PRINCESS
[To FERDINAND] Ay, sweet my lord; and so I take my leave.
FERDINAND
No, madam; we will bring you on your way.
BIRON
Our wooing doth not end like an old play;
Jack hath not Jill: these ladies' courtesy
Might well have made our sport a comedy.
FERDINAND
Come, sir, it wants a twelvemonth and a day,
And then 'twill end.
BIRON
That's too long for a play.
Re-enter DON ADRIANO DE ARMADO
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Sweet majesty, vouchsafe me, –
PRINCESS
Was not that Hector?
DUMAIN
The worthy knight of Troy.
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
I will kiss thy royal finger, and take leave. I am
a votary; I have vowed to Jaquenetta to hold the
plough for her sweet love three years. But, most
esteemed greatness, will you hear the dialogue that
the two learned men have compiled in praise of the
owl and the cuckoo? It should have followed in the
end of our show.
FERDINAND
Call them forth quickly; we will do so.
ADRIANO DE ARMADO
Holla! approach.
Re-enter HOLOFERNES, SIR NATHANIEL, MOTH, COSTARD, and others
This side is Hiems, Winter, this Ver, the Spring;
the one maintained by the owl, the other by the
cuckoo. Ver, begin.
THE SONG
A SPRING.
When daisies pied and violets blue
And lady-smocks all silver-white
And cuckoo-buds of yellow