BOYET.
Now, madam, summon up your dearest spirits:
Consider who the king your father sends,
To whom he sends, and what’s his embassy:
Yourself, held precious in the world’s esteem,
To parley with the sole inheritor
Of all perfections that a man may owe,
Matchless Navarre; the plea of no less weight
Than Aquitaine, a dowry for a queen.
Be now as prodigal of all dear grace
As Nature was in making graces dear
When she did starve the general world beside,
And prodigally gave them all to you.
PRINCESS.
Good Lord Boyet, my beauty, though but mean,
Needs not the painted flourish of your praise:
Beauty is bought by judgment of the eye,
Not utt’red by base sale of chapmen’s tongues.
I am less proud to hear you tell my worth
Than you much willing to be counted wise
In spending your wit in the praise of mine.
But now to task the tasker: good Boyet,
You are not ignorant, all-telling fame
Doth noise abroad, Navarre hath made a vow,
Till painful study shall outwear three years,
No woman may approach his silent court:
Therefore to’s seemeth it a needful course,
Before we enter his forbidden gates,
To know his pleasure; and in that behalf,
Bold of your worthiness, we single you
As our best-moving fair solicitor.
Tell him the daughter of the King of France,
On serious business, craving quick dispatch,
Importunes personal conference with his Grace.
Haste, signify so much; while we attend,
Like humble-visag’d suitors, his high will.
BOYET.
Proud of employment, willingly I go.
PRINCESS.
All pride is willing pride, and yours is so.
[Exit BOYET.]
Who are the votaries, my loving lords,
That are vow-fellows with this virtuous duke?
FIRST LORD.
Lord Longaville is one.
PRINCESS.
Know you the man?
MARIA.
I know him, madam: at a marriage feast,
Between Lord Perigort and the beauteous heir
Of Jaques Falconbridge, solemnized
In Normandy, saw I this Longaville.
A man of sovereign parts, he is esteem’d,
Well fitted in arts, glorious in arms:
Nothing becomes him ill that he would well.
The only soil of his fair virtue’s gloss,—
If virtue’s gloss will stain with any soil,—
Is a sharp wit match’d with too blunt a will;
Whose edge hath power to cut, whose will still wills
It should none spare that come within his power.
PRINCESS.
Some merry mocking lord, belike; is’t so?
MARIA.
They say so most that most his humours know.
PRINCESS.
Such short-liv’d wits do wither as they grow.
Who are the rest?
KATHARINE.
The young Dumain, a well-accomplish’d youth,
Of all that virtue love for virtue lov’d;
Most power to do most harm, least knowing ill,
For he hath wit to make an ill shape good,
And shape to win grace though he had no wit.
I saw him at the Duke Alencon’s once;
And much too little of that good I saw
Is my report to his great worthiness.
ROSALINE.
Another of these students at that time
Was there with him, if I have heard a truth:
Berowne they call him; but a merrier man,
Within the limit of becoming mirth,
I never spent an hour’s talk withal.
His eye begets occasion for his wit,
For every object that the one doth catch
The other turns to a mirth-moving jest,
Which his fair tongue, conceit’s expositor,
Delivers in such apt and gracious words
That aged ears play truant at his tales,
And younger hearings are quite ravished;
So sweet and voluble is his discourse.
PRINCESS.
God bless my ladies! Are they all in love,
That every one her own hath garnished
With such bedecking ornaments of praise?
FIRST LORD.
Here comes Boyet.
[Re-enter BOYET.]
PRINCESS.
Now, what admittance, lord?
BOYET.
Navarre had notice of your fair approach,
And he and his competitors in oath
Were all address’d to meet you, gentle lady,
Before I came. Marry, thus much I have learnt;
He rather means to lodge you in the field,
Like one that comes here to besiege his court,
Than seek a dispensation for his oath,
To let you enter his unpeeled house.
Here comes Navarre.
[The LADIES mask.]
[Enter KING, LONGAVILLE, DUMAINE, BEROWNE, and ATTENDANTS.]
KING.
Fair Princess, welcome to the court of Navarre.
PRINCESS. ‘Fair’ I give you back again; and ‘welcome’ I have not yet: the roof of this court is too high to be yours, and welcome to the wide fields too base to be mine.
KING.
You shall be welcome, madam, to my court.
PRINCESS.
I will be welcome then: conduct me thither.
KING.
Hear me, dear lady; I have sworn an oath.
PRINCESS.
Our Lady help my lord! he’ll be forsworn.
KING.
Not for the world, fair madam, by my will.
PRINCESS.