ROSALIND Why horns – which such as you are fain to be
beholding to your wives for: but he comes armed in his
fortune, and prevents the slander of his wife.
ORLANDO Virtue is no horn-maker; and my Rosalind is
virtuous.
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ROSALIND And I am your Rosalind.
CELIA It pleases him to call you so: but he hath a
Rosalind of a better leer than you.
ROSALIND Come, woo me, woo me; for now I am in a
holiday humour and like enough to consent. What
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would you say to me now, and I were your very very
Rosalind?
ORLANDO I would kiss before I spoke.
ROSALIND Nay, you were better speak first, and when
you were gravelled for lack of matter, you might take
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occasion to kiss. Very good orators when they are out,
they will spit, and for lovers lacking – God warr’nt
us! – matter, the cleanliest shift is to kiss.
ORLANDO How if the kiss be denied?
ROSALIND Then she puts you to entreaty, and there
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begins new matter.
ORLANDO Who could be out, being before his beloved
mistress?
ROSALIND Marry that should you, if I were your
mistress, or I should think my honesty ranker than my
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wit.
ORLANDO What, of my suit?
ROSALIND Not out of your apparel, and yet out of your
suit. Am not I your Rosalind?
ORLANDO I take some joy to say you are, because I
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would be talking of her.
ROSALIND Well, in her person, I say I will not have you.
ORLANDO Then in mine own person, I die.
ROSALIND No, faith, die by attorney. The poor world is
almost six thousand years old, and in all this time
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there was not any man died in his own person,
videlicet, in a love-cause. Troilus had his brains
dashed out with a Grecian club, yet he did what he
could to die before, and he is one of the patterns of
love. Leander, he would have lived many a fair year
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though Hero had turned nun, if it had not been for a
hot mid summer night; for, good youth, he went but
forth to wash him in the Hellespont, and being taken
with the cramp, was drowned, and the foolish
chroniclers of that age found it was Hero of Sestos.
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But these are all lies: men have died from time to time
and worms have eaten them, but not for love.
ORLANDO I would not have my right Rosalind of this
mind, for I protest her frown might kill me.
ROSALIND By this hand, it will not kill a fly. But come,
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now I will be your Rosalind in a more coming-on
disposition; and ask me what you will, I will grant it.
ORLANDO Then love me Rosalind.
ROSALIND Yes faith will I, Fridays and Saturdays and
all.
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ORLANDO And wilt thou have me?
ROSALIND Ay, and twenty such.
ORLANDO What sayest thou?
ROSALIND Are you not good?
ORLANDO I hope so.
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ROSALIND Why then, can one desire too much of a good
thing? Come sister, you shall be the priest and marry
us. Give me your hand Orlando. What do you say
sister?
ORLANDO Pray thee marry us.
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CELIA I cannot say the words.
ROSALIND You must begin, ‘Will you Orlando – ’
CELIA Go to. Will you Orlando have to wife this
Rosalind?
ORLANDO I will.
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ROSALIND Ay, but when?
ORLANDO Why now, as fast as she can marry us.
ROSALIND Then you must say ‘I take thee Rosalind for
wife.’
ORLANDO I take thee Rosalind for wife.
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ROSALIND I might ask you for your commission; but I
do take thee Orlando for my husband. There’s a girl
goes before the priest, and certainly a woman’s
thought runs before her actions.
ORLANDO So do all thoughts, they are winged.
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ROSALIND Now tell me how long you would have her,
after you have possessed her?
ORLANDO For ever, and a day.
ROSALIND Say a day, without the ever. No, no, Orlando,
men are April when they woo, December when they
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wed. Maids are May when they are maids, but the sky
changes when they are wives. I will be more jealous of
thee than a Barbary cock-pigeon over his hen, more
clamorous than a parrot against rain, more new-
fangled than an ape, more giddy in my desires than a
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monkey. I will weep for nothing, like Diana in the
fountain, and I will do that when you are disposed to
be merry. I will laugh like a hyen, and that when thou
art inclined to sleep.
ORLANDO But will my Rosalind do so?
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ROSALIND By my life, she will do as I do.
ORLANDO O but she is wise.
ROSALIND Or else she could not have the wit to do this.
The wiser, the waywarder. Make the doors upon a
woman’s wit, and it will out at the casement; shut
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that, and ’twill out at the keyhole; stop that, ’twill fly
with the smoke out at the chimney.
ORLANDO A man that had a wife with such a wit, he
might say, ‘Wit, whither wilt?’
ROSALIND Nay, you might keep that check for it, till you
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met your wife’s wit going to your neighbour’s bed.
ORLANDO And what wit could wit have to excuse that?
ROSALIND Marry to say she came to seek you there. You
shall never take her without her answer, unless you
take her without her tongue. O that woman that
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cannot make her fault her husband’s occasion, let her
never nurse her child herself, for she will breed it like
a fool.
ORLANDO For these two hours Rosalind, I will leave
thee.
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ROSALIND Alas, dear love, I cannot lack thee two hours.
ORLANDO I must attend the Duke at dinner. By two
o’clock I will be with thee again.
ROSALIND Ay, go your ways, go your ways. I knew what
you would prove. My friends told me as much, and I
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thought no less. That flattering tongue of yours won
me. ’Tis but one cast away, and so, come death! Two
o’clock is your hour?
ORLANDO Ay, sweet Rosalind.
ROSALIND By my troth, and in good earnest, and so
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God mend me, and by all pretty oaths that are not
dangerous, if you break one jot of your promise, or
come one minute behind your hour, I will think you
the most pathetical break-promise, and the most
hollow lover, and the most unworthy of her you call
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Rosalind, that may be chosen out of the gross band
of the unfaithful: therefore beware my censure and
keep your promise.
ORLANDO With no less religion than if thou wert indeed
my Rosalind. So adieu.
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&n
bsp; ROSALIND Well, Time is the old justice that examines
all such offenders, and let Time try. Adieu.
Exit Orlando.
CELIA You have simply misused our sex in your love-
prate. We must have your doublet and hose plucked
over your head, and show the world what the bird hath
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done to her own nest.
ROSALIND O coz, coz, coz, my pretty little coz, that
thou didst know how many fathom deep I am in love!
But it cannot be sounded. My affection hath an
unknown bottom, like the Bay of Portugal.
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CELIA Or rather bottomless, that as fast as you pour
affection in, it runs out.
ROSALIND No. That same wicked bastard of Venus, that
was begot of thought, conceived of spleen and born of
madness, that blind rascally boy that abuses everyone’s
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eyes because his own are out, let him be judge how
deep I am in love. I’ll tell thee Aliena, I cannot be out
of the sight of Orlando. I’ll go find a shadow and sigh
till he come.
CELIA And I’ll sleep. Exeunt.
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4.2 Enter JAQUES and Lords, like foresters.
JAQUES Which is he that killed the deer?
1 LORD Sir, it was I.
JAQUES Let’s present him to the Duke like a Roman
conqueror; and it would do well to set the deer’s horns
upon his head for a branch of victory. Have you no
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song, forester, for this purpose?
2 LORD Yes sir.
JAQUES Sing it. ’Tis no matter how it be in tune, so it
make noise enough.
[Given a note, they sing.]
LORDS What shall he have that kill’d the deer?
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His leather skin and horns to wear.
Then sing him home. The rest shall bear
This burden.
Take thou no scorn to wear the horn,
It was a crest ere thou wast born.
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Thy father’s father wore it,
And thy father bore it.
The horn, the horn, the lusty horn,
Is not a thing to laugh to scorn. Exeunt.
4.3 Enter ROSALIND and CELIA.
ROSALIND How say you now, is it not past two o’clock?
And here much Orlando!
CELIA I warrant you, with pure love and troubled brain,
he hath ta’en his bow and arrows, and is gone forth to
sleep. Look who comes here.
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Enter SILVIUS.
SILVIUS My errand is to you, fair youth.
My gentle Phebe did bid me give you this.
I know not the contents, but as I guess
By the stern brow and waspish action
Which she did use as she was writing of it,
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It bears an angry tenour. Pardon me.
I am but as a guiltless messenger.
ROSALIND Patience herself would startle at this letter,
And play the swaggerer. Bear this, bear all.
She says I am not fair, that I lack manners.
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She calls me proud, and that she could not love me,
Were man as rare as phoenix. ’Od’s my will,
Her love is not the hare that I do hunt;
Why writes she so to me? Well shepherd, well,
This is a letter of your own device.
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SILVIUS No, I protest, I know not the contents,
Phebe did write it.
ROSALIND Come, come, you are a fool,
And turn’d into the extremity of love.
I saw her hand. She has a leathern hand,
A freestone-colour’d hand. I verily did think
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That her old gloves were on, but ’twas her hands.
She has a hussif’s hand. But that’s no matter.
I say she never did invent this letter.
This is a man’s invention, and his hand.
SILVIUS Sure it is hers.
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ROSALIND Why, ’tis a boisterous and a cruel style,
A style for challengers. Why, she defies me,
Like Turk to Christian. Women’s gentle brain
Could not drop forth such giant-rude invention,
Such Ethiop words, blacker in their effect
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Than in their countenance. Will you hear the letter?
SILVIUS So please you, for I never heard it yet;
Yet heard too much of Phebe’s cruelty.
ROSALIND
She Phebes me. Mark how the tyrant writes.
[Reads.] Art thou god to shepherd turn’d,
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That a maiden’s heart hath burn’d?
Can a woman rail thus?
SILVIUS Call you this railing?
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 72
