If this thou do deny, let our hands part;
Neither intitled in the other's heart.

King. If this, or more than this, I would deny,
To flatter up these powers of mine with reft;
The fudden hand of death close up mine eye!

Hence, ever then, my heart is in thy breaft. Biron. (54) [And what to me, my love? and what

to me?

Rofa. You must be purged too, your fins are rank, You are attaint with fault and perjury;

Therefore if you my favour mean to get,

A twelve-month fhall you fpend, and never reft;
But seek the weary beds of people fick.]

Dum. But what to me, my love? but what to me Cath. (5) A wife!a beard, fair health and ho nesty;

With three-fold love I wish you all these three.
Dum. O, fhall I fay, I thank you, gentle wife?

(54) Biron. [And what to me, my Love? and what to me?
Rofa. You must be purged too: your Sins are rank :
You are attaint with Fault and Perjury.
Therefore if you my Favour mean to get,

A Twelvemonth hall you spend, and never reft,
But feek the weary Beds of People fick.]

Thefe fix Verses both Dr. Thirlby and Mr. Warburton concur to think fhould be expung'd; and therefore I have put them between Crotchets Not that they were an Interpolation, fays the Doctor, but as the Author's firft Draught, which he afterwards rejected; and executed the fame Thought a little lower with much more Spirit and Elegance. Mr. Wars burton conjectures, that Shakespeare is not to answer for the prefent ab furd Repetition, but his Actor-Editors; who, thinking Rofalind's Speech too long in the fecond Plan, had abridg'd it to the Lines above quoted: but, in publishing the Play, ftupidly printed both the Original Speech of Shakespeare, and their own Abridgment of it.

(55) A wife, a beard, fair health, and honefty s

With threefold Love I give you all these three.

Thus our fagacious Modern Editors. But if they had but the Reckoning of a Tapfter, as our Author fays, they might have been able to distinguish fur from three. I have, by the Direction of the old Impreffions, reform'd the Pointing; and made Catharine fay what She intended. Seeing Dumaine, fo very young, approach her with his Addreffes," You "fhall have a Wife, indeed! Jays She; No, no, I'll with you three "Things you have more Need of, a Beard, a found Conftitution, and Honefly enough to preferve it fuch.

Cath. Not fo, my lord; a twelve-month and a day, I'll mark no words that fmooth-fac'd wooers fay. Come, when the King doth to my lady come; Then if I have much love, I'll give you fome. Dum. I'll ferve thee true and faithfully till then. Cath. Yet fwear not, left ye be forfworn again, Long. What fays Maria?

Mar. At the twelve-month's end,

I'll change my black gown for a faithful friend.
Long. I'll stay with patience; but the time is long.
Mar. The liker you; few taller are fo young.
Biron. Studies my lady? mistress, look on me,
Behold the window of my heart, mine eye,
What humble Suit attends thy answer there;
Impose fome service on me for thy love.

Rofa. Oft have I heard of you, my lord Biron,
Before I faw you; and the world's large tongue
Proclaims you for a man replete with mocks;
Full of comparifons and wounding flouts;
Which you on all eftates will execute,
That lye within the mercy of your wit:
To weed this wormwood from your fruitful brain,
And therewithal to win me, if you please,
Without the which I am not to be won;
You fhall this twelve-month-term from day to day
Vifit the fpeechlefs Sick, and ftill converfe
With groaning wretches; and your task fhall be,
With all the fierce endeavour of your wit,
T'enforce the pained Impotent to smile.

Biron. To move wild laughter in the throat of death? It cannot be, it is impoffible:

Mirth cannot move a foul in agony.

Rofa. Why, that's the way to choak a gibing spirit,
Whose influence is begot of that loose grace,
Which fhallow laughing hearers give to fools:
A jeft's profperity lies in the ear

Of him that hears it, never in the tongue
Of him that makes it: then, if fickly ears,

Deaft with the clamours of their own dear groans,
Will hear your idle fcorns; continue then,

And

And I will have you, and that fault withal:
But if they will not, throw away that fpirit;
And I fhall find you empty of that fault,

Right joyful of your reformation,

Biron. A twelve-month? well, befall, what will befall,

I'll jeft a twelve-month in an Hofpital.

Prin. Ay, fweet my lord, and fo I take my leave.

[to the King. King. No, Madam; we will bring you on your way. Biron. Our wooing doth not end like an old Play; Jack hath not Fill; thefe ladies courtefie

Might well have made our sport a Comedy.

King. Come, Sir, it wants a twelve-month and a day, And then 'twill end.

Biron. (56) That's too long for a Play.

Enter Armado.

Arm. Sweet Majefty, vouchfafe me →→
Prin. Was not that Hector?

Dum. That warthy Knight of Troy.

Arm. I will kiss thy royal finger, and take leave. I am a Votary; I have vow'd to Jaquenetta to hold the plough for her fweet love three years. But, mostefteem'd Greatnefs, will you hear the dialogue that the two learned men have compiled, in praife of the owl and the cuckow? it should have follow'd in the end of our Show.

King. Call them forth quickly, we will do so.
Arm. Holla! approach.

Enter all.

This fide is Hiems, winter.

This Ver, the spring: the one maintain'd by the owl,

(56) That's too long for a Play.] Befides the exact Regularity to the Rules of Art, which the Author has happen'd to preferve in fome few of his Pieces; This is Demonftration, I think, that tho' he has more fre quently tranfgrefs'd the Unity of Time, by cramming Years into the Com pafs of a Play, yet he knew the Abfurdity of fo doing, and was not unacquainted with the Rule to the contrary.

N 3

The

The other by the cuckow.

Ver, begin.

The

SONG.

SPRING.

(57) When daizies pied, and violets blue,
And lady-fmocks all filver white,
And cuckow-buds of yellow hue,

Do paint the meadows with delight;
The cuckow-then on every tree

Mocks married men; for thus fings he,
Cuckow!

Cuckow! cuckow! O word of fear,
Unpleafing to a married ear!,

When Shepherds pipe on oaten ftraws,
And merry larks are ploughmens clocks:
When turtles tread, and rooks and daws;
And maidens bleach their fummer Smocks 3
The cuckow then on every tree

Mocks married men; for thus fings he
Cuckow!

Cuckow! cuckow! O word of fear,
Unpleafing to a married ear!

57) When Daizies py'd, and Violets blue,

And Cuckow-buds of yellow Hue

And Lady-fmocks all filver white,

Do paint the Meadows with Delight;] Tho' all the printed Copies range thefe Verfes in this Order, I have not fcrupled to tranfpofe the fecond and third Verfe, that the Metre may be conformable with That of the three following Stanza's; in all which the Rhymes of the. first four Lines are alternate. I have now done with this Play, which in the Main may be call'd a very bad One: and I have found it so very troublefom in the Corruptions, that, I think, I may conclude with the old religious Editors, Deo gratias!

WINTER.

When ificles bang by the wall,

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail;
And Tom bears logs into the ball,

And milk comes frozen bome in pail;
When blood is nipt, and ways be foul,
Then nightly fings the flaring owl
Tu-whit! to-who!

A merry note,

While greafie Jone doth keel the pot.

When all aloud the wind doth blow,
And coughing drowns the Parfon's faw;
And birds fit brooding in the fnow,
And Marian's nose looks red and raw ;
When roafted crabs hifs in the bowl,
Then nightly fings the ftaring owl,
Tu-whit! to-who!

A merry note,

While greafie Jone doth keel the pot.

Arm. The words of Mercury

Are harsh after the Songs of Apollo:
You, that way; we, this way.

1

[Exeunt omnes.