ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.

PERSONS REPRESENTED.

A gentle Astringer.
A Page.

COUNTESS

OF ROUSILLON, mother to Bertram.

KING OF FRANCE.
DUKE OF FLORENCE.
BERTRAM, Count of Rousillon.
LAFEU, an old lord.
PAROLLES, a follower of Ber-
Several young French Lords that
serve with Bertram in the Flo-
rentine war.
Steward, Clown, servants to the DIANA, daughter to the Widow.
Countess of Rousillon.

HELENA, a gentlewoman, pro-
tected by the Countess.
An old Widow of Florence.

far, would have made nature immortal, and death SCENE I.-Rousillon. A Room in the Countess's should have play for lack of work. 'Would, for the

Laf. How called you the man you speak of, maCount. He was famous, sir, in his profession, and it was his great right to be so: Gerard de Narbon. Laf. He was excellent, indeed, madam; the king Ber. And I, in going, madam, weep o'er my father's very lately spoke of him admiringly and mourningdeath anew: but I must attend his majesty's com- ly: he was skilful enough to have lived still, if knowmand, to whom I am now in ward, evermore in sub-ledge could be set up against mortality. jection.

Ber, What is it, my good lord, the king languishes Laf. A fistula, my lord? Ber. I heard not of it before. Laf. I would it were not notorious.-Was this gentlewoman the daughter of Gerard de Narbon? Count. His sole child, my lord; and bequeathed to my overlooking. I have those hopes of her good that her education promises: her dispositions she Laf. He hath abandoned his physician, madam; inherits, which make fair gifts fairer; for where an under whose practices he hath persecuted time with unclean mind carries virtuous qualities, their com hope, and finds no other advantage in the process mendations go with pity,-they are virtues and but only the losing of hope by time. traitors too: in her they are the better for their simpleness; she derives her honesty, and achieves her goodness. [tears. La. Your commendations, madam, get from her

Count. T is the best brine a maiden can season crease; and there was never virgin got till virginity
her praise in. The remembrance of her father never was first lost. That you were made of is metal to
approaches her heart but the tyranny of her sorrows make virgins. Virginity, by being once lost, may
takes all livelihood from her cheek. No more of be ten times found; by being ever kept, it is ever
this, Helena-go to, no more; lest it be rather lost: 't is too cold a companion; away with it.
thought you affect a sorrow, than to have.
Hel. I will stand for 't a little, though therefore I
Hel. I do affect a sorrow, indeed, but I have it too. die a virgin.
Laf. Moderate lamentation is the right of the
dead; excessive grief the enemy to the living.
Hel. If the living be enemy to the grief, the excess
makes it soon mortal.

Ber. Madam, I desire your holy wishes.
Laf. How understand we that?
[father
Count. Be thou blest, Bertram! and succeed thy
In manners, as in shape! thy blood, and virtue,
Contend for empire in thee; and thy goodness
Share with thy birth-right! Love all, trust a few,
Do wrong to none: be able for thine enemy
Rather in power than use; and keep thy friend
Under thy own life's key: be check'd for silence,
But never tax'd for speech. What heaven more will,
That thee may furnish, and my prayers pluck down,
Fall on thy head! Farewell.-My lord,
'T is an unseason'd courtier; good my lord,
Advise him. Laf. He cannot want the best

That shall attend his love.
Count. Heaven bless him!-Farewell, Bertram.
[Exit.
Ber. The best wishes that can be forged in your
thoughts [to Helena] be servants to you! Be com-
fortable to my mother, your mistress, and make

much of her.

Laf. Farewell, pretty lady: You must hold the
credit of your father.

[Exeunt Bertram and Lafeu.
Hel. O, were that all!-I think not on my father;
And these great tears grace his remembrance more
Than those I shed for him. What was he like?
I have forgot him: my imagination
Carries no favour in 't but Bertram's.
I am undone; there is no living, none,
If Bertram be away. It were all one
That I should love a bright particular star,
And think to wed it, he is so above me :
In his bright radiance and collateral light
Must I be comforted, not in his sphere.
The ambition in my love thus plagues itself:
The hind that would be mated by the lion

Must die for love. 'T was pretty, though a plague,
To see him every hour; to sit and draw
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls,
In our heart's table; heart too capable
Of every line and trick of his sweet favour:
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancy
Must sanctify his relics. Who comes here?

Par. Are you meditating on virginity?
Hel. Ay. You have some stain of soldier in you;
let me ask you a question: Man is enemy to vir-
ginity; how may we barricado it against him?
Par. Keep him out.

Hel. But he assails; and our virginity, though
valiant in the defence, yet is weak: unfold to us
some warlike resistance.

Par. There is none: man, sitting down before you, will undermine you, and blow you up.

Hel. Bless our poor virginity from underminers and blowers up!-Is there no military policy how virgins might blow up men?

Par. There's little can be said in 't; 't is against the rule of nature. To speak on the part of virginity is to accuse your mothers; which is most infallible disobedience. He that hangs himself is a virgin virginity murders itself; and should be buried in highways, out of all sanctified limit, as a desperate offendress against nature. Virginity breeds mites, much like a cheese; consumes itself to the very paring, and so dies with feeding his own stomach. Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, idle, made of self-love, which is the most inhibited sin in the canon. Keep it not; you cannot choose but lose by 't: Out with 't: within ten year it will make itself two, which is a goodly increase; and the principal itself not much the worse: Away with 't. Hel. How might one do, sir, to lose it to her own liking?

Par. Let me see: Marry, ill, to like him that
ne'er it likes. 'T is a commodity will lose the gloss
with lying; the longer kept the less worth off
with 't, while 't is vendible: answer the time of re-
quest. Virginity, like an old courtier, wears her
cap out of fashion; richly suited, but unsuitable:
just like the brooch and the toothpick, which wear
not now: Your date is better in your pie and your
porridge than in your cheek: And your virginity,
your old virginity, is like one of our French wither-
ed pears; it looks ill, it eats drily; marry, 't is a
withered pear; it was formerly better; marry, yet,
't is a withered pear: Will you anything with it?
Hel. Not my virginity yet.

There, shall your master have a thousand loves,
A mother, a mistress, and a friend,
A phoenix, captain, and an enemy,
A guide, a goddess, and a sovereign,
A counsellor, a traitress, and a dear;
His humble ambition, proud humility,
His jarring concord, and his discord dulcet,
His faith, his sweet disaster: with a world
Of pretty, fond, adoptious christendoms,
That blinking Cupid gossips. Now shall he-
I know not what he shall:-God send him well!-
The court's a learning-place;-and he is one-
Par. What one, i' faith?

Hel. That I wish well.-'T is pity-
Par. What's pity?

Hel. That wishing well had not a body in 't,
Which might be felt: that we, the poorer born,
Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes,
Might with effects of them follow our friends,
And show what we alone must think; which never
Returns us thanks.

Enter a Page.

Page. Monsieur Parolles, my lord calls for you.
[Exit.
Par. Little Helen, farewell: If I can remember
thee, I will think of thee at court.
Hel. Monsieur Parolles, you were born under a
charitable star. Par. Under Mars, I.
Hel. I especially think, under Mars.
Par. Why under Mars?
Hel. The wars have so kept you under, that you
must needs be born under Mars.
Par. When he was predominant.
Hel. When he was retrograde, I think, rather.
Par. Why think you so?

Hel. You go so much backward when you fight.
Par. That's for advantage.

Hel. So is running away, when fear proposes the
safety: But the composition that your valour and
fear makes in you is a virtue of a good wing, and I
like the wear well.

Par. Virginity, being blown down, man will quick- Par. I am so full of businesses I cannot answer lier be blown up: marry, in blowing him down again, thee acutely: I will return perfect courtier; in the with the breach yourselves made, you lose your city. which, my instruction shall serve to naturalise thee. It is not politic in the commonwealth of nature to so thou wilt be capable of a courtier's counsel, and preserve virginity. Loss of virginity is rational in-understand what advice shall thrust upon thee;

I, after him, do after him wish too,
Since I nor wax nor honey can bring home,
I quickly were dissolved from my hive,
To give some labourers room.
2 Lord.

else thou diest in thine unthankfulness, and thine | He scatter'd not in ears, but grafted them,
ignorance makes thee away: farewell. When thou To grow there, and to bear,)- Let me not live,'
hast leisure, say thy prayers; when thou hast none, Thus his good melancholy oft began,
remember thy friends: get thee a good husband, On the catastrophe and heel of pastime,
and use him as he uses thee: so farewell. [Exit. When it was out, Let me not live,' quoth he,
Hel. Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie,
'After my flame lacks oil, to be the snuff
Which we ascribe to heaven: the fated sky
Of younger spirits, whose apprehensive senses
Gives us free scope; only, doth backward pull All but new things disdain; whose judgments are
Our slow designs, when we ourselves are dull. Mere fathers of their garments; whose constancies
What power is it which mounts my love so high; Expire before their fashions: This he wish'd:
That makes me see, and cannot feed mine eye?
The mightiest space in fortune nature brings
To join like likes, and kiss like native things.
Impossible be strange attempts to those
That weigh their pains in sense; and do suppose
What hath been cannot be: Who ever strove
To show her merit that did miss her love?
The king's disease--my project may deceive me,
But my intents are fix'd, and will not leave me. [Ex.
SCENE II.-Paris. A Room in the King's Palace.
Flourish of cornets. Enter the King of France,
with letters; Lords and others attending.
King, The Florentines and Senoys are by the ears;
Have fought with equal fortune, and continue
A braving war. I Lord. So 't is reported, sir.
King. Nay, 't is most credible; we here receive it
A certainty, vouch'd from our cousin Austria,
With caution, that the Florentine will move us
For speedy aid; wherein our dearest friend
Prejudicates the business, and would seem
To have us make denial.

I Lord.

His love and wisdom,
Approv'd so to your majesty, may plead
For amplest credence.
King

He hath arm'd our answer,
And Florence is denied before he comes:
Yet, for our gentlemen that mean to see
The Tuscan service, freely have they leave
To stand on either part.

2 Lord.

It well may serve
A nursery to our gentry, who are sick
For breathing and exploit.
King.

What's he comes here?
Enter Bertram, Lafeu, and Parolles.
1 Lord. It is the count Rousillon, my good lord,
Young Bertram.

King. Youth, thou bear'st thy father's face;
Frank nature, rather curious than in haste,
Hath well compos'd thee. Thy father's moral parts
May'st thou inherit too! Welcome to Paris.
Ber. My thanks and duty are your majesty's.
King. I would I had that corporal soundness now,
As when thy father and myself, in friendship,
First tried our soldiership! He did look far
Into the service of the time, and was
Discipled of the bravest: he lasted long;
But on us both did haggish age steal on,
And wore us out of act. It much repairs me
To talk of your good father: In his youth
He had the wit, which I can well observe
To-day in our young lords; but they may jest
Till their own scorn return to them unnoted,
Ere they can hide their levity in honour,
So like a courtier; contempt nor bitterness
Were in his pride or sharpness; if they were,
His equal had awak'd them; and his honour,
Clock to itself, knew the true minute when
Exception bid him speak, and, at this time,
His tongue obey'd his hand: who were below him
He us'd as creatures of another place;
And bow'd his eminent top to their low ranks,
Making them proud of his humility,

In their poor praise he humbled: Such a man
Might be a copy to these younger times;
Which follow'd well, would demonstrate them now
But goers backward.
Ber.

His good remembrance, sir,
Lies richer in your thoughts than on his tomb;
So in approof lives not his epitaph,
As in your royal speech,

[say, King, 'Would I were with him! He would always (Methinks I hear him now: his plausive words

You 're lov'd, sir: They that least lend it you shall lack you first. King. I fill a place, I know 't.-How long is 't, Since the physician at your father's died? [count, He was much fam'd.

Ber.

Some six months since, my lord.
King. If he were living I would try him yet;-
end me an arm;-the rest have worn me out
With several applications:-nature and sickness
Debate it at their leisure. Welcome, count;
My son 's no dearer. Ber. Thank your majesty.
[Exeunt. Flourish.

SCENE III.-Rousillon. A Room in the
Countess's Palace.

Enter Countess, Steward, and Clown.
Count. I will now hear: what say you of this gentle-
woman?

Stew. Madam, the care I have had to even your content, I wish might be found in the calendar of my past endeavours: for then we wound our modesty, and make foul the clearness of our deservings, when of ourselves we publish them.

Count. What does this knave here? Get you gone, sirrah: The complaints I have heard of you I do not all believe; 't is my slowness that I do not for I know you lack not folly to commit them, and have ability enough to make such knaveries yours. Clo. 'T is not unknown to you, madam, I am a poor fellow. Count. Well, sir.

Clo. No, madam, 't is not so well that I am poor; though many of the rich are damned: But, if I may have your ladyship's good-will to go to the world, Isbel the woman and I will do as we may. Count. Wilt thou needs be a beggar? Clo. I do beg your good-will in this case. Count. In what case?

Clo. In Isbel's case and mine own. Service is no heritage: and I think I shall never have the blessing of God, till I have issue of my body; for, they say, barnes are blessings.

Count. Tell me thy reason why thou wilt marry. Clo. My poor body, madain, requires it: I am driven on by the flesh; and he must needs go that the devil drives.

Count. Is this all your worship's reason?

Clo. Faith, madam, I have other holy reasons, such as they are.

Count. May the world know them?

Clo. I have been, madam, a wicked creature, as you and all flesh and blood are; and, indeed, I do marry that I may repent.

Count. Thy marriage, sooner than thy wickedness. Clo. I am out o' friends, madam; and I hope to have friends for my wife's sake.

Count. Such friends are thine enemies, knave. Clo. You 're shallow, madam, in great friends; for the knaves come to do that for me, which I am aweary of. He that ears my land spares my team, and gives me leave to in the crop: If I be his cuckold, he 's my drudge: He that comforts my wife is the cherisher of my flesh and blood; he that cherishes my flesh and blood loves my flesh and blood; he that loves my flesh and blood is my friend; ergo, he that kisses my wife is my friend. If men could be contented to be what they are, there were no fear in marriage; for young Charbon the puritan, and old Poys the papist, howsome'er their hearts are severed in religion, their heads are both one,-they may jowl horns together, like any deer i' the herd.

Was this king Priam's joy?
With that she sighed as she stood,
With that she sighed as she stood,
And gave this sentence then:
Among nine bad if one be good,
Among nine bad if one be good,
There 's yet one good in ten.
Count. What, one good in ten? you corrupt the

song, sirrahı.

Clo. One good woman in ten, madam, which is a purifying of the song: 'Would God would serve the world so all the year! we'd find no fault with the tithe woman, if I were the parson: One in ten, quoth a'! an we might have a good woman born but for every blazing star, or at an earthquake, 't would mend the lottery well; a man may draw his heart out, ere he pluck one.

I

Hel. What is your pleasure, madam?
Count.

I am a mother to you.

Hel. Mine honourable mistress.
Count.

You know, Helen,

Nay, a mother;
Why not a mother? When I said, a mother,
Methought you saw a serpent: What 's in mother
That you start at it? I say, I am your mother;
That were enwombed mine: 'T is often seen,
And put you in the catalogue of those
A native slip to us from foreign seeds:
Adoption strives with nature; and choice breeds
Yet I express to you a mother's care:-
You ne'er oppress'd me with a mother's groan,
God's mercy, maiden! does it curd thy blood
To say, I am thy mother? What 's the matter,
That this distemper'd messenger of wet,
The many-colour'd Iris, rounds thine eye?
Why?-that you are my daughter?

Hel.

That I am not.

Count. I say, I am your mother.
Hel.
Pardon, madam;
The count Rousillon cannot be my brother:
I am from humble, he from honour'd name;
No note upon my parents, his all noble:
My master, my dear lord he is: and I
His servant live, and will his vassal die :

He must not be my brother.
Count.

Nor I your mother? Hel. You are my mother, madam. ('Would you were, Indeed, my mother!-(Or were you both our mothers, So that my lord, your son, were not my brother.) I care no more for than I do for heaven, So I were not his sister.) Can't be other But, I your daughter, he must be my brother? [law: Count. Yes, Helen, you might be my daughter-inCount. You'll be gone, sir knave, and do as So strive upon your pulse: What, pale again? God shield, you mean it not! daughter, and mother, command you! Clo. That man should be at woman's command, and My fear hath catch'd your fondness: Now I see yet no hurt done!--Though honesty be no puritan, Your salt tears' head. Now to all sense 't is gross. The mystery of your loneliness, and find yet it will do no hurt; it will wear the surplice of You love my son; invention is asham'd, humility over the black gown of a big heart.-I am Against the proclamation of thy passion, going, forsooth; the business is for Helen to come To say thou dost not: therefore tell me true; hither. [Exit. But tell me then, 't is so :-for, look, thy cheeks fentirely. Confess it, th' one to th' other; and thine eyes Stew. I know, madam, you love your gentlewoman See it so grossly shown in thy behaviours, Count. Faith, I do: her father bequeathed her to That in their kind they speak it: only sin me; and she herself, without other advantage, may And hellish obstinacy tie thy tongue, lawfully make title to as much love as she finds: That truth should be suspected: Speak, is 't so? there is more owing her than is paid; and more If it be so, you have wound a goodly clue; shall be paid her than she 'll demand.

Count. Well, now.

Stew. Madam, I was very late more near her than, I think, she wished me: alone she was, and did communicate to herself her own words to her own ears; she thought, I dare vow for her, they touched not any stranger sense. Her matter was, she loved your son: Fortune, she said, was no goddess, that had put such difference betwixt their two estates; Love, no god, that would not extend his might only where qualities were level; Diana, no queen of virgins, that would suffer her poor knight to be surprised, without rescue in the first assault, or ransom afterward: This she delivered in the most bitter

touch of sorrow that e'er I heard virgin exclaim in: which I held my duty, speedily to acquaint you withal; sithence, in the loss that may happen, it concerns you something to know it.

Count. You have discharged this honestly; keep it to yourself: many likelihoods informed me of this before, which hung so tottering in the balance, that I could neither believe, nor misdoubt: Pray, you, leave me: stall this in your bosom, and I thank you for your honest care: I will speak with you further [Exit Steward.

anon.

Enter Helena.

Count. Even so it was with me when I was young:
If ever we are nature's, these are ours; this thorn
Doth to our rose of youth rightly belong :

Our blood to us, this to our blood is born;
It is the show and seal of nature's truth,
Where love's strong passion is impress'd in youth:
By our remembrances of days foregone,
Such were our faults;-or then we thought them none.
Her eye is sick on 't; I observe her now.

As heaven shall work in me for thine avail,
If it be not, forswear 't: howe'er, I charge thee,
To tell me truly. Hel. Good madam, pardon me.
Count. Do you love my son?

Hel.

Your pardon, noble mistress!
Count. Love you my son?
Hel.
Do not you love him, madam?
Whereof the world takes note: come, come, disclose
Count. Go not about; my love hath in 't a bond,
The state of your affection; for your passions
Have to the full appeach'd.

Hel.

Then, I confess.

Here on my knee, before high heaven and you,
I love your son:-
That before you, and next unto high heaven,
My friends were poor but honest; so 's my love:
That he is lov'd of me: I follow him not
Be not offended; for it hurts not him
Nor would I have him, till I do deserve him;
By any token of presumptuous suit;
Yet never know how that desert should be.
I know I love in vain, strive against hope;
Yet, in this captious and intenible sieve,
1 still pour in the waters of my love,
And lack not to lose still: thus, Indian-like,
Religious in mine error, I adore
The sun, that looks upon his worshipper,
But knows of him no more. My dearest madam
Let not your hate encounter with my love,
For loving where you do: but, if yourself,
Whose aged honour cites a virtuous youth,
Did ever, in so true a flame of liking,
Wish chastely, and love dearly, that your Dian
Was both herself and love; O then, give pity

Laf. Nay, come your ways; This is his majesty, say your mind to him: A traitor you do look like; but such traitors 1 Lord. O my sweet lord that you will stay behind His majesty seldom fears: I am Cressid's uncle, Par. 'T is not his fault; the spark[us! That dare leave two together: fare you well. [Ex.