ACT II. SCENE Ι.

Before the King of Navarre's Palace.

Enter the Princess of France, Rofaline, Maria, Catharine, Boyet, Lords and other attendants.

N

BOYET.

OW, Madam, summon up your dearest spirits;
Consider, whom the King your father sends;

To whom he sends, and what's his embassy.
Yourself, held precious in the world's esteem,
To parley with the sole inheritor
Of all perfections that a man may owe,
Matchless Navarre; the plea, of no less weight
Than Aquitain, a dowry for a Queen.
Be now as prodigal of all dear grace,
As nature was in making graces dear,
When she did starve the general world beside,
And prodigally gave them all to you.

Prin. Good lord Boyet, my beauty, though but mean,
Needs not the painted flourish of your praife;
Beauty is bought by judgment of the eye,
Not utter'd by base sale of chapmen's tongues *.
I am less proud to hear you tell my worth,
Than you much willing to be counted wife,
In spending thus your wit in praise of mine.
But now, to task the tasker; good Boyet,
You are not ignorant, all-telling fame
Doth noife abroad, Navarre hath made a vow,
'Till painful study shall out-wear three years,
No woman may approach his filent Court;
Therefore to us feems it a needful course,

* Chapman here seems to fignify the feller, not, as now commonly, the buyer. Cheap or cheping was anciently Market, Chapman therefore is Marketman.

The meaning is, that the estimation of beauty depends not on the uttering or proclamation of the feller, but on the eye of the buyer.

Be

Before we enter his forbidden gates,
To know his pleasure; and in that behalf,
Bold of your worthiness, we single you
As our best-moving fair follicitor.
Tell him, the daughter of the King of France,
On ferious business, craving quick dispatch,
Importunes personal conference with his Grace.
Haste, signify so much, while we attend,
Like humble-vifag'd suitors, his high will.

[Exit.

Boyet. Proud of employment, willingly I go.
Prin. All pride is willing pride, and yours is so;

Who are the votaries, my loving lords,
That are vow-fellows with this virtuous King?
Lord. Longueville is one.
Prin. Know you the man?

Mar. I knew him, Madam, at a marriage-feast
Between lord Perigort and the beauteous heir
Of Jaques Faulconbridge folemnized.
In Normandy faw I this Longueville,
A man of fovereign parts he is esteem'd;
* Well fitted in the arts, glorious in arms,
Nothing becomes him ill, that he would well.
The only foil of his fair virtue's glofs,
(If virtue's gloss will stain with any foil,)
Is a sharp wit †, match'd with two blunt a will;
Whose edge hath power to cut, whose will still wills
It should spare none, that come within his power.
Prin. Some merry-mocking lord, belike. Is't so?
Mar. They say so most, that most his humours know.
Prin. Such short-liv'd wits do wither as they grow,

Who are the rest?

Cath. The young Dumain, a well-accomplish'd

youth.

Of all that virtue love, for virtue lov'd.
Most power to do most harm, least knowing ill;

For he hath wit to make an ill shape good,

And shape to win grace, tho' he had no wit.
I saw him at the Duke Alenson's once,
And much too little of that good I faw
Is my report to his great worthiness.

Rofa. Another of these students at that time
Was there with him, as I have heard o'truth;
Biron they call him; but a merrier man,
Within the limit of becoming mirth,
I never fpent an hour's talk withal.
His eye begets occasion for his wit;
For every object, that the one doth catch,
The other turns to a mirth-moving jest;
Which his fair tongue (conceit's expositor)
Delivers in fuch apt and gracious words,
That aged ears play truant at his tales;
And younger hearings are quite ravished;
So fweet and voluble is his difcourse.

Prin. God bless my ladies: are they all in love,
That every one her own hath garnished
With fuch bedecking ornaments of praife!
Mar. Here comes Boyet.

Enter Boyet.

Prin. Now, what admittance, Lord?

Boyet. Navarre had notice of your fair approach;

And he and his competitors in oath
Were all addrest to meet you, gentle lady,
Before I came. Marry, thus much I've learnt,
He rather means to lodge you in the field,
Like one that comes here to befiege his Court,
Than feek a dispensation for his oath,
To let you enter his unpeopled house.
Here comes Navarre.

SCENE

SCENE II.

Enter the King, Longueville, Dumain, Biron, and
Attendants.

King. Fair Princess, welcome to the Court of Navarre. Prin. Fair, I give you back again; and welcome I have not yet: the roof of this Court is too high to be yours; and welcome to the wide fields, too bafe to be mine.

King. You shall be welcome, Madam, to my Court.
Prin. I will be welcome then; conduct me thither.
King. Hear me, dear lady, I have fworn an oath.
Prin. Our Lady help my lord! he'll be forfworn.
King. Not for the world, fair Madam, by my will.
Prin. Why, Will shall break its will, and nothing else.
King. Your ladyship is ignorant what it is.
Prin. Were my lord fo, his ignorance were wife,
Where now his knowledge must prove ignorance.
I hear, your Grace hath sworn out house-keeping:
'Tis deadly sin to keep that oath, my Lord;
* And fin to break it.

But pardon me, I am too fudden bold :
To teach a teacher ill befeemeth me.
Vouchsafe to read the purpose of my Coming,
And fuddenly resolve me in my fuit.

King. Madam, I will, if fuddenly I may.
Prin. You will the fooner, that I were away;
For you'll prove perjur'd, if you make me stay.
Biron. Did not I dance with you in Brabant once?
Rof. Did not I dance with you in Brabant once?
Biron. I know, you did.

Rof. How needless was it then to ask the question?
Biron. You must not be so quick.

Rof. 'Tis long of you, that spur me with such

questions.

* Sir T. Hanmer reads not fin to break it. I believe erroneously. The Princess shews an

inconvenience very frequently attending rash oaths, which, whether kept or broken, produce guilt. K 3 Biron. Biron. Your wit's too hot, it speeds too fast, 'twill tire, Rof. Not 'till it leave the rider in the mire. Biron. What time o'day? Rof. The hour, that fools should ask. Biron. Now fair befall your mask! Rof. Fair fall the face it covers! Biron. And send you many lovers! Rof. Amen, so you be none! Biron. Nay, then will I be gone. King. Madam, your father here doth intimate The payment of a hundred thousand crowns; Being but th' one half of an entire sum, Disbursed by my father in his wars. But say, that he, or we, as neither have, Receiv'd that sum; yet there remains unpaid A hundred thoufand more; in furety of the which, One part of Aquitain is bound to us, Although not valu'd to the mony's worth: If then the King your father will restore But that one half which is unsatisfy'd, We will give up our right in Aquitain, And hold fair friendship with his Majesty: But that, it feems, he little purposeth, For here he doth demand to have repaid An hundred thousand crowns, and not demands 6, On payment of an hundred thousand crowns, To have his title live in Aquitain; Which we much rather had depart withal, And have the money by our father lent,

• The former editions read, And not demands One payment of an hundred thousand Crowns,

To have his Title live in Aquitaine.] I have restored, I believe, the genuine Sense of the Paflage. Aquitain was pledg'd, it seems, to Navarre's father, for 200000 Crowns. The French

Than

King pretends to have paid one Moiety of this Debt, (which Navarre knows nothing of,) but demands this Moiety back again: instead whereof (fays Navarre) he should rather pay the remaining Moiety and demand to have Aquitain re-deliver'd up to him. This is plain and easy Reasoning upon the Fact fuppos'd; and Na

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