Boyet. Why, all his behaviors did make their retire,
To the court of his eye, peeping thorough desire;
His heart, like an agate, with your print impressed,
Proud with his form, in his eye pride expressed;
His tongue, all impatient to speak and not see,'
Did stumble with haste in his eyesight to be;
All senses to that sense did make their repair,
To feel only looking on fairest of fair.

Methought, all his senses were locked in his eye,
As jewels in crystal for some prince to buy ;

Who, tend'ring their own worth, from where they were glassed,

2

Did point you to buy them along as you passed.
His face's own margent did quote such amazes,
That all eyes saw his eyes enchanted with gazes.
I'll give you Aquitain, and all that is his,

An you give him for my sake but one loving kiss.
Prin. Come, to our pavilion. Boyet is disposed-
Boyet. But to speak that in words, which his eye

hath disclosed.

I only have made a mouth of his eye,

By adding a tongue which I know will not lie.

Ros. Thou art an old love-monger, and speak'st skilfully.

Mar. He is Cupid's grandfather, and learns news

of him.

Ros. Then was Venus like her mother; for her father is but grim.

Boyet. Do you hear, my mad wenches?

Mar.

No.

1 Although the expression in the text is extremely odd, yet the sense appears to be, that his tongue envied the quickness of his eyes, and strove to be as rapid in its utterance, as they in their perception.

2 In Shakspeare's time, notes, quotations, &c. were usually printed in the exterior margin of bocks.

593499

ACT III.

SCENE I Another part of the same.

Enter ARMADO and MOTH.

Arm. Warble, child; make passionate my sense of

hearing.

Moth. Concolinel1

[Singing. Arm. Sweet air!-Go, tenderness of years, take this key, give enlargement to the swain, bring him festinately hither. I must employ him in a letter to my love.

Moth. Master, will you win brawl? 2

your love with a French

Arm. How mean'st thou ? brawling in French?

Moth. No, my complete master; but to jig off a tune at the tongue's end, canary" to it with your feet, humor it with turning up your eyelids; sigh a note, and sing a note; sometime through the throat, as if you swallowed love with singing love; sometime through the nose, as if you snuffed up love by smelling love; with your hat penthouselike o'er the shop of your eyes; with your arms crossed on your thin belly-doublet, like a rabbit on a spit; or your hands in your pocket, like a man after the old painting; and keep not too long in one tune, but a snip and away. These are complements, these are humors; these betray nice wenches-that would be betrayed without these; and make them men of note, (do you note, men? 5) that most are affected to these.

1 A song is apparently lost here. In old comedies, the songs are frequently omitted. On this occasion, the stage direction is generally Here hey sing or Cantant.

2 A kind of dance; spelled bransle by some authors; being the French name for the same dance.

3 Canary was the name of a sprightly dance, sometimes accompanied by the castanets.

4 i. e. accomplishments.

5 One of the modern editors proposes to read "do you note me?"

Arm. How hast thou purchased this experience?
Moth. By my penny of observation.1

Arm. But 0,-but 0,

Moth. the hobby-horse is forgot.

Arm. Callest thou my love hobby-horse? 2

Moth. No, master; the hobby-horse is but a colt, and your love perhaps a hackney.

forgot your love?

Arm. Almost I had.

But have you

Moth. Negligent student! learn her by heart.
Arm. By heart, and in heart, boy.

Moth. And out of heart, master; all those three I will prove.

Arm. What wilt thou prove?

Moth. A man, if I live; and this, by, in, and without, upon the instant. By heart you love her, because your heart cannot come by her; in heart you love her, because your heart is in love with her; and out of heart you love her, being out of heart that you cannot enjoy her.

Arm. I am all these three.

Moth. And three times as much more, and yet nothing at all.

Arm. Fetch hither the swain; he must carry me a letter.

Moth. A message well sympathized; a horse to be an ambassador for an ass!

Arm. Ha, ha! what sayest thou?

Moth. Marry, sir, you must send the ass upon the horse, for he is very slow-gaited. But I go. Arm. The way is but short; away.

Moth. As swift as lead, sir.

1 The allusion is probably to the old popular pamphlet, " A Pennyworth of Wit."

2 The Hobby-horse was a personage belonging to the ancient Morris dance, when complete. It was the figure of a horse fastened round the waist of a man, his own legs going through the body of the horse, and enabling him to walk, but concealed by a long footcloth; while false legs appeared where those of the man should be, at the sides of the horse. Latterly the Hobby-horse was frequently omitted, which appears to have occasioned a popular ballad, in which was this line, or burden.

Arm. Thy meaning, pretty ingenious?

Is not lead a metal heavy, dull, and slow?

Moth. Minimè, honest master; or rather, master, no. Arm. I say, lead is slow.

Moth.

You are too swift, sir, to say so.

Is that lead slow which is fired from a gun?

Arm. Sweet smoke of rhetoric!

He reputes me a cannon; and the bullet, that's he.

I shoot thee at the swain.

Moth.

Thump then, and I flee.

[Exit.

Arm. A most acute juvenal; voluble and free of

grace!

By thy favor, sweet welkin, I must sigh in thy face.
Most rude melancholy, valor gives thee place.
My herald is returned.

Re-enter MOTH and CoStard.

Moth. A wonder, master; here's a Costard1 broken

in a shin.

Arm. Some enigma, some riddle.

3

l'envoy; 2-begin.

Come,-thy

Cost. No egma, no riddle, no l'envoy; no salve in the mail, sir. O, sir, plantain, a plain plantain; no l'envoy, no l'envoy, no salve, sir, but a plantain !

Arm. By virtue, thou enforcest laughter; thy silly thought, my spleen; the heaving of my lungs provokes me to ridiculous smiling. O, pardon me, my stars! Doth the inconsiderate take salve for l'envoy, and the word, l'envoy, for a salve?

1 i. e. a head; a name adopted from an apple shaped like a man's head. It must have been a common sort of apple, as it gave a name to the dealers in apples who were called costar-mongers.

2 An old French term for concluding verses, which served either to convey the moral, or to address the poem to some person.

3 A mail or male was a budget, wallet, or portmanteau. Costard, mistaking enigma, riddle, and l'envoy for names of salves, objects to the application of any salve in the budget, and cries out for a plantain leaf. There is a quibble upon salve and salvé, a word with which it was not unusual to conclude epistles, &c., and which therefore was a kind of l'envoy.

Moth. Do the wise think them other? Is not l'envoy a salve?

Arm. No, page; it is an epilogue or discourse, to make plain

Some obscure precedence that hath tofore been sain. I will example it.

The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,

Were still at odds, being but three.
There's the moral; now the l'envoy.

Moth. I will add the l'envoy. Say the moral again.
Arm. The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,
Were still at odds, being but three.
Moth. Until the goose came out of door,

And stayed the odds by adding four.

Now will I begin your moral, and do you follow with my l'envoy.

The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,
Were still at odds, being but three.
Arm. Until the goose came out of door,
Staying the odds by adding four.

Moth. A good l'envoy, ending in the goose.
Would desire more?

you

Cost. The boy hath sold him a bargain, a goose; that's flat.

Sir, your pennyworth is good, an your goose be fat.To sell a bargain well, is as cunning as fast and loose. Let me see a fat l'envoy; ay, that's a fat goose.

Arm. Come hither, come hither. How did this argument begin?

Moth. By saying that a Costard was broken in a shin. Then called you for the l'envoy.

Cost. True, and I for a plantain; thus came your argument in.

Then the boy's fat l'envoy, the goose that you bought; And he ended the market.1

Arm. But tell me ; how was there a Costard2 broken in a shin?

1 Alluding to the proverb, "Three women and a goose make a market.” 2 See p. 102, note 1.