Enter Valentine and Proteus.

VALENTINE
Cease to persuade, my loving Proteus.
Home-keeping youth have ever homely wits.
Were ’t not affection chains thy tender days
To the sweet glances of thy honored love,
I rather would entreat thy company
To see the wonders of the world abroad
Than, living dully sluggardized at home,
Wear out thy youth with shapeless idleness.
But since thou lov’st, love still and thrive therein,
Even as I would when I to love begin.
PROTEUS
Wilt thou be gone? Sweet Valentine, adieu.
Think on thy Proteus when thou haply seest
Some rare noteworthy object in thy travel.
Wish me partaker in thy happiness
When thou dost meet good hap; and in thy danger,
If ever danger do environ thee,
Commend thy grievance to my holy prayers,
For I will be thy beadsman, Valentine.
VALENTINE
And on a love-book pray for my success?
PROTEUS
Upon some book I love I’ll pray for thee.

---

VALENTINE
That’s on some shallow story of deep love,
How young Leander crossed the Hellespont.
PROTEUS
That’s a deep story of a deeper love,
For he was more than over shoes in love.
VALENTINE
’Tis true, for you are over boots in love,
And yet you never swam the Hellespont.
PROTEUS
Over the boots? Nay, give me not the boots.
VALENTINE
No, I will not, for it boots thee not.
PROTEUS What?
VALENTINE
To be in love, where scorn is bought with groans,
Coy looks with heart-sore sighs, one fading
moment’s mirth
With twenty watchful, weary, tedious nights;
If haply won, perhaps a hapless gain;
If lost, why then a grievous labor won;
How ever, but a folly bought with wit,
Or else a wit by folly vanquishèd.
PROTEUS
So, by your circumstance, you call me fool.
VALENTINE
So, by your circumstance, I fear you’ll prove.
PROTEUS
’Tis love you cavil at; I am not Love.
VALENTINE
Love is your master, for he masters you;
And he that is so yokèd by a fool
Methinks should not be chronicled for wise.
PROTEUS
Yet writers say: as in the sweetest bud

---

The eating canker dwells, so eating love
Inhabits in the finest wits of all.
VALENTINE
And writers say: as the most forward bud
Is eaten by the canker ere it blow,
Even so by love the young and tender wit
Is turned to folly, blasting in the bud,
Losing his verdure, even in the prime,
And all the fair effects of future hopes.
But wherefore waste I time to counsel thee
That art a votary to fond desire?
Once more adieu. My father at the road
Expects my coming, there to see me shipped.
PROTEUS
And thither will I bring thee, Valentine.
VALENTINE
Sweet Proteus, no. Now let us take our leave.
To Milan let me hear from thee by letters
Of thy success in love, and what news else
Betideth here in absence of thy friend.
And I likewise will visit thee with mine.
PROTEUS
All happiness bechance to thee in Milan.
VALENTINE
As much to you at home. And so farewell. He exits.
PROTEUS
He after honor hunts, I after love.
He leaves his friends, to dignify them more;
I leave myself, my friends, and all, for love.
Thou, Julia, thou hast metamorphosed me,
Made me neglect my studies, lose my time,
War with good counsel, set the world at nought;
Made wit with musing weak, heart sick with thought.

Enter Speed.

---

SPEED
Sir Proteus, ’save you. Saw you my master?
PROTEUS
But now he parted hence to embark for Milan.
SPEED
Twenty to one, then, he is shipped already,
And I have played the sheep in losing him.
PROTEUS
Indeed a sheep doth very often stray,
An if the shepherd be awhile away.
SPEED You conclude that my master is a shepherd,
then, and I a sheep?
PROTEUS I do.
SPEED Why, then my horns are his horns, whether I
wake or sleep.
PROTEUS A silly answer, and fitting well a sheep.
SPEED This proves me still a sheep.
PROTEUS True, and thy master a shepherd.
SPEED Nay, that I can deny by a circumstance.
PROTEUS It shall go hard but I’ll prove it by another.
SPEED The shepherd seeks the sheep, and not the
sheep the shepherd; but I seek my master, and my
master seeks not me. Therefore I am no sheep.
PROTEUS The sheep for fodder follow the shepherd; the
shepherd for food follows not the sheep. Thou for
wages followest thy master; thy master for wages
follows not thee. Therefore thou art a sheep.
SPEED Such another proof will make me cry “baa.”
PROTEUS But dost thou hear? Gav’st thou my letter to
Julia?
SPEED Ay, sir. I, a lost mutton, gave your letter to her, a
laced mutton, and she, a laced mutton, gave me, a
lost mutton, nothing for my labor.
PROTEUS Here’s too small a pasture for such store of
muttons.

---

SPEED If the ground be overcharged, you were best
stick her.
PROTEUS Nay, in that you are astray; ’twere best pound
you.
SPEED Nay, sir, less than a pound shall serve me for
carrying your letter.
PROTEUS You mistake; I mean the pound, a pinfold.
SPEED
From a pound to a pin? Fold it over and over,
’Tis threefold too little for carrying a letter to your
lover.
PROTEUS But what said she?
SPEED , nodding Ay.
PROTEUS Nod—“Ay.” Why, that’s “noddy.”
SPEED You mistook, sir. I say she did nod, and you ask
me if she did nod, and I say “ay.”
PROTEUS And that set together is “noddy.”
SPEED Now you have taken the pains to set it together,
take it for your pains.
PROTEUS No, no, you shall have it for bearing the letter.
SPEED Well, I perceive I must be fain to bear with you.
PROTEUS Why, sir, how do you bear with me?
SPEED Marry, sir, the letter, very orderly, having nothing
but the word “noddy” for my pains.
PROTEUS Beshrew me, but you have a quick wit.
SPEED And yet it cannot overtake your slow purse.
PROTEUS Come, come, open the matter in brief. What
said she?
SPEED Open your purse, that the money and the matter
may be both at once delivered.
PROTEUS , giving money Well, sir, here is for your
pains. What said she?
SPEED , looking at the money Truly, sir, I think you’ll
hardly win her.
PROTEUS Why? Couldst thou perceive so much from
her?

---

SPEED Sir, I could perceive nothing at all from her, no,
not so much as a ducat for delivering your letter.
And being so hard to me that brought your mind, I
fear she’ll prove as hard to you in telling your mind.
Give her no token but stones, for she’s as hard as
steel.
PROTEUS What said she? Nothing?
SPEED No, not so much as “Take this for thy pains.”
To testify your bounty, I thank you, you have
testerned me. In requital whereof, henceforth
carry your letters yourself. And so, sir, I’ll commend
you to my master.
PROTEUS
Go, go, begone, to save your ship from wrack,
Which cannot perish having thee aboard,
Being destined to a drier death on shore.
Speed exits.
I must go send some better messenger.
I fear my Julia would not deign my lines,
Receiving them from such a worthless post.
He exits.

Enter Julia and Lucetta.

JULIA
But say, Lucetta, now we are alone,
Wouldst thou then counsel me to fall in love?
LUCETTA
Ay, madam, so you stumble not unheedfully.
JULIA
Of all the fair resort of gentlemen
That every day with parle encounter me,
In thy opinion which is worthiest love?

---

LUCETTA
Please you repeat their names, I’ll show my mind
According to my shallow simple skill.
JULIA
What think’st thou of the fair Sir Eglamour?
LUCETTA
As of a knight well-spoken, neat, and fine;
But, were I you, he never should be mine.
JULIA
What think’st thou of the rich Mercatio?
LUCETTA
Well of his wealth, but of himself so-so.
JULIA
What think’st thou of the gentle Proteus?
LUCETTA
Lord, Lord, to see what folly reigns in us!
JULIA
How now? What means this passion at his name?
LUCETTA
Pardon, dear madam, ’tis a passing shame
That I, unworthy body as I am,
Should censure thus on lovely gentlemen.
JULIA
Why not on Proteus, as of all the rest?
LUCETTA
Then thus: of many good, I think him best.
JULIA Your reason?
LUCETTA
I have no other but a woman’s reason:
I think him so because I think him so.
JULIA
And wouldst thou have me cast my love on him?
LUCETTA
Ay, if you thought your love not cast away.
JULIA
Why, he of all the rest hath never moved me.

---

LUCETTA
Yet he of all the rest I think best loves you.
JULIA
His little speaking shows his love but small.
LUCETTA
Fire that’s closest kept burns most of all.
JULIA
They do not love that do not show their love.
LUCETTA
O, they love least that let men know their love.
JULIA I would I knew his mind.
LUCETTA , handing her a paper Peruse this paper,
madam.
JULIA reads “To Julia.”—Say from whom.
LUCETTA That the contents will show.
JULIA Say, say who gave it thee.
LUCETTA
Sir Valentine’s page; and sent, I think, from
Proteus.
He would have given it you, but I, being in the way,
Did in your name receive it. Pardon the fault, I pray.
JULIA
Now, by my modesty, a goodly broker!
Dare you presume to harbor wanton lines?
To whisper and conspire against my youth?
Now trust me, ’tis an office of great worth,
And you an officer fit for the place.
There, take the paper; see it be returned,
Or else return no more into my sight.
LUCETTA , taking the paper
To plead for love deserves more fee than hate.
JULIA
Will you be gone?
LUCETTA That you may ruminate. She exits.
JULIA
And yet I would I had o’erlooked the letter.

---

It were a shame to call her back again
And pray her to a fault for which I chid her.
What fool is she that knows I am a maid
And would not force the letter to my view,
Since maids in modesty say “no” to that
Which they would have the profferer construe “ay”!
Fie, fie, how wayward is this foolish love
That like a testy babe will scratch the nurse
And presently, all humbled, kiss the rod!
How churlishly I chid Lucetta hence,
When willingly I would have had her here!
How angerly I taught my brow to frown,
When inward joy enforced my heart to smile!
My penance is to call Lucetta back
And ask remission for my folly past.—
What ho, Lucetta!

Enter Lucetta.

LUCETTA What would your Ladyship?
JULIA
Is ’t near dinner time?
LUCETTA I would it were,
That you might kill your stomach on your meat
And not upon your maid.
She drops a paper and then retrieves it.
JULIA
What is ’t that you took up so gingerly?
LUCETTA Nothing.
JULIA Why didst thou stoop, then?
LUCETTA
To take a paper up that I let fall.
JULIA And is that paper nothing?
LUCETTA Nothing concerning me.
JULIA
Then let it lie for those that it concerns.

---

LUCETTA
Madam, it will not lie where it concerns
Unless it have a false interpreter.
JULIA
Some love of yours hath writ to you in rhyme.
LUCETTA
That I might sing it, madam, to a tune,
Give me a note. Your Ladyship can set—
JULIA
As little by such toys as may be possible.
Best sing it to the tune of “ Light o’ Love. ”
LUCETTA
It is too heavy for so light a tune.
JULIA
Heavy? Belike it hath some burden then?
LUCETTA
Ay, and melodious were it, would you sing it.
JULIA
And why not you?
LUCETTA I cannot reach so high.
JULIA , taking the paper
Let’s see your song. How now, minion!
LUCETTA
Keep tune there still, so you will sing it out.
And yet methinks I do not like this tune.
JULIA You do not?
LUCETTA No, madam, ’tis too sharp.
JULIA You, minion, are too saucy.
LUCETTA Nay, now you are too flat
And mar the concord with too harsh a descant.
There wanteth but a mean to fill your song.
JULIA
The mean is drowned with your unruly bass.
LUCETTA
Indeed, I bid the base for Proteus.

---

JULIA
This babble shall not henceforth trouble me.
Here is a coil with protestation.
She rips up the paper. Lucetta begins
to pick up the pieces.
Go, get you gone, and let the papers lie.
You would be fing’ring them to anger me.
LUCETTA
She makes it strange, but she would be best pleased
To be so angered with another letter. She exits.
JULIA
Nay, would I were so angered with the same!
O hateful hands, to tear such loving words!
Injurious wasps, to feed on such sweet honey
And kill the bees that yield it with your stings!
I’ll kiss each several paper for amends.
She picks up some pieces.
Look, here is writ “kind Julia.” Unkind Julia,
As in revenge of thy ingratitude,
I throw thy name against the bruising stones,
Trampling contemptuously on thy disdain.
And here is writ “love-wounded Proteus.”
Poor wounded name, my bosom as a bed
Shall lodge thee till thy wound be throughly healed,
And thus I search it with a sovereign kiss.
But twice or thrice was “Proteus” written down.
Be calm, good wind. Blow not a word away
Till I have found each letter in the letter
Except mine own name. That some whirlwind bear
Unto a ragged, fearful, hanging rock
And throw it thence into the raging sea.
Lo, here in one line is his name twice writ:
“Poor forlorn Proteus, passionate Proteus,
To the sweet Julia.” That I’ll tear away—
And yet I will not, sith so prettily
He couples it to his complaining names.

---

Thus will I fold them one upon another.
Now kiss, embrace, contend, do what you will.

Enter Lucetta.

LUCETTA
Madam, dinner is ready, and your father stays.
JULIA Well, let us go.
LUCETTA
What, shall these papers lie like telltales here?
JULIA
If you respect them, best to take them up.
LUCETTA
Nay, I was taken up for laying them down.
Yet here they shall not lie, for catching cold.
She picks up the rest of the pieces.
JULIA
I see you have a month’s mind to them.
LUCETTA
Ay, madam, you may say what sights you see;
I see things too, although you judge I wink.
JULIA Come, come, will ’t please you go?
They exit.

Enter Antonio and Pantino.

ANTONIO
Tell me, Pantino, what sad talk was that
Wherewith my brother held you in the cloister?
PANTINO
’Twas of his nephew Proteus, your son.
ANTONIO
Why, what of him?
PANTINO He wondered that your Lordship
Would suffer him to spend his youth at home

---

While other men, of slender reputation,
Put forth their sons to seek preferment out:
Some to the wars to try their fortune there,
Some to discover islands far away,
Some to the studious universities.
For any or for all these exercises
He said that Proteus your son was meet,
And did request me to importune you
To let him spend his time no more at home,
Which would be great impeachment to his age
In having known no travel in his youth.
ANTONIO
Nor need’st thou much importune me to that
Whereon this month I have been hammering.
I have considered well his loss of time
And how he cannot be a perfect man,
Not being tried and tutored in the world.
Experience is by industry achieved
And perfected by the swift course of time.
Then tell me whither were I best to send him.
PANTINO
I think your Lordship is not ignorant
How his companion, youthful Valentine,
Attends the Emperor in his royal court.
ANTONIO I know it well.
PANTINO
’Twere good, I think, your Lordship sent him thither.
There shall he practice tilts and tournaments,
Hear sweet discourse, converse with noblemen,
And be in eye of every exercise
Worthy his youth and nobleness of birth.
ANTONIO
I like thy counsel. Well hast thou advised,
And that thou mayst perceive how well I like it,
The execution of it shall make known.

---

Even with the speediest expedition
I will dispatch him to the Emperor’s court.
PANTINO
Tomorrow, may it please you, Don Alphonso,
With other gentlemen of good esteem,
Are journeying to salute the Emperor
And to commend their service to his will.
ANTONIO
Good company. With them shall Proteus go.

Enter Proteus reading .

And in good time! Now will we break with him.
PROTEUS , to himself
Sweet love, sweet lines, sweet life!
Here is her hand, the agent of her heart;
Here is her oath for love, her honor’s pawn.
O, that our fathers would applaud our loves
To seal our happiness with their consents.
O heavenly Julia!
ANTONIO
How now? What letter are you reading there?
PROTEUS
May ’t please your Lordship, ’tis a word or two
Of commendations sent from Valentine,
Delivered by a friend that came from him.
ANTONIO
Lend me the letter. Let me see what news.
PROTEUS
There is no news, my lord, but that he writes
How happily he lives, how well beloved
And daily gracèd by the Emperor,
Wishing me with him, partner of his fortune.
ANTONIO
And how stand you affected to his wish?

---

PROTEUS
As one relying on your Lordship’s will,
And not depending on his friendly wish.
ANTONIO
My will is something sorted with his wish.
Muse not that I thus suddenly proceed,
For what I will, I will, and there an end.
I am resolved that thou shalt spend some time
With Valentinus in the Emperor’s court.
What maintenance he from his friends receives,
Like exhibition thou shalt have from me.
Tomorrow be in readiness to go.
Excuse it not, for I am peremptory.
PROTEUS
My lord, I cannot be so soon provided.
Please you deliberate a day or two.
ANTONIO
Look what thou want’st shall be sent after thee.
No more of stay. Tomorrow thou must go.—
Come on, Pantino; you shall be employed
To hasten on his expedition.
Antonio and Pantino exit.
PROTEUS
Thus have I shunned the fire for fear of burning
And drenched me in the sea, where I am drowned.
I feared to show my father Julia’s letter
Lest he should take exceptions to my love,
And with the vantage of mine own excuse
Hath he excepted most against my love.
O, how this spring of love resembleth
The uncertain glory of an April day,
Which now shows all the beauty of the sun,
And by and by a cloud takes all away.

Enter Pantino.

---

PANTINO
Sir Proteus, your father calls for you.
He is in haste. Therefore, I pray you, go.
PROTEUS
Why, this it is: my heart accords thereto.
Aside . And yet a thousand times it answers “no.”
They exit.

Enter Valentine and Speed, carrying a glove.

SPEED
Sir, your glove.
VALENTINE Not mine. My gloves are on.
SPEED
Why, then, this may be yours, for this is but one.
VALENTINE
Ha? Let me see. Ay, give it me, it’s mine.
Sweet ornament that decks a thing divine!
Ah, Sylvia, Sylvia!
SPEED , calling Madam Sylvia! Madam Sylvia!
VALENTINE How now, sirrah?
SPEED She is not within hearing, sir.
VALENTINE Why, sir, who bade you call her?
SPEED Your Worship, sir, or else I mistook.
VALENTINE Well, you’ll still be too forward.
SPEED And yet I was last chidden for being too slow.
VALENTINE Go to, sir. Tell me, do you know Madam
Sylvia?
SPEED She that your Worship loves?
VALENTINE Why, how know you that I am in love?
SPEED Marry, by these special marks: first, you have
learned, like Sir Proteus, to wreathe your arms like
a malcontent; to relish a love song like a robin
redbreast; to walk alone like one that had the

---

pestilence; to sigh like a schoolboy that had lost his
ABC; to weep like a young wench that had buried
her grandam; to fast like one that takes diet; to
watch like one that fears robbing; to speak puling
like a beggar at Hallowmas. You were wont, when
you laughed, to crow like a cock; when you walked,
to walk like one of the lions. When you fasted, it was
presently after dinner; when you looked sadly, it
was for want of money. And now you are metamorphosed
with a mistress, that when I look on you, I
can hardly think you my master.
VALENTINE Are all these things perceived in me?
SPEED They are all perceived without you.
VALENTINE Without me? They cannot.
SPEED Without you? Nay, that’s certain, for without
you were so simple, none else would. But you are so
without these follies, that these follies are within
you and shine through you like the water in an
urinal, that not an eye that sees you but is a
physician to comment on your malady.
VALENTINE But tell me, dost thou know my Lady
Sylvia?
SPEED She that you gaze on so as she sits at supper?
VALENTINE Hast thou observed that? Even she I mean.
SPEED Why, sir, I know her not.
VALENTINE Dost thou know her by my gazing on her
and yet know’st her not?
SPEED Is she not hard-favored, sir?
VALENTINE Not so fair, boy, as well-favored.
SPEED Sir, I know that well enough.
VALENTINE What dost thou know?
SPEED That she is not so fair as, of you, well-favored.
VALENTINE I mean that her beauty is exquisite but her
favor infinite.

---

SPEED That’s because the one is painted, and the other
out of all count.
VALENTINE How painted? And how out of count?
SPEED Marry, sir, so painted to make her fair, that no
man counts of her beauty.
VALENTINE How esteem’st thou me? I account of her
beauty.
SPEED You never saw her since she was deformed.
VALENTINE How long hath she been deformed?
SPEED Ever since you loved her.
VALENTINE I have loved her ever since I saw her, and
still I see her beautiful.
SPEED If you love her, you cannot see her.
VALENTINE Why?
SPEED Because love is blind. O, that you had mine eyes,
or your own eyes had the lights they were wont to
have when you chid at Sir Proteus for going
ungartered!
VALENTINE What should I see then?
SPEED Your own present folly and her passing deformity;
for he, being in love, could not see to garter his
hose, and you, being in love, cannot see to put on
your hose.
VALENTINE Belike, boy, then you are in love, for last
morning you could not see to wipe my shoes.
SPEED True, sir, I was in love with my bed. I thank you,
you swinged me for my love, which makes me the
bolder to chide you for yours.
VALENTINE In conclusion, I stand affected to her.
SPEED I would you were set, so your affection would
cease.
VALENTINE Last night she enjoined me to write some
lines to one she loves.
SPEED And have you?
VALENTINE I have.

---

SPEED Are they not lamely writ?
VALENTINE No, boy, but as well as I can do them.
Peace, here she comes.

Enter Sylvia.

SPEED , aside O excellent motion! O exceeding puppet!
Now will he interpret to her.
VALENTINE Madam and mistress, a thousand
good-morrows.
SPEED , aside O, give ye good ev’n! Here’s a million of
manners.
SYLVIA Sir Valentine, and servant, to you two
thousand.
SPEED , aside He should give her interest, and she
gives it him.
VALENTINE
As you enjoined me, I have writ your letter
Unto the secret, nameless friend of yours,
Which I was much unwilling to proceed in
But for my duty to your Ladyship.
He gives her a paper.
SYLVIA
I thank you, gentle servant, ’tis very clerkly done.
VALENTINE
Now trust me, madam, it came hardly off,
For, being ignorant to whom it goes,
I writ at random, very doubtfully.
SYLVIA
Perchance you think too much of so much pains?
VALENTINE
No, madam. So it stead you, I will write,
Please you command, a thousand times as much,
And yet—
SYLVIA
A pretty period. Well, I guess the sequel;
And yet I will not name it And yet I care not.

---

And yet take this again. She holds out the paper.
And yet I thank you,
Meaning henceforth to trouble you no more.
SPEED , aside
And yet you will; and yet another “yet.”
VALENTINE
What means your Ladyship? Do you not like it?
SYLVIA
Yes, yes, the lines are very quaintly writ,
But, since unwillingly, take them again.
Nay, take them. She again offers him the paper.
VALENTINE Madam, they are for you.
SYLVIA
Ay, ay. You writ them, sir, at my request,
But I will none of them. They are for you.
I would have had them writ more movingly.
VALENTINE , taking the paper
Please you, I’ll write your Ladyship another.
SYLVIA
And when it’s writ, for my sake read it over,
And if it please you, so; if not, why, so.
VALENTINE If it please me, madam? What then?
SYLVIA
Why, if it please you, take it for your labor.
And so good-morrow, servant. Sylvia exits.
SPEED , aside
O jest unseen, inscrutable, invisible
As a nose on a man’s face, or a weathercock on a
steeple!
My master sues to her, and she hath taught her
suitor,
He being her pupil, to become her tutor.
O excellent device! Was there ever heard a better?
That my master, being scribe, to himself should
write the letter?

---

VALENTINE How now, sir? What, are you reasoning
with yourself?
SPEED Nay, I was rhyming. ’Tis you that have the
reason.
VALENTINE To do what?
SPEED To be a spokesman from Madam Sylvia.
VALENTINE To whom?
SPEED To yourself. Why, she woos you by a figure.
VALENTINE What figure?
SPEED By a letter, I should say.
VALENTINE Why, she hath not writ to me!
SPEED What need she when she hath made you write
to yourself? Why, do you not perceive the jest?
VALENTINE No, believe me.
SPEED No believing you indeed, sir. But did you perceive
her earnest?
VALENTINE She gave me none, except an angry word.
SPEED Why, she hath given you a letter.
VALENTINE That’s the letter I writ to her friend.
SPEED And that letter hath she delivered, and there an
end.
VALENTINE I would it were no worse.
SPEED I’ll warrant you, ’tis as well.
For often have you writ to her, and she, in modesty
Or else for want of idle time, could not again reply,
Or fearing else some messenger that might her
mind discover,
Herself hath taught her love himself to write unto
her lover.
All this I speak in print, for in print I found it. Why
muse you, sir? ’Tis dinnertime.
VALENTINE I have dined.
SPEED Ay, but hearken, sir, though the chameleon love
can feed on the air, I am one that am nourished by

---

my victuals and would fain have meat. O, be not like
your mistress! Be moved, be moved.
They exit.

Enter Proteus and Julia.

PROTEUS Have patience, gentle Julia.
JULIA I must where is no remedy.
PROTEUS
When possibly I can, I will return.
JULIA
If you turn not, you will return the sooner.
Keep this remembrance for thy Julia’s sake.
She gives him a ring.
PROTEUS , giving her a ring
Why, then we’ll make exchange. Here, take you this.
JULIA
And seal the bargain with a holy kiss.
PROTEUS
Here is my hand for my true constancy.
And when that hour o’erslips me in the day
Wherein I sigh not, Julia, for thy sake,
The next ensuing hour some foul mischance
Torment me for my love’s forgetfulness.
My father stays my coming. Answer not.
The tide is now—nay, not thy tide of tears;
That tide will stay me longer than I should.
Julia, farewell. Julia exits.
What, gone without a word?
Ay, so true love should do. It cannot speak,
For truth hath better deeds than words to grace it.

Enter Pantino.

PANTINO Sir Proteus, you are stayed for.

---

PROTEUS Go. I come, I come.
Aside . Alas, this parting strikes poor lovers dumb.
They exit.

Enter Lance, weeping , with his dog, Crab.

LANCE Nay,’twill be this hour ere I have done weeping.
All the kind of the Lances have this very fault. I have
received my proportion like the Prodigious Son and
am going with Sir Proteus to the Imperial’s court. I
think Crab my dog be the sourest-natured dog that
lives: my mother weeping, my father wailing, my
sister crying, our maid howling, our cat wringing
her hands, and all our house in a great perplexity,
yet did not this cruel-hearted cur shed one tear. He
is a stone, a very pibble stone, and has no more pity
in him than a dog. A Jew would have wept to have
seen our parting. Why, my grandam, having no
eyes, look you, wept herself blind at my parting.
Nay, I’ll show you the manner of it. He takes off his
shoes. This shoe is my father. No, this left shoe is
my father; no, no, this left shoe is my mother. Nay,
that cannot be so neither. Yes, it is so, it is so; it hath
the worser sole. This shoe with the hole in it is my
mother; and this my father. A vengeance on ’t, there
’tis! Now sir, this staff is my sister, for, look you, she
is as white as a lily and as small as a wand. This hat
is Nan, our maid. I am the dog. No, the dog is
himself, and I am the dog. O, the dog is me, and I
am myself. Ay, so, so. Now come I to my father:
“Father, your blessing.” Now should not the shoe
speak a word for weeping. Now should I kiss my
father. He kisses one shoe. Well, he weeps on. Now

---

come I to my mother. O, that she could speak now
like a wold woman! Well, I kiss her. He kisses the
other shoe. Why, there ’tis; here’s my mother’s
breath up and down. Now come I to my sister. Mark
the moan she makes! Now the dog all this while
sheds not a tear nor speaks a word. But see how I
lay the dust with my tears.

Enter Pantino.

PANTINO Lance, away, away! Aboard. Thy master is
shipped, and thou art to post after with oars. What’s
the matter? Why weep’st thou, man? Away, ass.
You’ll lose the tide if you tarry any longer.
LANCE It is no matter if the tied were lost, for it is the
unkindest tied that ever any man tied.
PANTINO What’s the unkindest tide?
LANCE Why, he that’s tied here, Crab my dog.
PANTINO Tut, man. I mean thou ’lt lose the flood and, in
losing the flood, lose thy voyage and, in losing thy
voyage, lose thy master and, in losing thy master,
lose thy service and, in losing thy service— Lance
covers Pantino’s mouth. Why dost thou stop my
mouth?
LANCE For fear thou shouldst lose thy tongue.
PANTINO Where should I lose my tongue?
LANCE In thy tale.
PANTINO In thy tail!
LANCE Lose the tide, and the voyage, and the master,
and the service, and the tied. Why, man, if the river
were dry, I am able to fill it with my tears; if the
wind were down, I could drive the boat with my
sighs.
PANTINO Come. Come away, man. I was sent to call
thee.
LANCE Sir, call me what thou dar’st.

---

PANTINO Wilt thou go?
LANCE Well, I will go.
They exit.

Enter Valentine, Sylvia, Thurio, and Speed.

SYLVIA Servant!
VALENTINE Mistress?
SPEED Master, Sir Thurio frowns on you.
VALENTINE Ay, boy, it’s for love.
SPEED Not of you.
VALENTINE Of my mistress, then.
SPEED ’Twere good you knocked him.
SYLVIA , to Valentine Servant, you are sad.
VALENTINE Indeed, madam, I seem so.
THURIO Seem you that you are not?
VALENTINE Haply I do.
THURIO So do counterfeits.
VALENTINE So do you.
THURIO What seem I that I am not?
VALENTINE Wise.
THURIO What instance of the contrary?
VALENTINE Your folly.
THURIO And how quote you my folly?
VALENTINE I quote it in your jerkin.
THURIO My “jerkin” is a doublet.
VALENTINE Well, then, I’ll double your folly.
THURIO How!
SYLVIA What, angry, Sir Thurio? Do you change color?
VALENTINE Give him leave, madam. He is a kind of
chameleon.
THURIO That hath more mind to feed on your blood
than live in your air.

---

VALENTINE You have said, sir.
THURIO Ay, sir, and done too for this time.
VALENTINE I know it well, sir. You always end ere you
begin.
SYLVIA A fine volley of words, gentlemen, and quickly
shot off.
VALENTINE ’Tis indeed, madam. We thank the giver.
SYLVIA Who is that, servant?
VALENTINE Yourself, sweet lady, for you gave the fire.
Sir Thurio borrows his wit from your Ladyship’s
looks and spends what he borrows kindly in your
company.
THURIO Sir, if you spend word for word with me, I shall
make your wit bankrupt.
VALENTINE I know it well, sir. You have an exchequer
of words and, I think, no other treasure to give your
followers, for it appears by their bare liveries that
they live by your bare words.
SYLVIA
No more, gentlemen, no more. Here comes my
father.

Enter Duke.

DUKE
Now, daughter Sylvia, you are hard beset.—
Sir Valentine, your father is in good health.
What say you to a letter from your friends
Of much good news?
VALENTINE My lord, I will be thankful
To any happy messenger from thence.
DUKE
Know you Don Antonio, your countryman?
VALENTINE
Ay, my good lord, I know the gentleman
To be of worth and worthy estimation,
And not without desert so well reputed.

---

DUKE Hath he not a son?
VALENTINE
Ay, my good lord, a son that well deserves
The honor and regard of such a father.
DUKE You know him well?
VALENTINE
I knew him as myself, for from our infancy
We have conversed and spent our hours together,
And though myself have been an idle truant,
Omitting the sweet benefit of time
To clothe mine age with angel-like perfection,
Yet hath Sir Proteus—for that’s his name—
Made use and fair advantage of his days:
His years but young, but his experience old;
His head unmellowed, but his judgment ripe;
And in a word—for far behind his worth
Comes all the praises that I now bestow—
He is complete in feature and in mind,
With all good grace to grace a gentleman.
DUKE
Beshrew me, sir, but if he make this good,
He is as worthy for an empress’ love,
As meet to be an emperor’s counselor.
Well, sir, this gentleman is come to me
With commendation from great potentates,
And here he means to spend his time awhile.
I think ’tis no unwelcome news to you.
VALENTINE
Should I have wished a thing, it had been he.
DUKE
Welcome him then according to his worth.
Sylvia, I speak to you—and you, Sir Thurio.
For Valentine, I need not cite him to it.
I will send him hither to you presently. Duke exits.
VALENTINE
This is the gentleman I told your Ladyship

---

Had come along with me but that his mistress
Did hold his eyes locked in her crystal looks.
SYLVIA
Belike that now she hath enfranchised them
Upon some other pawn for fealty.
VALENTINE
Nay, sure, I think she holds them prisoners still.
SYLVIA
Nay, then, he should be blind, and being blind
How could he see his way to seek out you?
VALENTINE
Why, lady, love hath twenty pair of eyes.
THURIO
They say that Love hath not an eye at all.
VALENTINE
To see such lovers, Thurio, as yourself.
Upon a homely object, Love can wink.
SYLVIA
Have done, have done. Here comes the gentleman.

Enter Proteus.

VALENTINE
Welcome, dear Proteus.—Mistress, I beseech you
Confirm his welcome with some special favor.
SYLVIA
His worth is warrant for his welcome hither,
If this be he you oft have wished to hear from.
VALENTINE
Mistress, it is. Sweet lady, entertain him
To be my fellow-servant to your Ladyship.
SYLVIA
Too low a mistress for so high a servant.
PROTEUS
Not so, sweet lady, but too mean a servant
To have a look of such a worthy mistress.

---

VALENTINE
Leave off discourse of disability.
Sweet lady, entertain him for your servant.
PROTEUS
My duty will I boast of, nothing else.
SYLVIA
And duty never yet did want his meed.
Servant, you are welcome to a worthless mistress.
PROTEUS
I’ll die on him that says so but yourself.
SYLVIA That you are welcome?
PROTEUS That you are worthless.

Enter Servant.

SERVANT
Madam, my lord your father would speak with you.
SYLVIA
I wait upon his pleasure. Servant exits. Come, Sir
Thurio,
Go with me.—Once more, new servant, welcome.
I’ll leave you to confer of home affairs.
When you have done, we look to hear from you.
PROTEUS
We’ll both attend upon your Ladyship.
Sylvia and Thurio exit.
VALENTINE
Now tell me, how do all from whence you came?
PROTEUS
Your friends are well and have them much
commended.
VALENTINE
And how do yours?
PROTEUS I left them all in health.
VALENTINE
How does your lady? And how thrives your love?

---

PROTEUS
My tales of love were wont to weary you.
I know you joy not in a love discourse.
VALENTINE
Ay, Proteus, but that life is altered now.
I have done penance for contemning Love,
Whose high imperious thoughts have punished me
With bitter fasts, with penitential groans,
With nightly tears, and daily heartsore sighs,
For in revenge of my contempt of love,
Love hath chased sleep from my enthrallèd eyes
And made them watchers of mine own heart’s
sorrow.
O gentle Proteus, Love’s a mighty lord
And hath so humbled me as I confess
There is no woe to his correction,
Nor, to his service, no such joy on Earth.
Now, no discourse except it be of love.
Now can I break my fast, dine, sup, and sleep
Upon the very naked name of Love.
PROTEUS
Enough; I read your fortune in your eye.
Was this the idol that you worship so?
VALENTINE
Even she. And is she not a heavenly saint?
PROTEUS
No, but she is an earthly paragon.
VALENTINE
Call her divine.
PROTEUS I will not flatter her.
VALENTINE
O, flatter me, for love delights in praises.
PROTEUS
When I was sick, you gave me bitter pills,
And I must minister the like to you.

---

VALENTINE
Then speak the truth by her; if not divine,
Yet let her be a principality,
Sovereign to all the creatures on the Earth.
PROTEUS
Except my mistress.
VALENTINE Sweet, except not any,
Except thou wilt except against my love.
PROTEUS
Have I not reason to prefer mine own?
VALENTINE
And I will help thee to prefer her too:
She shall be dignified with this high honor—
To bear my lady’s train, lest the base earth
Should from her vesture chance to steal a kiss
And, of so great a favor growing proud,
Disdain to root the summer-swelling flower
And make rough winter everlastingly.
PROTEUS
Why, Valentine, what braggartism is this?
VALENTINE
Pardon me, Proteus, all I can is nothing
To her whose worth makes other worthies
nothing.
She is alone—
PROTEUS Then let her alone.
VALENTINE
Not for the world! Why, man, she is mine own,
And I as rich in having such a jewel
As twenty seas if all their sand were pearl,
The water nectar, and the rocks pure gold.
Forgive me that I do not dream on thee,
Because thou seest me dote upon my love.
My foolish rival, that her father likes
Only for his possessions are so huge,

---

Is gone with her along, and I must after,
For love, thou know’st, is full of jealousy.
PROTEUS But she loves you?
VALENTINE
Ay, and we are betrothed; nay more, our marriage
hour,
With all the cunning manner of our flight
Determined of: how I must climb her window,
The ladder made of cords, and all the means
Plotted and ’greed on for my happiness.
Good Proteus, go with me to my chamber,
In these affairs to aid me with thy counsel.
PROTEUS
Go on before. I shall inquire you forth.
I must unto the road to disembark
Some necessaries that I needs must use,
And then I’ll presently attend you.
VALENTINE Will you make haste?
PROTEUS I will. Valentine and Speed exit.
Even as one heat another heat expels,
Or as one nail by strength drives out another,
So the remembrance of my former love
Is by a newer object quite forgotten.
Is it mine eye , or Valentine’s praise,
Her true perfection, or my false transgression,
That makes me reasonless to reason thus?
She is fair, and so is Julia that I love—
That I did love, for now my love is thawed,
Which like a waxen image ’gainst a fire
Bears no impression of the thing it was.
Methinks my zeal to Valentine is cold,
And that I love him not as I was wont.
O, but I love his lady too too much,
And that’s the reason I love him so little.
How shall I dote on her with more advice
That thus without advice begin to love her?

---

’Tis but her picture I have yet beheld,
And that hath dazzled my reason’s light;
But when I look on her perfections,
There is no reason but I shall be blind.
If I can check my erring love, I will;
If not, to compass her I’ll use my skill.
He exits.

Enter Speed and Lance, with his dog, Crab.

SPEED Lance, by mine honesty, welcome to Padua.
LANCE Forswear not thyself, sweet youth, for I am not
welcome. I reckon this always: that a man is never
undone till he be hanged, nor never welcome to a
place till some certain shot be paid and the Hostess
say welcome.
SPEED Come on, you madcap. I’ll to the alehouse with
you presently, where, for one shot of five pence,
thou shalt have five thousand welcomes. But, sirrah,
how did thy master part with Madam Julia?
LANCE Marry, after they closed in earnest, they parted
very fairly in jest.
SPEED But shall she marry him?
LANCE No.
SPEED How then? Shall he marry her?
LANCE No, neither.
SPEED What, are they broken?
LANCE No, they are both as whole as a fish.
SPEED Why then, how stands the matter with them?
LANCE Marry, thus: when it stands well with him, it
stands well with her.
SPEED What an ass art thou! I understand thee not.
LANCE What a block art thou that thou canst not! My
staff understands me.

---

SPEED What thou sayst?
LANCE Ay, and what I do too. Look thee, I’ll but lean,
and my staff understands me.
SPEED It stands under thee indeed.
LANCE Why, “stand under” and “understand” is all
one.
SPEED But tell me true, will ’t be a match?
LANCE Ask my dog. If he say “Ay,” it will; if he say
“No,” it will; if he shake his tail and say nothing, it
will.
SPEED The conclusion is, then, that it will.
LANCE Thou shalt never get such a secret from me but
by a parable.
SPEED ’Tis well that I get it so. But, Lance, how sayst
thou that my master is become a notable lover?
LANCE I never knew him otherwise.
SPEED Than how?
LANCE A notable lubber, as thou reportest him to be.
SPEED Why, thou whoreson ass, thou mistak’st me.
LANCE Why, fool, I meant not thee; I meant thy master.
SPEED I tell thee, my master is become a hot lover.
LANCE Why, I tell thee, I care not though he burn
himself in love. If thou wilt, go with me to the
alehouse; if not, thou art an Hebrew, a Jew, and not
worth the name of a Christian.
SPEED Why?
LANCE Because thou hast not so much charity in thee
as to go to the ale with a Christian. Wilt thou go?
SPEED At thy service.
They exit.

Enter Proteus alone.

PROTEUS
To leave my Julia, shall I be forsworn.
To love fair Sylvia, shall I be forsworn.

---

To wrong my friend, I shall be much forsworn.
And ev’n that power which gave me first my oath
Provokes me to this threefold perjury.
Love bade me swear, and love bids me forswear.
O sweet-suggesting Love, if thou hast sinned,
Teach me, thy tempted subject, to excuse it.
At first I did adore a twinkling star,
But now I worship a celestial sun;
Unheedful vows may heedfully be broken,
And he wants wit that wants resolvèd will
To learn his wit t’ exchange the bad for better.
Fie, fie, unreverend tongue, to call her bad
Whose sovereignty so oft thou hast preferred
With twenty thousand soul-confirming oaths.
I cannot leave to love, and yet I do.
But there I leave to love where I should love.
Julia I lose, and Valentine I lose;
If I keep them, I needs must lose myself;
If I lose them, thus find I by their loss:
For Valentine, myself; for Julia, Sylvia.
I to myself am dearer than a friend,
For love is still most precious in itself,
And Sylvia—witness heaven that made her fair—
Shows Julia but a swarthy Ethiope.
I will forget that Julia is alive,
Rememb’ring that my love to her is dead;
And Valentine I’ll hold an enemy,
Aiming at Sylvia as a sweeter friend.
I cannot now prove constant to myself
Without some treachery used to Valentine.
This night he meaneth with a corded ladder
To climb celestial Sylvia’s chamber window,
Myself in counsel his competitor.
Now presently I’ll give her father notice

---

Of their disguising and pretended flight,
Who, all enraged, will banish Valentine,
For Thurio he intends shall wed his daughter.
But Valentine being gone, I’ll quickly cross
By some sly trick blunt Thurio’s dull proceeding.
Love, lend me wings to make my purpose swift,
As thou hast lent me wit to plot this drift.
He exits.

Enter Julia and Lucetta.

JULIA
Counsel, Lucetta. Gentle girl, assist me;
And ev’n in kind love I do conjure thee—
Who art the table wherein all my thoughts
Are visibly charactered and engraved—
To lesson me and tell me some good mean
How with my honor I may undertake
A journey to my loving Proteus.
LUCETTA
Alas, the way is wearisome and long.
JULIA
A true-devoted pilgrim is not weary
To measure kingdoms with his feeble steps;
Much less shall she that hath Love’s wings to fly,
And when the flight is made to one so dear,
Of such divine perfection, as Sir Proteus.
LUCETTA
Better forbear till Proteus make return.
JULIA
O, know’st thou not his looks are my soul’s food?
Pity the dearth that I have pinèd in
By longing for that food so long a time.

---

Didst thou but know the inly touch of love,
Thou wouldst as soon go kindle fire with snow
As seek to quench the fire of love with words.
LUCETTA
I do not seek to quench your love’s hot fire,
But qualify the fire’s extreme rage,
Lest it should burn above the bounds of reason.
JULIA
The more thou damm’st it up, the more it burns.
The current that with gentle murmur glides,
Thou know’st, being stopped, impatiently doth rage,
But when his fair course is not hinderèd,
He makes sweet music with th’ enameled stones,
Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge
He overtaketh in his pilgrimage;
And so by many winding nooks he strays
With willing sport to the wild ocean.
Then let me go and hinder not my course.
I’ll be as patient as a gentle stream
And make a pastime of each weary step
Till the last step have brought me to my love,
And there I’ll rest as after much turmoil
A blessèd soul doth in Elysium.
LUCETTA
But in what habit will you go along?
JULIA
Not like a woman, for I would prevent
The loose encounters of lascivious men.
Gentle Lucetta, fit me with such weeds
As may beseem some well-reputed page.
LUCETTA
Why, then, your Ladyship must cut your hair.
JULIA
No, girl, I’ll knit it up in silken strings
With twenty odd-conceited true-love knots.

---

To be fantastic may become a youth
Of greater time than I shall show to be.
LUCETTA
What fashion, madam, shall I make your breeches?
JULIA
That fits as well as “Tell me, good my lord,
What compass will you wear your farthingale?”
Why, ev’n what fashion thou best likes, Lucetta.
LUCETTA
You must needs have them with a codpiece, madam.
JULIA
Out, out, Lucetta. That will be ill-favored.
LUCETTA
A round hose, madam, now’s not worth a pin
Unless you have a codpiece to stick pins on.
JULIA
Lucetta, as thou lov’st me, let me have
What thou think’st meet and is most mannerly.
But tell me, wench, how will the world repute me
For undertaking so unstaid a journey?
I fear me it will make me scandalized.
LUCETTA
If you think so, then stay at home and go not.
JULIA Nay, that I will not.
LUCETTA
Then never dream on infamy, but go.
If Proteus like your journey when you come,
No matter who’s displeased when you are gone.
I fear me he will scarce be pleased withal.
JULIA
That is the least, Lucetta, of my fear.
A thousand oaths, an ocean of his tears,
And instances of infinite of love
Warrant me welcome to my Proteus.
LUCETTA
All these are servants to deceitful men.

---

JULIA
Base men that use them to so base effect!
But truer stars did govern Proteus’ birth.
His words are bonds, his oaths are oracles,
His love sincere, his thoughts immaculate,
His tears pure messengers sent from his heart,
His heart as far from fraud as heaven from Earth.
LUCETTA
Pray heav’n he prove so when you come to him.
JULIA
Now, as thou lov’st me, do him not that wrong
To bear a hard opinion of his truth.
Only deserve my love by loving him.
And presently go with me to my chamber
To take a note of what I stand in need of
To furnish me upon my longing journey.
All that is mine I leave at thy dispose,
My goods, my lands, my reputation.
Only, in lieu thereof, dispatch me hence.
Come, answer not, but to it presently.
I am impatient of my tarriance.
They exit.

Enter Duke, Thurio, and Proteus.

DUKE
Sir Thurio, give us leave, I pray, awhile;
We have some secrets to confer about. Thurio exits.
Now tell me, Proteus, what’s your will with me?
PROTEUS
My gracious lord, that which I would discover
The law of friendship bids me to conceal,
But when I call to mind your gracious favors
Done to me, undeserving as I am,
My duty pricks me on to utter that
Which else no worldly good should draw from me.
Know, worthy prince, Sir Valentine my friend
This night intends to steal away your daughter;
Myself am one made privy to the plot.
I know you have determined to bestow her
On Thurio, whom your gentle daughter hates,
And should she thus be stol’n away from you,
It would be much vexation to your age.
Thus, for my duty’s sake, I rather chose
To cross my friend in his intended drift
Than, by concealing it, heap on your head
A pack of sorrows which would press you down,
Being unprevented, to your timeless grave.

---

DUKE
Proteus, I thank thee for thine honest care,
Which to requite command me while I live.
This love of theirs myself have often seen,
Haply when they have judged me fast asleep,
And oftentimes have purposed to forbid
Sir Valentine her company and my court.
But fearing lest my jealous aim might err
And so, unworthily, disgrace the man—
A rashness that I ever yet have shunned—
I gave him gentle looks, thereby to find
That which thyself hast now disclosed to me.
And that thou mayst perceive my fear of this,
Knowing that tender youth is soon suggested,
I nightly lodge her in an upper tower,
The key whereof myself have ever kept,
And thence she cannot be conveyed away.
PROTEUS
Know, noble lord, they have devised a mean
How he her chamber-window will ascend
And with a corded ladder fetch her down;
For which the youthful lover now is gone,
And this way comes he with it presently,
Where, if it please you, you may intercept him.
But, good my lord, do it so cunningly
That my discovery be not aimèd at;
For love of you, not hate unto my friend,
Hath made me publisher of this pretense.
DUKE
Upon mine honor, he shall never know
That I had any light from thee of this.
PROTEUS
Adieu, my lord. Sir Valentine is coming.
Proteus exits.

---

Enter Valentine.

DUKE
Sir Valentine, whither away so fast?
VALENTINE
Please it your Grace, there is a messenger
That stays to bear my letters to my friends,
And I am going to deliver them.
DUKE Be they of much import?
VALENTINE
The tenor of them doth but signify
My health and happy being at your court.
DUKE
Nay then, no matter. Stay with me awhile;
I am to break with thee of some affairs
That touch me near, wherein thou must be secret.
’Tis not unknown to thee that I have sought
To match my friend Sir Thurio to my daughter.
VALENTINE
I know it well, my lord, and sure the match
Were rich and honorable. Besides, the gentleman
Is full of virtue, bounty, worth, and qualities
Beseeming such a wife as your fair daughter.
Cannot your Grace win her to fancy him?
DUKE
No. Trust me, she is peevish, sullen, froward,
Proud, disobedient, stubborn, lacking duty,
Neither regarding that she is my child
Nor fearing me as if I were her father;
And may I say to thee, this pride of hers,
Upon advice, hath drawn my love from her,
And where I thought the remnant of mine age
Should have been cherished by her childlike duty,
I now am full resolved to take a wife
And turn her out to who will take her in.
Then let her beauty be her wedding dower,
For me and my possessions she esteems not.

---

VALENTINE
What would your Grace have me to do in this?
DUKE
There is a lady in Verona here
Whom I affect; but she is nice, and coy,
And nought esteems my agèd eloquence.
Now therefore would I have thee to my tutor—
For long agone I have forgot to court;
Besides, the fashion of the time is changed—
How and which way I may bestow myself
To be regarded in her sun-bright eye.
VALENTINE
Win her with gifts if she respect not words;
Dumb jewels often in their silent kind
More than quick words do move a woman’s mind.
DUKE
But she did scorn a present that I sent her.
VALENTINE
A woman sometime scorns what best contents her.
Send her another; never give her o’er,
For scorn at first makes after-love the more.
If she do frown, ’tis not in hate of you,
But rather to beget more love in you.
If she do chide, ’tis not to have you gone,
Forwhy the fools are mad if left alone.
Take no repulse, whatever she doth say;
For “get you gone” she doth not mean “away.”
Flatter and praise, commend, extol their graces;
Though ne’er so black, say they have angels’ faces.
That man that hath a tongue, I say, is no man
If with his tongue he cannot win a woman.
DUKE
But she I mean is promised by her friends
Unto a youthful gentleman of worth
And kept severely from resort of men,
That no man hath access by day to her.

---

VALENTINE
Why, then, I would resort to her by night.
DUKE
Ay, but the doors be locked and keys kept safe,
That no man hath recourse to her by night.
VALENTINE
What lets but one may enter at her window?
DUKE
Her chamber is aloft, far from the ground,
And built so shelving that one cannot climb it
Without apparent hazard of his life.
VALENTINE
Why, then a ladder quaintly made of cords
To cast up, with a pair of anchoring hooks,
Would serve to scale another Hero’s tower,
So bold Leander would adventure it.
DUKE
Now, as thou art a gentleman of blood,
Advise me where I may have such a ladder.
VALENTINE
When would you use it? Pray sir, tell me that.
DUKE
This very night; for love is like a child
That longs for everything that he can come by.
VALENTINE
By seven o’clock I’ll get you such a ladder.
DUKE
But hark thee: I will go to her alone;
How shall I best convey the ladder thither?
VALENTINE
It will be light, my lord, that you may bear it
Under a cloak that is of any length.
DUKE
A cloak as long as thine will serve the turn?
VALENTINE
Ay, my good lord.

---

DUKE Then let me see thy cloak;
I’ll get me one of such another length.
VALENTINE
Why, any cloak will serve the turn, my lord.
DUKE
How shall I fashion me to wear a cloak?
I pray thee, let me feel thy cloak upon me.
Pulling off the cloak, he reveals
a rope ladder and a paper.
What letter is this same? What’s here? ( Reads . ) To
Sylvia.
And here an engine fit for my proceeding.
I’ll be so bold to break the seal for once.
( Reads . )
My thoughts do harbor with my Sylvia nightly,
And slaves they are to me that send them flying.
O, could their master come and go as lightly,
Himself would lodge where, senseless, they are
lying.
My herald thoughts in thy pure bosom rest them,
While I, their king, that thither them importune,
Do curse the grace that with such grace hath blest
them,
Because myself do want my servants’ fortune.
I curse myself, for they are sent by me,
That they should harbor where their lord should be.
What’s here?
( Reads . ) Sylvia, this night I will enfranchise thee.
’Tis so. And here’s the ladder for the purpose.
Why, Phaëton—for thou art Merops’ son—
Wilt thou aspire to guide the heavenly car
And with thy daring folly burn the world?
Wilt thou reach stars because they shine on thee?
Go, base intruder, overweening slave,
Bestow thy fawning smiles on equal mates
And think my patience, more than thy desert,

---

Is privilege for thy departure hence.
Thank me for this more than for all the favors
Which all too much I have bestowed on thee.
But if thou linger in my territories
Longer than swiftest expedition
Will give thee time to leave our royal court,
By heaven, my wrath shall far exceed the love
I ever bore my daughter or thyself.
Begone. I will not hear thy vain excuse,
But, as thou lov’st thy life, make speed from hence.
He exits.
VALENTINE
And why not death, rather than living torment?
To die is to be banished from myself,
And Sylvia is myself; banished from her
Is self from self—a deadly banishment.
What light is light if Sylvia be not seen?
What joy is joy if Sylvia be not by—
Unless it be to think that she is by
And feed upon the shadow of perfection?
Except I be by Sylvia in the night,
There is no music in the nightingale.
Unless I look on Sylvia 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
Fostered, illumined, cherished, 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 Proteus and Lance.

PROTEUS Run, boy, run, run, and seek him out.
LANCE So-ho, so-ho!
PROTEUS What seest thou?

---

LANCE Him we go to find. There’s not a hair on ’s head
but ’tis a Valentine.
PROTEUS Valentine?
VALENTINE No.
PROTEUS Who then? His spirit?
VALENTINE Neither.
PROTEUS What then?
VALENTINE Nothing.
LANCE Can nothing speak? Master, shall I strike?
PROTEUS Who wouldst thou strike?
LANCE Nothing.
PROTEUS Villain, forbear.
LANCE Why, sir, I’ll strike nothing. I pray you—
PROTEUS
Sirrah, I say forbear.—Friend Valentine, a word.
VALENTINE
My ears are stopped and cannot hear good news,
So much of bad already hath possessed them.
PROTEUS
Then in dumb silence will I bury mine,
For they are harsh, untunable, and bad.
VALENTINE Is Sylvia dead?
PROTEUS No, Valentine.
VALENTINE
No Valentine indeed for sacred Sylvia.
Hath she forsworn me?
PROTEUS No, Valentine.
VALENTINE
No Valentine if Sylvia have forsworn me.
What is your news?
LANCE Sir, there is a proclamation that you are
vanished.
PROTEUS
That thou art banishèd—O, that’s the news—
From hence, from Sylvia, and from me thy friend.

---

VALENTINE
O, I have fed upon this woe already,
And now excess of it will make me surfeit.
Doth Sylvia know that I am banishèd?
PROTEUS
Ay, ay, and she hath offered to the doom—
Which unreversed stands in effectual force—
A sea of melting pearl, which some call tears;
Those at her father’s churlish feet she tendered,
With them, upon her knees, her humble self,
Wringing her hands, whose whiteness so became
them
As if but now they waxèd pale for woe.
But neither bended knees, pure hands held up,
Sad sighs, deep groans, nor silver-shedding tears
Could penetrate her uncompassionate sire;
But Valentine, if he be ta’en, must die.
Besides, her intercession chafed him so,
When she for thy repeal was suppliant,
That to close prison he commanded her
With many bitter threats of biding there.
VALENTINE
No more, unless the next word that thou speak’st
Have some malignant power upon my life.
If so, I pray thee breathe it in mine ear
As ending anthem of my endless dolor.
PROTEUS
Cease to lament for that thou canst 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 canst not see thy love;
Besides, thy staying will abridge thy life.
Hope is a lover’s staff; walk hence with that
And manage it against despairing thoughts.
Thy letters may be here, though thou art hence,
Which, being writ to me, shall be delivered

---

Even in the milk-white bosom of thy love.
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
Of all that may concern thy love affairs.
As thou lov’st Sylvia, though not for thyself,
Regard thy danger, and along with me.
VALENTINE
I pray thee, Lance, an if thou seest my boy,
Bid him make haste and meet me at the North
Gate.
PROTEUS
Go, sirrah, find him out.—Come, Valentine.
VALENTINE
O, my dear Sylvia! Hapless Valentine!
Valentine and Proteus exit.
LANCE 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 knave. He lives not now that
knows me to be in love, yet I am in love, but a team
of horse shall not pluck 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 her master’s maid and serves for wages. She
hath more qualities than a water spaniel, which is
much in a bare Christian. He takes out a piece of
paper. Here is the catalog of her condition.
( Reads . ) Imprimis, She can fetch and carry. Why, a
horse can do no more; nay, a horse cannot fetch but
only carry; therefore is she better than a jade.
( Reads . ) Item, She can milk. Look you, a sweet
virtue in a maid with clean hands.

Enter Speed.

SPEED How now, Signior Lance? What news with your
Mastership?

---

LANCE With my master’s ship? Why, it is at sea.
SPEED Well, your old vice still: mistake the word. What
news, then, in your paper?
LANCE The black’st news that ever thou heard’st.
SPEED Why, man? How black?
LANCE Why, as black as ink.
SPEED Let me read them.
LANCE Fie on thee, jolt-head, thou canst not read.
SPEED Thou liest. I can.
LANCE I will try thee. Tell me this, who begot thee?
SPEED Marry, the son of my grandfather.
LANCE O, illiterate loiterer, it was the son of thy grandmother.
This proves that thou canst not read.
SPEED Come, fool, come. Try me in thy paper.
LANCE , giving him the paper There, and Saint Nicholas
be thy speed.
SPEED reads Imprimis, She can milk.
LANCE Ay, that she can.
SPEED Item, She brews good ale.
LANCE And thereof comes the proverb: “Blessing of
your heart, you brew good ale.”
SPEED Item, She can sew.
LANCE That’s as much as to say “Can she so?”
SPEED Item, She can knit.
LANCE What need a man care for a stock with a wench,
when she can knit him a stock?
SPEED Item, She can wash and scour.
LANCE A special virtue, for then she need not be
washed and scoured.
SPEED Item, She can spin.
LANCE Then may I set the world on wheels, when she
can spin for her living.
SPEED Item, She hath many nameless virtues.
LANCE That’s as much as to say “bastard virtues,” that
indeed know not their fathers and therefore have no
names.

---

SPEED Here follow her vices.
LANCE Close at the heels of her virtues.
SPEED Item, She is not to be kissed fasting in respect of
her breath.
LANCE Well, that fault may be mended with a breakfast.
Read on.
SPEED Item, She hath a sweet mouth.
LANCE That makes amends for her sour breath.
SPEED Item, She doth talk in her sleep.
LANCE It’s no matter for that, so she sleep not in her
talk.
SPEED Item, She is slow in words.
LANCE O villain, that set this down among her 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.
SPEED Item, She is proud.
LANCE Out with that too; it was Eve’s legacy and
cannot be ta’en from her.
SPEED Item, She hath no teeth.
LANCE I care not for that neither, because I love crusts.
SPEED Item, She is curst.
LANCE Well, the best is, she hath no teeth to bite.
SPEED Item, She will often praise her liquor.
LANCE 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.
LANCE 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
cannot I help. Well, proceed.
SPEED Item, She hath more hair than wit, and more
faults than hairs, and more wealth than faults.
LANCE Stop there. I’ll have her. She was mine and not
mine twice or thrice in that last article. Rehearse
that once more.
SPEED Item, She hath more hair than wit.

---

LANCE “More hair than wit”? It may be; I’ll prove it:
the cover of the salt hides the salt, and 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?
SPEED And more faults than hairs.
LANCE That’s monstrous! O, that that were out!
SPEED And more wealth than faults.
LANCE Why, that word makes the faults gracious. Well,
I’ll have her, and if it be a match, as nothing is
impossible—
SPEED What then?
LANCE Why, then will I tell thee that thy master stays
for thee at the North Gate.
SPEED For me?
LANCE For thee? Ay, who art thou? He hath stayed for a
better man than thee.
SPEED And must I go to him?
LANCE Thou must run to him, for thou hast stayed so
long that going will scarce serve the turn.
SPEED , handing him the paper Why didst not tell me
sooner? Pox of your love letters! He exits.
LANCE Now will he be swinged for reading my letter;
an unmannerly slave, that will thrust himself into
secrets. I’ll after, to rejoice in the boy’s correction.
He exits.

Enter Duke and Thurio.

DUKE
Sir Thurio, fear not but that she will love you
Now Valentine is banished from her sight.
THURIO
Since his exile she hath despised me most,

---

Forsworn my company and railed at me,
That I am desperate of obtaining her.
DUKE
This weak impress of love is as a figure
Trenchèd in ice, which with an hour’s heat
Dissolves to water and doth lose his form.
A little time will melt her frozen thoughts,
And worthless Valentine shall be forgot.

Enter Proteus.

How now, Sir Proteus? Is your countryman,
According to our proclamation, gone?
PROTEUS Gone, my good lord.
DUKE
My daughter takes his going grievously.
PROTEUS
A little time, my lord, will kill that grief.
DUKE
So I believe, but Thurio thinks not so.
Proteus, the good conceit I hold of thee,
For thou hast shown some sign of good desert,
Makes me the better to confer with thee.
PROTEUS
Longer than I prove loyal to your Grace
Let me not live to look upon your Grace.
DUKE
Thou know’st how willingly I would effect
The match between Sir Thurio and my daughter?
PROTEUS I do, my lord.
DUKE
And also, I think, thou art not ignorant
How she opposes her against my will?
PROTEUS
She did, my lord, when Valentine was here.
DUKE
Ay, and perversely she persevers so.

---

What might we do to make the girl forget
The love of Valentine, and love Sir Thurio?
PROTEUS
The best way is to slander Valentine
With falsehood, cowardice, and poor descent,
Three things that women highly hold in hate.
DUKE
Ay, but she’ll think that it is spoke in hate.
PROTEUS
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.
PROTEUS
And that, my lord, I shall be loath to do.
’Tis an ill office for a gentleman,
Especially against his very friend.
DUKE
Where your good word cannot advantage him,
Your slander never can endamage him;
Therefore the office is indifferent,
Being entreated to it by your friend.
PROTEUS
You have prevailed, my lord. If I can do it
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.
THURIO
Therefore, as you unwind her love from him,
Lest it should ravel and be good to none,
You must provide to bottom it on me,
Which must be done by praising me as much
As you in worth dispraise Sir Valentine.

---

DUKE
And, Proteus, we dare trust you in this kind
Because we know, on Valentine’s report,
You are already Love’s firm votary
And cannot soon revolt and change your mind.
Upon this warrant shall you have access
Where you with Sylvia 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
To hate young Valentine and love my friend.
PROTEUS
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 composèd rhymes
Should be full-fraught with serviceable vows.
DUKE
Ay, much is the force of heaven-bred poesy.
PROTEUS
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
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 soften steel and stones,
Make tigers tame, and huge leviathans
Forsake unsounded deeps to dance on sands.
After your dire-lamenting elegies,
Visit by night your lady’s chamber window
With some sweet consort; to their instruments
Tune a deploring dump; the night’s dead silence
Will well become such sweet complaining
grievance.
This, or else nothing, will inherit her.

---

DUKE
This discipline shows thou hast been in love.
THURIO , to Proteus
And thy advice this night I’ll put in practice.
Therefore, sweet Proteus, my direction-giver,
Let us into the city presently
To sort some gentlemen well-skilled in music.
I have a sonnet that will serve the turn
To give the onset to thy good advice.
DUKE About it, gentlemen.
PROTEUS
We’ll wait upon your Grace till after supper
And afterward determine our proceedings.
DUKE
Even now about it! I will pardon you.
They exit.

Enter certain Outlaws.

FIRST OUTLAW
Fellows, stand fast. I see a passenger.
SECOND OUTLAW
If there be ten, shrink not, but down with ’em.

Enter Valentine and Speed.

THIRD OUTLAW
Stand, sir, and throw us that you have about you.
If not, we’ll make you sit, and rifle you.
SPEED , to Valentine
Sir, we are undone; these are the villains
That all the travelers do fear so much.
VALENTINE My friends—
FIRST OUTLAW
That’s not so, sir. We are your enemies.
SECOND OUTLAW Peace. We’ll hear him.
THIRD OUTLAW
Ay, by my beard, will we, for he is a proper man.
VALENTINE
Then know that I have little wealth to lose.
A man I am crossed with adversity;
My riches are these poor habiliments,
Of which, if you should here disfurnish me,
You take the sum and substance that I have.

---

SECOND OUTLAW Whither travel you?
VALENTINE To Verona.
FIRST OUTLAW Whence came you?
VALENTINE From Milan.
THIRD OUTLAW Have you long sojourned there?
VALENTINE
Some sixteen months, and longer might have stayed
If crooked fortune had not thwarted me.
FIRST OUTLAW What, were you banished thence?
VALENTINE I was.
SECOND OUTLAW For what offense?
VALENTINE
For that which now torments me to rehearse;
I killed a man, whose death I much repent,
But yet I slew him manfully in fight
Without false vantage or base treachery.
FIRST OUTLAW
Why, ne’er repent it if it were done so;
But were you banished for so small a fault?
VALENTINE
I was, and held me glad of such a doom.
SECOND OUTLAW Have you the tongues?
VALENTINE
My youthful travel therein made me happy,
Or else I often had been miserable.
THIRD OUTLAW
By the bare scalp of Robin Hood’s fat friar,
This fellow were a king for our wild faction.
FIRST OUTLAW We’ll have him.—Sirs, a word.
The Outlaws step aside to talk.
SPEED Master, be one of them. It’s an honorable kind
of thievery.
VALENTINE Peace, villain.
SECOND OUTLAW , advancing
Tell us this: have you anything to take to?

---

VALENTINE Nothing but my fortune.
THIRD OUTLAW
Know then that some of us are gentlemen,
Such as the fury of ungoverned youth
Thrust from the company of awful men.
Myself was from Verona banishèd
For practicing to steal away a lady,
An heir and near allied unto the Duke.
SECOND OUTLAW
And I from Mantua, for a gentleman
Who, in my mood, I stabbed unto the heart.
FIRST OUTLAW
And I for such like petty crimes as these.
But to the purpose: for we cite our faults
That they may hold excused our lawless lives,
And partly seeing you are beautified
With goodly shape, and by your own report
A linguist, and a man of such perfection
As we do in our quality much want—
SECOND OUTLAW
Indeed because you are a banished 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 this wilderness?
THIRD OUTLAW
What sayst thou? Wilt thou be of our consort?
Say ay, and be the captain of us all;
We’ll do thee homage and be ruled by thee,
Love thee as our commander and our king.
FIRST OUTLAW
But if thou scorn our courtesy, thou diest.
SECOND OUTLAW
Thou shalt not live to brag what we have offered.

---

VALENTINE
I take your offer and will live with you,
Provided that you do no outrages
On silly women or poor passengers.
THIRD OUTLAW
No, we detest such vile base practices.
Come, go with us; we’ll bring thee to our crews
And show thee all the treasure we have got,
Which, with ourselves, all rest at thy dispose.
They exit.

Enter Proteus.

PROTEUS
Already have I been false to Valentine,
And now I must be as unjust to Thurio.
Under the color of commending him,
I have access my own love to prefer.
But Sylvia 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 falsehood to my friend;
When to her beauty I commend my vows,
She bids me think how I have been forsworn
In breaking faith with Julia, whom I loved;
And notwithstanding all her sudden quips,
The least whereof would quell a lover’s hope,
Yet, spaniel-like, the more she spurns my love,
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.

THURIO
How now, Sir Proteus, are you crept before us?
PROTEUS
Ay, gentle Thurio, for you know that love
Will creep in service where it cannot go.
THURIO
Ay, but I hope, sir, that you love not here.
PROTEUS
Sir, but I do, or else I would be hence.
THURIO
Who, Sylvia?
PROTEUS Ay, Sylvia, for your sake.
THURIO
I thank you for your own.—Now, gentlemen,
Let’s tune, and to it lustily awhile.

Enter Host of the inn, and Julia, disguised as a
page, Sebastian. They stand at a distance and talk.

HOST Now, my young guest, methinks you’re allycholly.
I pray you, why is it?
JULIA , as Sebastian Marry, mine host, because I
cannot be merry.
HOST Come, we’ll have you merry. I’ll bring you where
you shall hear music and see the gentleman that you
asked for.
JULIA , as Sebastian But shall I hear him speak?
HOST Ay, that you shall.
JULIA , as Sebastian That will be music.
HOST Hark, hark. Music plays.
JULIA , as Sebastian Is he among these?
HOST Ay. But peace; let’s hear ’em.

---

PROTEUS Who is Sylvia? What is she,
That all our swains commend her?
Holy, fair, and wise is she;
The heaven such grace did lend her
That she might admirèd be.

Is she kind as she is fair?
For beauty lives with kindness.
Love doth to her eyes repair
To help him of his blindness;
And, being helped, inhabits there.

Then to Sylvia let us sing,
That Sylvia is excelling;
She excels each mortal thing
Upon the dull earth dwelling.
To her let us garlands bring.

HOST How now? Are you sadder than you were before?
How do you, man? The music likes you not.
JULIA , as Sebastian You mistake. The musician likes me
not.
HOST Why, my pretty youth?
JULIA , as Sebastian He plays false, father.
HOST How, out of tune on the strings?
JULIA , as Sebastian Not so; but yet so false that he
grieves my very heart-strings.
HOST You have a quick ear.
JULIA , as Sebastian Ay, I would I were deaf; it makes
me have a slow heart.
HOST I perceive you delight not in music.
JULIA , as Sebastian Not a whit when it jars so.
HOST Hark, what fine change is in the music!
JULIA , as Sebastian Ay; that change is the spite.
HOST You would have them always play but one
thing?

---

JULIA , as Sebastian
I would always have one play but one thing.
But, host, doth this Sir Proteus, that we talk on,
Often resort unto this gentlewoman?
HOST I tell you what Lance his man told me: he loved
her out of all nick.
JULIA , as Sebastian Where is Lance?
HOST Gone to seek his dog, which tomorrow, by his
master’s command, he must carry for a present to
his lady. Music ends.
JULIA , as Sebastian Peace. Stand aside. The company
parts. Host and Julia move away.
PROTEUS
Sir Thurio, fear not you. I will so plead
That you shall say my cunning drift excels.
THURIO
Where meet we?
PROTEUS At Saint Gregory’s well.
THURIO Farewell.
Thurio and the Musicians exit.

Enter Sylvia, above .

PROTEUS
Madam, good even to your Ladyship.
SYLVIA
I thank you for your music, gentlemen.
Who is that that spake?
PROTEUS
One, lady, if you knew his pure heart’s truth,
You would quickly learn to know him by his voice.
SYLVIA Sir Proteus, as I take it.
PROTEUS
Sir Proteus, gentle lady, and your servant.
SYLVIA
What’s your will?

---

PROTEUS That I may compass yours.
SYLVIA
You have your wish: my will is even this,
That presently you hie you home to bed.
Thou subtle, perjured, false, disloyal man,
Think’st thou I am so shallow, so conceitless,
To be seducèd by thy flattery,
That hast deceived so many with thy vows?
Return, return, and make thy love amends.
For me, by this pale queen of night I swear,
I am so far from granting thy request
That I despise thee for thy wrongful suit
And by and by intend to chide myself
Even for this time I spend in talking to thee.
PROTEUS
I grant, sweet love, that I did love a lady,
But she is dead.
JULIA , aside ’Twere false if I should speak it,
For I am sure she is not burièd.
SYLVIA
Say that she be; yet Valentine thy friend
Survives, to whom, thyself art witness,
I am betrothed. And art thou not ashamed
To wrong him with thy importunacy?
PROTEUS
I likewise hear that Valentine is dead.
SYLVIA
And so suppose am I, for in his grave,
Assure thyself, my love is burièd.
PROTEUS
Sweet lady, let me rake it from the earth.
SYLVIA
Go to thy lady’s grave and call hers thence,
Or, at the least, in hers sepulcher thine.
JULIA , aside He heard not that.

---

PROTEUS
Madam, if your heart be so obdurate,
Vouchsafe me yet your picture for my love,
The picture that is hanging in your chamber;
To that I’ll speak, to that I’ll sigh and weep,
For since the substance of your perfect self
Is else devoted, I am but a shadow;
And to your shadow will I make true love.
JULIA , aside
If ’twere a substance you would sure deceive it
And make it but a shadow, as I am.
SYLVIA
I am very loath to be your idol, sir;
But since your falsehood shall become you well
To worship shadows and adore false shapes,
Send to me in the morning, and I’ll send it.
And so, good rest. Sylvia exits.
PROTEUS As wretches have o’ernight
That wait for execution in the morn. Proteus exits.
JULIA , as Sebastian Host, will you go?
HOST By my halidom, I was fast asleep.
JULIA , as Sebastian Pray you, where lies Sir Proteus?
HOST Marry, at my house. Trust me, I think ’tis almost
day.
JULIA , as Sebastian
Not so; but it hath been the longest night
That e’er I watched, and the most heaviest.
They exit.