As You Like It

Act I, Scene I

Orchard of OLIVER'S house

[Enter ORLANDO and ADAM]

ORLANDO:
As I remember, Adam, it was upon this fashion bequeathed
me by will but poor a thousand crowns, and, as thou say'st,
charged my brother, on his blessing, to breed me well; and there
begins my sadness. My brother Jaques he keeps at school, and
report speaks goldenly of his profit. For my part, he keeps me
rustically at home, or, to speak more properly, stays me here at
home unkept; for call you that keeping for a gentleman of my
birth that differs not from the stalling of an ox? His horses are
bred better; for, besides that they are fair with their feeding,
they are taught their manage, and to that end riders dearly
hir'd; but I, his brother, gain nothing under him but growth; for
the which his animals on his dunghills are as much bound to him
as I. Besides this nothing that he so plentifully gives me, the
something that nature gave me his countenance seems to take from
me. He lets me feed with his hinds, bars me the place of a
brother, and as much as in him lies, mines my gentility with my
education. This is it, Adam, that grieves me; and the spirit of
my father, which I think is within me, begins to mutiny against
this servitude. I will no longer endure it, though yet I know no
wise remedy how to avoid it.

[Enter OLIVER]

ADAM:
Yonder comes my master, your brother.

ORLANDO:
Go apart, up.

[ADAM retires]

OLIVER:
Now, sir! what make you here?

ORLANDO:
Nothing; I am not taught to make any thing.

OLIVER:
What mar you then, sir?

ORLANDO:
Marry, sir, I am helping you to mar that which God made, a
poor unworthy brother of yours, with idleness.

OLIVER:
Marry, sir, be better employed, and be nought awhile.

ORLANDO:
Shall I keep your hogs, and eat husks with them? Whatprodigal portion have I spent that I should come to such penury?

OLIVER:
Know you where you are, sir?

ORLANDO:
O, sir, very well; here in your orchard.

OLIVER:
Know you before whom, sir?

ORLANDO:
Ay, better than him I am before knows me. I know you are
my eldest brother; and in the gentle condition of blood, you
should so know me. The courtesy of nations allows you my better
in that you are the first-born; but the same tradition takes not
away my blood, were there twenty brothers betwixt us. I have as
much of my father in me as you, albeit I confess your coming
before me is nearer to his reverence.

OLIVER:
What, boy!

[Strikes him]

ORLANDO:
Come, come, elder brother, you are too young in this.

OLIVER:
Wilt thou lay hands on me, villain?

ORLANDO:
I am no villain; I am the youngest son of Sir Rowland de
Boys. He was my father; and he is thrice a villain that says such
a father begot villains. Wert thou not my brother, I would not
take this hand from thy throat till this other had pull'd out thy
tongue for saying so. Thou has rail'd on thyself.