All's Well That Ends Well - William Shakespeare (adult books to read TXT) 📗

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HELENA. I am a simple maid, and therein wealthiest That I protest I simply am a maid.-- Please it, your majesty, I have done already: The blushes in my cheeks thus whisper me-- 'We blush that thou shouldst choose; but, be refus'd, Let the white death sit on thy cheek for ever; We'll ne'er come there again.'

KING. Make choice; and, see: Who shuns thy love shuns all his love in me.

HELENA. Now, Dian, from thy altar do I fly, And to imperial Love, that god most high, Do my sighs stream.--Sir, will you hear my suit?

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, Before I speak, too threateningly replies: Love make your fortunes twenty times above Her that so wishes, and her humble love!

SECOND LORD. No better, if you please.

HELENA. My wish receive, Which great Love grant; and so I take my leave.

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. [To third Lord.] Be not afraid that I your hand should take; I'll never do you wrong for your own sake: Blessing upon your vows! and in your bed Find fairer fortune, if you ever wed!

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, To make yourself a son out of my blood.

FOURTH LORD. Fair one, I think not so.

LAFEU. There's one grape yet,--I am sure thy father drank wine.--But if thou beest 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 Me and my service, ever whilst I live, Into your guiding power.--This is the man.

KING. Why, then, young Bertram, take her; she's thy wife.

BERTRAM. My wife, my liege! I shall beseech your highness, In such a business give me leave to use The help of mine own eyes.

KING. Know'st thou not, Bertram, What she has done for me?

BERTRAM. Yes, my good lord; But never hope to know why I should marry her.

KING. Thou know'st she has rais'd me from my sickly bed.

BERTRAM. But follows it, my lord, to bring me down Must answer for your raising? I know her well; She had her breeding at my father's charge: A poor physician's daughter my wife!--Disdain Rather corrupt me ever!

KING. 'Tis only title thou disdain'st in her, the which I can build up. Strange is it that our bloods, Of colour, weight, and heat, pour'd all together, Would quite confound distinction, yet stand off In differences so mighty. If she be All that is virtuous,--save what thou dislik'st, A poor physician's daughter,--thou dislik'st Of virtue for the name: but do not so: From lowest place when virtuous things proceed, The place is dignified by the doer's deed: Where great additions swell's, and virtue none, It is a dropsied honour: good alone Is good without a name; vileness is so: The property by what it is should go, Not by the title. She is young, wise, fair; In these to nature she's immediate heir; And these breed honour: that is honour's scorn Which challenges itself as honour's born, And is not like the sire: honours thrive When rather from our acts we them derive Than our fore-goers: the mere word's a slave, Debauch'd on every tomb; on every grave A lying trophy; and as oft is dumb Where dust and damn'd oblivion is the tomb Of honour'd bones indeed. What should be said? If thou canst like this creature as a maid, I can create the rest: virtue and she Is her own dower; honour and wealth from me.

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 restor'd, my lord, I am glad: Let the rest go.

KING. My honour's at the stake; which to defeat, I must produce my power. Here, take her hand, Proud scornful boy, unworthy this good gift; That dost in vile misprision shackle up My love and her desert; that canst not dream We, poising us in her defective scale, Shall weigh thee to the beam; that wilt not know It is in us to plant thine honour where We please to have it grow. Check thy contempt: Obey our will, which travails in thy good; Believe not thy disdain, but presently Do thine own fortunes that obedient right Which both thy duty owes and our power claims Or I will throw thee from my care for ever, Into the staggers and the careless lapse Of youth and ignorance; both my revenge and hate Loosing upon thee in the name of justice, Without all terms of pity. Speak! thine answer!

BERTRAM. Pardon, my gracious lord; for I submit My fancy to your eyes: when I consider What great creation, and what dole of honour Flies where you bid it, I find that she, which late Was in my nobler thoughts most base, is now The praised of the king; who, so ennobled, Is as 'twere born so.

KING. Take her by the hand, And tell her she is thine: to whom I promise A counterpoise; if not to thy estate, A balance more replete.

BERTRAM. I take her hand.

KING. Good fortune and the favour of the king Smile upon this contract; whose ceremony Shall seem expedient on the now-born brief, And be perform'd to-night: the solemn feast Shall more attend upon the coming space, Expecting absent friends. As thou lov'st her, Thy love's to me religious; else, does err.

[Exeunt KING, BERTAM, HELENA, Lords, and Attendants.]

LAFEU. 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 burden. 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 art 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. E'en as soon as thou canst, for thou hast to pull at a smack o' th' contrary. If ever thou beest 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 have 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 thy 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'd beat thee: methink'st 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 heraldry of your birth and virtue gives you commission. You are not worth another word, else I'd call you knave. I leave you.

[Exit.]

PAROLLES. Good, very good, it is so then.--Good, very good; let it be concealed awhile.

[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, I will not bed her.

PAROLLES. What, what, sweet heart?

BERTRAM. O my Parolles, they have married me!-- I'll to the Tuscan wars, and never bed her.

PAROLLES. France is a dog-hole, and it no more merits The tread of a man's foot:--to the wars!

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! He wears his honour in a box unseen That hugs his kicksy-wicksy here at home, Spending his manly marrow in her arms, Which should sustain the bound and high curvet Of Mars's fiery steed. To other regions! France is a stable; we that dwell in't, jades; Therefore, to the war!

BERTRAM. It shall be so; I'll send her to my house, Acquaint my mother with my hate to her, And wherefore I am fled; write to the king That which I durst not speak: his present gift Shall furnish me to those Italian fields Where noble fellows strike: war is no strife To the dark house and the detested wife.

PAROLLES. Will this caprichio hold in thee,