Sir To. Will you encounter the house? my niece is desirous you should enter, if your trade be to her. Vio. I am bound to your niece, sir: I mean, she is the list of my voyage.

Sir To. Taste your legs, sir, put them to motion. Vio. My legs do better understand me, sir, than I understand what you mean by bidding me taste my legs.

Sir To. I mean, to go, sir, to enter.

Vio. I will answer you with gait and entrance: But we are prevented 8.

Enter OLIVIA and MARIA.

Most excellent accomplished lady, the heavens rain odours on you!

Sir And. That youth's a rare courtier ! Rain odours! well.

Vio. My matter hath no voice, lady, but to your own most pregnant 9 and vouchsafed ear.

Sir And. Odours, pregnant, and vouchsafed:I'll get 'em all three ready.

Oli. Let the garden door be shut, and leave me to my hearing.

[Exeunt SIR TOBY, SIR ANDREW, and MARIA. Give me your hand, sir.

Vio. My duty, madam, and most humble service. Oli. What is your name?

Vio. Cesario is your servant's name, fair princess. Oli. My servant, sir! 'Twas never merry world,

6 Bound, limit.

7 In the Frogs of Aristophanes a similar expression occurs, v. 462. 'TEYΣAI τns Oupas.' i. e. taste the door, knock gently

at it.

i. e. our purpose is anticipated. So in the 119th Psalm, 'Mine eyes prevent the night-watches.'

9 i. e. ready, apprehensive; vouchsafed, for vouchsafing.

Since lowly feigning was call'd compliment;

You are servant to the count Orsino, youth.

Vio. And he is yours, and his must needs be yours; Your servant's servant is your servant, madam.

Oli. For him, I think not on him: for his thoughts, 'Would they were blanks, rather than fill'd with me! Vio. Madam, I come to whet your gentle thoughts On his behalf:

Oli.

O, by your leave, I pray you;

I bade you never speak again of him:
But, would you undertake another suit,
I had rather hear you to solicit that,
Than musick from the spheres.

Vio.

Dear lady,

10

Oli. Give me leave, 'beseech you: I did send, After the last enchantment you did here 1o, A ring in chase of you; so did I abuse Myself, my servant, and, I fear me, you: Under your hard construction must I sit, To force that on you, in a shameful cunning, Which you knew none of What might you yours:

think?

Have you not set mine honour at the stake,

And baited it with all the unmuzzled thoughts

That tyrannous heart can think? To one of your receiving 11

Enough is shown; a cyprus 12, not a bosom,
Hides my heart: So let me hear you speak.

Vio. I pity you.

Oli. That's a degree to love.

Vio. No, not a grise 13; for 'tis a vulgar 14 proof,

That very oft we pity enemies.

10 i. e. after the enchantment your presence worked in my affec

Oli. Why, then, methinks, 'tis time to smile again; O world, how apt the poor are to be proud! If one should be a prey, how much the better To fall before the lion, than the wolf?

[Clock strikes.

The clock upbraids me with the waste of time.Be not afraid, good youth, I will not have you: And yet, when wit and youth is come to harvest, Your wife is like to reap a proper man:

There lies your way, due west.

Then westward-hoe:

Vio. Grace and good disposition 'tend your ladyship! You'll nothing, madam, to my lord by me?

Oli. Stay:

I pr'ythee, tell me, what thou think'st of me.
Vio. That you do think, you are not what you are.
Oli. If I think so, I think the same of you.
Vio. Then think you right; I am not what I am.
Oli. I would you were as I would have you be!
Vio. Would it be better, madam, than I am,
I wish it might; for now I am your
fool.

Oli. O, what a deal of scorn looks beautiful

In the contempt and anger of his lip!

A murd'rous guilt shows not itself more soon
Than love that would seem hid: love's night is noon.
Cesario, by the roses of the spring,

By maidhood, honour, truth, and every thing,
I love thee so, that, maugre 15 all thy pride,
Nor wit, nor reason, can my passion hide.
Do not extort thy reasons from this clause,
For, that I woo, thou therefore hast no cause:
But, rather, reason thus with reason fetter:
Love sought is good, but given unsought, is better.
Vio. By innocence I swear, and by my youth,

I have one heart, one bosom, and one truth,

15 In spite of: from the French malgré.

And that no woman has; nor never none
Shall mistress be of it, save I alone.
And so adieu, good madam; never more
Will I my master's tears to you deplore.

Oli. Yet come again: for thou, perhaps, may'st

move

That heart, which now abhors, to like his love.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. A Room in Olivia's House.

Enter SIR TOBY BELCH, SIR ANDREW AGUECHEEK, and FABIAN.

Sir And. No, faith, I'll not stay a jot longer. Sir To. Thy reason, dear venom, give thy reason. Fab. You must needs yield your reason, Sir Andrew.

Sir And. Marry, I saw your niece do more favours to the count's serving man, than ever she bestowed upon me; I saw't i'the orchard.

Sir To. Did she see thee the while, old boy? tell me that.

Sir And. As plain as I see you now.

Fab. This was a great argument of love in her toward you.

Sir And. 'Slight! will you make an ass o'me? Fab. I will prove it legitimate, sir, upon the oaths of judgment and reason.

Sir To. And they have been grand jury-men, since before Noah was a sailor.

Fab. She did show favour to the youth in your sight, only to exasperate you, to awake your dormouse valour, to put fire in your heart, and brimstone in your liver: You should then have accosted her; and with some excellent jests, fire-new from

the mint, you should have banged the youth into dumbness. This was looked for at your hand, and this was baulked: the double gilt of this opportunity you let time wash off, and you are now sailed into the north of my lady's opinion; where you will hang like an icicle on a Dutchman's beard, unless you do redeem it by some laudable attempt, either of valour, or policy.

Sir And. And't be any way, it must be with valour; for policy I hate: I had as lief be a Brownist1 as a politician.

Sir To. Why then, build me thy fortunes upon the basis of valour. Challenge me the count's youth to fight with him; hurt him in eleven places; my niece shall take note of it: and assure thyself, there is no love-broker in the world can more prevail in man's commendation with woman, than report of valour.

Fab. There is no way but this, Sir Andrew. Sir And. Will either of you bear me a challenge to him?

Sir To. Go, write it in a martial hand; be curst 2 and brief; it is no matter how witty, so it be eloquent, and full of invention: taunt him with the licence of ink: if thou thou'st3 him some thrice, it shall not be amiss; and as many lies as will lie in thy sheet of paper, although the sheet were big enough

1 The Brownists were so called from Mr. Robert Browne, a noted separatist, in Queen Elizabeth's reign. They seem to have been the constant objects of popular satire.

2 Be curst and brief.' Curst is cross, froward, petulant.

3 Shakspeare is thought to have had Lord Coke in his mind, whose virulent abuse of Sir Walter Raleigh on his trial was conveyed in a series of THOU's. His resentment against the flagrant conduct of the attorney general on this occasion was probably heightened by the contemptuous manner in which he spoke of players in his charge at Norwich, and the severity he was always willing to exert against them.