nature nor art, may complain of good breeding,* or comes of a very dull kindred. Character of an Honest and Simple Shepherd. Sir, I am a true labourer; I earn that I eat, get that I wear; owe no man hate, envy no man's happiness; glad of other men's good, content with my harm;† and the greatest of my pride is to see my ewes graze, and my lambs suck. Humorous Description of a Lover. A lean cheek; which you have not: a blue eye, and sunken; which you have not: an unquestionable spirit; which you have not: a beard neglected; which you have not :-(but I pardon you for that; for, simply, your having in beard is a younger brother's revenue):-Then your hose should be ungartered, your bonnet unbanded, your sleeve unbuttoned, your shoe untied, and everything about you demonstrating a careless desolation. But you are no such man: you are rather point-device‡ in your accoutrements; as loving yourself, than seeming the lover of any other. Real Passion Dissembled. Think not I love him, though I ask for him; But, sure, he's proud; and yet his pride becomes him. *The want of good breeding. + Content with my own misfortunes. Over careful. Did make offence, his eye did heal it up. Than that mix'd in his cheek; 'twas just the differ ence Betwixt the constant red and mingled damask. There be some women, Silvius, had they mark'd him In parcels as I did, would have gone near To fall in love with him: but, for my part, I love him not, nor hate him not; and yet ACT IV. Jaques' Description of Melancholy. 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. Marriage alters the Temper. 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 * Assumed, feigned. 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. Oliver's Exposure to Danger whilst Sleeping. Under an oak, whose boughs were moss'd with age, And high top bald with dry antiquity, A wretched ragged man, o'ergrown with hair, A green and gilded snake had wreath'd itself, Lay couching, head on ground, with cat-like watch, To prey on nothing that doth seem as dead. ACT V. Humorous Epilogue spoken by 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 hate 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 curt'sy, bid me farewell. ·000 COMEDY OF ERRORS. The chief incidents in this comedy arise out of the close similitude between the two brothers Antipholus of Ephesus and Antipholus of Syracuse, who, with their attendants, Dromio of Ephesus and Dromio of Syracuse, also twins, and bearing the same exact likeness to each other, have been shipwrecked in their infancy; Antipholus of Ephesus, with his attendant, being separated in the wreck from his brother and his attendant. Twenty-five years have elapsed, and the brothers meet at Ephesus, where, owing to the resemblance each bears to the other, numerous amusing mistakes occur. At last Ægeon and Æmilia, the father and mother of the Antipholus twins, who have also been separated in the wreck, meet each other, and their long-lost children at Ephesus, and the play concludes with the pardon of Ægeon by the Duke of Ephesus, for unwittingly breaking a recently enacted * Clothed. law. Mr. Steevens, the learned commentator on Shakspere, remarks, that this comedy "exhibits more intricacy of plot than distinction of character; and that attention is not actively engaged, since every one can tell how the denouement will be effected." ACT II. Man's Pre-eminence. THERE's nothing situate under Heaven's eye Patience more easily taught than practised. But were we burden'd with like weight of pain, Defamation. I see the jewel, best enamelled, Will lose his beauty; and though gold 'bides still, |