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Ros. Do you not know I am a woman? when I think, I must speak. Sweet, say on.

Enter ORLANDO, and JAQUES.

Cel. You bring me out:-Soft! comes he not here? Ros. 'Tis he; slink by, and note him.

279

[CELIA and ROSALIND retire. Jaq. I thank you for your company; but, good faith, I had as lief have been myself alone.

Orla. And so had I; but yet, for fashion sake, I thank you too for your society.

Jag. God be with you; let's meet as little as we

can.

Orla. I do desire we may be better strangers.

Jaq. I pray you, mar no more trees with writing love-songs in their barks.

Orla. I pray you, mar no more of my verses with reading them ill-favouredly.

Jaq. Rosalind is your love's name?

Orla. Yes, just.

Jaq. I do not like her name.

280

Orla. There was no thought of pleasing you, when she was christen'd.

Jaq. What stature is she of?

Orla. Just as high as my heart.

Jaq. You are full of pretty answers: Have ou not been acquainted with goldsmiths wives, and conn'd them out of rings?

290

Orla. Not so: but I answer you right painted cloth, from whence you have studied your questions.

Jaq. You have a nimble wit; I think it was made! of Atalanta's heels. Will you sit down with me; and we two will rail against our mistress, the world, and all our misery.

Orla. I will chide no breather in the world, but myself, against whom I know most faults.

Jaq. The worst fault you have is, to be in love. Orla. 'Tis a fault I would not change for your best virtue. I am weary of you.

301

Jaq. By my troth, I was seeking for a fool, when

I found you.

Orla. He is drown'd in the brook; look but in, and you shall see him.

Jaq. There I shall see mine own figure.

Orla. Which I take to be either a fool, or a cypher. Jaq. I'll tarry no longer with you: farewel, good signior love. [Exit.

Orla. I am glad of your departure: adieu, good monsieur melancholy. [CEL. and Ros. come forward. Ros. I will speak to him like a saucy lacquey, and under that habit play the knave with him.-Do you hear, forester ?

Orla. Very well; What would you?

Ros. I pray you, what is't a clock?

314

Orla. You should ask me, what time o'day; there's no clock in the forest.

Ros. Then there is no true lover in the forest; else sighing every minute, and groaning every hour, would

detect

!

detect the lazy foot of time, as well as a clock.

321

Orla. And why not the swift foot time? had not that been as proper?

Ros. By no means, sir: Time travels in divers paces with divers persons: I'll tell you who time ambles withal, who time trots withal, who time gallops withal, and who he stands still withal.

Orla. I pr'ythee, whom doth he trot withal.

Ros. Marry, he trots hard with a young maid, between the contract of her marriage and the day it is solemniz'd: if the interim be but a se'nnight, time's pace is so hard that it seems the length of seven years. Orla. Who ambles time withal? 333

Ros. With a priest that lacks Latin, and a rich man that hath not the gout: for the one sleeps easily, because he cannot study; and the other lives merrily, because he feels no pain: the one lacking the burden of lean and wasteful learning; the other knowing no burden of heavy tedious penury: These time ambles withal. 340

Orla. Whom doth he gallop withal

Ros. With a thief to the gallows for though he go as softly as foot can fall, he thinks himself too soon there.

Orla. Who stays it still withal?

Ros. With lawyers in the vacation; for they sleep between term and term, and then they perceive not how time moves.

Orla. Where dwell you, pretty youth?

Ros.

Ros. With this shepherdess, my sister; here in the skirts of the forest, like fringe upon a petticoat. 351 Orla. Are you a native of this place?

Ros. As the coney, that you see dwell where she is kindled.

Orla. Your accent is something finer than you could purchase in so removed a dwelling.

Ros. I have been told so of many: but, indeed, an old religious uncle of mine taught me to speak, who was in his youth an in-land man; one that knew courtship too well, for there he fell in love. I have heard him read many lectures against it; and I thank God, I am not a woman, to be touch'd with so many giddy offences as he hath generally tax'd their whole sex withal.

364 Orla. Can you remember any of the principal evils, that he laid to the charge of women?

Ros. There were none principal; they were all like one another, as half-pence are: every one fault seeming monstrous, 'till his fellow fault came to match it.

Orla. I pr'ythee, recount some of them.

370

Ros. No; I will not cast away my physick, but on those that are sick. There is a man haunts the forest, that abuses our young plants with carving Rosalind on their barks; hangs odes upon hawthorns, and elegies on brambles; all, forsooth, deifying the name of Rosalind if I could meet that fancy-monger, I would give him some good counsel, for he seems to have the quotidian of love upon him.

Orla. I am he that is so love-shak'd; I pray you, tell me your remedy.

380

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Ros. There is none of my uncle's marks upon you : he taught me how to know a man in love; in which cage of rushes, I am sure, you are not prisoner.

Orla. What were his marks?

Ros. A lean cheek; which you have not: a blue eye, and sunken; which you have not: an unquestionable spirit; which you have not: a beard neglected; which you have not :—but I pardon you for that; for, simply, your having in beard is a younger brother's revenue! Then your hose should be ungarter'd, your bonnet unbanded, your sleeve unbuttoned, your shoe untied, and every thing about you demonstrating a careless desolation. But you are no such man; you are rather point-device in your accoutrements; as loving yourself, than seeming the lover of any other. Orla. Fair youth, I would I could make thee believe I love.

Ros. Me believe it! you may as soon make her that you love believe it; which, I warrant, she is apter to do, than to confess she does; that is one of the points in the which women still give the lie to their consciences. But, in good sooth, are you he that hangs the verses on the trees, wherein Rosalind is so admired?

404 Orla. I swear to thee, youth, by the white hand of Rosalind, I am that he, that unfortunate he. Ros. But are you so much in love, as your rhimes speak?

Orla. Neither rhime nor reason can express how much.

410

Ros.

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