The Forest of Ardenne.
 Enter ORLANDO with a paper, which he fixes to a tree.

Orlando	Hang there, my verse, in witness of my love;
		And thou, thrice-crownd queen of night, survey
	With thy chaste eye, from thy pale sphere above,
		Thy huntress' name that my full life doth sway.
	O Rosalind, these trees shall be my books,
		And in their barks my thoughts I'll character,
	That every eye which in this forest looks
		Shall see thy virtue witnessed everywhere.
	Run, run, Orlando; carve on every tree
	The fair, the chaste, and unexpressive she.
															[Exit.

                       Enter CORIN and TOUCHSTONE.

Corin	And how like you this shepherd's life, Master Touchstone?

Touchstone	Truly, shepherd, in respect of itself, it is a good life; 
	but in respect that it is a shepherd's life, it is nought. 
	In respect that it is solitary, I like it very well; but in 
	respect that it is private, it is a very vile life. Now in 
	respect it is in the fields, it pleaseth me well; but in 
	respect it is not in the court, it is tedious. As it is a 
	spare life, look you, it fits my humour well; but as there 
	is no more plenty in it, it goes much against my stomach. 
	Hast any philosophy in thee, shepherd?

Corin	No more but that I know the more one sickens the worse at 
	ease he is, and that he that wants money, means, and 
	content, is without three good friends; that the property 
	of rain is to wet, and fire to burn; that good pasture 
	makes fat sheep; and that a great cause of the night is 
	lack of the sun; that he that hath learned no wit by nature 
	nor art may complain of good breeding, or comes of a very 
	dull kindred.

Touchstone	Such a one is a natural philosopher. Wast ever in court, 
	shepherd?

Corin	No, truly.

Touchstone	Then thou art damned.

Corin	Nay, I hope.

Touchstone	Truly thou art damned, like an ill-roasted egg, all on one 
	side.

Corin	For not being at court? Your reason.

Touchstone	Why, if thou never wast at court, thou never saw'st good 
	manners; if thou never saw'st good manners, then thy 
	manners must be wicked, and wickedness is sin, and sin is 
	damnation. Thou art in a parlous state, shepherd.

Corin	Not a whit, Touchstone. Those that are good manners at the 
	court are as ridiculous in the country as the behaviour of 
	the country is most mockable at the court. You told me you 
	salute not at the court, but you kiss your hands; that 
	courtesy would be uncleanly if courtiers were shepherds.

Touchstone	Instance, briefly; come, instance.

Corin	Why, we are still handling our ewes; and their fells, you 
	know, are greasy.

Touchstone	Why, do not your courtier's hands sweat; and is not the 
	grease of a mutton as wholesome as the sweat of a man? 
	Shallow, shallow. A better instance, I say. Come.

Corin	Besides, our hands are hard.

Touchstone	Your lips will feel them the sooner. Shallow again. A more 
	sounder instance; come.

Corin	And they are often tarred over with the surgery of our 
	sheep; and would you have us kiss tar? The courtier's hands 
	are perfumed with civet.

Touchstone	Most shallow, man! Thou worms-meat in respect of a good 
	piece of flesh indeed! Learn of the wise, and perpend: 
	civet is of a baser birth than tar, the very uncleanly flux 
	of a cat. Mend the instance, shepherd.

Corin	You have too courtly a wit for me; I'll rest.

Touchstone	Wilt thou rest damned? God help thee, shallow man! God make 
	incision in thee, thou art raw!

Corin	Sir, I am a true labourer. I earn that I eat, get that I 
	wear, owe no man hate, envy no man's happiness, glad of 
	other men's good, content with my harm; and the greatest of 
	my pride is to see my ewes graze and my lambs suck.

Touchstone	That is another simple sin in you, to bring the ewes and 
	the rams together, and to offer to get your living by the 
	copulation of cattle; to be bawd to a bell-wether, and to 
	betray a she-lamb of a twelvemonth to a crooked-pated old 
	cuckoldly ram, out of all reasonable match. If thou be'st 
	not damned for this, the devil himself will have no 
	shepherds. I cannot see else how thou shouldst 'scape.

Corin	Here comes young Master Ganymede, my new mistress's 
	brother.

            Enter ROSALIND. She takes the paper from the tree.

Rosalind	[Reads.]	From the east to western Inde,
			No jewel is like Rosalind.
			Her worth, being mounted on the wind,
			Through all the world bears Rosalind.
			All the pictures fairest lined
			Are but black to Rosalind.
			Let no face be kept in mind,
			But the fair of Rosalind.

Touchstone	I'll rhyme you so, eight years together - dinners and 
	suppers and sleeping hours excepted. It is the right 
	butter-women's rank to market.

Rosalind	Out fool!

Touchstone	For a taste:

			If a hart do lack a hind,
			Let him seek out Rosalind.
			If the cat will after kind,
			So be sure will Rosalind.
			Wintered garments must be lined,
			So must slender Rosalind.
			They that reap must sheaf and bind,
			Then to cart with Rosalind.
			Sweetest nut hath sourest rind,
			Such a nut is Rosalind.
			He that sweetest rose will find,
			Must find love's prick, and Rosalind.

	This is the very false gallop of verses; why do you infect 
	yourself with them?

Rosalind	Peace, you dull fool! I found them on a tree.

Touchstone	Truly, the tree yields bad fruit.

Rosalind	I'll graff it with you, and then I shall graff it with a 
	medlar; then it will be the earliest fruit i'th'country; 
	for you'll be rotten ere you be half ripe, and that's the 
	right virtue of the medlar.

Touchstone	You have said; but whether wisely or no, let the forest 
	judge.

Rosalind	Peace; here comes my sister, reading. Stand aside.

                        Enter CELIA, with a paper.

Celia	[Reads.]	Why should this a desert be?
				For it is unpeopled? No;
			Tongues I'll hang on every tree,
				That shall civil sayings show.
			Some, how brief the life of man
				Runs his erring pilgrimage,
			That the stretching of a span
				Buckles in his sum of age;
			Some, of violated vows
				'Twixt the souls of friend and friend;
			But upon the fairest boughs,
				Or at every sentence end,
			Will I 'Rosalinda' write,
				Teaching all that read to know
			The quintessence of every sprite
				Heaven would in little show.
			Therefore heaven Nature charged
				That one body should be filled
			With all graces wide-enlarged.
				Nature presently distilled
			Helen's cheek, but not her heart,
				Cleopatra's majesty,
			Atalanta's better part,
				Sad Lucretia's modesty.
			Thus Rosalind of many parts
				By heavenly synod was devised,
			Of many faces, eyes, and hearts,
				To have the touches dearest prized.
			Heaven would that she these gifts should have,
			And I to live and die her slave.

Rosalind	O most gentle Jupiter! What tedious homily of love have you 
	wearied your parishioners withal, and never cried 'Have 
	patience, good people!'

Celia	How now! Back, friends. Shepherd, go off a little. Go with 
	him, sirrah.

Touchstone	Come, shepherd, let us make an honourable retreat, though 
	not with bag and baggage, yet with scrip and scrippage.
										 [Exeunt TOUCHSTONE and CORIN.

Celia	Didst thou hear these verses?

Rosalind	O yes, I heard them all, and more too, for some of them had 
	in them more feet than the verses would bear.

Celia	That's no matter; the feet might bear the verses.

Rosalind	Ay, but the feet were lame, and could not bear themselves 
	without the verse, and therefore stood lamely in the verse.

Celia	But didst thou hear without wondering how thy name should 
	be hanged and carved upon these trees?

Rosalind	I was seven of the nine days out of the wonder before you 
	came; for look here what I found on a palm-tree. I was 
	never so berhymed since Pythagoras' time that I was an 
	Irish rat, which I can hardly remember.

Celia	Trow you who hath done this?

Rosalind	Is it a man?

Celia	And a chain that you once wore, about his neck. Change you 
	colour?

Rosalind	I prithee, who?

Celia	O Lord, Lord! It is a hard matter for friends to meet; but 
	mountains may be removed with earthquakes, and so 
	encounter.

Rosalind	Nay, but who is it?

Celia	Is it possible?

Rosalind	Nay, I prithee now, with most petitionary vehemence, tell 
	me who it is.

Celia	O wonderful, wonderful, and most wonderful wonderful! And 
	yet again wonderful! And after that, out of all whooping.

Rosalind	Good my complexion! Dost thou think, though I am 
	caparisoned like a man, I have a doublet and hose in my 
	disposition? One inch of delay more is a South Sea of 
	discovery. I prithee, tell me who is it quickly, and speak 
	apace. I would thou couldst stammer, that thou mightst pour 
	this concealed man out of thy mouth as wine comes out of a 
	narrow-mouthed bottle - either too much at once, or none at 
	all. I prithee, take the cork out of thy mouth, that I may 
	drink thy tidings.

Celia	So you may put a man in your belly.

Rosalind	Is he of God's making? What manner of man? Is his head 
	worth a hat, or his chin worth a beard?

Celia	Nay, he hath but a little beard.

Rosalind	Why, God will send more, if the man will be thankful. Let 
	me stay the growth of his beard, if thou delay me not the 
	knowledge of his chin.

Celia	It is young Orlando, that tripped up the wrestler's heels 
	and your heart both, in an instant.

Rosalind	Nay, but the devil take mocking! Speak sad brow and true 
	maid.

Celia	I'faith, coz, 'tis he.

Rosalind	Orlando?

Celia	Orlando.

Rosalind	Alas the day, what shall I do with my doublet and hose? 
	What did he when thou saw'st him? What said he? How looked 
	he? Wherein went he? What makes he here? Did he ask for me? 
	Where remains he? How parted he with thee, and when shalt 
	thou see him again? Answer me in one word.

Celia	You must borrow me Gargantua's mouth first; 'tis a word too 
	great for any mouth of this age's size. To say ay and no to 
	these particulars is more than to answer in a catechism.

Rosalind	But doth he know that I am in this forest, and in man's 
	apparel? Looks he as freshly as he did the day he wrestled?

Celia	It is as easy to count atomies as to resolve the 
	propositions of a lover; but take a taste of my finding 
	him, and relish it with good observance. I found him under 
	a tree, like a dropped acorn.

Rosalind	It may well be called Jove's tree, when it drops such 
	fruit.

Celia	Give me audience, good madam.

Rosalind	Proceed.

Celia	There lay he, stretched along like a wounded knight.

Rosalind	Though it be pity to see such a sight, it well becomes the 
	ground.

Celia	Cry 'holla' to the tongue, I prithee; it curvets 
	unseasonably. He was furnished like a hunter.

Rosalind	O ominous! He comes to kill my heart.

Celia	I would sing my song without a burden. Thou bring'st me out 
	of tune.

Rosalind	Do you not know I am a woman? When I think, I must speak. 
	Sweet, say on.

Celia	You bring me out. Soft; comes he not here?

                        Enter ORLANDO and JAQUES.

Rosalind	'Tis he. Slink by, and note him.
									 [ROSALIND and CELIA stand aside.

Jaques	I thank you for your company, but, good faith, I had as 
	lief have been myself alone.

Orlando	And so had I; but yet, for fashion sake, I thank you too 
	for your society.

Jaques	God-buy-you; let's meet as little as we can.

Orlando	I do desire we may be better strangers.

Jaques	I pray you, mar no more trees with writing love-songs in 
	their barks.

Orlando	I pray you, mar no more of my verses with reading them ill-
	favouredly.

Jaques	Rosalind is your love's name?

Orlando	Yes, just.

Jaques	I do not like her name.

Orlando	There was no thought of pleasing you when she was 
	christened.

Jaques	What stature is she of?

Orlando	Just as high as my heart.

Jaques	You are full of pretty answers. Have you not been 
	acquainted with goldsmiths' wives, and conned them out of 
	rings?

Orlando	Not so; but I answer you right painted cloth, from whence 
	you have studied your questions.

Jaques	You have a nimble wit; I think 'twas made of Atalanta's 
	heels. Will you sit down with me, and we two will rail 
	against our mistress the world, and all our misery?

Orlando	I will chide no breather in the world but myself, against 
	whom I know most faults.

Jaques	The worst fault you have is to be in love.

Orlando	'Tis a fault I will not change for your best virtue. I am 
	weary of you.

Jaques	By my troth, I was seeking for a fool when I found you.

Orlando	He is drowned in the brook - look but in, and you shall see 
	him.

Jaques	There I shall see mine own figure.

Orlando	Which I take to be either a fool or a cipher.

Jaques	I'll tarry no longer with you. Farewell, good Signor Love.

Orlando	I am glad of your departure. Adieu, good Monsieur 
	Melancholy.
															[Exit JAQUES.

Rosalind	[Aside to CELIA.] I will speak to him like a saucy lackey, 
	and under that habit play the knave with him.
										  [ROSALIND and CELIA advance.
	Do you hear, forester?

Orlando	Very well. What would you?

Rosalind	I pray you, what is't o'clock?

Orlando	You should ask me what time o'day; there's no clock in the 
	forest.

Rosalind	Then there is no true lover in the forest, else sighing 
	every minute and groaning every hour would detect the lazy 
	foot of Time as well as a clock.

Orlando	And why not the swift foot of Time? Had not that been as 
	proper?

Rosalind	By no means, sir. Time travels in divers paces with divers 
	persons. I'll tell you who Time ambles withal, who Time 
	trots withal, who Time gallops withal, and who he stands 
	still withal.

Orlando	I prithee, who doth he trot withal?

Rosalind	Marry, he trots hard with a young maid, between the 
	contract of her marriage and the day it is solemnized. If 
	the interim be but a sennight, Time's pace is so hard that 
	it seems the length of seven year.

Orlando	Who ambles Time withal?

Rosalind	With a priest that lacks Latin, and a rich man that hath 
	not the gout, for the one sleeps easily because he cannot 
	study, and the other lives merrily because he feels no 
	pain; the one lacking the burden of lean and wasteful 
	learning, the other knowing no burden of heavy tedious 
	penury. These Time ambles withal.

Orlando	Who doth he gallop withal?

Rosalind	With a thief to the gallows, for though he go as softly as 
	foot can fall, he thinks himself too soon there.

Orlando	Who stays it still withal?

Rosalind	With lawyers in the vacation, for they sleep between term 
	and term, and then they perceive not how Time moves.

Orlando	Where dwell you, pretty youth?

Rosalind	With this shepherdess, my sister, here in the skirts of the 
	forest, like fringe upon a petticoat.

Orlando	Are you native of this place?

Rosalind	As the cony that you see dwell where she is kindled.

Orlando	Your accent is something finer than you could purchase in 
	so removed a dwelling.

Rosalind	I have been told so of many; but indeed an old religious 
	uncle of mine taught me to speak, who was in his youth an 
	inland man; one that knew courtship too well, for there he 
	fell in love. I have heard him read many lectures against 
	it, and I thank God I am not a woman, to be touched with so 
	many giddy offences as he hath generally taxed their whole 
	sex withal.

Orlando	Can you remember any of the principal evils that he laid to 
	the charge of women?

Rosalind	There were none principal; they were all like one another 
	as halfpence are, every one fault seeming monstrous till 
	his fellow-fault came to match it.

Orlando	I prithee, recount some of them.

Rosalind	No; I will not cast away my physic but on those that are 
	sick. There is a man haunts the forest that abuses our 
	young plants with carving 'Rosalind' on their barks, hangs 
	odes upon hawthorns, and elegies on brambles; all, 
	forsooth, deifying the name of Rosalind. If I could meet 
	that fancy-monger, I would give him some good counsel, for 
	he seems to have the quotidian of love upon him.

Orlando	I am he that is so love-shaked. I pray you, tell me your 
	remedy.

Rosalind	There is none of my uncle's marks upon you. He taught me 
	how to know a man in love; in which cage of rushes I am 
	sure you are not prisoner.

Orlando	What were his marks?

Rosalind	A lean cheek, which you have not; a blue eye and sunken, 
	which you have not; an unquestionable spirit, which you 
	have not; a beard neglected, which you have not - but I 
	pardon you for that, for, simply, your having in beard is a 
	younger brother's revenue. Then, your hose should be 
	ungartered, your bonnet unbanded, your sleeve unbuttoned, 
	your shoe untied, and everything about you demonstrating a 
	careless desolation. But you are no such man: you are 
	rather point-device in your accoutrements, as loving 
	yourself than seeming the lover of any other.

Orlando	Fair youth, I would I could make thee believe I love.

Rosalind	Me believe it? You may as soon make her that you love 
	believe it, which, I warrant, she is apter to do than to 
	confess she does. That is one of the points in the which 
	women still give the lie to their consciences. But, in good 
	sooth, are you he that hangs the verses on the trees, 
	wherein Rosalind is so admired?

Orlando	I swear to thee, youth, by the white hand of Rosalind, I am 
	that he, that unfortunate he.

Rosalind	But are you so much in love as your rhymes speak?

Orlando	Neither rhyme nor reason can express how much.

Rosalind	Love is merely a madness, and, I tell you, deserves as well 
	a dark house and a whip as madmen do; and the reason why 
	they are not so punished and cured is that the lunacy is so 
	ordinary that the whippers are in love too. Yet I profess 
	curing it by counsel.

Orlando	Did you ever cure any so?

Rosalind	Yes, one; and in this manner. He was to imagine me his 
	love, his mistress, and I set him everyday to woo me; at 
	which time would I, being but a moonish youth, grieve, be 
	effeminate, changeable, longing and liking, proud, 
	fantastical, apish, shallow, inconstant, full of tears, 
	full of smiles, for every passion something, and for no 
	passion truly anything - as boys and women are for the most 
	part cattle of this colour; would now like him, now loathe 
	him, then entertain him, then forswear him, now weep for 
	him, then spit at him; that I drave my suitor from his mad 
	humour of love to a living humour of madness, which was to 
	forswear the full stream of the world and to live in a nook 
	merely monastic. And thus I cured him, and this way will I 
	take upon me to wash your liver as clean as a sound sheep's 
	heart, that there shall not be one spot of love in't.

Orlando	I would not be cured, youth.

Rosalind	I would cure you, if you would but call me Rosalind and 
	come everyday to my cote, and woo me.

Orlando	Now, by the faith of my love, I will. Tell me where it is.

Rosalind	Go with me to it and I'll show it you; and by the way you 
	shall tell me where in the forest you live. Will you go?

Orlando	With all my heart, good youth.

Rosalind	Nay, you must call me Rosalind. Come, sister, will you go?
															[Exeunt.
