I will

your very faithful feeder be,

And buy it with your gold right suddenly. [Exeunt.

SCENE V.

The same.

Enter AMIENS, JAQUES, and Others.

SONG.

Ami. Under the greenwood tree,

Who loves to lie with me,

And tune his merry note
Unto the sweet bird's throat,
Come hither, come hither, come hither;

Here shall he see

No enemy,

But winter and rough weather.

Jaq. More, more, I pr'ythee, more.

Ami. It will make you melancholy, monsieur Jaques.

I

Jaq. I thank it. More, I pr'ythee, more. can suck melancholy out of a song, as a weazel sucks eggs: More, I pr'ythee, more.

2

Ami. My voice is ragged; I know, I cannot please you.

Jaq. I do not desire you to please me, I do desire you to sing: Come, more; another stanza; Call you them stanzas?

Ami. What you will, monsieur Jaques.

Jaq. Nay, I care not for their names; they owe me nothing: Will you sing?

2 ragged;] Our modern editors (Mr. Malone excepted) read rugged; but ragged had anciently the same meaning.

VOL. III.

N

Ami. More at your request, than to please myself. Jaq. Well then, if ever I thank any man, I'll thank you: but that they call compliment, is like the encounter of two dog-apes; and when a man thanks me heartily, methinks, I have given him a penny, and he renders me the beggarly thanks. Come, sing; and you that will not, hold your tongues.

Ami. Well, I'll end the song.-Sirs, cover the while; the duke will drink under this tree:-he hath been all this day to look you.

Jaq. And I have been all this day to avoid him. He is too dispútable3 for my company: I think of as many matters as he; but I give heaven thanks, and make no boast of them. Come, warble, come.

SONG.

Who doth ambition shun, [All together here.
And loves to live i the sun,

Seeking the food he eats,

And pleas'd with what he gets,

Come hither, come hither, come hither;

Here shall he see

No enemy,

But winter and rough weather.

Jaq. I'll give you a verse to this note, that I made

yesterday in despite of Ami. And I'll sing it. Jaq. Thus it goes:

my invention.

If it do come to pass,
That any man turn ass,
Leaving his wealth and ease,
A stubborn will to please,

• disputable-] For disputatious.

Ducdame, ducdame, ducdame;1

Here shall he see,

Gross fools as he,

An if he will come to Ami.

Ami. What's that ducdame?

Jaq. 'Tis a Greek invocation, to call fools into a circle. I'll go sleep if I can; if I cannot, I'll rail against all the first-born of Egypt.

Ami. And I'll go seek the duke; his banquet is prepar❜d. [Exeunt severally.

SCENE VI.

The same.

Enter ORLANDO and ADAM.

Adam. Dear master, I can go no further: O, I die for food! Here lie I down, and measure out my grave. Farewell, kind master.

Orl. Why, how now, Adam! no greater heart in thee? Live a little; comfort a little; cheer thyself a little: If this uncouth forest yield any thing savage, I will either be food for it, or bring it for food to thee. Thy conceit is nearer death than thy powers. For my sake, be comfortable; hold death awhile at the arm's end: I will here be with thee presently; and if I bring thee not something to eat, I'll give thee leave to die: but if thou diest before I come, thou art a mocker of my labour. Well said! thou look'st cheerily and I'll be with thee quickly.Yet thou liest in the bleak air: Come, I will bear thee to some shelter; and thou shalt not die for lack

ducdame ;] For ducdàme, Sir Thomas Hanmer, very acutely and judiciously, reads duc ad me, that is, bring him to me. Dr. Farmer thinks it is evidently a word coined for the nonce.

of a dinner, if there live any thing in this desert. Cheerly, good Adam!

[Exeunt.

SCENE VII.

A table set out.

The same.

Enter Duke senior, AMIENS, Lords, and others.

Duke S. I think he be transform'd into a beast; For I can no where find him like a man.

1 Lord. My lord, he is but even now gone hence; Here was he merry, hearing of a song.

Duke S. If he, compact of jars,5 grow musical, We shall have shortly discord in the spheres:Go, seek him; tell him, I would speak with him.

Enter JAQUES.

1 Lord. He saves my labour by his own approach. Duke S. Why, how now, monsieur! what a life is this,

That your poor friends must woo your company?
What! you look merrily.

Jaq. A fool, a fool!——I met a fool i'the forest, A motley fool;-a miserable world!—

As I do live by food, I met a fool;

Who laid him down and bask'd him in the sun,
And rail'd on lady Fortune in good terms,
In good set terms,—and yet a motley fool.
Good-morrow, fool, quoth I: No, sir, quoth he,
Call me not fool, till heaven hath sent me fortune:
And then he drew a dial from his poke;

5

compact of jars,] i. e. made up of discords.

Call me not fool, till heaven hath sent me fortune:] Fortuna favet fatuis, is, as Mr. Upton observes, the saying here alluded to; or, as in Publius Syrus:

"Fortuna, nimium quem fovet, stultum facit."

And looking on it with lack-lustre eye,
Says, very wisely, It is ten o'clock:

Thus may we see, quoth he, how the world wags:
'Tis but an hour ago, since it was nine;
And after an hour more, 'twill be eleven;
And so, from hour to hour, we ripe and ripe,
And then, from hour to hour, we rot, and rot,
And thereby hangs a tale. When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
That fools should be so deep-contemplative;
And I did laugh, sans intermission,
An hour by his dial.-O noble fool!
A worthy fool! Motley's the only wear.
Duke S. What fool is this?

Jaq. O worthy fool!-One that hath been a courtier;

And says, if ladies be but young, and fair,
They have the gift to know it: and in his brain,-
Which is as dry as the remainder bisket

After a voyage, he hath strange places cramm'd
With observation, the which he vents

In mangled forms:-O, that I were a fool!
I am ambitious for a motley coat.

Duke S. Thou shalt have one.

Jaq.
It is my only suit;"
Provided, that you weed your better judgments
Of all opinion that grows rank in them,
That I am wise. I must have liberty
Withal, as large a charter as the wind,
To blow on whom I please; for so fools have:
And they that are most galled with my folly,

They most must laugh: And why, sir, must they so?
The why is plain as way to parish church:
He, that a fool doth very wisely hit,

7 only suit;] Suit means petition, not dress.