moth. A wonder, master! here's a costard broken in a shin.

Arm. Some enigma, some riddle: come, thy l'envoy; begin.

Cost. No egma, no riddle, no l'envoy; no salve fin the mail, sir: O, sir, plantain, a plain plantain! no l'envoy, no l'envoy; no salve, sir, but a plantain !

Arm. By virtue, thou enforcest laughter; thy silly thought my spleen; the heaving of my lungs provokes me to ridiculous smiling. O, pardon me, my stars! Doth the inconsiderate take salve for l'envoy, and the word l'envoy for a salve?

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Moth. Do the wise think them other? is

not l'envoy a salve ?

Arm. No, page: it is an epilogue or discourse, to make plain

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