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With willing sport, to the wide 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 hair.
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.

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Luc. What fashion, madam, shall I make your breeches? Jul. That fits as well as Tell me, good my lord, What compass will you wear your farthingale ?5 Why, even what fashion thou best likest, Lucetta. Luc. You must needs have them with a codpiece,6 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 codpiece to stick pins on.

Jul. Lucetta, as thou lovest me, let me have What thou think'st meet, and is most mannerly. But tell me, wench, how will the world repute me

5 The farthingale, Mr. Fairholt tells us, was originally a broad roll, which made the person full about the hips. It came to be applied to the gown so widened.

WHITE.

6 Codpiece was the coarse name formerly given to a certain part of a man's nether garment. The name seems to have passed out of use long ago; the thing, unsightly as it was, continued in use till a recent period.

For undertaking so unstaid a journey?

I fear me, it will make me scandalized.

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 displeased when you are gone:
I fear me, he will scarce be pleased withal.

Jul. That is the least, Lucetta, of my fear:
A thousand oaths, an ocean of his tears,
And instances o' the infinite of love,7
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:
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 lovest 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.8
All that is mine I leave at thy dispose,

7 Infinite for infinity. So, in Much Ado, ii. 3, we have, "It is past the infinite of thought." And in Chaucer: "Although the life of it be stretched with infinite of time."

8" My longing journey," if such be the right text, seems to mean "the journey that I long to be making." Or it may mean "the journey that I shall make with continual longing to be at the end of it." See Critical Notes.- Dispose, in the next line, is for disposal. Repeatedly so. See page 80, note 4.

My goods, my lands, my reputation;
Only, in lieu therof,9 dispatch me hence.
Come, answer not, but to it presently;
I am impatient of my tarriance.

[Exeunt.

ACT III.

SCENE I. Milan. An Ante-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 discover

The law of friendship bids me to conceal ;

But, when I call to mind your gracious favours
Done to me, undeserving as I am,

My duty pricks me on to utter that

Which else no worldly good should draw from me.
Know, worthy Prince, Sir Valentine, my friend,
This night intends to steal away your daughter;
Myself am one made privy to the plot.
I know you have determined to bestow her
On Thurio, whom your gentle daughter hates;
And, should she thus be stol'n away from you,

9 The phrase "in lieu of" formerly meant in return for, or in consideration of. So in Hooker's Eccle. Pol., i. xi. 5: "But be it that God of His great liberality had determined in lieu of man's endeavours to bestow the same." And in Spenser's dedication of his Four Hymns: “Beseeching you to accept this my humble service in lieu of the great graces and honourable favours which ye daily show unto me."

It would be much vexation to your age.
Thus, for my duty's sake, I rather chose
To cross my friend in his intended drift
Than, by concealing it, heap on your head
A pack of sorrows, which would press you down,
Being unprevented, to your timeless 1 grave.

1

Duke. Proteus, I thank thee for thine honest care; Which to requite, command me while I live.

This love of theirs myself have often seen,
Haply when they have judged me fast asleep;
And oftentimes have purposed to forbid
Sir Valentine her company and my Court:
But, fearing lest my jealous aim 2 might err,
And so, unworthily, disgrace the man,
A rashness that I ever yet have shunn'd, -
I gave him gentle looks; thereby to find
That which thyself hast now disclosed to me.
And, that thou mayst perceive my fear of this,
Knowing that tender youth is soon suggested,3
I nightly lodge her in an upper tower,
The key whereof myself have ever kept;
And thence she cannot be convey'd away.

Pro. Know, noble lord, they have devised a mean

How he her chamber-window will ascend,

And with a corded ladder fetch her down;
For which the youthful lover now is gone,

And this way comes he with it presently;

1 Timeless for untimely. Repeatedly thus. So in Romeo and Juliet, v. 3: "Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end." And in Richard II., iv. 1: "Who perform'd the bloody office of his timeless end."

2 Aim, here, is guess; a common use of the word. So in Julius Cæsar, i. 2: "What you would work me to, I have some aim." And in Romeo and Juliet, i. 1: "I aim'd so near, when I supposed you loved." Also, in the next speech: "That my discovery be not aimèd at."

3 Suggested for tempted. See page 195, note 1.

Where, if it please you, you may intercept him.
But, good my lord, do it so cunningly

That my discovery be not aimèd at;
For love of you, not hate unto my friend,
Hath made me publisher of this pretence.4

Duke. Upon mine honour, he shall never know

That I had any light from thee of this.

Pro. Adieu, my lord; Sir Valentine is coming.

[Exit.

Enter VALENTINE.

Duke. Sir Valentine, whither away so fast?
Val. Please it your Grace, there is a messenger
That stays to bear my letters to my friends,
And I am going to deliver them.

Duke. Be they of much import?

Val. The tenour of them doth but signify My health, and happy being at your Court.

Duke. Nay, then no matter; stay with me awhile:

I am to break with thee of some affairs

That touch me near, wherein thou must be secret.
'Tis not unknown to thee that I have sought
To match my friend Sir Thurio to my daughter.
Val. I know it well, my lord; and, sure, the match
Were rich and honourable; besides, the gentleman
Is full of virtue, bounty, worth, and qualities
Beseeming such a wife as your fair daughter:
Cannot your Grace win her to fancy him?

Duke. No, trust me; she is peevish, sullen, froward,
Proud, disobedient, stubborn, lacking duty;

Neither regarding that she is my child,

Nor fearing me as if I were her father:
And, may I say to thee, this pride of hers,

4 Pretence for purpose or design. See page 196, note 4.

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