Enter Valentine and Proteus.
VALENTINE.
Cease to persuade, my loving Proteus.
Home-keeping youth have ever homely wits.
Were’t not affection chains thy tender days
To the sweet glances of thy honoured love,
I rather would entreat thy company
To see the wonders of the world abroad
Than, living dully sluggardized at home,
Wear out thy youth with shapeless idleness.
But since thou lov’st, love still, and thrive therein,
Even as I would when I to love begin.
PROTEUS.
Wilt thou be gone? Sweet Valentine, adieu.
Think on thy Proteus when thou haply seest
Some rare noteworthy object in thy travel.
Wish me partaker in thy happiness
When thou dost meet good hap; and in thy danger,
If ever danger do environ thee,
Commend thy grievance to my holy prayers,
For I will be thy headsman, Valentine.
VALENTINE.
And on a love-book pray for my success?
PROTEUS.
Upon some book I love I’ll pray for thee.
VALENTINE.
That’s on some shallow story of deep love,
How young Leander crossed the Hellespont.
PROTEUS.
That’s a deep story of a deeper love,
For he was more than over shoes in love.
VALENTINE.
’Tis true; for you are over boots in love,
And yet you never swam the Hellespont.
PROTEUS.
Over the boots? Nay, give me not the boots.
VALENTINE.
No, I will not, for it boots thee not.