But do not look for further recompense

Than thine own gladness that thou art employ'd.
SIL. So holy and so perfect is my love,

And I in such a poverty of grace,

That I shall think it a most plenteous crop

To glean the broken ears after the man

That the main harvest reaps: loose now and then

A scatter'd smile, and that I'll live upon.

PHE. Know'st thou the youth that spoke to me erewhile?

SIL. Not very well, but I have met him oft;

And he hath bought the cottage and the bounds
That the old carlot once was master of.

PHE. Think not I love him, though I ask for him;
"T is but a peevish boy; yet he talks well;
But what care I for words? yet words do well
When he that speaks them pleases those that hear.
It is a pretty youth: not very pretty:

But, sure, he's proud, and yet his pride becomes him:
He'll make a proper man: the best thing in him

Is his complexion; and faster than his tongue

Did make offence his eye did heal it up.

He is not very tall; yet for his years he's tall:
His leg is but so so; and yet 't is well:

There was a pretty redness in his lip,

A little riper and more lusty red

Than that mix'd in his cheek; 't was just the difference

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107 carlot] Apparently a diminutive of "carl," churl, peasant. No other example of the word is found.

110

120

Betwixt the constant red and mingled damask.

There be some women, Silvus, 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

I have more cause to hate him than to love him:
For what had he to do to chide at me?

He said mine eyes were black and my hair black;
And, now I am remember'd, scorn'd at me:

I marvel why I answer'd not again:

But that's all one; omittance is no quittance.
I'll 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.

122 mingled damask] Cf. Sonnet cxxx, 5: "I have seen roses damask'd,

red and white."

132 omittance is no quittance] Milton, P. L., X, 53, varies this expression thus: "Forbearance is no quittance." Quittance means discharge.

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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, 't is good to be sad and say nothing.

Ros. Why then, 't is good to be a post.

JAQ. I have neither the scholar's melancholy, which is 10 emulation; nor the musician's, which is fantastical; nor

6 modern censure] common, ordinary judgment.

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 gained my experience.

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!

Enter ORLANDO

ORL. Good day and happiness, dear Rosalind!
JAQ. Nay, then, God buy you, an you talk in blank

verse.

[Exit.

20

Ros. Farewell, Monsieur Traveller: look you lisp 30 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 gondola. Why, how now, Orlando! where have you been all this

22 rich eyes] Cf. All's Well, V, iii, 16-17: "the survey Of richest eyes.” 28 God buy you] Cf. III, ii, 242, supra, and note.

34 swam in a gondola] been on a visit to Venice, the fashionable goal of contemporary travel.

while? You a lover! An 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 40 divide a minute into a thousand parts, and break but a part of the thousandth part of a minute in the affairs of love, it may be said of him that Cupid hath clapped him o' the shoulder, but I 'll warrant him heart-whole.

ORL. Pardon me, dear Rosalind.

Ros. Nay, an you be so tardy, come no more in my sight: I had as lief be wooed 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, 50 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 armed 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 humour and like enough to consent. What would you say to me now, an I were your very very Rosalind? ORL. I would kiss before I spoke.

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