The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works
Page 104
1 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’ th’ swathing-clothes the other, from their nursery
Were stol’n; and to this hour no guess in knowledge
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Which way they went.
2 GENTLEMAN How long is this ago?
1 GENTLEMAN Some twenty years.
2 GENTLEMAN
That a king’s children should be so convey’d,
So slackly guarded, and the search so slow
That could not trace them!
1 GENTLEMAN Howsoe’er ’tis strange,
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Or that the negligence may well be laugh’d at,
Yet is it true, sir.
2 GENTLEMAN I do well believe you.
1 GENTLEMAN
We must forbear. Here comes the gentleman,
The queen, and princess. Exeunt.
1.2 Enter the QUEEN, POSTHUMUS and IMOGEN.
QUEEN No, be assur’d you shall not find me, daughter,
After the slander of most stepmothers,
Evil-ey’d unto you. You’re my prisoner, but
Your gaoler shall deliver you the keys
That lock up your restraint. For you Posthumus,
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So soon as I can win th’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 Please your highness,
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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 charg’d you should not speak together. Exit.
IMOGEN O
Dissembling courtesy! How fine this tyrant
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Can tickle where she wounds! My dearest husband,
I something fear my father’s wrath, but nothing
(Always reserv’d my holy duty) what
His rage can do on me. You must be gone,
And I shall here abide the hourly shot
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Of angry eyes: not comforted to live,
But that there is this jewel in the world
That I may see again.
POSTHUMUS My queen, my mistress:
O lady, weep no more, lest I give cause
To be suspected of more tenderness
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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,
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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
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But he does buy my injuries, to be friends:
Pays dear for my offences. Exit.
POSTHUMUS 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:
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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 How, how? Another?
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You gentle gods, give me but this I have,
And sear up my embracements from a next
With bonds of death! Remain, remain thou here,
[putting on the ring]
While sense can keep it on: And sweetest, fairest,
As I my poor self did exchange for you
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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 on her arm]
IMOGEN O the gods!
When shall we see again?
Enter CYMBELINE and lords.
POSTHUMUS Alack, the king!
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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 The gods protect you,
And bless the good remainders of the court!
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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,
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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 blessed, that I might not! I chose an eagle,
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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 lov’d Posthumus:
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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
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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,
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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?
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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.
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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?
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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
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He will remain so.
PISANIO I humbly thank your highness
QUEEN Pray, walk awhile.
IMOGEN
About some half-hour hence, pray you, speak with
me;
You shall (at least) go see my lord aboard.
For this time leave me. Exeunt.
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1.3 Enter CLOTEN and two Lords.
1 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
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hurt him?
2 LORD [aside] No, faith: not so much as his patience.
1 LORD Hurt him? his body’s a passable carcass, if he be
not hurt. It is a throughfare for steel, if it be not hurt.
2 LORD [aside] His steel was in debt, it went o’th’
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backside the town.
CLOTEN The villain would not stand me.
2 LORD [aside] No, but he fled forward still, toward your
face.
1 LORD Stand you? You have land enough of your own:
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but he added to your having, gave you some ground.
2 LORD [aside] As many inches as you have oceans.
Puppies!
CLOTEN I would they had not come between us.
2 LORD [aside] So would I, till you had measur’d how
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long a fool you were upon the ground.
CLOTEN And that she should love this fellow, and refuse
me!
2 LORD [aside] If it be a sin to make a true election, she
is damn’d.
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1 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.
2 LORD [aside] She shines not upon fools, lest the
reflection should hurt her.
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CLOTEN Come, I’ll to my chamber. Would there had
been some hurt done!
2 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?
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1 LORD I’ll attend your lordship.
CLOTEN Nay come, let’s go together
2 LORD Well my lord. Exeunt.
1.4 Enter IMOGEN and PISANIO.
IMOGEN
I would thou grew’st unto the shores o’th’ haven,
And question’dst every sail: if he should write,
And I 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!
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IMOGEN Then wav’d 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
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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
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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, followed him, till he had melted from
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The smallness of a gnat, to air: and then