Part 21

ROSALIND. I might ask you for your commission. But I do take thee, Orlando, for my husband. There’s a girl goes before the priest, and certainly a woman’s thought runs before her actions.

ORLANDO. So do all thoughts. They are winged.

ROSALIND. Now tell me how long you would have her after you have possessed her.

ORLANDO. For ever and a day.

ROSALIND. Say “a day” without the “ever.” No, no, Orlando, men are April when they woo, December when they wed. Maids are May when they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives. I will be more jealous of thee than a Barbary cock-pigeon over his hen, more clamorous than a parrot against rain, more new-fangled than an ape, more giddy in my desires than a monkey. I will weep for nothing, like Diana in the fountain, and I will do that when you are disposed to be merry. I will laugh like a hyena, and that when thou are inclined to sleep.

ORLANDO. But will my Rosalind do so?

ROSALIND. By my life, she will do as I do.

ORLANDO. O, but she is wise.

ROSALIND. Or else she could not have the wit to do this. The wiser, the waywarder. Make the doors upon a woman’s wit, and it will out at the casement. Shut that, and ’twill out at the keyhole. Stop that, ’twill fly with the smoke out at the chimney.

ORLANDO. A man that had a wife with such a wit, he might say, “Wit, whither wilt?”

ROSALIND. Nay, you might keep that check for it till you met your wife’s wit going to your neighbour’s bed.

ORLANDO. And what wit could wit have to excuse that?

ROSALIND. Marry, to say she came to seek you there. You shall never take her without her answer unless you take her without her tongue. O, that woman that cannot make her fault her husband’s occasion, let her never nurse her child herself, for she will breed it like a fool.

ORLANDO. For these two hours, Rosalind, I will leave thee.

ROSALIND. Alas, dear love, I cannot lack thee two hours.

ORLANDO. I must attend the Duke at dinner. By two o’clock I will be with thee again.

ROSALIND. Ay, go your ways, go your ways. I knew what you would prove. My friends told me as much, and I thought no less. That flattering tongue of yours won me. ’Tis but one cast away, and so, come death! Two o’clock is your hour?

ORLANDO. Ay, sweet Rosalind.

ROSALIND. By my troth, and in good earnest, and so God mend me, and by all pretty oaths that are not dangerous, if you break one jot of your promise or come one minute behind your hour, I will think you the most pathetical break-promise, and the most hollow lover, and the most unworthy of her you call Rosalind that may be chosen out of the gross band of the unfaithful. Therefore beware my censure, and keep your promise.

ORLANDO. With no less religion than if thou wert indeed my Rosalind. So, adieu.

ROSALIND. Well, Time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and let time try. Adieu.

[_Exit Orlando._]

CELIA. You have simply misused our sex in your love-prate! We must have your doublet and hose plucked over your head and show the world what the bird hath done to her own nest.

ROSALIND. O coz, coz, coz, my pretty little coz, that thou didst know how many fathom deep I am in love! But it cannot be sounded; my affection hath an unknown bottom, like the Bay of Portugal.

CELIA. Or rather, bottomless, that as fast as you pour affection in, it runs out.

ROSALIND. No, that same wicked bastard of Venus, that was begot of thought, conceived of spleen, and born of madness, that blind rascally boy that abuses everyone’s eyes because his own are out, let him be judge how deep I am in love. I’ll tell thee, Aliena, I cannot be out of the sight of Orlando. I’ll go find a shadow and sigh till he come.

CELIA. And I’ll sleep.

[_Exeunt._]

SCENE II. Another part of the Forest

Enter Jaques and Lords, like foresters.

JAQUES. Which is he that killed the deer?

FIRST LORD. Sir, it was I.

JAQUES. Let’s present him to the Duke, like a Roman conqueror, and it would do well to set the deer’s horns upon his head for a branch of victory. Have you no song, forester, for this purpose?

SECOND LORD. Yes, sir.

JAQUES. Sing it. ’Tis no matter how it be in tune, so it make noise enough.

SONG

SECOND LORD. [_Sings_.] What shall he have that killed the deer? His leather skin and horns to wear. Then sing him home: [_The rest shall bear this burden_.] Take thou no scorn to wear the horn. It was a crest ere thou wast born. Thy father’s father wore it And thy father bore it. The horn, the horn, the lusty horn Is not a thing to laugh to scorn.

[_Exeunt._]

SCENE III. Another part of the Forest

Enter Rosalind and Celia.

ROSALIND. How say you now? Is it not past two o’clock? And here much Orlando.

CELIA. I warrant you, with pure love and troubled brain he hath ta’en his bow and arrows and is gone forth to sleep.

Enter Silvius.

Look who comes here.

SILVIUS. My errand is to you, fair youth. My gentle Phoebe did bid me give you this.

[_Giving a letter._]

I know not the contents, but, as I guess By the stern brow and waspish action Which she did use as she was writing of it, It bears an angry tenor. Pardon me, I am but as a guiltless messenger.

ROSALIND. Patience herself would startle at this letter And play the swaggerer. Bear this, bear all! She says I am not fair, that I lack manners; She calls me proud, and that she could not love me, Were man as rare as phoenix. ’Od’s my will, Her love is not the hare that I do hunt. Why writes she so to me? Well, shepherd, well, This is a letter of your own device.

SILVIUS. No, I protest, I know not the contents. Phoebe did write it.

ROSALIND. Come, come, you are a fool, And turned into the extremity of love. I saw her hand. She has a leathern hand, A freestone-coloured hand. I verily did think That her old gloves were on, but ’twas her hands. She has a huswife’s hand—but that’s no matter. I say she never did invent this letter; This is a man’s invention, and his hand.

SILVIUS. Sure, it is hers.

ROSALIND. Why, ’tis a boisterous and a cruel style, A style for challengers. Why, she defies me, Like Turk to Christian. Women’s gentle brain Could not drop forth such giant-rude invention, Such Ethiop words, blacker in their effect Than in their countenance. Will you hear the letter?

SILVIUS. So please you, for I never heard it yet, Yet heard too much of Phoebe’s cruelty.

ROSALIND. She Phoebes me. Mark how the tyrant writes.

[_Reads._]

_Art thou god to shepherd turned, That a maiden’s heart hath burned?_ Can a woman rail thus?

SILVIUS. Call you this railing?

ROSALIND. _Why, thy godhead laid apart, Warr’st thou with a woman’s heart?_ Did you ever hear such railing? _Whiles the eye of man did woo me, That could do no vengeance to me._ Meaning me a beast. _If the scorn of your bright eyne Have power to raise such love in mine, Alack, in me what strange effect Would they work in mild aspect? Whiles you chid me, I did love, How then might your prayers move? He that brings this love to thee Little knows this love in me; And by him seal up thy mind, Whether that thy youth and kind Will the faithful offer take Of me, and all that I can make, Or else by him my love deny, And then I’ll study how to die._

SILVIUS. Call you this chiding?

CELIA. Alas, poor shepherd.

ROSALIND. Do you pity him? No, he deserves no pity.—Wilt thou love such a woman? What, to make thee an instrument and play false strains upon thee? Not to be endured! Well, go your way to her, for I see love hath made thee a tame snake, and say this to her: that if she love me, I charge her to love thee; if she will not, I will never have her unless thou entreat for her. If you be a true lover, hence, and not a word, for here comes more company.

[_Exit Silvius._]

Enter Oliver.

OLIVER. Good morrow, fair ones. Pray you, if you know, Where in the purlieus of this forest stands A sheepcote fenced about with olive trees?

CELIA. West of this place, down in the neighbour bottom; The rank of osiers, by the murmuring stream, Left on your right hand, brings you to the place. But at this hour the house doth keep itself. There’s none within.

OLIVER. If that an eye may profit by a tongue, Then should I know you by description, Such garments, and such years. “The boy is fair, Of female favour, and bestows himself Like a ripe sister; the woman low, And browner than her brother.” Are not you The owner of the house I did inquire for?

CELIA. It is no boast, being asked, to say we are.

OLIVER. Orlando doth commend him to you both, And to that youth he calls his Rosalind He sends this bloody napkin. Are you he?

ROSALIND. I am. What must we understand by this?

OLIVER. Some of my shame, if you will know of me What man I am, and how, and why, and where This handkerchief was stained.

CELIA. I pray you tell it.

OLIVER. When last the young Orlando parted from you, He left a promise to return again Within an hour, and pacing through the forest, Chewing the food of sweet and bitter fancy, Lo, what befell. He threw his eye aside, And mark what object did present itself. Under an oak, whose boughs were mossed with age And high top bald with dry antiquity, A wretched ragged man, o’ergrown with hair, Lay sleeping on his back; about his neck A green and gilded snake had wreathed itself, Who with her head, nimble in threats, approached The opening of his mouth. But suddenly, Seeing Orlando, it unlinked itself And with indented glides did slip away Into a bush; under which bush’s shade A lioness, with udders all drawn dry, Lay couching, head on ground, with catlike watch When that the sleeping man should stir. For ’tis The royal disposition of that beast To prey on nothing that doth seem as dead. This seen, Orlando did approach the man And found it was his brother, his elder brother.

CELIA. O, I have heard him speak of that same brother, And he did render him the most unnatural That lived amongst men.

OLIVER. And well he might so do, For well I know he was unnatural.

ROSALIND. But, to Orlando: did he leave him there, Food to the sucked and hungry lioness?

OLIVER. Twice did he turn his back and purposed so; But kindness, nobler ever than revenge, And nature, stronger than his just occasion, Made him give battle to the lioness, Who quickly fell before him; in which hurtling From miserable slumber I awaked.

CELIA. Are you his brother?

ROSALIND. Was it you he rescued?

CELIA. Was’t you that did so oft contrive to kill him?

OLIVER. ’Twas I; but ’tis not I. I do not shame To tell you what I was, since my conversion So sweetly tastes, being the thing I am.

ROSALIND. But, for the bloody napkin?

OLIVER. By and by. When from the first to last betwixt us two Tears our recountments had most kindly bathed— As how I came into that desert place— In brief, he led me to the gentle Duke, Who gave me fresh array and entertainment, Committing me unto my brother’s love, Who led me instantly unto his cave, There stripped himself, and here upon his arm The lioness had torn some flesh away, Which all this while had bled; and now he fainted, And cried in fainting upon Rosalind. Brief, I recovered him, bound up his wound, And after some small space, being strong at heart, He sent me hither, stranger as I am, To tell this story, that you might excuse His broken promise, and to give this napkin, Dyed in his blood, unto the shepherd youth That he in sport doth call his Rosalind.

[_Rosalind faints._]

CELIA. Why, how now, Ganymede, sweet Ganymede!

OLIVER. Many will swoon when they do look on blood.

CELIA. There is more in it. Cousin—Ganymede!

OLIVER. Look, he recovers.

ROSALIND. I would I were at home.

CELIA. We’ll lead you thither. I pray you, will you take him by the arm?

OLIVER. Be of good cheer, youth. You a man? You lack a man’s heart.

ROSALIND. I do so, I confess it. Ah, sirrah, a body would think this was well counterfeited. I pray you tell your brother how well I counterfeited. Heigh-ho.

OLIVER. This was not counterfeit. There is too great testimony in your complexion that it was a passion of earnest.

ROSALIND. Counterfeit, I assure you.

OLIVER. Well then, take a good heart, and counterfeit to be a man.

ROSALIND. So I do. But, i’ faith, I should have been a woman by right.

CELIA. Come, you look paler and paler. Pray you draw homewards. Good sir, go with us.

OLIVER. That will I, for I must bear answer back How you excuse my brother, Rosalind.

ROSALIND. I shall devise something. But I pray you commend my counterfeiting to him. Will you go?

[_Exeunt._]

ACT V

SCENE I. The Forest of Arden

Enter Touchstone and Audrey.

TOUCHSTONE. We shall find a time, Audrey; patience, gentle Audrey.

AUDREY. Faith, the priest was good enough, for all the old gentleman’s saying.

TOUCHSTONE. A most wicked Sir Oliver, Audrey, a most vile Martext. But Audrey, there is a youth here in the forest lays claim to you.

AUDREY. Ay, I know who ’tis. He hath no interest in me in the world.

Enter William.

Here comes the man you mean.

TOUCHSTONE. It is meat and drink to me to see a clown. By my troth, we that have good wits have much to answer for. We shall be flouting; we cannot hold.

WILLIAM. Good ev’n, Audrey.

AUDREY. God ye good ev’n, William.

WILLIAM. And good ev’n to you, sir.

TOUCHSTONE. Good ev’n, gentle friend. Cover thy head, cover thy head. Nay, prithee, be covered. How old are you, friend?

WILLIAM. Five-and-twenty, sir.

TOUCHSTONE. A ripe age. Is thy name William?

WILLIAM. William, sir.

TOUCHSTONE. A fair name. Wast born i’ th’ forest here?

WILLIAM. Ay, sir, I thank God.

TOUCHSTONE. “Thank God.” A good answer. Art rich?

WILLIAM. Faith, sir, so-so.

TOUCHSTONE. “So-so” is good, very good, very excellent good. And yet it is not, it is but so-so. Art thou wise?

WILLIAM. Ay, sir, I have a pretty wit.

TOUCHSTONE. Why, thou sayst well. I do now remember a saying: “The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.” The heathen philosopher, when he had a desire to eat a grape, would open his lips when he put it into his mouth, meaning thereby that grapes were made to eat and lips to open. You do love this maid?

WILLIAM. I do, sir.

TOUCHSTONE. Give me your hand. Art thou learned?

WILLIAM. No, sir.

TOUCHSTONE. Then learn this of me: to have is to have. For it is a figure in rhetoric that drink, being poured out of cup into a glass, by filling the one doth empty the other. For all your writers do consent that _ipse_ is “he.” Now, you are not _ipse_, for I am he.

WILLIAM. Which he, sir?

TOUCHSTONE. He, sir, that must marry this woman. Therefore, you clown, abandon—which is in the vulgar, “leave”—the society—which in the boorish is “company”—of this female—which in the common is “woman”; which together is, abandon the society of this female, or, clown, thou perishest; or, to thy better understanding, diest; or, to wit, I kill thee, make thee away, translate thy life into death, thy liberty into bondage. I will deal in poison with thee, or in bastinado, or in steel. I will bandy with thee in faction; will o’errun thee with policy. I will kill thee a hundred and fifty ways! Therefore tremble and depart.

AUDREY. Do, good William.

WILLIAM. God rest you merry, sir.

[_Exit._]

Enter Corin.

CORIN. Our master and mistress seek you. Come away, away.

TOUCHSTONE. Trip, Audrey, trip, Audrey! I attend, I attend.

[_Exeunt._]

SCENE II. Another part of the Forest

Enter Orlando and Oliver.

ORLANDO. Is’t possible that on so little acquaintance you should like her? That but seeing, you should love her? And loving woo? And wooing, she should grant? And will you persever to enjoy her?

OLIVER. Neither call the giddiness of it in question, the poverty of her, the small acquaintance, my sudden wooing, nor her sudden consenting. But say with me, I love Aliena; say with her that she loves me; consent with both that we may enjoy each other. It shall be to your good, for my father’s house and all the revenue that was old Sir Rowland’s will I estate upon you, and here live and die a shepherd.

Enter Rosalind.

ORLANDO. You have my consent. Let your wedding be tomorrow. Thither will I invite the Duke and all’s contented followers. Go you and prepare Aliena; for, look you, here comes my Rosalind.

ROSALIND. God save you, brother.

OLIVER. And you, fair sister.

[_Exit._]

ROSALIND. O my dear Orlando, how it grieves me to see thee wear thy heart in a scarf!

ORLANDO. It is my arm.

ROSALIND. I thought thy heart had been wounded with the claws of a lion.

ORLANDO. Wounded it is, but with the eyes of a lady.

ROSALIND. Did your brother tell you how I counterfeited to swoon when he showed me your handkercher?

ORLANDO. Ay, and greater wonders than that.

ROSALIND. O, I know where you are. Nay, ’tis true. There was never anything so sudden but the fight of two rams, and Caesar’s thrasonical brag of “I came, saw and overcame.” For your brother and my sister no sooner met but they looked; no sooner looked but they loved; no sooner loved but they sighed; no sooner sighed but they asked one another the reason; no sooner knew the reason but they sought the remedy; and in these degrees have they made pair of stairs to marriage, which they will climb incontinent, or else be incontinent before marriage. They are in the very wrath of love, and they will together. Clubs cannot part them.

ORLANDO. They shall be married tomorrow, and I will bid the Duke to the nuptial. But O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man’s eyes! By so much the more shall I tomorrow be at the height of heart-heaviness, by how much I shall think my brother happy in having what he wishes for.

ROSALIND. Why, then, tomorrow I cannot serve your turn for Rosalind?

ORLANDO. I can live no longer by thinking.

ROSALIND. I will weary you then no longer with idle talking. Know of me then—for now I speak to some purpose—that I know you are a gentleman of good conceit. I speak not this that you should bear a good opinion of my knowledge, insomuch I say I know you are. Neither do I labour for a greater esteem than may in some little measure draw a belief from you, to do yourself good, and not to grace me. Believe then, if you please, that I can do strange things. I have, since I was three year old, conversed with a magician, most profound in his art and yet not damnable. If you do love Rosalind so near the heart as your gesture cries it out, when your brother marries Aliena shall you marry her. I know into what straits of fortune she is driven and it is not impossible to me, if it appear not inconvenient to you, to set her before your eyes tomorrow, human as she is, and without any danger.

ORLANDO. Speak’st thou in sober meanings?

ROSALIND. By my life, I do, which I tender dearly, though I say I am a magician. Therefore put you in your best array, bid your friends; for if you will be married tomorrow, you shall, and to Rosalind, if you will.

Enter Silvius and Phoebe.

Look, here comes a lover of mine and a lover of hers.

PHOEBE. Youth, you have done me much ungentleness To show the letter that I writ to you.

ROSALIND. I care not if I have; it is my study To seem despiteful and ungentle to you. You are there followed by a faithful shepherd. Look upon him, love him; he worships you.

PHOEBE. Good shepherd, tell this youth what ’tis to love.

SILVIUS. It is to be all made of sighs and tears, And so am I for Phoebe.

PHOEBE. And I for Ganymede.

ORLANDO. And I for Rosalind.

ROSALIND. And I for no woman.

SILVIUS. It is to be all made of faith and service, And so am I for Phoebe.

PHOEBE. And I for Ganymede.

ORLANDO. And I for Rosalind.

ROSALIND. And I for no woman.

SILVIUS. It is to be all made of fantasy, All made of passion, and all made of wishes, All adoration, duty, and observance, All humbleness, all patience, and impatience, All purity, all trial, all observance, And so am I for Phoebe.

PHOEBE. And so am I for Ganymede.

ORLANDO. And so am I for Rosalind.

ROSALIND. And so am I for no woman.

PHOEBE. [_To Rosalind_.] If this be so, why blame you me to love you?

SILVIUS. [_To Phoebe_.] If this be so, why blame you me to love you?

ORLANDO. If this be so, why blame you me to love you?

ROSALIND. Why do you speak too, “Why blame you me to love you?”

ORLANDO. To her that is not here, nor doth not hear.

ROSALIND. Pray you, no more of this, ’tis like the howling of Irish wolves against the moon. [_to Silvius_.] I will help you if I can. [_to Phoebe_.] I would love you if I could.—Tomorrow meet me all together. [_to Phoebe_.] I will marry you, if ever I marry woman, and I’ll be married tomorrow. [_to Orlando_.] I will satisfy you if ever I satisfied man, and you shall be married tomorrow. [_to Silvius_.] I will content you, if what pleases you contents you, and you shall be married tomorrow. [_to Orlando_.] As you love Rosalind, meet. [_to Silvius_.] As you love Phoebe, meet.—And as I love no woman, I’ll meet. So fare you well. I have left you commands.

SILVIUS. I’ll not fail, if I live.

PHOEBE. Nor I.

ORLANDO. Nor I.

[_Exeunt._]

SCENE III. Another part of the Forest

Enter Touchstone and Audrey.

TOUCHSTONE. Tomorrow is the joyful day, Audrey, tomorrow will we be married.

AUDREY. I do desire it with all my heart; and I hope it is no dishonest desire to desire to be a woman of the world.

Enter two Pages.

Here come two of the banished Duke’s pages.

FIRST PAGE. Well met, honest gentleman.

TOUCHSTONE. By my troth, well met. Come sit, sit, and a song.

SECOND PAGE. We are for you, sit i’ th’ middle.

FIRST PAGE. Shall we clap into’t roundly, without hawking or spitting or saying we are hoarse, which are the only prologues to a bad voice?

SECOND PAGE. I’faith, i’faith, and both in a tune like two gipsies on a horse.

SONG

PAGES. [_Sing_.] It was a lover and his lass, With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, That o’er the green cornfield did pass In the spring-time, the only pretty ring time, When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding. Sweet lovers love the spring.

Between the acres of the rye, With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, These pretty country folks would lie, In the spring-time, the only pretty ring time, When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding. Sweet lovers love the spring.

This carol they began that hour, With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, How that a life was but a flower, In the spring-time, the only pretty ring time, When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding. Sweet lovers love the spring.

And therefore take the present time, With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, For love is crowned with the prime, In the spring-time, the only pretty ring time, When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding. Sweet lovers love the spring.

TOUCHSTONE Truly, young gentlemen, though there was no great matter in the ditty, yet the note was very untuneable.

FIRST PAGE. You are deceived, sir, we kept time, we lost not our time.

TOUCHSTONE. By my troth, yes. I count it but time lost to hear such a foolish song. God be wi’ you, and God mend your voices. Come, Audrey.

[_Exeunt._]

SCENE IV. Another part of the Forest

Enter Duke Senior, Amiens, Jaques, Orlando, Oliver and Celia.

DUKE SENIOR. Dost thou believe, Orlando, that the boy Can do all this that he hath promised?

ORLANDO. I sometimes do believe and sometimes do not, As those that fear they hope, and know they fear.

Enter Rosalind, Silvius and Phoebe.

ROSALIND. Patience once more whiles our compact is urged. [_To the Duke._] You say, if I bring in your Rosalind, You will bestow her on Orlando here?

DUKE SENIOR. That would I, had I kingdoms to give with her.