Ros. By this hand, it will not kill a fly: But come, now I will be your Rosalind in a more coming-on disposition; and ask me what you will, I will grant it. ORL. Then love me, Rosalind. Ros. Yes, faith will I, Fridays, and Saturdays, and all. Ros. Why then, can one desire too much of a good thing?-Come, sister, you shall be the priest, and marry us.-Give me your hand, Orlando:What do you say, sister? ORL. Pray thee, marry us. CEL. I cannot say the words. Ros. You must begin,--Will you, Orlando,CEL. Go to:--Will you, Orlando, have to wife this Rosalind? ORL. I will. Ros. Ay, but when? ORL. Why now; as fast as she can marry us. Ros. Then you must say,—I take thee, Rosalind, for wife. ORL. I take thee, Rosalind, for wife. Ros. I might ask you for your commission; but, I do take thee, Orlando, for my husband: There 2 a girl goes before the priest; and, certainly, a woman's thought runs before her actions. ORL. So do all thoughts; they are winged. Ros. Now tell me, how long you would have her, after you have possessed her. ORL. For ever, and a day. Ros. Say a day, without the ever: No, no, Orlando; 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 of thee than a Barbary cockpigeon 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,3 and I will do that when you are disposed to be merry; I will 2 There a girl goes before the priest;] The old copy reads-" There's a girl," &c. The emendation in the text was proposed to me long ago by Dr. Farmer. STEEvens. 3 — I will weep for nothing, like Diana in the fountain,] The allusion is to the cross in Cheapside; the religious images, with which it was ornamented, being defaced, (as we learn from Stowe,) in 1596: "There was then set up, a curious wrought tabernacle of gray marble, and in the same an alabaster image of Diana, and water conveyed from the Thames, prilling from her naked breast." Stowe, in Cheap Ward. Statues, and particularly that of Diana, with water conveyed through them to give them the appearance of weeping figures, were anciently a frequent ornament of fountains. So, in The City Match, Act III. sc. iii: 66 Now could I cry "Like any image in a fountain, which "Runs lamentations." And again, in Rosamond's Epistle to Henry II. by Drayton: "Here in the garden, wrought by curious hands, "Naked Diana in the fountain stands." WHALLEY. laugh like a hyen, and that when thou art inclined to sleep. ORL. But will my Rosalind do so? Ros. By my life, she will do as I do. Ros. Or else she could not have the wit to do this the wiser, the waywarder: Make the doors" upon a woman's wit, and it will out at the casement; shut that, and 'twill out at the key-hole; stop that, 'twill fly with the smoke out at the chimney. ORL. A man that had a wife with such a wit, he might say,-Wit, whither wilt?" I will laugh like a hyen,] The bark of the hyena was anciently supposed to resemble a loud laugh. So, in Webster's Duchess of Malfy, 1623: 66 Methinks I see her laughing, "Excellent Hyena!" Again, in The Cobler's Prophecy, 1594: 5 "You laugh hyena-like, weep like a crocodile.” STEEVENS. Make the doors-] This is an expression used in several of the midland counties, instead of bar the doors. So, in The Comedy of Errors: 6 "The doors are made against you." STEEVENS. Wit, whither wilt?] This must be some allusion to a story well known at that time, though now perhaps irretrievable. JOHNSON. This was an exclamation much in use, when any one was either talking nonsense, or usurping a greater share in conversation than justly belonged to him. So, in Decker's Satiromastix, 1602: "My sweet, Wit whither wilt thou, my delicate poetical fury," &c. Again, in Heywood's Royal King, 1637: "Wit:-is the word strange to you?—Wit?— Ros. Nay, you might keep that check for it, till you met your wife's wit going to your neighbour's bed. ORL. And what wit could wit have to excuse that? Ros. Marry, to say,-she came to seek you there. You shall never take her without her answer,' unless you take her without her tongue. O, that woman that cannot make her fault her husband's occasion, let her never nurse her child herself, for she will breed it like a fool. ORL. For these two hours, Rosalind, I will leave thee. Ros. Alas, dear love, I cannot lack thee two hours. Again, in the Preface to Greene's Groatsworth of Wit, 1621: "Wit whither wilt thou? woe is me, "Thou hast brought me to this miserie." The same expression occurs more than once in Taylor the waterpoet, and seems to have been the title of some ludicrous performance. STEEVENS. If I remember right, these are the first words of an old madrigal. MALONE. "You shall never take her without her answer,] See Chaucer's Marchantes Tale, ver. 10,138—10,149: "Ye, sire, quod Proserpine, and wol ye so? "For lack of answere, non of us shall dien. "Al had ye seen a thing with bothe youre eyen, "And wepe and swere and chiden subtilly, TYRWHITT. make her fault her husband's occasion,] That is, represent her fault as occasioned by her husband. Sir T. Hanmer reads, her husband's accusation. JOHNSON. › VOL. VIII. L ORL. I must attend the duke at dinner; by two o'clock I will be with thee again. Ros. Ay, go your ways, go your ways;-I knew what you would prove; my friends told me as much, and I thought no less-that flattering. tongue of yours won me :-'tis but one cast away, and so,-come, death.-Two o'clock is ORL. Ay, sweet Rosalind. your hour? Ros. By my troth, and in good earnest, and so God mend me, and by all pretty oaths that are not dangerous, if you break one jot of your promise, or come one minute behind your hour, I will think you the most pathetical break-promise," and the most hollow lover, and the most unworthy of her you call Rosalind, that may be chosen out of the gross band of the unfaithful: therefore beware my censure, and keep your promise. ORL. With no less religion, than if thou wert indeed my Rosalind: So, adieu. Ros. Well, time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and let time try:1 Adieu! [Exit ORLANDO. "I will think you the most pathetical break-promise,] The same epithet occurs again in Love's Labour's Lost, and with as little apparent meaning: most pathetical nit." Again, in Greene's Never too late, 1590: "-having no patheticall impression in my head, I had flat fallen into a slumber." STEEVENS. I believe, by pathetical break-promise, Rosalind means a lover whose falsehood would most deeply affect his mistress. MALONE. 1time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and let time try:] So, in Troilus and Cressida: "And that old common arbitrator, Time, |