Duke F. Thou art thy father's daughter; there's

enough.

Ros. 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.

Cel. Dear sovereign, hear me speak.

Duke F. Ay, Celia; we stay'd her for your sake,

Else had she with her father ranged along.

Cel. 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 wheresoe'er we went, like Juno's swans,
Still we went coupled and inseparable.

Duke F. 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

60. In Lodge, Torismond's action has at least a reasonable pretext. He fears that one of his peers 'who were enamoured of her beauty' might marry her, and then, in his wife's right,

attempt the kingdom.'

60

70

80

72. remorse, compassion. 77. Juno's swans, a slip (or possibly a misprint) for Venus'

swans.

Which I have pass'd upon her; she is banish'd. Cel. Pronounce that sentence then on me, my liege :

I cannot live out of her company.

Duke F. 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.

Cel. 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. Ros. I have more cause. Cel. Thou hast not, cousin ; Prithee, be cheerful: know'st thou not, the duke Hath banish'd me, his daughter?

Ros.

That he hath not.

Cel. 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.
Ros. Why, whither shall we go?

Cel. To seek my uncle in the forest of Arden.
Ros. Alas, what danger will it be to us,
Maids as we are, to travel forth so far!
Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold.

without either more company or delay.'

104. change, change of fortune. The second Folio reads 'charge.'

Cel. 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.

Ros.

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.

Cel. What shall I call thee when thou art a man?

Ros. 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?

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

Ros. 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?

Cel. 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.

119. curtle-axe, cutlass.
122. swashing, swaggering.

[Exeunt.

120

130

140

124. outface it, put others out of countenance.

ACT II.

SCENE I. The Forest of Arden.

Enter DUKE senior, AMIENS, and two or three
Lords, like foresters.

Duke S. Now, my co-mates and brothers in exile,
Hath not old custom made this life more sweet
Than that of painted pomp? Are not these woods
More free from peril than the envious court?
Here feel we but the penalty of Adam,
'The seasons' difference, as the icy fang
And churlish chiding of the winter's wind,
Which, when it bites and blows upon my body,
Even till I shrink with cold, I smile and say
'This is no flattery: these are counsellors
That feelingly persuade me what I am.'
Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
And this our life exempt from public haunt

Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones and good in every thing.

I would not change it.

Ami.

Happy is your grace,

That can translate the stubbornness of fortune
Into so quiet and so sweet a style.

Duke S. Come, shall we go and kill us venison ?

11. feelingly, by touching my feelings.

ΤΟ

20

in the heads of old and great toads,' and to be of power to repulse poisons' (Fenton, Secret Wonders of Nature, 1569). Hence the venomous toad bore its antidote with it.

And yet it irks me the poor dappled fools,
Being native burghers of this desert city,
Should in their own confines with forked heads
Have their round haunches gored.

First Lord.

Indeed, my lord,

The melancholy Jaques grieves at that,

And, in that kind, swears you do more usurp
Than doth your brother that hath banish'd you.
To-day my Lord of Amiens and myself
Did steal behind him as he lay along

Under an oak whose antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood:
To the which place a poor sequester'd stag,
That from the hunter's aim had ta'en a hurt,
Did come to languish, and indeed, my lord,
The wretched animal heaved forth such groans
That their discharge did stretch his leathern coat
Almost to bursting, and the big round tears
Coursed one another down his innocent nose
In piteous chase; and thus the hairy fool,
Much marked of the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift brook,
Augmenting it with tears.

Duke S.

But what said Jaques ? Did he not moralize this spectacle?

First Lord. O, yes, into a thousand similes. First, for his weeping into the needless stream ; 'Poor deer,' quoth he 'thou makest a testament

As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more

To that which had too much :' then, being there alone, Left and abandon'd of his velvet friends,

"Tis right: quoth he 'thus misery doth part The flux of company:' anon a careless herd,

22. irks me, grieves me. 46. needless, which had no need of it.

51. part, shut out.

52. flux, flow.