Imatges de pàgina
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Jaq. More, more, I pr'ythee, more.

Ami. It will make you melancholy, Monfieur Jaques. Jaq. I thank it; more, I pr'ythee, more; I can fuck melancholy out of a Song, as a weazel fucks eggs: more, I pr'ythee, more.

Ami. My voice is rugged; I know, I cannot pleafe

you.

Jaq. I do not defire you to please me, I do defire you to fing; come, come, another stanzo; call you

'em ftanzo's?

Ami. What you will, Monfieur Jaques.

Jaq. Nay, I care not for their names, they owe mę nothing. Will you fing?

Ami. More at your requeft, than to please myself. Jaq. Well then, if ever I thank any man, I'll thank you; but That, they call Compliments, is like the encounter of two dog-apes. And when a man thanks me heartily, methinks, I have given him a penny, and he renders me the beggarly thanks. Come, fing; and you that will not, hold your tongues

Ami. Well, I'll end the fong, Sirs; cover the while; the Duke will dine under this tree; he hath been all this day to look you.

Jaq. And I have been all this day to avoid him. He is too difputable for my company: I think of as many matters as he, but I give heav'n thanks, and make no boaft of them. Come, warble, come.

SONG.

Who doth ambition fhun,

And loves to lie i̇th' Sun,

Seeking the food he eats,

And pleas'd with what he gets';

Come hither, come hither, come hither;

Here fhall he fee

No enemy,

But winter and rough weather.

Jaq,

Jaq. I'll give you a verse to this note, that I made yeflerday in defpight of my invention.

Ami. And I'll fing it.

Jaq. Thus it goes.

If it do come to pass,

That any man turn afs;
Leaving his wealth and eafe

A ftubborn will to please,

Duc ad me, duc ad me, duc ad me;

Here fhall he fee

Grofs fools as he,

An if he will come to me.

Ami. What's that duc ad me?

Jaq. 'Tis a Greek invocation, to call fools into a circle. I'll go to fleep if I can; if I cannot, I'll rail against all the first-born of Egypt.

Ami. And I'll go seek the Duke: his banquet is prepar❜d. [Exeunt, feverally.

Adam.

SCENE VI.

Enter Orlando and Adam.

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EAR mafter, I can go no further; O, I die for food! here lie I down, and measure out my grave. Farewel, kind master.

Orla. Why, how now, Adam! no greater heart in thee? live a little; comfort a little; cheer thyfelf a little. If this uncouth Foreft yield any thing favage, I will either be food for it, or bring it for food to thee: thy conceit is nearer death, than thy powers. For my fake be comfortable, hold death a while at the arm's end: I will be here with thee presently, and if I bring thee not something to eat, I'll give thee leave to die. But if thou dieft before I come, thou art a mocker of my labour. Well faid, thou look'st cheerly.

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cheerly. And I'll be with thee quickly; yet thou lieft in the bleak air. Come, I will bear thee to fome shelter, and thou shalt not die for lack of a dinner, if there live any thing in this Defart. Cheerly, good Adam.

SCENE

Enter Duke Sen. and Lords

Duke Sen.

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[Exeunt.

VII.

[A Table fet out.

Think, he is transform'd into a beaft, For I can no where find him like a man. 1 Lord. My Lord, he is but even now gone hence. Here was he merry, hearing of a Song.

Duke Sen. If he, compact of jars, grow mufical, We shall have shortly discord in the spheres: Go, feek him; tell him, I would speak with him.

Enter Jaques.

1 Lord. He faves my labour by his own approach. Duke Sen. Why, how now, Monfieur, what a life is this,

That your poor friends muft woo your company? What! you look merrily.

Jaq. A fool, a fool;—I met a fool i' th' foreft, A motley fool; a miserable varlet !

As I do live by food, I met a fool,

Who laid him down and bask'd him in the fun,
And rail'd on Lady Fortune in good terms,
In good set terms, and yet a motley fool.
Good-morrow, fool, quoth I: No, Sir, quoth he,
Call me not fool, till heaven hath fent me fortune;
And then he drew a dial from his poak,

And looking on it with lack-luftre, eye,

Says, very wifely, it is ten a clock;

Thus may we fee, quoth he, how the world wags: 'Tis but an hour ago fince it was nine,

And after one hour more 'twill be eleven;
And fo from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,

And

And then from hour to hour we rot and rot,
And thereby hangs a tale. When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
That fools fhould be fo deep contemplative:
And I did laugh, fans intermiffion,
An hour by his dial. O noble fool,
A worthy fool! motley's the only wear.
Duke Sen. What fool is this?

Jaq. O worthy fool! one that hath been a Courtier, And fays, if ladies be but young and fair, They have the gift to know it: and in his brain, Which is as dry as the remainder bifket After a voyage, he hath ftrange places cram'd With obfervation, the which he vents In mangled forms. O that I were a fool! I am ambitious for a motley coat.

Duke Sen. Thou shalt have one.

Jaq. It is my only fuit;

Provided, that you weed your better judgments
Of all opinion, that grows rank in them,
That I am wife. I must have liberty

Withal, as large a charter as the wind,

To blow on whom I pleafe; for fo fools have;
And they that are moft gauled with my folly,
They moft muft laugh; and, why, Sir, muft they fo?
The why is plain, as way to parish church;
He, whom a fool doth very wifely hit,
Doth very foolishly, although he smart,
*Not to feem fenfelefs of the bob. If not,
The wife man's folly is anatomiz'd
Even by the fquandring glances of a fool.
Invest me in my motley, give me leave

To speak my mind, and I will through and through

* Seem fenfeless of the bob.] Both the Measure and the Sense dire&

us to read,

Not to seem fenfeless, &c.

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Cleanse

Cleanse the foul body of th' infected world,
If they will patiently receive my medicine.

Duke Sen. Fie on thee! I can tell what thou wouldft
do.

Jaq. What, for a counter, would I do but good? Duke Sen. Moft mifchievous foul fin, in chiding fin: For thou thyself haft been a libertine,

As fenfual as the brutish fting itself;

And all th' emboffed fores and headed evils,
That thou with licence of free foot haft caught,
Would't thou difgorge into the general world.
Jaq. Why, who cries out on pride,
That can therein tax any private party?
Doth it not flow as hugely as the Sea,
'Till that the very very means do ebb?
What woman in the city do I name,
When that I fay, the city-woman bears
The coft of Princes on unworthy fhoulders?
Who can come in, and fay, that I mean her;
When fuch a one as fhe, fuch is her neighbour?
Or what is he of bafeft function,

That fays, his bravery is not on my coft;
Thinking, that I mean him; but therein futes
His folly to the metal of my fpeech?

There then; how then? what then? let me fee where

in

My tongue hath wrong'd him; if it do him right,
Then he hath wrong'd himfelf; if he be free,
Why, then my taxing, like a wild goofe, flies
Unclaim'd of any man.

But who comes here ?

SCENE VIII.

Entre Orlando, with Sword drawn.

ORBEAR, and eat no more.

Orla. Faq. Why, I have eat none yet.

Orla. Nor halt thou, 'till neceffity be ferv'd.

Jaq.

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