Dum. Our letters, madam, show'd much more than jest. Lon. So did our looks. Ros. We did not quote them so. King. Now, at the latest minute of the hour, Grant us your loves. Prin. A time, methinks, too short Change not your offer made in heat of blood; Come challenge, challenge me by these deserts; For the remembrance of my father's death. King. If this, or more than this, I would deny, To flatter up these powers of mine with rest, The sudden hand of death close up mine eye ! Hence ever then my heart is in thy breast. Biron. And what to me, my love? and what to me? Vol. 1. Rr Ros. You must be purged too, your sins are rank; You are attaint with faults and perjury; Therefore, if you my favour mean to get, A twelvemonth shall you spend, and never rest, But seek the weary beds of people sick. Dum. But what to me, my love? but what to me? Dum. Fll serve thee true and faithfully till then. Mar. At the twelvemonth's end Ros. Oft have I heard of you, my lord Biron, That lie within the mercy of your wit: To weed this wornwood from your fruitful brain; You shall this twelvemonth term from day to day To enforce the pained impotent to smile. Biron. To move wild laughter in the throat of death? It cannot be; it is impossible : Mirth cannot move a soul in agony. Ros. Why, that's the way to choke a gibing spirit, Of him that hears it, never in the tongue And I will have you, and that fault withal; Biron. A twelvemonth? well, befal what will befal, I'll jest a twelvemonth in an hospital. Prin. Ay, sweet my lord; and so I take my leave. [To the King. King. No, madam: we will bring you on your way. Biron. Our wooing doth not end like an old play ; Jack hath not Jill: these ladies' courtesy Might well have made our sport a comedy. King. Come, sir, it wants a twelvemonth and a day, And then 'twill end. Biron. That's too long for a play. Enter Armado. Arm. Sweet majesty, vouchsafe me,- Dum. The worthy knight of Troy. Arm. I will kiss thy royal finger, and take leave: I am a votary; I have vowed to Jaquenetta to hold the plough for her sweet love three years. But, most esteemed greatness, will you hear the dialogue that the two learned men have compiled, in praise of the owl and the cuckoo? it should have followed in the end of our show. King. Call them forth quickly, we will do so. Arm. Holla! approach. Enter Holofernes, Nathaniel, Moth, Costard, and others. This side is Hiems, winter; this Ver, the spring; the one maintain❜d by the owl, the other by the cuckoo. Ver, begin. SONG. Spring. When daisies pied, and violets blue, And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue, Do paint the meadows with delight, The cuckoo then, on every tree, Mocks married men, for thus sings he, Cuckoo, cuckoo,-O word of fear, When shepherds pipe on oaten straws, And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks, When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws, And maidens bleach their summer smocks, The cuckoo then, on every tree, Mocks married men, for thus sings he, Cuckoo; Cuckoo, cuckoo,-O word of fear, Unpleasing to a married ear! III. Winter. When icicles hang by the wall, And Dick the shepherd blows his nail And milk comes frozen home in pail, Towhe; Tu-whit, to-who, a merry note, When all aloud the wind doth blow, And coughing drowns the parson's saw, And Marian's nose looks red and raw, Tu-whit, to-who, a merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. Arm. The words of Mercury are harsh after the songs of Apollo.-You, that way; we, this way. |