Alls Well That Ends Well | Page 8

Speak, is't so?
If it be so, you have wound a goodly clue;
If it be not,
forswear't: howe'er, I charge thee,
As heaven shall work in me for
thine avail,
To tell me truly.
HELENA.
Good madam, pardon me!
COUNTESS.
Do you love my son?
HELENA.
Your pardon, noble mistress!

COUNTESS.
Love you my son?
HELENA.
Do not you love him, madam?
COUNTESS.
Go not about; my love hath in't a bond
Whereof the
world takes note: come, come, disclose
The state of your affection;
for your passions
Have to the full appeach'd.
HELENA.
Then I confess,
Here on my knee, before high heaven
and you,
That before you, and next unto high heaven,
I love your
son:--
My friends were poor, but honest; so's my love:
Be not
offended; for it hurts not him
That he is lov'd of me: I follow him not

By any token of presumptuous suit;
Nor would I have him till I do
deserve him;
Yet never know how that desert should be.
I know I
love in vain, strive against hope;
Yet in this captious and intenible
sieve
I still pour in the waters of my love,
And lack not to lose still:
thus, Indian-like,
Religious in mine error, I adore
The sun, that
looks upon his worshipper,
But knows of him no more. My dearest
madam,
Let not your hate encounter with my love,
For loving
where you do; but if yourself,
Whose aged honour cites a virtuous
youth,
Did ever, in so true a flame of liking,
Wish chastely, and
love dearly, that your Dian
Was both herself and love; O, then, give
pity
To her whose state is such that cannot choose
But lend and
give where she is sure to lose;
That seeks not to find that her search
implies,
But, riddle-like, lives sweetly where she dies!
COUNTESS.
Had you not lately an intent,--speak truly,--
To go to
Paris?
HELENA.
Madam, I had.
COUNTESS.
Wherefore? tell true.
HELENA.

I will tell truth; by grace itself I swear.
You know my

father left me some prescriptions
Of rare and prov'd effects, such as
his reading
And manifest experience had collected
For general
sovereignty; and that he will'd me
In heedfullest reservation to
bestow them,
As notes whose faculties inclusive were
More than
they were in note: amongst the rest
There is a remedy, approv'd, set
down,
To cure the desperate languishings whereof
The king is
render'd lost.
COUNTESS.
This was your motive
For Paris, was it? speak.
HELENA.
My lord your son made me to think of this;
Else Paris,
and the medicine, and the king,
Had from the conversation of my
thoughts
Haply been absent then.
COUNTESS.
But think you, Helen,
If you should tender your
supposed aid,
He would receive it? He and his physicians
Are of a
mind; he, that they cannot help him;
They, that they cannot help: how
shall they credit
A poor unlearned virgin, when the schools,

Embowell'd of their doctrine, have let off
The danger to itself?
HELENA.
There's something in't
More than my father's skill,
which was the greatest
Of his profession, that his good receipt
Shall,
for my legacy, be sanctified
By th' luckiest stars in heaven: and,
would your honour
But give me leave to try success, I'd venture

The well-lost life of mine on his grace's cure.
By such a day and hour.
COUNTESS.
Dost thou believe't?
HELENA.
Ay, madam, knowingly.
COUNTESS.
Why, Helen, thou shalt have my leave, and love,

Means, and attendants, and my loving greetings
To those of mine in
court: I'll stay at home,
And pray God's blessing into thy attempt:

Be gone to-morrow; and be sure of this,
What I can help thee to thou
shalt not miss.

[Exeunt.]
ACT II.
SCENE 1. Paris. A room in the King's palace.
[Flourish. Enter the King, with young LORDS taking leave for the
Florentine war; BERTRAM, PAROLLES, and Attendants.]
KING.
Farewell, young lord; these war-like principles
Do not
throw from you:--and you, my lord, farewell;--
Share the advice
betwixt you; if both gain all,
The gift doth stretch itself as 'tis
received,
And is enough for both.
FIRST LORD.
It is our hope, sir,
After well-enter'd soldiers, to
return
And find your grace in health.
KING.
No, no, it cannot be; and yet my heart
Will not confess he
owes the malady
That doth my life besiege. Farewell, young lords;

Whether I live or die, be you the sons
Of worthy Frenchmen; let
higher Italy,--
Those bated that inherit but the fall
Of the last
monarchy,--see that you come
Not to woo honour, but to wed it;
when
The bravest questant shrinks, find what you seek,
That fame
may cry you aloud: I say farewell.
SECOND LORD.
Health, at your bidding, serve your majesty!
KING.
Those girls of Italy, take heed of them;
They say our French
lack language to deny,
If they demand: beware of being captives

Before you serve.
BOTH.
Our hearts receive your warnings.
KING.
Farewell.--Come hither to me.
[The king retires to a couch.]

FIRST LORD.
O my sweet lord, that you will stay behind us!
PAROLLES.
'Tis not his fault; the spark--
SECOND LORD.
O, 'tis brave wars!
PAROLLES.
Most admirable: I have seen those wars.
BERTRAM.
I am commanded here and kept a coil with,
'Too
young' and next year' and ''tis too early.'
PAROLLES.
An thy mind stand to it, boy, steal away bravely.
BERTRAM.
I shall stay here the forehorse to a smock,
Creaking
my shoes on the plain masonry,
Till