Is but for two months victual'd:-So to your plea- | I'll stay to know at your abandon'd cave. sures; I am for other than for dancing measures. Jaq. To see no pastime, I:-what you would have Exit Duke S. Proceed, proceed: we will begin these rites, And we do trust they'll end in true delights. EPILOGUE. Ros. It is not the fashion to see the lady the epilogue: but it is no more unhandsome, than to see the lord the prologue. If it be true, that good wine needs no bush, 'tis true, that a good play needs no epilogue: Yet to good wine they do use good bushes; and good plays prove the better by the help of good epilogues. What a case am I in then that am neither a good epilogue, nor cannot insinuate with you in the behalf of a good play? I am not furnished like a beggar, therefore to beg will not become me my way is, to conjure you; and I'll begin with the women. I charge you, O women, 5 Dressed. A dance. for the love you bear to men, to like as much of this play as pleases them: and so I charge you, O men, for the love you bear to women, (as I perceive by your simpering, none of you hate them,) that between you and the woman, the play may please. If I were a women, I would kiss as many of you as had beards that pleased me, complexions that liked me: and breaths that I defied not; and, am sure, as many as have good beards, or good faces, or sweet breaths, will, for my kind offer when I make curts'y, bid me farewell. [Exeunt. That I liked. KING OF FRANCE. DUKE OF FLORENCE. BERTRAM, Count of Rousillon. PAROLLES, a follower of Bertram. PERSONS REPRESENTED. Several young French Lords, that serve with Bertram in the Florentine War. Steward, } Servants to the Countess of Rousillon. Clown, A Page. COUNTESS OF ROUSILLON, Mother to Bertram. DIANA, Daughter to the Widow. VIOLENTA, Neighbors and Friends to the Widow. Lords attending on the King; Officers, Soldiers, &c., French and Florentine SCENE,-partly in France, and partly in Tuscany. ACT 1. SCENE I-Rousillon. A room in the Countess' | her praise in. The remembrance of her father never Palace. Enter BERTRAM, the COUNTESS of ROUSILLON, HELENA, and LAFEU, in mourning. Countess. In delivering my son from me, I bury a second husband. Ber. And I, in going, madam, weep o'er my father's death anew: but I must attend his majesty's command, to whom I am now in ward, evermore in subjection, Laf. You shall find of the king a husband, madam;-you, sir, a father: He that so generally is at all times good, must of necessity hold his virtue to you; whose worthiness would stir it up where wanted, rather than lack it where there is such abundance. Count. What hope is there of his majesty's amendment? Laf. He hath abandoned his physicians, madam; under whose practices he hath persecuted time with hope; and finds no other advantage in the process but only the losing of hope by time. Count. This young gentlewoman had a father, (0, that had! how sad a passage 'tis!) whose skill was almost as great as his honesty; had it stretched so far, would have made nature immortal, and death should have play for lack of work. 'Would for the king's sake, he were living! I think, it would be the death of the king's disease. Laf. How called you the man you speak of. madam? Count. He was famous, sir, in his profession, and it was his great right to be so: Gerard de Narbon. Laf. He was excellent, indeed, madam; the king very lately spoke of him, admiringly, and mourningly; he was skilful enough to have lived still, if knowledge could be set up against mortality. Ber. What is it, my good lord, the king languishes of! Laf. A fistula, my lord. Ber. I heard not of it before. Laf. I would, it were not notorious. Was this gentlewoman the daughter of Gerard de Narbon? Count. His sole child, my lord; and bequeathed to my overlooking. I have those hopes of her good, that her education promises: her dispositions she inherits, which make fair gifts fairer; for where an unclean mind carries virtuous qualities, there commendations go with pity, they are virtues and traitors too; in her they are the better for their simpleness: she derives her honesty, and achieves her goodness. Lof. Your commendations, madam, get from her tears. Count. 'Tis the best brine a maiden can season 1 Under his particular care, as my guardian. approaches her heart, but the tyranny of her sorrows takes all livelihood from her cheek. No more of this, Helena, 'go to, no more; lest it be rather thought you affect a sorrow, than to have. Hel. I do affect a sorrow indeed, but I have it too. Laf. Moderate lamentation is the right of the dead, excessive grief the enemy to the living. Count. If the living be enemy to the grief, the excess makes it soon mortal. Ber. Madam, I desire your holy wishes. Count. Be thou blest, Bertram! and succeed thy father In manners, as in shape! thy blood, and virtue, Laf. Farewell, pretty lady: You must hold the Countenance. Hel. But he assails; and our virginity, though valiant in the defence, yet is weak: unfold to us some warlike resistance. Pur. There is none; man, sitting down before you, will undermine you, and blow you up. Hel. Bless our poor virginity from underminers, and blowers up!-Is there no military policy, how virgins might blow up men? like the wear well. Par. I am so full of business, I cannot answer Par. Virginity, being blown down, man will thee acutely: I will return perfect courtier; in the quicklier be blown up: marry, in blowing him which, my instruction shall serve to naturalize thee, down again, with the breach yourselves made, you understand what advice shall thrust upon thee; else so thou wilt be capable of a courtier's counsel, and lose your city. It is not politic in the common-thou diest in thine unthankfulness, and thine ignowealth of nature, to preserve virginity. Loss of virginity is rational increase; and there was never virgin got, till virginity was first lost. That, you were made of, is metal to make virgins. Virginity, by being once lost, may be ten times found: by being ever kept, it is ever lost; 'tis too cold a companion; away with it. Hel. I will stand for't a little, though therefore I die a virgin. Par There's little can be said in't; 'tis against the rule of nature. To speak on the part of virginity, is to accuse your mothers: which is most infallible disobedience. He that hangs himself, is a virgin virginity murders itself; and should be buried in highways, out of all sanctified limit, as a desperate offendress against nature. Virginity breeds mites, much like a cheese; consumes itself to the very paring, and so dies with feeding his own stomach. Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, idle, made of self-love, which is the most inhibited sin in the canon. Keep it not: you cannot choose but lose by t; Out with't: within ten years it will make itself ten, which is a goodly increase: and the principal itself not much the worse: Away with't. Hel. How might one do, sir, to lose it to her own liking? Par. Let me see: Marry, ill, to like him that ne er it likes. 'Tis a commodity will lose the gloss with lying; the longer kept, the less worth: off with't, while 'tis vendible: answer the time of request. Virginity, like an old courtier, wears her cap out of fashion; richly suited, but unsuitable: just like the brooch and toothpick, which wear not now: Your date is better in your pie and your porridge, than in your cheek: And your virginity, your old virginity, is like one of our French with ered pears; it looks ill, it eats dryly: marry, 'tis a withered pear; it was formerly better; marry, yet, 'tis a withered pear; Will you any thing with it? Hel. Not my virginity yet. There shall your master have a thousand loves, A phoenix, captain, and an enemy, His humble ambition, proud humility, I know not what he shall;-God send him well!- Hel. That I wish well.-'Tis pity Par. What's pity? Hel. 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, rance makes thee away: farewell. When thou SCENE II.-Paris. [Exit. A Room in the King's ears; 1 Lord. So 'tis reported, sir. 1 Lord. His love and wisdom, King. He hath arm'd our answer, 2 Lord. It may well serve King. What's he comes here? Enter BERTRAM, LAFEU, and PAROLLES. 1 Lord. It is the count Rousillon, my good lord, Young Bertram. King. Youth, thou bear'st thy father's face; Ber. My thanks and duty are your majesty's. The citizens of the small republic of which Sienna is the capital. First try'd our soldiership! He did look far In their poor praise he humbled: Such a man Ber. His good remembrance, sir, (Methinks, I hear him now; his plausive words I, after him, do after him wish too, Since I nor wax, nor honey, can bring home, To give some laborers room. 2 Lord. You are lov'd, sir: They, that least lend it you, shall lack you first. Ber. Ber. Thank your majesty. [Exeunt. Flourish. SCENE III-Rousillon. A Room in the Coun tess's Palace. Enter COUNTESS, Steward, and Clown. Count. I will now hear: what say you of this gentlewoman? Count. Tell me the reason why thou wilt marry. Clo. My poor body, madam, requires it: I am driven on by the flesh; and he must needs go, that the devil drives. Count. Is this all your worship's reason? Clo. Faith, nadam, I have other holy reasons, such as they are. Count. May the world know them! Clo. I have been, madam, a wicked creature; as you and all flesh and blood are; and, indeed, Í do marry, that I may repent. Count. Thy marriage, sooner than thy wicked ness. Clo. I am out of friends, madam; and I hope to have friends for my wife's sake. Count. Such friends are thine enemies, knave. Clo. You are shallow, madam; e'en great friends; for the knaves come to do that for me, which I am a-weary of. He, that ears my land, spares my team, and gives me leave to inn the crop: If I be his cuckold, he's my drudge: He, that comforts my wife, is the cherisher of my flesh and blood; he, that cherishes my flesh and blood, loves my flesh and blood; he, that loves my flesh and blood, is my friend: ergo, he that kisses my wife, is my friend. If man could be contented to be what they are, there were no fear in marriage; for young Charbon the puritan, and old Poysam the papist, howso'eer their hearts are several in religion, their heads are both one, they may joll horns together, like any deer i' the herd. Count. Wilt thou ever be a foul-mouthed and calumnious knave? Clo. A prophet I, madam; and I speak the truth the next way:s For 1 the ballad will repeat, Which men full true shall find; Count. Get you gone, sir; I'll talk with you [Singing Why the Grecians sacked Troy? Was this King Priam's joy? Count. What, one good in ten? you corrupt the song, sirrah. Clo. One good woman in ten, Madam; which is a purifying o' the song: 'Would God serve the world so all the year? we'd find no fault with the tythe-woman, if I were the person: One in ten, quoth a'! an we might have a good woman born but every blazing star, or at an earthquake, 'twould mend the lottery well; a man may draw his heart ere he pluck one. Stew. Madam, the care I have had to even your content, I wish inight be found in the calendar of my past endeavors; for then we wound our modesty, and make foul the clearness of our deserv-out ings, when of ourselves we publish them. Count. What does this knave here? Get you gone, sirrah: The complaints, I have heard of you, I do not all believe: tis my slowness, that I do not: for, I know you lack not foily to commit them, and have ability enough to make such knaveries yours. Clo. 'Tis not unknown to you, madam, I am a poor fellow. Count. Well, sir. Cio. No, madam, 'tis not so well, that I am poor; though many of the rich are damned: But, if I may have your ladyship's good will to go to the world, Isbel the woman and I will do as we may. Count. Wilt thou needs be a beggar? Clo. I do beg your good will in this case. Count. In what case? Clo. In Isbel's case, and mine own. Service is no heritage: and, I think, I shall never have the blessing of God, till I have issue of my body; for, they say, bearns are blessings. Count. You'll be gone, sir knave, and do as I command you? Clo. That man should be at woman s command, and yet no hurt done!-Though honesty be no puritan, yet it will do no hurt; it will wear the surplice of humility over the black gown of a big heart.-I am going, forsooth: the business is for Helen to come hither. [Exit Clown. Count. Well, now. Stew. I know, madam, you love your gentlewoman entirely. Count. Indeed, I do; her father bequeathed her to me; and she herself, without other advantage, may lawfully make title to as much love as she finds: there is more owing her, than is paid; and more shall be paid her, than she'll demand. Stew. Madam, I was very late more near her than, I think, she wished me alone she was, and did communicate to herself, her own words to her own ears; she thought, I dare vow for her, they • Ploughs. • Therefore. The nearest way. 6 Foolishly done. touched not any stranger sense. Her matter was, she loved your son: Fortune, she said, was no goddess, that had put such difference betwixt their two estates; Love, no god, that would not extend his might, only where qualities were level: Diana, no queen of virgins, that would suffer her poor knight to be surprised, without rescue, in the first assault, or ransom afterwards: This she delivered in the most bitter touch of sorrow, that e'er I heard virgin exclaim in which I held my duty, speedily to acquaint you withal; sithence, in the loss that may happen, it concerns you something to know it. Count. You have discharged this honestly: keep it to yourself: many likelihoods informed me of this before, which hung so tottering in the balance, that I could neither believe, nor misdoubt: Pray you. leave me; stall this in your bosom, and I thank you for your honest care: I will speak with you further anon. [Exit Steward. Her eye is sick on't; I observe her now. Hel. What is your pleasure, madam? Count. I am a mother to you. Hel. Mine honorable mistress. As heaven shall work in me for thine avail, Hel. Hel. Your pardon noble mistress! Count. Love, you my son? Hel. My friends were poor, but honest; so's my love. You know, Helen, Wish chastely, and love dearly, that your Dian Nay a mother; God's mercy, maiden! does it curd thy blood, Hel. That I am not. Count. I say, I am your mother. Count. were (So that my lord, your son, were not my brother,) God shield, you mean it not! daughter, and mother You love my son; invention is asham'd, Hel. Count. Madam, I had. Wherefore? tell true. Hel. I will tell true; by grace itself, I swear. You know, my father left me some prescriptions Of rare and prov'd effects, such as his reading, And manifest experience, had collected For general sovereignty; and that he will'd me In heedfullest reservation to bestow them, As notes, whose faculties inclusive were More than they were in note: amongst the rest, There is a remedy, approv'd, set down, To cure the desperate languishes, whereof The king is render'd lost. Count. For Paris, was it? speak. This was your motive Hel. My lord, your son, made me to think of Else Paris, and the medicine, and the king, Had, from the conversation of my thoughts, Haply, been absent then. Count. But think you, Helen, Hel. There's something hints By the luckiest stars in heaven: and, would your But give me leave to try success, I'd venture Means, and attendants, and my loving greetings |