The Complete Works of William Shakespeare - Israel Gollancz William Shakespeare [626]
ROSALIND.
The Duke my father lov'd 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.
FREDERICK.
Mistress, dispatch you with your safest haste,
And get you from our court.
ROSALIND.
Me, uncle?
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.
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.
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 banish'd 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.
FREDERICK.
Ay, Celia; we stay'd her for your sake,
Else had she with her father rang'd 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, learn'd, play'd, eat together;
And wheresoe'er we went, like Juno's swans,
Still we went coupled and inseparable.
FREDERICK.
She is too subtle for thee; and her smoothness,
Her very silence and her patience,
Speak to the people, and they pity her.
Thou art a fool. She robs thee of thy name;
And thou wilt show more bright and seem more virtuous
When she is gone. Then open not thy lips.
Firm and irrevocable is my doom
Which I have pass'd upon her; she is banish'd.
CELIA.
Pronounce that sentence, then, on me, my liege;
I cannot live out of her company.
FREDERICK.
You are a fool. You, niece, provide yourself.
If you outstay the time, upon mine honour,
And in the greatness of my word, you die.
Exeunt DUKE and LORDS
CELIA.
O my poor Rosalind! Whither wilt thou go?
Wilt thou change fathers? I will give thee mine.
I charge thee be not thou more griev'd than I am.
ROSALIND.
I have more cause.
CELIA.
Thou hast not, cousin.
Prithee be cheerful. Know'st thou not the Duke
Hath banish'd me, his daughter?
ROSALIND.
That he hath not.
CELIA.
No, hath not? Rosalind lacks, then, the love
Which teacheth thee that thou and I am one.
Shall we be sund'red? Shall we part, sweet girl?
No; let my father seek another heir.
Therefore devise with me how we may fly,
Whither to go, and what to bear with us;
And do not seek to take your charge upon you,
To bear your griefs yourself, and leave me out;
For, by this heaven, now at our sorrows pale,
Say what thou canst, I'll go along with thee.
ROSALIND.
Why, whither shall we go?
CELIA.
To seek my uncle in the Forest of Arden.
ROSALIND.
Alas, what danger will it be to us,
Maids as we are, to travel forth so far!
Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold.
CELIA.
I'll put myself in poor and mean attire,