Your mistress shall be happy.

ROSALIND (giving him a chain from her neck) Gentleman, Wear this for me—one out of suits with fortune, That could give more but that her hand lacks means. Shall we go, coz?

CELIA Ay. Fare you well, fair gentleman.

Rosalind and Celia turn to go

ORLANDO (aside)

Can I not say ‘I thank you’? My better parts

Are all thrown down, and that which here stands up

Is but a quintain, a mere lifeless block.

ROSALIND (to Celia)

He calls us back. My pride fell with my fortunes,

I’ll ask him what he would.—Did you call, sir?

Sir, you have wrestled well, and overthrown

More than your enemies.

CELIA Will you go, coz?

ROSALIND Have with you. (To Orlando) Fare you well.

Exeunt Rosalind and Celia

ORLANDO

What passion hangs these weights upon my tongue?

I cannot speak to her, yet she urged conference.

Enter Le Beau

O poor Orlando! Thou art overthrown.

Or Charles or something weaker masters thee.

LE BEAU

Good sir, I do in friendship counsel you

To leave this place. Albeit you have deserved

High commendation, true applause, and love,

Yet such is now the Duke’s condition

That he misconsters all that you have done.

The Duke is humorous. What he is indeed

More suits you to conceive than I to speak of.

ORLANDO

I thank you, sir. And pray you tell me this,

Which of the two was daughter of the Duke

That here was at the wrestling?

LE BEAU

Neither his daughter, if we judge by manners—

But yet indeed the shorter is his daughter.

The other is daughter to the banished Duke,

And here detained by her usurping uncle

To keep his daughter company, whose loves

Are dearer than the natural bond of sisters.

But I can tell you that of late this Duke

Hath ta‘en displeasure ’gainst his gentle niece,

Grounded upon no other argument

But that the people praise her for her virtues

And pity her for her good father’s sake.

And, on my life, his malice ’gainst the lady

Will suddenly break forth. Sir, fare you well.

Hereafter, in a better world than this,

I shall desire more love and knowledge of you.

ORLANDO

I rest much bounden to you. Fare you well.

Exit Le Beau

Thus must I from the smoke into the smother,

From tyrant Duke unto a tyrant brother.—

But heavenly Rosalind! Exit

13. Enter Celia and Rosalind

CELIA Why cousin, why Rosalind—Cupid have mercy, not a word?

ROSALIND Not one to throw at a dog.

CELIA No, thy words are too precious to be cast away upon curs. Throw some of them at me. Come, lame me with reasons.

ROSALIND Then there were two cousins laid up, when the one should be lamed with reasons and the other mad without any.

CELIA But is all this for your father?

ROSALIND No, some of it is for my child’s father. O how full of briers is this working-day world!

CELIA They are but burs, cousin, thrown upon thee in holiday foolery. If we walk not in the trodden paths our very petticoats will catch them.

ROSALIND I could shake them off my coat. These burs are in my heart.

CELIA Hem them away.

ROSALIND I would try, if I could cry ‘hem’ and have him.

CELIA Come, come, wrestle with thy affections.

ROSALIND O, they take the part of a better wrestler than myself.

CELIA O, a good wish upon you! You will try in time, in despite of a fall. But turning these jests out of service, let us talk in good earnest. Is it possible on such a sudden you should fall into so strong a liking with old Sir Rowland’s youngest son?

ROSALIND The Duke my father loved his father dearly.

CELIA Doth it therefore ensue that you should love his son dearly? By this kind of chase I should hate him, for my father hated his father dearly; yet I hate not Orlando.

ROSALIND No, faith, hate him not, for my sake.

CELIA Why should I not? Doth he not deserve well? Enter Duke Frederick, with Lords

ROSALIND Let me love him for that, and do you love him because I do. Look, here comes the Duke.

CELIA With his eyes full of anger.

DUKE FREDERICK (to Rosalind) Mistress, dispatch you with your safest haste, And get you from our court.

ROSALIND Me, uncle?

DUKE FREDERICK You, cousin. Within these ten days if that thou beest found So near our public court as twenty miles, Thou diest for it.

ROSALIND I do beseech your grace

Let me the knowledge of my fault bear with me.

If with myself I hold intelligence,

Or have acquaintance with mine own desires,

If that I do not dream, or be not frantic—

As I do trust I am not—then, dear uncle,

Never so much as in a thought unborn

Did I offend your highness.

DUKE FREDERICK

Thus do all traitors.

If their purgation did consist in words

They are as innocent as grace itself.

Let it suffice thee that I trust thee not.

ROSALIND

Yet your mistrust cannot make me a traitor.

Tell me whereon the likelihood depends?

DUKE FREDERICK

Thou art thy father’s daughter—there’s enough.

ROSALIND

So was I when your highness took his dukedom;

So was I when your highness banished him.

Treason is not inherited, my lord,

Or if we did derive it from our friends,

What’s that to me? My father was no traitor.

Then, good my liege, mistake me not so much

To think my poverty is treacherous.

CELIA Dear sovereign, hear me speak.

DUKE FREDERICK

Ay, Celia, we stayed her for your sake,

Else had she with her father ranged along.

CELIA

I did not then entreat to have her stay.

It was your pleasure, and your own remorse.

I was too young that time to value her,

But now I know her. If she be a traitor,

Why, so am I. We still have slept together,

Rose at an instant, learned, played, eat together,