As You Like It

1 Enter Rosalind, Celia and Jaques.
2 JAQUES.
3 I prithee, pretty youth, let me be better acquainted with thee.
4 ROSALIND.
5 They say you are a melancholy fellow.
6 JAQUES.
7 I am so; I do love it better than laughing.
8 ROSALIND.
9 Those that are in extremity of either are abominable fellows, and
10 betray themselves to every modern censure worse than drunkards.
11 JAQUES.
12 Why, ’tis good to be sad and say nothing.
13 ROSALIND.
14 Why then, ’tis good to be a post.
15 JAQUES.
16 I have neither the scholar’s melancholy, which is emulation; nor the
17 musician’s, which is fantastical; nor the courtier’s, which is proud;
18 nor the soldier’s, which is ambitious; nor the lawyer’s, which is
19 politic; nor the lady’s, which is nice; nor the lover’s, which is all
20 these; but it is a melancholy of mine own, compounded of many simples,
21 extracted from many objects, and indeed the sundry contemplation of my
22 travels, in which my often rumination wraps me in a most humorous
23 sadness.
24 ROSALIND.
25 A traveller! By my faith, you have great reason to be sad. I fear you
26 have sold your own lands to see other men’s. Then to have seen much and
27 to have nothing is to have rich eyes and poor hands.
28 JAQUES.
29 Yes, I have gained my experience.
30 ROSALIND.
31 And your experience makes you sad. I had rather have a fool to make me
32 merry than experience to make me sad—and to travel for it too.
33 Enter Orlando.
34 ORLANDO.
35 Good day and happiness, dear Rosalind!
36 JAQUES.
37 Nay, then, God be wi’ you, an you talk in blank verse.
38 ROSALIND.
39 Farewell, Monsieur Traveller. Look you lisp and wear strange suits;
40 disable all the benefits of your own country; be out of love with your
41 nativity, and almost chide God for making you that countenance you are,
42 or I will scarce think you have swam in a gondola.
43 [_Exit Jaques._]
44 Why, how now, Orlando, where have you been all this while? You a lover!
45 An you serve me such another trick, never come in my sight more.
46 ORLANDO.
47 My fair Rosalind, I come within an hour of my promise.
48 ROSALIND.
49 Break an hour’s promise in love? He that will divide a minute into a
50 thousand parts, and break but a part of the thousand part of a minute
51 in the affairs of love, it may be said of him that Cupid hath clapped
52 him o’ the shoulder, but I’ll warrant him heart-whole.
53 ORLANDO.
54 Pardon me, dear Rosalind.
55 ROSALIND.
56 Nay, an you be so tardy, come no more in my sight. I had as lief be
57 wooed of a snail.
58 ORLANDO.
59 Of a snail?
60 ROSALIND.
61 Ay, of a snail, for though he comes slowly, he carries his house on his
62 head—a better jointure, I think, than you make a woman. Besides, he
63 brings his destiny with him.
64 ORLANDO.
65 What’s that?
66 ROSALIND.
67 Why, horns, which such as you are fain to be beholding to your wives
68 for. But he comes armed in his fortune and prevents the slander of his
69 wife.
70 ORLANDO.
71 Virtue is no horn-maker and my Rosalind is virtuous.
72 ROSALIND.
73 And I am your Rosalind.
74 CELIA.
75 It pleases him to call you so, but he hath a Rosalind of a better leer
76 than you.
77 ROSALIND.
78 Come, woo me, woo me, for now I am in a holiday humour, and like enough
79 to consent. What would you say to me now, an I were your very, very
80 Rosalind?
81 ORLANDO.
82 I would kiss before I spoke.
83 ROSALIND.
84 Nay, you were better speak first, and when you were gravelled for lack
85 of matter, you might take occasion to kiss. Very good orators, when
86 they are out, they will spit; and for lovers lacking—God warn
87 us—matter, the cleanliest shift is to kiss.
88 ORLANDO.
89 How if the kiss be denied?
90 ROSALIND.
91 Then she puts you to entreaty, and there begins new matter.
92 ORLANDO.
93 Who could be out, being before his beloved mistress?
94 ROSALIND.
95 Marry, that should you, if I were your mistress, or I should think my
96 honesty ranker than my wit.
97 ORLANDO.
98 What, of my suit?
99 ROSALIND.
100 Not out of your apparel, and yet out of your suit. Am not I your
101 Rosalind?
102 ORLANDO.
103 I take some joy to say you are because I would be talking of her.
104 ROSALIND.
105 Well, in her person, I say I will not have you.
106 ORLANDO.
107 Then, in mine own person, I die.
108 ROSALIND.
109 No, faith, die by attorney. The poor world is almost six thousand years
110 old, and in all this time there was not any man died in his own person,
111 _videlicet_, in a love-cause. Troilus had his brains dashed out with a
112 Grecian club, yet he did what he could to die before, and he is one of
113 the patterns of love. Leander, he would have lived many a fair year
114 though Hero had turned nun, if it had not been for a hot midsummer
115 night; for, good youth, he went but forth to wash him in the Hellespont
116 and, being taken with the cramp, was drowned; and the foolish
117 chroniclers of that age found it was Hero of Sestos. But these are all
118 lies. Men have died from time to time and worms have eaten them, but
119 not for love.
120 ORLANDO.
121 I would not have my right Rosalind of this mind, for I protest her
122 frown might kill me.
123 ROSALIND.
124 By this hand, it will not kill a fly. But come, now I will be your
125 Rosalind in a more coming-on disposition, and ask me what you will, I
126 will grant it.
127 ORLANDO.
128 Then love me, Rosalind.
129 ROSALIND.
130 Yes, faith, will I, Fridays and Saturdays and all.
131 ORLANDO.
132 And wilt thou have me?
133 ROSALIND.
134 Ay, and twenty such.
135 ORLANDO.
136 What sayest thou?
137 ROSALIND.
138 Are you not good?
139 ORLANDO.
140 I hope so.
141 ROSALIND.
142 Why then, can one desire too much of a good thing?—Come, sister, you
143 shall be the priest and marry us.—Give me your hand, Orlando.—What do
144 you say, sister?
145 ORLANDO.
146 Pray thee, marry us.
147 CELIA.
148 I cannot say the words.
149 ROSALIND.
150 You must begin “Will you, Orlando—”
151 CELIA.
152 Go to.—Will you, Orlando, have to wife this Rosalind?
153 ORLANDO.
154 I will.
155 ROSALIND.
156 Ay, but when?
157 ORLANDO.
158 Why now, as fast as she can marry us.
159 ROSALIND.
160 Then you must say “I take thee, Rosalind, for wife.”
161 ORLANDO.
162 I take thee, Rosalind, for wife.
163 ROSALIND.
164 I might ask you for your commission. But I do take thee, Orlando, for
165 my husband. There’s a girl goes before the priest, and certainly a
166 woman’s thought runs before her actions.
167 ORLANDO.
168 So do all thoughts. They are winged.
169 ROSALIND.
170 Now tell me how long you would have her after you have possessed her.
171 ORLANDO.
172 For ever and a day.
173 ROSALIND.
174 Say “a day” without the “ever.” No, no, Orlando, men are April when
175 they woo, December when they wed. Maids are May when they are maids,
176 but the sky changes when they are wives. I will be more jealous of thee
177 than a Barbary cock-pigeon over his hen, more clamorous than a parrot
178 against rain, more new-fangled than an ape, more giddy in my desires
179 than a monkey. I will weep for nothing, like Diana in the fountain, and
180 I will do that when you are disposed to be merry. I will laugh like a
181 hyena, and that when thou are inclined to sleep.
182 ORLANDO.
183 But will my Rosalind do so?
184 ROSALIND.
185 By my life, she will do as I do.
186 ORLANDO.
187 O, but she is wise.
188 ROSALIND.
189 Or else she could not have the wit to do this. The wiser, the
190 waywarder. Make the doors upon a woman’s wit, and it will out at the
191 casement. Shut that, and ’twill out at the keyhole. Stop that, ’twill
192 fly with the smoke out at the chimney.
193 ORLANDO.
194 A man that had a wife with such a wit, he might say, “Wit, whither
195 wilt?”
196 ROSALIND.
197 Nay, you might keep that check for it till you met your wife’s wit
198 going to your neighbour’s bed.
199 ORLANDO.
200 And what wit could wit have to excuse that?
201 ROSALIND.
202 Marry, to say she came to seek you there. You shall never take her
203 without her answer unless you take her without her tongue. O, that
204 woman that cannot make her fault her husband’s occasion, let her never
205 nurse her child herself, for she will breed it like a fool.
206 ORLANDO.
207 For these two hours, Rosalind, I will leave thee.
208 ROSALIND.
209 Alas, dear love, I cannot lack thee two hours.
210 ORLANDO.
211 I must attend the Duke at dinner. By two o’clock I will be with thee
212 again.
213 ROSALIND.
214 Ay, go your ways, go your ways. I knew what you would prove. My friends
215 told me as much, and I thought no less. That flattering tongue of yours
216 won me. ’Tis but one cast away, and so, come death! Two o’clock is your
217 hour?
218 ORLANDO.
219 Ay, sweet Rosalind.
220 ROSALIND.
221 By my troth, and in good earnest, and so God mend me, and by all pretty
222 oaths that are not dangerous, if you break one jot of your promise or
223 come one minute behind your hour, I will think you the most pathetical
224 break-promise, and the most hollow lover, and the most unworthy of her
225 you call Rosalind that may be chosen out of the gross band of the
226 unfaithful. Therefore beware my censure, and keep your promise.
227 ORLANDO.
228 With no less religion than if thou wert indeed my Rosalind. So, adieu.
229 ROSALIND.
230 Well, Time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and let
231 time try. Adieu.
232 [_Exit Orlando._]
233 CELIA.
234 You have simply misused our sex in your love-prate! We must have your
235 doublet and hose plucked over your head and show the world what the
236 bird hath done to her own nest.
237 ROSALIND.
238 O coz, coz, coz, my pretty little coz, that thou didst know how many
239 fathom deep I am in love! But it cannot be sounded; my affection hath
240 an unknown bottom, like the Bay of Portugal.
241 CELIA.
242 Or rather, bottomless, that as fast as you pour affection in, it runs
243 out.
244 ROSALIND.
245 No, that same wicked bastard of Venus, that was begot of thought,
246 conceived of spleen, and born of madness, that blind rascally boy that
247 abuses everyone’s eyes because his own are out, let him be judge how
248 deep I am in love. I’ll tell thee, Aliena, I cannot be out of the sight
249 of Orlando. I’ll go find a shadow and sigh till he come.
250 CELIA.
251 And I’ll sleep.
252 [_Exeunt._]