To whom he sends, and what's his embassy:
	Yourself, held precious in the world's esteem,
	To parley with the sole inheritor
	Of all perfections that a man may owe,
	Matchless Navarre; the plea of no less weight
	Than Aquitaine, a dowry for a queen.
	Be now as prodigal of all dear grace
	As Nature was in making graces dear
	When she did starve the general world beside
	And prodigally gave them all to you.

PRINCESS	Good Lord Boyet, my beauty, though but mean,
	Needs not the painted flourish of your praise:
	Beauty is bought by judgement of the eye,
	Not utter'd by base sale of chapmen's tongues:
	I am less proud to hear you tell my worth
	Than you much willing to be counted wise
	In spending your wit in the praise of mine.
	But now to task the tasker: good Boyet,
	You are not ignorant, all-telling fame
	Doth noise abroad, Navarre hath made a vow,
	Till painful study shall outwear three years,
	No woman may approach his silent court:
	Therefore to's seemeth it a needful course,
	Before we enter his forbidden gates,
	To know his pleasure; and in that behalf,
	Bold of your worthiness, we single you
	As our best-moving fair solicitor.
	Tell him, the daughter of the King of France,
	On serious business, craving quick dispatch,
	Importunes personal conference with his grace:
	Haste, signify so much; while we attend,
	Like humble-visaged suitors, his high will.

BOYET	Proud of employment, willingly I go.

PRINCESS	All pride is willing pride, and yours is so.

	[Exit BOYET]

	Who are the votaries, my loving lords,
	That are vow-fellows with this virtuous duke?

First Lord	Lord Longaville is one.

PRINCESS	Know you the man?

MARIA	I know him, madam: at a marriage-feast,
	Between Lord Perigort and the beauteous heir
	Of Jaques Falconbridge, solemnized
	In Normandy, saw I this Longaville:
	A man of sovereign parts he is esteem'd;
	Well fitted in arts, glorious in arms:
	Nothing becomes him ill that he would well.
	The only soil of his fair virtue's gloss,
	If virtue's gloss will stain with any soil,
	Is a sharp wit matched with too blunt a will;
	Whose edge hath power to cut, whose will still wills
	It should none spare that come within his power.

PRINCESS	Some merry mocking lord, belike; is't so?

MARIA	They say so most that most his humours know.

PRINCESS	Such short-lived wits do wither as they grow.
	Who are the rest?

KATHARINE	The young Dumain, a well-accomplished youth,
	Of all that virtue love for virtue loved:
	Most power to do most harm, least knowing ill;
	For he hath wit to make an ill shape good,
	And shape to win grace though he had no wit.
	I saw him at the Duke Alencon's once;
	And much too little of that good I saw
	Is my report to his great worthiness.

ROSALINE	Another of these students at that time
	Was there with him, if I have heard a truth.
	Biron they call him; but a merrier man,
	Within the limit of becoming mirth,
	I never spent an hour's talk withal:
	His eye begets occasion for his wit;
	For every object that the one doth catch
	The other turns to a mirth-moving jest,
	Which his fair tongue, conceit's expositor,
	Delivers in such apt and gracious words
	That aged ears play truant at his tales
	And younger hearings are quite ravished;
	So sweet and voluble is his discourse.

PRINCESS	God bless my ladies! are they all in love,
	That every one her own hath garnished
	With such bedecking ornaments of praise?

First Lord	Here comes Boyet.

	[Re-enter BOYET]

PRINCESS	Now, what admittance, lord?