And leave the world no copy.

Oli. O, sir, I will not be so hard-hearted; I will give out divers schedules of my beauty: it shall be inventoried, and every particle and utensil labeled to my will: as, item, two lips indifferent red; item, two gray eyes, with lids to them; item, one neck, one chin, and so forth. Were Were you sent hither to praise me? Vio. I see you what you are, you are too proud; But, if you were the devil, you are fair. My lord and master loves you: O, such love Could be but recompensed, though you were crown'd

Oli.

The nonpareil of beauty!

How does he love me?

Vio. With adorations, fertile tears,

281

With groans that thunder love, with sighs of fire.

Oli. Your lord does know my mind; I cannot love him:

Yet I suppose him virtuous, know him noble,
Of great estate, of fresh and stainless youth;
In voices well divulged, free, learn'd and val-
iant;

And in dimension and the shape of nature

290

A gracious person: but yet I cannot love him;
He might have took his answer long ago.

Vio. If I did love you in my master's flame,

290. "In voices well divulged"; well reputed in the popular voice. -C. H. H.

"learned and valiant; that is, well-reputed for his knowledge in languages, which was esteemed a great accomplishment in the Poet's time.-H. N. H.

With such a suffering, such a deadly life,
In your denial I would find no sense;
I would not understand it.

300

Oli.
Why, what would you?
Vio. Make me a willow cabin at your gate,
And call upon my soul within the house;
Write loyal cantons of contemned love
And sing them loud even in the dead of night;
Halloo your name to the reverberate hills,
And make the babbling gossip of the air
Cry out 'Olivia!' O, you should not rest
Between the elements of air and earth,
But you should pity me!

Oli.

You might do much.

What is your parentage?

Vio. Above my fortunes, yet my state is well: I am a gentleman.

Oli.

310

Get you to your lord; I cannot love him: let him send no more; Unless, perchance, you come to me again, To tell me how he takes it. Fare you well: I thank you for your pains: spend this for me. Vio. I am no fee'd post, lady; keep your purse: My master, not myself, lacks recompense. Love make his heart of flint that you shall love; And let your fervor, like my master's, be Placed in contempt! Farewell, fair cruelty. [Exit.

Oli. 'What is your parentage?'

'Above my fortunes, yet my state is well: 320

303. "babbling gossip of the air"; a Shakespearean expression for echo.-H. N. H.

I am a gentleman.' I'll be sworn thou art; Thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, actions, and spirit,

Do give thee five-fold blazon: not too fast: soft,
soft!

Unless the master were the man. How now!
Even so quickly may one catch the plague?
Methinks I feel this youth's perfections
With an invisible and subtle stealth

To creep
What ho, Malvolio!

in at mine eyes. Well, let it be.

Mal.

Re-enter Malvolio.

Here, madam, at your service.

Oli. Run after that same peevish messenger,

330

The county's man: he left this ring behind him,
Would I or not: tell him I 'll none of it.
Desire him not to flatter with his lord,

Nor hold him up with hopes; I am not for him: If that the youth will come this way to-morrow, I'll give him reasons for 't: hie thee, Malvolio. Mal. Madam, I will.

Oli. I do I know not what, and fear to find

[Exit.

Mine eye too great a flatterer for my mind.
Fate, show thy force: ourselves we do not owe;
What is decreed must be, and be this so.

341

[Exit.

339. "Mine eye too great a flatterer"; that is, she fears that her eyes had formed so flattering an idea of the supposed youth Cesario, that she should not have strength of mind sufficient to resist the impression.-H. N. H.

ACT SECOND

SCENE I

The sea-coast.

Enter Antonio and Sebastian.

Ant. Will you stay no longer? nor will you not
that I go with you?

Seb. By your patience, no. My stars shine
darkly over me: the malignancy of my fate
might perhaps distemper yours; therefore I
shall crave of you your leave that I may bear
my evils alone: it were a bad recompense for
your love, to lay any of them on you.
Ant. Let me yet know of you whither you are
bound.
Seb. No, sooth, sir: my determinate voyage is

mere extravagancy. But I perceive in you
so excellent a touch of modesty, that you will
not extort from me what I am willing to
keep in; therefore it charges me in manners
the rather to express myself. You must
know of me then, Antonio, my name is Se-
bastian, which I called Roderigo. My
father was that Sebastian of Messaline,

10

19. "Messaline"; possibly an error for Mitylene, as Capell conjectured.-I. G.

whom I know you have heard of. He left 20 behind him myself and a sister, both born in an hour: if the heavens had been pleased, would we had so ended! but you, sir, altered that; for some hour before you took me from the breach of the sea was my sister drowned. Ant. Alas the day.

Seb. A lady, sir, though it was said she much
resembled me, was yet of many accounted
beautiful: but, though I could not with such
estimable wonder overfar believe that, yet 30
thus far I will boldly publish her; she bore
a mind that envy could not but call fair.
She is drowned already, sir, with salt water,
though I seem to drown her remembrance
again with more.

Ant. Pardon me, sir, your bad entertainment.
Seb. O good Antonio, forgive me your trouble.
Ant. If you will not murder me for my love,
let me be your servant.

39. “your servant"; Mr. Knight thinks, and apparently with good reason, that in this passage reference is had to a superstition thus indicated by Sir Walter Scott in The Pirate: When Mordaunt has rescued Cleveland from the sea, and is trying to revive him, Bryce the peddler says to him,-“Are you mad? you, that have so long lived in Zetland, to risk the saving of a drowning man? Wot ye not, if you bring him to life again, he will be sure to do you some capital injury?" Sir Walter suggests in a note that this inhuman maxim was probably held by the islanders of the Orkneys, as an excuse for leaving all to perish alone who were shipwrecked upon their coasts, to the end that there might be nothing to hinder the plundering of their goods; which of course could not well be, if any of the owners survived. This practice, he says, continued into the eighteenth century, and "was with difficulty weeded out by the sedulous instructions of the clergy and the rigorous injunctions of the proprietors."-H. N. H.