While they were talking, a gentleman entered whom the duke had sent to Olivia, and he said, "So please you, my lord, I might not be admitted to the lady, but by her handmaid she returned you this answer: Until seven years hence the element itself shall not behold her face; but like a cloistress she will walk veiled, watering her chamber with her tears for the sad remembrance of her dead brother."

On hearing this the duke exclaimed, "Oh, she that has a heart of this fine frame, to pay this debt of love to a dead brother, how will she love when the rich golden shaft has touched her heart!"

And then he said to Viola: "You know, Cesario, I have told you all the secrets of my heart; therefore, good youth, go to Olivia's house. Be not denied access; stand at her doors and tell her there your fixed foot shall grow till you have audience."

"And if I do speak to her, my lord, what then?" said Viola.

"Oh, then," replied Orsino, "unfold to her the passion of my love. Make a long discourse to her of my dear faith. It will well become you to act my woes, for she will attend more to you than to one of graver aspect."

Away then went Viola; but not willingly did she undertake this courtship, for she was to woo a lady to become a wife to him she wished to marry; but, having undertaken the affair, she performed it with fidelity, and Olivia soon heard that a youth was at her door who insisted upon being admitted to her presence.

"I told him," said the servant, "that you were sick. He said he knew you were, and therefore he came to speak with you. I told him that you were asleep. He seemed to have a foreknowledge of that, too, and said that therefore he must speak with you. What is to be said to him, lady? for he seems fortified against all denial, and will speak with you, whether you will or no."

Olivia, curious to see who this peremptory messenger might be, desired he might be admitted, and, throwing her veil over her face, she said she would once more hear Orsino's embassy, not doubting but that he came from the duke, by his importunity. Viola, entering, put on the most manly air she could assume, and, affecting the fine courtier language of great men's pages, she said to the veiled lady:

"Most radiant, exquisite, and matchless beauty, I pray you tell me if you are the lady of the house; for I should be sorry to cast away my speech upon another; for besides that it is excellently well penned, I have taken great pains to learn it."

"Whence come you, sir?" said Olivia.

"I can say little more than I have studied," replied Viola, "and that question is out of my part."

"Are you a comedian?" said Olivia.

"No," replied Viola; "and yet I am not that which I play," meaning that she, being a woman, feigned herself to be a man. And again she asked Olivia if she were the lady of the house.

Olivia said she was; and then Viola, having more curiosity to see her rival's features than haste to deliver her master's message, said, "Good madam, let me see your face." With this bold request Olivia was not averse to comply, for this haughty beauty, whom the Duke Orsino had loved so long in vain, at first sight conceived a passion for the supposed page, the humble Cesario.

When Viola asked to see her face, Olivia said, "Have you any commission from your lord and master to negotiate with my face?" And then, forgetting her determination to go veiled for seven long years, she drew aside her veil, saying: "But I will draw the curtain and show the picture. Is it not well done?"

Viola replied: "It is beauty truly mixed; the red and white upon your cheeks is by Nature's own cunning hand laid on. You are the most cruel lady living if you lead these graces to the grave and leave the world no copy."

"Oh, sir," replied Olivia, "I will not be so cruel. The world may have an inventory of my beauty. As, item, two lips, indifferent red; item, two gray eyes with lids to them; one neck; one chin; and so forth. Were you sent here to praise me?"

Viola replied, "I see what you are: you are too proud, but you are fair. My lord and master loves you. Oh, such a love could but be recompensed though you were crowned the queen of beauty; for Orsino loves you with adoration and with tears, with groans that thunder love, and sighs of fire."

"Your lord," said Olivia, "knows well my mind. I cannot love him; yet I doubt not he is virtuous; I know him to be noble and of high estate, of fresh and spotless youth. All voices proclaim him learned, courteous, and valiant; yet I cannot love him. He might have taken his answer long ago."

"If I did love you as my master does," said Viola, "I would make me a willow cabin at your gates, and call upon your name. I would write complaining sonnets on Olivia, and sing them in the dead of the night. Your name should sound among the hills, and I would make Echo, the babbling gossip of the air, cry out Olivia. Oh, you should not rest between the elements of earth and air, but you should pity me."

"You might do much," said Olivia. "What is your parentage?"

Viola replied: "Above my fortunes, yet my state is well. I am a gentleman."

Olivia now reluctantly dismissed Viola, saying: "Go to your master and tell him I cannot love him. Let him send no more, unless perchance you come again to tell me how he takes it."

And Viola departed, bidding the lady farewell by the name of Fair Cruelty. When she was gone Olivia repeated the words, Above my fortunes, yet my state is well. I am a gentleman. And she said aloud, "I will be sworn he is; his tongue, his face, his limbs, action, and spirit plainly show he is a gentleman." And then she wished Cesario was the duke; and, perceiving the fast hold he had taken on her affections, she blamed herself for her sudden love; but the gentle blame which people lay upon their own faults has no deep root, and presently the noble lady Olivia so far forgot the inequality between her fortunes and those of this seeming page, as well as the maidenly reserve which is the chief ornament of a lady's character, that she resolved to court the love of young Cesario, and sent a servant after him with a diamond ring, under the pretense that he had left it with her as a present from Orsino. She hoped by thus artfully making Cesario a present of the ring she should give him some intimation of her design; and truly it did make Viola suspect; for, knowing that Orsino had sent no ring by her, she began to recollect that Olivia's looks and manner were expressive of admiration, and she presently guessed her master's mistress had fallen in love with her.

"Alas!" said she, "the poor lady might as well love a dream. Disguise I see is wicked, for it has caused Olivia to breathe as fruitless sighs for me as I do for Orsino."