Act 1, Scene 2

The park.

[Enter ARMADO and MOTH.]
Don Adriano de Armado
287 Boy, what sign is it when a man of great spirit grows
288 melancholy?
Moth
289 A great sign, sir, that he will look sad.
Don Adriano de Armado
290 Why, sadness is one and the self-same thing, dear imp.
Moth
291 No, no; O Lord, sir, no.
Don Adriano de Armado
292 How canst thou part sadness and melancholy, my tender
293 juvenal?
Moth
294 By a familiar demonstration of the working, my tough senior.
Don Adriano de Armado
295 Why tough senior? Why tough senior?
Moth
296 Why tender juvenal? Why tender juvenal?
Don Adriano de Armado
297 I spoke it, tender juvenal, as a congruent epitheton
298 appertaining to thy young days, which we may nominate tender.
Moth
299 And I, tough senior, as an appertinent title to your old
300 time, which we may name tough.
Don Adriano de Armado
301 Pretty and apt.
Moth
302 How mean you, sir? I pretty, and my saying apt? or I apt, and
303 my saying pretty?
Don Adriano de Armado
304 Thou pretty, because little.
Moth
305 Little pretty, because little. Wherefore apt?
Don Adriano de Armado
306 And therefore apt, because quick.
Moth
307 Speak you this in my praise, master?
Don Adriano de Armado
308 In thy condign praise.
Moth
309 I will praise an eel with the same praise.
Don Adriano de Armado
310 What! That an eel is ingenious?
Moth
311 That an eel is quick.
Don Adriano de Armado
312 I do say thou art quick in answers: thou heat'st my blood.
Moth
313 I am answered, sir.
Don Adriano de Armado
314 I love not to be crossed.
[Aside]
Moth
315 He speaks the mere contrary: crosses love not him.
Don Adriano de Armado
316 I have promised to study three years with the duke.
Moth
317 You may do it in an hour, sir.
Don Adriano de Armado
318 Impossible.
Moth
319 How many is one thrice told?
Don Adriano de Armado
320 I am ill at reck'ning; it fitteth the spirit of a tapster.
Moth
321 You are a gentleman and a gamester, sir.
Don Adriano de Armado
322 I confess both: they are both the varnish of a complete man.
Moth
323 Then I am sure you know how much the gross sum of deuce-ace
324 amounts to.
Don Adriano de Armado
325 It doth amount to one more than two.
Moth
326 Which the base vulgar do call three.
Don Adriano de Armado
327 True.
Moth
328 Why, sir, is this such a piece of study? Now here's three
329 studied ere ye'll thrice wink; and how easy it is to put 'years'
330 to the word 'three,' and study three years in two words, the
331 dancing horse will tell you.
Don Adriano de Armado
332 A most fine figure!
[Aside]
Moth
333 To prove you a cipher.
Don Adriano de Armado
334 I will hereupon confess I am in love; and as it is base for
335 a soldier to love, so am I in love with a base wench. If drawing
336 my sword against the humour of affection would deliver me from
337 the reprobate thought of it, I would take Desire prisoner, and
338 ransom him to any French courtier for a new-devised curtsy. I
339 think scorn to sigh: methinks I should out-swear Cupid. Comfort
340 me, boy: what great men have been in love?
Moth
341 Hercules, master.
Don Adriano de Armado
342 Most sweet Hercules! More authority, dear boy, name more;
343 and, sweet my child, let them be men of good repute and carriage.
Moth
344 Samson, master: he was a man of good carriage, great
345 carriage, for he carried the town gates on his back like a
346 porter; and he was in love.
Don Adriano de Armado
347 O well-knit Samson! strong-jointed Samson! I do excel thee
348 in my rapier as much as thou didst me in carrying gates. I am in
349 love too. Who was Samson's love, my dear Moth?
Moth
350 A woman, master.
Don Adriano de Armado
351 Of what complexion?
Moth
352 Of all the four, or the three, or the two, or one of the
353 four.
Don Adriano de Armado
354 Tell me precisely of what complexion.
Moth
355 Of the sea-water green, sir.
Don Adriano de Armado
356 Is that one of the four complexions?
Moth
357 As I have read, sir; and the best of them too.
Don Adriano de Armado
358 Green, indeed, is the colour of lovers; but to have a love
359 of that colour, methinks Samson had small reason for it. He
360 surely affected her for her wit.
Moth
361 It was so, sir, for she had a green wit.
Don Adriano de Armado
362 My love is most immaculate white and red.
Moth
363 Most maculate thoughts, master, are masked under such
364 colours.
Don Adriano de Armado
365 Define, define, well-educated infant.
Moth
366 My father's wit my mother's tongue assist me!
Don Adriano de Armado
367 Sweet invocation of a child; most pretty, and pathetical!
Moth
368 If she be made of white and red,
369 Her faults will ne'er be known;
370 For blushing cheeks by faults are bred,
371 And fears by pale white shown.
372 Then if she fear, or be to blame,
373 By this you shall not know,
374 For still her cheeks possess the same
375 Which native she doth owe.
376 A dangerous rhyme, master, against the reason of white and red.
Don Adriano de Armado
377 Is there not a ballad, boy, of the King and the Beggar?
Moth
378 The world was very guilty of such a ballad some three ages
379 since; but I think now 'tis not to be found; or if it were, it
380 would neither serve for the writing nor the tune.
Don Adriano de Armado
381 I will have that subject newly writ o'er, that I may
382 example my digression by some mighty precedent. Boy, I do love
383 that country girl that I took in the park with the rational hind
384 Costard: she deserves well.
[Aside]
Moth
385 To be whipped; and yet a better love than my master.
Don Adriano de Armado
386 Sing, boy: my spirit grows heavy in love.
Moth
387 And that's great marvel, loving a light wench.
Don Adriano de Armado
388 I say, sing.
Moth
389 Forbear till this company be past.
[Enter DULL, COSTARD, and JAQUENETTA.]
Anthony Dull
390 Sir, the Duke's pleasure is, that you keep Costard safe: and
391 you must suffer him to take no delight nor no penance; but a'
392 must fast three days a week. For this damsel, I must keep her at
393 the park; she is allowed for the day-woman. Fare you well.
Don Adriano de Armado
394 I do betray myself with blushing. Maid!
Jaquenetta
395 Man?
Don Adriano de Armado
396 I will visit thee at the lodge.
Jaquenetta
397 That's hereby.
Don Adriano de Armado
398 I know where it is situate.
Jaquenetta
399 Lord, how wise you are!
Don Adriano de Armado
400 I will tell thee wonders.
Jaquenetta
401 With that face?
Don Adriano de Armado
402 I love thee.
Jaquenetta
403 So I heard you say.
Don Adriano de Armado
404 And so, farewell.
Jaquenetta
405 Fair weather after you!
Anthony Dull
406 Come, Jaquenetta, away!
[Exit with JAQUENETTA.]
Don Adriano de Armado
407 Villain, thou shalt fast for thy offences ere thou be
408 pardoned.
Costard
409 Well, sir, I hope when I do it I shall do it on a full
410 stomach.
Don Adriano de Armado
411 Thou shalt be heavily punished.
Costard
412 I am more bound to you than your fellows, for they are but
413 lightly rewarded.
Don Adriano de Armado
414 Take away this villain: shut him up.
Moth
415 Come, you transgressing slave: away!
Costard
416 Let me not be pent up, sir: I will fast, being loose.
Moth
417 No, sir; that were fast and loose: thou shalt to prison.
Costard
418 Well, if ever I do see the merry days of desolation that I
419 have seen, some shall see—
Moth
420 What shall some see?
Costard
421 Nay, nothing, Master Moth, but what they look upon. It is
422 not for prisoners to be too silent in their words, and therefore
423 I will say nothing. I thank God I have as little patience as
424 another man, and therefore I can be quiet.
[Exeunt MOTH and COSTARD.]
Don Adriano de Armado
425 I do affect the very ground, which is base, where her shoe,
426 which is baser, guided by her foot, which is basest, doth tread.
427 I shall be forsworn,—which is a great argument of falsehood,—if
428 I love. And how can that be true love which is falsely attempted?
429 Love is a familiar; Love is a devil; there is no evil angel but
430 Love. Yet was Samson so tempted, and he had an excellent
431 strength; yet was Solomon so seduced, and he had a very good wit.
432 Cupid's butt-shaft is too hard for Hercules' club, and therefore
433 too much odds for a Spaniard's rapier. The first and second cause
434 will not serve my turn; the passado he respects not, the duello
435 he regards not; his disgrace is to be called boy, but his glory
436 is to subdue men. Adieu, valour! rust, rapier! be still, drum!
437 for your manager is in love; yea, he loveth. Assist me, some
438 extemporal god of rime, for I am sure I shall turn sonneter.
439 Devise, wit; write, pen; for I am for whole volumes in folio.
[Exit.]

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Word definitions on hover

Notes

TLN 290wordplay
“sadness is one and the self-same thing”
Armado uses 'melancholy' and 'sadness' as grand synonyms, but Moth punctures the pretension: 'sadness' can simply mean 'looking sad,' while 'melancholy' was the fashionable Renaissance humour of the deep-feeling man of genius. The exchange mocks the Elizabethan vogue for performed melancholy.
TLN 297rhetorical device
“congruent epitheton appertaining to thy young days”
Armado uses grammar-school Latin: 'epitheton' (Greek and Latin for an adjective or descriptive word attached to a noun) and 'appertaining' (belonging to, appropriate for). He is saying 'tender' is a fitting descriptive label ('congruent epitheton') for youth. The joke is that he reaches for technical rhetorical vocabulary to win a simple argument with a boy.
TLN 308archaic vocab
“In thy condign praise”
'Condign' means fully deserved, merited, or fitting — often used in legal and official language ('condign punishment'). Armado means 'yes, and your praises are richly deserved' — but the word is stiff and bureaucratic for a simple compliment to a page, which is part of his comic character.
TLN 315wordplay
“crosses love not him”
Moth's aside turns 'crossed' (to be contradicted or thwarted) into 'crosses' meaning coins — the back of a coin in this period bore a cross. Armado says he loves not to be 'crossed' (opposed); Moth retorts that 'crosses' (money) love not him, meaning he is broke. It is a quick pun on the poverty of the braggart soldier.
TLN 323wordplay
“the gross sum of deuce-ace amounts to”
In dice, 'deuce' is a two and 'ace' is a one: deuce-ace = three. Moth baits Armado into solemnly calculating that two plus one is three, then uses this to mock the whole three-year oath of study: 'three years' is merely 'three' — a number even a child (or an idiot) already knows. The joke lands because it reduces Armado's grandiose promise to 'the duke' to simple arithmetic.
TLN 330historical topical
“the dancing horse will tell you”
Morocco was a celebrated performing horse exhibited in London in the 1590s whose trainer, a Scotsman called Banks, had trained him to count, tap out numbers with his hoof, and perform tricks that amazed audiences. He was a popular London sensation and a byword for any seemingly impossible feat of intelligence. Moth says even an animal could work out '1 + 2 = 3.'
TLN 339classical allusion
“I should out-swear Cupid. Comfort me, boy”
Armado means he wishes he could defeat love by sheer force of oath — 'swear off' Cupid, outdo him with vows. Cupid was the Roman god of erotic love, typically imagined as a winged boy with a bow and golden arrows that kindled love in anyone they struck. For a soldier to say he wants to 'out-swear' the god of love is already a comic absurdity.
classical Cupid's golden and leaden arrows
TLN 345biblical allusion
“he carried the town gates on his back like a porter”
Moth refers to the episode in Judges where the Philistines lock the city gates at Gaza to trap Samson, but at midnight he rises, tears the gates off their posts, and carries them — two posts, bar, and all — on his shoulders to the top of a hill. He is the supreme Old Testament example of superhuman physical strength. Moth offers him as proof that even the strongest man is vulnerable to love.
biblical Samson and Delilah (and Solomon's wives)
TLN 352cultural context
“Of all the four, or the three, or the two, or one of the four”
The 'four complexions' refers to the four humours of Renaissance medicine: sanguine (blood), choleric (yellow bile), melancholic (black bile), and phlegmatic (phlegm). Each gave the body a different colour — ruddy, yellow, dark, or pale. Moth's deliberately unhelpful answer parodies Armado's pedantry by replying in equally pedantic fashion, and 'sea-water green' was emphatically NOT one of the four recognised complexions — it is a joke at Armado's expense.
TLN 363wordplay
“Most maculate thoughts, master, are masked under such colours”
Armado praises his love as 'most immaculate white and red' (spotlessly pure). Moth responds with 'maculate' — the exact opposite, meaning stained or spotted (from Latin maculatus, spotted). The gag turns Armado's Petrarchan praise of his lady's complexion into an admission that white-and-red beauty conceals impure intentions. It is also a pun: 'colours' means both the lady's rosy-and-white face and a military/heraldic disguise — 'colours' as false flags.
TLN 383archaic vocab
“the rational hind Costard”
'Hind' here means a male farm servant or rustic labourer (from Old English hine, a household servant), not a female deer. 'Rational' is used mockingly — Armado is calling Costard a 'reasoning/talking servant,' ironically granting him the faculty of reason that distinguishes humans from animals, while 'hind' simultaneously implies he is barely more than livestock.
TLN 417wordplay
“that were fast and loose”
Moth plays on two meanings at once. Literally: if Costard fasts while loose (free), that would be 'fast and loose' simultaneously. But 'fast and loose' was also the name of a cheating fairground game in which a spectator tried to pin a folded belt with a stick, while the trickster could always pull it free — a byword for double-dealing and inconsistency. Moth means Costard cannot be both free and fasting — he must go to prison.
TLN 429cultural context
“Love is a familiar; Love is a devil; there is no evil angel but Love”
A 'familiar' was a demon spirit that, in Elizabethan belief, attended witches and magicians, doing their bidding. To call Love a familiar is to say it is a demon enslaving its host. The three-clause figure (familiar / devil / evil angel) is deliberate rhetorical amplification (Latin gradatio), each phrase confirming the same dark point with increasing theological weight — Armado reaches for the worst supernatural categories to describe how helpless he is.
TLN 431biblical allusion
“Solomon so seduced, and he had a very good wit”
King Solomon, famous in the Bible as the wisest man who ever lived, was led into idolatry by his many foreign wives and concubines. Armado cites him, alongside Samson, to argue that even the greatest men — the strongest and the wisest — fell to love, so a mere Spanish soldier need not be ashamed. The pairing of Samson (strength overcome) and Solomon (wisdom overcome) was a Renaissance commonplace about the 'Power of Women.'
biblical Samson and Delilah (and Solomon's wives)
TLN 432classical allusion
“Cupid's butt-shaft is too hard for Hercules' club”
A 'butt-shaft' was a blunt-headed arrow used for target-shooting at a 'butt' (an archery mound or marker) — so less deadly than a barbed war arrow. The joke is that even Cupid's most trivial, practice arrow is stronger than the great hero Hercules's own weapon. Armado has just invoked Hercules as a man who fell in love; now he says love defeats even that supreme strength. Hercules was the classical hero of the twelve labours, the model of human muscle and effort.
classical Hercules and his labours
TLN 433cultural context
“The first and second cause will not serve my turn; the passado he respects not, the duello he regards not”
Armado thinks like a duelist. The 'first and second cause' refers to the formal justifications for a duel according to the fashionable Italian codes of honor: a 'cause' was the specific insult that entitled a gentleman to demand satisfaction. A 'passado' is a fencing term for a forward thrust. The 'duello' is the formal code of dueling rules. Armado is saying that the normal rules of a duellist's life — insult, challenge, fight — are useless against Love.
TLN 437rhetorical device
“Assist me, some extemporal god of rime, for I am sure I shall turn sonneter”
Armado invokes an imaginary deity of on-the-spot (extemporal = improvised, off the cuff) verse to help him write love poetry. His vow to 'turn sonneter' and produce 'volumes in folio' is comic overstatement: love has reduced this blustering soldier to reaching for a pen. It is also a self-aware joke about the Elizabethan fashion for writing sonnet sequences to prove one's love.
historical Petrarch and the Petrarchan lover