Provokes me to this threefold perjury.

Love bade me swear, and love bids me forswear:
O sweet suggesting1 love, if thou hast sinn'd,
Teach me, thy tempted subject, to excuse it.
At first I did adore a twinkling star,
But now I worship a celestial sun.
Unheedful vows may heedfully be broken;
And he wants wit, that wants resolved will
To learn his wit to exchange the bad for better.—
Fie, fie, unreverend tongue! to call her bad,
Whose sovereignty so oft thou hast preferr'd
With twenty thousand soul-confirming oaths.
I cannot leave to love, and yet I do;

But there I leave to love, where I should love.
Julia I lose, and Valentine I lose:

If I keep them, I needs must lose myself;
If I lose them, thus find I by their loss,
For Valentine, myself; For Julia, Silvia.
I to myself am dearer than a friend;
For love is still most precious in itself:
And Silvia, witness heaven, that made her fair!
Shews Julia but a swarthy Ethiope.

I will forget that Julia is alive,
Rememb'ring that my love to her is dead;
And Valentine I'll hold an enemy,
Aiming at Silvia as a sweeter friend.
I cannot now prove constant to myself,
Without some treachery used to Valentine:-
This night, he meaneth with a corded ladder
To climb celestial Silvia's chamber-window;
Myself in counsel, his competitor2:

To suggest, in the language of our ancestors, was to tempt. 2 i. e. myself who am his competitor or rival, being admitted to his counsel. Competitor here means confederate, assistant, partThus in Ant. Cleop. Act v. Sc. 1.

ner.

That thou my brother, my competitor

In top of all design, my mate in empire,
Friend and companion in the front of war.

Now presently I'll give her father notice
Of their disguising, and pretended3 flight;
Who, all enrag'd, will banish Valentine;
For Thurio, he intends, shall wed his daughter:
But, Valentine being gone, I'll quickly cross,
By some sly trick, blunt Thurio's dull proceeding.
Love, lend me wings to make my purpose swift,
As thou hast lent me wit to plot this drift! [Exit.

SCENE VII.

Verona. A Room in Julia's House.

Enter JULIA and LUCETTA.

Jul. Counsel, Lucetta; gentle girl, assist me!
And, e'en in kind love, I do cònjure thee1,
Who art the table wherein all my thoughts
Are visibly charácter'd and engrav'd,–
To lesson me; and tell me some good mean,
How, with my honour, I may undertake
A journey to my loving Proteus.

་

Luc. Alas! the way is wearisome and long.
Jul. A true-devoted pilgrim is not weary
To measure kingdoms with his feeble steps;
Much less shall she, that hath love's wings to fly;
And when the flight is made to one so dear,
Of such divine perfection, as Sir Proteus.

Luc. Better forbear, till Proteus make return.
Jul. O, know'st thou not, his looks are my

food?

Pity the dearth that I have pined in,
By longing for that food so long a time.
Didst thou but know the inly touch of love,

soul's

3 i. e. proposed or intended flight. The verb prétendre has the same signification in French.

1 The verb to conjure, or earnestly request, was then accented on the first syllable.

VOL. I.

N

Thou would'st as soon go kindle fire with snow,
As seek to quench the fire of love with words.

Luc. I do not seek to quench your love's hot fire; But qualify the fire's extreme rage,

Lest it should burn above the bounds of reason.
Jul. The more thou dam'st 3 it up, the more it burns;
The current, that with gentle murmur glides,
Thou know'st, being stopp'd, impatiently doth rage;
But, when his fair course is not hindered,

He makes sweet musick with th' enamel'd stones,
Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge

He overtaketh in his pilgrimage;

And so by many winding nooks he strays,
With willing sport to the wild ocean.
Then let me go, and hinder not my course:
I'll be as patient as a gentle stream,
And make a pastime of each weary step,
Till the last step have brought me to my love;
And there I'll rest, as, after much turmoil*,
A blessed soul doth in Elysium.

Luc. But in what habit will you go along?
Jul. Not like a woman; for I would prevent
The loose encounters of lascivious men:
Gentle Lucetta, fit me with such weeds

As

may beseem some well reputed page.
Luc. Why then your ladyship must cut your
Jul. No, girl; I'll knit it up in silken strings,
With twenty odd-conceited true-love knots:
To be fantastic may become a youth
Of greater time than I shall show to be.

hair.

Luc. What fashion, madam, shall I make your breeches?

Jul. That fits as well, as-" tell me, good my lord,

2 Fire as a dissyllable, as if spelt Fier. 4 Trouble.

9 i. e. closest.

"What compass will you wear your farthingale?” Why, even what fashion thou best lik'st, Lucetta. Luc. You must needs have them with a codpiece5, madam.

Jul. Out, out, Lucetta; that will be ill favour'd. Luc. A round hose, madam, now's not worth a pin, Unless you have a cod-piece to stick pins on.

Jul. Lucetta, as thou lov'st me, let me have What thou think'st meet, and is most mannerly: But tell me, wench, how will the world repute me, For undertaking so unstaid a journey?

I fear me, it will make me scandaliz'd.

Luc. If you think so, then stay at home, and go not.
Jul. Nay, that I will not.

Luc. Then never dream on infamy, but go.
If Proteus like your journey, when you come,
No matter who's displeas'd, when you are gone:
I fear me, he will scarce be pleas'd withal.

Jul. That is the least, Lucetta, of my fear:
A thousand oaths, an ocean of his tears,
And instances of infinite" of love,

Warrant me welcome to my Proteus.

Luc. All these are servants to deceitful men. Jul. Base men, that use them to so base effect! But truer stars did govern Proteus' birth:

5 Whoever wishes to be acquainted with that singular appendage to dress a cod-piece, may consult "Bulwer's Artificial Changeling." Ocular instruction may be had from the armour shown as John of Gaunt's in the Tower. However offensive this language may appear to modern ears, it certainly gave none to any of the spectators in Shakspeare's days. He only used the ordinary language of his contemporaries.

6 The second folio reads "as infinite of love," Malone wished to read of the infinite of love, because he found "the infinite of thought" in Much Ado About Nothing. The text seems to me sufficiently intelligible, though we are not used to such construction. Malone has cited an instance of infinite used for an infinity from Lord Lonsdale's Memoirs, written in 1688.

His words are bonds, his oaths are oracles;
His love sincere, his thoughts immaculate;
His tears, pure messengers sent from his heart;
His heart as far from fraud, as heaven from earth.

Luc. Pray heaven, he prove so, when you come

to him!

Jul. Now, as thou lov'st me, do him not that wrong, To bear a hard opinion of his truth;

Only deserve my love, by loving him;
And presently go with me to my chamber,
To take a note of what I stand in need of,
To furnish me upon my longing? journey.
All that is mine I leave at thy dispose,
My goods, my lands, my reputation;
Only, in lieu thereof despatch me hence:
Come, answer not, but to it presently;
I am impatient of my tarriance.

[Exeunt.

ACT III.

SCENE I.

Milan. An Anti-room in the Duke's Palace.

Enter DUKE, THURIO, and Proteus. Duke. Sir Thurio, give us leave, I pray, awhile; We have some secrets to confer about.-

[Exit THURIO. Now, tell me, Proteus, what's your will with me? Pro. My gracious lord, that which I would dis

cover,

The law of friendship bids me to conceal:

But, when I call to mind your gracious favours

7 By her longing journey, Julia means a journey which she shall pass in longing.