The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works
Page 107
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
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Would make the great’st king double, to be partner’d
With tomboys hir’d with that self exhibition
Which your own coffers yield! with diseas’d ventures,
That play with all infirmities for gold
Which rottenness can lend Nature! Such boil’d stuff
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As well might poison poison! Be reveng’d,
Or she that bore you was no queen, and you
Recoil from your great stock.
IMOGEN Reveng’d!
How should I be reveng’d? If this be true,
(As I have such a heart that both mine ears
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Must not in haste abuse) if it be true,
How should I be reveng’d?
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.
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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.
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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
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From thy report as thou from honour, and
Solicits 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
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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!
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IACHIMO O happy Leonatus! I may say:
The credit that thy lady hath of thee
Deserves thy trust, and thy most perfect goodness
Her assur’d credit. Blessed live you long!
A lady to the worthiest sir that ever
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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
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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,
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More than a mortal seeming. Be not angry,
Most mighty princess, that I have adventur’d
To try your taking of a false report, which hath
Honour’d with confirmation your great judgement
In the election of a sir so rare,
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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’th’ court for yours.
IACHIMO My humble thanks. I had almost forgot
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T’entreat your grace, but in a small request,
And yet of moment too, 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
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(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,
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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
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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 abroad to-morrow.
IMOGEN O, no, no.
IACHIMO Yes, I beseech: or I shall short my word
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By length’ning 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
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To greet your lord with writing, do’t to-night:
I have outstood my time, which is material
To th’ 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.
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2.1 Enter CLOTEN and two Lords.
CLOTEN Was there ever man had such luck? When I
kissed the jack upon an upcast, 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
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pleasure.
1 LORD What got he by that? You have broke his pate
with your bowl.
2 LORD [aside] If his wit had been like him that broke it,
it would have run all out.
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CLOTEN When a gentleman is dispos’d to swear, it is not
for any standers-by to curtail his oaths. Ha?
2 LORD No, my lord; [aside] nor crop the ears of them.
CLOTEN Whoreson dog! I gave him satisfaction! Would
he had been one of my rank!
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2 LORD [aside] To have smelt like a fool.
CLOTEN I am not vex’d more at any thing in th’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
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must go up and down like a cock, that nobody can
match.
2 LORD [aside] You are cock and capon too, and you
crow, cock, with your comb on.
CLOTEN Sayest thou?
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2 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.
2 LORD Ay, it is fit for your lordship only.
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CLOTEN Why, so I say.
1 LORD Did you hear of a stranger that’s come to court
to-night?
CLOTEN A stranger, and I know not on’t?
2 LORD [aside] He’s a strange fe
llow himself, and
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knows it not.
1 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?
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1 LORD One of your lordship’s pages.
CLOTEN Is it fit I went to look upon him? Is there no
derogation in’t?
2 LORD You cannot derogate, my lord.
CLOTEN Not easily, I think.
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2 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.
2 LORD I’ll attend your lordship.
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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,
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Thou divine Imogen, what thou endur’st,
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
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Of the divorce, he’ld make. The heavens hold firm
The walls of thy dear honour, keep unshak’d
That temple, thy fair mind, that thou mayst stand,
T’enjoy thy banish’d lord and this great land! Exit.
2.2 Enter IMOGEN in her bed, and a Lady.
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:
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And if thou canst awake by four o’th’ clock,
I prithee call me. Sleep hath seiz’d me wholly.
Exit Lady.
To your protection I commend me, gods,
From fairies and the tempters of the night,
Guard me, beseech ye!
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[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 becom’st thy bed! fresh lily!
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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’th’ taper
Bows toward her, and would under-peep her lids,
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To see th’enclosed lights, now canopied
Under these windows, white and azure lac’d
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
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Th’adornment of her bed; the arras, figures,
Why, such, and such; and the contents o’th’ story.
Ah, but some natural notes about her body
Above ten thousand meaner moveables
Would testify, t’enrich mine inventory.
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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,
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As strongly as the conscience does within,
To th’ madding of her lord. On her left breast
A mole cinque-spotted: like the crimson drops
I’th’ bottom of a cowslip. Here’s a voucher,
Stronger than ever law could make; this secret
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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
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Where Philomel gave up. I have enough:
To th’ trunk again, and shut the spring of it.