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ACT IV.

SCENE I-A forest, near Mantua. Enter certain Cut-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 por habilaments,

Of which if you should here disfurnish me,
You take the sum and substance that I have.

2 Out. Whither travel

Val. To Verona.

you

?

1 Out. Whence came you?

Val. From Milan.

3 Out. Have you long sojourn'd there? 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?

Fal. For that which now torments me to rehearse (1) Well-looking.

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?!

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 gentle

men,

Such as the fury of ungovern'd youth
Thrust from the company of awful2 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,3 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 excus'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,

(1) Languages.
(3) Anger, resentment.

(2) Lawful.

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
consórt?

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

Dn 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 show thee all the treasure we have got; Which, with ourselves, all rest at thy dispose. [Exeunt.

SCENE II-Milan. Court of the palace. En ter Proteus.

Pro. Already have I been false to Valentine,
And now I must be as unjust to Thurio.
Under the colour of commending him,
I have access my own love to prefer;
But Silvia is too fair, too true, too holy,
To be corrupted with my worthless gifts.
When I protest true loyalty to her,

She twits me with my falsehood to my friend;
When to her beauty I commend my vows,
She bids me think, how I have been forsworn
In breaking faith with Julia whom I lov'd:
And, notwithstanding all her sudden quips,1
The least whereof would quell a lover's hope,
Yet, spaniel-like, the more she spurns my love,

(1) Passionate reproaches.

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