The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works

by William Shakespeare

Post on the lame feet of my rhyme,

  Which never could I so convey

  Unless your thoughts went on my way.

  ⌈Enter Dionyza with Leonine⌉

  Dionyza does appear,

  With Leonine, a murderer. Exit

  DIONYZA

  Thy oath remember. Thou hast sworn to do’t.

  ‘Tis but a blow, which never shall be known.

  Thou canst not do a thing i’th’ world so soon

  To yield thee so much profit. Let not conscience,

  Which is but cold, or fanning love thy bosom

  Unflame too nicely, nor let pity, which

  E’en women have cast off, melt thee; but be

  A soldier to thy purpose.

  LEONINE I will do’t;

  But yet she is a goodly creature.

  DIONYZA

  The fitter then the gods should have her.

  Enter Marina ⌈to the tomb⌉ with a basket of flowers

  Here she comes, weeping her only nurse’s death.

  Thou art resolved.

  LEONINE I am resolved.

  MARINA

  No, I will rob Tellus of her weed

  To strew thy grave with flow’rs. The yellows, blues,

  The purple violets and marigolds

  Shall as a carpet hang upon thy tomb

  While summer days doth last. Ay me, poor maid,

  Born in a tempest when my mother died,

  This world to me is but a ceaseless storm

  Whirring me from my friends.

  DIONYZA

  How now, Marina, why do you keep alone?

  How chance my daughter is not with you?

  Do not consume your blood with sorrowing.

  Have you a nurse of me. Lord, how your favour

  Is changed with this unprofitable woe!

  Give me your flowers. Come, o’er the sea margin

  Walk with Leonine. The air is piercing there,

  And quick; it sharps the stomach. Come, Leonine,

  Take her by th’ arm. Walk with her.

  MARINA No, I pray you,

  I’ll not bereave you of your servant.

  DIONYZA Come, come,

  I love the King your father and yourself

  With more than foreign heart. We ev’ry day

  Expect him here. When he shall come and find

  Our paragon to all reports thus blasted,

  He will repent the breadth of his great voyage,

  Blame both my lord and me, that we have taken

  No care to your best courses. Go, I pray you,

  Walk and be cheerful once again; resume

  That excellent complexion which did steal

  The eyes of young and old. Care not for me.

  I can go home alone.

  MARINA Well, I will go,

  But truly I have no desire to it.

  DIONYZA

  Nay, I know ’tis good for you. Walk half an hour,

  Leonine, at the least; remember

  What I have said.

  LEONINE I warr’nt you, madam.

  DIONYZA (to Marina)

  I’ll leave you, my sweet lady, for a while.

  Pray you walk softly, do not heat your blood.

  What, I must have care of you!

  MARINA My thanks, sweet madam.

  Exit Dionyza

  Is this wind westerly that blows?

  LEONINE South-west.

  MARINA

  When I was born the wind was north.

  LEONINE Was’t SO? MARINA

  My father, as nurse says, did never fear,

  But cried ’Good seamen’ to the mariners,

  Galling his kingly hands with haling ropes,

  And, clasping to the mast, endured a sea

  That almost burst the deck.

  LEONINE When was this?

  MARINA When I was born.

  Never was waves nor wind more violent.

  Once from the ladder tackle washes off

  A canvas-climber. ‘Ha!’ says one, ‘wolt out?’

  And with a dropping industry they skip

  From stem to stern. The boatswain whistles, and

  The master calls and trebles their confusion.

  LEONINE Come, say your prayers.

  MARINA What mean you?

  LEONINE

  If you require a little space for prayer

  I grant it. Pray, but be not tedious.

  The gods are quick of ear, and I am sworn

  To do my work with haste.

  MARINA Why would you kill me?

  LEONINE

  To satisfy my lady.

  MARINA

  Why would she have me killed? Now, as I can remember, by my troth

  I never did her hurt in all my life.

  I never spake bad word, nor did ill turn

  To any living creature. Believe me, la.

  I never killed a mouse nor hurt a fly.

  I trod once on a worm against my will,

  But I wept for it. How have I offended

  Wherein my death might yield her any profit

  Or my life imply her danger?

  LEONINE My commission

  Is not to reason of the deed, but do’t.

  MARINA

  You will not do’t for all the world, I hope.

  You are well favoured, and your looks foreshow

  You have a gentle heart. I saw you lately

  When you caught hurt in parting two that fought.

  Good sooth, it showed well in you. Do so now.

  Your lady seeks my life. Come you between,

  And save poor me, the weaker.

  LEONINE ⌈drawing out his sword⌉ I am sworn,

  And will dispatch.

  Enter Pirates ⌈running⌉

  FIRST PIRATE Hold, villain.

  Leonine runs away ⌈and hides behind the tomb⌉

  SECOND PIRATE A prize, a prize.

  THIRD PIRATE Half-part, mates, half-part. Come, let’s have her aboard suddenly.

  Exeunt Pirates ⌈carrying⌉ Marina

  Leonine ⌈steals back⌉

  LEONINE

  These roguing thieves serve the great pirate Valdes.

  An they have seized Marina, let her go.

  There’s no hope she’ll return. I’ll swear she’s dead

  And thrown into the sea; but I’ll see further.

  Perhaps they will but please themselves upon her,

  Not carry her aboard. If she remain,

  Whom they have ravished must by me be slain.

  Exit. ⌈The tomb is concealed⌉

  Sc. 16 ⌈A brothel sign.] Enter the Pander, his wife the Bawd, and their man Boult

  PANDER Boult.

  BOULT Sir.

  PANDER Search the market narrowly. Mytilene is full of gallants. We lose too much money this mart by being wenchless.

  BAWD We were never so much out of creatures. We have but poor three, and they can do no more than they can do, and they with continual action are even as good as rotten.

  PANDER Therefore let’s have fresh ones, whate’er we pay for them. If there be not a conscience to be used in every trade, we shall never prosper.

  BAWD Thou sayst true. ’Tis not our bringing up of poor bastards—as I think I have brought up some eleven—

  BOULT Ay, to eleven, and brought them down again. But shall I search the market?

  BAWD What else, man? The stuff we have, a strong wind will blow it to pieces, they are so pitifully sodden.

  PANDER Thou sayst true. They’re too unwholesome, o’ conscience. The poor Transylvanian is dead that lay with the little baggage.

  BOULT Ay, she quickly pooped him, she made him roast meat for worms. But I’ll go search the market. Exit

  PANDER Three or four thousand chequins were as pretty a proportion to live quietly, and so give over.

  BAWD Why to give over, I pray you? Is it a shame to get when we are old?

  PANDER O, our credit comes not in like the commodity, nor the commodity wages not with th
e danger. Therefore if in our youths we could pick up some pretty estate, ‘twere not amiss to keep our door hatched. Besides, the sore terms we stand upon with the gods will be strong with us for giving o’er.

  BAWD Come, other sorts offend as well as we. PANDER As well as we? Ay, and better too; we offend worse. Neither is our profession any mystery, it’s no calling. But here comes Boult.

  Enter Boult with the Pirates and Marina

  BOULT ⌈to the Pirates⌉ Come your ways, my masters, you say she’s a virgin?

  A PIRATE O sir, we doubt it not.

  BOULT (to Pander) Master, I have gone through for this piece you see. If you like her, so; if not, I have lost my earnest.

  BAWD Boult, has she any qualities?

  BOULT She has a good face, speaks well, and has excellent good clothes. There’s no farther necessity of qualities can make her be refused.

  BAWD What’s her price, Boult?

  BOULT I cannot be bated one doit of a hundred sesterces.

  PANDER (to Pirates) Well, follow me, my masters. You shall have your money presently. (To Bawd) Wife, take her in, instruct her what she has to do, that she may not be raw in her entertainment.

  Exeunt Pander and Pirates

  BAWD Boult, take you the marks of her, the colour of her hair, complexion, height, her age, with warrant of her virginity, and cry ‘He that will give most shall have her first.’ Such a maidenhead were no cheap thing if men were as they have been. Get this done as I command you.

  BOULT Performance shall follow. Exit

  MARINA

  Alack that Leonine was so slack, so slow.

  He should have struck, not spoke; or that these pirates,

  Not enough barbarous, had but o’erboard thrown me

  To seek my mother.

  BAWD Why lament you, pretty one?

  MARINA That I am pretty.

  BAWD Come, the gods have done their part in you.

  MARINA I accuse them not.

  BAWD You are light into my hands, where you are like to live.

  MARINA The more my fault

  To scape his hands where I was like to die.

  BAWD Ay, and you shall live in pleasure.

  MARINA No.

  BAWD Yes, indeed shall you, and taste gentlemen of all fashions. You shall fare well. You shall have the difference of all complexions. What, do you stop your ears?

  MARINA Are you a woman?

  BAWD What would you have me be an I be not a woman?

  MARINA

  An honest woman, or not a woman.

  BAWD Marry, whip the gosling! I think I shall have something to do with you. Come, you’re a young foolish sapling, and must be bowed as I would have you.

  MARINA The gods defend me!

  BAWD If it please the gods to defend you by men, then men must comfort you, men must feed you, men must stir you up.

  Enter Boult

  Now, sir, hast thou cried her through the market? BOULT I have cried her almost to the number of her hairs.

  I have drawn her picture with my voice.

  BAWD And I prithee tell me, how dost thou find the inclination of the people, especially of the younger sort?

  BOULT Faith, they listened to me as they would have hearkened to their fathers’ testament. There was a Spaniard’s mouth watered as he went to bed to her very description.

  BAWD We shall have him here tomorrow with his best ruff on.

  BOULT Tonight, tonight. But mistress, do you know the French knight that cowers i’ the hams?

  BAWD Who, Monsieur Veroles?

  BOULT Ay, he. He offered to cut a caper at the proclamation, but he made a groan at it, and swore he would see her tomorrow.

  BAWD Well, well, as for him, he brought his disease hither. Here he does but repair it. I know he will come in our shadow to scatter his crowns of the sun.

  BOULT Well, if we had of every nation a traveller, we should lodge them all with this sign.

  BAWD (to Marina) Pray you, come hither a while. You have fortunes coming upon you. Mark me, you must seem to do that fearfully which you commit willingly, to despise profit where you have most gain. To weep that you live as ye do makes pity in your lovers. Seldom but that pity begets you a good opinion, and that opinion a mere profit.

  MARINA I understand you not.

  BOULT (to Bawd) O, take her home, mistress, take her home. These blushes of hers must be quenched with some present practice.

  BAWD Thou sayst true, i’faith, so they must, for your bride goes to that with shame which is her way to go with warrant.

  BOULT Faith, some do and some do not. But mistress, if I have bargained for the joint—

  BAWD Thou mayst cut a morsel off the spit.

  BOULT I may so.

  BAWD Who should deny it? (To Marina) Come, young one, I like the manner of your garments well.

  BOULT Ay, by my faith, they shall not be changed yet.

  BAWD (giving him money) Boult, spend thou that in the town. Report what a sojourner we have. You’ll lose nothing by custom. When nature framed this piece she meant thee a good turn. Therefore say what a paragon she is, and thou reapest the harvest out of thine own setting forth.

  BOULT I warrant you, mistress, thunder shall not so awake the beds of eels as my giving out her beauty stirs up the lewdly inclined. I’ll bring home some tonight.

  ⌈Exit⌉

  BAWD Come your ways, follow me.

  MARINA

  If fires be hot, knives sharp, or waters deep,

  Untied I still my virgin knot will keep.

  Diana aid my purpose.

  BAWD What have we to do with Diana? Pray you, will you go with me?

  Exeunt. ⌈The sign is removed⌉

  Sc. 17 Enter ⌈in mourning garments⌉ Cleon and Dionyza DIONYZA

  Why, are you foolish? Can it be undone?

  CLEON

  O Dionyza, such a piece of slaughter

  The sun and moon ne’er looked upon.

  DIONYZA

  I think you’ll turn a child again.

  CLEON

  Were I chief lord of all this spacious world

  I’d give it to undo the deed. A lady

  Much less in blood than virtue, yet a princess

  To equal any single crown o‘th’ earth

  I’th’ justice of compare. O villain Leonine,

  Whom thou hast poisoned too,

  If thou hadst drunk to him ‘t’ad been a kindness

  Becoming well thy fact. What canst thou say

  When noble Pericles demands his child?

  DIONYZA

  That she is dead. Nurses are not the fates.

  To foster is not ever to preserve.

  She died at night. I’ll say so. Who can cross it,

  Unless you play the pious innocent

  And, for an honest attribute, cry out

  ‘She died by foul play.’

  CLEON O, go to. Well, well,

  Of all the faults beneath the heav’ns the gods

  Do like this worst.

  DIONYZA Be one of those that thinks

  The petty wrens of Tarsus will fly hence

  And open this to Pericles. I do shame

  To think of what a noble strain you are,

  And of how cowed a spirit.

  CLEON To such proceeding

  Whoever but his approbation added,

  Though not his prime consent, he did not flow

  From honourable sources.

  DIONYZA Be it so, then.

  Yet none does know but you how she came dead,

  Nor none can know, Leonine being gone.

  She did distain my child, and stood between

  Her and her fortunes. None would look on her,

  But cast their gazes on Marina’s face

  Whilst ours was blurted at, and held a malkin

  Not worth the time of day. It pierced me through,

  And though you call my course unnatural,

  You not your child well loving, yet I find

  It
greets me as an enterprise of kindness

  Performed to your sole daughter.

  CLEON Heavens forgive it.

  DIONYZA And as for Pericles,

  What should he say? We wept after her hearse,

  And yet we mourn. Her monument

  Is almost finished, and her epitaphs

  In glitt‘ring golden characters express

  A gen’ral praise to her and care in us,

  At whose expense ’tis done.

  CLEON Thou art like the harpy, Which, to betray, dost, with thine angel face, Seize in thine eagle talons.

  DIONYZA

  Ye’re like one that superstitiously

  Do swear to th’ gods that winter kills the flies,

  But yet I know you’ll do as I advise. Exeunt

  Sc. 18 Enter Gower

  GOWER

  Thus time we waste, and long leagues make we short,

  Sail seas in cockles, have and wish but for‘t,

  Making to take imagination

  From bourn to bourn, region to region.

  By you being pardoned, we commit no crime

  To use one language in each sev’ral clime

  Where our scene seems to live. I do beseech you

  To learn of me, who stand i’th’ gaps to teach you

  The stages of our story: Pericles

  Is now again thwarting the wayward seas,

  Attended on by many a lord and knight,

  To see his daughter, all his life’s delight.

  Old Helicanus goes along. Behind

  Is left to govern, if you bear in mind,

  Old Aeschines, whom Helicanus late

  Advanced in Tyre to great and high estate.

  Well sailing ships and bounteous winds have brought

  This king to Tarsus—think his pilot thought;

  So with his steerage shall your thoughts go on—

  To fetch his daughter home, who first is gone.

  Like motes and shadows see them move a while;

  Your ears unto your eyes I’ll reconcile.

  Dumb show.

  Enter Pericles at one door with all his train, Cleon

  and Dionyza ⌈in mourning garments⌉ at the other.

  Cleon ⌈draws the curtain and⌉ shows Pericles the

  tomb, whereat Pericles makes lamentation, puts on

  sack-cloth, and in a mighty passion departs,

  followed by his train. Cleon and Dionyza depart at