Duke. Where your good word cannot advantage

him,

Your slander never can endamage him;
Therefore the office is indifferent,

Being entreated to it by your friend.

Pro. You have prevail'd, my lord: if I can do it,

By aught that I can speak in his dispraise,
She shall not long continue love to him.
But say, this weed her love from Valentine,
It follows not that she will love sir Thurio.

Thu. Therefore, as you unwind her love from him,
Lest it should ravel, and be good to none,
You must provide to bottom it on me:
Which must be done, by praising me as much
As you in worth dispraise sir Valentine.

Duke. And, Proteus, we dare trust you in this kind; Because we know, on Valentine's report, You are already love's firm votary,

1

And cannot soon revolt and change your mind.
Upon this warrant shall you have access,
Where you with Silvia may confer at large;
For she is lumpish, heavy, melancholy,
And, for your friend's sake, will be glad of you;
Where you may temper her, by your persuasion,
To hate young Valentine, and love my friend.
Pro. As much as I can do, I will effect:-
But you, sir Thurio, are not sharp enough;
You must lay lime, to tangle her desires,
By wailful sonnets, whose composed rhymes
Should be full fraught with serviceable vows.
Duke. Ay, much the force of heaven-bred poesy.

Pro. Say, that upon the altar of her beauty You sacrifice your tears, your sighs, your heart: Write till your ink be dry; and with your tears Moist it again; and frame some feeling line, That may discover such integrity :For Orpheus' lute was strung with poet's sinews; Whose golden touch could soften steel and stones, Make tigers tame, and huge leviathans Forsake unsounded deeps to dance on sands. After your dire-lamenting elegies, Visit by night your lady's chamber-window With some sweet concert: to their instruments Tune a deploring dump; the night's dead silence Will well become such sweet complaining grievance. This, or else nothing, will inherit her.

Duke. This discipline shows thou hast been in love.
Thu. And thy advice this night I'll put in practice:
Therefore, sweet Proteus, my direction-giver,
Let us into the city presently

To sort some gentlemen well skill'd in musick:
I have a sonnet, that will serve the turn,

To give the onset to thy good advice.

Duke. About it, gentlemen.

Pro. We'll wait upon your grace till after supper :

And afterward determine our proceedings.

Duke. Even now about it; I will pardon you.

[Exeunt.

ACT IV.

SCENE I. A Forest, near Mantua.

Enter certain OUT-LAWS.

1 Out. Fellows, stand fast; I see a passenger. 2 Out. If there be ten, shrink not, but down with

'em.

Enter VALENTINE and SPEED.

3 Out. Stand, sir, and throw us that you have about you;

If not, we'll make you sit, and rifle you.

Speed. Sir, we are undone! these are the villains

That all the travellers do fear so much.

Val. My friends,

1 Out. That's not so, sir; we are your enemies.

2 Out. Peace; we'll hear him.

3 Out. Ay, by my beard, will we;

For he's a proper1 man.

Val. Then know, that I have little wealth to lose;

A man I am, cross'd with adversity :

My riches are these poor habiliments,

Of which if you should here disfurnish me,

You take the sum and substance that I have.

2 Out. Whither travel you ?

Val. To Verona.

1 Out. Whence came you?

Val. From Milan.

3 Out. Have you long sojourn'd there?

Well looking.

Val. Some sixteen months; and longer might have

staid,

If crooked fortune had not thwarted me.

1 Out. What, were you banish'd thence? Val. I was.

2 Out. For what offence?

Val. For that which now torments me to rehearse : I kill'd a man, whose death I much repent; But yet I slew him manfully in fight, Without false vantage, or base treachery.

1 Out. Why ne'er repent it, if it were done so : But were you banish'd for so small a fault?

Val. I was, and held me glad of such a doom. 1 Out. Have you the tongues ?2

Val. My youthful travel therein made me happy; Or else I often had been miserable.

3 Out. By the bare scalp of Robin Hood's fat friar,

This fellow were a king for our wild faction.

1 Out. We'll have him: sirs, a word.

Speed. Master, be one of them;

It is an honourable kind of thievery.

Val. Peace, villain!

2 Out. Tell us this: Have you any thing to take to ? Val. Nothing, but my fortune.

3 Out. Know then, that some of us are gentlemen,

Such as the fury of ungovern'd youth
Thrust from the company of awful men:

Myself was from Verona banished,
For practising to steal away a lady,

An heir, and near allied unto the duke.

2 Out. And I from Mantua, for a gentleman, Whom, in my mood, I stabb'd unto the heart. 1 Out. And I, for such like petty crimes as these. But to the purpose,-(for we cite our faults, That they may hold exeus'd our lawless lives,) And, partly, seeing you are beautified With goodly shape; and by your own report A linguist; and a man of such perfection, As we do in our quality much want ;

2 Out. Indeed, because you are a banish'd man, Therefore, above the rest, we parley to you: Are you content to be our general ? To make a virtue of necessity,

And live, as we do, in this wilderness?

3 Out. What say'st thou? wilt thou be of our con-
sórt?

Say, ay, and be the captain of us all :
We'll do thee homage, and be rul'd by thee,
Love thee as our commander, and our king.

1 Out. But if thou scorn our courtesy, thou diest.
2 Out. Thou shalt not live to brag what we have

offer'd.

Val. I take your offer, and will live with you;
Provided that you do no outrages
On silly women, or poor passengers.

3 Out. No, we detest such vile base practices.
Come, go with us, we'll bring thee to our crews,
And shew thee all the treasure we have got;
Which, with ourselves, all rest at thy dispose.

[Ereunt.