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Oli. Can you tell if Rosalind, the old Duke's daughter, be banish'd with her father?

Cha. O, no; for the new Duke's daughter her coufin so loves her, being ever from their cradles bred together, that she would have follow'd her exile, or have died to stay behind her. She is at the court, and no less beloved of her uncle than his own daughter, and never two ladies loved as they do.

Oli. Where will the old Duke live?

Cha. They say, he is already in the foreft of Arden, and a many merry men with him; and there they live like the old Robin Hood of England; they say, many young gentlemen flock to him every day, and fleet the time carelefly, as they did in the golden world.

Olt. What, you wrestle to-morrow before the new Duke? Cha. Marry do I, Sir, and I come to acquaint you with a matter. I am given, Sir, secretly to understand, that your younger brother Orlando hath a disposition to come in disguis'd against me to try a fall; to-morrow, Sir, I'wrestle for my credit, and he that escapes me without some broken limb shall acquit him well. Your brother is but young and tender, and for your love I would be loth to foil him, as I must for mine own honour if he come in; therefore out of my love to you, I came hither to acquaint you withal, that either you might stay him from his intendment, or brook such disgrace well as he shall run into, in that it is a thing of his own search, and altogether against my will.

Oli. Charles, I thank thee for thy love to me, which thou shalt find I will most kindly requite. I had myself notice of my brother's purpose herein, and have by underhand means laboured to diffuade him from it; but he is resolute. I tell thee, Charles, he is the stubbornest young fellow of France; full of ambition, an envious emulator of every man's good parts, a secret and villainous contriver against me his natural brother; therefore use thy discretion; I had as lief thou didst break his neck as his finger. And thou wert best look to't; for if thou dost him any flight disgrace, or if he do not mightily grace himself on

thee, he will practise against thee by poison, entrap thee

by by some treacherous device; and never leave thee till he hath ta'en thy life by some indirect means or other: for I affure thee, (and almost with tears I speak it) there is not one so young and so villainous this day living. I speak but brotherly of him; but should I anatomize him to thee as he is, I must blush and weep, and thou must look pale and

wonder.

Cha. I am heartily glad I came hither to you: if he come to-morrow, I'll give him his payment; if ever he go alone again, I'll never wrestle for prize more; and so, God keep your worship. [Exit.

Oli. Farewel, good Charles. Now will I stir this gamefter: I hope I shall see an end of him; for my soul, yet I know not why, hates nothing more than him. Yet he's gentle, never school'd, and yet learned, full of noble device, of all forts enchantingly beloved; and indeed so much in the heart of the world, and especially of my own people who best know him, that I am altogether misprised. But it shall not be so long; this wrestler shall clear all: nothing remains, but that I kindle the boy thither, which now I'll go about. [Exit.

SCENE IV. Before the Duke's Palace.
Enter Rosalind and Celia.

Cel. I pray thee, Rosalind, sweet coz, be merry. Rof. Dear Celia, I show more mirth than I am mistress of; and would you yet I were merrier? unless you could teach me to forget a banish'd father, you must not learn me how to remember any extraordinary pleasure.

Cel. Herein I fee thou lov'st me not with the full weight that I love thee. If my uncle, thy banish'd father, had banished thy uncle the Duke my father, so thou hadst been still with me, I could have taught my love to take thy father for mine; so wouldst thou, if the truth of thy love to me were so righteously temper'd, as mine is to thee.

Rof. Well, I will forget the condition of my estate, to rejoice in yours.

Cel. You know my father hath no child but me, nor none is like to have, and truly when he dies thou shalt be his heir; for what he hath taken away from thy father perforce, I will render thee again in affection; by mine honour,

honour, I will; and when I break that oath, let me turn monster: therefore, my sweet Rofe, my dear Rofe, be

merry.

Rof. From henceforth I will, coz, and devise sports: let me fee what think you of falling in love?

Cel. Marry, I pr'ythee, do, to make sport withal; but love no man in good earnest, nor no further in sport neither, than with safety of a pure blush thou may'st in honour come off again.

Rof. What shall be the sport then?

Cel. Let us fit and mock the good housewife fortune from her wheel, that her gifts may henceforth be bestowed equally.

Rof. I would we could do so; for her benefits are mightily misplaced, and the bountiful blind woman doth most mistake in her gifts to women.

Cel. 'Tis true; for those that she makes fair she scarce makes honeft, and those that she makes honest she makes very ill-favoured.

Rof. Nay, now thou goest from fortune's office to nature's: fortune reigns in gifts of the world, not in the lineaments of nature.

Enter Clown.

Cel. No? when nature hath made a fair creature, may he not by fortune fall into the fire? tho' nature hath given us wit to flout at fortune, hath not fortune sent in this fool to cut off this argument?

Rof. Indeed, there is fortune too hard for nature, when fortune makes nature's natural the cutter off of nature's wit.

Cel. Peradventure this is not fortune's work neither, but nature's; who, perceiving our natural wits too dull to reason of such goddesses, hath sent this natural for our whetftone: for always the dulness of the fool is the whetstone of the wits. How now, whither wander you ?

Clo. Mistress, you must come away to your father.
Cel. Were you made the messenger ?

Cio. No, by mine honour; but I was bid to come for

you.

Rof. Where learned you that oath, fool ?

Clo

Clo. Of a certain Knight, that swore by his honour they were good pancakes, and swore by his honour the mustard was naught: now I'll stand to it, the pancakes were naught, and the mustard was good, and yet was not the Knight forsworn.

Cel. How prove you that in the great heap of your knowledge?

Rof. Ay marry, now unmuzzle your wisdom.

Clo. Stand you both forth now; stroke your chins, and fwear by your beards that I am a knave.

Cel. By our beards, if we had them, thou art.

Clo. By my knavery, if I had it, then I were; but if you swear by that that is not, you are not forsworn, no more was this Knight swearing by his honour, for he never had any; or if he had, he had sworn it away, before ever he saw those pancakes or that mustard.

Cel. Pr'ythee who is that thou mean'st?

Clo. One that old Frederick your father loves.

Cel. My father's love is enough to honour him: enough! speak no more of him; you'll be whipt for taxation one of these days.

Clo. The more pity that fools may not speak wisely what wise men do foolishly.

Cel. By my troth, thou say'st true; for fince the little wit that fools have was filenc'd, the little foolery that wise men have makes a great shew: here comes Monfieur Le Beu.

SCENE V. Enter Le Beu.

Rof. With his mouth full of news.

Cel. Which he will put on us,as pigeons feed their young.

Rof. Then shall we be news-cram'd.

Cel. All the better, we shall be the more marketable.

Bon jour, Monfieur Le Beu; what news?

Le Beu. Fair Princess, you have loft much sport.

Cel. Sport; of what colour?

Le Beu. What colour, Madam? how shall I answer you?

Rof. As wit and fortune will.

Clo. Or as the destinies decree.

Cel, Well faid, that was laid on with a trowel.

Cles

Clo. Nay, if I keep not my rank
Rof. Thou losest thy old smell.

Le Beu. You amaze me, ladies; I would have told you of good wrestling, which you have lost the fight of. Rof. Yet tell us the manner of the wrestling.

Le Beu. I will tell you the beginning, and, if it please your ladyships, you may fee the end, for the best is yet to do; and here where you are, they are coming to perform it.

Cel. Well, the beginning that is dead and buried.
Le Beu. There comes an old man and his three fons.
Cel. I could match this beginning with an old tale.
Le Beu. Three proper young men, of excellent growth

and prefence.

Raf. With bills on their necks: Be it known unto all men by these presents.

Le Beu. The eldest of the three wrestled with Charles the Duke's wrestler, which Charles in a moment threw him, and broke three of his ribs, that there is little hope of life in him: so he ferv'd the second, and so the third: yonder they lye, the poor old man their father making such pitiful dole over them, that all the beholders take his part with weeping.

Rof. Alas!

Clo. But what is the sport, Monfieur, that the ladies have loft?

Le Beu. Why, this that I speak of.

Clo. Thus men grow wiser every day. It is the first time that ever I heard breaking of ribs was sport for ladies. Cel. Or I, I promise thee.

Rof. But is there any else longs to set this broken musick in his fides? is there yet another doats upon rib-breaking ? shall we see this wrestling, coufin?

Le Beu. You must if you stay here, for here is the place appointed for the wrestling; and they are ready to perform it.

Cel. Yonder sure they are coming: let us now stay and fee it.

SCENE

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