The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare (book suggestions TXT) 📖

id="calibre_pb_15">Enter LAFEU and BERTRAM

 

LAFEU. But I hope your lordship thinks not him a soldier.

BERTRAM. Yes, my lord, and of very valiant approof.

LAFEU. You have it from his own deliverance.

BERTRAM. And by other warranted testimony.

LAFEU. Then my dial goes not true; I took this lark for a bunting.

BERTRAM. I do assure you, my lord, he is very great in knowledge, and accordingly valiant.

LAFEU. I have then sinn’d against his experience and transgress’d against his valour; and my state that way is dangerous, since I cannot yet find in my heart to repent. Here he comes; I pray you make us friends; I will pursue the amity Enter PAROLLES

 

PAROLLES. [To BERTRAM] These things shall be done, sir.

LAFEU. Pray you, sir, who’s his tailor?

PAROLLES. Sir!

LAFEU. O, I know him well. Ay, sir; he, sir, ‘s a good workman, a very good tailor.

BERTRAM. [Aside to PAROLLES] Is she gone to the King?

PAROLLES. She is.

BERTRAM. Will she away tonight?

PAROLLES. As you’ll have her.

BERTRAM. I have writ my letters, casketed my treasure, Given order for our horses; and tonight, When I should take possession of the bride, End ere I do begin.

LAFEU. A good traveller is something at the latter end of a dinner; but one that lies three-thirds and uses a known truth to pass a thousand nothings with, should be once heard and thrice beaten.

God save you, Captain.

BERTRAM. Is there any unkindness between my lord and you, monsieur?

PAROLLES. I know not how I have deserved to run into my lord’s displeasure.

LAFEU. You have made shift to run into ‘t, boots and spurs and all, like him that leapt into the custard; and out of it you’ll run again, rather than suffer question for your residence.

BERTRAM. It may be you have mistaken him, my lord.

LAFEU. And shall do so ever, though I took him at’s prayers.

Fare you well, my lord; and believe this of me: there can be no kernal in this light nut; the soul of this man is his clothes; trust him not in matter of heavy consequence; I have kept of them tame, and know their natures. Farewell, monsieur; I have spoken better of you than you have or will to deserve at my hand; but we must do good against evil. Exit PAROLLES. An idle lord, I swear.

BERTRAM. I think so.

PAROLLES. Why, do you not know him?

BERTRAM. Yes, I do know him well; and common speech Gives him a worthy pass. Here comes my clog.

 

Enter HELENA

 

HELENA. I have, sir, as I was commanded from you, Spoke with the King, and have procur’d his leave For present parting; only he desires

Some private speech with you.

BERTRAM. I shall obey his will.

You must not marvel, Helen, at my course, Which holds not colour with the time, nor does The ministration and required office

On my particular. Prepar’d I was not

For such a business; therefore am I found So much unsettled. This drives me to entreat you That presently you take your way for home, And rather muse than ask why I entreat you; For my respects are better than they seem, And my appointments have in them a need Greater than shows itself at the first view To you that know them not. This to my mother.

[Giving a letter]

‘Twill be two days ere I shall see you; so I leave you to your wisdom.

HELENA. Sir, I can nothing say

But that I am your most obedient servant.

BERTRAM. Come, come, no more of that.

HELENA. And ever shall

With true observance seek to eke out that Wherein toward me my homely stars have fail’d To equal my great fortune.

BERTRAM. Let that go.

My haste is very great. Farewell; hie home.

HELENA. Pray, sir, your pardon.

BERTRAM. Well, what would you say?

HELENA. I am not worthy of the wealth I owe, Nor dare I say ‘tis mine, and yet it is; But, like a timorous thief, most fain would steal What law does vouch mine own.

BERTRAM. What would you have?

HELENA. Something; and scarce so much; nothing, indeed.

I would not tell you what I would, my lord.

Faith, yes:

Strangers and foes do sunder and not kiss.

BERTRAM. I pray you, stay not, but in haste to horse.

HELENA. I shall not break your bidding, good my lord.

BERTRAM. Where are my other men, monsieur?

Farewell! Exit HELENA Go thou toward home, where I will never come Whilst I can shake my sword or hear the drum.

Away, and for our flight.

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ACT III. SCENE 1.

Florence. The DUKE’s palace

 

Flourish. Enter the DUKE OF FLORENCE, attended; two FRENCH LORDS, with a TROOP OF SOLDIERS

 

DUKE. So that, from point to point, now have you hear The fundamental reasons of this war;

Whose great decision hath much blood let forth And more thirsts after.

FIRST LORD. Holy seems the quarrel

Upon your Grace’s part; black and fearful On the opposer.

DUKE. Therefore we marvel much our cousin France Would in so just a business shut his bosom Against our borrowing prayers.

SECOND LORD. Good my lord,

The reasons of our state I cannot yield, But like a common and an outward man

That the great figure of a council frames By self-unable motion; therefore dare not Say what I think of it, since I have found Myself in my incertain grounds to fail As often as I guess’d.

DUKE. Be it his pleasure.

FIRST LORD. But I am sure the younger of our nature, That surfeit on their ease, will day by day Come here for physic.

DUKE. Welcome shall they be

And all the honours that can fly from us Shall on them settle. You know your places well; When better fall, for your avails they fell.

Tomorrow to th’ field. Flourish. Exeunt

ACT III. SCENE 2.

Rousillon. The COUNT’S palace

 

Enter COUNTESS and CLOWN

 

COUNTESS. It hath happen’d all as I would have had it, save that he comes not along with her.

CLOWN. By my troth, I take my young lord to be a very melancholy man.

COUNTESS. By what observance, I pray you?

CLOWN. Why, he will look upon his boot and sing; mend the ruff and sing; ask questions and sing; pick his teeth and sing. I know a man that had this trick of melancholy sold a goodly manor for a song.

COUNTESS. Let me see what he writes, and when he means to come.

[Opening a letter]

CLOWN. I have no mind to Isbel since I was at court. Our old ling and our Isbels o’ th’ country are nothing like your old ling and your Isbels o’ th’ court. The brains of my Cupid’s knock’d out; and I begin to love, as an old man loves money, with no stomach.

COUNTESS. What have we here?

CLOWN. E’en that you have there. Exit COUNTESS. [Reads] ‘I have sent you a daughter-in-law; she hath recovered the King and undone me. I have wedded her, not bedded her; and sworn to make the “not” eternal. You shall hear I am run away; know it before the report come. If there be breadth enough in the world, I will hold a long distance. My duty to you.

Your unfortunate son, BERTRAM.’

This is not well, rash and unbridled boy, To fly the favours of so good a king, To pluck his indignation on thy head

By the misprizing of a maid too virtuous For the contempt of empire.

 

Re-enter CLOWN

 

CLOWN. O madam, yonder is heavy news within between two soldiers and my young lady.

COUNTESS. What is the -matter?

CLOWN. Nay, there is some comfort in the news, some comfort; your son will not be kill’d so soon as I thought he would.

COUNTESS. Why should he be kill’d?

CLOWN. So say I, madam, if he run away, as I hear he does the danger is in standing to ‘t; that’s the loss of men, though it be the getting of children. Here they come will tell you more. For my part, I only hear your son was run away. Exit Enter HELENA and the two FRENCH GENTLEMEN

 

SECOND GENTLEMAN. Save you, good madam.

HELENA. Madam, my lord is gone, for ever gone.

FIRST GENTLEMAN. Do not say so.

COUNTESS. Think upon patience. Pray you, gentlemen-I have felt so many quirks of joy and grief That the first face of neither, on the start, Can woman me unto ‘t. Where is my son, I pray you?

FIRST GENTLEMAN. Madam, he’s gone to serve the Duke of Florence.

We met him thitherward; for thence we came, And, after some dispatch in hand at court, Thither we bend again.

HELENA. Look on this letter, madam; here’s my passport.

[Reads] ‘When thou canst get the ring upon my finger, which never shall come off, and show me a child begotten of thy body that I am father to, then call me husband; but in such a “then” I write a “never.”

This is a dreadful sentence.

COUNTESS. Brought you this letter, gentlemen?

FIRST GENTLEMAN. Ay, madam;

And for the contents’ sake are sorry for our pains.

COUNTESS. I prithee, lady, have a better cheer; If thou engrossest all the griefs are thine, Thou robb’st me of a moiety. He was my son; But I do wash his name out of my blood, And thou art all my child. Towards Florence is he?

FIRST GENTLEMAN. Ay, madam.

COUNTESS. And to be a soldier?

FIRST GENTLEMAN. Such is his noble purpose; and, believe ‘t, The Duke will lay upon him all the honour That good convenience claims.

COUNTESS. Return you thither?

SECOND GENTLEMAN. Ay, madam, with the swiftest wing of speed.

HELENA. [Reads] ‘Till I have no wife, I have nothing in France.’

‘Tis bitter.

COUNTESS. Find you that there?

HELENA. Ay, madam.

SECOND GENTLEMAN. ‘Tis but the boldness of his hand haply, which his heart was not consenting to.

COUNTESS. Nothing in France until he have no wife!

There’s nothing here that is too good for him But only she; and she deserves a lord That twenty such rude boys might tend upon, And call her hourly mistress. Who was with him?

SECOND GENTLEMAN. A servant only, and a gentleman Which I have sometime known.

COUNTESS. Parolles, was it not?

SECOND GENTLEMAN. Ay, my good lady, he.

COUNTESS. A very tainted fellow, and full of wickedness.

My son corrupts a well-derived nature With his inducement.

SECOND GENTLEMAN. Indeed, good lady,

The fellow has a deal of that too much Which holds him much to have.

COUNTESS. Y’are welcome, gentlemen.

I will entreat you, when you see my son, To tell him that his sword can never win The honour that he loses. More I’ll entreat you Written to bear along.

FIRST GENTLEMAN. We serve you, madam,

In that and all your worthiest affairs.

COUNTESS. Not so, but as we change our courtesies.

Will you draw near? Exeunt COUNTESS and GENTLEMEN

HELENA. ‘Till I have no wife, I have nothing in France.’

Nothing in France until he has no wife!

Thou shalt have none, Rousillon, none in France Then hast thou all again. Poor lord! is’t That chase thee from thy country, and expose Those tender limbs of thine to the event Of the non-sparing war? And is it I

That drive thee