Oli. This was not counterfeit: there is too great testimony in your complexion, that it was a passion of earnest.1 Ros. Counterfeit, I assure you. Oli. Well, then, take a good heart, and counterfeit to be a man. Ros. So I do: but, i' faith, I should have been a woman by right. [Cel. Come, you look paler and paler: pray you, draw homewards.-Good sir, go with us. Oli. That will I, for I must bear answer back How you excuse my brother, Rosalind. 181 Ros. I shall devise something: but, I pray you, commend my counterfeiting to him:will you go?] [Exeunt. SCENE II. Another part of the forest. Enter ORLANDO and OLIVER. Orl. Is 't possible that, on so little acquaintance, you should like her? that, but seeing, you should love her? and, loving, woo? and, wooing, she should grant? and will you persever to enjoy her? Oli. Neither call the giddiness of it in question, the poverty of her, the small acquaintance, my sudden wooing, nor her sudden consenting; but say with me, I love Aliena; say with her, that she loves me; consent with both that we may enjoy each other: it shall be to your good; for my father's house, and all the revenue that was old Sir Roland's, will I estate1 upon you, and here live and die a shepherd. Orl. You have my consent. Let your wedding be to-morrow: thither will I invite the duke, and all's contented followers. Go you and prepare Aliena; for, look you, here comes my Rosalind. 19 Enter ROSALIND. Ros. God save you, brother. Ros. O, my dear Orlando, how it grieves me to see thee wear thy heart in a scarf!-(Act v. 2. 22, 23.) is in the vulgar leave,-the society,-which in the boorish is company,-of this female,which in the common is woman; which together is, abandon the society of this female, or, clown, thou perishest; or, to thy better understanding, diest; or to wit, I kill thee, make thee away, translate thy life into death, thy liberty into bondage: I will deal in poison with thee, or in bastinado, or in steel; I will bandy with thee in faction; I will o'er-run thee with policy; I will kill thee a hundred and fifty ways: therefore tremble, and depart. Aud. Do, good William. Will. God rest you merry, sir. 64 [Exit. sonical brag of "I came, saw, and overcame:"1 for your brother and my sister no sooner met, but they look'd; no sooner look'd, but they lov'd; no sooner lov'd, but they sigh'd; no sooner sigh'd, but they ask'd one another the reason; no sooner knew the reason, but they sought the remedy: [and in these degrees have they made a pair of stairs to marriage, which they will climb incontinent, or else be incontinent 2 before marriage:] they are in the very wrath of love, and they will together; clubs cannot part them. 44 Orl. They shall be married to-morrow; and I will bid the duke to the nuptial. But, O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man's eyes! By so much the more shall I to-morrow be at the height of heart-heaviness, by how much I shall think my brother happy in having what he wishes for. Ros. Why, then, to-morrow I cannot serve your turn for Rosalind? Orl. I can live no longer by thinking. Ros. I will weary you, then, no longer with idle talking. Know of me, then,-for now I speak to some purpose, [-that I know you are a gentleman of good conceit:3 I speak not this that you should bear a good opinion of my knowledge, insomuch I say I know you are; neither do I labour for a greater esteem than may in some little measure draw a belief from you, to do yourself good, and not to grace me. Believe, then, if you please,] that I can do strange things: I have, since I was three year old, convers'd with a magician, most profound in his art, and yet not damnable. If you do love Rosalind so near the heart as your gesture cries it out, when your brother marries Aliena, shall you marry her: [I know into what straits of fortune she is driven; and it is not impossible to me, if it appear not inconvenient to you, to set her before your eyes to-morrow human as she is, and without any danger.] 100 [Sil. It is to be all made of fantasy, All made of passion, and all made of wishes; All adoration, duty, and observance, All humbleness, all patience, and impatience, All purity, all trial, all obedience;-And so am I for Phebe. Phe. And so am I for Ganymede. Orl. And so am I for Rosalind. Ros. And so am I for no woman. Phe. If this be so, why blame you me to love you? [To Rosalind. Sil. If this be so, why blame you me to love. you? [To Phebe. Orl. If this be so, why blame you me to love you? Ros. Why do you speak too,—“Why blame you me to love you?" Orl. To her that is not here, nor doth not hear. Ros.] Pray you, no more of this; 't is like the howling of Irish wolves against the moon.-I will help you [to Silvius], if I can:-I would love you [to Phebe], if I could.-To-morrow without hawking, or spitting, or saying we are hoarse, which are the only prologues to a bad voice? Sec. Page. I' faith, i' faith; and both in a tune, like two gipsies on a horse. Song. It was a lover and his lass, With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, In spring-time, the only pretty ring-time, Between the acres of the rye, With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, In spring-time, &c. This carol they began that hour, With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, How that a life was but a flower In spring-time, &c. 22 30 |