The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works

by William Shakespeare

  Paying what ransom the insulter willeth;

  550

  Whose vulture thought doth pitch the price so high

  That she will draw his lips’ rich treasure dry.

  And having felt the sweetness of the spoil,

  With blindfold fury she begins to forage;

  Her face doth reek and smoke, her blood doth boil,

  555

  And careless lust stirs up a desperate courage,

  Planting oblivion, beating reason back,

  Forgetting shame’s pure blush and honour’s wrack.

  Hot, faint and weary with her hard embracing,

  Like a wild bird being tam’d with too much handling,

  560

  Or as the fleet-foot roe that’s tir’d with chasing,

  Or like the froward infant still’d with dandling:

  He now obeys, and now no more resisteth,

  While she takes all she can, not all she listeth.

  What wax so frozen but dissolves with temp’ring,

  565

  And yields at last to very light impression?

  Things out of hope are compass’d oft with vent’ring,

  Chiefly in love, whose leave exceeds commission:

  Affection faints not like a pale-fac’d coward,

  But then woos best when most his choice is froward.

  570

  When he did frown, O had she then gave over,

  Such nectar from his lips she had not suck’d.

  Foul words and frowns must not repel a lover;

  What though the rose have prickles, yet ’tis pluck’d.

  Were beauty under twenty locks kept fast,

  575

  Yet love breaks through, and picks them all at last.

  For pity now she can no more detain him;

  The poor fool prays her that he may depart.

  She is resolv’d no longer to restrain him,

  Bids him farewell, and look well to her heart,

  580

  The which by Cupid’s bow she doth protest

  He carries thence encaged in his breast.

  ‘Sweet boy,’ she says, ‘this night I’ll waste in sorrow,

  For my sick heart commands mine eyes to watch.

  Tell me, love’s master, shall we meet tomorrow?

  585

  Say, shall we, shall we? wilt thou make the match?’

  He tells her no, tomorrow he intends

  To hunt the boar with certain of his friends.

  ‘The boar,’ quoth she: whereat a sudden pale,

  Like lawn being spread upon the blushing rose,

  590

  Usurps her cheek; she trembles at his tale,

  And on his neck her yoking arms she throws.

  She sinketh down, still hanging by his neck;

  He on her belly falls, she on her back.

  Now is she in the very lists of love,

  595

  Her champion mounted for the hot encounter.

  All is imaginary she doth prove;

  He will not manage her, although he mount her:

  That worse than Tantalus’ is her annoy,

  To clip Elizium and to lack her joy.

  600

  Even so poor birds deceiv’d with painted grapes

  Do surfeit by the eye and pine the maw:

  Even so she languisheth in her mishaps,

  As those poor birds that helpless berries saw.

  The warm effects which she in him finds missing

  605

  She seeks to kindle with continual kissing.

  But all in vain; good queen, it will not be.

  She hath assay’d as much as may be prov’d:

  Her pleading hath deserv’d a greater fee;

  She’s love, she loves, and yet she is not lov’d.

  610

  ‘Fie, fie,’ he says, ‘you crush me; let me go,

  You have no reason to withhold me so.’

  ‘Thou hadst been gone,’ quoth she, ‘sweet boy, ere this,

  But that thou told’st me, thou wouldst hunt the boar.

  Oh be advis’d, thou know’st not what it is,

  615

  With javelin’s point a churlish swine to gore,

  Whose tushes never sheath’d he whetteth still,

  Like to a mortal butcher, bent to kill.

  ‘On his bow-back he hath a battle set

  Of bristly pikes that ever threat his foes;

  620

  His eyes like glow-worms shine when he doth fret,

  His snout digs sepulchres where’er he goes;

  Being mov’d, he strikes whate’er is in his way,

  And whom he strikes his crooked tushes slay.

  ‘His brawny sides with hairy bristles armed

  625

  Are better proof than thy spear’s point can enter;

  His short thick neck cannot be easily harmed;

  Being ireful, on the lion he will venture.

  The thorny brambles and embracing bushes,

  As fearful of him, part; through whom he rushes.

  630

  ‘Alas, he naught esteems that face of thine,

  To which love’s eyes pays tributary gazes;

  Nor thy soft hands, sweet lips and crystal eyne,

  Whose full perfection all the world amazes:

  But having thee at vantage – wondrous dread! –

  635

  Would root these beauties as he roots the mead.

  ‘Oh let him keep his loathsome cabin still!

  Beauty hath naught to do with such foul fiends.

  Come not within his danger by thy will:

  They that thrive well, take counsel of their friends.

  640

  When thou didst name the boar, not to dissemble,

  I fear’d thy fortune, and my joints did tremble.

  ‘Didst thou not mark my face, was it not white?

  Saw’st thou not signs of fear lurk in mine eye?

  Grew I not faint, and fell I not downright?

  645

  Within my bosom, whereon thou dost lie,

  My boding heart pants, beats, and takes no rest,

  But like an earthquake, shakes thee on my breast.

  ‘For where love reigns, disturbing jealousy

  Doth call himself affection’s sentinel;

  650

  Gives false alarms, suggesteth mutiny,

  And in a peaceful hour doth cry “Kill, kill!”

  Distemp’ring gentle love in his desire,

  As air and water do abate the fire.

  ‘This sour informer, this bate-breeding spy,

  655

  This canker that eats up love’s tender spring,

  This carry-tale, dissentious jealousy,

  That sometime true news, sometime false doth bring,

  Knocks at my heart, and whispers in mine ear,

  That if I love thee, I thy death should fear.

  660

  ‘And more than so, presenteth to mine eye

  The picture of an angry chafing boar,

  Under whose sharp fangs on his back doth lie

  An image like thyself, all stain’d with gore;

  Whose blood upon the fresh flowers being shed,

  665

  Doth make them droop with grief and hang the head.

  ‘What should I do, seeing thee so indeed,

  That tremble at th’imagination?

  The thought of it doth make my faint heart bleed,

  And fear doth teach it divination:

  670

  I prophesy thy death, my living sorrow,

  If thou encounter with the boar tomorrow.

  ‘But if thou needs wilt hunt, be rul’d by me:

  Uncouple at the timorous flying hare,

  Or at the fox which lives by subtlety,

  675

  Or at the roe which no encounter dare;

  Pursue these fearful creatures o’er the downs,

  And on thy well-breath’d
horse keep with thy hounds.

  ‘And when thou hast on foot the purblind hare,

  Mark the poor wretch, to overshoot his troubles,

  680

  How he outruns the wind, and with what care

  He cranks and crosses with a thousand doubles;

  The many musits through the which he goes

  Are like a labyrinth to amaze his foes.

  ‘Sometime he runs among a flock of sheep,

  685

  To make the cunning hounds mistake their smell;

  And sometime where earth-delving conies keep,

  To stop the loud pursuers in their yell;

  And sometime sorteth with a heard of deer:

  Danger deviseth shifts, wit waits on fear.

  690

  ‘For there his smell with others being mingled,

  The hot scent-snuffing hounds are driven to doubt,

  Ceasing their clamorous cry, till they have singled

  With much ado the cold fault cleanly out;

  Then they do spend their mouths: echo replies,

  695

  As if another chase were in the skies.

  ‘By this, poor Wat, far off upon a hill,

  Stands on his hinder-legs with list’ning ear,

  To hearken if his foes pursue him still.

  Anon their loud alarums he doth hear;

  700

  And now his grief may be compared well

  To one sore sick, that hears the passing bell.

  ‘Then shalt thou see the dew-bedabbled wretch

  Turn, and return, indenting with the way.

  Each envious briar his weary legs do scratch,

  705

  Each shadow makes him stop, each murmur stay:

  For misery is trodden on by many,

  And being low, never reliev’d by any.

  ‘Lie quietly, and hear a little more;

  Nay, do not struggle, for thou shalt not rise.

  710

  To make thee hate the hunting of the boar,

  Unlike myself thou hear’st me moralise,

  Applying this to that, and so to so,

  For love can comment upon every woe.

  ‘Where did I leave?’ ‘No matter where,’ quoth he;

  715

  ‘Leave me, and then the story aptly ends:

  The night is spent.’ ‘Why, what of that?’ quoth she.

  ‘I am,’ quoth he, ‘expected of my friends,

  And now ’tis dark, and going I shall fall.’

  ‘In night,’ quoth she, ‘desire sees best of all.

  720

  ‘But if thou fall, oh then imagine this:

  The earth in love with thee thy footing trips,

  And all is but to rob thee of a kiss.

  Rich preys make true men thieves; so do thy lips

  Make modest Dian cloudy and forlorn,

  725

  Lest she should steal a kiss and die forsworn.

  ‘Now of this dark night I perceive the reason:

  Cynthia for shame obscures her silver shine,

  Till forging nature be condemn’d of treason,

  For stealing moulds from heaven, that were divine;

  730

  Wherein she fram’d thee, in high heaven’s despite,

  To shame the sun by day and her by night.

  ‘And therefore hath she brib’d the destinies

  To cross the curious workmanship of nature,

  To mingle beauty with infirmities

  735

  And pure perfection with impure defeature,

  Making it subject to the tyranny

  Of mad mischances and much misery:

  ‘As burning fevers, agues pale and faint,

  Life-poisoning pestilence and frenzies wood,

  740

  The marrow-eating sickness whose attaint

  Disorder breeds by heating of the blood;

  Surfeits, imposthumes, grief and damn’d despair,

  Swear nature’s death, for framing thee so fair.

  ‘And not the least of all these maladies

  745

  But in one minute’s fight brings beauty under;

  Both favour, savour, hue and qualities,

  Whereat th’impartial gazer late did wonder,

  Are on the sudden wasted, thaw’d and done,

  As mountain snow melts with the midday sun.

  750

  ‘Therefore despite of fruitless chastity,

  Love-lacking vestals and self-loving nuns,

  That on the earth would breed a scarcity

  And barren dearth of daughters and of sons,

  Be prodigal; the lamp that burns by night

  755

  Dries up his oil to lend the world his light.

  ‘What is thy body but a swallowing grave,

  Seeming to bury that posterity,

  Which by the rights of time thou needs must have,

  If thou destroy them not in dark obscurity?

  760

  If so, the world will hold thee in disdain,

  Sith in thy pride so fair a hope is slain.

  ‘So in thyself thyself art made away;

  A mischief worse than civil home-bred strife,