COUNTESS

Brought you this letter, gentlemen?

First Gentleman

Ay, madam;
And for the contents' sake are sorry for our pain.

COUNTESS

I prithee, lady, have a better cheer;
If thou engrossest all the griefs are thine,
Thou robb'st me of a moiety: he was my son;
But I do wash his name out of my blood,
And thou art all my child. Towards Florence is he?

Second Gentleman

Ay, madam.

COUNTESS

And to be a soldier?

Second Gentleman

Such is his noble purpose; and believe 't,
The duke will lay upon him all the honour
That good convenience claims.

COUNTESS

Return you thither?

First Gentleman

Ay, madam, with the swiftest wing of speed.

HELENA

[Reads] Till I have no wife I have nothing in France.
'Tis bitter.

COUNTESS

Find you that there?

HELENA

Ay, madam.

First Gentleman

'Tis but the boldness of his hand, haply, which his
heart was not consenting to.

COUNTESS

Nothing in France, until he have no wife!
There's nothing here that is too good for him
But only she; and she deserves a lord
That twenty such rude boys might tend upon
And call her hourly mistress. Who was with him?