Where, if it please you, you may intercept him.

But, good my lord, do it so cunningly

That my discovery be not aimed at;

For love of you, not hate unto my friend,

Hath made me publisher of this pretence.

DUKE

Upon mine honour, he shall never know

That I had any light from thee of this.

PROTEUS

Adieu, my lord. Sir Valentine is coming. Exit Enter Valentine

DUKE

Sir Valentine, whither away so fast?

VALENTINE

Please it your grace, there is a messenger

That stays to bear my letters to my friends,

And I am going to deliver them.

DUKE Be they of much import?

VALENTINE

The tenor of them doth but signify

My health and happy being at your court.

DUKE

Nay then, no matter. Stay with me awhile.

I am to break with thee of some affairs

That touch me near, wherein thou must be secret.

‘Tis not unknown to thee that I have sought

To match my friend Sir Thurio to my daughter.

VALENTINE

I know it well, my lord; and sure the match

Were rich and honourable. Besides, the gentleman

Is full of virtue, bounty, worth, and qualities

Beseeming such a wife as your fair daughter.

Cannot your grace win her to fancy him?

DUKE

No, trust me. She is peevish, sullen, froward,

Proud, disobedient, stubborn, lacking duty,

Neither regarding that she is my child

Nor fearing me as if I were her father.

And may I say to thee, this pride of hers

Upon advice hath drawn my love from her,

And where I thought the remnant of mine age

Should have been cherished by her child-like duty,

I now am full resolved to take a wife,

And turn her out to who will take her in.

Then let her beauty be her wedding dower,

For me and my possessions she esteems not.

VALENTINE

What would your grace have me to do in this?

DUKE

There is a lady of Verona here

Whom I affect, but she is nice, and coy,

And naught esteems my aged eloquence.

Now therefore would I have thee to my tutor—

For long agone I have forgot to court,

Besides, the fashion of the time is changed—

How and which way I may bestow myself

To be regarded in her sun-bright eye.

VALENTINE

Win her with gifts if she respect not words.

Dumb jewels often in their silent kind

More than quick words do move a woman’s mind.

DUKE

But she did scorn a present that I sent her.

VALENTINE

A woman sometime scorns what best contents her.

Send her another. Never give her o’er,

For scorn at first makes after-love the more.

If she do frown, ‘tis not in hate of you,

But rather to beget more love in you.

If she do chide, ‘tis not to have you gone,

Forwhy the fools are mad if left alone.

Take no repulse, whatever she doth say:

For ‘Get you gone’ she doth not mean ‘Away’.

Flatter and praise, commend, extol their graces;

Though ne’er so black, say they have angels’ faces.

That man that hath a tongue I say is no man

If with his tongue he cannot win a woman.

DUKE

But she I mean is promised by her friends

Unto a youthful gentleman of worth,

And kept severely from resort of men,

That no man hath access by day to her.

VALENTINE

Why then I would resort to her by night.

DUKE

Ay, but the doors be locked and keys kept safe,

That no man hath recourse to her by night.

VALENTINE

What lets but one may enter at her window?

DUKE

Her chamber is aloft, far from the ground,

And built so shelving that one cannot climb it

Without apparent hazard of his life.

VALENTINE

Why then, a ladder quaintly made of cords

To cast up, with a pair of anchoring hooks,

Would serve to scale another Hero’s tower,

So bold Leander would adventure it.

DUKE

Now as thou art a gentleman of blood,

Advise me where I may have such a ladder.

VALENTINE

When would you use it? Pray sir, tell me that.

DUKE

This very night; for love is like a child

That longs for everything that he can come by.

VALENTINE

By seven o’clock I’ll get you such a ladder.

DUKE

But hark thee: I will go to her alone.

How shall I best convey the ladder thither?

VALENTINE

It will be light, my lord, that you may bear it

Under a cloak that is of any length.

DUKE

A cloak as long as thine will serve the turn?

VALENTINE

Ay, my good lord.

DUKE

Then let me see thy cloak,

I’ll get me one of such another length.

VALENTINE

Why, any cloak will serve the turn, my lord.

DUKE

How shall I fashion me to wear a cloak?

I pray thee let me feel thy cloak upon me.

He lifts Valentine’s cloak and finds a letter and a rope-ladder

What letter is this same? What’s here? ‘To Silvia’?

And here an engine fit for my proceeding.

I’ll be so bold to break the seal for once.

(Reads)

‘My thoughts do harbour with my Silvia nightly,

And slaves they are to me, that send them flying.

O, could their master come and go as lightly,

Himself would lodge where, senseless, they are lying.

My herald thoughts in thy pure bosom rest them,

While I, their king, that thither them importune,

Do curse the grace that with such grace hath blessed