Enter BIRON.

Bir. O, my good knave Costard! exceedingly well met. Cost. Pray you, sir, how much carnation ribbon may a man buy for a remuneration?

Biron. What is a remuneration?

Cost. Marry, sir, half-penny farthing.
Biron. O, why then, three-farthings-worth of silk.
Cost. I thank your worship: God be with you!
Biron. O, stay, slave; I must employ thee:
As thou wilt win my favour, good my knave,
Do one thing for me that I shall entreat.

Cost. When would you have it done, sir?
Biron. O, this afternoon.

Cost. Well, I will do it, sir: Fare you well.
Biron. O, thou knowest not what it is.

Cost. I shall know, sir, when I have done it.
Biron. Why, villain, thou must know first.

Cost. I will come to your worship to-morrow morning.
Biron. It must be done this afternoon. Hark, slave,

it is but this ;

The princess comes to hunt here in the park,
And in her train there is a gentle lady;

When tongues speak sweetly, then they name her name,
And Rosaline they call her: ask for her;
And to her white hand see thou do commend

This seal'd-up counsel. There's thy guerdon; go.

[Gives him money.

Cost. Guerdon, - sweet guerdon! better than remuneration; eleven-pence farthing better: Most sweet

pence fart

guerdon!-I will do it, sir, in print.-Guerdon-re- print. Guerdon-re

numeration.

[Exit.

Biron. O!-And I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been

love's whip;

A very beadle to a humorous sigh;

A critic; nay, a night-watch constable ;

A domineering pedant o'er the boy,

Than whom no mortal so magnificent!

This wimpled, whining, purblind, wayward boy;

This senior-junior, giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid;

[7] The wimple was a hood or veil which fell over the face. Had Shakspere been acquainted with the flammeum of the Romans, or the gem which represents the marriage of Cupid and Psyche, his choice of the epithet would have been much applauded by all the advocates in favour of his learning. In Isaiah, iii. 22, we find: "-the mantles, and the wimples, and the crisping-pins." STEEV.

Regent of love-rhymes, lord of folded arms, The anointed sovereign of sighs and groans, Liege of all loiterers and malcontents, Dread prince of plackets, & king of codpieces, Sole imperator, and great general Of trotting paritors, 9-O my little heart!And I to be a corporal of his field, 1 And wear his colours like a tumbler's hoop! What? I! I love! I sue! I seek a wife! A woman, that is like a German clock, 2 Still a repairing; ever out of frame; And never going aright, being a watch, But being watch'd that it may still go right? Nay, to be perjur'd, which is worst of all; And, among three, to love the worst of all; A whitely wanton with a velvet brow, With two pitch balls stuck in her face for eyes; Ay, and, by heaven, one that will do the deed, Though Argus were her eunuch and her guard: And I to sigh for her! to watch for her! To pray for her! Go to; it is a plague That Cupid will impose for my neglect Of his almighty dreadful little might. Well, I will love, write, sigh, pray, sue, and groan; Some men must love my lady, and some Joan. [Exit.

[8] A placket is a petticoat. DOUCE.

[9] An appariter, or paritor, is an officer of the Bishop's court, who carries out citations; as citations are most frequently issued for fornication, the paritor is put under Cupid's government. JOHNSON.

[1] It appears from Lord Stafford's Letters, Vol. II. p. 199, that a corporal of the field was employed as an aid-de-camp is now, "in taking and carrying to and fro the directions of the general, or other the higher officers of the field." TYRWHITT.

[2] The following extract is taken from a book, called The Artificial Clock-Maker, 1714.- Clock-making was supposed to have had its beginning in Germany within less than these two hundred years It is very probable that our balance-clocks or watches and some other automata, might have had their beginning there." &c. To the inartificial construction of these first pieces of mechanism, executed in Germany, we may suppose Shakspeare alludes. The clock at Hampton Court, which was set up in 1540, (as appears from the inscription affixed to it) is said to be the first ever fabricated in England. STEEVENS.

"In some towns in Germany, (says Dr. Powel in his Human Industry, 8vo. 1661) there are very rare and elaborate clocks to be seen in their town-halls, wherein a man may read astronomy, and never lock up to the skies.-In the town-hall of Prague there is a clock that shows the annual motions of the sun and moon, the names and numbers of the months, days, and festivals of the who'e year, the time of the sun rising and setting throughout the year, the equinoxes, the length of the days and nights, the rising and setting of the twelve signs of the Zodiack, &c. But the town of Strasburgh carries the bell of all other steeples of Germany in this point." These elaborate clocks were probably often "out of frame," MALONE.

ACT IV.

SCENE I.-Another part of the same. Enter the Princess, RosALINE, MARIA, KATHARINE, BOYET, Lords, Attendants, and a Forester.

Princess.

WAS that the king, that spurr'd his horse so hard
Against the steep uprising of the hill?

Boyet. I know not; but, I think, it was not he.
Prin. Whoe'er he was, he show'd a mounting mind.

-Well, lords, to-day we shall have our despatch;
On Saturday we will return to France.
-Then, forester, my friend, where is the bush,
That we must stand and play the murderer in?
For. Here by, upon the edge of yonder coppice;
A stand, where you may make the fairest shoot.
Prin. I thank my beauty, I am fair that shoot,
And thereupon thou speak'st the fairest shoot.
For. Pardon me, madam, for I meant not so.
Prin. What, what? first praise me, and again say, no?
short-liv'd pride! Not fair? alack for woe!
For. Yes, madam, fair.

X

Prin. Nay, never paint me now;
Where fair is not, praise cannot mend the brow.
Here, good my glass, take this for telling true;

[Giving him money.

Fair payment for foul words is more than due.
For. Nothing but fair is that which you inherit.
Prin. See, see, my beauty will be sav'd by merit.)
O heresy in fair, fit for these days!

A giving hand, though foul, shall have fair praise.-
But come, the bow:-Now mercy goes to kill,
And shooting well is then accounted ill."
Thus will I save my credit in the shoot:
Not wounding, pity would not let me do't;
If wounding, then it was to shew my skill,
That more for praise, than purpose, meant to kill.
And, out of question, so it is sometimes;
Glory grows guilty of detested crimes;
When, for fame's sake, for praise, an outward part,
We bend to that the working of the heart:

32* VOL. II.

As I, for praise alone, now seek to spill
The poor deer's blood, that my heart means no ill.

Boyet. Do not curst wives hold that self-sovereignty
Only for praise-sake, when they strive to be
Lords o'er their lords?

Prin. Only for praise: and praise we may afford To any lady that subdues a lord.

Enter COSTARD.

Prin. Here comes a member of the common-wealth. Cost. God dig-you-den all! Pray you, which is the head lady?

Prin. Thou shalt know her, fellow, by the rest that have no heads.

Cost. Which is the greatest lady, the highest?
Prin. The thickest, and the tallest.

Cost. The thickest, and the tallest! it is so; truth is truth.

An your waist, mistress, were as slender as my wit,
One of these maid's girdles for your waist should be fit.
Are not you the chief woman? you are the thickest here.
Prin. What's your will, sir? what's your will?
Cost. I have a letter from monsieur Biron, to one la-

dy Rosaline.

Prin. O, thy letter, thy letter; he's a good friend of

mine:

Stand aside, good bearer.---Boyet, you can carve;
Break up this capon. 3

Boyet. I am bound to serve.

This letter is mistook, it importeth none here;
It is writ to Jaquenetta.

Prin. We will read it, I swear: Break the neck of the wax, 4 and every one give ear. Boyet. [Reads.] By heaven, that thou art fair, is most infallible; true, that thou art beauteous; truth itself, that thou art lovely : More fairer than fair, beautiful than beauteous; truer than truth itself, have commiseration on thy heroical vassal! The magnanimous and most illustrate king Cophetuas set eye upon the pernicious and indubitate beggar Zenelophon; and he it was

[3] i. e. Open this letter. Our poet uses this metaphor, as the French do their poulet; which signifies both a young fowl and a love letter. The Italfans use the same manner of expression, when they call a love-epistle una pollicetta amorosa. THEOBALD

[4] Still alluding to the capm. JOHNSON.

[5] The ballad of King Cophetua and the Beggar-Maid, may be seen in the Reliques of Ancient Poetry. The beggar's name was Penelophon. PERCY.

1

that might rightly say, veni, vidi, vici; which to anatomise in the vulgar, (Obase and obscure vulgar!) videlicet, he came, saw, and overcame: he came, one ; saw, twο; overcame, three. Who came? the king; Why did he come? to see; Why did he see? to overcome: To whom came he? to the beggar; What saw he? the beggar; Who overcame he? the beggar: The conclusion is victory; On whose side? the king's: the captive is enrich'd; On whose side ? the beggar's; The catastrophe is a nuptial; on whose side? the king's ?-no, on both in one, or one in both. I am the king; for so stands the comparison: thou the beggar ; for so witnesseth thy lowliness. Shall I command thy love? I may: Shall I enforce thy love? I could: Shall I entreat thy love? I will. What shalt thou exchange for rags? robes; For tittles, titles; For thyself, me. Thus, expecting thy reply, I profane my lips on thy foot, my eyes on thy picture, and my heart on thy every part. Thine, in the dearest design of industry.

DON ADRIANO DE ARMADO.

Thus dost thou hear the Nemean lion roar

'Gainst thee, thou lamb, that standest as his prey; Submissive fall his princely feet before,

And he from forage will incline to play :
But if thou strive, poor soul, what art thou then?
Food for his rage, repasture for his den.6

Prin. What plume of feathers is he, that indited this

letter?

What vane? what weather-cock? did you ever hear better?

Boyet. I am much deceived, but I remember the style. Prin. Else your memory is bad, going o'er it erewhile.7 Boyet. This Arnado is a Spaniard, that keeps here

in court;

A phantasm, a Monarcho, & and one that makes sport
To the prince and his book-mates.
Prin. Thou, fellow, a word:

Who gave thee this letter?

[6] These six lines appear to be a quotation from some ridiculous poem of

that time. WARBURTON.

[7] A pun upon the word stile.

MUSGRAVE.

[8] The allusion is to a fantastical character of that time.

FARMER.

A local allusion employed by a poet like Shakspeare, resembles the mortal steed that drew in the chariot of Achilles. But short services could be ex