Act II
Scene I
Paris. The King’s palace.
Flourish of cornets. Enter the King, attended with divers young Lords taking leave for the Florentine war; Bertram, and Parolles. | |
King |
Farewell, young lords; these warlike principles
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First Lord |
’Tis our hope, sir,
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King |
No, no, it cannot be; and yet my heart
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Second Lord | Health, at your bidding, serve your majesty! |
King |
Those girls of Italy, take heed of them:
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Both | Our hearts receive your warnings. |
King | Farewell. Come hither to me. Exit, attended. |
First Lord | O, my sweet lord, that you will stay behind us! |
Parolles | ’Tis not his fault, the spark. |
Second Lord | O, ’tis brave wars! |
Parolles | Most admirable: I have seen those wars. |
Bertram |
I am commanded here, and kept a coil with
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Parolles | An thy mind stand to’t, boy, steal away bravely. |
Bertram |
I shall stay here the forehorse to a smock,
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First Lord | There’s honour in the theft. |
Parolles | Commit it, count. |
Second Lord | I am your accessary; and so, farewell. |
Bertram | I grow to you, and our parting is a tortured body. |
First Lord | Farewell, captain. |
Second Lord | Sweet Monsieur Parolles! |
Parolles | Noble heroes, my sword and yours are kin. Good sparks and lustrous, a word, good metals: you shall find in the regiment of the Spinii one Captain Spurio, with his cicatrice, an emblem of war, here on his sinister cheek; it was this very sword entrenched it: say to him, I live; and observe his reports for me. |
First Lord | We shall, noble captain. Exeunt Lords. |
Parolles | Mars dote on you for his novices! what will ye do? |
Bertram | Stay: the king. |
Re-enter King. Bertram and Parolles retire. | |
Parolles | To Bertram. Use a more spacious ceremony to the noble lords; you have restrained yourself within the list of too cold an adieu: be more expressive to them: for they wear themselves in the cap of the time, there do muster true gait, eat, speak, and move under the influence of the most received star; and though the devil lead the measure, such are to be followed: after them, and take a more dilated farewell. |
Bertram | And I will do so. |
Parolles | Worthy fellows; and like to prove most sinewy sword-men. Exeunt Bertram and Parolles. |
Enter Lafeu. | |
Lafeu | Kneeling. Pardon, my lord, for me and for my tidings. |
King | I’ll fee thee to stand up. |
Lafeu |
Then here’s a man stands, that has brought his pardon.
|
King |
I would I had; so I had broke thy pate,
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Lafeu |
Good faith, across: but, my good lord ’tis thus;
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King | No. |
Lafeu |
O, will you eat no grapes, my royal fox?
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King | What “her” is this? |
Lafeu |
Why, Doctor She: my lord, there’s one arrived,
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King |
Now, good Lafeu,
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Lafeu |
Nay, I’ll fit you,
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King | Thus he his special nothing ever prologues. |
Re-enter Lafeu, with Helena. | |
Lafeu | Nay, come your ways. |
King | This haste hath wings indeed. |
Lafeu |
Nay, come your ways;
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King | Now, fair one, does your business follow us? |
Helena |
Ay, my good lord.
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King | I knew him. |
Helena |
The rather will I spare my praises towards him;
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King |
We thank you, maiden;
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Helena |
My duty then shall pay me for my pains:
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King |
I cannot give thee less, to be call’d grateful:
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Helena |
What I can do can do no hurt to try,
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King |
I must not hear thee; fare thee well, kind maid;
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Helena |
Inspired merit so by breath is barr’d:
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King |
Are thou so confident? within what space
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Helena |
The great’st grace lending grace,
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King |
Upon thy certainty and confidence
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Helena |
Tax of impudence,
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King |
Methinks in thee some blessed spirit doth speak
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Helena |
If I break time, or flinch in property
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King | Make thy demand. |
Helena | But will you make it even? |
King | Ay, by my sceptre and my hopes of heaven. |
Helena |
Then shalt thou give me with thy kingly hand
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King |
Here is my hand; the premises observed,
|
Scene II
Rousillon. The Count’s palace.
Enter Countess and Clown. | |
Countess | Come on, sir; I shall now put you to the height of your breeding. |
Clown | I will show myself highly fed and lowly taught: I know my business is but to the court. |
Countess | To the court! why, what place make you special, when you put off that with such contempt? But to the court! |
Clown | Truly, madam, if God have lent a man any manners, he may easily put it off at court: he that cannot make a leg, put off’s cap, kiss his hand and say nothing, has neither leg, hands, lip, nor cap; and indeed such a fellow, to say precisely, were not for the court; but for me, I have an answer will serve all men. |
Countess | Marry, that’s a bountiful answer that fits all questions. |
Clown | It is like a barber’s chair that fits all buttocks, the pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawn buttock, or any buttock. |
Countess | Will your answer serve fit to all questions? |
Clown | As fit as ten groats is for the hand of an attorney, as your French crown for your taffeta punk, as Tib’s rush for Tom’s forefinger, as a pancake for Shrove Tuesday, a morris for May-day, as the nail to his hole, the cuckold to his horn, as a scolding queen to a wrangling knave, as the nun’s lip to the friar’s mouth, nay, as the pudding to his skin. |
Countess | Have you, I say, an answer of such fitness for all questions? |
Clown | From below your duke to beneath your constable, it will fit any question. |
Countess | It must be an answer of most monstrous size that must fit all demands. |
Clown | But a trifle neither, in good faith, if the learned should speak truth of it: here it is, and all that belongs to’t. Ask me if I am a courtier: it shall do you no harm to learn. |
Countess | To be young again, if we could: I will be a fool in question, hoping to be the wiser by your answer. I pray you, sir, are you a courtier? |
Clown | O Lord, sir! There’s a simple putting off. More, more, a hundred of them. |
Countess | Sir, I am a poor friend of yours, that loves you. |
Clown | O Lord, sir! Thick, thick, spare not me. |
Countess | I think, sir, you can eat none of this homely meat. |
Clown | O Lord, sir! Nay, put me to’t, I warrant you. |
Countess | You were lately whipped, sir, as I think. |
Clown | O Lord, sir! spare not me. |
Countess | Do you cry, “O Lord, sir!” at your whipping, and “spare not me”? Indeed your “O Lord, sir!” is very sequent to your whipping: you would answer very well to a whipping, if you were but bound to’t. |
Clown | I ne’er had worse luck in my life in my “O Lord, sir!” I see things may serve long, but not serve ever. |
Countess |
I play the noble housewife with the time,
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Clown | O Lord, sir! why, there’t serves well again. |
Countess |
An end, sir; to your business. Give Helen this,
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Clown | Not much commendation to them. |
Countess | Not much employment for you: you understand me? |
Clown | Most fruitfully: I am there before my legs. |
Countess | Haste you again. Exeunt severally. |
Scene III
Paris. The King’s palace.
Enter Bertram, Lafeu, and Parolles. | |
Lafeu | They say miracles are past; and we have our philosophical persons, to make modern and familiar, things supernatural and causeless. Hence is it that we make trifles of terrors, ensconcing ourselves into seeming knowledge, when we should submit ourselves to an unknown fear. |
Parolles | Why, ’tis the rarest argument of wonder that hath shot out in our latter times. |
Bertram | And so ’tis. |
Lafeu | To be relinquished of the artists— |
Parolles | So I say. |
Lafeu | Both of Galen and Paracelsus. |
Parolles | So I say. |
Lafeu | Of all the learned and authentic fellows— |
Parolles | Right; so I say. |
Lafeu | That gave him out incurable— |
Parolles | Why, there ’tis; so say I too. |
Lafeu | Not to be helped— |
Parolles | Right; as ’twere, a man assured of a— |
Lafeu | Uncertain life, and sure death. |
Parolles | Just, you say well; so would I have said. |
Lafeu | I may truly say, it is a novelty to the world. |
Parolles | It is, indeed: if you will have it in showing, you shall read it in—what do you call there? |
Lafeu | A showing of a heavenly effect in an earthly actor. |
Parolles | That’s it; I would have said the very same. |
Lafeu | Why, your dolphin is not lustier: ’fore me, I speak in respect— |
Parolles | Nay, ’tis strange, ’tis very strange, that is the brief and the tedious of it; and he’s of a most facinerious spirit that will not acknowledge it to be the— |
Lafeu | Very hand of heaven. |
Parolles | Ay, so I say. |
Lafeu | In a most weak—pausing and debile minister, great power, great transcendence: which should, indeed, give us a further use to be made than alone the recovery of the king, as to be—pausing generally thankful. |
Parolles | I would have said it; you say well. Here comes the king. |
Enter King, Helena, and Attendants. Lafeu and Parolles retire. | |
Lafeu | Lustig, as the Dutchman says: I’ll like a maid the better, whilst I have a tooth in my head: why, he’s able to lead her a coranto. |
Parolles | Mort du vinaigre! is not this Helen? |
Lafeu | ’Fore God, I think so. |
King |
Go, call before me all the lords in court.
|
Enter three or four Lords. | |
Fair maid, send forth thine eye: this youthful parcel
|
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Helena |
To each of you one fair and virtuous mistress
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Lafeu |
I’ld give bay Curtal and his furniture,
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King |
Peruse them well:
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Helena |
Gentlemen,
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All | We understand it, and thank heaven for you. |
Helena |
I am a simple maid, and therein wealthiest,
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King |
Make choice; and, see,
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Helena |
Now, Dian, from thy altar do I fly,
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First Lord | And grant it. |
Helena | Thanks, sir; all the rest is mute. |
Lafeu | I had rather be in this choice than throw ames-ace for my life. |
Helena |
The honour, sir, that flames in your fair eyes,
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Second Lord | No better, if you please. |
Helena |
My wish receive,
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Lafeu | Do all they deny her? An they were sons of mine, I’d have them whipped; or I would send them to the Turk, to make eunuchs of. |
Helena |
Be not afraid that I your hand should take;
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Lafeu | These boys are boys of ice, they’ll none have her: sure, they are bastards to the English; the French ne’er got ’em. |
Helena |
You are too young, too happy, and too good,
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Fourth Lord | Fair one, I think not so. |
Lafeu | There’s one grape yet; I am sure thy father drunk wine: but if thou be’st not an ass, I am a youth of fourteen; I have known thee already. |
Helena |
To Bertram. I dare not say I take you; but I give
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King | Why, then, young Bertram, take her; she’s thy wife. |
Bertram |
My wife, my liege! I shall beseech your highness,
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King |
Know’st thou not, Bertram,
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Bertram |
Yes, my good lord;
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King | Thou know’st she has raised me from my sickly bed. |
Bertram |
But follows it, my lord, to bring me down
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King |
’Tis only title thou disdain’st in her, the which
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Bertram | I cannot love her, nor will strive to do’t. |
King | Thou wrong’st thyself, if thou shouldst strive to choose. |
Helena |
That you are well restored, my lord, I’m glad:
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King |
My honour’s at the stake; which to defeat,
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Bertram |
Pardon, my gracious lord; for I submit
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King |
Take her by the hand,
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Bertram | I take her hand. |
King |
Good fortune and the favour of the king
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Lafeu | Advancing. Do you hear, monsieur? a word with you. |
Parolles | Your pleasure, sir? |
Lafeu | Your lord and master did well to make his recantation. |
Parolles | Recantation! My lord! my master! |
Lafeu | Ay; is it not a language I speak? |
Parolles | A most harsh one, and not to be understood without bloody succeeding. My master! |
Lafeu | Are you companion to the Count Rousillon? |
Parolles | To any count, to all counts, to what is man. |
Lafeu | To what is count’s man: count’s master is of another style. |
Parolles | You are too old, sir; let it satisfy you, you are too old. |
Lafeu | I must tell thee, sirrah, I write man; to which title age cannot bring thee. |
Parolles | What I dare too well do, I dare not do. |
Lafeu | I did think thee, for two ordinaries, to be a pretty wise fellow; thou didst make tolerable vent of thy travel; it might pass: yet the scarfs and the bannerets about thee did manifoldly dissuade me from believing thee a vessel of too great a burthen. I have now found thee; when I lose thee again, I care not: yet art thou good for nothing but taking up; and that thou’rt scarce worth. |
Parolles | Hadst thou not the privilege of antiquity upon thee— |
Lafeu | Do not plunge thyself too far in anger, lest thou hasten thy trial; which if—Lord have mercy on thee for a hen! So, my good window of lattice, fare thee well: thy casement I need not open, for I look through thee. Give me thy hand. |
Parolles | My lord, you give me most egregious indignity. |
Lafeu | Ay, with all my heart; and thou art worthy of it. |
Parolles | I have not, my lord, deserved it. |
Lafeu | Yes, good faith, every dram of it; and I will not bate thee a scruple. |
Parolles | Well, I shall be wiser. |
Lafeu | Even as soon as thou canst, for thou hast to pull at a smack o’ the contrary. If ever thou be’st bound in thy scarf and beaten, thou shalt find what it is to be proud of thy bondage. I have a desire to hold my acquaintance with thee, or rather my knowledge, that I may say in the default, he is a man I know. |
Parolles | My lord, you do me most insupportable vexation. |
Lafeu | I would it were hell-pains for thy sake, and my poor doing eternal: for doing I am past; as I will by thee, in what motion age will give me leave. Exit. |
Parolles | Well, thou hast a son shall take this disgrace off me; scurvy, old, filthy, scurvy lord! Well, I must be patient; there is no fettering of authority. I’ll beat him, by my life, if I can meet him with any convenience, an he were double and double a lord. I’ll have no more pity of his age than I would of—I’ll beat him, an if I could but meet him again. |
Re-enter Lafeu. | |
Lafeu | Sirrah, your lord and master’s married; there’s news for you: you have a new mistress. |
Parolles | I most unfeignedly beseech your lordship to make some reservation of your wrongs: he is my good lord: whom I serve above is my master. |
Lafeu | Who? God? |
Parolles | Ay, sir. |
Lafeu | The devil it is that’s thy master. Why dost thou garter up thy arms o’ this fashion? dost make hose of sleeves? do other servants so? Thou wert best set thy lower part where thy nose stands. By mine honour, if I were but two hours younger, I’ld beat thee: methinks, thou art a general offence, and every man should beat thee: I think thou wast created for men to breathe themselves upon thee. |
Parolles | This is hard and undeserved measure, my lord. |
Lafeu | Go to, sir; you were beaten in Italy for picking a kernel out of a pomegranate; you are a vagabond and no true traveller: you are more saucy with lords and honourable personages than the commission of your birth and virtue gives you heraldry. You are not worth another word, else I’ld call you knave. I leave you. Exit. |
Parolles | Good, very good; it is so then: good, very good; let it be concealed awhile. |
Re-enter Bertram. | |
Bertram | Undone, and forfeited to cares for ever! |
Parolles | What’s the matter, sweet-heart? |
Bertram |
Although before the solemn priest I have sworn,
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Parolles | What, what, sweet-heart? |
Bertram |
O my Parolles, they have married me!
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Parolles |
France is a dog-hole, and it no more merits
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Bertram | There’s letters from my mother: what the import is, I know not yet. |
Parolles |
Ay, that would be known. To the wars, my boy, to the wars!
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Bertram |
It shall be so: I’ll send her to my house,
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Parolles | Will this capriccio hold in thee? art sure? |
Bertram |
Go with me to my chamber, and advise me.
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Parolles |
Why, these balls bound; there’s noise in it. ’Tis hard:
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Scene IV
Paris. The King’s palace.
Enter Helena and Clown. | |
Helena | My mother greets me kindly: is she well? |
Clown | She is not well; but yet she has her health: she’s very merry; but yet she is not well: but thanks be given, she’s very well and wants nothing i’ the world; but yet she is not well. |
Helena | If she be very well, what does she ail, that she’s not very well? |
Clown | Truly, she’s very well indeed, but for two things. |
Helena | What two things? |
Clown | One, that she’s not in heaven, whither God send her quickly! the other that she’s in earth, from whence God send her quickly! |
Enter Parolles. | |
Parolles | Bless you, my fortunate lady! |
Helena | I hope, sir, I have your good will to have mine own good fortunes. |
Parolles | You had my prayers to lead them on; and to keep them on, have them still. O, my knave, how does my old lady? |
Clown | So that you had her wrinkles and I her money, I would she did as you say. |
Parolles | Why, I say nothing. |
Clown | Marry, you are the wiser man; for many a man’s tongue shakes out his master’s undoing: to say nothing, to do nothing, to know nothing, and to have nothing, is to be a great part of your title; which is within a very little of nothing. |
Parolles | Away! thou’rt a knave. |
Clown | You should have said, sir, before a knave thou’rt a knave; that’s, before me thou’rt a knave: this had been truth, sir. |
Parolles | Go to, thou art a witty fool; I have found thee. |
Clown | Did you find me in yourself, sir? or were you taught to find me? The search, sir, was profitable; and much fool may you find in you, even to the world’s pleasure and the increase of laughter. |
Parolles |
A good knave, i’ faith, and well fed.
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Helena | What’s his will else? |
Parolles |
That you will take your instant leave o’ the king
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Helena | What more commands he? |
Parolles |
That, having this obtain’d, you presently
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Helena | In every thing I wait upon his will. |
Parolles | I shall report it so. |
Helena | I pray you. Exit Parolles. Come, sirrah. Exeunt. |
Scene V
Paris. The King’s palace.
Enter Lafeu and Bertram. | |
Lafeu | But I hope your lordship thinks not him a soldier. |
Bertram | Yes, my lord, and of very valiant approof. |
Lafeu | You have it from his own deliverance. |
Bertram | And by other warranted testimony. |
Lafeu | Then my dial goes not true: I took this lark for a bunting. |
Bertram | I do assure you, my lord, he is very great in knowledge and accordingly valiant. |
Lafeu | I have then sinned against his experience and transgressed against his valour; and my state that way is dangerous, since I cannot yet find in my heart to repent. Here he comes: I pray you, make us friends; I will pursue the amity. |
Enter Parolles. | |
Parolles | To Bertram. These things shall be done, sir. |
Lafeu | Pray you, sir, who’s his tailor? |
Parolles | Sir? |
Lafeu | O, I know him well, I, sir; he, sir, ’s a good workman, a very good tailor. |
Bertram | Aside to Parolles. Is she gone to the king? |
Parolles | She is. |
Bertram | Will she away to-night? |
Parolles | As you’ll have her. |
Bertram |
I have writ my letters, casketed my treasure,
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Lafeu | A good traveller is something at the latter end of a dinner; but one that lies three thirds and uses a known truth to pass a thousand nothings with, should be once heard and thrice beaten. God save you, captain. |
Bertram | Is there any unkindness between my lord and you, monsieur? |
Parolles | I know not how I have deserved to run into my lord’s displeasure. |
Lafeu | You have made shift to run into’t, boots and spurs and all, like him that leaped into the custard; and out of it you’ll run again, rather than suffer question for your residence. |
Bertram | It may be you have mistaken him, my lord. |
Lafeu | And shall do so ever, though I took him at ’s prayers. Fare you well, my lord; and believe this of me, there can be no kernel in this light nut; the soul of this man is his clothes. Trust him not in matter of heavy consequence; I have kept of them tame, and know their natures. Farewell, monsieur: I have spoken better of you than you have or will to deserve at my hand; but we must do good against evil. Exit. |
Parolles | An idle lord. I swear. |
Bertram | I think so. |
Parolles | Why, do you not know him? |
Bertram |
Yes, I do know him well, and common speech
|
Enter Helena. | |
Helena |
I have, sir, as I was commanded from you,
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Bertram |
I shall obey his will.
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Helena |
Sir, I can nothing say,
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Bertram | Come, come, no more of that. |
Helena |
And ever shall
|
Bertram |
Let that go:
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Helena | Pray, sir, your pardon. |
Bertram | Well, what would you say? |
Helena |
I am not worthy of the wealth I owe,
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Bertram | What would you have? |
Helena |
Something; and scarce so much: nothing, indeed.
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Bertram | I pray you, stay not, but in haste to horse. |
Helena | I shall not break your bidding, good my lord. |
Bertram |
Where are my other men, monsieur? Farewell. Exit Helena.
|
Parolles | Bravely, coragio! Exeunt. |