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As You Like It: Act 1 Scene 3

Scene III A room in the palace.

[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?

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.

[Enter DUKE FREDERICK, with Lords]

DUKE FREDERICK

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 be'st 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 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.

DUKE FREDERICK

Ay, Celia; we stay'd 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, learn'd, play'd, eat together,

And wheresoever we went, like Juno's swans,

Still we went coupled and inseparable.

DUKE 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.

DUKE 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 FREDERICK 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 grieved 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 sunder'd? 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 change 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

And with a kind of umber smirch my face;

The like do you: so shall we pass along

And never stir assailants.

ROSALIND

Were it not better,

Because that I am more than common tall,

That I did suit me all points like a man?

A gallant curtle-axe upon my thigh,

A boar-spear in my hand; and--in my heart

Lie there what hidden woman's fear there will--

We'll have a swashing and a martial outside,

As many other mannish cowards have

That do outface it with their semblances.

CELIA

What shall I call thee when thou art a man?

ROSALIND

I'll have no worse a name than Jove's own page;

And therefore look you call me Ganymede.

But what will you be call'd?

CELIA

Something that hath a reference to my state

No longer Celia, but Aliena.

ROSALIND

But, cousin, what if we assay'd to steal

The clownish fool out of your father's court?

Would he not be a comfort to our travel?

CELIA

He'll go along o'er the wide world with me;

Leave me alone to woo him. Let's away,

And get our jewels and our wealth together,

Devise the fittest time and safest way

To hide us from pursuit that will be made

After my flight. Now go we in content

To liberty and not to banishment.

[Exeunt]