write to him a very taunting letter,
And thou shalt bear it; wilt thou, Silvius?
Sil.
Phebe, with all my heart.
Phe.
I’ll write it straight;
The matter’s in my head and in my heart.
I will be bitter with him and passing short.
Go with me, Silvius.
Exeunt.
¶
ACT IV
Scene I
Enter Rosalind and Celia and Jaques.
Jaq. I prithee, pretty youth, let me [be] better acquainted with thee.
Ros. They say you are a melancholy fellow.
Jaq. I am so; I do love it better than laughing.
Ros. Those that are in extremity of either are abominable fellows, and betray themselves to every modern censure worse than drunkards.
Jaq. Why, ’tis good to be sad and say nothing.
Ros. Why then ’tis good to be a post.
Jaq. I have neither the scholar’s melancholy, which is emulation; nor the musician’s, which is fantastical; nor the courtier’s, which is proud; nor the soldier’s, which is ambitious; nor the lawyer’s, which is politic; nor the lady’s, which is nice; nor the lover’s, which is all these: but it is a melancholy of mine own, compounded of many simples, extracted from many objects, and indeed the sundry contemplation of my travels, in which [my] often rumination wraps me in a most humorous sadness.
Ros. A traveller! By my faith, you have great reason to be sad. I fear you have sold your own lands to see other men’s; then to have seen much, and to have nothing, is to have rich eyes and poor hands.
Jaq. Yes, I have gain’d my experience.
Enter Orlando.
Ros. And your experience makes you sad. I had rather have a fool to make me merry than experience to make me sad—and to travel for it too!
Orl. Good day and happiness, dear Rosalind!
Jaq. Nay then God buy you, and you talk in blank verse.
Ros. Farewell, Monsieur Traveller: look you lisp and wear strange suits; disable all the benefits of your own country; be out of love with your nativity, and almost chide God for making you that countenance you are; or I will scarce think you have swam in a gundello. [Exit Jaques.] Why, how now, Orlando, where have you been all this while? You a lover! And you serve me such another trick, never come in my sight more.
Orl. My fair Rosalind, I come within an hour of my promise.
Ros. Break an hour’s promise in love! He that will divide a minute into a thousand parts, and break but a part of the thousand part of a minute in the affairs of love, it may be said of him that Cupid hath clapp’d him o’ th’ shoulder, but I’ll warrant him heart-whole.
Orl. Pardon me, dear Rosalind.
Ros. Nay, and you be so tardy, come no more in my sight. I had as lief be woo’d of a snail.
Orl. Of a snail?
Ros. Ay, of a snail; for though he comes slowly, he carries his house on his head; a better jointure I think than you make a woman. Besides, he brings his destiny with him.
Orl. What’s that?
Ros. Why, horns! which such as you are fain to be beholding to your wives for. But he comes arm’d in his fortune, and prevents the slander of his wife.
Orl. Virtue is no horn-maker; and my Rosalind is virtuous.
Ros. And I am your Rosalind.
Cel. It pleases him to call you so; but he hath a Rosalind of a better leer than you.
Ros. Come, woo me, woo me; for now I am in a holiday humor, and like enough to consent. What would you say to me now, and I were your very very Rosalind?
Orl. I would kiss before I spoke.
Ros. Nay, you were better speak first, and when you were gravell’d for lack of matter, you might take occasion to kiss. Very good orators when they are out, they will spit, and for lovers lacking (God warn us!) matter, the cleanliest shift is to kiss.
Orl. How if the kiss be denied?
Ros. Then she puts you to entreaty, and there begins new matter.
Orl. Who could be out, being before his belov’d mistress?
Ros. Marry, that should you if I were your mistress, or I should think my honesty ranker than my wit.
Orl. What, of my suit?
Ros. Not out of your apparel, and yet out of your suit. Am not I your Rosalind?
Orl. I take some joy to say you are, because I would be talking of her.
Ros. Well, in her person, I say I will not have you.
Orl. Then in mine own person, I die.
Ros. No, faith, die by attorney. The poor world is almost six thousand years old, and in all this time there was not any man died in his own person, videlicet, in a love-cause. Troilus had his brains dash’d out with a Grecian club, yet he did what he could to die before, and he is one of the patterns of love. Leander, he would have liv’d many a fair year though Hero had turn’d nun, if it had not been for a hot midsummer night; for, good youth, he went but forth to wash him in the Hellespont, and being taken with the cramp was drown’d; and the foolish chroniclers of that age found it was—Hero of Sestos. But these are all lies: men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but not for love.
Orl. I would not have my right Rosalind of this mind, for I protest her frown might kill me.
Ros. By this hand, it will not kill a fly. But come, now I will be your Rosalind in a more coming-on disposition; and ask me what you will, I will grant it.
Orl. Then love me, Rosalind.
Ros. Yes, faith, will I, Fridays and Saturdays and all.
Orl. And wilt thou have me?
Ros. Ay, and twenty such.
Orl.
