Except I be by Silvia in the night,
There is no musick in the nightingale;
Unless I look on Silvia in the day,
There is no day for me to look upon;
She is my essence; and I leave to be,
If I be not by her fair influence
Foster'd, illumin'd, cherish'd, kept alive.
I fly not death, to fly his deadly doom':
Tarry I here, I but attend on death;
But fly I hence, I fly away from life.

Enter Protheus and Launce.

Pro. Run, boy, run, run, and seek him out.
Laun. So-ho! so-ho!

Pro. What seest thou?

But Valentine, if he be ta'en, must die.
Besides, her intercession chaf'd him so,
When she for thy repeal was suppliant,
That to close prison he commanded her,

5 With many bitter threats of biding there. [speak'st,
Val. No more; unless the next word that thou
Have some malignant power upon my life:
If so, I pray thee, breathe it in mine ear,
As ending anthem of my endless dolour.

10 Pro.Ceaseto lament for that thou can'st not help,
And study help for that which thou lament'st.
Time is the nurse and breeder of all good.
Here if thou stay, thou can'st not see thy love;
Besides, thy staying will abridge thy life.

Laun. Him we go to find: there's not an hair 15 Hope is a lover's staff; walk hence with that,

on's head, but 'tis a Valentine.

Pro. Valentine?

Val. No.

Pro. Who then? his spirit?

And manage it against despairing thoughts.
Thy letters may be here, though thou art hence;
Which, being writ to me, shall be deliver'd
Even in the milk-white bosom of thy love.

Val. Neither.

Pro. What then?

20 The time now serves not to expostulate: Come, I'll convey thee through the city-gate; And, ere I part with thee, confer at large

As thou lov'st Silvia, though not for thyself, 25 Regard thy danger, and along with me.

Val. Nothing.

Laun. Can nothing speak? Master, shall I strike? Of all that may concern thy love affairs :
Pro. Whom would'st thou strike?

Pro. No, Valentine.

30

Vat. I pray thee, Launce, an if thou seest myboy, Bid him make haste, and meet me at the north-gate. Pro.Go, sirrah, find him out. Come, Valentine. Val. O my dear Silvia! hapless Valentine! [Exeunt Valentine and Protheus. Laun. I am but a fool, look you; and yet I have the wit to think, my master is a kind of a knave: but that's all one, if he be but one knave3. He lives not now, that knows me to be in love: yet I

Val. No Valentine, indeed, for sacred Silvia!- 35 am in love: but a team of horse shall not pluck

Hath she forsworn me?

Pro. No, Valentine.

Val. No Valentine, if Silvia have forsworn me!

What is your news?

[vanish'd.

that from me: nor who 'tis I love, and yet 'tis a woman: but what woman, I will not tell myself, and yet 'tis a milk-maid: yet 'tis not a maid, for she hath had gossips: yet 'tis a maid, for she is

Laun. Sir, there's a proclamation that you are 40 her master's maid, and serves for wages. She Pro. That thou art banish'd, oh, that is the new From hence, from Silvia, and from me thy friend. Val. Oh, I have fed upon this woe already, And now excess of it will make me surfeit. Doth Silvia know that I am banished?

Pro. Ay, ay; and she hath offer'd to the doom,
(Which unrevers'd, stands in effectual force)
A sea of melting pearl, which some call tears;
Those at her father's churlish feet she tenderd;
With them, upon her knees, her humble self;
Wringing her hands, whose whiteness so became
As if but now they waxed pale for woe: [them,
But neither bended knees, pure hands held up,
Sad sighs, deep groans, nor silver-shedding tears,
Could penetrate her uncompassionate sire;

* The phrase of, to fly his doom used here for by flying, or in flying, is a gallicism. The sense is, By avoiding the execution of his sentence I shall not escape death. * Before the meaning of this address of letters to the bosom of a mistress can be understood, it should be known that women antiently had a pocket in the fore part of their stays, in which they not only carried love-letters and love-tokens, but even their money and materials for needle-work. In many parts of England the country girls still observe the same practice. 3 One knave may signify a knave on one occasion, a single knave. We still use a double villain for a villain beyond the common rate of guilt. Gossips, not only signify those who are sponsors for a child in baptism, but the tattling women who attend lyings-in. has two senses; mere and naked. Launce uses it in both, and opposes the naked female to the waterspaniel cover'd with hairs of remarkable thickness.

[thee? 5

Laun. I will try thee: Tell me this: Whobegot Speed. Marry, the son of my grandfather. Laun. O illiterate loiterer ! it was the son of thy grandmother': this proves, that thou can't not

read.

Speed. Come, fool, come; try me in thy paper.
Laun. There; and St. Nicholas be thy speed!
Speed. Imprimis, She can milk.

Speed. Item, She will often praise her liquor. Laun. If her liquor be good, she shall: if she will not, I will; for good things should be praised,

Speed. Item, She is too liberal.

Laun. Of her tongue she cannot; for that's writ down, she is slow of: of her purse she shall not; for that I'll keep shut: now of another thing she may; and that I cannot help. Well, proceed.

Speed. Item, She hath more hair than wit, and 10 morefultsthanhairs, andmore wealththan faults. Laun. Stop there; I'll have her: she was mine, and not mine, twice or thrice in that last article: Rehearse that once more.

Laun. Av, that she can.

Speed. Item, She brews good ale.

15

Speed. Item, She hath more hair than wit,-
Laun. More hair than wit, it may be; I'll

Laun. And therefore coines the proverb, - prove it: The cover of the salt hides the salt, and

Blessing of your heart, you brew good ale.

Speed. Item, She can sew.

Laun. That's as much as to say, Can she so?
Speed. Item, She can knit.

therefore it is more than the salt: the hair, that covers the wit, is more than the wit; for the greater hides the less. What's next?

20 Speed.-And more faults than hairs,

Laun. What need a man care for a stock with

Laun. That's monstrous: Oh, that that were out!

a wench,, when she can knit him a stock1?
Speed. Item, She can wash and scour.
Laun. A special virtue; for then she need not
to be wash'd and scour'd.

Speed. Item, She can spin.

Laun. Then may I set the world on wheels,

when she can spin for her living.

Speed.-And more wealth than faults.

Laun. Why, that word makes the faults gra25 cious: Well, I'll have her: And if it be a match, as nothing is impossible,

Speed. Item, She hath many nameless virtues. Laun. That's as much as to say, bastard vir-30 tues; that, indeed, know not their fathers, and therefore have no names.

Speed. Here follow her vices.

Laun. Close at the heels of her virtues.

Speed. Item, She is not to be kiss'd fasting, 35 in respect of her breath.

Luun. Well, that fault may be mended with al breakfast, Read on.

Speed. Item, She hath a sweet mouth.

Laun. That makes amends for her sour breath.
Speed. Item, She doth talk in her sleep.
Laun. It's no matter for that, so she sleep not

in her talk.

Speed. Item, She is slow in words.

Speed. What then?

Laun. Why, then will I tell thee,-that thy master stays for thee at the north-gate. Speed. For me?

Laun. For thee? ay; who art thou? he hath staid for a better man than thee.

Speed. And must I go to him? Laun. Thou must run to him, for thou hast staid so long, that going will scarce serve thy turn. Speed. Why didst not tell me sooner? pox on your love-letters!

Laun. Now will he be swing'd for reading my letter; an unmannerly slave, that will thrust 40 himself into secrets!-I'll after, to rejoice in the boy's correction. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Enter Duke and Thurio, and Protheus behind.

Laun. O villain! that set down among her 45 Duke. Sir Thurio, fear not, but that she will

vices? To be slow in words, is a woman's only

virtue: I pray thee, out with't; and place it for

her chief virtue.

Specd. Item, She is proud.

love you,

Now Valentine is banish'd from her sight,

Thu. Since his exile she hath despised me most, Forsworn my company, and rail'd at me,

Laun. Out with that too; it was Eve's legacy, 50 That I am desperate of obtaining her. and cannot be taken from her.

Speed. Item, She hath no teeth.

Laun. I care not for that neither, because I love crusts.

Speed. Item, She is curst.

Laun. Well; the best is, she hath no teeth to

bite.

Duke. This weak impress of love is as a figure
Trenched in ice; which with an hour's heat
Dissolves to water, and doth lose his form.
A little time will melt her frozen thoughts,
55 And worthless Valentine shall be forgot.
How now, sir Protheus? Is your countryman,
According to our proclamation, gone?

It is undoubtedly true that the mother only knows the legitimacy of the child. Launce probably infers, that if he could read, he must have read this well-known observation. 2 St. Nicholas presided over scholars, who were therefore call'd St. Nicholas's clerks. 3 'That is, a stocking. 4 Dr. Johnson is of opinion that sweet mouth implies the same with what is now vulgarly called a sweet tooth, a luxurious desire of dainties and sweetmeats; while Mr. Steevens believes, that by a sweet mouth is meant that she sings sweetly. Liberal, is licentious and gross in language. Gracious, in old language, means graceful. That is, cut, carv'd in ice.

Pro.

Pro. Gone, my good lord.

Duke. My daughter takes his going heavily.
Pro. A little time, my lord, will kill that grief.
Duke. So I believe, but Thurio thinks not so.-

Protheus, the good conceit I hold of thee,
(For thou hast shewn some sign of good desert)
Makes me the better to conter with thee.

Pro. Longer than I prove loyal to your grace,
Let me not live to look upon your grace. [effect

Duke. And, Protheus, we dare trust you in this
Because we know, on Valentine's report, [kind;
You are already love's firm votary,
And cannot soon revolt and change your mind.
5 Upon this warrant shall you have access,
Where you with Silvia may confer at large,
For she is lumpish, heavy, melancholy,
And, for your friend's sake, will be glad of you;
Where you may temper her, by your persuasion,

Duke. Thou know'st, how willingly I would 10 To hate young Valentine, and love my friend.

The match between sir Thurio and my daughter.

Pro. I do, my lord.

Duke. And also, I do think, thou art not ignorant How she opposes her against my will.

Pro. As much as I can do, I will effect:But you, sir Thurio, are not sharp enough; You must lay lime, to tangle her desires, By wailful sonnets, whose composed rhimes

Pro. She did, my lord, when Valentine was here. 15 Should be full fraught with serviceable vows.

Duke. Ay, and perversely she perseveres so.
What might we do to make the girl forget
The love of Valentine, and love sir Thurio?

Pro. The best way is, to slander Valentine
With falshood, cowardice, and poor descent;
Three things that women highly hold in hate.
Duke. Ay, but she'll think that it is spoke in hate.
Pro. Ay, Ay, if his enemy deliver it :

Therefore it must, with circumstance, be spoken
By one, whom she esteemeth as his friend.

Duke. Then you must undertake to slander him.
Pro. And that, my lord, I shall be loth to do:

'Tis an ill office for a gentleman;

Especially, against his very friend.

[him,

Duke. Ay, ,much is the force of heaven-bred poesy.
Pro. Say, that upon the altar of her beauty
You sacrifice your tears, your sighs, your heart:
Write, till your ink be dry; and with your tears

20 Moist it again; and frame some feeling line,
That may discover such integrity:-
For Orpheus' lute was strung with poets' sinews;
Whose golden touch could solten steel and stones,
Make tygers tame, and huge leviathans
25 Forsake unsounded deeps to dance on sands.
After your dire-lamenting elegies,

Visit by night your lady's chamber-window
With some sweet concert: to their instruments
Tune a deploring dump; the night's dead silence

Duke. Where your good word cannot advantage 30 Will well become such sweet complaininggrievance.

Your slander never can endamage him;
Therefore the office is indifferent,

Being intreated to it by your friend.

Pro. You have prevail'd, my lord: if I can doit,

By aught that I can speak in his dispraise,
She shall not long continue love to him.
But say, this weed her love from Valentine,
It follows not that she will love sir Thurio. [him,
Thu. Therefore as you unwind her love from

Lest it should ravel, and be good to none,
You must provide to bottom it on me2:
Which must be done, by praising me as much
As you in worth dispraise sir Valentine,

This, or else nothing, will inherit her.
[love.
Duke. This discipline shews thou hast been in
Thu. Andthyadvicethis night I'll putin practice:
Therefore, sweet Protheus, my direction-giver,

35 Let us into the city presently

To sort some gentlemen well skill'd in musick:
I have a sonnet, that will serve the turn,
To give the onset to thy good advice.

Duke. About it gentlemen.

[per,

40 Pro. We'll wait upon your gracetill after supAnd afterwards determine our proceedings.

Duke. Even now about it; I will pardon you.

[Exeunt.

4

Very is immediate. The meaning of this allusion is, As you wind off her love from him, make me the bottom on which you wind it. The women's term for a ball of thread wound upon a central body, is a bottom of thread. That is, birdlime. * A dump was the ancient term for a mournful * To inherit, is here used for to obtain possession of, without any idea of acquiring by inheritance. That is, to chuse out, That is, I will excuse you from waiting,

elegy.

My My riches are these poor habiliments.

Of which if you should here disfurnish me,
You take the sum and substance that I have.

2 Out. Whither travel you?

Val. To Verona.

1 Out. Whence came you?

Val. From Milan.

3 Out. Have you long sojourn'd there?

Val. Some sixteen months; and longer might

have staid,

If crooked fortune had not thwarted me.
1 Out. What, were you banish'd thence?
Val. I was.

2 Out. For what offence?

[hearse.

Provided, that you do no outrages
On silly women, or poor passengers.

3 Out. No, we detest such vile base practices, Come, go with us, we'll bring thee to our crews,

5 And shew thee all the treasure we have got; Which, with ourselves, all rest at thy dispose.

10

SCENE II.

[Exeunt,

Under Silvia's apartment in Milan,
Enter Protheus.

Pro. Already have I been false to Valentine,
And now I must be as unjust to Thurio.
Under the colour of cominending him,

Val. For that which now torments me to re-151 have access my own love to prefer;

I kill'd a man, whose death I much repent;
But yet I slew him manfully in fight,
Without false vantage, or base treachery.

1 Out. Winy ne'er repent it, if it were done so: But were you banish'd for so small a fault?

Val. I was, and held me glad of such a doom.
1 Out. Have you the tongues?
Val. My youthful travel therein mademe happy:

Or else I often had been miserable.

[friar,

But Silvia is too fair, too true, too holy,
To be corrupted with my worthless gifts.
When I protest true loyalty to her,
She twits me with my falshood to my friend;

20 When to her beauty I commend my vows,
She bids me think, how I have been forsworn
In breaking faith with Julia whom I lov'd.
And, notwithstanding all her sudden quips,
The least whereof would quell a lover's hope,

3 Out. By the bare scalp of Robin Hood's fat 25 Yet, spaniel-like, the more she spurns my love, This fellow were a king for our wild faction.

1 Out. We'll have him: sirs, a word.

Speed. Master, be one of them;

It is a kind of honourable thievery.

Val. Peace, villain!

[to: 30

2 Out. Tell us this; have you any thing to take Val. Nothing but my fortune.

3 Out. Know then, that some of us are gentlemen,

Such as the fury of ungovern'd youth
Thrust from the company of awful' men:
Myself was from Verona banished,
For practising to steal away a lady,

An

heir,

ir, and niece ally'd unto the duke.
2 Out. And I from Mantua, for a gentleman,
Whom, in my mood, I stabb'd unto the heart.

1 Out. And I, for suchlike petty crimes as these.
But to the purpose,-(for we cite our faults,
That they may hold excus'd our lawless lives)
And, partly, seeing you are beautify'd
With goodly shape; and by your own report
A linguist; and a man of such perfection
As we do in our quality much want,-

2 Out. Indeed, because you are a banish'd man,
Therefore, above the rest, we parley to you:
Are you content to be our general?
To make a virtue of necessity,
And live, as we do, in the wilderness?

3 Out. What say'st thou? wilt thou be our

consort?

Say, ay, and be the captain of us all :
We'll do thee homage, and be rul'd by thee,
Love thee as our commander, and our king.

1 Out. But if thou scorn our courtesy, thou dy'st, 2 Out. Thou shalt not live to brag what we have

offer'd.

Val. I take your offer, and will live with you;

The more it grows, and fawneth on her still.
But here comes Thurio: now must we to her

window,

And give some evening music to her ear.
Enter Thurio and Musicians.

Thu. How now, sir Protheus? are you crept
before us?
[love

Pro. Ay, gentle Thurio; for, you know, that

Will creep in service where it cannot go.

33 Thu. Ay, but I hope, sir, that you love not here, Pro. Sir, but I do; or else I would be hence. Thu. Whom? Silvia?

Pro. Ay, Silvia, for your sake.

Thu. I thank youforyourown. Now, gentlemen,

40 Let's tune, and to it lustily a while.
Enter Hostata distance; and Juliainboyscloaths.
Host. Now, my young guest! methinks you're
allycholly; I pray you, why is it?

Jul. Marry, mine host, because I cannot be

Reverend, worshipful, such as magistrates. 2 Quality is nature relatively considered. That is, hasty passionate reproaches and scoffs,

3

How do you, man? the music likes you not.
Jul. You mistake; the musician likes me not. 15
Host. Why, my pretty youth?

Jul. He plays false, father.

Host. How, out of tune on the strings?

Jul. Not so; but yet so false, that he grieves

Jul. Peace! stand aside, the company parts.
Pro. Sir Thurio, fear not you; I will so plead, 40 Host. By my hallidom, I was fast asleep.

[truth,

Pro. One, lady, if you knew his pure heart's

You'd quickly learn to know him by his voice. 50 Egl. This is the hour that madam Silvia

Sil. You have your wish; my will iseven this, - 55 Sil. Who calls?

Beyond all reckoning or count. Reckonings are kept upon nicked or notched sticks or tallies. Impose is injunction, command,