Love’s Labour’s Lost
ACT IV SCENE II | The same. | |
Enter HOLOFERNES the Pedant, NATHANIEL, and DULL. | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | Very reverend sport, truly; and done in the testimony | |
of a good conscience. | ||
HOLOFERNES | The deer was, as you know, sanguis, in blood; ripe | |
as the pomewater, who now hangeth like a jewel in | 5 | |
the ear of caelo, the sky, the welkin, the heaven; | ||
and anon falleth like a crab on the face of terra, | ||
the soil, the land, the earth. | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | Truly, Master Holofernes, the epithets are sweetly | |
varied, like a scholar at the least: but, sir, I | 10 | |
assure ye, it was a buck of the first head. | ||
HOLOFERNES | Sir Nathaniel, haud credo. | |
DULL | ‘Twas not a haud credo; ’twas a pricket. | |
HOLOFERNES | Most barbarous intimation! yet a kind of | |
insinuation, as it were, in via, in way, of | 15 | |
explication; facere, as it were, replication, or | ||
rather, ostentare, to show, as it were, his | ||
inclination, after his undressed, unpolished, | ||
uneducated, unpruned, untrained, or rather, | ||
unlettered, or ratherest, unconfirmed fashion, to | 20 | |
insert again my haud credo for a deer. | ||
DULL | I said the deer was not a haud credo; twas a pricket. | |
HOLOFERNES | Twice-sod simplicity, his coctus! | |
O thou monster Ignorance, how deformed dost thou look! | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | Sir, he hath never fed of the dainties that are bred | 25 |
in a book; he hath not eat paper, as it were; he | ||
hath not drunk ink: his intellect is not | ||
replenished; he is only an animal, only sensible in | ||
the duller parts: | ||
And such barren plants are set before us, that we | 30 | |
thankful should be, | ||
Which we of taste and feeling are, for those parts that | ||
do fructify in us more than he. | ||
For as it would ill become me to be vain, indiscreet, or a fool, | ||
So were there a patch set on learning, to see him in a school: | 35 | |
But omne bene, say I; being of an old father’s mind, | ||
Many can brook the weather that love not the wind. | ||
DULL | You two are book-men: can you tell me by your wit | |
What was a month old at Cain’s birth, that’s not five | ||
weeks old as yet? | 40 | |
HOLOFERNES | Dictynna, goodman Dull; Dictynna, goodman Dull. | |
DULL | What is Dictynna? | |
SIR NATHANIEL | A title to Phoebe, to Luna, to the moon. | |
HOLOFERNES | The moon was a month old when Adam was no more, | |
And raught not to five weeks when he came to | 45 | |
five-score. | ||
The allusion holds in the exchange. | ||
DULL | ‘Tis true indeed; the collusion holds in the exchange. | |
HOLOFERNES | God comfort thy capacity! I say, the allusion holds | |
in the exchange. | 50 | |
DULL | And I say, the pollusion holds in the exchange; for | |
the moon is never but a month old: and I say beside | ||
that, ’twas a pricket that the princess killed. | ||
HOLOFERNES | Sir Nathaniel, will you hear an extemporal epitaph | |
on the death of the deer? And, to humour the | 55 | |
ignorant, call I the deer the princess killed a pricket. | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | Perge, good Master Holofernes, perge; so it shall | |
please you to abrogate scurrility. | ||
HOLOFERNES | I will something affect the letter, for it argues facility. | |
The preyful princess pierced and prick’d a pretty | 60 | |
pleasing pricket; | ||
Some say a sore; but not a sore, till now made | ||
sore with shooting. | ||
The dogs did yell: put L to sore, then sorel jumps | ||
from thicket; | 65 | |
Or pricket sore, or else sorel; the people fall a-hooting. | ||
If sore be sore, then L to sore makes fifty sores | ||
one sorel. | ||
Of one sore I an hundred make by adding but one more L. | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | A rare talent! | 70 |
DULL | Aside If a talent be a claw, look how he claws him with a talent. | |
him with a talent. | ||
HOLOFERNES | This is a gift that I have, simple, simple; a | |
foolish extravagant spirit, full of forms, figures, | ||
shapes, objects, ideas, apprehensions, motions, | ||
revolutions: these are begot in the ventricle of | 75 | |
memory, nourished in the womb of pia mater, and | ||
delivered upon the mellowing of occasion. But the | ||
gift is good in those in whom it is acute, and I am | ||
thankful for it. | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | Sir, I praise the Lord for you; and so may my | 80 |
parishioners; for their sons are well tutored by | ||
you, and their daughters profit very greatly under | ||
you: you are a good member of the commonwealth. | ||
HOLOFERNES | Mehercle, if their sons be ingenuous, they shall | |
want no instruction; if their daughters be capable, | 85 | |
I will put it to them: but vir sapit qui pauca | ||
loquitur; a soul feminine saluteth us. | ||
Enter JAQUENETTA and COSTARD. | ||
JAQUENETTA | God give you good morrow, master Parson. | |
HOLOFERNES | Master Parson, quasi pers-on. An if one should be | |
pierced, which is the one? | 90 | |
COSTARD | Marry, master schoolmaster, he that is likest to a hogshead. | |
HOLOFERNES | Piercing a hogshead! a good lustre of conceit in a | |
tuft of earth; fire enough for a flint, pearl enough | ||
for a swine: ’tis pretty; it is well. | ||
JAQUENETTA | Good master Parson, be so good as read me this | 95 |
letter: it was given me by Costard, and sent me | ||
from Don Armado: I beseech you, read it. | ||
HOLOFERNES | Fauste, precor gelida quando pecus omne sub umbra | |
Ruminat, and so forth. Ah, good old Mantuan! I | ||
may speak of thee as the traveller doth of Venice; | 100 | |
Venetia, Venetia, | ||
Chi non ti vede non ti pretia. | ||
Old Mantuan, old Mantuan! who understandeth thee | ||
not, loves thee not. Ut, re, sol, la, mi, fa. | ||
Under pardon, sir, what are the contents? or rather, | 105 | |
as Horace says in his–What, my soul, verses? | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | Ay, sir, and very learned. | |
HOLOFERNES | Let me hear a staff, a stanze, a verse; lege, domine. | |
SIR NATHANIEL | Reads | |
If love make me forsworn, how shall I swear to love? | ||
Ah, never faith could hold, if not to beauty vow’d! | 110 | |
Though to myself forsworn, to thee I’ll faithful prove: | ||
Those thoughts to me were oaks, to thee like | ||
osiers bow’d. | ||
Study his bias leaves and makes his book thine eyes, | ||
Where all those pleasures live that art would | 115 | |
comprehend: | ||
If knowledge be the mark, to know thee shall suffice; | ||
Well learned is that tongue that well can thee commend, | ||
All ignorant that soul that sees thee without wonder; | ||
Which is to me some praise that I thy parts admire: | 120 | |
Thy eye Jove’s lightning bears, thy voice his dreadful thunder, | ||
Which not to anger bent, is music and sweet fire. | ||
Celestial as thou art, O, pardon, love, this wrong, | ||
That sings heaven’s praise with such an earthly tongue. | ||
HOLOFERNES | You find not the apostraphas, and so miss the | 125 |
accent: let me supervise the canzonet. Here are | ||
only numbers ratified; but, for the elegancy, | ||
facility, and golden cadence of poesy, caret. | ||
Ovidius Naso was the man: and why, indeed, Naso, | ||
but for smelling out the odouriferous flowers of | 130 | |
fancy, the jerks of invention? Imitari is nothing: | ||
so doth the hound his master, the ape his keeper, | ||
the tired horse his rider. But, damosella virgin, | ||
was this directed to you? | ||
JAQUENETTA | Ay, sir, from one Monsieur Biron, one of the strange | 135 |
queen’s lords. | ||
HOLOFERNES | I will overglance the superscript: ‘To the | |
snow-white hand of the most beauteous Lady | ||
Rosaline.’ I will look again on the intellect of | ||
the letter, for the nomination of the party writing | 140 | |
to the person written unto: ‘Your ladyship’s in all | ||
desired employment, BIRON.’ Sir Nathaniel, this | ||
Biron is one of the votaries with the king; and here | ||
he hath framed a letter to a sequent of the stranger | ||
queen’s, which accidentally, or by the way of | 145 | |
progression, hath miscarried. Trip and go, my | ||
sweet; deliver this paper into the royal hand of the | ||
king: it may concern much. Stay not thy | ||
compliment; I forgive thy duty; adieu. | ||
JAQUENETTA | Good Costard, go with me. Sir, God save your life! | 150 |
COSTARD | Have with thee, my girl. | |
Exeunt COSTARD and JAQUENETTA. | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | Sir, you have done this in the fear of God, very | |
religiously; and, as a certain father saith,– | ||
HOLOFERNES | Sir tell me not of the father; I do fear colourable | |
colours. But to return to the verses: did they | 155 | |
please you, Sir Nathaniel? | ||
SIR NATHANIEL | Marvellous well for the pen. | |
HOLOFERNES | I do dine to-day at the father’s of a certain pupil | |
of mine; where, if, before repast, it shall please | ||
you to gratify the table with a grace, I will, on my | 160 | |
privilege I have with the parents of the foresaid | ||
child or pupil, undertake your ben venuto; where I | ||
will prove those verses to be very unlearned, | ||
neither savouring of poetry, wit, nor invention: I | ||
beseech your society. | 165 | |
SIR NATHANIEL | And thank you too; for society, saith the text, is | |
the happiness of life. | ||
HOLOFERNES | And, certes, the text most infallibly concludes it. | |
To DULL | ||
Sir, I do invite you too; you shall not | ||
say me nay: pauca verba. Away! the gentles are at | 170 | |
their game, and we will to our recreation. | ||
Exeunt |
Love’s Labour’s Lost, Act 4, Scene 3