SCENE I. The forest

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: 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.

Enter WILLIAM

WILLIAM
Good even, Audrey.

AUDREY
God ye good even, William.

WILLIAM
And good even to you, sir.

TOUCHSTONE
Good even, 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' the 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 sayest 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 a 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; I 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 seeks you; come, away, away!

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

Exeunt

SCENE II

SCENE II. 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.

ORLANDO
You have my consent. Let your wedding be to-morrow: thither will I invite the duke and all's contented followers. Go you and prepare Aliena; for look you, here comes my Rosalind.

Enter 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.

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 handkerchief?

ORLANDO
Ay, and greater wonders than that.

ROSALIND
O, I know where you are: nay, 'tis true: there was never any thing 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 a 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 to-morrow, 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 to-morrow 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, to-morrow 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
Speakest 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 to-morrow, you shall, and to Rosalind, if you will.

Enter SILVIUS and PHEBE

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

PHEBE
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.

PHEBE
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 Phebe.

PHEBE
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 Phebe.

PHEBE
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 Phebe.

PHEBE
And so am I for Ganymede.

ORLANDO
And so am I for Rosalind.

ROSALIND
And so am I for no woman.

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

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

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

ROSALIND
Who do you speak to, '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 PHEBE ] I would love you, if I could. To-morrow meet me all together. [To PHEBE ] I will marry you, if ever I marry woman, and I'll be married to-morrow: [To ORLANDO ] I will satisfy you, if ever I satisfied man, and you shall be married to-morrow: [To SILVIUS ] I will content you, if what pleases you contents you, and you shall be married to-morrow. [To ORLANDO ] As you love Rosalind, meet: [To SILVIUS ] as you love Phebe, 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.

PHEBE
Nor I.

ORLANDO
Nor I.

Exeunt

SCENE III. The forest

Enter TOUCHSTONE and AUDREY

TOUCHSTONE
To-morrow is the joyful day, Audrey; to-morrow 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. Here comes two of the banished duke's pages.

Enter two 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' the 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]
It was a lover and his lass,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino,
That o'er the green corn-field did pass
In 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 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 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 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 untunable.

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

SCENE IV. 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 PHEBE

ROSALIND
Patience once more, whiles our compact is urged:
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.

ROSALIND
And you say, you will have her, when I bring her?

ORLANDO
That would I, were I of all kingdoms king.

ROSALIND
You say, you'll marry me, if I be willing?

PHEBE
That will I, should I die the hour after.

ROSALIND
But if you do refuse to marry me,
You'll give yourself to this most faithful shepherd?

PHEBE
So is the bargain.

ROSALIND
You say, that you'll have Phebe, if she will?

SILVIUS
Though to have her and death were both one thing.

ROSALIND
I have promised to make all this matter even.
Keep you your word, O duke, to give your daughter;
You yours, Orlando, to receive his daughter:
Keep your word, Phebe, that you'll marry me,
Or else refusing me, to wed this shepherd:
Keep your word, Silvius, that you'll marry her.
If she refuse me: and from hence I go,
To make these doubts all even.

Exeunt ROSALIND and CELIA

DUKE SENIOR
I do remember in this shepherd boy
Some lively touches of my daughter's favour.

ORLANDO
My lord, the first time that I ever saw him
Methought he was a brother to your daughter:
But, my good lord, this boy is forest-born,
And hath been tutor'd in the rudiments
Of many desperate studies by his uncle,
Whom he reports to be a great magician,
Obscured in the circle of this forest.

Enter TOUCHSTONE and AUDREY

JAQUES
There is, sure, another flood toward, and these
couples are coming to the ark. Here comes a pair of
very strange beasts, which in all tongues are called fools.

JAQUES
Good my lord, bid him welcome: this is the motley-minded gentleman that I have so often met in the forest: he hath been a courtier, he swears.

TOUCHSTONE
If any man doubt that, let him put me to my purgation. I have trod a measure; I have flattered a lady; I have been politic with my friend, smooth with mine enemy; I have undone three tailors; I have had four quarrels, and like to have fought one.

JAQUES
And how was that ta'en up?

TOUCHSTONE
Faith, we met, and found the quarrel was upon the seventh cause.

JAQUES
How seventh cause? Good my lord, like this fellow.

DUKE SENIOR
I like him very well.

TOUCHSTONE
God 'ild you, sir; I desire you of the like. I press in here, sir, amongst the rest of the country copulatives, to swear and to forswear: according as marriage binds and blood breaks: a poor virgin, sir, an ill-favoured thing, sir, but mine own; a poor humour of mine, sir, to take that that no man else will: rich honesty dwells like a miser, sir, in a poor house; as your pearl in your foul oyster.

DUKE SENIOR
By my faith, he is very swift and sententious.

TOUCHSTONE
According to the fool's bolt, sir, and such dulcet diseases.

JAQUES
But, for the seventh cause; how did you find the quarrel on the seventh cause?

TOUCHSTONE
Upon a lie seven times removed:--bear your body more seeming, Audrey:--as thus, sir. I did dislike the cut of a certain courtier's beard: he sent me word, if I said his beard was not cut well, he was in the mind it was: this is called the Retort Courteous. If I sent him word again 'it was not well cut,' he would send me word, he cut it to please himself: this is called the Quip Modest. If again 'it was not well cut,' he disabled my judgment: this is called the Reply Churlish. If again 'it was not well cut,' he would answer, I spake not true: this is called the Reproof Valiant. If again 'it was not well cut,' he would say I lied: this is called the Counter-cheque Quarrelsome: and so to the Lie Circumstantial and the Lie Direct.

JAQUES
And how oft did you say his beard was not well cut?

TOUCHSTONE
I durst go no further than the Lie Circumstantial, nor he durst not give me the Lie Direct; and so we measured swords and parted.

JAQUES
Can you nominate in order now the degrees of the lie?

TOUCHSTONE
O sir, we quarrel in print, by the book; as you have books for good manners: I will name you the degrees. The first, the Retort Courteous; the second, the Quip Modest; the third, the Reply Churlish; the fourth, the Reproof Valiant; the fifth, the Countercheque Quarrelsome; the sixth, the Lie with Circumstance; the seventh, the Lie Direct. All these you may avoid but the Lie Direct; and you may avoid that too, with an If. I knew when seven justices could not take up a quarrel, but when the parties were met themselves, one of them thought but of an If, as, 'If you said so, then I said so;' and they shook hands and swore brothers. Your If is the only peacemaker; much virtue in If.

JAQUES
Is not this a rare fellow, my lord? he's as good at any thing and yet a fool.

DUKE SENIOR
He uses his folly like a stalking-horse and under the presentation of that he shoots his wit.

Enter HYMEN, ROSALIND, and CELIA

Still Music

HYMEN
Then is there mirth in heaven,
When earthly things made even
Atone together.
Good duke, receive thy daughter
Hymen from heaven brought her,
Yea, brought her hither,
That thou mightst join her hand with his
Whose heart within his bosom is.

ROSALIND
[To DUKE SENIOR] To you I give myself, for I am yours.
[To ORLANDO] To you I give myself, for I am yours.

DUKE SENIOR
If there be truth in sight, you are my daughter.

ORLANDO
If there be truth in sight, you are my Rosalind.

PHEBE
If sight and shape be true,
Why then, my love adieu!

ROSALIND
[To DUKE SENIOR] I'll have no father, if you be not he:
[To ORLANDO] I'll have no husband, if you be not he:
[To PHEBE] Nor ne'er wed woman, if you be not she.

[SONG]
Wedding is great Juno's crown:
O blessed bond of board and bed!
'Tis Hymen peoples every town;
High wedlock then be honoured:
Honour, high honour and renown,
To Hymen, god of every town!

DUKE SENIOR
O my dear niece, welcome thou art to me!
Even daughter, welcome, in no less degree.

PHEBE
I will not eat my word, now thou art mine;
Thy faith my fancy to thee doth combine.

Enter JAQUES DE BOYS

JAQUES DE BOYS
Let me have audience for a word or two:
I am the second son of old Sir Rowland,
That bring these tidings to this fair assembly.
Duke Frederick, hearing how that every day
Men of great worth resorted to this forest,
Address'd a mighty power; which were on foot,
In his own conduct, purposely to take
His brother here and put him to the sword:
And to the skirts of this wild wood he came;
Where meeting with an old religious man,
After some question with him, was converted
Both from his enterprise and from the world,
His crown bequeathing to his banish'd brother,
And all their lands restored to them again
That were with him exiled. This to be true,
I do engage my life.

DUKE SENIOR
Welcome, young man;
Thou offer'st fairly to thy brothers' wedding:
To one his lands withheld, and to the other
A land itself at large, a potent dukedom.
First, in this forest, let us do those ends
That here were well begun and well begot:
And after, every of this happy number
That have endured shrewd days and nights with us
Shall share the good of our returned fortune,
According to the measure of their states.
Meantime, forget this new-fall'n dignity
And fall into our rustic revelry.
Play, music! And you, brides and bridegrooms all,
With measure heap'd in joy, to the measures fall.

JAQUES
Sir, by your patience. If I heard you rightly,
The duke hath put on a religious life
And thrown into neglect the pompous court?

JAQUES DE BOYS
He hath.

JAQUES
To him will I : out of these convertites
There is much matter to be heard and learn'd.
[To DUKE SENIOR]
You to your former honour I bequeath;
Your patience and your virtue well deserves it:
[To ORLANDO] 
You to a love that your true faith doth merit:
[To OLIVER]
You to your land and love and great allies:
[To SILVIUS]
You to a long and well-deserved bed:
[To TOUCHSTONE]
And you to wrangling; for thy loving voyage
Is but for two months victuall'd. So, to your pleasures:
I am for other than for dancing measures.

DUKE SENIOR
Stay, Jaques, stay.

JAQUES
To see no pastime I what you would have
I'll stay to know at your abandon'd cave.

Exit

DUKE SENIOR
Proceed, proceed: we will begin these rites,
As we do trust they'll end, in true delights.

A dance

EPILOGUE

ROSALIND
It is not the fashion to see the lady the epilogue; but it is no more unhandsome than to see the lord the prologue. If it be true that good wine needs no bush, 'tis true that a good play needs no epilogue; yet to good wine they do use good bushes, and good plays prove the better by the help of good epilogues. What a case am I in then, that am neither a good epilogue nor cannot insinuate with you in the behalf of a good play! I am not furnished like a beggar, therefore to beg will not become me: my way is to conjure you; and I'll begin with the women. I charge you, O women, for the love you bear to men, to like as much of this play as please you: and I charge you, O men, for the love you bear to women--as I perceive by your simpering, none of you hates them--that between you and the women the play may please. If I were a woman I would kiss as many of you as had beards that pleased me, complexions that liked me and breaths that I defied not: and, I am sure, as many as have good beards or good faces or sweet breaths will, for my kind offer, when I make curtsy, bid me farewell.

Exeunt

DUKE FREDERICK
Thou art thy father's daughter; there's enough.

ROSALIND
So was I when your highness took his dukedom;
So was I when your highness banish'd him:
Treason is not inherited, my lord;
Or, if we did derive it from our friends,
What's that to me? my father was no traitor:
Then, good my liege, mistake me not so much
To think my poverty is treacherous.

CELIA
Dear sovereign, hear me speak.

DUKE FREDERICK
Ay, Celia; we stay'd her for your sake,
Else had she with her father ranged along.

CELIA
I did not then entreat to have her stay;
It was your pleasure and your own remorse:
I was too young that time to value her;
But now I know her: if she be a traitor,
Why so am I; we still have slept together,
Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together,
And wheresoever we went, like Juno's swans,
Still we went coupled and inseparable.

DUKE FREDERICK
She is too subtle for thee; and her smoothness,
Her very silence and her patience
Speak to the people, and they pity her.
Thou art a fool: she robs thee of thy name;
And thou wilt show more bright and seem more virtuous
When she is gone. Then open not thy lips:
Firm and irrevocable is my doom
Which I have pass'd upon her; she is banish'd.

CELIA
Pronounce that sentence then on me, my liege:
I cannot live out of her company.

DUKE FREDERICK
You are a fool. You, niece, provide yourself:
If you outstay the time, upon mine honour,
And in the greatness of my word, you die.

Exeunt DUKE FREDERICK and Lords

CELIA
O my poor Rosalind, whither wilt thou go?
Wilt thou change fathers? I will give thee mine.
I charge thee, be not thou more grieved than I am.

ROSALIND
I have more cause.

CELIA
Thou hast not, cousin;
Prithee be cheerful: know'st thou not, the duke
Hath banish'd me, his daughter?

ROSALIND
That he hath not.

CELIA
No, hath not? Rosalind lacks then the love
Which teacheth thee that thou and I am one:
Shall we be sunder'd? shall we part, sweet girl?
No: let my father seek another heir.
Therefore devise with me how we may fly,
Whither to go and what to bear with us;
And do not seek to take your change upon you,
To bear your griefs yourself and leave me out;
For, by this heaven, now at our sorrows pale,
Say what thou canst, I'll go along with thee.

ROSALIND
Why, whither shall we go?

CELIA
To seek my uncle in the forest of Arden.

ROSALIND
Alas, what danger will it be to us,
Maids as we are, to travel forth so far!
Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold.

CELIA
I'll put myself in poor and mean attire
And with a kind of umber smirch my face;
The like do you: so shall we pass along
And never stir assailants.

ROSALIND
Were it not better,
Because that I am more than common tall,
That I did suit me all points like a man?
A gallant curtle-axe upon my thigh,
A boar-spear in my hand; and--in my heart
Lie there what hidden woman's fear there will--
We'll have a swashing and a martial outside,
As many other mannish cowards have
That do outface it with their semblances.

CELIA
What shall I call thee when thou art a man?

ROSALIND
I'll have no worse a name than Jove's own page;
And therefore look you call me Ganymede.
But what will you be call'd?

CELIA
Something that hath a reference to my state
No longer Celia, but Aliena.

ROSALIND
But, cousin, what if we assay'd to steal
The clownish fool out of your father's court?
Would he not be a comfort to our travel?

CELIA
He'll go along o'er the wide world with me;
Leave me alone to woo him. Let's away,
And get our jewels and our wealth together,
Devise the fittest time and safest way
To hide us from pursuit that will be made
After my flight. Now go we in content
To liberty and not to banishment.

Exeunt

CHARLES
O, no; for the duke's daughter, her cousin, so loves her, being ever from their cradles bred together, that she would have followed 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.

OLIVER
Where will the old duke live?

CHARLES
They say he is already in the forest 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 carelessly, as they did in the golden world.

OLIVER
What, you wrestle to-morrow before the new duke?

CHARLES
Marry, do I, sir; and I came to acquaint you with a matter. I am given, sir, secretly to understand that your younger brother Orlando hath a disposition to come in disguised 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 loath to foil him, as I must, for my 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.

OLIVER
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 dissuade him from it, but he is resolute. I'll tell thee, Charles: it is the stubbornest young fellow of France, full of ambition, an envious emulator of every man's good parts, a secret and villanous 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 slight disgrace or if he do not mightily grace himself on thee, he will practise against thee by poison, entrap thee by some treacherous device and never leave thee till he hath ta'en thy life by some indirect means or other; for, I assure thee, and almost with tears I speak it, there is not one so young and so villanous 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.

CHARLES
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!

OLIVER
Farewell, good Charles.

Exit CHARLES

Now will I stir this gamester: I hope I shall see an end of him; for my soul, yet I know not why, hates nothing more than he. Yet he's gentle, never schooled and yet learned, full of noble device, of all sorts 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 II. Lawn before the Duke's palace

Enter CELIA and ROSALIND

CELIA
I pray thee, Rosalind, sweet my coz, be merry.

ROSALIND
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 banished father, you must not learn me how to remember any extraordinary pleasure.

CELIA
Herein I see thou lovest me not with the full weight that I love thee. If my uncle, thy banished 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 tempered as mine is to thee.

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

CELIA
You know my father hath no child but I, 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, I will; and when I break that oath, let me turn monster: therefore, my sweet Rose, my dear Rose, be merry.

ROSALIND
From henceforth I will, coz, and devise sports. Let me see; what think you of falling in love?

CELIA
Marry, I prithee, 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 mayst in honour come off again.

ROSALIND
What shall be our sport, then?

CELIA
Let us sit and mock the good housewife Fortune from her wheel, that her gifts may henceforth be bestowed equally.

ROSALIND
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.

ROSALIND
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 TOUCHSTONE

CELIA
No? when Nature hath made a fair creature, may she not by Fortune fall into the fire? Though Nature hath given us wit to flout at Fortune, hath not Fortune sent in this fool to cut off the argument?

ROSALIND
Indeed, there is Fortune too hard for Nature, when Fortune makes Nature's natural the cutter-off of Nature's wit.

CELIA
Peradventure this is not Fortune's work neither, but Nature's; who perceiveth our natural wits too dull to reason of such goddesses and hath sent this natural for our whetstone; for always the dulness of the fool is the whetstone of the wits. How now, wit! whither wander you?

TOUCHSTONE
Mistress, you must come away to your father.

CELIA
Were you made the messenger?

TOUCHSTONE
No, by mine honour, but I was bid to come for you.

ROSALIND
Where learned you that oath, fool?

TOUCHSTONE
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.

CELIA
How prove you that, in the great heap of your knowledge?

ROSALIND
Ay, marry, now unmuzzle your wisdom.

TOUCHSTONE
Stand you both forth now: stroke your chins, and swear by your beards that I am a knave.

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

TOUCHSTONE
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.

CELIA
Prithee, who is't that thou meanest?

TOUCHSTONE
One that old Frederick, your father, loves.

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

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

CELIA
By my troth, thou sayest true; for since the little wit that fools have was silenced, the little foolery that wise men have makes a great show. Here comes Monsieur Le Beau.

ROSALIND
With his mouth full of news.

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

ROSALIND
Then shall we be news-crammed.

CELIA
All the better; we shall be the more marketable.

Enter LE BEAU

Bon jour, Monsieur Le Beau: what's the news?

LE BEAU
Fair princess, you have lost much good sport.

CELIA
Sport! of what colour?

LE BEAU
What colour, madam! how shall I answer you?

ROSALIND
As wit and fortune will.

TOUCHSTONE
Or as the Destinies decree.

CELIA
Well said: that was laid on with a trowel.

TOUCHSTONE
Nay, if I keep not my rank,--

ROSALIND
Thou losest thy old smell.

LE BEAU
You amaze me, ladies: I would have told you of good wrestling, which you have lost the sight of.

ROSALIND
You tell us the manner of the wrestling.

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

CELIA
Well, the beginning, that is dead and buried.

LE BEAU
There comes an old man and his three sons,--

CELIA
I could match this beginning with an old tale.

LE BEAU
Three proper young men, of excellent growth and presence.

ROSALIND
With bills on their necks, 'Be it known unto all men by these presents.'

LE BEAU
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 served the second, and so the third. Yonder they lie; the poor old man, their father, making such pitiful dole over them that all the beholders take his part with weeping.

ROSALIND
Alas!

TOUCHSTONE
But what is the sport, monsieur, that the ladies have lost?

LE BEAU
Why, this that I speak of.

TOUCHSTONE
Thus men may grow wiser every day: it is the first time that ever I heard breaking of ribs was sport for ladies.

CELIA
Or I, I promise thee.

ROSALIND
But is there any else longs to see this broken music in his sides? is there yet another dotes upon rib-breaking? Shall we see this wrestling, cousin?

CELIA
Yonder, sure, they are coming: let us now stay and see it.

Flourish. Enter DUKE FREDERICK, Lords, ORLANDO, CHARLES, and Attendants

DUKE FREDERICK
Come on: since the youth will not be entreated, his own peril on his forwardness.

ROSALIND
Is yonder the man?

LE BEAU
Even he, madam.

CELIA
Alas, he is too young! yet he looks successfully.

DUKE FREDERICK
How now, daughter and cousin! are you crept hither to see the wrestling?

ROSALIND
Ay, my liege, so please you give us leave.

DUKE FREDERICK
You will take little delight in it, I can tell you; there is such odds in the man. In pity of the challenger's youth I would fain dissuade him, but he will not be entreated. Speak to him, ladies; see if you can move him.

CELIA
Call him hither, good Monsieur Le Beau.

DUKE FREDERICK
Do so: I'll not be by.

LE BEAU
Monsieur the challenger, the princesses call for you.

ORLANDO
I attend them with all respect and duty.

ROSALIND
Young man, have you challenged Charles the wrestler?

ORLANDO
No, fair princess; he is the general challenger: I come but in, as others do, to try with him the strength of my youth.

CELIA
Young gentleman, your spirits are too bold for your years. You have seen cruel proof of this man's strength: if you saw yourself with your eyes or knew yourself with your judgment, the fear of your adventure would counsel you to a more equal enterprise. We pray you, for your own sake, to embrace your own safety and give over this attempt.

ROSALIND
Do, young sir; your reputation shall not therefore be misprised: we will make it our suit to the duke that the wrestling might not go forward.

ORLANDO
I beseech you, punish me not with your hard thoughts; wherein I confess me much guilty, to deny so fair and excellent ladies any thing. But let your fair eyes and gentle wishes go with me to my trial: wherein if I be foiled, there is but one shamed that was never gracious; if killed, but one dead that was willing to be so: I shall do my friends no wrong, for I have none to lament me, the world no injury, for in it I have nothing; only in the world I fill up a place, which may be better supplied when I have made it empty.

ROSALIND
The little strength that I have, I would it were with you.

CELIA
And mine, to eke out hers.

ROSALIND
Fare you well: pray heaven I be deceived in you!

CELIA
Your heart's desires be with you!

CHARLES
Come, where is this young gallant that is so desirous to lie with his mother earth?

ORLANDO
Ready, sir; but his will hath in it a more modest working.

DUKE FREDERICK
You shall try but one fall.

CHARLES
No, I warrant your grace, you shall not entreat him to a second, that have so mightily persuaded him from a first.

ORLANDO
An you mean to mock me after, you should not have mocked me before: but come your ways.

ROSALIND
Now Hercules be thy speed, young man!

CELIA
I would I were invisible, to catch the strong fellow by the leg.

They wrestle

ROSALIND
O excellent young man!

CELIA
If I had a thunderbolt in mine eye, I can tell who should down.

Shout. CHARLES is thrown

DUKE FREDERICK
No more, no more.

ORLANDO
Yes, I beseech your grace: I am not yet well breathed.

DUKE FREDERICK
How dost thou, Charles?

LE BEAU
He cannot speak, my lord.

DUKE FREDERICK
Bear him away. What is thy name, young man?

ORLANDO
Orlando, my liege; the youngest son of Sir Rowland de Boys.

DUKE FREDERICK
I would thou hadst been son to some man else:
The world esteem'd thy father honourable,
But I did find him still mine enemy:
Thou shouldst have better pleased me with this deed,
Hadst thou descended from another house.
But fare thee well; thou art a gallant youth:
I would thou hadst told me of another father.

Exeunt DUKE FREDERICK, train, and LE BEAU

CELIA
Were I my father, coz, would I do this?

ORLANDO
I am more proud to be Sir Rowland's son,
His youngest son; and would not change that calling,
To be adopted heir to Frederick.

ROSALIND
My father loved Sir Rowland as his soul,
And all the world was of my father's mind:
Had I before known this young man his son,
I should have given him tears unto entreaties,
Ere he should thus have ventured.

CELIA
Gentle cousin,
Let us go thank him and encourage him:
My father's rough and envious disposition
Sticks me at heart. Sir, you have well deserved:
If you do keep your promises in love
But justly, as you have exceeded all promise,
Your mistress shall be happy.

Giving him a chain from her neck

Wear this for me, one out of suits with fortune,
That could give more, but that her hand lacks means.
Shall we go, coz?

CELIA
Ay. Fare you well, fair gentleman.

ORLANDO
Can I not say, I thank you? My better parts
Are all thrown down, and that which here stands up
Is but a quintain, a mere lifeless block.

ROSALIND
He calls us back: my pride fell with my fortunes;
I'll ask him what he would. Did you call, sir?
Sir, you have wrestled well and overthrown
More than your enemies.

CELIA
Will you go, coz?

ROSALIND
Have with you. Fare you well.

Exeunt ROSALIND and CELIA

ORLANDO
What passion hangs these weights upon my tongue?
I cannot speak to her, yet she urged conference.
O poor Orlando, thou art overthrown!
Or Charles or something weaker masters thee.

Re-enter LE BEAU

LE BEAU
Good sir, I do in friendship counsel you
To leave this place. Albeit you have deserved
High commendation, true applause and love,
Yet such is now the duke's condition
That he misconstrues all that you have done.
The duke is humorous; what he is indeed,
More suits you to conceive than I to speak of.

ORLANDO
I thank you, sir: and, pray you, tell me this:
Which of the two was daughter of the duke
That here was at the wrestling?

LE BEAU
Neither his daughter, if we judge by manners;
But yet indeed the lesser is his daughter
The other is daughter to the banish'd duke,
And here detain'd by her usurping uncle,
To keep his daughter company; whose loves
Are dearer than the natural bond of sisters.
But I can tell you that of late this duke
Hath ta'en displeasure 'gainst his gentle niece,
Grounded upon no other argument
But that the people praise her for her virtues
And pity her for her good father's sake;
And, on my life, his malice 'gainst the lady
Will suddenly break forth. Sir, fare you well:
Hereafter, in a better world than this,
I shall desire more love and knowledge of you.

ORLANDO
I rest much bounden to you: fare you well.

Exit LE BEAU

Thus must I from the smoke into the smother;
From tyrant duke unto a tyrant brother:
But heavenly Rosalind!

Exit

SCENE III. A room in the palace

Enter CELIA and ROSALIND

CELIA
Why, cousin! why, Rosalind! Cupid have mercy! not a word?

ROSALIND
Not one to throw at a dog.

CELIA
No, thy words are too precious to be cast away upon curs; throw some of them at me; come, lame me with reasons.

ROSALIND
Then there were two cousins laid up; when the one should be lamed with reasons and the other mad without any.

CELIA
But is all this for your father?

ROSALIND
No, some of it is for my child's father. O, how full of briers is this working-day world!

CELIA
They are but burs, cousin, thrown upon thee in holiday foolery: if we walk not in the trodden paths our very petticoats will catch them.

ROSALIND
I could shake them off my coat: these burs are in my heart.

CELIA
Hem them away.

ROSALIND
I would try, if I could cry 'hem' and have him.

CELIA
Come, come, wrestle with thy affections.

ROSALIND
O, they take the part of a better wrestler than myself!

CELIA
O, a good wish upon you! you will try in time, in despite of a fall. But, turning these jests out of service, let us talk in good earnest: is it possible, on such a sudden, you should fall into so strong a liking with old Sir Rowland's youngest son?

ROSALIND
The duke my father loved his father dearly.

CELIA
Doth it therefore ensue that you should love his son dearly? By this kind of chase, I should hate him, for my father hated his father dearly; yet I hate not Orlando.

ROSALIND
No, faith, hate him not, for my sake.

CELIA
Why should I not? doth he not deserve well?

ROSALIND
Let me love him for that, and do you love him because I do. Look, here comes the duke.

CELIA
With his eyes full of anger.

Enter DUKE FREDERICK, with Lords

DUKE FREDERICK
Mistress, dispatch you with your safest haste
And get you from our court.

ROSALIND
Me, uncle?

DUKE FREDERICK
You, cousin
Within these ten days if that thou be'st found
So near our public court as twenty miles,
Thou diest for it.

ROSALIND
I do beseech your grace,
Let me the knowledge of my fault bear with me:
If with myself I hold intelligence
Or have acquaintance with mine own desires,
If that I do not dream or be not frantic,--
As I do trust I am not--then, dear uncle,
Never so much as in a thought unborn
Did I offend your highness.

DUKE FREDERICK
Thus do all traitors:
If their purgation did consist in words,
They are as innocent as grace itself:
Let it suffice thee that I trust thee not.

DUKE FREDERICK
Thou art thy father's daughter; there's enough.

ROSALIND
So was I when your highness took his dukedom;
So was I when your highness banish'd him:
Treason is not inherited, my lord;
Or, if we did derive it from our friends,
What's that to me? my father was no traitor:
Then, good my liege, mistake me not so much
To think my poverty is treacherous.

CELIA
Dear sovereign, hear me speak.

DUKE FREDERICK
Ay, Celia; we stay'd her for your sake,
Else had she with her father ranged along.

CELIA
I did not then entreat to have her stay;
It was your pleasure and your own remorse:
I was too young that time to value her;
But now I know her: if she be a traitor,
Why so am I; we still have slept together,
Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together,
And wheresoever we went, like Juno's swans,
Still we went coupled and inseparable.

DUKE FREDERICK
She is too subtle for thee; and her smoothness,
Her very silence and her patience
Speak to the people, and they pity her.
Thou art a fool: she robs thee of thy name;
And thou wilt show more bright and seem more virtuous
When she is gone. Then open not thy lips:
Firm and irrevocable is my doom
Which I have pass'd upon her; she is banish'd.

CELIA
Pronounce that sentence then on me, my liege:
I cannot live out of her company.

DUKE FREDERICK
You are a fool. You, niece, provide yourself:
If you outstay the time, upon mine honour,
And in the greatness of my word, you die.

Exeunt DUKE FREDERICK and Lords

CELIA
O my poor Rosalind, whither wilt thou go?
Wilt thou change fathers? I will give thee mine.
I charge thee, be not thou more grieved than I am.

ROSALIND
I have more cause.

CELIA
Thou hast not, cousin;
Prithee be cheerful: know'st thou not, the duke
Hath banish'd me, his daughter?

ROSALIND
That he hath not.

CELIA
No, hath not? Rosalind lacks then the love
Which teacheth thee that thou and I am one:
Shall we be sunder'd? shall we part, sweet girl?
No: let my father seek another heir.
Therefore devise with me how we may fly,
Whither to go and what to bear with us;
And do not seek to take your change upon you,
To bear your griefs yourself and leave me out;
For, by this heaven, now at our sorrows pale,
Say what thou canst, I'll go along with thee.

ROSALIND
Why, whither shall we go?

CELIA
To seek my uncle in the forest of Arden.

ROSALIND
Alas, what danger will it be to us,
Maids as we are, to travel forth so far!
Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold.

CELIA
I'll put myself in poor and mean attire
And with a kind of umber smirch my face;
The like do you: so shall we pass along
And never stir assailants.

ROSALIND
Were it not better,
Because that I am more than common tall,
That I did suit me all points like a man?
A gallant curtle-axe upon my thigh,
A boar-spear in my hand; and--in my heart
Lie there what hidden woman's fear there will--
We'll have a swashing and a martial outside,
As many other mannish cowards have
That do outface it with their semblances.

CELIA
What shall I call thee when thou art a man?

ROSALIND
I'll have no worse a name than Jove's own page;
And therefore look you call me Ganymede.
But what will you be call'd?

CELIA
Something that hath a reference to my state
No longer Celia, but Aliena.

ROSALIND
But, cousin, what if we assay'd to steal
The clownish fool out of your father's court?
Would he not be a comfort to our travel?

CELIA
He'll go along o'er the wide world with me;
Leave me alone to woo him. Let's away,
And get our jewels and our wealth together,
Devise the fittest time and safest way
To hide us from pursuit that will be made
After my flight. Now go we in content
To liberty and not to banishment.

Exeunt