VALENTINE	Love is your master, for he masters you:
	And he that is so yoked by a fool,
	Methinks, should not be chronicled for wise.

PROTEUS	Yet writers say, as in the sweetest bud
	The eating canker dwells, so eating love
	Inhabits in the finest wits of all.

VALENTINE	And writers say, as the most forward bud
	Is eaten by the canker ere it blow,
	Even so by love the young and tender wit
	Is turn'd to folly, blasting in the bud,
	Losing his verdure even in the prime
	And all the fair effects of future hopes.
	But wherefore waste I time to counsel thee,
	That art a votary to fond desire?
	Once more adieu! my father at the road
	Expects my coming, there to see me shipp'd.

PROTEUS	And thither will I bring thee, Valentine.

VALENTINE	Sweet Proteus, no; now let us take our leave.
	To Milan let me hear from thee by letters
	Of thy success in love, and what news else
	Betideth here in absence of thy friend;
	And likewise will visit thee with mine.

PROTEUS	All happiness bechance to thee in Milan!

VALENTINE	As much to you at home! and so, farewell.

	[Exit]

PROTEUS	He after honour hunts, I after love:
	He leaves his friends to dignify them more,
	I leave myself, my friends and all, for love.
	Thou, Julia, thou hast metamorphosed me,
	Made me neglect my studies, lose my time,
	War with good counsel, set the world at nought;
	Made wit with musing weak, heart sick with thought.

	[Enter SPEED]

SPEED	Sir Proteus, save you! Saw you my master?

PROTEUS	But now he parted hence, to embark for Milan.

SPEED	Twenty to one then he is shipp'd already,
	And I have play'd the sheep in losing him.

PROTEUS	Indeed, a sheep doth very often stray,
	An if the shepherd be a while away.

SPEED	You conclude that my master is a shepherd, then,
	and I a sheep?

PROTEUS	I do.

SPEED	Why then, my horns are his horns, whether I wake or sleep.

PROTEUS	A silly answer and fitting well a sheep.

SPEED	This proves me still a sheep.

PROTEUS	True; and thy master a shepherd.

SPEED	Nay, that I can deny by a circumstance.

PROTEUS	It shall go hard but I'll prove it by another.

SPEED	The shepherd seeks the sheep, and not the sheep the
	shepherd; but I seek my master, and my master seeks
	not me: therefore I am no sheep.

PROTEUS	The sheep for fodder follow the shepherd; the
	shepherd for food follows not the sheep: thou for
	wages followest thy master; thy master for wages
	follows not thee: therefore thou art a sheep.

SPEED	Such another proof will make me cry 'baa.'

PROTEUS	But, dost thou hear? gavest thou my letter to Julia?

SPEED	Ay sir: I, a lost mutton, gave your letter to her,
	a laced mutton, and she, a laced mutton, gave me, a
	lost mutton, nothing for my labour.

PROTEUS	Here's too small a pasture for such store of muttons.

SPEED	If the ground be overcharged, you were best stick her.

PROTEUS	Nay: in that you are astray, 'twere best pound you.

SPEED	Nay, sir, less than a pound shall serve me for
	carrying your letter.

PROTEUS	You mistake; I mean the pound,--a pinfold.

SPEED	From a pound to a pin? fold it over and over,
	'Tis threefold too little for carrying a letter to