If this thou do deny, let our hands part;
Neither intitled in the other's heart.
King. If this, or more than this, I would deny,

To flatter up these powers of mine with reft;
The sudden hand of death close up mine eye!

Hence, ever then, my heart is in thy breast.
Biron. (54) [And what to me, my love ? and what

to me?
Rofa. You must be purged too, your ains are rank,
You are attaint with fault and perjury,
Therefore if you my favour mean to gety
A twelve-month shall you spend, and never reft;
But seek the weary beds of people fick.]

Dum. But what to me, my love? but what to me
Cath. (55) A wife! a beard, fair health and hox

nesty
With three-fold love I wish you all these three.

Dum. O, shall I say, I thank you, gentle wife?

(54) Biron. [And what to me, my Love? and what to me?
Rosa. You muft be purged too : Four Sins are rank :

You are attaint with Fault and Perjury.
Therefore if you my Favour mean to get,
A Twelvemonth Jhall you spend, and never reft;

But seek the weary Beds of People fick.]
These fix Verses both Dr. Thirlby and Mr. Warburton concur to think
hould be expung'd; and therefore I have put them between Crotchets
Not that they were an Interpolation, says the Doktor, but as the Author's
firft Draught, which he afterwards rejected ; and executed the fame
Thought a little lower with much more Spirit and Elegance. Mr. Wars
burton conjectures, that Shakesféare is not to answer for the present ab
fard Repetition, but his Actor-Editors; who, thinking Rosalind's Speech
too long in the second Plan, had abridg’d it to the Lines above quoted:
but, in publishing the Play, ftupidly printed both the Original Speech
of Shakespeare, and their own Abridgment of it.
(55) A wife, a beard, fair health, and honestys

With threefold Love I give you all these three. Thus our fagacious Modern Editors. But if they had but the Reckoning of a Tapter, as our Author fays, they might have been able to distinguis fur from three. I have, by the Direction of the old Impressions, reform'd the Pointing; and made Catharine say what She intended. Seeing Dumaine, so very young, approach her with his Addresles,

“ You " Thall have a Wife, indeed! Says She; No, no, I'll with you three

Things you have more Need of, a Beard, a sound Conftitution, and
Honelty enough to preserve it fuch.

Na

Gath

Cath. Not so, my lord; a twelve-month and a day;
I'll mark no words that smooth-fac'd wooers say.
Come, when the King doth to my lady come;
Then if I have much love, I'll give you fome,

Dum. I'll serve thee true and faithfully till then.
Catb. Yet swear not, left ye be forsworn again,
Long. What says Maria?

Mar. At the twelve-month's end,
I'll change my

black gown for a faithful friend. . Long. I'll stay with patience; but the time is long. Mar. The liker you; few taller are so young.

Biron. Studies my lady? mistress, look on me,
Behold the window of my heart, mine eye,
What humble Suit attends thy answer there ;
Impose some service on me for thy love.

Rosa. Oft have I heard of you, my lord Birona
Before I saw you; and the world's large tongue
Proclaims you for a man replete with mocks;
Full of comparisons and wounding flouts;
Which you on all estates will execute,
That lyé within the mercy of your wit :
To weed this wormwood' from your fruitful brain,
And therewithal to win me,

if

you please,
Without the which I am not to be won ;
You shall this twelve-month-term from day to day
Visit the speechless Sick, and still converse
With groaning wretches ; and your task shall be,
With all the fierce endeavour of your wit,
T'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.

Rosa. Why, that's the way to choak a gibing spirit, Whose influence is begot of that loose grace, Which shallow laughing hearers give to fools: A jest's prosperity lies in the ear Of him that hears it, never in the tongue Of him that makes it : then, if fickly ears, Deaft with the clamours of their own dear groans, Will hear your idle scorns; continue then,

And

And I will have you, and that fault withal :
But if they will not, throw away that spirit;
And I shall find you empty of that fault,
Right joyful of your reformation,
Biron. A twelve-month? well; befall, what will be-

fall, Į'll jest a twelve-month 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 courtefic Might well have made our sport a Comedy,

King. Come, Sir, it wants a twelve-month and a day,
And then 'twill end.
Biron. (56) That's too long for a Play.

Enter Armado..
Arm. Sweet Majesty, vouchsafe me on
Prin. Was not that Hector ?
Dum. That warthy Knight of Troy.

Arm. I will kiss thy royal finger, and take leave. I am a Vocary; I have vow'd to Jaquenetta to hold the plough for her sweet love three years. But, moftesteem's Greatness, will you hear che dialogue thaç the two learned men have compiled, in praise of the owl and the cuckow ? it should have follow'd in the end of our Show.

King. Call them forth quickly, we will do so.
Arm. Holla! approach.

Enter all
This fide is Hiems, winter.
This Ver, the spring : the one maintain'd by the owl,

(56) That's too long for a Play.] Befides the exact Regularity to the Rules of Art, which the Author has happen'd to preserve in some few of his Pieces ; This is Demonstration, I think, that tho' he has more fra quently transgress'd the Unity of Time, by cramming Years into the Conte pass of a Play, yet he knew the Absurdity of so doing, and was not uz acquainted with the Rule to the contrary.

Tho

N 3

The other by the cuckow.
Per, begin.

The SONG,

(97) When daizies pied, and violets blue, And lady

smocks all silver white,
And cuckow-buds of yellow hue,

Do paint the meadows with delight i
The cuckow-then on every tree
Mocks married mer; for thus fings heg
Cuckow !

Cuckow ! cuckow ! 0 word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear!

When shepherds pipe on oaten straws,

And merry larks are ploughmens clocks :
When turtles tread, and rooks and daws ;

And maidens bleach their summer smocks :
The cuckow then on every tree
Mocks married men ; for thus fings hea
Cuckow !.

Cuckow ! cuckow! 0 word of feara,
Unpleasing to a married ear!

057) When Daizies py'd, and Violets blue,

And Cuckow-bud's of yellow Hue
And Lady-smocks all Nver white,

Do paint the Meadows with Delight ;] Tho all the printed Ca pies range these Verses in this Order, I have not scrupled to transpose the second and third Verse, that the Metre may be conformable with That of the three following Stanza's; in all which the Rhymes of the first four Lines are alternate. I have now done with this Play, which in the Main may be call'd a very bad One : and I have found it so very troublesom in the Corruptions, that, I think, I may conclude with the old religious Editors, Deo gratias !

W I N T E R.

When isicles hang by the wall,

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail;
And Tom bears logs into the hall,

And milk comes frozen bome in pail;
When blood is nipt, and ways be foul,
Then nightly fings the staring owl
Tu-whit! to-wbo!

A merry note,
While greafie Jonc doth keel the pot.

When all aloud the wind doth blow,

And coughing drowns the Parson's faw ;
And birds fit brooding in the snow,

And Marian's nose looks red and raw ;
When roasted crabs biss in the bowl,
Then nightly fings the staring owl,
Tu-whit! to-who!

A merry note,
While greafie Jone doth keel the pot.

Arm. The words of Mercury
Are harsh after the Songs of Apollo:
You, that way; we, this way.

[Exeunt omnes.

NA

AS