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Cymbeline


 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 	DRAMATIS PERSONAE
 
 
 CYMBELINE	king of Britain.
 
 CLOTEN	son to the Queen by a former husband.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	a gentleman, husband to Imogen.
 
 BELARIUS	a banished lord, disguised under the name of Morgan.
 
 
 GUIDERIUS	|  sons to Cymbeline, disguised under the names
 	|  of Polydote and Cadwal, supposed sons to
 ARVIRAGUS	|  Morgan.
 
 
 PHILARIO	friend to Posthumus,	|
 			|  Italians.
 IACHIMO	friend to Philario, 	|
 
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	general of the Roman forces.
 
 PISANIO	servant to Posthumus.
 
 CORNELIUS	a physician.
 
 	A Roman Captain. (Captain:)
 
 	Two British Captains.
 	(First Captain:)
 	(Second Captain:)
 
 	A Frenchman, friend to Philario.
 	(Frenchman:)
 
 	Two Lords of Cymbeline's court.
 	(First Lord:)
 	(Second Lord:)
 
 	Two Gentlemen of the same.
 	(First Gentleman:)
 	(Second Gentleman:)
 
 	Two Gaolers.
 	(First Gaoler:)
 	(Second Gaoler:)
 
 QUEEN	wife to Cymbeline.
 
 IMOGEN	daughter to Cymbeline by a former queen.
 
 HELEN	a lady attending on Imogen.
 
 	Lords, Ladies, Roman Senators, Tribunes,
 	a Soothsayer, a Dutchman, a Spaniard, Musicians,
 	Officers, Captains, Soldiers, Messengers,
 	and other Attendants. (Lord:)
 	(Lady:)
 	(First Lady:)
 	(First Senator:)
 	(Second Senator:)
 	(First Tribune:)
 	(Soothsayer:)
 	(Messenger:)
 
 	Apparitions.
 	(Sicilius Leonatus:)
 	(Mother:)
 	(First Brother:)
 	(Second Brother:)
 	(Jupiter:)
 
 SCENE	Britain; Rome.
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT I
 
 
 
 SCENE I	Britain. The garden of Cymbeline's palace.
 
 
 	[Enter two Gentlemen]
 
 First Gentleman	You do not meet a man but frowns: our bloods
 	No more obey the heavens than our courtiers
 	Still seem as does the king.
 
 Second Gentleman	But what's the matter?
 
 First Gentleman	His daughter, and the heir of's kingdom, whom
 	He purposed to his wife's sole son--a widow
 	That late he married--hath referr'd herself
 	Unto a poor but worthy gentleman: she's wedded;
 	Her husband banish'd; she imprison'd: all
 	Is outward sorrow; though I think the king
 	Be touch'd at very heart.
 
 Second Gentleman	None but the king?
 
 First Gentleman	He that hath lost her too; so is the queen,
 	That most desired the match; but not a courtier,
 	Although they wear their faces to the bent
 	Of the king's look's, hath a heart that is not
 	Glad at the thing they scowl at.
 
 Second Gentleman	And why so?
 
 First Gentleman	He that hath miss'd the princess is a thing
 	Too bad for bad report: and he that hath her--
 	I mean, that married her, alack, good man!
 	And therefore banish'd--is a creature such
 	As, to seek through the regions of the earth
 	For one his like, there would be something failing
 	In him that should compare. I do not think
 	So fair an outward and such stuff within
 	Endows a man but he.
 
 Second Gentleman	You speak him far.
 
 First Gentleman	I do extend him, sir, within himself,
 	Crush him together rather than unfold
 	His measure duly.
 
 Second Gentleman	                  What's his name and birth?
 
 First Gentleman	I cannot delve him to the root: his father
 	Was call'd Sicilius, who did join his honour
 	Against the Romans with Cassibelan,
 	But had his titles by Tenantius whom
 	He served with glory and admired success,
 	So gain'd the sur-addition Leonatus;
 	And had, besides this gentleman in question,
 	Two other sons, who in the wars o' the time
 	Died with their swords in hand; for which
 	their father,
 	Then old and fond of issue, took such sorrow
 	That he quit being, and his gentle lady,
 	Big of this gentleman our theme, deceased
 	As he was born. The king he takes the babe
 	To his protection, calls him Posthumus Leonatus,
 	Breeds him and makes him of his bed-chamber,
 	Puts to him all the learnings that his time
 	Could make him the receiver of; which he took,
 	As we do air, fast as 'twas minister'd,
 	And in's spring became a harvest, lived in court--
 	Which rare it is to do--most praised, most loved,
 	A sample to the youngest, to the more mature
 	A glass that feated them, and to the graver
 	A child that guided dotards; to his mistress,
 	For whom he now is banish'd, her own price
 	Proclaims how she esteem'd him and his virtue;
 	By her election may be truly read
 	What kind of man he is.
 
 Second Gentleman	I honour him
 	Even out of your report. But, pray you, tell me,
 	Is she sole child to the king?
 
 First Gentleman	His only child.
 	He had two sons: if this be worth your hearing,
 	Mark it: the eldest of them at three years old,
 	I' the swathing-clothes the other, from their nursery
 	Were stol'n, and to this hour no guess in knowledge
 	Which way they went.
 
 Second Gentleman	How long is this ago?
 
 First Gentleman	Some twenty years.
 
 Second Gentleman	That a king's children should be so convey'd,
 	So slackly guarded, and the search so slow,
 	That could not trace them!
 
 First Gentleman	Howsoe'er 'tis strange,
 	Or that the negligence may well be laugh'd at,
 	Yet is it true, sir.
 
 Second Gentleman	I do well believe you.
 
 First Gentleman	We must forbear: here comes the gentleman,
 	The queen, and princess.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 	[Enter the QUEEN, POSTHUMUS LEONATUS, and IMOGEN]
 
 QUEEN	No, be assured you shall not find me, daughter,
 	After the slander of most stepmothers,
 	Evil-eyed unto you: you're my prisoner, but
 	Your gaoler shall deliver you the keys
 	That lock up your restraint. For you, Posthumus,
 	So soon as I can win the offended king,
 	I will be known your advocate: marry, yet
 	The fire of rage is in him, and 'twere good
 	You lean'd unto his sentence with what patience
 	Your wisdom may inform you.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Please your highness,
 	I will from hence to-day.
 
 QUEEN	You know the peril.
 	I'll fetch a turn about the garden, pitying
 	The pangs of barr'd affections, though the king
 	Hath charged you should not speak together.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 IMOGEN	O
 	Dissembling courtesy! How fine this tyrant
 	Can tickle where she wounds! My dearest husband,
 	I something fear my father's wrath; but nothing--
 	Always reserved my holy duty--what
 	His rage can do on me: you must be gone;
 	And I shall here abide the hourly shot
 	Of angry eyes, not comforted to live,
 	But that there is this jewel in the world
 	That I may see again.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	My queen! my mistress!
 	O lady, weep no more, lest I give cause
 	To be suspected of more tenderness
 	Than doth become a man. I will remain
 	The loyal'st husband that did e'er plight troth:
 	My residence in Rome at one Philario's,
 	Who to my father was a friend, to me
 	Known but by letter: thither write, my queen,
 	And with mine eyes I'll drink the words you send,
 	Though ink be made of gall.
 
 	[Re-enter QUEEN]
 
 QUEEN	Be brief, I pray you:
 	If the king come, I shall incur I know not
 	How much of his displeasure.
 
 	[Aside]
 
 		        Yet I'll move him
 	To walk this way: I never do him wrong,
 	But he does buy my injuries, to be friends;
 	Pays dear for my offences.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Should we be taking leave
 	As long a term as yet we have to live,
 	The loathness to depart would grow. Adieu!
 
 IMOGEN	Nay, stay a little:
 	Were you but riding forth to air yourself,
 	Such parting were too petty. Look here, love;
 	This diamond was my mother's: take it, heart;
 	But keep it till you woo another wife,
 	When Imogen is dead.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	How, how! another?
 	You gentle gods, give me but this I have,
 	And sear up my embracements from a next
 	With bonds of death!
 
 	[Putting on the ring]
 
 		Remain, remain thou here
 	While sense can keep it on. And, sweetest, fairest,
 	As I my poor self did exchange for you,
 	To your so infinite loss, so in our trifles
 	I still win of you: for my sake wear this;
 	It is a manacle of love; I'll place it
 	Upon this fairest prisoner.
 
 	[Putting a bracelet upon her arm]
 
 IMOGEN	O the gods!
 	When shall we see again?
 
 	[Enter CYMBELINE and Lords]
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Alack, the king!
 
 CYMBELINE	Thou basest thing, avoid! hence, from my sight!
 	If after this command thou fraught the court
 	With thy unworthiness, thou diest: away!
 	Thou'rt poison to my blood.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	The gods protect you!
 	And bless the good remainders of the court! I am gone.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 IMOGEN	                  There cannot be a pinch in death
 	More sharp than this is.
 
 CYMBELINE	O disloyal thing,
 	That shouldst repair my youth, thou heap'st
 	A year's age on me.
 
 IMOGEN	I beseech you, sir,
 	Harm not yourself with your vexation
 	I am senseless of your wrath; a touch more rare
 	Subdues all pangs, all fears.
 
 CYMBELINE	Past grace? obedience?
 
 IMOGEN	Past hope, and in despair; that way, past grace.
 
 CYMBELINE	That mightst have had the sole son of my queen!
 
 IMOGEN	O blest, that I might not! I chose an eagle,
 	And did avoid a puttock.
 
 CYMBELINE	Thou took'st a beggar; wouldst have made my throne
 	A seat for baseness.
 
 IMOGEN	No; I rather added
 	A lustre to it.
 
 CYMBELINE	                  O thou vile one!
 
 IMOGEN	Sir,
 	It is your fault that I have loved Posthumus:
 	You bred him as my playfellow, and he is
 	A man worth any woman, overbuys me
 	Almost the sum he pays.
 
 CYMBELINE	What, art thou mad?
 
 IMOGEN	Almost, sir: heaven restore me! Would I were
 	A neat-herd's daughter, and my Leonatus
 	Our neighbour shepherd's son!
 
 CYMBELINE	Thou foolish thing!
 
 	[Re-enter QUEEN]
 
 	They were again together: you have done
 	Not after our command. Away with her,
 	And pen her up.
 
 QUEEN	                  Beseech your patience. Peace,
 	Dear lady daughter, peace! Sweet sovereign,
 	Leave us to ourselves; and make yourself some comfort
 	Out of your best advice.
 
 CYMBELINE	Nay, let her languish
 	A drop of blood a day; and, being aged,
 	Die of this folly!
 
 	[Exeunt CYMBELINE and Lords]
 
 QUEEN	                  Fie! you must give way.
 
 	[Enter PISANIO]
 
 	Here is your servant. How now, sir! What news?
 
 PISANIO	My lord your son drew on my master.
 
 QUEEN	Ha!
 	No harm, I trust, is done?
 
 PISANIO	There might have been,
 	But that my master rather play'd than fought
 	And had no help of anger: they were parted
 	By gentlemen at hand.
 
 QUEEN	I am very glad on't.
 
 IMOGEN	Your son's my father's friend; he takes his part.
 	To draw upon an exile! O brave sir!
 	I would they were in Afric both together;
 	Myself by with a needle, that I might prick
 	The goer-back. Why came you from your master?
 
 PISANIO	On his command: he would not suffer me
 	To bring him to the haven; left these notes
 	Of what commands I should be subject to,
 	When 't pleased you to employ me.
 
 QUEEN	This hath been
 	Your faithful servant: I dare lay mine honour
 	He will remain so.
 
 PISANIO	                  I humbly thank your highness.
 
 QUEEN	Pray, walk awhile.
 
 IMOGEN	                  About some half-hour hence,
 	I pray you, speak with me: you shall at least
 	Go see my lord aboard: for this time leave me.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT I
 
 
 
 SCENE II	The same. A public place.
 
 
 	[Enter CLOTEN and two Lords]
 
 First Lord	Sir, I would advise you to shift a shirt; the
 	violence of action hath made you reek as a
 	sacrifice: where air comes out, air comes in:
 	there's none abroad so wholesome as that you vent.
 
 CLOTEN	If my shirt were bloody, then to shift it. Have I hurt him?
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  No, 'faith; not so much as his patience.
 
 First Lord	Hurt him! his body's a passable carcass, if he be
 	not hurt: it is a thoroughfare for steel, if it be not hurt.
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  His steel was in debt; it went o' the
 	backside the town.
 
 CLOTEN	The villain would not stand me.
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  No; but he fled forward still, toward your face.
 
 First Lord	Stand you! You have land enough of your own: but
 	he added to your having; gave you some ground.
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  As many inches as you have oceans. Puppies!
 
 CLOTEN	I would they had not come between us.
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  So would I, till you had measured how long
 	a fool you were upon the ground.
 
 CLOTEN	And that she should love this fellow and refuse me!
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  If it be a sin to make a true election, she
 	is damned.
 
 First Lord	Sir, as I told you always, her beauty and her brain
 	go not together: she's a good sign, but I have seen
 	small reflection of her wit.
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  She shines not upon fools, lest the
 	reflection should hurt her.
 
 CLOTEN	Come, I'll to my chamber. Would there had been some
 	hurt done!
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  I wish not so; unless it had been the fall
 	of an ass, which is no great hurt.
 
 CLOTEN	You'll go with us?
 
 First Lord	I'll attend your lordship.
 
 CLOTEN	Nay, come, let's go together.
 
 Second Lord	Well, my lord.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT I
 
 
 
 SCENE III	A room in Cymbeline's palace.
 
 
 	[Enter IMOGEN and PISANIO]
 
 IMOGEN	I would thou grew'st unto the shores o' the haven,
 	And question'dst every sail: if he should write
 	And not have it, 'twere a paper lost,
 	As offer'd mercy is. What was the last
 	That he spake to thee?
 
 PISANIO	It was his queen, his queen!
 
 IMOGEN	Then waved his handkerchief?
 
 PISANIO	And kiss'd it, madam.
 
 IMOGEN	Senseless Linen! happier therein than I!
 	And that was all?
 
 PISANIO	                  No, madam; for so long
 	As he could make me with this eye or ear
 	Distinguish him from others, he did keep
 	The deck, with glove, or hat, or handkerchief,
 	Still waving, as the fits and stirs of 's mind
 	Could best express how slow his soul sail'd on,
 	How swift his ship.
 
 IMOGEN	Thou shouldst have made him
 	As little as a crow, or less, ere left
 	To after-eye him.
 
 PISANIO	                  Madam, so I did.
 
 IMOGEN	I would have broke mine eye-strings; crack'd them, but
 	To look upon him, till the diminution
 	Of space had pointed him sharp as my needle,
 	Nay, follow'd him, till he had melted from
 	The smallness of a gnat to air, and then
 	Have turn'd mine eye and wept. But, good Pisanio,
 	When shall we hear from him?
 
 PISANIO	Be assured, madam,
 	With his next vantage.
 
 IMOGEN	I did not take my leave of him, but had
 	Most pretty things to say: ere I could tell him
 	How I would think on him at certain hours
 	Such thoughts and such, or I could make him swear
 	The shes of Italy should not betray
 	Mine interest and his honour, or have charged him,
 	At the sixth hour of morn, at noon, at midnight,
 	To encounter me with orisons, for then
 	I am in heaven for him; or ere I could
 	Give him that parting kiss which I had set
 	Betwixt two charming words, comes in my father
 	And like the tyrannous breathing of the north
 	Shakes all our buds from growing.
 
 	[Enter a Lady]
 
 Lady	The queen, madam,
 	Desires your highness' company.
 
 IMOGEN	Those things I bid you do, get them dispatch'd.
 	I will attend the queen.
 
 PISANIO	Madam, I shall.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT I
 
 
 
 SCENE IV	Rome. Philario's house.
 
 
 	[Enter PHILARIO, IACHIMO, a Frenchman, a
 	Dutchman, and a Spaniard]
 
 IACHIMO	Believe it, sir, I have seen him in Britain: he was
 	then of a crescent note, expected to prove so worthy
 	as since he hath been allowed the name of; but I
 	could then have looked on him without the help of
 	admiration, though the catalogue of his endowments
 	had been tabled by his side and I to peruse him by items.
 
 PHILARIO	You speak of him when he was less furnished than now
 	he is with that which makes him both without and within.
 
 Frenchman	I have seen him in France: we had very many there
 	could behold the sun with as firm eyes as he.
 
 IACHIMO	This matter of marrying his king's daughter, wherein
 	he must be weighed rather by her value than his own,
 	words him, I doubt not, a great deal from the matter.
 
 Frenchman	And then his banishment.
 
 IACHIMO	Ay, and the approbation of those that weep this
 	lamentable divorce under her colours are wonderfully
 	to extend him; be it but to fortify her judgment,
 	which else an easy battery might lay flat, for
 	taking a beggar without less quality. But how comes
 	it he is to sojourn with you? How creeps
 	acquaintance?
 
 PHILARIO	His father and I were soldiers together; to whom I
 	have been often bound for no less than my life.
 	Here comes the Briton: let him be so entertained
 	amongst you as suits, with gentlemen of your
 	knowing, to a stranger of his quality.
 
 	[Enter POSTHUMUS LEONATUS]
 
 	I beseech you all, be better known to this
 	gentleman; whom I commend to you as a noble friend
 	of mine: how worthy he is I will leave to appear
 	hereafter, rather than story him in his own hearing.
 
 Frenchman	Sir, we have known together in Orleans.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Since when I have been debtor to you for courtesies,
 	which I will be ever to pay and yet pay still.
 
 Frenchman	Sir, you o'er-rate my poor kindness: I was glad I
 	did atone my countryman and you; it had been pity
 	you should have been put together with so mortal a
 	purpose as then each bore, upon importance of so
 	slight and trivial a nature.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	By your pardon, sir, I was then a young traveller;
 	rather shunned to go even with what I heard than in
 	my every action to be guided by others' experiences:
 	but upon my mended judgment--if I offend not to say
 	it is mended--my quarrel was not altogether slight.
 
 Frenchman	'Faith, yes, to be put to the arbitrement of swords,
 	and by such two that would by all likelihood have
 	confounded one the other, or have fallen both.
 
 IACHIMO	Can we, with manners, ask what was the difference?
 
 Frenchman	Safely, I think: 'twas a contention in public,
 	which may, without contradiction, suffer the report.
 	It was much like an argument that fell out last
 	night, where each of us fell in praise of our
 	country mistresses; this gentleman at that time
 	vouching--and upon warrant of bloody
 	affirmation--his to be more fair, virtuous, wise,
 	chaste, constant-qualified and less attemptable
 	than any the rarest of our ladies in France.
 
 IACHIMO	That lady is not now living, or this gentleman's
 	opinion by this worn out.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	She holds her virtue still and I my mind.
 
 IACHIMO	You must not so far prefer her 'fore ours of Italy.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Being so far provoked as I was in France, I would
 	abate her nothing, though I profess myself her
 	adorer, not her friend.
 
 IACHIMO	As fair and as good--a kind of hand-in-hand
 	comparison--had been something too fair and too good
 	for any lady in Britain. If she went before others
 	I have seen, as that diamond of yours outlustres
 	many I have beheld. I could not but believe she
 	excelled many: but I have not seen the most
 	precious diamond that is, nor you the lady.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I praised her as I rated her: so do I my stone.
 
 IACHIMO	What do you esteem it at?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	More than the world enjoys.
 
 IACHIMO	Either your unparagoned mistress is dead, or she's
 	outprized by a trifle.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	You are mistaken: the one may be sold, or given, if
 	there were wealth enough for the purchase, or merit
 	for the gift: the other is not a thing for sale,
 	and only the gift of the gods.
 
 IACHIMO	Which the gods have given you?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Which, by their graces, I will keep.
 
 IACHIMO	You may wear her in title yours: but, you know,
 	strange fowl light upon neighbouring ponds. Your
 	ring may be stolen too: so your brace of unprizable
 	estimations; the one is but frail and the other
 	casual; a cunning thief, or a that way accomplished
 	courtier, would hazard the winning both of first and last.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Your Italy contains none so accomplished a courtier
 	to convince the honour of my mistress, if, in the
 	holding or loss of that, you term her frail. I do
 	nothing doubt you have store of thieves;
 	notwithstanding, I fear not my ring.
 
 PHILARIO	Let us leave here, gentlemen.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Sir, with all my heart. This worthy signior, I
 	thank him, makes no stranger of me; we are familiar at first.
 
 IACHIMO	With five times so much conversation, I should get
 	ground of your fair mistress, make her go back, even
 	to the yielding, had I admittance and opportunity to friend.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	No, no.
 
 IACHIMO	I dare thereupon pawn the moiety of my estate to
 	your ring; which, in my opinion, o'ervalues it
 	something: but I make my wager rather against your
 	confidence than her reputation: and, to bar your
 	offence herein too, I durst attempt it against any
 	lady in the world.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	You are a great deal abused in too bold a
 	persuasion; and I doubt not you sustain what you're
 	worthy of by your attempt.
 
 IACHIMO	What's that?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	A repulse: though your attempt, as you call it,
 	deserve more; a punishment too.
 
 PHILARIO	Gentlemen, enough of this: it came in too suddenly;
 	let it die as it was born, and, I pray you, be
 	better acquainted.
 
 IACHIMO	Would I had put my estate and my neighbour's on the
 	approbation of what I have spoke!
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	What lady would you choose to assail?
 
 IACHIMO	Yours; whom in constancy you think stands so safe.
 	I will lay you ten thousand ducats to your ring,
 	that, commend me to the court where your lady is,
 	with no more advantage than the opportunity of a
 	second conference, and I will bring from thence
 	that honour of hers which you imagine so reserved.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I will wage against your gold, gold to it: my ring
 	I hold dear as my finger; 'tis part of it.
 
 IACHIMO	You are afraid, and therein the wiser. If you buy
 	ladies' flesh at a million a dram, you cannot
 	preserve it from tainting: but I see you have some
 	religion in you, that you fear.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	This is but a custom in your tongue; you bear a
 	graver purpose, I hope.
 
 IACHIMO	I am the master of my speeches, and would undergo
 	what's spoken, I swear.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Will you? I shall but lend my diamond till your
 	return: let there be covenants drawn between's: my
 	mistress exceeds in goodness the hugeness of your
 	unworthy thinking: I dare you to this match: here's my ring.
 
 PHILARIO	I will have it no lay.
 
 IACHIMO	By the gods, it is one. If I bring you no
 	sufficient testimony that I have enjoyed the dearest
 	bodily part of your mistress, my ten thousand ducats
 	are yours; so is your diamond too: if I come off,
 	and leave her in such honour as you have trust in,
 	she your jewel, this your jewel, and my gold are
 	yours: provided I have your commendation for my more
 	free entertainment.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I embrace these conditions; let us have articles
 	betwixt us. Only, thus far you shall answer: if
 	you make your voyage upon her and give me directly
 	to understand you have prevailed, I am no further
 	your enemy; she is not worth our debate: if she
 	remain unseduced, you not making it appear
 	otherwise, for your ill opinion and the assault you
 	have made to her chastity you shall answer me with
 	your sword.
 
 IACHIMO	Your hand; a covenant: we will have these things set
 	down by lawful counsel, and straight away for
 	Britain, lest the bargain should catch cold and
 	starve: I will fetch my gold and have our two
 	wagers recorded.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Agreed.
 
 	[Exeunt POSTHUMUS LEONATUS and IACHIMO]
 
 Frenchman	Will this hold, think you?
 
 PHILARIO	Signior Iachimo will not from it.
 	Pray, let us follow 'em.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT I
 
 
 
 SCENE V	Britain. A room in Cymbeline's palace.
 
 
 	[Enter QUEEN, Ladies, and CORNELIUS]
 
 QUEEN	Whiles yet the dew's on ground, gather those flowers;
 	Make haste: who has the note of them?
 
 First Lady	I, madam.
 
 QUEEN	Dispatch.
 
 	[Exeunt Ladies]
 
 	Now, master doctor, have you brought those drugs?
 
 CORNELIUS	Pleaseth your highness, ay: here they are, madam:
 
 	[Presenting a small box]
 
 	But I beseech your grace, without offence,--
 	My conscience bids me ask--wherefore you have
 	Commanded of me those most poisonous compounds,
 	Which are the movers of a languishing death;
 	But though slow, deadly?
 
 QUEEN	I wonder, doctor,
 	Thou ask'st me such a question. Have I not been
 	Thy pupil long? Hast thou not learn'd me how
 	To make perfumes? distil? preserve? yea, so
 	That our great king himself doth woo me oft
 	For my confections? Having thus far proceeded,--
 	Unless thou think'st me devilish--is't not meet
 	That I did amplify my judgment in
 	Other conclusions? I will try the forces
 	Of these thy compounds on such creatures as
 	We count not worth the hanging, but none human,
 	To try the vigour of them and apply
 	Allayments to their act, and by them gather
 	Their several virtues and effects.
 
 CORNELIUS	Your highness
 	Shall from this practise but make hard your heart:
 	Besides, the seeing these effects will be
 	Both noisome and infectious.
 
 QUEEN	O, content thee.
 
 	[Enter PISANIO]
 
 	[Aside]
 
 	Here comes a flattering rascal; upon him
 	Will I first work: he's for his master,
 	An enemy to my son. How now, Pisanio!
 	Doctor, your service for this time is ended;
 	Take your own way.
 
 CORNELIUS	[Aside]          I do suspect you, madam;
 	But you shall do no harm.
 
 QUEEN	[To PISANIO]            Hark thee, a word.
 
 CORNELIUS	[Aside]  I do not like her. She doth think she has
 	Strange lingering poisons: I do know her spirit,
 	And will not trust one of her malice with
 	A drug of such damn'd nature. Those she has
 	Will stupefy and dull the sense awhile;
 	Which first, perchance, she'll prove on
 	cats and dogs,
 	Then afterward up higher: but there is
 	No danger in what show of death it makes,
 	More than the locking-up the spirits a time,
 	To be more fresh, reviving. She is fool'd
 	With a most false effect; and I the truer,
 	So to be false with her.
 
 QUEEN	No further service, doctor,
 	Until I send for thee.
 
 CORNELIUS	I humbly take my leave.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 QUEEN	Weeps she still, say'st thou? Dost thou think in time
 	She will not quench and let instructions enter
 	Where folly now possesses? Do thou work:
 	When thou shalt bring me word she loves my son,
 	I'll tell thee on the instant thou art then
 	As great as is thy master, greater, for
 	His fortunes all lie speechless and his name
 	Is at last gasp: return he cannot, nor
 	Continue where he is: to shift his being
 	Is to exchange one misery with another,
 	And every day that comes comes to decay
 	A day's work in him. What shalt thou expect,
 	To be depender on a thing that leans,
 	Who cannot be new built, nor has no friends,
 	So much as but to prop him?
 
 	[The QUEEN drops the box: PISANIO takes it up]
 
 		      Thou takest up
 	Thou know'st not what; but take it for thy labour:
 	It is a thing I made, which hath the king
 	Five times redeem'd from death: I do not know
 	What is more cordial. Nay, I prethee, take it;
 	It is an earnest of a further good
 	That I mean to thee. Tell thy mistress how
 	The case stands with her; do't as from thyself.
 	Think what a chance thou changest on, but think
 	Thou hast thy mistress still, to boot, my son,
 	Who shall take notice of thee: I'll move the king
 	To any shape of thy preferment such
 	As thou'lt desire; and then myself, I chiefly,
 	That set thee on to this desert, am bound
 	To load thy merit richly. Call my women:
 	Think on my words.
 
 	[Exit PISANIO]
 
 		A sly and constant knave,
 	Not to be shaked; the agent for his master
 	And the remembrancer of her to hold
 	The hand-fast to her lord. I have given him that
 	Which, if he take, shall quite unpeople her
 	Of liegers for her sweet, and which she after,
 	Except she bend her humour, shall be assured
 	To taste of too.
 
 	[Re-enter PISANIO and Ladies]
 
 	So, so: well done, well done:
 	The violets, cowslips, and the primroses,
 	Bear to my closet. Fare thee well, Pisanio;
 	Think on my words.
 
 	[Exeunt QUEEN and Ladies]
 
 PISANIO	And shall do:
 	But when to my good lord I prove untrue,
 	I'll choke myself: there's all I'll do for you.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT I
 
 
 
 SCENE VI	The same. Another room in the palace.
 
 
 	[Enter IMOGEN]
 
 IMOGEN	A father cruel, and a step-dame false;
 	A foolish suitor to a wedded lady,
 	That hath her husband banish'd;--O, that husband!
 	My supreme crown of grief! and those repeated
 	Vexations of it! Had I been thief-stol'n,
 	As my two brothers, happy! but most miserable
 	Is the desire that's glorious: blest be those,
 	How mean soe'er, that have their honest wills,
 	Which seasons comfort. Who may this be? Fie!
 
 	[Enter PISANIO and IACHIMO]
 
 PISANIO	Madam, a noble gentleman of Rome,
 	Comes from my lord with letters.
 
 IACHIMO	Change you, madam?
 	The worthy Leonatus is in safety
 	And greets your highness dearly.
 
 	[Presents a letter]
 
 IMOGEN	Thanks, good sir:
 	You're kindly welcome.
 
 IACHIMO	[Aside]  All of her that is out of door most rich!
 	If she be furnish'd with a mind so rare,
 	She is alone the Arabian bird, and I
 	Have lost the wager. Boldness be my friend!
 	Arm me, audacity, from head to foot!
 	Or, like the Parthian, I shall flying fight;
 	Rather directly fly.
 
 IMOGEN	[Reads]  'He is one of the noblest note, to whose
 	kindnesses I am most infinitely tied. Reflect upon
 	him accordingly, as you value your trust--
 			 LEONATUS.'
 	So far I read aloud:
 	But even the very middle of my heart
 	Is warm'd by the rest, and takes it thankfully.
 	You are as welcome, worthy sir, as I
 	Have words to bid you, and shall find it so
 	In all that I can do.
 
 IACHIMO	Thanks, fairest lady.
 	What, are men mad? Hath nature given them eyes
 	To see this vaulted arch, and the rich crop
 	Of sea and land, which can distinguish 'twixt
 	The fiery orbs above and the twinn'd stones
 	Upon the number'd beach? and can we not
 	Partition make with spectacles so precious
 	'Twixt fair and foul?
 
 IMOGEN	What makes your admiration?
 
 IACHIMO	It cannot be i' the eye, for apes and monkeys
 	'Twixt two such shes would chatter this way and
 	Contemn with mows the other; nor i' the judgment,
 	For idiots in this case of favour would
 	Be wisely definite; nor i' the appetite;
 	Sluttery to such neat excellence opposed
 	Should make desire vomit emptiness,
 	Not so allured to feed.
 
 IMOGEN	What is the matter, trow?
 
 IACHIMO	The cloyed will,
 	That satiate yet unsatisfied desire, that tub
 	Both fill'd and running, ravening first the lamb
 	Longs after for the garbage.
 
 IMOGEN	What, dear sir,
 	Thus raps you? Are you well?
 
 IACHIMO	Thanks, madam; well.
 
 	[To PISANIO]
 
 		 Beseech you, sir, desire
 	My man's abode where I did leave him: he
 	Is strange and peevish.
 
 PISANIO	I was going, sir,
 	To give him welcome.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 IMOGEN	Continues well my lord? His health, beseech you?
 
 IACHIMO	Well, madam.
 
 IMOGEN	Is he disposed to mirth? I hope he is.
 
 IACHIMO	Exceeding pleasant; none a stranger there
 	So merry and so gamesome: he is call'd
 	The Briton reveller.
 
 IMOGEN	When he was here,
 	He did incline to sadness, and oft-times
 	Not knowing why.
 
 IACHIMO	                  I never saw him sad.
 	There is a Frenchman his companion, one
 	An eminent monsieur, that, it seems, much loves
 	A Gallian girl at home; he furnaces
 	The thick sighs from him, whiles the jolly Briton--
 	Your lord, I mean--laughs from's free lungs, cries 'O,
 	Can my sides hold, to think that man, who knows
 	By history, report, or his own proof,
 	What woman is, yea, what she cannot choose
 	But must be, will his free hours languish for
 	Assured bondage?'
 
 IMOGEN	                  Will my lord say so?
 
 IACHIMO	Ay, madam, with his eyes in flood with laughter:
 	It is a recreation to be by
 	And hear him mock the Frenchman. But, heavens know,
 	Some men are much to blame.
 
 IMOGEN	Not he, I hope.
 
 IACHIMO	Not he: but yet heaven's bounty towards him might
 	Be used more thankfully. In himself, 'tis much;
 	In you, which I account his beyond all talents,
 	Whilst I am bound to wonder, I am bound
 	To pity too.
 
 IMOGEN	                  What do you pity, sir?
 
 IACHIMO	Two creatures heartily.
 
 IMOGEN	Am I one, sir?
 	You look on me: what wreck discern you in me
 	Deserves your pity?
 
 IACHIMO	Lamentable! What,
 	To hide me from the radiant sun and solace
 	I' the dungeon by a snuff?
 
 IMOGEN	I pray you, sir,
 	Deliver with more openness your answers
 	To my demands. Why do you pity me?
 
 IACHIMO	That others do--
 	I was about to say--enjoy your--But
 	It is an office of the gods to venge it,
 	Not mine to speak on 't.
 
 IMOGEN	You do seem to know
 	Something of me, or what concerns me: pray you,--
 	Since doubling things go ill often hurts more
 	Than to be sure they do; for certainties
 	Either are past remedies, or, timely knowing,
 	The remedy then born--discover to me
 	What both you spur and stop.
 
 IACHIMO	Had I this cheek
 	To bathe my lips upon; this hand, whose touch,
 	Whose every touch, would force the feeler's soul
 	To the oath of loyalty; this object, which
 	Takes prisoner the wild motion of mine eye,
 	Fixing it only here; should I, damn'd then,
 	Slaver with lips as common as the stairs
 	That mount the Capitol; join gripes with hands
 	Made hard with hourly falsehood--falsehood, as
 	With labour; then by-peeping in an eye
 	Base and unlustrous as the smoky light
 	That's fed with stinking tallow; it were fit
 	That all the plagues of hell should at one time
 	Encounter such revolt.
 
 IMOGEN	My lord, I fear,
 	Has forgot Britain.
 
 IACHIMO	And himself. Not I,
 	Inclined to this intelligence, pronounce
 	The beggary of his change; but 'tis your graces
 	That from pay mutest conscience to my tongue
 	Charms this report out.
 
 IMOGEN	Let me hear no more.
 
 IACHIMO	O dearest soul! your cause doth strike my heart
 	With pity, that doth make me sick. A lady
 	So fair, and fasten'd to an empery,
 	Would make the great'st king double,--to be partner'd
 	With tomboys hired with that self-exhibition
 	Which your own coffers yield! with diseased ventures
 	That play with all infirmities for gold
 	Which rottenness can lend nature! such boil'd stuff
 	As well might poison poison! Be revenged;
 	Or she that bore you was no queen, and you
 	Recoil from your great stock.
 
 IMOGEN	Revenged!
 	How should I be revenged? If this be true,--
 	As I have such a heart that both mine ears
 	Must not in haste abuse--if it be true,
 	How should I be revenged?
 
 IACHIMO	Should he make me
 	Live, like Diana's priest, betwixt cold sheets,
 	Whiles he is vaulting variable ramps,
 	In your despite, upon your purse? Revenge it.
 	I dedicate myself to your sweet pleasure,
 	More noble than that runagate to your bed,
 	And will continue fast to your affection,
 	Still close as sure.
 
 IMOGEN	What, ho, Pisanio!
 
 IACHIMO	Let me my service tender on your lips.
 
 IMOGEN	Away! I do condemn mine ears that have
 	So long attended thee. If thou wert honourable,
 	Thou wouldst have told this tale for virtue, not
 	For such an end thou seek'st,--as base as strange.
 	Thou wrong'st a gentleman, who is as far
 	From thy report as thou from honour, and
 	Solicit'st here a lady that disdains
 	Thee and the devil alike. What ho, Pisanio!
 	The king my father shall be made acquainted
 	Of thy assault: if he shall think it fit,
 	A saucy stranger in his court to mart
 	As in a Romish stew and to expound
 	His beastly mind to us, he hath a court
 	He little cares for and a daughter who
 	He not respects at all. What, ho, Pisanio!
 
 IACHIMO	O happy Leonatus! I may say
 	The credit that thy lady hath of thee
 	Deserves thy trust, and thy most perfect goodness
 	Her assured credit. Blessed live you long!
 	A lady to the worthiest sir that ever
 	Country call'd his! and you his mistress, only
 	For the most worthiest fit! Give me your pardon.
 	I have spoke this, to know if your affiance
 	Were deeply rooted; and shall make your lord,
 	That which he is, new o'er: and he is one
 	The truest manner'd; such a holy witch
 	That he enchants societies into him;
 	Half all men's hearts are his.
 
 IMOGEN	You make amends.
 
 IACHIMO	He sits 'mongst men like a descended god:
 	He hath a kind of honour sets him off,
 	More than a mortal seeming. Be not angry,
 	Most mighty princess, that I have adventured
 	To try your taking a false report; which hath
 	Honour'd with confirmation your great judgment
 	In the election of a sir so rare,
 	Which you know cannot err: the love I bear him
 	Made me to fan you thus, but the gods made you,
 	Unlike all others, chaffless. Pray, your pardon.
 
 IMOGEN	All's well, sir: take my power i' the court
 	for yours.
 
 IACHIMO	My humble thanks. I had almost forgot
 	To entreat your grace but in a small request,
 	And yet of moment to, for it concerns
 	Your lord; myself and other noble friends,
 	Are partners in the business.
 
 IMOGEN	Pray, what is't?
 
 IACHIMO	Some dozen Romans of us and your lord--
 	The best feather of our wing--have mingled sums
 	To buy a present for the emperor
 	Which I, the factor for the rest, have done
 	In France: 'tis plate of rare device, and jewels
 	Of rich and exquisite form; their values great;
 	And I am something curious, being strange,
 	To have them in safe stowage: may it please you
 	To take them in protection?
 
 IMOGEN	Willingly;
 	And pawn mine honour for their safety: since
 	My lord hath interest in them, I will keep them
 	In my bedchamber.
 
 IACHIMO	They are in a trunk,
 	Attended by my men: I will make bold
 	To send them to you, only for this night;
 	I must aboard to-morrow.
 
 IMOGEN	O, no, no.
 
 IACHIMO	Yes, I beseech; or I shall short my word
 	By lengthening my return. From Gallia
 	I cross'd the seas on purpose and on promise
 	To see your grace.
 
 IMOGEN	I thank you for your pains:
 	But not away to-morrow!
 
 IACHIMO	O, I must, madam:
 	Therefore I shall beseech you, if you please
 	To greet your lord with writing, do't to-night:
 	I have outstood my time; which is material
 	To the tender of our present.
 
 IMOGEN	I will write.
 	Send your trunk to me; it shall safe be kept,
 	And truly yielded you. You're very welcome.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT II
 
 
 
 SCENE I	Britain. Before Cymbeline's palace.
 
 
 	[Enter CLOTEN and two Lords]
 
 CLOTEN	Was there ever man had such luck! when I kissed the
 	jack, upon an up-cast to be hit away! I had a
 	hundred pound on't: and then a whoreson jackanapes
 	must take me up for swearing; as if I borrowed mine
 	oaths of him and might not spend them at my pleasure.
 
 First Lord	What got he by that? You have broke his pate with
 	your bowl.
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  If his wit had been like him that broke it,
 	it would have run all out.
 
 CLOTEN	When a gentleman is disposed to swear, it is not for
 	any standers-by to curtail his oaths, ha?
 
 Second Lord	No my lord;
 
 	[Aside]
 
 	nor crop the ears of them.
 
 CLOTEN	Whoreson dog! I give him satisfaction?
 	Would he had been one of my rank!
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  To have smelt like a fool.
 
 CLOTEN	I am not vexed more at any thing in the earth: a
 	pox on't! I had rather not be so noble as I am;
 	they dare not fight with me, because of the queen my
 	mother: every Jack-slave hath his bellyful of
 	fighting, and I must go up and down like a cock that
 	nobody can match.
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  You are cock and capon too; and you crow,
 	cock, with your comb on.
 
 CLOTEN	Sayest thou?
 
 Second Lord	It is not fit your lordship should undertake every
 	companion that you give offence to.
 
 CLOTEN	No, I know that: but it is fit I should commit
 	offence to my inferiors.
 
 Second Lord	Ay, it is fit for your lordship only.
 
 CLOTEN	Why, so I say.
 
 First Lord	Did you hear of a stranger that's come to court to-night?
 
 CLOTEN	A stranger, and I not know on't!
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  He's a strange fellow himself, and knows it
 	not.
 
 First Lord	There's an Italian come; and, 'tis thought, one of
 	Leonatus' friends.
 
 CLOTEN	Leonatus! a banished rascal; and he's another,
 	whatsoever he be. Who told you of this stranger?
 
 First Lord	One of your lordship's pages.
 
 CLOTEN	Is it fit I went to look upon him? is there no
 	derogation in't?
 
 Second Lord	You cannot derogate, my lord.
 
 CLOTEN	Not easily, I think.
 
 Second Lord	[Aside]  You are a fool granted; therefore your
 	issues, being foolish, do not derogate.
 
 CLOTEN	Come, I'll go see this Italian: what I have lost
 	to-day at bowls I'll win to-night of him. Come, go.
 
 Second Lord	I'll attend your lordship.
 
 	[Exeunt CLOTEN and First Lord]
 
 	That such a crafty devil as is his mother
 	Should yield the world this ass! a woman that
 	Bears all down with her brain; and this her son
 	Cannot take two from twenty, for his heart,
 	And leave eighteen. Alas, poor princess,
 	Thou divine Imogen, what thou endurest,
 	Betwixt a father by thy step-dame govern'd,
 	A mother hourly coining plots, a wooer
 	More hateful than the foul expulsion is
 	Of thy dear husband, than that horrid act
 	Of the divorce he'ld make! The heavens hold firm
 	The walls of thy dear honour, keep unshaked
 	That temple, thy fair mind, that thou mayst stand,
 	To enjoy thy banish'd lord and this great land!
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT II
 
 
 
 SCENE II	Imogen's bedchamber in Cymbeline's palace:
 	a trunk in one corner of it.
 
 
 	[IMOGEN in bed, reading; a Lady attending]
 
 IMOGEN	Who's there? my woman Helen?
 
 Lady	Please you, madam
 
 IMOGEN	What hour is it?
 
 Lady	                  Almost midnight, madam.
 
 IMOGEN	I have read three hours then: mine eyes are weak:
 	Fold down the leaf where I have left: to bed:
 	Take not away the taper, leave it burning;
 	And if thou canst awake by four o' the clock,
 	I prithee, call me. Sleep hath seized me wholly
 
 	[Exit Lady]
 
 	To your protection I commend me, gods.
 	From fairies and the tempters of the night
 	Guard me, beseech ye.
 
 	[Sleeps. IACHIMO comes from the trunk]
 
 IACHIMO	The crickets sing, and man's o'er-labour'd sense
 	Repairs itself by rest. Our Tarquin thus
 	Did softly press the rushes, ere he waken'd
 	The chastity he wounded. Cytherea,
 	How bravely thou becomest thy bed, fresh lily,
 	And whiter than the sheets! That I might touch!
 	But kiss; one kiss! Rubies unparagon'd,
 	How dearly they do't! 'Tis her breathing that
 	Perfumes the chamber thus: the flame o' the taper
 	Bows toward her, and would under-peep her lids,
 	To see the enclosed lights, now canopied
 	Under these windows, white and azure laced
 	With blue of heaven's own tinct. But my design,
 	To note the chamber: I will write all down:
 	Such and such pictures; there the window; such
 	The adornment of her bed; the arras; figures,
 	Why, such and such; and the contents o' the story.
 	Ah, but some natural notes about her body,
 	Above ten thousand meaner moveables
 	Would testify, to enrich mine inventory.
 	O sleep, thou ape of death, lie dull upon her!
 	And be her sense but as a monument,
 	Thus in a chapel lying! Come off, come off:
 
 	[Taking off her bracelet]
 
 	As slippery as the Gordian knot was hard!
 	'Tis mine; and this will witness outwardly,
 	As strongly as the conscience does within,
 	To the madding of her lord. On her left breast
 	A mole cinque-spotted, like the crimson drops
 	I' the bottom of a cowslip: here's a voucher,
 	Stronger than ever law could make: this secret
 	Will force him think I have pick'd the lock and ta'en
 	The treasure of her honour. No more. To what end?
 	Why should I write this down, that's riveted,
 	Screw'd to my memory? She hath been reading late
 	The tale of Tereus; here the leaf's turn'd down
 	Where Philomel gave up. I have enough:
 	To the trunk again, and shut the spring of it.
 	Swift, swift, you dragons of the night, that dawning
 	May bare the raven's eye! I lodge in fear;
 	Though this a heavenly angel, hell is here.
 
 	[Clock strikes]
 
 	One, two, three: time, time!
 
 	[Goes into the trunk. The scene closes]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT II
 
 
 
 Scene III	An ante-chamber adjoining Imogen's apartments.
 
 
 	[Enter CLOTEN and Lords]
 
 First Lord	Your lordship is the most patient man in loss, the
 	most coldest that ever turned up ace.
 
 CLOTEN	It would make any man cold to lose.
 
 First Lord	But not every man patient after the noble temper of
 	your lordship. You are most hot and furious when you win.
 
 CLOTEN	Winning will put any man into courage. If I could
 	get this foolish Imogen, I should have gold enough.
 	It's almost morning, is't not?
 
 First Lord	Day, my lord.
 
 CLOTEN	I would this music would come: I am advised to give
 	her music o' mornings; they say it will penetrate.
 
 	[Enter Musicians]
 
 	Come on; tune: if you can penetrate her with your
 	fingering, so; we'll try with tongue too: if none
 	will do, let her remain; but I'll never give o'er.
 	First, a very excellent good-conceited thing;
 	after, a wonderful sweet air, with admirable rich
 	words to it: and then let her consider.
 	[SONG]
 
 	Hark, hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings,
 	And Phoebus 'gins arise,
 	His steeds to water at those springs
 	On chaliced flowers that lies;
 	And winking Mary-buds begin
 	To ope their golden eyes:
 	With every thing that pretty is,
 	My lady sweet, arise:
 	Arise, arise.
 
 CLOTEN	So, get you gone. If this penetrate, I will
 	consider your music the better: if it do not, it is
 	a vice in her ears, which horse-hairs and
 	calves'-guts, nor the voice of unpaved eunuch to
 	boot, can never amend.
 
 	[Exeunt Musicians]
 
 Second Lord	Here comes the king.
 
 CLOTEN	I am glad I was up so late; for that's the reason I
 	was up so early: he cannot choose but take this
 	service I have done fatherly.
 
 	[Enter CYMBELINE and QUEEN]
 
 	Good morrow to your majesty and to my gracious mother.
 
 CYMBELINE	Attend you here the door of our stern daughter?
 	Will she not forth?
 
 CLOTEN	I have assailed her with music, but she vouchsafes no notice.
 
 CYMBELINE	The exile of her minion is too new;
 	She hath not yet forgot him: some more time
 	Must wear the print of his remembrance out,
 	And then she's yours.
 
 QUEEN	You are most bound to the king,
 	Who lets go by no vantages that may
 	Prefer you to his daughter. Frame yourself
 	To orderly soliciting, and be friended
 	With aptness of the season; make denials
 	Increase your services; so seem as if
 	You were inspired to do those duties which
 	You tender to her; that you in all obey her,
 	Save when command to your dismission tends,
 	And therein you are senseless.
 
 CLOTEN	Senseless! not so.
 
 	[Enter a Messenger]
 
 Messenger	So like you, sir, ambassadors from Rome;
 	The one is Caius Lucius.
 
 CYMBELINE	A worthy fellow,
 	Albeit he comes on angry purpose now;
 	But that's no fault of his: we must receive him
 	According to the honour of his sender;
 	And towards himself, his goodness forespent on us,
 	We must extend our notice. Our dear son,
 	When you have given good morning to your mistress,
 	Attend the queen and us; we shall have need
 	To employ you towards this Roman. Come, our queen.
 
 	[Exeunt all but CLOTEN]
 
 CLOTEN	If she be up, I'll speak with her; if not,
 	Let her lie still and dream.
 
 	[Knocks]
 
 		       By your leave, ho!
 	I Know her women are about her: what
 	If I do line one of their hands? 'Tis gold
 	Which buys admittance; oft it doth; yea, and makes
 	Diana's rangers false themselves, yield up
 	Their deer to the stand o' the stealer; and 'tis gold
 	Which makes the true man kill'd and saves the thief;
 	Nay, sometime hangs both thief and true man: what
 	Can it not do and undo? I will make
 	One of her women lawyer to me, for
 	I yet not understand the case myself.
 
 	[Knocks]
 
 	By your leave.
 
 	[Enter a Lady]
 
 Lady	Who's there that knocks?
 
 CLOTEN	A gentleman.
 
 Lady	No more?
 
 CLOTEN	Yes, and a gentlewoman's son.
 
 Lady	That's more
 	Than some, whose tailors are as dear as yours,
 	Can justly boast of. What's your lordship's pleasure?
 
 CLOTEN	Your lady's person: is she ready?
 
 Lady	Ay,
 	To keep her chamber.
 
 CLOTEN	There is gold for you;
 	Sell me your good report.
 
 Lady	How! my good name? or to report of you
 	What I shall think is good?--The princess!
 
 	[Enter IMOGEN]
 
 CLOTEN	Good morrow, fairest: sister, your sweet hand.
 
 	[Exit Lady]
 
 IMOGEN	Good morrow, sir. You lay out too much pains
 	For purchasing but trouble; the thanks I give
 	Is telling you that I am poor of thanks
 	And scarce can spare them.
 
 CLOTEN	Still, I swear I love you.
 
 IMOGEN	If you but said so, 'twere as deep with me:
 	If you swear still, your recompense is still
 	That I regard it not.
 
 CLOTEN	This is no answer.
 
 IMOGEN	But that you shall not say I yield being silent,
 	I would not speak. I pray you, spare me: 'faith,
 	I shall unfold equal discourtesy
 	To your best kindness: one of your great knowing
 	Should learn, being taught, forbearance.
 
 CLOTEN	To leave you in your madness, 'twere my sin:
 	I will not.
 
 IMOGEN	          Fools are not mad folks.
 
 CLOTEN	Do you call me fool?
 
 IMOGEN	As I am mad, I do:
 	If you'll be patient, I'll no more be mad;
 	That cures us both. I am much sorry, sir,
 	You put me to forget a lady's manners,
 	By being so verbal: and learn now, for all,
 	That I, which know my heart, do here pronounce,
 	By the very truth of it, I care not for you,
 	And am so near the lack of charity--
 	To accuse myself--I hate you; which I had rather
 	You felt than make't my boast.
 
 CLOTEN	You sin against
 	Obedience, which you owe your father. For
 	The contract you pretend with that base wretch,
 	One bred of alms and foster'd with cold dishes,
 	With scraps o' the court, it is no contract, none:
 	And though it be allow'd in meaner parties--
 	Yet who than he more mean?--to knit their souls,
 	On whom there is no more dependency
 	But brats and beggary, in self-figured knot;
 	Yet you are curb'd from that enlargement by
 	The consequence o' the crown, and must not soil
 	The precious note of it with a base slave.
 	A hilding for a livery, a squire's cloth,
 	A pantler, not so eminent.
 
 IMOGEN	Profane fellow
 	Wert thou the son of Jupiter and no more
 	But what thou art besides, thou wert too base
 	To be his groom: thou wert dignified enough,
 	Even to the point of envy, if 'twere made
 	Comparative for your virtues, to be styled
 	The under-hangman of his kingdom, and hated
 	For being preferred so well.
 
 CLOTEN	The south-fog rot him!
 
 IMOGEN	He never can meet more mischance than come
 	To be but named of thee. His meanest garment,
 	That ever hath but clipp'd his body, is dearer
 	In my respect than all the hairs above thee,
 	Were they all made such men. How now, Pisanio!
 
 	[Enter PISANIO]
 
 CLOTEN	'His garment!' Now the devil--
 
 IMOGEN	To Dorothy my woman hie thee presently--
 
 CLOTEN	'His garment!'
 
 IMOGEN	                  I am sprited with a fool.
 	Frighted, and anger'd worse: go bid my woman
 	Search for a jewel that too casually
 	Hath left mine arm: it was thy master's: 'shrew me,
 	If I would lose it for a revenue
 	Of any king's in Europe. I do think
 	I saw't this morning: confident I am
 	Last night 'twas on mine arm; I kiss'd it:
 	I hope it be not gone to tell my lord
 	That I kiss aught but he.
 
 PISANIO	'Twill not be lost.
 
 IMOGEN	I hope so: go and search.
 
 	[Exit PISANIO]
 
 CLOTEN	You have abused me:
 	'His meanest garment!'
 
 IMOGEN	Ay, I said so, sir:
 	If you will make't an action, call witness to't.
 
 CLOTEN	I will inform your father.
 
 IMOGEN	Your mother too:
 	She's my good lady, and will conceive, I hope,
 	But the worst of me. So, I leave you, sir,
 	To the worst of discontent.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 CLOTEN	I'll be revenged:
 	'His meanest garment!' Well.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT II
 
 
 
 SCENE IV	Rome. Philario's house.
 
 
 	[Enter POSTHUMUS and PHILARIO]
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Fear it not, sir: I would I were so sure
 	To win the king as I am bold her honour
 	Will remain hers.
 
 PHILARIO	                  What means do you make to him?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Not any, but abide the change of time,
 	Quake in the present winter's state and wish
 	That warmer days would come: in these sear'd hopes,
 	I barely gratify your love; they failing,
 	I must die much your debtor.
 
 PHILARIO	Your very goodness and your company
 	O'erpays all I can do. By this, your king
 	Hath heard of great Augustus: Caius Lucius
 	Will do's commission throughly: and I think
 	He'll grant the tribute, send the arrearages,
 	Or look upon our Romans, whose remembrance
 	Is yet fresh in their grief.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I do believe,
 	Statist though I am none, nor like to be,
 	That this will prove a war; and you shall hear
 	The legions now in Gallia sooner landed
 	In our not-fearing Britain than have tidings
 	Of any penny tribute paid. Our countrymen
 	Are men more order'd than when Julius Caesar
 	Smiled at their lack of skill, but found
 	their courage
 	Worthy his frowning at: their discipline,
 	Now mingled with their courages, will make known
 	To their approvers they are people such
 	That mend upon the world.
 
 	[Enter IACHIMO]
 
 PHILARIO	See! Iachimo!
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	The swiftest harts have posted you by land;
 	And winds of all the comers kiss'd your sails,
 	To make your vessel nimble.
 
 PHILARIO	Welcome, sir.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I hope the briefness of your answer made
 	The speediness of your return.
 
 IACHIMO	Your lady
 	Is one of the fairest that I have look'd upon.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	And therewithal the best; or let her beauty
 	Look through a casement to allure false hearts
 	And be false with them.
 
 IACHIMO	Here are letters for you.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Their tenor good, I trust.
 
 IACHIMO	'Tis very like.
 
 PHILARIO	Was Caius Lucius in the Britain court
 	When you were there?
 
 IACHIMO	He was expected then,
 	But not approach'd.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	All is well yet.
 	Sparkles this stone as it was wont? or is't not
 	Too dull for your good wearing?
 
 IACHIMO	If I had lost it,
 	I should have lost the worth of it in gold.
 	I'll make a journey twice as far, to enjoy
 	A second night of such sweet shortness which
 	Was mine in Britain, for the ring is won.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	The stone's too hard to come by.
 
 IACHIMO	Not a whit,
 	Your lady being so easy.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Make not, sir,
 	Your loss your sport: I hope you know that we
 	Must not continue friends.
 
 IACHIMO	Good sir, we must,
 	If you keep covenant. Had I not brought
 	The knowledge of your mistress home, I grant
 	We were to question further: but I now
 	Profess myself the winner of her honour,
 	Together with your ring; and not the wronger
 	Of her or you, having proceeded but
 	By both your wills.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	If you can make't apparent
 	That you have tasted her in bed, my hand
 	And ring is yours; if not, the foul opinion
 	You had of her pure honour gains or loses
 	Your sword or mine, or masterless leaves both
 	To who shall find them.
 
 IACHIMO	Sir, my circumstances,
 	Being so near the truth as I will make them,
 	Must first induce you to believe: whose strength
 	I will confirm with oath; which, I doubt not,
 	You'll give me leave to spare, when you shall find
 	You need it not.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	                  Proceed.
 
 IACHIMO	First, her bedchamber,--
 	Where, I confess, I slept not, but profess
 	Had that was well worth watching--it was hang'd
 	With tapesty of silk and silver; the story
 	Proud Cleopatra, when she met her Roman,
 	And Cydnus swell'd above the banks, or for
 	The press of boats or pride: a piece of work
 	So bravely done, so rich, that it did strive
 	In workmanship and value; which I wonder'd
 	Could be so rarely and exactly wrought,
 	Since the true life on't was--
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	This is true;
 	And this you might have heard of here, by me,
 	Or by some other.
 
 IACHIMO	More particulars
 	Must justify my knowledge.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	So they must,
 	Or do your honour injury.
 
 IACHIMO	The chimney
 	Is south the chamber, and the chimney-piece
 	Chaste Dian bathing: never saw I figures
 	So likely to report themselves: the cutter
 	Was as another nature, dumb; outwent her,
 	Motion and breath left out.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	This is a thing
 	Which you might from relation likewise reap,
 	Being, as it is, much spoke of.
 
 IACHIMO	The roof o' the chamber
 	With golden cherubins is fretted: her andirons--
 	I had forgot them--were two winking Cupids
 	Of silver, each on one foot standing, nicely
 	Depending on their brands.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	This is her honour!
 	Let it be granted you have seen all this--and praise
 	Be given to your remembrance--the description
 	Of what is in her chamber nothing saves
 	The wager you have laid.
 
 IACHIMO	Then, if you can,
 
 	[Showing the bracelet]
 
 	Be pale: I beg but leave to air this jewel; see!
 	And now 'tis up again: it must be married
 	To that your diamond; I'll keep them.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Jove!
 	Once more let me behold it: is it that
 	Which I left with her?
 
 IACHIMO	Sir--I thank her--that:
 	She stripp'd it from her arm; I see her yet;
 	Her pretty action did outsell her gift,
 	And yet enrich'd it too: she gave it me, and said
 	She prized it once.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	May be she pluck'd it off
 	To send it me.
 
 IACHIMO	She writes so to you, doth she?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	O, no, no, no! 'tis true. Here, take this too;
 
 	[Gives the ring]
 
 	It is a basilisk unto mine eye,
 	Kills me to look on't. Let there be no honour
 	Where there is beauty; truth, where semblance; love,
 	Where there's another man: the vows of women
 	Of no more bondage be, to where they are made,
 	Than they are to their virtues; which is nothing.
 	O, above measure false!
 
 PHILARIO	Have patience, sir,
 	And take your ring again; 'tis not yet won:
 	It may be probable she lost it; or
 	Who knows if one of her women, being corrupted,
 	Hath stol'n it from her?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Very true;
 	And so, I hope, he came by't. Back my ring:
 	Render to me some corporal sign about her,
 	More evident than this; for this was stolen.
 
 IACHIMO	By Jupiter, I had it from her arm.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Hark you, he swears; by Jupiter he swears.
 	'Tis true:--nay, keep the ring--'tis true: I am sure
 	She would not lose it: her attendants are
 	All sworn and honourable:--they induced to steal it!
 	And by a stranger!--No, he hath enjoyed her:
 	The cognizance of her incontinency
 	Is this: she hath bought the name of whore
 	thus dearly.
 	There, take thy hire; and all the fiends of hell
 	Divide themselves between you!
 
 PHILARIO	Sir, be patient:
 	This is not strong enough to be believed
 	Of one persuaded well of--
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Never talk on't;
 	She hath been colted by him.
 
 IACHIMO	If you seek
 	For further satisfying, under her breast--
 	Worthy the pressing--lies a mole, right proud
 	Of that most delicate lodging: by my life,
 	I kiss'd it; and it gave me present hunger
 	To feed again, though full. You do remember
 	This stain upon her?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Ay, and it doth confirm
 	Another stain, as big as hell can hold,
 	Were there no more but it.
 
 IACHIMO	Will you hear more?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Spare your arithmetic: never count the turns;
 	Once, and a million!
 
 IACHIMO	I'll be sworn--
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	No swearing.
 	If you will swear you have not done't, you lie;
 	And I will kill thee, if thou dost deny
 	Thou'st made me cuckold.
 
 IACHIMO	I'll deny nothing.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	O, that I had her here, to tear her limb-meal!
 	I will go there and do't, i' the court, before
 	Her father. I'll do something--
 
 	[Exit]
 
 PHILARIO	Quite besides
 	The government of patience! You have won:
 	Let's follow him, and pervert the present wrath
 	He hath against himself.
 
 IACHIMO	With an my heart.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT II
 
 
 
 SCENE V	Another room in Philario's house.
 
 
 	[Enter POSTHUMUS LEONATUS]
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Is there no way for men to be but women
 	Must be half-workers? We are all bastards;
 	And that most venerable man which I
 	Did call my father, was I know not where
 	When I was stamp'd; some coiner with his tools
 	Made me a counterfeit: yet my mother seem'd
 	The Dian of that time so doth my wife
 	The nonpareil of this. O, vengeance, vengeance!
 	Me of my lawful pleasure she restrain'd
 	And pray'd me oft forbearance; did it with
 	A pudency so rosy the sweet view on't
 	Might well have warm'd old Saturn; that I thought her
 	As chaste as unsunn'd snow. O, all the devils!
 	This yellow Iachimo, in an hour,--wast not?--
 	Or less,--at first?--perchance he spoke not, but,
 	Like a full-acorn'd boar, a German one,
 	Cried 'O!' and mounted; found no opposition
 	But what he look'd for should oppose and she
 	Should from encounter guard. Could I find out
 	The woman's part in me! For there's no motion
 	That tends to vice in man, but I affirm
 	It is the woman's part: be it lying, note it,
 	The woman's; flattering, hers; deceiving, hers;
 	Lust and rank thoughts, hers, hers; revenges, hers;
 	Ambitions, covetings, change of prides, disdain,
 	Nice longing, slanders, mutability,
 	All faults that may be named, nay, that hell knows,
 	Why, hers, in part or all; but rather, all;
 	For even to vice
 	They are not constant but are changing still
 	One vice, but of a minute old, for one
 	Not half so old as that. I'll write against them,
 	Detest them, curse them: yet 'tis greater skill
 	In a true hate, to pray they have their will:
 	The very devils cannot plague them better.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT III
 
 
 
 SCENE I	Britain. A hall in Cymbeline's palace.
 
 
 	[Enter in state, CYMBELINE, QUEEN, CLOTEN,
 	and Lords at one door, and at another,
 	CAIUS LUCIUS and Attendants]
 
 CYMBELINE	Now say, what would Augustus Caesar with us?
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	When Julius Caesar, whose remembrance yet
 	Lives in men's eyes and will to ears and tongues
 	Be theme and hearing ever, was in this Britain
 	And conquer'd it, Cassibelan, thine uncle,--
 	Famous in Caesar's praises, no whit less
 	Than in his feats deserving it--for him
 	And his succession granted Rome a tribute,
 	Yearly three thousand pounds, which by thee lately
 	Is left untender'd.
 
 QUEEN	And, to kill the marvel,
 	Shall be so ever.
 
 CLOTEN	There be many Caesars,
 	Ere such another Julius. Britain is
 	A world by itself; and we will nothing pay
 	For wearing our own noses.
 
 QUEEN	That opportunity
 	Which then they had to take from 's, to resume
 	We have again. Remember, sir, my liege,
 	The kings your ancestors, together with
 	The natural bravery of your isle, which stands
 	As Neptune's park, ribbed and paled in
 	With rocks unscalable and roaring waters,
 	With sands that will not bear your enemies' boats,
 	But suck them up to the topmast. A kind of conquest
 	Caesar made here; but made not here his brag
 	Of 'Came' and 'saw' and 'overcame: ' with shame--
 	That first that ever touch'd him--he was carried
 	From off our coast, twice beaten; and his shipping--
 	Poor ignorant baubles!-- upon our terrible seas,
 	Like egg-shells moved upon their surges, crack'd
 	As easily 'gainst our rocks: for joy whereof
 	The famed Cassibelan, who was once at point--
 	O giglot fortune!--to master Caesar's sword,
 	Made Lud's town with rejoicing fires bright
 	And Britons strut with courage.
 
 CLOTEN	Come, there's no more tribute to be paid: our
 	kingdom is stronger than it was at that time; and,
 	as I said, there is no moe such Caesars: other of
 	them may have crook'd noses, but to owe such
 	straight arms, none.
 
 CYMBELINE	Son, let your mother end.
 
 CLOTEN	We have yet many among us can gripe as hard as
 	Cassibelan: I do not say I am one; but I have a
 	hand. Why tribute? why should we pay tribute? If
 	Caesar can hide the sun from us with a blanket, or
 	put the moon in his pocket, we will pay him tribute
 	for light; else, sir, no more tribute, pray you now.
 
 CYMBELINE	You must know,
 	Till the injurious Romans did extort
 	This tribute from us, we were free:
 	Caesar's ambition,
 	Which swell'd so much that it did almost stretch
 	The sides o' the world, against all colour here
 	Did put the yoke upon 's; which to shake off
 	Becomes a warlike people, whom we reckon
 	Ourselves to be.
 
 CLOTEN	|
 	|                We do.
 Lords	|
 
 CYMBELINE	Say, then, to Caesar,
 	Our ancestor was that Mulmutius which
 	Ordain'd our laws, whose use the sword of Caesar
 	Hath too much mangled; whose repair and franchise
 	Shall, by the power we hold, be our good deed,
 	Though Rome be therefore angry: Mulmutius made our laws,
 	Who was the first of Britain which did put
 	His brows within a golden crown and call'd
 	Himself a king.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	                  I am sorry, Cymbeline,
 	That I am to pronounce Augustus Caesar--
 	Caesar, that hath more kings his servants than
 	Thyself domestic officers--thine enemy:
 	Receive it from me, then: war and confusion
 	In Caesar's name pronounce I 'gainst thee: look
 	For fury not to be resisted. Thus defied,
 	I thank thee for myself.
 
 CYMBELINE	Thou art welcome, Caius.
 	Thy Caesar knighted me; my youth I spent
 	Much under him; of him I gather'd honour;
 	Which he to seek of me again, perforce,
 	Behoves me keep at utterance. I am perfect
 	That the Pannonians and Dalmatians for
 	Their liberties are now in arms; a precedent
 	Which not to read would show the Britons cold:
 	So Caesar shall not find them.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Let proof speak.
 
 CLOTEN	His majesty bids you welcome. Make
 	pastime with us a day or two, or longer: if
 	you seek us afterwards in other terms, you
 	shall find us in our salt-water girdle: if you
 	beat us out of it, it is yours; if you fall in
 	the adventure, our crows shall fare the better
 	for you; and there's an end.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	So, sir.
 
 CYMBELINE	I know your master's pleasure and he mine:
 	All the remain is 'Welcome!'
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT III
 
 
 
 SCENE II	Another room in the palace.
 
 
 	[Enter PISANIO, with a letter]
 
 PISANIO	How? of adultery? Wherefore write you not
 	What monster's her accuser? Leonatus,
 	O master! what a strange infection
 	Is fall'n into thy ear! What false Italian,
 	As poisonous-tongued as handed, hath prevail'd
 	On thy too ready hearing? Disloyal! No:
 	She's punish'd for her truth, and undergoes,
 	More goddess-like than wife-like, such assaults
 	As would take in some virtue. O my master!
 	Thy mind to her is now as low as were
 	Thy fortunes. How! that I should murder her?
 	Upon the love and truth and vows which I
 	Have made to thy command? I, her? her blood?
 	If it be so to do good service, never
 	Let me be counted serviceable. How look I,
 	That I should seem to lack humanity
 	so much as this fact comes to?
 
 	[Reading]
 
 		'Do't: the letter
 	that I have sent her, by her own command
 	Shall give thee opportunity.' O damn'd paper!
 	Black as the ink that's on thee! Senseless bauble,
 	Art thou a feodary for this act, and look'st
 	So virgin-like without? Lo, here she comes.
 	I am ignorant in what I am commanded.
 
 	[Enter IMOGEN]
 
 IMOGEN	How now, Pisanio!
 
 PISANIO	Madam, here is a letter from my lord.
 
 IMOGEN	Who? thy lord? that is my lord, Leonatus!
 	O, learn'd indeed were that astronomer
 	That knew the stars as I his characters;
 	He'ld lay the future open. You good gods,
 	Let what is here contain'd relish of love,
 	Of my lord's health, of his content, yet not
 	That we two are asunder; let that grieve him:
 	Some griefs are med'cinable; that is one of them,
 	For it doth physic love: of his content,
 	All but in that! Good wax, thy leave. Blest be
 	You bees that make these locks of counsel! Lovers
 	And men in dangerous bonds pray not alike:
 	Though forfeiters you cast in prison, yet
 	You clasp young Cupid's tables. Good news, gods!
 
 	[Reads]
 
 	'Justice, and your father's wrath, should he take me
 	in his dominion, could not be so cruel to me, as
 	you, O the dearest of creatures, would even renew me
 	with your eyes. Take notice that I am in Cambria,
 	at Milford-Haven: what your own love will out of
 	this advise you, follow. So he wishes you all
 	happiness, that remains loyal to his vow, and your,
 	increasing in love,
 		        LEONATUS POSTHUMUS.'
 	O, for a horse with wings! Hear'st thou, Pisanio?
 	He is at Milford-Haven: read, and tell me
 	How far 'tis thither. If one of mean affairs
 	May plod it in a week, why may not I
 	Glide thither in a day? Then, true Pisanio,--
 	Who long'st, like me, to see thy lord; who long'st,--
 	let me bate,-but not like me--yet long'st,
 	But in a fainter kind:--O, not like me;
 	For mine's beyond beyond--say, and speak thick;
 	Love's counsellor should fill the bores of hearing,
 	To the smothering of the sense--how far it is
 	To this same blessed Milford: and by the way
 	Tell me how Wales was made so happy as
 	To inherit such a haven: but first of all,
 	How we may steal from hence, and for the gap
 	That we shall make in time, from our hence-going
 	And our return, to excuse: but first, how get hence:
 	Why should excuse be born or e'er begot?
 	We'll talk of that hereafter. Prithee, speak,
 	How many score of miles may we well ride
 	'Twixt hour and hour?
 
 PISANIO	One score 'twixt sun and sun,
 	Madam, 's enough for you:
 
 	[Aside]
 
 		     and too much too.
 
 IMOGEN	Why, one that rode to's execution, man,
 	Could never go so slow: I have heard of
 	riding wagers,
 	Where horses have been nimbler than the sands
 	That run i' the clock's behalf. But this is foolery:
 	Go bid my woman feign a sickness; say
 	She'll home to her father: and provide me presently
 	A riding-suit, no costlier than would fit
 	A franklin's housewife.
 
 PISANIO	Madam, you're best consider.
 
 IMOGEN	I see before me, man: nor here, nor here,
 	Nor what ensues, but have a fog in them,
 	That I cannot look through. Away, I prithee;
 	Do as I bid thee: there's no more to say,
 	Accessible is none but Milford way.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT III
 
 
 
 SCENE III	Wales: a mountainous country with a cave.
 
 
 	[Enter, from the cave, BELARIUS; GUIDERIUS,
 	and ARVIRAGUS following]
 
 BELARIUS	A goodly day not to keep house, with such
 	Whose roof's as low as ours! Stoop, boys; this gate
 	Instructs you how to adore the heavens and bows you
 	To a morning's holy office: the gates of monarchs
 	Are arch'd so high that giants may jet through
 	And keep their impious turbans on, without
 	Good morrow to the sun. Hail, thou fair heaven!
 	We house i' the rock, yet use thee not so hardly
 	As prouder livers do.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Hail, heaven!
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Hail, heaven!
 
 BELARIUS	Now for our mountain sport: up to yond hill;
 	Your legs are young; I'll tread these flats. Consider,
 	When you above perceive me like a crow,
 	That it is place which lessens and sets off;
 	And you may then revolve what tales I have told you
 	Of courts, of princes, of the tricks in war:
 	This service is not service, so being done,
 	But being so allow'd: to apprehend thus,
 	Draws us a profit from all things we see;
 	And often, to our comfort, shall we find
 	The sharded beetle in a safer hold
 	Than is the full-wing'd eagle. O, this life
 	Is nobler than attending for a cheque,
 	Richer than doing nothing for a bauble,
 	Prouder than rustling in unpaid-for silk:
 	Such gain the cap of him that makes 'em fine,
 	Yet keeps his book uncross'd: no life to ours.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Out of your proof you speak: we, poor unfledged,
 	Have never wing'd from view o' the nest, nor know not
 	What air's from home. Haply this life is best,
 	If quiet life be best; sweeter to you
 	That have a sharper known; well corresponding
 	With your stiff age: but unto us it is
 	A cell of ignorance; travelling a-bed;
 	A prison for a debtor, that not dares
 	To stride a limit.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	                  What should we speak of
 	When we are old as you? when we shall hear
 	The rain and wind beat dark December, how,
 	In this our pinching cave, shall we discourse
 	The freezing hours away? We have seen nothing;
 	We are beastly, subtle as the fox for prey,
 	Like warlike as the wolf for what we eat;
 	Our valour is to chase what flies; our cage
 	We make a quire, as doth the prison'd bird,
 	And sing our bondage freely.
 
 BELARIUS	How you speak!
 	Did you but know the city's usuries
 	And felt them knowingly; the art o' the court
 	As hard to leave as keep; whose top to climb
 	Is certain falling, or so slippery that
 	The fear's as bad as falling; the toil o' the war,
 	A pain that only seems to seek out danger
 	I' the name of fame and honour; which dies i'
 	the search,
 	And hath as oft a slanderous epitaph
 	As record of fair act; nay, many times,
 	Doth ill deserve by doing well; what's worse,
 	Must court'sy at the censure:--O boys, this story
 	The world may read in me: my body's mark'd
 	With Roman swords, and my report was once
 	First with the best of note: Cymbeline loved me,
 	And when a soldier was the theme, my name
 	Was not far off: then was I as a tree
 	Whose boughs did bend with fruit: but in one night,
 	A storm or robbery, call it what you will,
 	Shook down my mellow hangings, nay, my leaves,
 	And left me bare to weather.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Uncertain favour!
 
 BELARIUS	My fault being nothing--as I have told you oft--
 	But that two villains, whose false oaths prevail'd
 	Before my perfect honour, swore to Cymbeline
 	I was confederate with the Romans: so
 	Follow'd my banishment, and this twenty years
 	This rock and these demesnes have been my world;
 	Where I have lived at honest freedom, paid
 	More pious debts to heaven than in all
 	The fore-end of my time. But up to the mountains!
 	This is not hunters' language: he that strikes
 	The venison first shall be the lord o' the feast;
 	To him the other two shall minister;
 	And we will fear no poison, which attends
 	In place of greater state. I'll meet you in the valleys.
 
 	[Exeunt GUIDERIUS and ARVIRAGUS]
 
 	How hard it is to hide the sparks of nature!
 	These boys know little they are sons to the king;
 	Nor Cymbeline dreams that they are alive.
 	They think they are mine; and though train'd
 	up thus meanly
 	I' the cave wherein they bow, their thoughts do hit
 	The roofs of palaces, and nature prompts them
 	In simple and low things to prince it much
 	Beyond the trick of others. This Polydore,
 	The heir of Cymbeline and Britain, who
 	The king his father call'd Guiderius,--Jove!
 	When on my three-foot stool I sit and tell
 	The warlike feats I have done, his spirits fly out
 	Into my story: say 'Thus, mine enemy fell,
 	And thus I set my foot on 's neck;' even then
 	The princely blood flows in his cheek, he sweats,
 	Strains his young nerves and puts himself in posture
 	That acts my words. The younger brother, Cadwal,
 	Once Arviragus, in as like a figure,
 	Strikes life into my speech and shows much more
 	His own conceiving.--Hark, the game is roused!
 	O Cymbeline! heaven and my conscience knows
 	Thou didst unjustly banish me: whereon,
 	At three and two years old, I stole these babes;
 	Thinking to bar thee of succession, as
 	Thou reft'st me of my lands. Euriphile,
 	Thou wast their nurse; they took thee for
 	their mother,
 	And every day do honour to her grave:
 	Myself, Belarius, that am Morgan call'd,
 	They take for natural father. The game is up.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT III
 
 
 
 SCENE IV	Country near Milford-Haven.
 
 
 	[Enter PISANIO and IMOGEN]
 
 IMOGEN	Thou told'st me, when we came from horse, the place
 	Was near at hand: ne'er long'd my mother so
 	To see me first, as I have now. Pisanio! man!
 	Where is Posthumus? What is in thy mind,
 	That makes thee stare thus? Wherefore breaks that sigh
 	From the inward of thee? One, but painted thus,
 	Would be interpreted a thing perplex'd
 	Beyond self-explication: put thyself
 	Into a havior of less fear, ere wildness
 	Vanquish my staider senses. What's the matter?
 	Why tender'st thou that paper to me, with
 	A look untender? If't be summer news,
 	Smile to't before; if winterly, thou need'st
 	But keep that countenance still. My husband's hand!
 	That drug-damn'd Italy hath out-craftied him,
 	And he's at some hard point. Speak, man: thy tongue
 	May take off some extremity, which to read
 	Would be even mortal to me.
 
 PISANIO	Please you, read;
 	And you shall find me, wretched man, a thing
 	The most disdain'd of fortune.
 
 IMOGEN	[Reads]  'Thy mistress, Pisanio, hath played the
 	strumpet in my bed; the testimonies whereof lie
 	bleeding in me. I speak not out of weak surmises,
 	but from proof as strong as my grief and as certain
 	as I expect my revenge. That part thou, Pisanio,
 	must act for me, if thy faith be not tainted with
 	the breach of hers. Let thine own hands take away
 	her life: I shall give thee opportunity at
 	Milford-Haven. She hath my letter for the purpose
 	where, if thou fear to strike and to make me certain
 	it is done, thou art the pandar to her dishonour and
 	equally to me disloyal.'
 
 PISANIO	What shall I need to draw my sword? the paper
 	Hath cut her throat already. No, 'tis slander,
 	Whose edge is sharper than the sword, whose tongue
 	Outvenoms all the worms of Nile, whose breath
 	Rides on the posting winds and doth belie
 	All corners of the world: kings, queens and states,
 	Maids, matrons, nay, the secrets of the grave
 	This viperous slander enters. What cheer, madam?
 
 IMOGEN	False to his bed! What is it to be false?
 	To lie in watch there and to think on him?
 	To weep 'twixt clock and clock? if sleep
 	charge nature,
 	To break it with a fearful dream of him
 	And cry myself awake? that's false to's bed, is it?
 
 PISANIO	Alas, good lady!
 
 IMOGEN	I false! Thy conscience witness: Iachimo,
 	Thou didst accuse him of incontinency;
 	Thou then look'dst like a villain; now methinks
 	Thy favour's good enough. Some jay of Italy
 	Whose mother was her painting, hath betray'd him:
 	Poor I am stale, a garment out of fashion;
 	And, for I am richer than to hang by the walls,
 	I must be ripp'd:--to pieces with me!--O,
 	Men's vows are women's traitors! All good seeming,
 	By thy revolt, O husband, shall be thought
 	Put on for villany; not born where't grows,
 	But worn a bait for ladies.
 
 PISANIO	Good madam, hear me.
 
 IMOGEN	True honest men being heard, like false Aeneas,
 	Were in his time thought false, and Sinon's weeping
 	Did scandal many a holy tear, took pity
 	From most true wretchedness: so thou, Posthumus,
 	Wilt lay the leaven on all proper men;
 	Goodly and gallant shall be false and perjured
 	From thy great fall. Come, fellow, be thou honest:
 	Do thou thy master's bidding: when thou see'st him,
 	A little witness my obedience: look!
 	I draw the sword myself: take it, and hit
 	The innocent mansion of my love, my heart;
 	Fear not; 'tis empty of all things but grief;
 	Thy master is not there, who was indeed
 	The riches of it: do his bidding; strike
 	Thou mayst be valiant in a better cause;
 	But now thou seem'st a coward.
 
 PISANIO	Hence, vile instrument!
 	Thou shalt not damn my hand.
 
 IMOGEN	Why, I must die;
 	And if I do not by thy hand, thou art
 	No servant of thy master's. Against self-slaughter
 	There is a prohibition so divine
 	That cravens my weak hand. Come, here's my heart.
 	Something's afore't. Soft, soft! we'll no defence;
 	Obedient as the scabbard. What is here?
 	The scriptures of the loyal Leonatus,
 	All turn'd to heresy? Away, away,
 	Corrupters of my faith! you shall no more
 	Be stomachers to my heart. Thus may poor fools
 	Believe false teachers: though those that
 	are betray'd
 	Do feel the treason sharply, yet the traitor
 	Stands in worse case of woe.
 	And thou, Posthumus, thou that didst set up
 	My disobedience 'gainst the king my father
 	And make me put into contempt the suits
 	Of princely fellows, shalt hereafter find
 	It is no act of common passage, but
 	A strain of rareness: and I grieve myself
 	To think, when thou shalt be disedged by her
 	That now thou tirest on, how thy memory
 	Will then be pang'd by me. Prithee, dispatch:
 	The lamb entreats the butcher: where's thy knife?
 	Thou art too slow to do thy master's bidding,
 	When I desire it too.
 
 PISANIO	O gracious lady,
 	Since I received command to do this business
 	I have not slept one wink.
 
 IMOGEN	Do't, and to bed then.
 
 PISANIO	I'll wake mine eye-balls blind first.
 
 IMOGEN	Wherefore then
 	Didst undertake it? Why hast thou abused
 	So many miles with a pretence? this place?
 	Mine action and thine own? our horses' labour?
 	The time inviting thee? the perturb'd court,
 	For my being absent? whereunto I never
 	Purpose return. Why hast thou gone so far,
 	To be unbent when thou hast ta'en thy stand,
 	The elected deer before thee?
 
 PISANIO	But to win time
 	To lose so bad employment; in the which
 	I have consider'd of a course. Good lady,
 	Hear me with patience.
 
 IMOGEN	Talk thy tongue weary; speak
 	I have heard I am a strumpet; and mine ear
 	Therein false struck, can take no greater wound,
 	Nor tent to bottom that. But speak.
 
 PISANIO	Then, madam,
 	I thought you would not back again.
 
 IMOGEN	Most like;
 	Bringing me here to kill me.
 
 PISANIO	Not so, neither:
 	But if I were as wise as honest, then
 	My purpose would prove well. It cannot be
 	But that my master is abused:
 	Some villain, ay, and singular in his art.
 	Hath done you both this cursed injury.
 
 IMOGEN	Some Roman courtezan.
 
 PISANIO	No, on my life.
 	I'll give but notice you are dead and send him
 	Some bloody sign of it; for 'tis commanded
 	I should do so: you shall be miss'd at court,
 	And that will well confirm it.
 
 IMOGEN	Why good fellow,
 	What shall I do the where? where bide? how live?
 	Or in my life what comfort, when I am
 	Dead to my husband?
 
 PISANIO	If you'll back to the court--
 
 IMOGEN	No court, no father; nor no more ado
 	With that harsh, noble, simple nothing,
 	That Cloten, whose love-suit hath been to me
 	As fearful as a siege.
 
 PISANIO	If not at court,
 	Then not in Britain must you bide.
 
 IMOGEN	Where then
 	Hath Britain all the sun that shines? Day, night,
 	Are they not but in Britain? I' the world's volume
 	Our Britain seems as of it, but not in 't;
 	In a great pool a swan's nest: prithee, think
 	There's livers out of Britain.
 
 PISANIO	I am most glad
 	You think of other place. The ambassador,
 	Lucius the Roman, comes to Milford-Haven
 	To-morrow: now, if you could wear a mind
 	Dark as your fortune is, and but disguise
 	That which, to appear itself, must not yet be
 	But by self-danger, you should tread a course
 	Pretty and full of view; yea, haply, near
 	The residence of Posthumus; so nigh at least
 	That though his actions were not visible, yet
 	Report should render him hourly to your ear
 	As truly as he moves.
 
 IMOGEN	O, for such means!
 	Though peril to my modesty, not death on't,
 	I would adventure.
 
 PISANIO	Well, then, here's the point:
 	You must forget to be a woman; change
 	Command into obedience: fear and niceness--
 	The handmaids of all women, or, more truly,
 	Woman its pretty self--into a waggish courage:
 	Ready in gibes, quick-answer'd, saucy and
 	As quarrelous as the weasel; nay, you must
 	Forget that rarest treasure of your cheek,
 	Exposing it--but, O, the harder heart!
 	Alack, no remedy!--to the greedy touch
 	Of common-kissing Titan, and forget
 	Your laboursome and dainty trims, wherein
 	You made great Juno angry.
 
 IMOGEN	Nay, be brief
 	I see into thy end, and am almost
 	A man already.
 
 PISANIO	First, make yourself but like one.
 	Fore-thinking this, I have already fit--
 	'Tis in my cloak-bag--doublet, hat, hose, all
 	That answer to them: would you in their serving,
 	And with what imitation you can borrow
 	From youth of such a season, 'fore noble Lucius
 	Present yourself, desire his service, tell him
 	wherein you're happy,--which you'll make him know,
 	If that his head have ear in music,--doubtless
 	With joy he will embrace you, for he's honourable
 	And doubling that, most holy. Your means abroad,
 	You have me, rich; and I will never fail
 	Beginning nor supplyment.
 
 IMOGEN	Thou art all the comfort
 	The gods will diet me with. Prithee, away:
 	There's more to be consider'd; but we'll even
 	All that good time will give us: this attempt
 	I am soldier to, and will abide it with
 	A prince's courage. Away, I prithee.
 
 PISANIO	Well, madam, we must take a short farewell,
 	Lest, being miss'd, I be suspected of
 	Your carriage from the court. My noble mistress,
 	Here is a box; I had it from the queen:
 	What's in't is precious; if you are sick at sea,
 	Or stomach-qualm'd at land, a dram of this
 	Will drive away distemper. To some shade,
 	And fit you to your manhood. May the gods
 	Direct you to the best!
 
 IMOGEN	Amen: I thank thee.
 
 	[Exeunt, severally]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT III
 
 
 
 SCENE V	A room in Cymbeline's palace.
 
 
 	[Enter CYMBELINE, QUEEN, CLOTEN, LUCIUS,
 	Lords, and Attendants]
 
 CYMBELINE	Thus far; and so farewell.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Thanks, royal sir.
 	My emperor hath wrote, I must from hence;
 	And am right sorry that I must report ye
 	My master's enemy.
 
 CYMBELINE	                  Our subjects, sir,
 	Will not endure his yoke; and for ourself
 	To show less sovereignty than they, must needs
 	Appear unkinglike.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	                  So, sir: I desire of you
 	A conduct over-land to Milford-Haven.
 	Madam, all joy befal your grace!
 
 QUEEN	And you!
 
 CYMBELINE	My lords, you are appointed for that office;
 	The due of honour in no point omit.
 	So farewell, noble Lucius.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Your hand, my lord.
 
 CLOTEN	Receive it friendly; but from this time forth
 	I wear it as your enemy.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Sir, the event
 	Is yet to name the winner: fare you well.
 
 CYMBELINE	Leave not the worthy Lucius, good my lords,
 	Till he have cross'd the Severn. Happiness!
 
 	[Exeunt LUCIUS and Lords]
 
 QUEEN	He goes hence frowning: but it honours us
 	That we have given him cause.
 
 CLOTEN	'Tis all the better;
 	Your valiant Britons have their wishes in it.
 
 CYMBELINE	Lucius hath wrote already to the emperor
 	How it goes here. It fits us therefore ripely
 	Our chariots and our horsemen be in readiness:
 	The powers that he already hath in Gallia
 	Will soon be drawn to head, from whence he moves
 	His war for Britain.
 
 QUEEN	'Tis not sleepy business;
 	But must be look'd to speedily and strongly.
 
 CYMBELINE	Our expectation that it would be thus
 	Hath made us forward. But, my gentle queen,
 	Where is our daughter? She hath not appear'd
 	Before the Roman, nor to us hath tender'd
 	The duty of the day: she looks us like
 	A thing more made of malice than of duty:
 	We have noted it. Call her before us; for
 	We have been too slight in sufferance.
 
 	[Exit an Attendant]
 
 QUEEN	Royal sir,
 	Since the exile of Posthumus, most retired
 	Hath her life been; the cure whereof, my lord,
 	'Tis time must do. Beseech your majesty,
 	Forbear sharp speeches to her: she's a lady
 	So tender of rebukes that words are strokes
 	And strokes death to her.
 
 	[Re-enter Attendant]
 
 CYMBELINE	Where is she, sir? How
 	Can her contempt be answer'd?
 
 Attendant	Please you, sir,
 	Her chambers are all lock'd; and there's no answer
 	That will be given to the loudest noise we make.
 
 QUEEN	My lord, when last I went to visit her,
 	She pray'd me to excuse her keeping close,
 	Whereto constrain'd by her infirmity,
 	She should that duty leave unpaid to you,
 	Which daily she was bound to proffer: this
 	She wish'd me to make known; but our great court
 	Made me to blame in memory.
 
 CYMBELINE	Her doors lock'd?
 	Not seen of late? Grant, heavens, that which I fear
 	Prove false!
 
 	[Exit]
 
 QUEEN	Son, I say, follow the king.
 
 CLOTEN	That man of hers, Pisanio, her old servant,
 	have not seen these two days.
 
 QUEEN	Go, look after.
 
 	[Exit CLOTEN]
 
 	Pisanio, thou that stand'st so for Posthumus!
 	He hath a drug of mine; I pray his absence
 	Proceed by swallowing that, for he believes
 	It is a thing most precious. But for her,
 	Where is she gone? Haply, despair hath seized her,
 	Or, wing'd with fervor of her love, she's flown
 	To her desired Posthumus: gone she is
 	To death or to dishonour; and my end
 	Can make good use of either: she being down,
 	I have the placing of the British crown.
 
 	[Re-enter CLOTEN]
 
 	How now, my son!
 
 CLOTEN	'Tis certain she is fled.
 	Go in and cheer the king: he rages; none
 	Dare come about him.
 
 QUEEN	[Aside]            All the better: may
 	This night forestall him of the coming day!
 
 	[Exit]
 
 CLOTEN	I love and hate her: for she's fair and royal,
 	And that she hath all courtly parts more exquisite
 	Than lady, ladies, woman; from every one
 	The best she hath, and she, of all compounded,
 	Outsells them all; I love her therefore: but
 	Disdaining me and throwing favours on
 	The low Posthumus slanders so her judgment
 	That what's else rare is choked; and in that point
 	I will conclude to hate her, nay, indeed,
 	To be revenged upon her. For when fools Shall--
 
 	[Enter PISANIO]
 
 	Who is here? What, are you packing, sirrah?
 	Come hither: ah, you precious pander! Villain,
 	Where is thy lady? In a word; or else
 	Thou art straightway with the fiends.
 
 PISANIO	O, good my lord!
 
 CLOTEN	Where is thy lady? Or, by Jupiter,--
 	I will not ask again. Close villain,
 	I'll have this secret from thy heart, or rip
 	Thy heart to find it. Is she with Posthumus?
 	From whose so many weights of baseness cannot
 	A dram of worth be drawn.
 
 PISANIO	Alas, my lord,
 	How can she be with him? When was she missed?
 	He is in Rome.
 
 CLOTEN	                  Where is she, sir? Come nearer;
 	No further halting: satisfy me home
 	What is become of her.
 
 PISANIO	O, my all-worthy lord!
 
 CLOTEN	All-worthy villain!
 	Discover where thy mistress is at once,
 	At the next word: no more of 'worthy lord!'
 	Speak, or thy silence on the instant is
 	Thy condemnation and thy death.
 
 PISANIO	Then, sir,
 	This paper is the history of my knowledge
 	Touching her flight.
 
 	[Presenting a letter]
 
 CLOTEN	Let's see't. I will pursue her
 	Even to Augustus' throne.
 
 PISANIO	[Aside]                 Or this, or perish.
 	She's far enough; and what he learns by this
 	May prove his travel, not her danger.
 
 CLOTEN	Hum!
 
 PISANIO	[Aside]  I'll write to my lord she's dead. O Imogen,
 	Safe mayst thou wander, safe return again!
 
 CLOTEN	Sirrah, is this letter true?
 
 PISANIO	Sir, as I think.
 
 CLOTEN	It is Posthumus' hand; I know't. Sirrah, if thou
 	wouldst not be a villain, but do me true service,
 	undergo those employments wherein I should have
 	cause to use thee with a serious industry, that is,
 	what villany soe'er I bid thee do, to perform it
 	directly and truly, I would think thee an honest
 	man: thou shouldst neither want my means for thy
 	relief nor my voice for thy preferment.
 
 PISANIO	Well, my good lord.
 
 CLOTEN	Wilt thou serve me? for since patiently and
 	constantly thou hast stuck to the bare fortune of
 	that beggar Posthumus, thou canst not, in the
 	course of gratitude, but be a diligent follower of
 	mine: wilt thou serve me?
 
 PISANIO	Sir, I will.
 
 CLOTEN	Give me thy hand; here's my purse. Hast any of thy
 	late master's garments in thy possession?
 
 PISANIO	I have, my lord, at my lodging, the same suit he
 	wore when he took leave of my lady and mistress.
 
 CLOTEN	The first service thou dost me, fetch that suit
 	hither: let it be thy lint service; go.
 
 PISANIO	I shall, my lord.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 CLOTEN	Meet thee at Milford-Haven!--I forgot to ask him one
 	thing; I'll remember't anon:--even there, thou
 	villain Posthumus, will I kill thee. I would these
 	garments were come. She said upon a time--the
 	bitterness of it I now belch from my heart--that she
 	held the very garment of Posthumus in more respect
 	than my noble and natural person together with the
 	adornment of my qualities. With that suit upon my
 	back, will I ravish her: first kill him, and in her
 	eyes; there shall she see my valour, which will then
 	be a torment to her contempt. He on the ground, my
 	speech of insultment ended on his dead body, and
 	when my lust hath dined,--which, as I say, to vex
 	her I will execute in the clothes that she so
 	praised,--to the court I'll knock her back, foot
 	her home again. She hath despised me rejoicingly,
 	and I'll be merry in my revenge.
 
 	[Re-enter PISANIO, with the clothes]
 
 	Be those the garments?
 
 PISANIO	Ay, my noble lord.
 
 CLOTEN	How long is't since she went to Milford-Haven?
 
 PISANIO	She can scarce be there yet.
 
 CLOTEN	Bring this apparel to my chamber; that is the second
 	thing that I have commanded thee: the third is,
 	that thou wilt be a voluntary mute to my design. Be
 	but duteous, and true preferment shall tender itself
 	to thee. My revenge is now at Milford: would I had
 	wings to follow it! Come, and be true.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 PISANIO	Thou bid'st me to my loss: for true to thee
 	Were to prove false, which I will never be,
 	To him that is most true. To Milford go,
 	And find not her whom thou pursuest. Flow, flow,
 	You heavenly blessings, on her! This fool's speed
 	Be cross'd with slowness; labour be his meed!
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT III
 
 
 
 SCENE VI	Wales. Before the cave of Belarius.
 
 
 	[Enter IMOGEN, in boy's clothes]
 
 IMOGEN	I see a man's life is a tedious one:
 	I have tired myself, and for two nights together
 	Have made the ground my bed. I should be sick,
 	But that my resolution helps me. Milford,
 	When from the mountain-top Pisanio show'd thee,
 	Thou wast within a ken: O Jove! I think
 	Foundations fly the wretched; such, I mean,
 	Where they should be relieved. Two beggars told me
 	I could not miss my way: will poor folks lie,
 	That have afflictions on them, knowing 'tis
 	A punishment or trial? Yes; no wonder,
 	When rich ones scarce tell true. To lapse in fulness
 	Is sorer than to lie for need, and falsehood
 	Is worse in kings than beggars. My dear lord!
 	Thou art one o' the false ones. Now I think on thee,
 	My hunger's gone; but even before, I was
 	At point to sink for food. But what is this?
 	Here is a path to't: 'tis some savage hold:
 	I were best not to call; I dare not call:
 	yet famine,
 	Ere clean it o'erthrow nature, makes it valiant,
 	Plenty and peace breeds cowards: hardness ever
 	Of hardiness is mother. Ho! who's here?
 	If any thing that's civil, speak; if savage,
 	Take or lend. Ho! No answer? Then I'll enter.
 	Best draw my sword: and if mine enemy
 	But fear the sword like me, he'll scarcely look on't.
 	Such a foe, good heavens!
 
 	[Exit, to the cave]
 
 	[Enter BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, and ARVIRAGUS]
 
 BELARIUS	You, Polydote, have proved best woodman and
 	Are master of the feast: Cadwal and I
 	Will play the cook and servant; 'tis our match:
 	The sweat of industry would dry and die,
 	But for the end it works to. Come; our stomachs
 	Will make what's homely savoury: weariness
 	Can snore upon the flint, when resty sloth
 	Finds the down pillow hard. Now peace be here,
 	Poor house, that keep'st thyself!
 
 GUIDERIUS	I am thoroughly weary.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	I am weak with toil, yet strong in appetite.
 
 GUIDERIUS	There is cold meat i' the cave; we'll browse on that,
 	Whilst what we have kill'd be cook'd.
 
 BELARIUS	[Looking into the cave]
 
 	Stay; come not in.
 	But that it eats our victuals, I should think
 	Here were a fairy.
 
 GUIDERIUS	What's the matter, sir?
 
 BELARIUS	By Jupiter, an angel! or, if not,
 	An earthly paragon! Behold divineness
 	No elder than a boy!
 
 	[Re-enter IMOGEN]
 
 IMOGEN	Good masters, harm me not:
 	Before I enter'd here, I call'd; and thought
 	To have begg'd or bought what I have took:
 	good troth,
 	I have stol'n nought, nor would not, though I had found
 	Gold strew'd i' the floor. Here's money for my meat:
 	I would have left it on the board so soon
 	As I had made my meal, and parted
 	With prayers for the provider.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Money, youth?
 
 ARVIRAGUS	All gold and silver rather turn to dirt!
 	As 'tis no better reckon'd, but of those
 	Who worship dirty gods.
 
 IMOGEN	I see you're angry:
 	Know, if you kill me for my fault, I should
 	Have died had I not made it.
 
 BELARIUS	Whither bound?
 
 IMOGEN	To Milford-Haven.
 
 BELARIUS	What's your name?
 
 IMOGEN	Fidele, sir. I have a kinsman who
 	Is bound for Italy; he embark'd at Milford;
 	To whom being going, almost spent with hunger,
 	I am fall'n in this offence.
 
 BELARIUS	Prithee, fair youth,
 	Think us no churls, nor measure our good minds
 	By this rude place we live in. Well encounter'd!
 	'Tis almost night: you shall have better cheer
 	Ere you depart: and thanks to stay and eat it.
 	Boys, bid him welcome.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Were you a woman, youth,
 	I should woo hard but be your groom. In honesty,
 	I bid for you as I'd buy.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	I'll make't my comfort
 	He is a man; I'll love him as my brother:
 	And such a welcome as I'd give to him
 	After long absence, such is yours: most welcome!
 	Be sprightly, for you fall 'mongst friends.
 
 IMOGEN	'Mongst friends,
 	If brothers.
 
 	[Aside]
 
 	Would it had been so, that they
 	Had been my father's sons! then had my prize
 	Been less, and so more equal ballasting
 	To thee, Posthumus.
 
 BELARIUS	He wrings at some distress.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Would I could free't!
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Or I, whate'er it be,
 	What pain it cost, what danger. God's!
 
 BELARIUS	Hark, boys.
 
 	[Whispering]
 
 IMOGEN	Great men,
 	That had a court no bigger than this cave,
 	That did attend themselves and had the virtue
 	Which their own conscience seal'd them--laying by
 	That nothing-gift of differing multitudes--
 	Could not out-peer these twain. Pardon me, gods!
 	I'd change my sex to be companion with them,
 	Since Leonatus's false.
 
 BELARIUS	It shall be so.
 	Boys, we'll go dress our hunt. Fair youth, come in:
 	Discourse is heavy, fasting; when we have supp'd,
 	We'll mannerly demand thee of thy story,
 	So far as thou wilt speak it.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Pray, draw near.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	The night to the owl and morn to the lark
 	less welcome.
 
 IMOGEN	Thanks, sir.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	I pray, draw near.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT III
 
 
 
 SCENE VII	Rome. A public place.
 
 
 	[Enter two Senators and Tribunes]
 
 First Senator	This is the tenor of the emperor's writ:
 	That since the common men are now in action
 	'Gainst the Pannonians and Dalmatians,
 	And that the legions now in Gallia are
 	Full weak to undertake our wars against
 	The fall'n-off Britons, that we do incite
 	The gentry to this business. He creates
 	Lucius preconsul: and to you the tribunes,
 	For this immediate levy, he commends
 	His absolute commission. Long live Caesar!
 
 First Tribune	Is Lucius general of the forces?
 
 Second Senator	Ay.
 
 First Tribune	Remaining now in Gallia?
 
 First Senator	With those legions
 	Which I have spoke of, whereunto your levy
 	Must be supplyant: the words of your commission
 	Will tie you to the numbers and the time
 	Of their dispatch.
 
 First Tribune	                  We will discharge our duty.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT IV
 
 
 
 SCENE I	Wales: near the cave of Belarius.
 
 
 	[Enter CLOTEN]
 
 CLOTEN	I am near to the place where they should meet, if
 	Pisanio have mapped it truly. How fit his garments
 	serve me! Why should his mistress, who was made by
 	him that made the tailor, not be fit too? the
 	rather--saving reverence of the word--for 'tis said
 	a woman's fitness comes by fits. Therein I must
 	play the workman. I dare speak it to myself--for it
 	is not vain-glory for a man and his glass to confer
 	in his own chamber--I mean, the lines of my body are
 	as well drawn as his; no less young, more strong,
 	not beneath him in fortunes, beyond him in the
 	advantage of the time, above him in birth, alike
 	conversant in general services, and more remarkable
 	in single oppositions: yet this imperceiverant
 	thing loves him in my despite. What mortality is!
 	Posthumus, thy head, which now is growing upon thy
 	shoulders, shall within this hour be off; thy
 	mistress enforced; thy garments cut to pieces before
 	thy face: and all this done, spurn her home to her
 	father; who may haply be a little angry for my so
 	rough usage; but my mother, having power of his
 	testiness, shall turn all into my commendations. My
 	horse is tied up safe: out, sword, and to a sore
 	purpose! Fortune, put them into my hand! This is
 	the very description of their meeting-place; and
 	the fellow dares not deceive me.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT IV
 
 
 
 SCENE II	Before the cave of Belarius.
 
 
 	[Enter, from the cave, BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS,
 	ARVIRAGUS, and IMOGEN]
 
 BELARIUS	[To IMOGEN]  You are not well: remain here in the cave;
 	We'll come to you after hunting.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	[To IMOGEN]	Brother, stay here
 	Are we not brothers?
 
 IMOGEN	So man and man should be;
 	But clay and clay differs in dignity,
 	Whose dust is both alike. I am very sick.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Go you to hunting; I'll abide with him.
 
 IMOGEN	So sick I am not, yet I am not well;
 	But not so citizen a wanton as
 	To seem to die ere sick: so please you, leave me;
 	Stick to your journal course: the breach of custom
 	Is breach of all. I am ill, but your being by me
 	Cannot amend me; society is no comfort
 	To one not sociable: I am not very sick,
 	Since I can reason of it. Pray you, trust me here:
 	I'll rob none but myself; and let me die,
 	Stealing so poorly.
 
 GUIDERIUS	I love thee; I have spoke it
 	How much the quantity, the weight as much,
 	As I do love my father.
 
 BELARIUS	What! how! how!
 
 ARVIRAGUS	If it be sin to say so, I yoke me
 	In my good brother's fault: I know not why
 	I love this youth; and I have heard you say,
 	Love's reason's without reason: the bier at door,
 	And a demand who is't shall die, I'd say
 	'My father, not this youth.'
 
 BELARIUS	[Aside]	O noble strain!
 	O worthiness of nature! breed of greatness!
 	Cowards father cowards and base things sire base:
 	Nature hath meal and bran, contempt and grace.
 	I'm not their father; yet who this should be,
 	Doth miracle itself, loved before me.
 	'Tis the ninth hour o' the morn.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Brother, farewell.
 
 IMOGEN	I wish ye sport.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	                  You health. So please you, sir.
 
 IMOGEN	[Aside]  These are kind creatures. Gods, what lies
 	I have heard!
 	Our courtiers say all's savage but at court:
 	Experience, O, thou disprovest report!
 	The imperious seas breed monsters, for the dish
 	Poor tributary rivers as sweet fish.
 	I am sick still; heart-sick. Pisanio,
 	I'll now taste of thy drug.
 
 	[Swallows some]
 
 GUIDERIUS	I could not stir him:
 	He said he was gentle, but unfortunate;
 	Dishonestly afflicted, but yet honest.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Thus did he answer me: yet said, hereafter
 	I might know more.
 
 BELARIUS	To the field, to the field!
 	We'll leave you for this time: go in and rest.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	We'll not be long away.
 
 BELARIUS	Pray, be not sick,
 	For you must be our housewife.
 
 IMOGEN	Well or ill,
 	I am bound to you.
 
 BELARIUS	And shalt be ever.
 
 	[Exit IMOGEN, to the cave]
 
 	This youth, how'er distress'd, appears he hath had
 	Good ancestors.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	                  How angel-like he sings!
 
 GUIDERIUS	But his neat cookery! he cut our roots
 	In characters,
 	And sauced our broths, as Juno had been sick
 	And he her dieter.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Nobly he yokes
 	A smiling with a sigh, as if the sigh
 	Was that it was, for not being such a smile;
 	The smile mocking the sigh, that it would fly
 	From so divine a temple, to commix
 	With winds that sailors rail at.
 
 GUIDERIUS	I do note
 	That grief and patience, rooted in him both,
 	Mingle their spurs together.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Grow, patience!
 	And let the stinking elder, grief, untwine
 	His perishing root with the increasing vine!
 
 BELARIUS	It is great morning. Come, away!--
 	Who's there?
 
 	[Enter CLOTEN]
 
 CLOTEN	I cannot find those runagates; that villain
 	Hath mock'd me. I am faint.
 
 BELARIUS	'Those runagates!'
 	Means he not us? I partly know him: 'tis
 	Cloten, the son o' the queen. I fear some ambush.
 	I saw him not these many years, and yet
 	I know 'tis he. We are held as outlaws: hence!
 
 GUIDERIUS	He is but one: you and my brother search
 	What companies are near: pray you, away;
 	Let me alone with him.
 
 	[Exeunt BELARIUS and ARVIRAGUS]
 
 CLOTEN	                  Soft! What are you
 	That fly me thus? some villain mountaineers?
 	I have heard of such. What slave art thou?
 
 GUIDERIUS	A thing
 	More slavish did I ne'er than answering
 	A slave without a knock.
 
 CLOTEN	Thou art a robber,
 	A law-breaker, a villain: yield thee, thief.
 
 GUIDERIUS	To who? to thee? What art thou? Have not I
 	An arm as big as thine? a heart as big?
 	Thy words, I grant, are bigger, for I wear not
 	My dagger in my mouth. Say what thou art,
 	Why I should yield to thee?
 
 CLOTEN	Thou villain base,
 	Know'st me not by my clothes?
 
 GUIDERIUS	No, nor thy tailor, rascal,
 	Who is thy grandfather: he made those clothes,
 	Which, as it seems, make thee.
 
 CLOTEN	Thou precious varlet,
 	My tailor made them not.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Hence, then, and thank
 	The man that gave them thee. Thou art some fool;
 	I am loath to beat thee.
 
 CLOTEN	Thou injurious thief,
 	Hear but my name, and tremble.
 
 GUIDERIUS	What's thy name?
 
 CLOTEN	Cloten, thou villain.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Cloten, thou double villain, be thy name,
 	I cannot tremble at it: were it Toad, or
 	Adder, Spider,
 	'Twould move me sooner.
 
 CLOTEN	To thy further fear,
 	Nay, to thy mere confusion, thou shalt know
 	I am son to the queen.
 
 GUIDERIUS	I am sorry for 't; not seeming
 	So worthy as thy birth.
 
 CLOTEN	Art not afeard?
 
 GUIDERIUS	Those that I reverence those I fear, the wise:
 	At fools I laugh, not fear them.
 
 CLOTEN	Die the death:
 	When I have slain thee with my proper hand,
 	I'll follow those that even now fled hence,
 	And on the gates of Lud's-town set your heads:
 	Yield, rustic mountaineer.
 
 	[Exeunt, fighting]
 
 	[Re-enter BELARIUS and ARVIRAGUS]
 
 BELARIUS	No companies abroad?
 
 ARVIRAGUS	None in the world: you did mistake him, sure.
 
 BELARIUS	I cannot tell: long is it since I saw him,
 	But time hath nothing blurr'd those lines of favour
 	Which then he wore; the snatches in his voice,
 	And burst of speaking, were as his: I am absolute
 	'Twas very Cloten.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	                  In this place we left them:
 	I wish my brother make good time with him,
 	You say he is so fell.
 
 BELARIUS	Being scarce made up,
 	I mean, to man, he had not apprehension
 	Of roaring terrors; for the effect of judgment
 	Is oft the cause of fear. But, see, thy brother.
 
 	[Re-enter GUIDERIUS, with CLOTEN'S head]
 
 GUIDERIUS	This Cloten was a fool, an empty purse;
 	There was no money in't: not Hercules
 	Could have knock'd out his brains, for he had none:
 	Yet I not doing this, the fool had borne
 	My head as I do his.
 
 BELARIUS	What hast thou done?
 
 GUIDERIUS	I am perfect what: cut off one Cloten's head,
 	Son to the queen, after his own report;
 	Who call'd me traitor, mountaineer, and swore
 	With his own single hand he'ld take us in
 	Displace our heads where--thank the gods!--they grow,
 	And set them on Lud's-town.
 
 BELARIUS	We are all undone.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Why, worthy father, what have we to lose,
 	But that he swore to take, our lives? The law
 	Protects not us: then why should we be tender
 	To let an arrogant piece of flesh threat us,
 	Play judge and executioner all himself,
 	For we do fear the law? What company
 	Discover you abroad?
 
 BELARIUS	No single soul
 	Can we set eye on; but in all safe reason
 	He must have some attendants. Though his humour
 	Was nothing but mutation, ay, and that
 	From one bad thing to worse; not frenzy, not
 	Absolute madness could so far have raved
 	To bring him here alone; although perhaps
 	It may be heard at court that such as we
 	Cave here, hunt here, are outlaws, and in time
 	May make some stronger head; the which he hearing--
 	As it is like him--might break out, and swear
 	He'ld fetch us in; yet is't not probable
 	To come alone, either he so undertaking,
 	Or they so suffering: then on good ground we fear,
 	If we do fear this body hath a tail
 	More perilous than the head.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Let ordinance
 	Come as the gods foresay it: howsoe'er,
 	My brother hath done well.
 
 BELARIUS	I had no mind
 	To hunt this day: the boy Fidele's sickness
 	Did make my way long forth.
 
 GUIDERIUS	With his own sword,
 	Which he did wave against my throat, I have ta'en
 	His head from him: I'll throw't into the creek
 	Behind our rock; and let it to the sea,
 	And tell the fishes he's the queen's son, Cloten:
 	That's all I reck.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 BELARIUS	I fear 'twill be revenged:
 	Would, Polydote, thou hadst not done't! though valour
 	Becomes thee well enough.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Would I had done't
 	So the revenge alone pursued me! Polydore,
 	I love thee brotherly, but envy much
 	Thou hast robb'd me of this deed: I would revenges,
 	That possible strength might meet, would seek us through
 	And put us to our answer.
 
 BELARIUS	Well, 'tis done:
 	We'll hunt no more to-day, nor seek for danger
 	Where there's no profit. I prithee, to our rock;
 	You and Fidele play the cooks: I'll stay
 	Till hasty Polydote return, and bring him
 	To dinner presently.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Poor sick Fidele!
 	I'll weringly to him: to gain his colour
 	I'ld let a parish of such Clotens' blood,
 	And praise myself for charity.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 BELARIUS	O thou goddess,
 	Thou divine Nature, how thyself thou blazon'st
 	In these two princely boys! They are as gentle
 	As zephyrs blowing below the violet,
 	Not wagging his sweet head; and yet as rough,
 	Their royal blood enchafed, as the rudest wind,
 	That by the top doth take the mountain pine,
 	And make him stoop to the vale. 'Tis wonder
 	That an invisible instinct should frame them
 	To royalty unlearn'd, honour untaught,
 	Civility not seen from other, valour
 	That wildly grows in them, but yields a crop
 	As if it had been sow'd. Yet still it's strange
 	What Cloten's being here to us portends,
 	Or what his death will bring us.
 
 	[Re-enter GUIDERIUS]
 
 GUIDERIUS	Where's my brother?
 	I have sent Cloten's clotpoll down the stream,
 	In embassy to his mother: his body's hostage
 	For his return.
 
 	[Solemn music]
 
 BELARIUS	                  My ingenious instrument!
 	Hark, Polydore, it sounds! But what occasion
 	Hath Cadwal now to give it motion? Hark!
 
 GUIDERIUS	Is he at home?
 
 BELARIUS	                  He went hence even now.
 
 GUIDERIUS	What does he mean? since death of my dear'st mother
 	it did not speak before. All solemn things
 	Should answer solemn accidents. The matter?
 	Triumphs for nothing and lamenting toys
 	Is jollity for apes and grief for boys.
 	Is Cadwal mad?
 
 BELARIUS	                  Look, here he comes,
 	And brings the dire occasion in his arms
 	Of what we blame him for.
 
 	[Re-enter ARVIRAGUS, with IMOGEN, as dead,
 	bearing her in his arms]
 
 ARVIRAGUS	The bird is dead
 	That we have made so much on. I had rather
 	Have skipp'd from sixteen years of age to sixty,
 	To have turn'd my leaping-time into a crutch,
 	Than have seen this.
 
 GUIDERIUS	O sweetest, fairest lily!
 	My brother wears thee not the one half so well
 	As when thou grew'st thyself.
 
 BELARIUS	O melancholy!
 	Who ever yet could sound thy bottom? find
 	The ooze, to show what coast thy sluggish crare
 	Might easiliest harbour in? Thou blessed thing!
 	Jove knows what man thou mightst have made; but I,
 	Thou diedst, a most rare boy, of melancholy.
 	How found you him?
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Stark, as you see:
 	Thus smiling, as some fly hid tickled slumber,
 	Not as death's dart, being laugh'd at; his
 	right cheek
 	Reposing on a cushion.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Where?
 
 ARVIRAGUS	O' the floor;
 	His arms thus leagued: I thought he slept, and put
 	My clouted brogues from off my feet, whose rudeness
 	Answer'd my steps too loud.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Why, he but sleeps:
 	If he be gone, he'll make his grave a bed;
 	With female fairies will his tomb be haunted,
 	And worms will not come to thee.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	With fairest flowers
 	Whilst summer lasts and I live here, Fidele,
 	I'll sweeten thy sad grave: thou shalt not lack
 	The flower that's like thy face, pale primrose, nor
 	The azured harebell, like thy veins, no, nor
 	The leaf of eglantine, whom not to slander,
 	Out-sweeten'd not thy breath: the ruddock would,
 	With charitable bill,--O bill, sore-shaming
 	Those rich-left heirs that let their fathers lie
 	Without a monument!--bring thee all this;
 	Yea, and furr'd moss besides, when flowers are none,
 	To winter-ground thy corse.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Prithee, have done;
 	And do not play in wench-like words with that
 	Which is so serious. Let us bury him,
 	And not protract with admiration what
 	Is now due debt. To the grave!
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Say, where shall's lay him?
 
 GUIDERIUS	By good Euriphile, our mother.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Be't so:
 	And let us, Polydore, though now our voices
 	Have got the mannish crack, sing him to the ground,
 	As once our mother; use like note and words,
 	Save that Euriphile must be Fidele.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Cadwal,
 	I cannot sing: I'll weep, and word it with thee;
 	For notes of sorrow out of tune are worse
 	Than priests and fanes that lie.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	We'll speak it, then.
 
 BELARIUS	Great griefs, I see, medicine the less; for Cloten
 	Is quite forgot. He was a queen's son, boys;
 	And though he came our enemy, remember
 	He was paid for that: though mean and
 	mighty, rotting
 	Together, have one dust, yet reverence,
 	That angel of the world, doth make distinction
 	Of place 'tween high and low. Our foe was princely
 	And though you took his life, as being our foe,
 	Yet bury him as a prince.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Pray You, fetch him hither.
 	Thersites' body is as good as Ajax',
 	When neither are alive.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	If you'll go fetch him,
 	We'll say our song the whilst. Brother, begin.
 
 	[Exit BELARIUS]
 
 GUIDERIUS	Nay, Cadwal, we must lay his head to the east;
 	My father hath a reason for't.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	'Tis true.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Come on then, and remove him.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	So. Begin.
 	[SONG]
 
 GUIDERIUS	     Fear no more the heat o' the sun,
 	Nor the furious winter's rages;
 	Thou thy worldly task hast done,
 	Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages:
 	Golden lads and girls all must,
 	As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	     Fear no more the frown o' the great;
 	Thou art past the tyrant's stroke;
 	Care no more to clothe and eat;
 	To thee the reed is as the oak:
 	The sceptre, learning, physic, must
 	All follow this, and come to dust.
 
 GUIDERIUS	     Fear no more the lightning flash,
 
 ARVIRAGUS	        Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone;
 
 GUIDERIUS	     Fear not slander, censure rash;
 
 ARVIRAGUS	        Thou hast finish'd joy and moan:
 
 
 GUIDERIUS	|
 	|  All lovers young, all lovers must
 ARVIRAGUS	|   Consign to thee, and come to dust.
 
 
 GUIDERIUS	     No exorciser harm thee!
 
 ARVIRAGUS	        Nor no witchcraft charm thee!
 
 GUIDERIUS	     Ghost unlaid forbear thee!
 
 ARVIRAGUS	        Nothing ill come near thee!
 
 
 GUIDERIUS	|
 	|   Quiet consummation have;
 ARVIRAGUS	|    And renowned be thy grave!
 
 
 	[Re-enter BELARIUS, with the body of CLOTEN]
 
 GUIDERIUS	We have done our obsequies: come, lay him down.
 
 BELARIUS	Here's a few flowers; but 'bout midnight, more:
 	The herbs that have on them cold dew o' the night
 	Are strewings fitt'st for graves. Upon their faces.
 	You were as flowers, now wither'd: even so
 	These herblets shall, which we upon you strew.
 	Come on, away: apart upon our knees.
 	The ground that gave them first has them again:
 	Their pleasures here are past, so is their pain.
 
 	[Exeunt BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, and ARVIRAGUS]
 
 IMOGEN	[Awaking]  Yes, sir, to Milford-Haven; which is
 	the way?--
 	I thank you.--By yond bush?--Pray, how far thither?
 	'Ods pittikins! can it be six mile yet?--
 	I have gone all night. 'Faith, I'll lie down and sleep.
 	But, soft! no bedfellow!--O gods and goddesses!
 
 	[Seeing the body of CLOTEN]
 
 	These flowers are like the pleasures of the world;
 	This bloody man, the care on't. I hope I dream;
 	For so I thought I was a cave-keeper,
 	And cook to honest creatures: but 'tis not so;
 	'Twas but a bolt of nothing, shot at nothing,
 	Which the brain makes of fumes: our very eyes
 	Are sometimes like our judgments, blind. Good faith,
 	I tremble stiff with fear: but if there be
 	Yet left in heaven as small a drop of pity
 	As a wren's eye, fear'd gods, a part of it!
 	The dream's here still: even when I wake, it is
 	Without me, as within me; not imagined, felt.
 	A headless man! The garments of Posthumus!
 	I know the shape of's leg: this is his hand;
 	His foot Mercurial; his Martial thigh;
 	The brawns of Hercules: but his Jovial face
 	Murder in heaven?--How!--'Tis gone. Pisanio,
 	All curses madded Hecuba gave the Greeks,
 	And mine to boot, be darted on thee! Thou,
 	Conspired with that irregulous devil, Cloten,
 	Hast here cut off my lord. To write and read
 	Be henceforth treacherous! Damn'd Pisanio
 	Hath with his forged letters,--damn'd Pisanio--
 	From this most bravest vessel of the world
 	Struck the main-top! O Posthumus! alas,
 	Where is thy head? where's that? Ay me!
 	where's that?
 	Pisanio might have kill'd thee at the heart,
 	And left this head on. How should this be? Pisanio?
 	'Tis he and Cloten: malice and lucre in them
 	Have laid this woe here. O, 'tis pregnant, pregnant!
 	The drug he gave me, which he said was precious
 	And cordial to me, have I not found it
 	Murderous to the senses? That confirms it home:
 	This is Pisanio's deed, and Cloten's: O!
 	Give colour to my pale cheek with thy blood,
 	That we the horrider may seem to those
 	Which chance to find us: O, my lord, my lord!
 
 	[Falls on the body]
 
 	[Enter LUCIUS, a Captain and other Officers,
 	and a Soothsayer]
 
 Captain	To them the legions garrison'd in Gailia,
 	After your will, have cross'd the sea, attending
 	You here at Milford-Haven with your ships:
 	They are in readiness.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	But what from Rome?
 
 Captain	The senate hath stirr'd up the confiners
 	And gentlemen of Italy, most willing spirits,
 	That promise noble service: and they come
 	Under the conduct of bold Iachimo,
 	Syenna's brother.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	                  When expect you them?
 
 Captain	With the next benefit o' the wind.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	This forwardness
 	Makes our hopes fair. Command our present numbers
 	Be muster'd; bid the captains look to't. Now, sir,
 	What have you dream'd of late of this war's purpose?
 
 Soothsayer	Last night the very gods show'd me a vision--
 	I fast and pray'd for their intelligence--thus:
 	I saw Jove's bird, the Roman eagle, wing'd
 	From the spongy south to this part of the west,
 	There vanish'd in the sunbeams: which portends--
 	Unless my sins abuse my divination--
 	Success to the Roman host.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Dream often so,
 	And never false. Soft, ho! what trunk is here
 	Without his top? The ruin speaks that sometime
 	It was a worthy building. How! a page!
 	Or dead, or sleeping on him? But dead rather;
 	For nature doth abhor to make his bed
 	With the defunct, or sleep upon the dead.
 	Let's see the boy's face.
 
 Captain	He's alive, my lord.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	He'll then instruct us of this body. Young one,
 	Inform us of thy fortunes, for it seems
 	They crave to be demanded. Who is this
 	Thou makest thy bloody pillow? Or who was he
 	That, otherwise than noble nature did,
 	Hath alter'd that good picture? What's thy interest
 	In this sad wreck? How came it? Who is it?
 	What art thou?
 
 IMOGEN	                  I am nothing: or if not,
 	Nothing to be were better. This was my master,
 	A very valiant Briton and a good,
 	That here by mountaineers lies slain. Alas!
 	There is no more such masters: I may wander
 	From east to occident, cry out for service,
 	Try many, all good, serve truly, never
 	Find such another master.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	'Lack, good youth!
 	Thou movest no less with thy complaining than
 	Thy master in bleeding: say his name, good friend.
 
 IMOGEN	Richard du Champ.
 
 	[Aside]
 
 	If I do lie and do
 	No harm by it, though the gods hear, I hope
 	They'll pardon it.--Say you, sir?
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Thy name?
 
 IMOGEN	Fidele, sir.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Thou dost approve thyself the very same:
 	Thy name well fits thy faith, thy faith thy name.
 	Wilt take thy chance with me? I will not say
 	Thou shalt be so well master'd, but, be sure,
 	No less beloved. The Roman emperor's letters,
 	Sent by a consul to me, should not sooner
 	Than thine own worth prefer thee: go with me.
 
 IMOGEN	I'll follow, sir. But first, an't please the gods,
 	I'll hide my master from the flies, as deep
 	As these poor pickaxes can dig; and when
 	With wild wood-leaves and weeds I ha' strew'd his grave,
 	And on it said a century of prayers,
 	Such as I can, twice o'er, I'll weep and sigh;
 	And leaving so his service, follow you,
 	So please you entertain me.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Ay, good youth!
 	And rather father thee than master thee.
 	My friends,
 	The boy hath taught us manly duties: let us
 	Find out the prettiest daisied plot we can,
 	And make him with our pikes and partisans
 	A grave: come, arm him. Boy, he is preferr'd
 	By thee to us, and he shall be interr'd
 	As soldiers can. Be cheerful; wipe thine eyes
 	Some falls are means the happier to arise.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT IV
 
 
 
 SCENE III	A room in Cymbeline's palace.
 
 
 	[Enter CYMBELINE, Lords, PISANIO, and Attendants]
 
 CYMBELINE	Again; and bring me word how 'tis with her.
 
 	[Exit an Attendant]
 
 	A fever with the absence of her son,
 	A madness, of which her life's in danger. Heavens,
 	How deeply you at once do touch me! Imogen,
 	The great part of my comfort, gone; my queen
 	Upon a desperate bed, and in a time
 	When fearful wars point at me; her son gone,
 	So needful for this present: it strikes me, past
 	The hope of comfort. But for thee, fellow,
 	Who needs must know of her departure and
 	Dost seem so ignorant, we'll enforce it from thee
 	By a sharp torture.
 
 PISANIO	Sir, my life is yours;
 	I humbly set it at your will; but, for my mistress,
 	I nothing know where she remains, why gone,
 	Nor when she purposes return. Beseech your highness,
 	Hold me your loyal servant.
 
 First Lord	Good my liege,
 	The day that she was missing he was here:
 	I dare be bound he's true and shall perform
 	All parts of his subjection loyally. For Cloten,
 	There wants no diligence in seeking him,
 	And will, no doubt, be found.
 
 CYMBELINE	The time is troublesome.
 
 	[To PISANIO]
 
 	We'll slip you for a season; but our jealousy
 	Does yet depend.
 
 First Lord	                  So please your majesty,
 	The Roman legions, all from Gallia drawn,
 	Are landed on your coast, with a supply
 	Of Roman gentlemen, by the senate sent.
 
 CYMBELINE	Now for the counsel of my son and queen!
 	I am amazed with matter.
 
 First Lord	Good my liege,
 	Your preparation can affront no less
 	Than what you hear of: come more, for more
 	you're ready:
 	The want is but to put those powers in motion
 	That long to move.
 
 CYMBELINE	                  I thank you. Let's withdraw;
 	And meet the time as it seeks us. We fear not
 	What can from Italy annoy us; but
 	We grieve at chances here. Away!
 
 	[Exeunt all but PISANIO]
 
 PISANIO	I heard no letter from my master since
 	I wrote him Imogen was slain: 'tis strange:
 	Nor hear I from my mistress who did promise
 	To yield me often tidings: neither know I
 	What is betid to Cloten; but remain
 	Perplex'd in all. The heavens still must work.
 	Wherein I am false I am honest; not true, to be true.
 	These present wars shall find I love my country,
 	Even to the note o' the king, or I'll fall in them.
 	All other doubts, by time let them be clear'd:
 	Fortune brings in some boats that are not steer'd.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT IV
 
 
 
 SCENE IV	Wales: before the cave of Belarius.
 
 
 	[Enter BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, and ARVIRAGUS.
 
 GUIDERIUS	The noise is round about us.
 
 BELARIUS	Let us from it.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	What pleasure, sir, find we in life, to lock it
 	From action and adventure?
 
 GUIDERIUS	Nay, what hope
 	Have we in hiding us? This way, the Romans
 	Must or for Britons slay us, or receive us
 	For barbarous and unnatural revolts
 	During their use, and slay us after.
 
 BELARIUS	Sons,
 	We'll higher to the mountains; there secure us.
 	To the king's party there's no going: newness
 	Of Cloten's death--we being not known, not muster'd
 	Among the bands--may drive us to a render
 	Where we have lived, and so extort from's that
 	Which we have done, whose answer would be death
 	Drawn on with torture.
 
 GUIDERIUS	This is, sir, a doubt
 	In such a time nothing becoming you,
 	Nor satisfying us.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	                  It is not likely
 	That when they hear the Roman horses neigh,
 	Behold their quarter'd fires, have both their eyes
 	And ears so cloy'd importantly as now,
 	That they will waste their time upon our note,
 	To know from whence we are.
 
 BELARIUS	O, I am known
 	Of many in the army: many years,
 	Though Cloten then but young, you see, not wore him
 	From my remembrance. And, besides, the king
 	Hath not deserved my service nor your loves;
 	Who find in my exile the want of breeding,
 	The certainty of this hard life; aye hopeless
 	To have the courtesy your cradle promised,
 	But to be still hot summer's tamings and
 	The shrinking slaves of winter.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Than be so
 	Better to cease to be. Pray, sir, to the army:
 	I and my brother are not known; yourself
 	So out of thought, and thereto so o'ergrown,
 	Cannot be question'd.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	By this sun that shines,
 	I'll thither: what thing is it that I never
 	Did see man die! scarce ever look'd on blood,
 	But that of coward hares, hot goats, and venison!
 	Never bestrid a horse, save one that had
 	A rider like myself, who ne'er wore rowel
 	Nor iron on his heel! I am ashamed
 	To look upon the holy sun, to have
 	The benefit of his blest beams, remaining
 	So long a poor unknown.
 
 GUIDERIUS	By heavens, I'll go:
 	If you will bless me, sir, and give me leave,
 	I'll take the better care, but if you will not,
 	The hazard therefore due fall on me by
 	The hands of Romans!
 
 ARVIRAGUS	So say I	amen.
 
 BELARIUS	No reason I, since of your lives you set
 	So slight a valuation, should reserve
 	My crack'd one to more care. Have with you, boys!
 	If in your country wars you chance to die,
 	That is my bed too, lads, an there I'll lie:
 	Lead, lead.
 
 	[Aside]
 
 	The time seems long; their blood
 	thinks scorn,
 	Till it fly out and show them princes born.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT V
 
 
 
 SCENE I	Britain. The Roman camp.
 
 
 	[Enter POSTHUMUS, with a bloody handkerchief]
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Yea, bloody cloth, I'll keep thee, for I wish'd
 	Thou shouldst be colour'd thus. You married ones,
 	If each of you should take this course, how many
 	Must murder wives much better than themselves
 	For wrying but a little! O Pisanio!
 	Every good servant does not all commands:
 	No bond but to do just ones. Gods! if you
 	Should have ta'en vengeance on my faults, I never
 	Had lived to put on this: so had you saved
 	The noble Imogen to repent, and struck
 	Me, wretch more worth your vengeance. But, alack,
 	You snatch some hence for little faults; that's love,
 	To have them fall no more: you some permit
 	To second ills with ills, each elder worse,
 	And make them dread it, to the doers' thrift.
 	But Imogen is your own: do your best wills,
 	And make me blest to obey! I am brought hither
 	Among the Italian gentry, and to fight
 	Against my lady's kingdom: 'tis enough
 	That, Britain, I have kill'd thy mistress; peace!
 	I'll give no wound to thee. Therefore, good heavens,
 	Hear patiently my purpose: I'll disrobe me
 	Of these Italian weeds and suit myself
 	As does a Briton peasant: so I'll fight
 	Against the part I come with; so I'll die
 	For thee, O Imogen, even for whom my life
 	Is every breath a death; and thus, unknown,
 	Pitied nor hated, to the face of peril
 	Myself I'll dedicate. Let me make men know
 	More valour in me than my habits show.
 	Gods, put the strength o' the Leonati in me!
 	To shame the guise o' the world, I will begin
 	The fashion, less without and more within.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT V
 
 
 
 SCENE II	Field of battle between the British and Roman camps.
 
 
 	[Enter, from one side, LUCIUS, IACHIMO, and
 	the Roman Army: from the other side, the
 	British Army; POSTHUMUS LEONATUS following,
 	like a poor soldier. They march over and go
 	out. Then enter again, in skirmish, IACHIMO
 	and POSTHUMUS LEONATUS he vanquisheth and disarmeth
 	IACHIMO, and then leaves him]
 
 IACHIMO	The heaviness and guilt within my bosom
 	Takes off my manhood: I have belied a lady,
 	The princess of this country, and the air on't
 	Revengingly enfeebles me; or could this carl,
 	A very drudge of nature's, have subdued me
 	In my profession? Knighthoods and honours, borne
 	As I wear mine, are titles but of scorn.
 	If that thy gentry, Britain, go before
 	This lout as he exceeds our lords, the odds
 	Is that we scarce are men and you are gods.
 
 	[Exit]
 
 	[The battle continues; the Britons fly; CYMBELINE is
 	taken: then enter, to his rescue, BELARIUS,
 	GUIDERIUS, and ARVIRAGUS]
 
 BELARIUS	Stand, stand! We have the advantage of the ground;
 	The lane is guarded: nothing routs us but
 	The villany of our fears.
 
 
 GUIDERIUS	|
 	|  Stand, stand, and fight!
 ARVIRAGUS	|
 
 
 	[Re-enter POSTHUMUS LEONATUS, and seconds the
 	Britons: they rescue CYMBELINE, and exeunt. Then
 	re-enter LUCIUS, and IACHIMO, with IMOGEN]
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Away, boy, from the troops, and save thyself;
 	For friends kill friends, and the disorder's such
 	As war were hoodwink'd.
 
 IACHIMO	'Tis their fresh supplies.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	It is a day turn'd strangely: or betimes
 	Let's reinforce, or fly.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT V
 
 
 
 SCENE III	Another part of the field.
 
 
 	[Enter POSTHUMUS LEONATUS and a British Lord]
 
 Lord	Camest thou from where they made the stand?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I did.
 	Though you, it seems, come from the fliers.
 
 Lord	I did.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	No blame be to you, sir; for all was lost,
 	But that the heavens fought: the king himself
 	Of his wings destitute, the army broken,
 	And but the backs of Britons seen, all flying
 	Through a straight lane; the enemy full-hearted,
 	Lolling the tongue with slaughtering, having work
 	More plentiful than tools to do't, struck down
 	Some mortally, some slightly touch'd, some falling
 	Merely through fear; that the straight pass was damm'd
 	With dead men hurt behind, and cowards living
 	To die with lengthen'd shame.
 
 Lord	Where was this lane?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Close by the battle, ditch'd, and wall'd with turf;
 	Which gave advantage to an ancient soldier,
 	An honest one, I warrant; who deserved
 	So long a breeding as his white beard came to,
 	In doing this for's country: athwart the lane,
 	He, with two striplings-lads more like to run
 	The country base than to commit such slaughter
 	With faces fit for masks, or rather fairer
 	Than those for preservation cased, or shame--
 	Made good the passage; cried to those that fled,
 	'Our Britain s harts die flying, not our men:
 	To darkness fleet souls that fly backwards. Stand;
 	Or we are Romans and will give you that
 	Like beasts which you shun beastly, and may save,
 	But to look back in frown: stand, stand.'
 	These three,
 	Three thousand confident, in act as many--
 	For three performers are the file when all
 	The rest do nothing--with this word 'Stand, stand,'
 	Accommodated by the place, more charming
 	With their own nobleness, which could have turn'd
 	A distaff to a lance, gilded pale looks,
 	Part shame, part spirit renew'd; that some,
 	turn'd coward
 	But by example--O, a sin in war,
 	Damn'd in the first beginners!--gan to look
 	The way that they did, and to grin like lions
 	Upon the pikes o' the hunters. Then began
 	A stop i' the chaser, a retire, anon
 	A rout, confusion thick; forthwith they fly
 	Chickens, the way which they stoop'd eagles; slaves,
 	The strides they victors made: and now our cowards,
 	Like fragments in hard voyages, became
 	The life o' the need: having found the backdoor open
 	Of the unguarded hearts, heavens, how they wound!
 	Some slain before; some dying; some their friends
 	O'er borne i' the former wave: ten, chased by one,
 	Are now each one the slaughter-man of twenty:
 	Those that would die or ere resist are grown
 	The mortal bugs o' the field.
 
 Lord	This was strange chance
 	A narrow lane, an old man, and two boys.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Nay, do not wonder at it: you are made
 	Rather to wonder at the things you hear
 	Than to work any. Will you rhyme upon't,
 	And vent it for a mockery? Here is one:
 	'Two boys, an old man twice a boy, a lane,
 	Preserved the Britons, was the Romans' bane.'
 
 Lord	Nay, be not angry, sir.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	'Lack, to what end?
 	Who dares not stand his foe, I'll be his friend;
 	For if he'll do as he is made to do,
 	I know he'll quickly fly my friendship too.
 	You have put me into rhyme.
 
 Lord	Farewell; you're angry.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Still going?
 
 	[Exit Lord]
 
 	This is a lord! O noble misery,
 	To be i' the field, and ask 'what news?' of me!
 	To-day how many would have given their honours
 	To have saved their carcasses! took heel to do't,
 	And yet died too! I, in mine own woe charm'd,
 	Could not find death where I did hear him groan,
 	Nor feel him where he struck: being an ugly monster,
 	'Tis strange he hides him in fresh cups, soft beds,
 	Sweet words; or hath more ministers than we
 	That draw his knives i' the war. Well, I will find him
 	For being now a favourer to the Briton,
 	No more a Briton, I have resumed again
 	The part I came in: fight I will no more,
 	But yield me to the veriest hind that shall
 	Once touch my shoulder. Great the slaughter is
 	Here made by the Roman; great the answer be
 	Britons must take. For me, my ransom's death;
 	On either side I come to spend my breath;
 	Which neither here I'll keep nor bear again,
 	But end it by some means for Imogen.
 
 	[Enter two British Captains and Soldiers]
 
 First Captain	Great Jupiter be praised! Lucius is taken.
 	'Tis thought the old man and his sons were angels.
 
 Second Captain	There was a fourth man, in a silly habit,
 	That gave the affront with them.
 
 First Captain	So 'tis reported:
 	But none of 'em can be found. Stand! who's there?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	A Roman,
 	Who had not now been drooping here, if seconds
 	Had answer'd him.
 
 Second Captain	                  Lay hands on him; a dog!
 	A leg of Rome shall not return to tell
 	What crows have peck'd them here. He brags
 	his service
 	As if he were of note: bring him to the king.
 
 	[Enter CYMBELINE, BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, ARVIRAGUS,
 	PISANIO, Soldiers, Attendants, and Roman Captives.
 	The Captains present POSTHUMUS LEONATUS to
 	CYMBELINE, who delivers him over to a Gaoler:
 	then exeunt omnes]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT V
 
 
 
 SCENE IV	A British prison.
 
 
 	[Enter POSTHUMUS LEONATUS and two Gaolers]
 
 First Gaoler	You shall not now be stol'n, you have locks upon you;
 	So graze as you find pasture.
 
 Second Gaoler	Ay, or a stomach.
 
 	[Exeunt Gaolers]
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Most welcome, bondage! for thou art away,
 	think, to liberty: yet am I better
 	Than one that's sick o' the gout; since he had rather
 	Groan so in perpetuity than be cured
 	By the sure physician, death, who is the key
 	To unbar these locks. My conscience, thou art fetter'd
 	More than my shanks and wrists: you good gods, give me
 	The penitent instrument to pick that bolt,
 	Then, free for ever! Is't enough I am sorry?
 	So children temporal fathers do appease;
 	Gods are more full of mercy. Must I repent?
 	I cannot do it better than in gyves,
 	Desired more than constrain'd: to satisfy,
 	If of my freedom 'tis the main part, take
 	No stricter render of me than my all.
 	I know you are more clement than vile men,
 	Who of their broken debtors take a third,
 	A sixth, a tenth, letting them thrive again
 	On their abatement: that's not my desire:
 	For Imogen's dear life take mine; and though
 	'Tis not so dear, yet 'tis a life; you coin'd it:
 	'Tween man and man they weigh not every stamp;
 	Though light, take pieces for the figure's sake:
 	You rather mine, being yours: and so, great powers,
 	If you will take this audit, take this life,
 	And cancel these cold bonds. O Imogen!
 	I'll speak to thee in silence.
 
 	[Sleeps]
 
 	[Solemn music. Enter, as in an apparition,
 	SICILIUS LEONATUS, father to Posthumus Leonatus,
 	an old man, attired like a warrior; leading in
 	his hand an ancient matron, his wife, and mother
 	to Posthumus Leonatus, with music before them:
 	then, after other music, follow the two young
 	Leonati, brothers to Posthumus Leonatus, with
 	wounds as they died in the wars. They circle
 	Posthumus Leonatus round, as he lies sleeping]
 
 Sicilius Leonatus	No more, thou thunder-master, show
 	Thy spite on mortal flies:
 	With Mars fall out, with Juno chide,
 	That thy adulteries
 	Rates and revenges.
 	Hath my poor boy done aught but well,
 	Whose face I never saw?
 	I died whilst in the womb he stay'd
 	Attending nature's law:
 	Whose father then, as men report
 	Thou orphans' father art,
 	Thou shouldst have been, and shielded him
 	From this earth-vexing smart.
 
 Mother	Lucina lent not me her aid,
 	But took me in my throes;
 	That from me was Posthumus ript,
 	Came crying 'mongst his foes,
 	A thing of pity!
 
 Sicilius Leonatus	Great nature, like his ancestry,
 	Moulded the stuff so fair,
 	That he deserved the praise o' the world,
 	As great Sicilius' heir.
 
 First Brother	When once he was mature for man,
 	In Britain where was he
 	That could stand up his parallel;
 	Or fruitful object be
 	In eye of Imogen, that best
 	Could deem his dignity?
 
 Mother	With marriage wherefore was he mock'd,
 	To be exiled, and thrown
 	From Leonati seat, and cast
 	From her his dearest one,
 	Sweet Imogen?
 
 Sicilius Leonatus	Why did you suffer Iachimo,
 	Slight thing of Italy,
 	To taint his nobler heart and brain
 	With needless jealosy;
 	And to become the geck and scorn
 	O' th' other's villany?
 
 Second Brother	For this from stiller seats we came,
 	Our parents and us twain,
 	That striking in our country's cause
 	Fell bravely and were slain,
 	Our fealty and Tenantius' right
 	With honour to maintain.
 
 First Brother	Like hardiment Posthumus hath
 	To Cymbeline perform'd:
 	Then, Jupiter, thou king of gods,
 	Why hast thou thus adjourn'd
 	The graces for his merits due,
 	Being all to dolours turn'd?
 
 Sicilius Leonatus	Thy crystal window ope; look out;
 	No longer exercise
 	Upon a valiant race thy harsh
 	And potent injuries.
 
 Mother	Since, Jupiter, our son is good,
 	Take off his miseries.
 
 Sicilius Leonatus	Peep through thy marble mansion; help;
 	Or we poor ghosts will cry
 	To the shining synod of the rest
 	Against thy deity.
 
 
 First Brother	|   Help, Jupiter; or we appeal,
 	|   And from thy justice fly.
 Second Brother	|
 
 
 	[Jupiter descends in thunder and lightning, sitting
 	upon an eagle: he throws a thunderbolt. The
 	Apparitions fall on their knees]
 
 Jupiter	No more, you petty spirits of region low,
 	Offend our hearing; hush! How dare you ghosts
 	Accuse the thunderer, whose bolt, you know,
 	Sky-planted batters all rebelling coasts?
 	Poor shadows of Elysium, hence, and rest
 	Upon your never-withering banks of flowers:
 	Be not with mortal accidents opprest;
 	No care of yours it is; you know 'tis ours.
 	Whom best I love I cross; to make my gift,
 	The more delay'd, delighted. Be content;
 	Your low-laid son our godhead will uplift:
 	His comforts thrive, his trials well are spent.
 	Our Jovial star reign'd at his birth, and in
 	Our temple was he married. Rise, and fade.
 	He shall be lord of lady Imogen,
 	And happier much by his affliction made.
 	This tablet lay upon his breast, wherein
 	Our pleasure his full fortune doth confine:
 	and so, away: no further with your din
 	Express impatience, lest you stir up mine.
 	Mount, eagle, to my palace crystalline.
 
 	[Ascends]
 
 Sicilius Leonatus	He came in thunder; his celestial breath
 	Was sulphurous to smell: the holy eagle
 	Stoop'd as to foot us: his ascension is
 	More sweet than our blest fields: his royal bird
 	Prunes the immortal wing and cloys his beak,
 	As when his god is pleased.
 
 All	Thanks, Jupiter!
 
 Sicilius Leonatus	The marble pavement closes, he is enter'd
 	His radiant root. Away! and, to be blest,
 	Let us with care perform his great behest.
 
 	[The Apparitions vanish]
 
 Posthumus Leonatus	[Waking]  Sleep, thou hast been a grandsire, and begot
 	A father to me; and thou hast created
 	A mother and two brothers: but, O scorn!
 	Gone! they went hence so soon as they were born:
 	And so I am awake. Poor wretches that depend
 	On greatness' favour dream as I have done,
 	Wake and find nothing. But, alas, I swerve:
 	Many dream not to find, neither deserve,
 	And yet are steep'd in favours: so am I,
 	That have this golden chance and know not why.
 	What fairies haunt this ground? A book? O rare one!
 	Be not, as is our fangled world, a garment
 	Nobler than that it covers: let thy effects
 	So follow, to be most unlike our courtiers,
 	As good as promise.
 
 	[Reads]
 
 	'When as a lion's whelp shall, to himself unknown,
 	without seeking find, and be embraced by a piece of
 	tender air; and when from a stately cedar shall be
 	lopped branches, which, being dead many years,
 	shall after revive, be jointed to the old stock and
 	freshly grow; then shall Posthumus end his miseries,
 	Britain be fortunate and flourish in peace and plenty.'
 	'Tis still a dream, or else such stuff as madmen
 	Tongue and brain not; either both or nothing;
 	Or senseless speaking or a speaking such
 	As sense cannot untie. Be what it is,
 	The action of my life is like it, which
 	I'll keep, if but for sympathy.
 
 	[Re-enter First Gaoler]
 
 First Gaoler	Come, sir, are you ready for death?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Over-roasted rather; ready long ago.
 
 First Gaoler	Hanging is the word, sir: if
 	you be ready for that, you are well cooked.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	So, if I prove a good repast to the
 	spectators, the dish pays the shot.
 
 First Gaoler	A heavy reckoning for you, sir. But the comfort is,
 	you shall be called to no more payments, fear no
 	more tavern-bills; which are often the sadness of
 	parting, as the procuring of mirth: you come in
 	flint for want of meat, depart reeling with too
 	much drink; sorry that you have paid too much, and
 	sorry that you are paid too much; purse and brain
 	both empty; the brain the heavier for being too
 	light, the purse too light, being drawn of
 	heaviness: of this contradiction you shall now be
 	quit. O, the charity of a penny cord! It sums up
 	thousands in a trice: you have no true debitor and
 	creditor but it; of what's past, is, and to come,
 	the discharge: your neck, sir, is pen, book and
 	counters; so the acquittance follows.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I am merrier to die than thou art to live.
 
 First Gaoler	Indeed, sir, he that sleeps feels not the
 	tooth-ache: but a man that were to sleep your
 	sleep, and a hangman to help him to bed, I think he
 	would change places with his officer; for, look you,
 	sir, you know not which way you shall go.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Yes, indeed do I, fellow.
 
 First Gaoler	Your death has eyes in 's head then; I have not seen
 	him so pictured: you must either be directed by
 	some that take upon them to know, or do take upon
 	yourself that which I am sure you do not know, or
 	jump the after inquiry on your own peril: and how
 	you shall speed in your journey's end, I think you'll
 	never return to tell one.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I tell thee, fellow, there are none want eyes to
 	direct them the way I am going, but such as wink and
 	will not use them.
 
 First Gaoler	What an infinite mock is this, that a man should
 	have the best use of eyes to see the way of
 	blindness! I am sure hanging's the way of winking.
 
 	[Enter a Messenger]
 
 Messenger	Knock off his manacles; bring your prisoner to the king.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Thou bring'st good news; I am called to be made free.
 
 First Gaoler	I'll be hang'd then.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Thou shalt be then freer than a gaoler; no bolts for the dead.
 
 	[Exeunt POSTHUMUS LEONATUS and Messenger]
 
 First Gaoler	Unless a man would marry a gallows and beget young
 	gibbets, I never saw one so prone. Yet, on my
 	conscience, there are verier knaves desire to live,
 	for all he be a Roman: and there be some of them
 	too that die against their wills; so should I, if I
 	were one. I would we were all of one mind, and one
 	mind good; O, there were desolation of gaolers and
 	gallowses! I speak against my present profit, but
 	my wish hath a preferment in 't.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 
 
 
 
 	CYMBELINE
 
 
 ACT V
 
 
 
 SCENE V	Cymbeline's tent.
 
 
 	[Enter CYMBELINE, BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, ARVIRAGUS,
 	PISANIO, Lords, Officers, and Attendants]
 
 CYMBELINE	Stand by my side, you whom the gods have made
 	Preservers of my throne. Woe is my heart
 	That the poor soldier that so richly fought,
 	Whose rags shamed gilded arms, whose naked breast
 	Stepp'd before larges of proof, cannot be found:
 	He shall be happy that can find him, if
 	Our grace can make him so.
 
 BELARIUS	I never saw
 	Such noble fury in so poor a thing;
 	Such precious deeds in one that promises nought
 	But beggary and poor looks.
 
 CYMBELINE	No tidings of him?
 
 PISANIO	He hath been search'd among the dead and living,
 	But no trace of him.
 
 CYMBELINE	To my grief, I am
 	The heir of his reward;
 
 	[To BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, and ARVIRAGUS]
 
 		    which I will add
 	To you, the liver, heart and brain of Britain,
 	By whom I grant she lives. 'Tis now the time
 	To ask of whence you are. Report it.
 
 BELARIUS	Sir,
 	In Cambria are we born, and gentlemen:
 	Further to boast were neither true nor modest,
 	Unless I add, we are honest.
 
 CYMBELINE	Bow your knees.
 	Arise my knights o' the battle: I create you
 	Companions to our person and will fit you
 	With dignities becoming your estates.
 
 	[Enter CORNELIUS and Ladies]
 
 	There's business in these faces. Why so sadly
 	Greet you our victory? you look like Romans,
 	And not o' the court of Britain.
 
 CORNELIUS	Hail, great king!
 	To sour your happiness, I must report
 	The queen is dead.
 
 CYMBELINE	Who worse than a physician
 	Would this report become? But I consider,
 	By medicine life may be prolong'd, yet death
 	Will seize the doctor too. How ended she?
 
 CORNELIUS	With horror, madly dying, like her life,
 	Which, being cruel to the world, concluded
 	Most cruel to herself. What she confess'd
 	I will report, so please you: these her women
 	Can trip me, if I err; who with wet cheeks
 	Were present when she finish'd.
 
 CYMBELINE	Prithee, say.
 
 CORNELIUS	First, she confess'd she never loved you, only
 	Affected greatness got by you, not you:
 	Married your royalty, was wife to your place;
 	Abhorr'd your person.
 
 CYMBELINE	She alone knew this;
 	And, but she spoke it dying, I would not
 	Believe her lips in opening it. Proceed.
 
 CORNELIUS	Your daughter, whom she bore in hand to love
 	With such integrity, she did confess
 	Was as a scorpion to her sight; whose life,
 	But that her flight prevented it, she had
 	Ta'en off by poison.
 
 CYMBELINE	O most delicate fiend!
 	Who is 't can read a woman? Is there more?
 
 CORNELIUS	More, sir, and worse. She did confess she had
 	For you a mortal mineral; which, being took,
 	Should by the minute feed on life and lingering
 	By inches waste you: in which time she purposed,
 	By watching, weeping, tendance, kissing, to
 	O'ercome you with her show, and in time,
 	When she had fitted you with her craft, to work
 	Her son into the adoption of the crown:
 	But, failing of her end by his strange absence,
 	Grew shameless-desperate; open'd, in despite
 	Of heaven and men, her purposes; repented
 	The evils she hatch'd were not effected; so
 	Despairing died.
 
 CYMBELINE	                  Heard you all this, her women?
 
 First Lady	We did, so please your highness.
 
 CYMBELINE	Mine eyes
 	Were not in fault, for she was beautiful;
 	Mine ears, that heard her flattery; nor my heart,
 	That thought her like her seeming; it had
 	been vicious
 	To have mistrusted her: yet, O my daughter!
 	That it was folly in me, thou mayst say,
 	And prove it in thy feeling. Heaven mend all!
 
 	[Enter LUCIUS, IACHIMO, the Soothsayer, and other
 	Roman Prisoners, guarded; POSTHUMUS LEONATUS
 	behind, and IMOGEN]
 
 	Thou comest not, Caius, now for tribute that
 	The Britons have razed out, though with the loss
 	Of many a bold one; whose kinsmen have made suit
 	That their good souls may be appeased with slaughter
 	Of you their captives, which ourself have granted:
 	So think of your estate.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Consider, sir, the chance of war: the day
 	Was yours by accident; had it gone with us,
 	We should not, when the blood was cool,
 	have threaten'd
 	Our prisoners with the sword. But since the gods
 	Will have it thus, that nothing but our lives
 	May be call'd ransom, let it come: sufficeth
 	A Roman with a Roman's heart can suffer:
 	Augustus lives to think on't: and so much
 	For my peculiar care. This one thing only
 	I will entreat; my boy, a Briton born,
 	Let him be ransom'd: never master had
 	A page so kind, so duteous, diligent,
 	So tender over his occasions, true,
 	So feat, so nurse-like: let his virtue join
 	With my request, which I make bold your highness
 	Cannot deny; he hath done no Briton harm,
 	Though he have served a Roman: save him, sir,
 	And spare no blood beside.
 
 CYMBELINE	I have surely seen him:
 	His favour is familiar to me. Boy,
 	Thou hast look'd thyself into my grace,
 	And art mine own. I know not why, wherefore,
 	To say 'live, boy:' ne'er thank thy master; live:
 	And ask of Cymbeline what boon thou wilt,
 	Fitting my bounty and thy state, I'll give it;
 	Yea, though thou do demand a prisoner,
 	The noblest ta'en.
 
 IMOGEN	                  I humbly thank your highness.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	I do not bid thee beg my life, good lad;
 	And yet I know thou wilt.
 
 IMOGEN	No, no: alack,
 	There's other work in hand: I see a thing
 	Bitter to me as death: your life, good master,
 	Must shuffle for itself.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	The boy disdains me,
 	He leaves me, scorns me: briefly die their joys
 	That place them on the truth of girls and boys.
 	Why stands he so perplex'd?
 
 CYMBELINE	What wouldst thou, boy?
 	I love thee more and more: think more and more
 	What's best to ask. Know'st him thou look'st on? speak,
 	Wilt have him live? Is he thy kin? thy friend?
 
 IMOGEN	He is a Roman; no more kin to me
 	Than I to your highness; who, being born your vassal,
 	Am something nearer.
 
 CYMBELINE	Wherefore eyest him so?
 
 IMOGEN	I'll tell you, sir, in private, if you please
 	To give me hearing.
 
 CYMBELINE	Ay, with all my heart,
 	And lend my best attention. What's thy name?
 
 IMOGEN	Fidele, sir.
 
 CYMBELINE	                  Thou'rt my good youth, my page;
 	I'll be thy master: walk with me; speak freely.
 
 	[CYMBELINE and IMOGEN converse apart]
 
 BELARIUS	Is not this boy revived from death?
 
 ARVIRAGUS	One sand another
 	Not more resembles that sweet rosy lad
 	Who died, and was Fidele. What think you?
 
 GUIDERIUS	The same dead thing alive.
 
 BELARIUS	Peace, peace! see further; he eyes us not; forbear;
 	Creatures may be alike: were 't he, I am sure
 	He would have spoke to us.
 
 GUIDERIUS	But we saw him dead.
 
 BELARIUS	Be silent; let's see further.
 
 PISANIO	[Aside]	It is my mistress:
 	Since she is living, let the time run on
 	To good or bad.
 
 	[CYMBELINE and IMOGEN come forward]
 
 CYMBELINE	                  Come, stand thou by our side;
 	Make thy demand aloud.
 
 	[To IACHIMO]
 		  Sir, step you forth;
 	Give answer to this boy, and do it freely;
 	Or, by our greatness and the grace of it,
 	Which is our honour, bitter torture shall
 	Winnow the truth from falsehood. On, speak to him.
 
 IMOGEN	My boon is, that this gentleman may render
 	Of whom he had this ring.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	[Aside]                 What's that to him?
 
 CYMBELINE	That diamond upon your finger, say
 	How came it yours?
 
 IACHIMO	Thou'lt torture me to leave unspoken that
 	Which, to be spoke, would torture thee.
 
 CYMBELINE	How! me?
 
 IACHIMO	I am glad to be constrain'd to utter that
 	Which torments me to conceal. By villany
 	I got this ring: 'twas Leonatus' jewel;
 	Whom thou didst banish; and--which more may
 	grieve thee,
 	As it doth me--a nobler sir ne'er lived
 	'Twixt sky and ground. Wilt thou hear more, my lord?
 
 CYMBELINE	All that belongs to this.
 
 IACHIMO	That paragon, thy daughter,--
 	For whom my heart drops blood, and my false spirits
 	Quail to remember--Give me leave; I faint.
 
 CYMBELINE	My daughter! what of her? Renew thy strength:
 	I had rather thou shouldst live while nature will
 	Than die ere I hear more: strive, man, and speak.
 
 IACHIMO	Upon a time,--unhappy was the clock
 	That struck the hour!--it was in Rome,--accursed
 	The mansion where!--'twas at a feast,--O, would
 	Our viands had been poison'd, or at least
 	Those which I heaved to head!--the good Posthumus--
 	What should I say? he was too good to be
 	Where ill men were; and was the best of all
 	Amongst the rarest of good ones,--sitting sadly,
 	Hearing us praise our loves of Italy
 	For beauty that made barren the swell'd boast
 	Of him that best could speak, for feature, laming
 	The shrine of Venus, or straight-pight Minerva.
 	Postures beyond brief nature, for condition,
 	A shop of all the qualities that man
 	Loves woman for, besides that hook of wiving,
 	Fairness which strikes the eye--
 
 CYMBELINE	I stand on fire:
 	Come to the matter.
 
 IACHIMO	All too soon I shall,
 	Unless thou wouldst grieve quickly. This Posthumus,
 	Most like a noble lord in love and one
 	That had a royal lover, took his hint;
 	And, not dispraising whom we praised,--therein
 	He was as calm as virtue--he began
 	His mistress' picture; which by his tongue
 	being made,
 	And then a mind put in't, either our brags
 	Were crack'd of kitchen-trolls, or his description
 	Proved us unspeaking sots.
 
 CYMBELINE	Nay, nay, to the purpose.
 
 IACHIMO	Your daughter's chastity--there it begins.
 	He spake of her, as Dian had hot dreams,
 	And she alone were cold: whereat I, wretch,
 	Made scruple of his praise; and wager'd with him
 	Pieces of gold 'gainst this which then he wore
 	Upon his honour'd finger, to attain
 	In suit the place of's bed and win this ring
 	By hers and mine adultery. He, true knight,
 	No lesser of her honour confident
 	Than I did truly find her, stakes this ring;
 	And would so, had it been a carbuncle
 	Of Phoebus' wheel, and might so safely, had it
 	Been all the worth of's car. Away to Britain
 	Post I in this design: well may you, sir,
 	Remember me at court; where I was taught
 	Of your chaste daughter the wide difference
 	'Twixt amorous and villanous. Being thus quench'd
 	Of hope, not longing, mine Italian brain
 	'Gan in your duller Britain operate
 	Most vilely; for my vantage, excellent:
 	And, to be brief, my practise so prevail'd,
 	That I return'd with simular proof enough
 	To make the noble Leonatus mad,
 	By wounding his belief in her renown
 	With tokens thus, and thus; averting notes
 	Of chamber-hanging, pictures, this her bracelet,--
 	O cunning, how I got it!--nay, some marks
 	Of secret on her person, that he could not
 	But think her bond of chastity quite crack'd,
 	I having ta'en the forfeit. Whereupon--
 	Methinks, I see him now--
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	[Advancing]             Ay, so thou dost,
 	Italian fiend! Ay me, most credulous fool,
 	Egregious murderer, thief, any thing
 	That's due to all the villains past, in being,
 	To come! O, give me cord, or knife, or poison,
 	Some upright justicer! Thou, king, send out
 	For torturers ingenious: it is I
 	That all the abhorred things o' the earth amend
 	By being worse than they. I am Posthumus,
 	That kill'd thy daughter:--villain-like, I lie--
 	That caused a lesser villain than myself,
 	A sacrilegious thief, to do't: the temple
 	Of virtue was she; yea, and she herself.
 	Spit, and throw stones, cast mire upon me, set
 	The dogs o' the street to bay me: every villain
 	Be call'd Posthumus Leonitus; and
 	Be villany less than 'twas! O Imogen!
 	My queen, my life, my wife! O Imogen,
 	Imogen, Imogen!
 
 IMOGEN	                  Peace, my lord; hear, hear--
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Shall's have a play of this? Thou scornful page,
 	There lie thy part.
 
 	[Striking her: she falls]
 
 PISANIO	O, gentlemen, help!
 	Mine and your mistress! O, my lord Posthumus!
 	You ne'er kill'd Imogen til now. Help, help!
 	Mine honour'd lady!
 
 CYMBELINE	Does the world go round?
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	How come these staggers on me?
 
 PISANIO	Wake, my mistress!
 
 CYMBELINE	If this be so, the gods do mean to strike me
 	To death with mortal joy.
 
 PISANIO	How fares thy mistress?
 
 IMOGEN	O, get thee from my sight;
 	Thou gavest me poison: dangerous fellow, hence!
 	Breathe not where princes are.
 
 CYMBELINE	The tune of Imogen!
 
 PISANIO	Lady,
 	The gods throw stones of sulphur on me, if
 	That box I gave you was not thought by me
 	A precious thing: I had it from the queen.
 
 CYMBELINE	New matter still?
 
 IMOGEN	                  It poison'd me.
 
 CORNELIUS	O gods!
 	I left out one thing which the queen confess'd.
 	Which must approve thee honest: 'If Pisanio
 	Have,' said she, 'given his mistress that confection
 	Which I gave him for cordial, she is served
 	As I would serve a rat.'
 
 CYMBELINE	What's this, Comelius?
 
 CORNELIUS	The queen, sir, very oft importuned me
 	To temper poisons for her, still pretending
 	The satisfaction of her knowledge only
 	In killing creatures vile, as cats and dogs,
 	Of no esteem: I, dreading that her purpose
 	Was of more danger, did compound for her
 	A certain stuff, which, being ta'en, would cease
 	The present power of life, but in short time
 	All offices of nature should again
 	Do their due functions. Have you ta'en of it?
 
 IMOGEN	Most like I did, for I was dead.
 
 BELARIUS	My boys,
 	There was our error.
 
 GUIDERIUS	This is, sure, Fidele.
 
 IMOGEN	Why did you throw your wedded lady from you?
 	Think that you are upon a rock; and now
 	Throw me again.
 
 	[Embracing him]
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Hang there like a fruit, my soul,
 	Till the tree die!
 
 CYMBELINE	                  How now, my flesh, my child!
 	What, makest thou me a dullard in this act?
 	Wilt thou not speak to me?
 
 IMOGEN	[Kneeling]               Your blessing, sir.
 
 BELARIUS	[To GUIDERIUS and ARVIRAGUS]  Though you did love
 	this youth, I blame ye not:
 	You had a motive for't.
 
 CYMBELINE	My tears that fall
 	Prove holy water on thee! Imogen,
 	Thy mother's dead.
 
 IMOGEN	I am sorry for't, my lord.
 
 CYMBELINE	O, she was nought; and long of her it was
 	That we meet here so strangely: but her son
 	Is gone, we know not how nor where.
 
 PISANIO	My lord,
 	Now fear is from me, I'll speak troth. Lord Cloten,
 	Upon my lady's missing, came to me
 	With his sword drawn; foam'd at the mouth, and swore,
 	If I discover'd not which way she was gone,
 	It was my instant death. By accident,
 	had a feigned letter of my master's
 	Then in my pocket; which directed him
 	To seek her on the mountains near to Milford;
 	Where, in a frenzy, in my master's garments,
 	Which he enforced from me, away he posts
 	With unchaste purpose and with oath to violate
 	My lady's honour: what became of him
 	I further know not.
 
 GUIDERIUS	Let me end the story:
 	I slew him there.
 
 CYMBELINE	Marry, the gods forfend!
 	I would not thy good deeds should from my lips
 	Pluck a bard sentence: prithee, valiant youth,
 	Deny't again.
 
 GUIDERIUS	                  I have spoke it, and I did it.
 
 CYMBELINE	He was a prince.
 
 GUIDERIUS	A most incivil one: the wrongs he did me
 	Were nothing prince-like; for he did provoke me
 	With language that would make me spurn the sea,
 	If it could so roar to me: I cut off's head;
 	And am right glad he is not standing here
 	To tell this tale of mine.
 
 CYMBELINE	I am sorry for thee:
 	By thine own tongue thou art condemn'd, and must
 	Endure our law: thou'rt dead.
 
 IMOGEN	That headless man
 	I thought had been my lord.
 
 CYMBELINE	Bind the offender,
 	And take him from our presence.
 
 BELARIUS	Stay, sir king:
 	This man is better than the man he slew,
 	As well descended as thyself; and hath
 	More of thee merited than a band of Clotens
 	Had ever scar for.
 
 	[To the Guard]
 
 	Let his arms alone;
 	They were not born for bondage.
 
 CYMBELINE	Why, old soldier,
 	Wilt thou undo the worth thou art unpaid for,
 	By tasting of our wrath? How of descent
 	As good as we?
 
 ARVIRAGUS	                  In that he spake too far.
 
 CYMBELINE	And thou shalt die for't.
 
 BELARIUS	We will die all three:
 	But I will prove that two on's are as good
 	As I have given out him. My sons, I must,
 	For mine own part, unfold a dangerous speech,
 	Though, haply, well for you.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Your danger's ours.
 
 GUIDERIUS	And our good his.
 
 BELARIUS	                  Have at it then, by leave.
 	Thou hadst, great king, a subject who
 	Was call'd Belarius.
 
 CYMBELINE	What of him? he is
 	A banish'd traitor.
 
 BELARIUS	He it is that hath
 	Assumed this age; indeed a banish'd man;
 	I know not how a traitor.
 
 CYMBELINE	Take him hence:
 	The whole world shall not save him.
 
 BELARIUS	Not too hot:
 	First pay me for the nursing of thy sons;
 	And let it be confiscate all, so soon
 	As I have received it.
 
 CYMBELINE	Nursing of my sons!
 
 BELARIUS	I am too blunt and saucy: here's my knee:
 	Ere I arise, I will prefer my sons;
 	Then spare not the old father. Mighty sir,
 	These two young gentlemen, that call me father
 	And think they are my sons, are none of mine;
 	They are the issue of your loins, my liege,
 	And blood of your begetting.
 
 CYMBELINE	How! my issue!
 
 BELARIUS	So sure as you your father's. I, old Morgan,
 	Am that Belarius whom you sometime banish'd:
 	Your pleasure was my mere offence, my punishment
 	Itself, and all my treason; that I suffer'd
 	Was all the harm I did. These gentle princes--
 	For such and so they are--these twenty years
 	Have I train'd up: those arts they have as I
 	Could put into them; my breeding was, sir, as
 	Your highness knows. Their nurse, Euriphile,
 	Whom for the theft I wedded, stole these children
 	Upon my banishment: I moved her to't,
 	Having received the punishment before,
 	For that which I did then: beaten for loyalty
 	Excited me to treason: their dear loss,
 	The more of you 'twas felt, the more it shaped
 	Unto my end of stealing them. But, gracious sir,
 	Here are your sons again; and I must lose
 	Two of the sweet'st companions in the world.
 	The benediction of these covering heavens
 	Fall on their heads like dew! for they are worthy
 	To inlay heaven with stars.
 
 CYMBELINE	Thou weep'st, and speak'st.
 	The service that you three have done is more
 	Unlike than this thou tell'st. I lost my children:
 	If these be they, I know not how to wish
 	A pair of worthier sons.
 
 BELARIUS	Be pleased awhile.
 	This gentleman, whom I call Polydore,
 	Most worthy prince, as yours, is true Guiderius:
 	This gentleman, my Cadwal, Arviragus,
 	Your younger princely son; he, sir, was lapp'd
 	In a most curious mantle, wrought by the hand
 	Of his queen mother, which for more probation
 	I can with ease produce.
 
 CYMBELINE	Guiderius had
 	Upon his neck a mole, a sanguine star;
 	It was a mark of wonder.
 
 BELARIUS	This is he;
 	Who hath upon him still that natural stamp:
 	It was wise nature's end in the donation,
 	To be his evidence now.
 
 CYMBELINE	O, what, am I
 	A mother to the birth of three? Ne'er mother
 	Rejoiced deliverance more. Blest pray you be,
 	That, after this strange starting from your orbs,
 	may reign in them now! O Imogen,
 	Thou hast lost by this a kingdom.
 
 IMOGEN	No, my lord;
 	I have got two worlds by 't. O my gentle brothers,
 	Have we thus met? O, never say hereafter
 	But I am truest speaker you call'd me brother,
 	When I was but your sister; I you brothers,
 	When ye were so indeed.
 
 CYMBELINE	Did you e'er meet?
 
 ARVIRAGUS	Ay, my good lord.
 
 GUIDERIUS	                  And at first meeting loved;
 	Continued so, until we thought he died.
 
 CORNELIUS	By the queen's dram she swallow'd.
 
 CYMBELINE	O rare instinct!
 	When shall I hear all through? This fierce
 	abridgement
 	Hath to it circumstantial branches, which
 	Distinction should be rich in. Where? how lived You?
 	And when came you to serve our Roman captive?
 	How parted with your brothers? how first met them?
 	Why fled you from the court? and whither? These,
 	And your three motives to the battle, with
 	I know not how much more, should be demanded;
 	And all the other by-dependencies,
 	From chance to chance: but nor the time nor place
 	Will serve our long inter'gatories. See,
 	Posthumus anchors upon Imogen,
 	And she, like harmless lightning, throws her eye
 	On him, her brother, me, her master, hitting
 	Each object with a joy: the counterchange
 	Is severally in all. Let's quit this ground,
 	And smoke the temple with our sacrifices.
 
 	[To BELARIUS]
 
 	Thou art my brother; so we'll hold thee ever.
 
 IMOGEN	You are my father too, and did relieve me,
 	To see this gracious season.
 
 CYMBELINE	All o'erjoy'd,
 	Save these in bonds: let them be joyful too,
 	For they shall taste our comfort.
 
 IMOGEN	My good master,
 	I will yet do you service.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Happy be you!
 
 CYMBELINE	The forlorn soldier, that so nobly fought,
 	He would have well becomed this place, and graced
 	The thankings of a king.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	I am, sir,
 	The soldier that did company these three
 	In poor beseeming; 'twas a fitment for
 	The purpose I then follow'd. That I was he,
 	Speak, Iachimo: I had you down and might
 	Have made you finish.
 
 IACHIMO	[Kneeling]          I am down again:
 	But now my heavy conscience sinks my knee,
 	As then your force did. Take that life, beseech you,
 	Which I so often owe: but your ring first;
 	And here the bracelet of the truest princess
 	That ever swore her faith.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Kneel not to me:
 	The power that I have on you is, to spare you;
 	The malice towards you to forgive you: live,
 	And deal with others better.
 
 CYMBELINE	Nobly doom'd!
 	We'll learn our freeness of a son-in-law;
 	Pardon's the word to all.
 
 ARVIRAGUS	You holp us, sir,
 	As you did mean indeed to be our brother;
 	Joy'd are we that you are.
 
 POSTHUMUS LEONATUS	Your servant, princes. Good my lord of Rome,
 	Call forth your soothsayer: as I slept, methought
 	Great Jupiter, upon his eagle back'd,
 	Appear'd to me, with other spritely shows
 	Of mine own kindred: when I waked, I found
 	This label on my bosom; whose containing
 	Is so from sense in hardness, that I can
 	Make no collection of it: let him show
 	His skill in the construction.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Philarmonus!
 
 Soothsayer	Here, my good lord.
 
 CAIUS LUCIUS	Read, and declare the meaning.
 
 Soothsayer	[Reads]  'When as a lion's whelp shall, to himself
 	unknown, without seeking find, and be embraced by a
 	piece of tender air; and when from a stately cedar
 	shall be lopped branches, which, being dead many
 	years, shall after revive, be jointed to the old
 	stock, and freshly grow; then shall Posthumus end
 	his miseries, Britain be fortunate and flourish in
 	peace and plenty.'
 	Thou, Leonatus, art the lion's whelp;
 	The fit and apt construction of thy name,
 	Being Leonatus, doth import so much.
 
 	[To CYMBELINE]
 
 	The piece of tender air, thy virtuous daughter,
 	Which we call 'mollis aer;' and 'mollis aer'
 	We term it 'mulier:' which 'mulier' I divine
 	Is this most constant wife; who, even now,
 	Answering the letter of the oracle,
 	Unknown to you, unsought, were clipp'd about
 	With this most tender air.
 
 CYMBELINE	This hath some seeming.
 
 Soothsayer	The lofty cedar, royal Cymbeline,
 	Personates thee: and thy lopp'd branches point
 	Thy two sons forth; who, by Belarius stol'n,
 	For many years thought dead, are now revived,
 	To the majestic cedar join'd, whose issue
 	Promises Britain peace and plenty.
 
 CYMBELINE	Well
 	My peace we will begin. And, Caius Lucius,
 	Although the victor, we submit to Caesar,
 	And to the Roman empire; promising
 	To pay our wonted tribute, from the which
 	We were dissuaded by our wicked queen;
 	Whom heavens, in justice, both on her and hers,
 	Have laid most heavy hand.
 
 Soothsayer	The fingers of the powers above do tune
 	The harmony of this peace. The vision
 	Which I made known to Lucius, ere the stroke
 	Of this yet scarce-cold battle, at this instant
 	Is full accomplish'd; for the Roman eagle,
 	From south to west on wing soaring aloft,
 	Lessen'd herself, and in the beams o' the sun
 	So vanish'd: which foreshow'd our princely eagle,
 	The imperial Caesar, should again unite
 	His favour with the radiant Cymbeline,
 	Which shines here in the west.
 
 CYMBELINE	Laud we the gods;
 	And let our crooked smokes climb to their nostrils
 	From our blest altars. Publish we this peace
 	To all our subjects. Set we forward: let
 	A Roman and a British ensign wave
 	Friendly together: so through Lud's-town march:
 	And in the temple of great Jupiter
 	Our peace we'll ratify; seal it with feasts.
 	Set on there! Never was a war did cease,
 	Ere bloody hands were wash'd, with such a peace.
 
 	[Exeunt]
 

Next: Hamlet