Orl.
Who's there?

Adam.
What, my young Master; Oh my gentle Master,
Oh my sweet Master! Oh you Memory
Of old Sir Rowland!—Why, what make you here?
Why are you virtuous? Why do People love you?
And wherefore are you gentle, strong, and valiant?
Why wou'd you be so fond to overcome
The bonny Prizer of the humourous Duke?
Your Praise is come too swiftly Home before you:
Know you not, Master, to some kind of Men
Their Graces serve them but as Enemies,
No more do yours; your Virtues, gentle Master,
Are sanctify'd, and holy Traitors to you:
Oh, what a World is this! when what is comely
Envenoms him that bears it.

Orl.
Why, what's the Matter?

Adam.
—Oh, unhappy Youth,
Come not within these Doors, beneath this Roof
The Enemy of all your Graces lives;
Your Brother, no, no Brother, yet the Son
(Yet not the Son, I will not call him Son)
Of him I was about to call his Father,
Hath heard your Praises, and this Night he means
To burn the Lodging where you us'd to lie,

And you within it; if he fail of that,
He will have other Means to cut you off;
I over-heard him and his Practices;
This is no Place, this House is but a Butchery;
Abhor it, fear it, do not enter it.

Orl.
Why-whither, Adam, wou'd'st thou have me go?

Adam.
No matter whither, so you come not here.

Orl.
What, wou'd'st thou have me go and beg my Food;
Or with a base and boisterous Hand inforce
A Thievish Living on the Common Road?
This I must do, or know not what to do:
Yet this I will not do, do how I can:
I rather will subject me to the Malice
Of a diverted Blood, and bloody Brother.

Adam.
But do not so; I have five hundred Crowns,
The thrifty Hire I saved under your Father,
Which I did Store to be my Foster Nurse
When Service shou'd in my old Limbs lie lame,
And unregarded Age in Corners thrown:
Take that—And He that doth the Ravens feed,
Yea providently caters for the Sparrow,
Be Comfort to my Age; here is the Gold,
All this I give you, let me be your Servant,
Tho' I look old, yet I am strong and lusty;
For in my Youth I never did apply
Hot and Rebellious Liquors to my Blood,
Nor did I with unbashful Forehead woe
The Means of Weakness and Debility;
Therefore my Age is as a lusty Winter,
Frosty, but kindly; let me go with you,
I'll do the Service of a younger Man,
In all your Business, and Necessities.

Orl.
Oh good Old Man! how well in thee appears
The constant Service of the Antique World,
When Service sweat for Duty, not for Need;
Thou art not for the Fashion of these Times,

Where none will sweat but for Promotion,
And having that, do choak their Service up
Even with the having; it is not so with thee;
But poor Old Man, thou prunest a rotten Tree,
That cannot so much as a Blossom yield
In lieu of all thy Pains and Husbandry. Enter Le-Beu.
So, Sir, what News from Court?

Le-Beu.
Bad News towards you, Orlando.

Orl.
Say it then, good Le-Beu,
I have been hackney'd, worn in evil Fortune,
And shall receive it with a constant Mind.

Le-Beu.
The Duke, too jealous of his sickly State,
Perhaps of your Desert, commands you go
Within three Days after the Sight of this [giving him an Order.
Into perpetual Banishment, or else
To suffer as a Traitor convict.

Orl.
The jealous Duke prevents my Brother's Malice;
Behold, good Adam, that eternal Guard
That watches and provides for all its Creatures,
Warns us away to save us from Destruction;
Thus what the Vulgar think Infliction, Pain,
Is often a Reward, and Virtue's Merit:
But come thy ways, we'll both along together,
And e'er we have thy youthful Wages spent,
We'll light upon some settled low Content.

Adam.
Master, go on, and I will follow thee
To the last Gasp, with Truth and Loyalty,
From seventeen Years, till now almost fourscore,
Here liv'd I, but now live here no more:
At seventeen Years many their Fortunes seek,
But at fourscore, it is too late a Week;
Yet Fortune cannot recompence me better,
Than to die well, and not my Master's Debtor. [Exeunt.

FREDERICK's Palace. Duke Frederick, with Lords.

Duke.
Can it be possible that no Man saw 'em?
It can not be, some Villains of my Court
Are of Consent and Sufferance in this.

Lord.
I cannot hear of any that did see her:
Hisperia the Princess's Gentlewoman
Confesses that she secretly o're heard
Your Daughter and her Cousin much commend
The Parts and Graces of the young Orlando,
That did but lately foil the sinewy Charles,
And she believes wherever they are gone
That Youth is surely in their Company.

Duke.
Send to his Brother, fetch that Gallant hither,
If he be absent, bring his Brother to me;
I'll make him find him; do this suddenly,
And let no Search, no Inquisition quail;
Bring me again this foolish Runaway, [Exeunt. The Forest of Arden, before the Duke's Cave. Duke Alberto, Amiens, Jaques, and two or three Lords like Foresters.

Duke.
Now my Comates and Brothers in Exile,
Hath not old Custom made this Life more sweet
Than that of painted Pomp? Are not these Woods
More free from Peril, than the envious Court?
Here we do feel the Penalty of Adam,
The Season's Difference, the Icy Phang,
And churlish chiding of the Winter's Wind:

Which, when it bites and blows upon my Body
Even till I shrink with Cold, I smile and say,
This is no Flattery: These are Councellours
Who feelingly perswade me what I am.

Amiens.
—Happy is your Grace
That can translate the Stubborness of Fortune
Into so quiet and so sweet a Stile:
But, Sir, this Forest will become a City,
Your People quit the Tyrant's Court, and hither
Resort in Crouds; Mechanics of all Sorts
Petition to delight and serve your Grace;
They will obey you as their King and Father:
A double Tye of Duty.

Duke.
—My Heart bleeds
When I reflect, good Amiens, that my Power
Is weaker than my Love; No more of this:
Come, shall we go and kill us Venison?
And yet it irks me, the poor dapple Fools,
Being native Burghers of this Desart City,
Shou'd, in their own Confines, with forked Heads,
Have their round Haunches goar'd.

Jaques.
Indeed, my Lord, it grieves me very much,
And in that Kind, I swear you more usurp,
Than does your Brother, who hath banish'd you;
Mark well my Story and you'll find it so:
To Day, my Lord of Amiens, and myself,
Lay in the Shade of an old Druid Oak,
Whose antique venerable Root peeps out
Upon the Brook that brawls along this Wood,
To which Place, a poor sequestred Stag,
That from the Hunter's Aim had ta'en a Hurt,
Did come to languish; and indeed, my Lord,
The wretched Animal heav'd forth such Groans,
That their Discharge did stretch his leathern Coat
Almost to bursting, while the big round Drops
Cours'd one another down his innocent Nose
In piteous Chace; and thus the hairy Fool

Stood on the extreamest Verge of the swift Brook,
Augmenting it with Tears.

Duke.
—Didst thou not Jaques?
Didst thou not moralize this Spectacle?

Jaques.
Who cou'd behold it, Sir, and not reflect?
First, for his Weeping in the unwanting Stream;
Is it not plain he made a Testament
As Worldlings do, giving his Sum of more
To that which had too much: Anon a careless Herd,
Full of the Pasture, jumps along the Verdure,
And never stays to greet him; there you see
A Crowd of fat and greasy Citizens
Looking with Scorn on a poor ruin'd Bankrupt.
Are we not all Usurpers, Tyrants, worse,
To fright these Animals and kill them thus
In their assign'd and native Dwelling-Place.

Duke.
—Shew me this Place,
There will we sweetly moralize together,
And make our Contemplations give at once
Delight, and Use. [Exeunt.

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