With true obfervance feek to eke out that

Wherein tow'rd me my homely stars have fail'd
To equal my great fortune.

Ber. Let that go:

My hafte is very great.

Farewel; hie home.

Hel. Pray, Sir, your pardon.

Ber. Well, what would you fay?

Hel. I am not worthy of the wealth I owe,

Nor dare I say 'tis mine, and yet it is;

But, like a tim'rous thief, moft fain would steal
What law does vouch mine own.

Ber. What would you have?

Hel. Something, and scarce fo much-nothing indeed

would`

I would not tell you what I 'faith, yesStrangers and foes do funder, and not kiss.

Ber. I pray you, ftay not; but in hafte to horse. Hel. I fhall not break your bidding, good my Lord. Ber. "Where are my other men, Monfieur? farewel, Go thou tow'rd home; where I will never come, [Ex. Hel. Whilft I can shake my fword, or hear the drum: Away, and for our flight.

Par. Bravely, Couragio!

5 would, my Lord

[Exeunt.

6 This line is given to Hel. in the old edit. . . . Theob, emend.

ACT

COURS

ACT III.

SCENE I.

FLORENCE.

Flourish. Enter the Duke of Florence, two French Lords,

S

with Soldiers.

DUKE.

that from point to point now have you heard The fundamental reasons of this war,

Whose great decifion hath much blood let forth, And more thirfts after.

I Lord. Holy feems the quarrel

Upon your Grace's part; but black and fearful

On the 7'oppofer's.

Duke. Therefore we marvel much, our coufin France Would, in fo just a business, shut his bofom

Against our borrowing prayers.

2 Lord. Good my Lord,

The reasons of our ftate I cannot yield,
But like a common and an outward man,
That the great figure of a council frames
By felf-unable motion, therefore dare not
Say what I think of it, fince I have found
My felf in my incertain grounds to fail
As often as I gueft.

Duke. Be it his pleasure.

2 Lord. But I am fure the younger of our nation, That furfeit on their eafe, will day by day

Come here for phyfick.

Duke, Welcome shall they be:

And all the honours that can fly from us,

7 oppofer.

Shall

Shall on them fettle. You know your places well;
When better fall, for your avails they 'fall:

To-morrow to the field.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Changes to Roufillon in France.

Enter Countess and Clown.

Count.IT hath happen'd all as I would have had it, fave that he comes not along with her.

Clo. By my troth, I take my young Lord to be a very melancholy man.

Count. By what obfervance, I pray you?

Clo. Why, he will look upon his boot, and fing mend his ruff, and fing; ask questions, and fing; pick his teeth, and fing. I knew a man that had this trick of melancholy, fold a goodly manor for a song.

Count. Let me fee what he writes, and when he means

to come.

Clo. I have no mind to Isbel fince I was at Court. Our old ling, and our Isbels o'th' country, are nothing like your old ling, and your Isbels o'th' Court: the brain of my Cupid's knock'd out, and I begin to love, as an old man loves money, with no ftomach.

Count. What have we here?

Clo. E'en that you have there.

Countess reads a letter.

[Exit.

I have fent you a daughter-in-law: fhe bath recovered the King, and undone me. I have wedded her, not bedded her; and fworn to make the not eternal. You shall bear I am run away; know it before the report come. If there be breadth enough in the world, I will hold a long distance. My duty to you.

Your unfortunate fon,

Bertram.

8 fell;

This

This is not well, rafh and unbridled boy,
To fly the favours of fo good a King,
To pluck his indignation on thy head,
By the mifprifing of a maid, too virtuous
For the contempt of empire.

Enter Clown.

Clo. O Madam, yonder is heavy news within between two foldiers and my young lady.

Count. What is the matter?

Clo. Nay, there is fome comfort in the news, fome comfort, your fon will not be kill'd fo foon as I thought he would.

Count. Why fhould he be kill'd?

Clo. So fay I, Madam, if he run away, as I hear he does; the danger is in ftanding to't; that's the lofs of men, though it be the getting of children. Here they come will tell you more. For my part, I only ?'heard your son was run away.

Enter Helena and two Gentlemen.

1 Gen. Save you, good Madam,

Hel. Madam, my Lord is gone, for ever gone.

2 Gen. Do not say so.

Count. Think upon patience, 'pray you: Gentlemen, I've felt fo many quirks of joy and grief,

That the first face of neither on the ftart

Can woman me unto't. Where is my fon?

[rence.

2 Gen. Madam, he's gone to ferve the Duke of Flo

We met him thitherward, from thence we came;
And after some dispatch in hand at Court,

Thither we bend again.

Hel. Look on this letter, Madam, here's my paffport.

9 hear

When

When thou canst get the ring from my finger, which never fhall come off, and fhew me a child begotten of thy body that I am father to, then call me husband: but in fuch a Then I write a Never.

This is a dreadful fentence.

Count. Brought you this letter, Gentlemen?

1 Gen. Ay, Madam, and, for the contents fake, are forry for our pains.

Count. I pr'ythee, Lady, have a better cheer. If thou engroffeft all the griefs as thine,

Thou robb'ft me of a moiety: he was my fon,

But I do wash his name out of my blood,

And thou art all my child. Towards Florence is he? 2 Gen. Ay, Madam.

Count. And to be a foldier?

2 Gen. Such is his noble purpose; and believe't The Duke will lay upon him all the honour That good convenience claims.

Count. Return you thither?

1 Gen. Ay, Madam, with the swifteft wing of fpeed. Hel. 'Till I bave no wife, I have nothing in France.

'Tis bitter.

Count. Find you that there?

Hel. Yes, Madam.

[Reading.

1 Gen. 'Tis but the boldness of his hand happily which his heart was not confenting to.

Count. Nothing in France until he have no wife? There's nothing here that is too good for him.

But only fhe, and the deferves a Lord,

That twenty fuch rude boys might tend upon,
And call her hourly mistress.

Who was with him?

1 Gen. A fervant only, and a gentleman Which I have fometime known.

Count. Parolles, was't not?

1 Gen. Ay, my good Lady, he.

1 upon

Count.