Act III · Scene I
The same.
Hover a speech to translate it — or press play to hear it performed.
Enter DON ADRIANO DE ARMADO and MOTH
DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Warble, child; make passionate my sense of hearing.
MOTH
Concolinel.
Singing
MOTH
DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Sweet air! Go, tenderness of years; take this key,give enlargement to the swain, bring him festinatelyhither: I must employ him in a letter to my love.
MOTH
Master, will you win your love with a French brawl?DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
How meanest thou? brawling in French?
MOTH
No, my complete master: but to jig off a tune atthe tongue's end, canary to it with your feet, humourit with turning up your eyelids, sigh a note andsing a note, sometime through the throat, as if youswallowed love with singing love, sometime throughthe nose, as if you snuffed up love by smellinglove; with your hat penthouse-like o'er the shop ofyour eyes; with your arms crossed on your thin-bellydoublet like a rabbit on a spit; or your hands inyour pocket like a man after the old painting; andkeep not too long in one tune, but a snip and away.These are complements, these are humours; thesebetray nice wenches, that would be betrayed withoutthese; and make them men of note--do you noteme?--that most are affected to these.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
How hast thou purchased this experience?
MOTH
By my penny of observation.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
But O,--but O,--
MOTH
'The hobby-horse is forgot.'DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Callest thou my love 'hobby-horse'?
MOTH
No, master; the hobby-horse is but a colt, and yourlove perhaps a hackney. But have you forgot your love?DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Almost I had.
MOTH
Negligent student! learn her by heart.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
By heart and in heart, boy.
MOTH
And out of heart, master: all those three I will prove.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
What wilt thou prove?
MOTH
A man, if I live; and this, by, in, and without, uponthe instant: by heart you love her, because yourheart cannot come by her; in heart you love her,because your heart is in love with her; and out ofheart you love her, being out of heart that youcannot enjoy her.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
I am all these three.
MOTH
And three times as much more, and yet nothing atall.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Fetch hither the swain: he must carry me a letter.
MOTH
A message well sympathized; a horse to be ambassadorfor an ass.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Ha, ha! what sayest thou?
MOTH
Marry, sir, you must send the ass upon the horse,for he is very slow-gaited. But I go.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
The way is but short: away!
MOTH
As swift as lead, sir.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
The meaning, pretty ingenious?Is not lead a metal heavy, dull, and slow?
MOTH
Minime, honest master; or rather, master, no.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
I say lead is slow.
MOTH
You are too swift, sir, to say so:Is that lead slow which is fired from a gun?DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Sweet smoke of rhetoric!He reputes me a cannon; and the bullet, that's he:I shoot thee at the swain.
MOTH
Thump then and I flee.
Exit
MOTH
DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
A most acute juvenal; voluble and free of grace!By thy favour, sweet welkin, I must sigh in thy face:Most rude melancholy, valour gives thee place.My herald is return'd.
Re-enter MOTH with COSTARD
MOTH
A wonder, master! here's a costard broken in a shin.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Some enigma, some riddle: come, thy l'envoy; begin.
COSTARD
No enigma, no riddle, no l'envoy; no salve in themail, sir: O, sir, plantain, a plain plantain! nol'envoy, no l'envoy; no salve, sir, but a plantain!DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
By virtue, thou enforcest laughter; thy sillythought my spleen; the heaving of my lungs provokesme to ridiculous smiling. O, pardon me, my stars!Doth the inconsiderate take salve for l'envoy, andthe word l'envoy for a salve?
MOTH
Do the wise think them other? is not l'envoy a salve?DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
No, page: it is an epilogue or discourse, to make plainSome obscure precedence that hath tofore been sain.I will example it:The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,Were still at odds, being but three.There's the moral. Now the l'envoy.
MOTH
I will add the l'envoy. Say the moral again.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,Were still at odds, being but three.
MOTH
Until the goose came out of door,And stay'd the odds by adding four.Now will I begin your moral, and do you follow withmy l'envoy.The fox, the ape, and the humble-bee,Were still at odds, being but three.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Until the goose came out of door,Staying the odds by adding four.
MOTH
A good l'envoy, ending in the goose: would youdesire more?
COSTARD
The boy hath sold him a bargain, a goose, that's flat.Sir, your pennyworth is good, an your goose be fat.To sell a bargain well is as cunning as fast and loose:Let me see; a fat l'envoy; ay, that's a fat goose.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Come hither, come hither. How did this argument begin?
MOTH
By saying that a costard was broken in a shin.Then call'd you for the l'envoy.
COSTARD
True, and I for a plantain: thus came yourargument in;Then the boy's fat l'envoy, the goose that you bought;And he ended the market.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
But tell me; how was there a costard broken in a shin?
MOTH
I will tell you sensibly.
COSTARD
Thou hast no feeling of it, Moth: I will speak that l'envoy:I Costard, running out, that was safely within,Fell over the threshold and broke my shin.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
We will talk no more of this matter.
COSTARD
Till there be more matter in the shin.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Sirrah Costard, I will enfranchise thee.
COSTARD
O, marry me to one Frances: I smell some l'envoy,some goose, in this.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
By my sweet soul, I mean setting thee at liberty,enfreedoming thy person; thou wert immured,restrained, captivated, bound.
COSTARD
True, true; and now you will be my purgation and let me loose.DON
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
I give thee thy liberty, set thee from durance; and,in lieu thereof, impose on thee nothing but this:bear this significant
Giving a letter
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
to the country maid Jaquenetta:there is remuneration; for the best ward of minehonour is rewarding my dependents. Moth, follow.
Exit
MOTH
Like the sequel, I. Signior Costard, adieu.
COSTARD
My sweet ounce of man's flesh! my incony Jew!
Exit MOTH
COSTARD
Now will I look to his remuneration. Remuneration!O, that's the Latin word for three farthings: threefarthings--remuneration.--'What's the price of thisinkle?'--'One penny.'--'No, I'll give you aremuneration:' why, it carries it. Remuneration!why, it is a fairer name than French crown. I willnever buy and sell out of this word.
Enter BIRON
BIRON
O, my good knave Costard! exceedingly well met.
COSTARD
Pray you, sir, how much carnation ribbon may a manbuy for a remuneration?
BIRON
What is a remuneration?
COSTARD
Marry, sir, halfpenny farthing.
BIRON
Why, then, three-farthing worth of silk.
COSTARD
I thank your worship: God be wi' you!
BIRON
Stay, slave; I must employ thee:As thou wilt win my favour, good my knave,Do one thing for me that I shall entreat.
COSTARD
When would you have it done, sir?
BIRON
This afternoon.
COSTARD
Well, I will do it, sir: fare you well.
BIRON
Thou knowest not what it is.
COSTARD
I shall know, sir, when I have done it.
BIRON
Why, villain, thou must know first.
COSTARD
I will come to your worship to-morrow morning.
BIRON
It must be done this afternoon.Hark, slave, it is but this:The princess comes to hunt here in the park,And in her train there is a gentle lady;When tongues speak sweetly, then they name her name,And Rosaline they call her: ask for her;And to her white hand see thou do commendThis seal'd-up counsel. There's thy guerdon; go.
Giving him a shilling
COSTARD
Gardon, O sweet gardon! better than remuneration,a'leven-pence farthing better: most sweet gardon! Iwill do it sir, in print. Gardon! Remuneration!
Exit
BIRON
And I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been love's whip;A very beadle to a humorous sigh;A critic, nay, a night-watch constable;A domineering pedant o'er the boy;Than whom no mortal so magnificent!This whimpled, whining, purblind, wayward boy;This senior-junior, giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid;Regent of love-rhymes, lord of folded arms,The anointed sovereign of sighs and groans,Liege of all loiterers and malcontents,Dread prince of plackets, king of codpieces,Sole imperator and great generalOf trotting 'paritors:--O my little heart:--And I to be a corporal of his field,And wear his colours like a tumbler's hoop!What, I! I love! I sue! I seek a wife!A woman, that is like a German clock,Still a-repairing, ever out of frame,And never going aright, being a watch,But being watch'd that it may still go right!Nay, to be perjured, which is worst of all;And, among three, to love the worst of all;A wightly wanton with a velvet brow,With two pitch-balls stuck in her face for eyes;Ay, and by heaven, one that will do the deedThough Argus were her eunuch and her guard:And I to sigh for her! to watch for her!To pray for her! Go to; it is a plagueThat Cupid will impose for my neglectOf his almighty dreadful little might.Well, I will love, write, sigh, pray, sue and groan:Some men must love my lady and some Joan.
Exit
BIRON
LOVE'S LABOURS LOST