I'll go find a shadow,22 and sigh till he come.

Cel. And I'll sleep.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Another Part of the Forest.

Enter JAQUES and Lords in the habit of Foresters, with a dead deer.

Jaq. Which is he that killed the deer?

1 Lord. Sir, it was I.

Jaq. Let's present him to the Duke, like a Roman conqueror; and it would do well to set the deer's horns upon his head, for a branch of victory. Have you no song, forester, for this purpose?

2 Lord. Yes, sir.

:

Jaq. Sing it 'tis no matter how it be in tune, so it make noise enough.

SONG.

2 Lord. What shall he have that kill'd the deer? His leather skin, and horns to wear.

[They sing him home, the rest bearing this burden.]

Take thou no scorn to wear the horn :
It was a crest ere thou wast born;
Thy father's father wore it,

And thy father bore it:

The horn, the horn, the lusty horn,

Is not a thing to laugh to scorn.

[Exeunt.

22 Shadow for shade or shady place. So in The Tempest, iv. 1: "And thy brown groves, whose shadow the dismissed bachelor loves."

SCENE III. - Another Part of the Forest.

Enter ROSALIND and CELIA.

Ros. How say you now? Is it not past two o'clock? and here much 1 Orlando!

Cel. I warrant you, with pure love and troubled brain he hath ta'en his bow and arrows, and is forth gone

Look, who comes here.

Enter SILVIUS.

Sil. My errand is to you, fair youth:
My gentle Phebe bid me give you this:
I know not the contents; but, as I guess
By the stern brow and waspish action
Which she did use as she was writing of it,

It bears an angry tenour: pardon me ;

I am but as a guiltless messenger.

to sleep.

[Giving a letter.

Ros. Patience herself would startle at this letter,

And play the swaggerer; bear this, bear all:

She says

I am not fair; that I lack manners;

She calls me proud; and that she could not love me,
Were man as rare as phoenix. 'Od's my will!

Her love is not the hare that I do hunt:

Why writes she so to me? — Well, shepherd, well,

This is a letter of your own device.

Sil. No, I protest I know not the contents: Phebe did write it.

Ros.

Come, come, you're a fool,

And turn'd into th' extremity of love.

I saw her hand: she has a leathern hand,

A freestone-colour'd hand; I verily did think

1 Much is used ironically here; as we still say, "A good deal you will," meaning "No you won't."

That her old gloves were on, but 'twas her hands:
She has a housewife's hand; but that's no matter.
I say, she never did invent this letter;
This is a man's invention, and his hand.

Sil. Sure, it is hers.

Ros. Why, 'tis a boisterous and a cruel style,
A style for challengers; why, she defies me,
Like Turk to Christian: woman's gentle brain
Could not drop forth such giant-rude invention,
Such Ethiop words, blacker in their effect

Than in their countenance. Will you hear the letter?
Sil. So please you, for I never heard it yet;
Yet heard too much of Phebe's cruelty.

Ros. She Phebes me: mark how the tyrant writes:

[Reads.] Art thou god to shepherd turn'd,

That a maiden's heart hath burn'd? —

Can a woman rail thus?

Sil. Call you this railing?

Ros. [Reads.]

Why, thy godhead laid apart,

Warr'st thou with a woman's heart?

Did you ever hear such railing?

[Reads.] Whiles the eye of man did woo me, That could do no vengeance to me.—

Meaning me a beast.

[Reads.] If the scorn of your bright eyne

Have power to raise such love in mine,
Alack, in me what strange effect
Would they work in mild aspect!

Whiles you chid me, I did love;
How, then, might your prayers move!

He that brings this love to thee
Little knows this love in me:

2

And by him seal up thy mind;
Whether that thy youth and kind3
Will the faithful offer take

Of me, and all that I can make;

Or else by him my love deny,

And then I'll study how to die.

Sil. Call you this chiding?

Cel. Alas, poor shepherd!

Ros. Do you pity him? no, he deserves no pity. — Wilt

thou love such a woman? What, to make thee an instrument, and play false strains upon thee! not to be endured! Well, go your way to her, for I see love hath made thee a tame snake, and say this to her: That, if she love me, I charge her to love thee; if she will not, I will never have her, unless thou entreat for her. If you be a true lover, hence, and not a word; for here comes more company.

Enter OLIVER.

[Exit SILVIUS.

Oli. Good morrow, fair ones: pray you, if you know,

Where in the purlieus of this forest stands

A sheep-cote fenced about with olive-trees?

Cel. West of this place, down in the neighbour bottom:

The rank of osiers, by the murmuring stream,

Left on your right hand, brings you to the place.

But at this hour the house doth keep itself;
There's none within.

Oli. If that an eye may profit by a tongue,
Then should I know you by description;
Such garments and such years: The boy is fair,

2 "Seal up your answer, and send it back by him."

3 Kind, again, in its radical sense of nature. See page 36, note 10.

Of female favour, but bestows himself4
Like a right forester; the woman low,
And browner than her brother.

Are not you
The owners of the house I did inquire for?

Cel. It is no boast, being ask'd, to say we are.
Oli. Orlando doth commend him to you both;
And to that youth he calls his Rosalind
He sends this bloody napkin; 5 - are you he?

Ros. I am what must we understand by this?
Oli. Some of my shame; if you will know of me
What man I am, and how, and why, and where
This handkercher was stain'd.

Cel.

I pray you, tell it.

Oli. When last the young Orlando parted from you,
He left a promise to return again

Within an hour; and, pacing through the forest,
Chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy,6

Lo, what befell! he threw his eye aside,

And, mark, what object did present itself:

Under an oak, whose boughs were moss'd with age,

And high top bald with dry antiquity,

A wretched ragged man, o'ergrown with hair,
Lay sleeping on his back: about his neck

A green and gilded snake had wreath'd itself,

Who with her head, nimble in threats, approach'd

The opening of his mouth; but suddenly,

Seeing Orlando, it unlink'd itself,

And with indented glides did slip away

4 "Bestows himself" is bears himself, behaves, or appears. See vol. i., page 203, note 7.

Napkin and handkerchief were often used interchangeably.

6 To chew the cud was a common phrase, meaning to ruminate, or revolve in the mind. The epithets sweet and bitter are in accordance with the old custom of describing love by contraries; and we have many instances of fancy used for love.