Moth. I will tell you sensibly.

Cost. Thou hast no feeling of it, Moth; I will speak that l'envoy.

I, Costard, running out, that was safely within,
Fell over the threshold, and broke my shin.

Arm. We will talk no more of this matter.

Cost. Till there be more matter in the shin.
Arm. Sirrah Costard, I will enfranchise thee.

Cost. O, marry me to one Frances.-I smell some l'envoy, some goose in this.

Arm. By my sweet soul, I mean, setting thee at liberty, enfreedoming thy person; thou wert immured, restrained, captivated, bound.

Cost. True, true; and now you will be my purgation, and let me loose.

Arm. I give thee thy liberty, set thee from durance; and, in lieu thereof, impose on thee nothing but this. Bear this significant to the country maid Jaquenetta. There is remuneration; [Giving him money.] for the best ward of mine honor is, rewarding my dependants. Moth, follow. [Exit. Moth. Like the sequel, I.-Seignior Costard, adieu. Cost. My sweet ounce of man's flesh! My incony1 Jew![Exit MOTH. Now will I look to his remuneration. Remuneration! O, that's the Latin word for three farthings: three farthings-remuneration.-What's the price of this inkle? A penny.—No, I'll give you a remuneration. Why, it carries it.- Remuneration!-Why, it is a fairer name than French crown. I will never buy and sell out of this word.

Enter BIRON.

Biron. O, my good knave Costard! exceedingly well met.

Cost. Pray you, sir, how much carnation riband may a man buy for a remuneration?

Incony or kony, says Warburton, signifies, in the north, fine or delicate. It seems to be substantially the same with canny, a familiar Scotch word.

Biron. What is a remuneration?

Cost. Marry, sir, half-penny farthing.

Biron. O, why, then, three farthings worth of silk.
Cost. I thank your worship. God be with you!
Biron. O, stay, slave; I must employ thee.

As thou wilt win my favor, good my knave,
Do one thing for me that I shall entreat.
Cost. When would you have it done, sir?
Biron. O, this afternoon.

Cost. Well, I will do it, sir. Fare

you well. Biron. O, thou knowest not what it is.

Cost. I shall know, sir, when I have done it.
Biron. Why, villain, thou must know first.

Cost. I will come to your worship to-morrow morning.

Biron. It must be done this afternoon. Hark slave, it is but this.

The princess comes to hunt here in the park,

And in her train there is a gentle lady;

When tongues speak sweetly, then they name her

name,

And Rosaline they call her. Ask for her;

And to her white hand see thou do commend This sealed-up counsel. There's thy guerdon; go. [Gives him money.

Cost. Guerdon,-O sweet guerdon! better than remuneration; eleven-pence farthing better. Most sweet guerdon!-I will do it, sir, in print.'-Guerdon [Exit. Biron. O! And I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been love's whip;

-remuneration.

A very beadle to a humorous sigh;

A critic; nay, a night-watch constable;

A domineering pedant o'er the boy,

Than whom no mortal so magnificent! 2

This wimpled,3 whining, purblind, wayward boy;

1 With the utmost nicety.

2 Magnificent here means glorying, boasting.

3 To wimple is to veil, from guimple (Fr.). Shakspeare means no more than that Cupid was hood-winked.

VOL. II.

14

This senior-junior, giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid;
Regent of love rhymes, lord of folded arms,
The anointed sovereign of sighs and groans,
Liege of all loiterers and malcontents,
Dread prince of plackets,' king of codpieces,
Sole imperator, and great general

Of trotting paritors 2-O my little heart—
And I to be a corporal of his field,3

And wear his colors like a tumbler's hoop!
What? I! I love! I sue! I seek a wife!
A woman, that is like a German clock,
Still a-repairing; ever out of frame ;
And never going aright, being a watch,
But being watched that it may still go right!
Nay, to be perjured, which is worst of all;
And, among three, to love the worst of all;
A whitely wanton with a velvet brow,

With too pitch balls stuck in her face for eyes,
Ay, and, by Heaven, one that will do the deed,
Though Argus were her eunuch and her guard;—
And I to sigh for her! to watch for her!
To pray for her! Go to; it is a plague
That Cupid will impose for my neglect
Of his almighty dreadful little might.

Well, I will love, write, sigh, pray, sue, and groan ;
Some men must love my lady, and some Joan. [Exit.

1 Plackets were stomachers.

2 The officers of the spiritual courts who serve citations.

3 It appears from Lord Stafford's Letters, vol. ii. p. 199, that a corporal of the field was employed, as an aid-de-camp is now, "in taking and carrying to and fro the directions of the general, or other higher officers of

the field."

4 It was once a mark of gallantry to wear a lady's colors. So in Cynthia's Revels, by Jonson, "despatches his lacquey to her chamber early, to know what her colors are for the day." It appears that a tumbler's hoop was usually dressed out with colored ribands.

ACT IV.

SCENE I. Another part of the same.

Enter the Princess, ROSALINE, MARIA, KATHARINE, BOYET, Lords, Attendants, and a Forester.

Prin. Was that the king, that spurred his horse so hard

Against the steep uprising of the hill?

Boyet. I know not; but I think it was not he.
Prin. Whoe'er he was, he showed a mounting
mind.

Well, lords, to-day we shall have our despatch;
On Saturday we will return to France.-
Then, forester, my friend, where is the bush,
That we must stand and play the murderer in?
For. Here by, upon the edge of yonder coppice;
A stand where you may make the fairest shoot.
Prin. I thank my beauty, I am fair that shoot,
And thereupon thou speakest, the fairest shoot.
For. Pardon me, madam, for I meant not so.
Prin. What, what? first praise me, and again
say, no?

O short-lived pride! Not fair? alack for woe!

For. Yes, madam, fair.

Prin. Nay, never paint me now; Where fair is not, praise cannot mend the brow. Here, good my glass, take this for telling true;

[Giving him money.
Fair payment for foul words is more than due.
For. Nothing but fair is that which you inherit.
Prin. See, see, my beauty will be saved by merit.
O heresy in fair, fit for these days!

A giving hand, though foul, shall have fair praise.-
But come, the bow.-Now mercy goes to kill,
And shooting well is then accounted ill.
Thus will I save my credit in the shoot;
Not wounding, pity would not let me do't;

If wounding, then it was to show my skill,

That more for praise, than purpose, meant to kill.
And, out of question, so it is sometimes;

Glory grows guilty of detested crimes,

When, for fame's sake, for praise, an outward part,
We bend to that the working of the heart;
As I, for praise alone, now seek to spill

The poor deer's blood, that my heart means no ill.
Boyet. Do not curst wives hold that self-sovereignty
Only for praise' sake, when they strive to be
Lords o'er their lords?

Prin. Only for praise; and praise we may afford
To any lady that subdues a lord.

Enter COSTARD.

Here comes a member of the commonwealth.1

Cost. God dig-you-den all! Pray you, which is the head lady?

Prin. Thou shalt know her, fellow, by the rest that have no heads.

Cost. Which is the greatest lady, the highest?

Prin. The thickest, and the tallest.

. Cost. The thickest, and the tallest! It is so; truth is truth.

An your waist, mistress, were as slender as my wit, One of these maids' girdles for your waist should be fit. Are not you the chief woman? You are the thickest

here.

Prin. What's your will, sir? what's your will?
Cost. I have a letter from monsieur Biron, to one

lady Rosaline.

Prin. O, thy letter, thy letter; he's a good friend
of mine.

Stand aside, good bearer.-Boyet, you can carve;
Break up this capon.3

1 The princess calls Costard a member of the commonwealth, because he is one of the attendants on the king and his associates in their newmodelled society.

2 A corruption of God give you good even.

3 i. e. open this letter. The poet uses this metaphor as the French do their poulet; which signifies both a young fowl and a love-letter.