nature nor art, may complain of good breeding,* or comes of a very dull kindred.

Character of an Honest and Simple Shepherd.

Sir, I am a true labourer; I earn that I eat, get that I wear; owe no man hate, envy no man's happiness; glad of other men's good, content with my harm;† and the greatest of my pride is to see my ewes graze, and my lambs suck.

Humorous Description of a Lover.

A lean cheek; which you have not: a blue eye, and sunken; which you have not: an unquestionable spirit; which you have not: a beard neglected; which you have not :-(but I pardon you for that; for, simply, your having in beard is a younger brother's revenue):-Then your hose should be ungartered, your bonnet unbanded, your sleeve unbuttoned, your shoe untied, and everything about you demonstrating a careless desolation. But you are no such man: you are rather point-device‡ in your accoutrements; as loving yourself, than seeming the lover of any other.

Real Passion Dissembled.

Think not I love him, though I ask for him;
'Tis but a peevish boy :-yet he talks well;-
But what care I for words? yet words do well,
When he that speaks them pleases those that hear.
It is a pretty youth :-not very pretty :—

But, sure, he's proud; and yet his pride becomes him.
He'll make a proper man: the best thing in him
Is his complexion; and faster than his tongue.

*The want of good breeding.

+ Content with my own misfortunes.

Over careful.

Did make offence, his eye did heal it up.
He is not tall; yet for his years he's tall:
His leg is but so-so; and yet 'tis well:
There was a pretty redness in his lip :
A little riper and more lusty red

Than that mix'd in his cheek; 'twas just the differ

ence

Betwixt the constant red and mingled damask.

There be some women, Silvius, had they mark'd him In parcels as I did, would have gone near

To fall in love with him: but, for my part,

I love him not, nor hate him not; and yet
I have more cause to hate him than to love him ;
For what had he to do to chide at me?
He said, mine eyes were black, and my
hair black;
And, now I am remember'd, scorn'd at me:
I marvel why I answer'd not again :
But that's all one; omittance is no quittance.

ACT IV.

Jaques' Description of Melancholy.

I have neither the scholar's melancholy, which is emulation: nor the musician's, which is fantastical ; nor the courtier's, which is proud; nor the soldier's, which is ambitious; nor the lawyer's, which is politic; nor the lady's, which is nice ;* nor the lover's, which is all these.

Marriage alters the Temper.

Men are April when they woo, December when they wed; maids are May when they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives. I will be more jealous

* Assumed, feigned.

of thee than a Barbary cock-pigeon over his hen; more clamorous than a parrot against rain; more new-fangled than an ape; more giddy in my desires than a monkey; I will weep for nothing, like Diana in the fountain, and I will do that when you are disposed to be merry.

Oliver's Exposure to Danger whilst Sleeping.

Under an oak, whose boughs were moss'd with age, And high top bald with dry antiquity,

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

A green and gilded snake had wreath'd itself,
Who with her head, nimble in threats, approach'd
The opening of his mouth; but suddenly
Seeing Orlando, it unlink'd itself,
And with indented glides did slip away
Into a bush: under which bush's shade
A lioness with udders all drawn dry,

Lay couching, head on ground, with cat-like watch,
When that sleeping man should stir: for 'tis
The royal disposition of that beast

To prey on nothing that doth seem as dead.

ACT V.

Humorous Epilogue spoken by Rosalind.

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, for the love you bear to men, to like as much of this play as please you and 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 women the play may please. If I were a woman, I would kiss as many of you as had beards that pleased me, complexions that liked me, and breaths that I defied not: and, I am sure, as many as have good beards, or good faces, or sweet breaths, will, for my kind offer, when I make curt'sy, bid me farewell.

·000

COMEDY OF ERRORS.

The chief incidents in this comedy arise out of the close similitude between the two brothers Antipholus of Ephesus and Antipholus of Syracuse, who, with their attendants, Dromio of Ephesus and Dromio of Syracuse, also twins, and bearing the same exact likeness to each other, have been shipwrecked in their infancy; Antipholus of Ephesus, with his attendant, being separated in the wreck from his brother and his attendant. Twenty-five years have elapsed, and the brothers meet at Ephesus, where, owing to the resemblance each bears to the other, numerous amusing mistakes occur. At last Ægeon and Æmilia, the father and mother of the Antipholus twins, who have also been separated in the wreck, meet each other, and their long-lost children at Ephesus, and the play concludes with the pardon of Ægeon by the Duke of Ephesus, for unwittingly breaking a recently enacted

* Clothed.

law. Mr. Steevens, the learned commentator on Shakspere, remarks, that this comedy "exhibits more intricacy of plot than distinction of character; and that attention is not actively engaged, since every one can tell how the denouement will be effected."

ACT II.

Man's Pre-eminence.

THERE's nothing situate under Heaven's eye
But hath its bound, in earth, in sea, in sky;
The beasts, the fishes, and the winged fowls,
Are their males' subjects, and at their controls :
Men, more divine, the masters of all these,
Lords of the wide world, and wild watery seas,
Endued with intellectual sense and souls,
Of more pre-eminence than fish and fowls,
Are masters to their females, and their lords:
Then let your will attend on their accords.

Patience more easily taught than practised.
Patience, unmoved, no marvel though she pause,
They can be meek that have no other cause.
A wretched soul, bruised with adversity,
We bid be quiet when we hear it cry;

But were we burden'd with like weight of pain,
As much, or more, we should ourselves complain.

Defamation.

I see the jewel, best enamelled,

Will lose his beauty; and though gold 'bides still,
That others touch, yet often touching will
Wear gold; and so no man, that hath a name,
But falsehood and corruption doth it shame.