All’s Well That Ends Well

1 Enter Countess and Clown.
2 COUNTESS.
3 It hath happen’d all as I would have had it, save that he comes not
4 along with her.
5 CLOWN.
6 By my troth, I take my young lord to be a very melancholy man.
7 COUNTESS.
8 By what observance, I pray you?
9 CLOWN.
10 Why, he will look upon his boot and sing; mend the ruff and sing; ask
11 questions and sing; pick his teeth and sing. I know a man that had this
12 trick of melancholy sold a goodly manor for a song.
13 COUNTESS.
14 Let me see what he writes, and when he means to come.
15 [_Opening a letter._]
16 CLOWN.
17 I have no mind to Isbel since I was at court. Our old lings and our
18 Isbels o’ th’ country are nothing like your old ling and your Isbels o’
19 th’ court. The brains of my Cupid’s knock’d out, and I begin to love,
20 as an old man loves money, with no stomach.
21 COUNTESS.
22 What have we here?
23 CLOWN.
24 E’en that you have there.
25 [_Exit._]
26 COUNTESS.
27 [_Reads._] _I have sent you a daughter-in-law; she hath recovered the
28 king and undone me. I have wedded her, not bedded her, and sworn to
29 make the “not” eternal. You shall hear I am run away; know it before
30 the report come. If there be breadth enough in the world, I will hold a
31 long distance. My duty to you.
32 Your unfortunate son,_
33 BERTRAM.
34 This is not well, rash and unbridled boy,
35 To fly the favours of so good a king,
36 To pluck his indignation on thy head
37 By the misprizing of a maid too virtuous
38 For the contempt of empire.
39 Enter Clown.
40 CLOWN.
41 O madam, yonder is heavy news within between two soldiers and my young
42 lady.
43 COUNTESS.
44 What is the matter?
45 CLOWN.
46 Nay, there is some comfort in the news, some comfort; your son will not
47 be kill’d so soon as I thought he would.
48 COUNTESS.
49 Why should he be kill’d?
50 CLOWN.
51 So say I, madam, if he run away, as I hear he does; the danger is in
52 standing to’t; that’s the loss of men, though it be the getting of
53 children. Here they come will tell you more. For my part, I only hear
54 your son was run away.
55 [_Exit._]
56 Enter Helena and the two Gentlemen.
57 FIRST GENTLEMAN.
58 Save you, good madam.
59 HELENA.
60 Madam, my lord is gone, for ever gone.
61 SECOND GENTLEMAN.
62 Do not say so.
63 COUNTESS.
64 Think upon patience. Pray you, gentlemen,—
65 I have felt so many quirks of joy and grief
66 That the first face of neither on the start
67 Can woman me unto ’t. Where is my son, I pray you?
68 SECOND GENTLEMAN.
69 Madam, he’s gone to serve the Duke of Florence;
70 We met him thitherward, for thence we came,
71 And, after some despatch in hand at court,
72 Thither we bend again.
73 HELENA.
74 Look on this letter, madam; here’s my passport.
75 [_Reads._] _When thou canst get the ring upon my finger, which never
76 shall come off, and show me a child begotten of thy body that I am
77 father to, then call me husband; but in such a “then” I write a
78 “never”._
79 This is a dreadful sentence.
80 COUNTESS.
81 Brought you this letter, gentlemen?
82 FIRST GENTLEMAN.
83 Ay, madam; And for the contents’ sake, are sorry for our pains.
84 COUNTESS.
85 I pr’ythee, lady, have a better cheer;
86 If thou engrossest all the griefs are thine,
87 Thou robb’st me of a moiety. He was my son,
88 But I do wash his name out of my blood,
89 And thou art all my child. Towards Florence is he?
90 SECOND GENTLEMAN.
91 Ay, madam.
92 COUNTESS.
93 And to be a soldier?
94 SECOND GENTLEMAN.
95 Such is his noble purpose, and, believe’t,
96 The duke will lay upon him all the honour
97 That good convenience claims.
98 COUNTESS.
99 Return you thither?
100 FIRST GENTLEMAN.
101 Ay, madam, with the swiftest wing of speed.
102 HELENA.
103 [_Reads._] _Till I have no wife, I have nothing in France._
104 ’Tis bitter.
105 COUNTESS.
106 Find you that there?
107 HELENA.
108 Ay, madam.
109 FIRST GENTLEMAN.
110 ’Tis but the boldness of his hand haply, which his heart was not
111 consenting to.
112 COUNTESS.
113 Nothing in France until he have no wife!
114 There’s nothing here that is too good for him
115 But only she, and she deserves a lord
116 That twenty such rude boys might tend upon,
117 And call her hourly mistress. Who was with him?
118 FIRST GENTLEMAN.
119 A servant only, and a gentleman which I have sometime known.
120 COUNTESS.
121 Parolles, was it not?
122 FIRST GENTLEMAN.
123 Ay, my good lady, he.
124 COUNTESS.
125 A very tainted fellow, and full of wickedness.
126 My son corrupts a well-derived nature
127 With his inducement.
128 FIRST GENTLEMAN.
129 Indeed, good lady,
130 The fellow has a deal of that too much,
131 Which holds him much to have.
132 COUNTESS.
133 Y’are welcome, gentlemen.
134 I will entreat you, when you see my son,
135 To tell him that his sword can never win
136 The honour that he loses: more I’ll entreat you
137 Written to bear along.
138 SECOND GENTLEMAN.
139 We serve you, madam,
140 In that and all your worthiest affairs.
141 COUNTESS.
142 Not so, but as we change our courtesies.
143 Will you draw near?
144 [_Exeunt Countess and Gentlemen._]
145 HELENA.
146 “Till I have no wife, I have nothing in France.”
147 Nothing in France until he has no wife!
148 Thou shalt have none, Rossillon, none in France;
149 Then hast thou all again. Poor lord, is’t I
150 That chase thee from thy country, and expose
151 Those tender limbs of thine to the event
152 Of the none-sparing war? And is it I
153 That drive thee from the sportive court, where thou
154 Wast shot at with fair eyes, to be the mark
155 Of smoky muskets? O you leaden messengers,
156 That ride upon the violent speed of fire,
157 Fly with false aim; move the still-peering air,
158 That sings with piercing; do not touch my lord.
159 Whoever shoots at him, I set him there;
160 Whoever charges on his forward breast,
161 I am the caitiff that do hold him to’t;
162 And though I kill him not, I am the cause
163 His death was so effected. Better ’twere
164 I met the ravin lion when he roar’d
165 With sharp constraint of hunger; better ’twere
166 That all the miseries which nature owes
167 Were mine at once. No; come thou home, Rossillon,
168 Whence honour but of danger wins a scar,
169 As oft it loses all. I will be gone;
170 My being here it is that holds thee hence.
171 Shall I stay here to do’t? No, no, although
172 The air of paradise did fan the house,
173 And angels offic’d all. I will be gone,
174 That pitiful rumour may report my flight
175 To consolate thine ear. Come, night; end, day;
176 For with the dark, poor thief, I’ll steal away.
177 [_Exit._]