Read The Twelfth Night :: The Lover

Duke Orsino was in love. He was so much in love that he could do nothing all day but lie on soft cushions in his private rooms listening to sweet music and thinking of the beautiful Olivia. "If music is the food of love, keep playing" he told his musicians. "Maybe I will have too much and no longer want any more!" His friends tried their best to get him to do something, but it was no good.

"Will you hunt today sir?" asked the noble Curio (one of his friends) "Hunt what, Curio?" "Deer, my lord?" "but I have hunted my 'dear' already!" he sighed and lay back on his cushions with a dreamy look on his face. "Olivia," he whispered, smiling to himself. He sat up quickly, though, when he heard the door open. It was Valentine (also his friend) who had just been to Olivia's house.

"Any news?" Orsino asked hopefully. "She would not see me, my lord," his friend replied. "Her maid told me that she has sworn not to leave her house for seven years, and will pass the time each day weeping for her dead brother." "She gives so much love only to her brother!" he sighed "How much greater love will she give to me when she has me as her husband!"

He stood up quickly. "Follow me into the garden! The sweet perfume of flowers helps my loving thoughts to rise higher and higher!", the two servants bowed, slowly opening the great doors, and the lovesick duke walked out into the sunlit garden, followed by his closest friends.