Vio. Alas, I took great pains to ftudy it, and 'tis poetical.

Oli. It is the more like to be feign'd. I pray you, keep it in. I heard you were fawcy at my gates, and I allow'd your approach, rather to wonder at you than to hear you. If you be not mad, be gone; if you have reason, be brief; 'tis not that time of the moon with me, to make one in fo fkipping a dialogue.

Mar. Will you hoift fail, Sir? here lyes your way. Vio.. No, good fwabber, I am to hull here a little longer, Some mollification for your giant, fweet lady.

Oli. Tell me your mind.

Vio. I am a messenger,

Oli. Sure you have fome hideous matter to deliver, when the courtefie of it is fo fearful. Speak your office.

Vio. It alone concerns your ear. I bring no overture of war, no taxation of homage; I hold the olive in my hand: my words are as full of peace as matter.

Oli. Yet you began rudely. What are you? what would you?

Vio. The rudeness that hath appear'd in me have I learn'd from my entertainment. What I am, and what I would, are as fecret as a maiden-head; to your ears divinity; to any others prophanation.

Oli. Give us the place alone. [Exit Maria.] We will hear this divinity. Now, Sir, what is your text? i Vio. Moft fweet Lady.

Oli. A comfortable doctrine, and much may be faid of

it. Where lyes the text?

Oli. In his bofom? in what chapter of his bofom?
Vio. To answer by the method, in the first of his heart.
Oli. O, I have read it; it is herefie.

more to say?

Vio, Good Madam, let me fee your face.

Have you no

Oli. Have you any commiffion from your Lord to negotiate with my face? you are now out of your text 3 but we will draw the curtain, and fhew you the picture. Look you, Sir, fuch a one I wear this prefent; is't not well done?

[Unveiling,

ม

Vio. Excellently done, if God did all.

Oli. "Tis in grain, Sir, 'twill endure wind and weather,
Vio. 'Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white
Nature's own sweet and cunning hand laid on:
Lady, you are the cruell'ft fhe alive,

If you will lead these graces to the grave,
And leave the world no copy.

Oli. O, Sir, I will not be so hard-hearted: I will give out divers schedules of my beauty. It fhall be inventoried, and every particle and utenfil labell'd to my will. As, Item, two lips indifferent red. Item, two grey eyes, with lids to them. Item, one neck, one chin, and fo forth. Were you fent. hither to praise me?

Vio. I fee you what you are, you are too proud;
But if you were the devil, you are fair.

My Lord and mafter loves you: O, fuch love
Could be but recompenc'd, tho' you were crown'd
The non-pareil of beauty.

Oli. How does he love me?

Vio. With adorations, with fertile tears,
With groans that thunder love, with fighs of fire.

Oli. Your Lord does know my mind, I cannot love him; Yet I fuppofe him virtuous, know him noble,

Of great eftate, of fresh and stainless youth;

In voices well divulg'd, free, learn'd, and valiant,
And in dimenfion and the fhape of nature
A gracious perfon; yet I cannot love him;
He might have took his answer long ago.
Vio. If I did love you in my mafter's flame,
With fuch a fuff'ring, fuch a deadly life,
In your denial I would find no fenfe:
I would not understand it.

Oli. What would you do?

Vio. Make me a willow cabin at your gate,
And call upon my foul within the house;
Write loyal canto's of contemned love,
And fing them loud even in the dead of night:
Hollow your name to the reverberant hills,
And make the babling goffip of the air
Cry out, Olivia: O, you should not reft

X 2

Be

Between the elements of air and earth,
But you should pity me.

Oli. You might do much :
What is your parentage?

Vio. Above my fortunes, yet my state is well: I am a gentleman.

Oli. Get you to your Lord

I cannot love him: let him fend no more,
Unless, perchance, you come to me again,
To tell me how he takes it; fare you well:
I thank you for your pains; spend this for me.
Vio. I am no fee'd poft, Lady; keep your purse:
My mafter, not my felf, lacks recompence.
Love makes his heart of flint, that you shall love;
And let your fervour, like my master's, be
Plac'd in contempt! farewel, fair cruelty.
Oli. What is your parentage?

Above my fortunes, yet my fate is well:

[Exit.

I am a gentleman I'll be fworn thou art.
Thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, actions, and fpirit,
Do give thee five-fold blazon

not too faft.

Soft, foft, unless the man the mafter were.

How now? even fo quickly may one catch

The plague? methinks I feel this youth's perfections,
With an invifible and subtile stealth

Το creep in at mine eyes. Well, let it be

What hoa, Malvolio !

Enter Malvolio.

Mal. Here, Madam, at your fervice.

Oli. Run after that fame peevish messenger,
The Duke's man; he left here this ring behind him
Would I, or not: tell him, I'll none of it.
Defire him not to flatter with his Lord,
Nor hold him up with hopes; I am not for him:
If that the youth will come this way to-morrow,
I'll give him reafon for't. Hye thee, Malvolio.
Mal. Madam, I will.

Oli. I do I know not what, and fear to find
Mine eye too great a flatterer for my mind:

[Exit.

Fate,

Fate, fhew thy force; our felves we do not owe;
What is decreed muft be; and be this fo!

[Exit.

Enter Antonio and Sebaftian.

ILL you ftay no longer? nor will you not that I go with you?

Ant. W that

me;

Seb. By your patience, no: my ftars fhine darkly over the malignancy of my fate might perhaps diftemper yours; therefore I crave of you your leave, that I may bear my evils alone. It were a bad recompence for your love, to lay any of them on you.

Ant. Let me yet know of you, whither you are bound Scb. No, footh, Sir; my determinate voyage is meer extravagancy: but I perceive in you fo excellent a touch of modefty, that you will not extort from me what I am wil ling to keep in; therefore it charges me in manners the rather to exprefs my felf: you must know of me then, Antonio, my name is Sebaftian, which I call'd Rodorigo; my father was that Sebaftian of Metelin, whom I know you have heard of. He left behind him, my self, and a fifter, both born in one hour; if the heav'ns had been pleas'd, would we had fo ended! but you, Sir, alter'd that, for fome hours before you took me from the breach of the fea, was my fifter drown'd.

Ant. Alas the day!

Seb. A Lady, Sir, who, tho' it was faid fhe much refembled me, was yet of many accounted beautiful; but tho' I could not with fuch eftimable wonder over-far believe that, yet thus far I will boldly publish her, fhe bore a mind that envy could not but call fair: fhe is drown'd already, Sir, with falt water, tho' I feem to drown her remembrance again with more.

Ant. Pardon me, Sir, your bad entertainment.
Seb. O good Antonio, forgive me your trouble.

Ant. If you will not murther me for my love, let me be your fervant.

Seb. If you will not undo what you have done, kill him whom you have recover'd, defire it not,

X. 3

that is,

Fare ye

well

well at once; my bofom is full of kindness, and I am yet fo near the manners of my mother, that upon the least occafion more, mine eyes will tell tales of me: I am bound to the Duke Orfino's Court; farewel.

[Exit.

Ant. The gentleness of all the Gods go with thee!
I have made enemies in Orfino's Court,
Elfe would I very fhortly fee thee there:
But come what may, I do adore thee fo,
That danger fhall feem fport, and I will

SCENE II.

go.

[Exit.

Enter Viola and Malvolio at feveral doors. Mal. Were not you e'en now with the Countess Olivia! Vi. Even now, Sir ; on a moderate pace I have fince arriv'd but hither.

Mal. She returns this ring to you, Sir; for being your Lord's fhe'll none of it. You might have saved me my pains, to have taken it away your felf. She adds moreover, that you should put your Lord into a defperate affurance, fhe will none of him. And one thing more, that you be never fo hardy to come again in his affairs, unless it be to report your Lord's taking of this: receive it fo.

Vio. She took the ring of me, I'll none of it.

Mal. Come, Sir, you peevishly threw it to her, and her will is, it fhould be fo return'd: if it be worth stooping for, there it lyes in your eye; if not, be it his that finds it. [Exit. Vio. None of my Lord's ring? why, he fent her none, I left no ring with her; what means this Lady?

Fortune forbid my outfide fhould have charm'd her!
She made good view of me, indeed fo much,
That fure methought her eyes did let her tongue,
For fhe did fpeak in ftarts diftractedly:
She loves me fure, the cunning of her paffion
Invites me in this churlifh meffenger.
I fhould be man, if it be fo: as 'tis,
Poor Lady, the were better love a dream.
Difguife! I fee thou art a wickedness,
Wherein the pregnant enemy does much.
How eafie is it, for the proper falle

In womens waxen hearts to fet their forms!

Alas,