Together then this faithful servant and his loved master set out, and Orlando and Adam traveled on, uncertain what course to pursue, till they came to the forest of Arden, and there they found themselves in the same distress for want of food that Ganimed and Aliena had been. They wandered on, seeking some human habitation, till they were almost spent with hunger and fatigue. Adam at last said, “O my dear master, I die for want of food; I can go no farther!” He then laid himself down, thinking to make that place his grave, and bade his dear master farewell. Orlando, seeing him in this weak state, took his old servant up in his arms, and carried him under the shelter of some pleasant trees; and he said to him, “Cheerily, old Adam, rest your weary limbs here awhile, and do not talk of dying.” Orlando then searched about to find some food, and he happened to arrive at that part of the forest where the duke was; and he and his friends were just going to eat their dinner, this royal duke being seated on the grass, under no other canopy than the shady covert of some large trees. Orlando, whom hunger had made desperate, drew his sword, intending to take meat by force, and said, “Forbear, and eat no more; I must have your food!” The duke asked him if distress had made him so bold, or if he were a rude despiser of good manners? On this Orlando said he was dying with hunger: and then the duke told him he was welcome to sit down and eat with them. Orlando hearing him speak so gently, put up his sword, and blushed with shame at the rude manner in which he had demanded their food. “Pardon me, I pray you,” said he; “I thought that all things had been savage here, and therefore I put on the countenance of stern command; but whatever men you are, that in this desert, under the shade of melancholy boughs, lose and neglect the creeping hours of time; if ever you have looked on better days; if ever you have been where bells have knolled to church; if you have ever sat at any good man’s feast; if ever from your eyelids you have wiped a tear, and know what it is to pity or be pitied, may gentle speeches now move you to do me human courtesy!” The duke replied, “True it is that we are men (as you say) who have seen better days, and though we have now our habitation in this wild forest, we have lived in towns and cities, and have with holy bell been knolled to church, have sat at good men’s feasts, and from our eyes we have wiped the drops which sacred pity has engendered: therefore sit you down, and take of our refreshment as much as will minister to your wants.” “There is an old poor man,” answered Orlando, “who has limped after me many a weary step in pure love, oppressed at once with two sad infirmities, age and hunger; till he be satisfied, I must not touch a bit.” “Go, find him out, and bring him hither,” said the duke; “we will forbear to eat till you return.” Then Orlando went like a doe to find its fawn and give it food; and presently returned, bringing Adam in his arms; and the duke said: “Set down your venerable burthen; you are both welcome:” and they fed the old man, and cheered his heart, and he revived, and recovered his health and strength again.
The duke inquired who Orlando was, and when he found that he was the son of his old friend, Sir Rowland de Boys, he took him under his protection, and Orlando and his old servant lived with the duke in the forest. Orlando arrived in the forest not many days after Ganimed and Aliena came there, and (as has been before related) bought the shepherd’s cottage. Ganimed and Aliena were strangely surprised to find the name of Rosalind carved on the trees, and love sonnets fastened to them, all addressed to Rosalind; and while they were wondering how this could be, they met Orlando, and they perceived the chain which Rosalind had given him about his neck.
Orlando little thought that Ganimed was the fair princess Rosalind, who by her noble condescension and favor had so won his heart that he passed his whole time in carving her name upon the trees, and writing sonnets in praise of her beauty; but being much pleased with the graceful air of this pretty shepherd youth, he entered into conversation with him, and he thought he saw a likeness in Ganimed to his beloved Rosalind, but that he had none of the dignified deportment of that noble lady; for Ganimed assumed the forward manners often seen in youths when they are between boys and men, and with much archness and humor talked to Orlando of a certain lover, “who,” said he, “haunts our forest, and spoils our young trees with carving Rosalind upon their barks; and he hangs odes upon hawthorns, and elegies upon brambles, all praising this same Rosalind. If I could find this lover, I would give him some good counsel that would soon cure him of his love.”
Orlando confessed that he was the fond lover of whom he spoke, and asked Ganimed to give him the good counsel he talked of. The remedy Ganimed proposed, and the counsel he gave him, was that Orlando should come every day to the cottage where he and his sister Aliena dwelt. “And then,” said Ganimed, “I will feign myself to be Rosalind, and you shall feign to court me in the same manner as you would do if I was Rosalind, and then I will imitate the fantastic ways of whimsical ladies to their lovers, till I make you ashamed of your love; and this is the way I propose to cure you.” Orlando had no great faith in the remedy, yet he agreed to come every day to Ganimed’s cottage and feign a playful courtship; and every day Orlando visited Ganimed and Aliena, and Orlando called the shepherd Ganimed his Rosalind, and every day talked over all the fine words and flattering compliments which young men delight to use when they court. It does not appear, however, that Ganimed made any progress in curing Orlando of his love for Rosalind. Though Orlando thought all this was but a sportive play (not dreaming that Ganimed was his very Rosalind), yet the opportunity it gave him of saying all the fond things he had in his heart, pleased his fancy almost as well as it did Ganimed’s, who enjoyed the secret jest in knowing these fine love speeches were all addressed to the right person.
In this manner many days passed pleasantly on with these young people; and the good-natured Aliena seeing it made Ganimed happy, let him have his own way, and was diverted at the mock courtship, and did not care to remind Ganimed that the lady Rosalind had not yet made herself known to the duke, her father, whose place of resort in the forest they had learnt from Orlando. Ganimed met the duke one day, and had some talk with him, and the duke asked of what parentage he came; Ganimed answered that he came of as good parentage as he did: which made the duke smile, for he did not suspect the pretty shepherd boy came of royal lineage. Then seeing the duke look well and happy, Ganimed was content to put off all further explanation for a few days longer.
One morning, as Orlando was going to visit Ganimed, he saw a man lying asleep on the ground, and a large green snake had twisted itself about his neck. The snake, seeing Orlando approach, glided away among the bushes. Orlando went nearer, and then he discovered a lioness lie couching, with her head on the ground, with a cat-like watch, waiting till the sleeping man awaked (for it is said that lions will prey on nothing that is dead or sleeping). It seemed as if Orlando was sent by Providence to free the man from the danger of the snake and lioness: but when Orlando looked in the man’s face, he perceived that the sleeper, who was exposed to this double peril, was his own brother Oliver, who had so cruelly used him, and had threatened to destroy him by fire; and he was almost tempted to leave him a prey to the hungry lioness: but brotherly affection and the gentleness of his nature soon overcame his first anger against his brother; and he drew his sword, and attacked the lioness, and slew her, and thus preserved his brother’s life both from the venomous snake and from the furious lioness; but before Orlando could conquer the lioness, she had torn one of his arms with her sharp claws.
While Orlando was engaged with the lioness, Oliver awaked, and perceiving that his brother Orlando, whom he had so cruelly treated, was saving him from the fury of a wild beast at the risk of his own life, shame and remorse at once seized him, and he repented of his unworthy conduct, and besought with many tears his brother’s pardon for the injuries he had done him. Orlando rejoiced to see him so penitent, and readily forgave him; they embraced each other; and from that hour Oliver loved Orlando with a true brotherly affection, though he had come to the forest bent on his destruction.
The wound in Orlando’s arm having bled very much, he found himself too weak to go to visit Ganimed, and therefore he desired his brother to go, and tell Ganimed, “whom,” said Orlando, “I in sport do call my Rosalind,” the accident which had befallen him. Thither then Oliver went, and told to Ganimed and Aliena how Orlando had saved his life; and when he had finished the story of Orlando’s bravery, and his own providential escape, he owned to them that he was Orlando’s brother, who had so cruelly used him; and then he told them of their reconciliation.
The sincere sorrow that Oliver expressed for his offenses, made such a lively impression on the kind heart of Aliena, that she instantly fell in love with him; and Oliver, observing how much she pitied the distress he told her he felt for his fault, as suddenly fell in love with her. But while love was thus stealing into the hearts of Aliena and Oliver, he was no less busy with Ganimed, who hearing of the danger Orlando had been in, and that he was wounded by the lioness, fainted; and when he recovered, he pretended that he had counterfeited the swoon in the imaginary character of Rosalind, and Ganimed said to Oliver, “Tell your brother Orlando how well I counterfeited a swoon.” But Oliver saw by the paleness of his complexion that he really did faint, and much wondering at the weakness of the young man, he said, “Well, if you did counterfeit, take a good heart, and counterfeit to be a man.” “So I do,” replied Ganimed (truly), “but I should have been a woman by right.”
Oliver made this visit a very long one, and when at last he returned back to his brother, he had much news to tell him, for, besides the account of Ganimed’s fainting at the hearing that Orlando was wounded, Oliver told him how he had fallen in love with the fair shepherdess Aliena, and that she had lent a favorable ear to his suit, even in this their first interview; and he talked to his brother, as of a thing almost settled that he should marry Aliena, saying, that he so well loved her he would live here as a shepherd, and settle his estate and house at home upon Orlando.