Act IV
Scene I
Athens. A room in the prison.
Enter Gaoler and First Friend. | |
Gaoler |
Hear you no more? was nothing said of me
|
First Friend |
Nothing that I heard;
|
Gaoler | Pray heaven, it hold so! |
Enter Second Friend. | |
Second Friend |
Be of good comfort, man: I bring you news,
|
Gaoler | They’re welcome. |
Second Friend |
Palamon has clear’d you,
|
Gaoler |
Ye’re a good man,
|
First Friend | How was it ended? |
Second Friend |
Why, as it should be; they that never begg’d
|
First Friend | I knew ’twould be so. |
Second Friend |
But there be new conditions, which you’ll hear of
|
Gaoler | I hope they’re good. |
Second Friend |
They’re honourable:
|
First Friend | ’Twill be known. |
Enter Wooer. | |
Wooer | Alas, sir, where’s your daughter? |
Gaoler | Why do you ask? |
Wooer | O, sir, when did you see her? |
Second Friend | How he looks! |
Gaoler | This morning. |
Wooer |
Was she well? was she in health, sir?
|
First Friend | These are strange questions. |
Gaoler |
I do not think she was very well; for, now
|
Wooer |
Nothing but my pity:
|
Gaoler | Well, sir? |
First Friend | Not right? |
Second Friend | Not well? |
Wooer |
No, sir; not well:
|
First Friend | It cannot be. |
Wooer | Believe, you’ll find it so. |
Gaoler |
I half suspected
|
Wooer | ’Tis likely. |
Gaoler | But why all this haste, sir? |
Wooer |
I’ll tell you quickly. As I late was angling
|
Gaoler | Pray, go on, sir. |
Wooer |
She sung much, but no sense; only I heard her
|
First Friend | Pretty soul! |
Wooer |
“His shackles will betray him, he’ll be taken;
|
Second Friend | Alas, what pity ’tis! |
Wooer |
I made in to her:
|
Enter Gaoler’s Brother, Daughter, and others. | |
Daughter |
Sings. May you never more enjoy the light, etc. Is not this a fine song? |
Brother | O, a very fine one! |
Daughter | I can sing twenty more. |
Brother | I think you can. |
Daughter |
Yes, truly, can I; I can sing “The Broom,”
|
Brother | Yes. |
Daughter | Where’s my wedding-gown? |
Brother | I’ll bring’t to-morrow. |
Daughter |
Do, very rarely; I must be abroad else,
O fair, O sweet, etc. |
Brother | You must even take it patiently. |
Gaoler | ’Tis true. |
Daughter |
Good even, good men. Pray, did you ever hear
|
Gaoler | Yes, wench, we know him. |
Daughter | Is’t not a fine young gentleman? |
Gaoler | ’Tis love! |
Brother |
By no mean cross her; she is then distemper’d
|
First Friend | Yes, he’s a fine man. |
Daughter | O, is he so? You have a sister? |
First Friend | Yes. |
Daughter |
But she shall never have him, tell her so,
|
First Friend | Yes. |
Daughter |
There is at least two hundred now with child by him—
|
Second Friend | This is strange. |
Daughter | As ever you heard: but say nothing. |
First Friend | No. |
Daughter |
They come from all parts of the dukedome to him;
|
Gaoler |
She’s lost,
|
Brother | Heaven forbid, man! |
Daughter | Come hither; you’re a wise man. |
First Friend | Does she know him? |
Second Friend | No; would she did! |
Daughter | You’re master of a ship? |
Gaoler | Yes. |
Daughter | Where’s your compass? |
Gaoler | Here. |
Daughter |
Set it to the north;
|
All |
Owgh, owgh, owgh! ’tis up, the wind is fair:
|
Brother | Let’s get her in. |
Gaoler | Up to the top, boy! |
Brother | Where’s the pilot? |
First Friend | Here. |
Daughter | What kenn’st thou? |
Second Friend | A fair wood. |
Daughter |
Bear for it, master:
When Cynthia with her borrow’d light, etc. Exeunt. |
Scene II
Athens. A room in the palace.
Enter Emilia with two pictures. | |
Emilia |
Yet I may bind those wounds up, that must open
|
Enter a Gentleman. | |
How now, sir! | |
Gentleman |
From the noble duke your brother,
|
Emilia | To end the quarrel? |
Gentleman | Yes. |
Emilia |
Would I might end first!
|
Enter Theseus, Hippolyta, Pirithous, and Attendants. | |
Theseus |
Bring ’em in
|
Emilia |
I had rather both,
|
Theseus | Who saw ’em? |
Pirithous | I a while. |
Gentleman | And I. |
Enter Messenger. | |
Theseus | From whence come you, sir? |
Messenger | From the knights. |
Theseus |
Pray, speak,
|
Messenger |
I will, sir,
|
Theseus | Thou’st well describ’d him. |
Pirithous |
Yet a great deal short,
|
Theseus | Pray, speak him, friend. |
Pirithous |
I guess he is a prince too,
|
Emilia | Must these men die too? |
Pirithous |
When he speaks, his tongue
|
Messenger |
There’s another,
|
Pirithous | O, he that’s freckle-fac’d? |
Messenger |
The same, my lord:
|
Pirithous | Yes, they’re well. |
Messenger |
Methinks,
|
Theseus | Are they all thus? |
Pirithous | They’re all the sons of honour. |
Theseus |
Now, as I have a soul, I long to see ’em.—
|
Hippolyta |
I wish it,
|
Theseus |
You’ve steel’d ’em with your beauty.—Honour’d friend,
|
Pirithous | Yes, sir. |
Theseus |
Come, I’ll go visit ’em: I cannot stay—
|
Pirithous | There shall want no bravery. |
Emilia |
Poor wench, go weep; for whosoever wins,
|
Scene III
Athens. A room in the prison.
Enter Gaoler, Wooer, and Doctor. | |
Doctor | Her distraction is more at some time of the moon than at other some, is it not? |
Gaoler | She is continually in a harmless distemper; sleeps little; altogether without appetite, save often drinking; dreaming of another world and a better; and what broken piece of matter soe’er she’s about, the name Palamon lards it; that she farces every business withal, fits it to every question.—Look, where she comes; you shall perceive her behaviour. |
Enter Gaoler’s Daughter. | |
Daughter | I have forgot it quite; the burden on’t, was Down-a, down-a; and penned by no worse man than Giraldo, Emilia’s schoolmaster: he’s as fantastical, too, as ever he may go upon’s legs; for in the next world will Dido see Palamon, and then will she be out of love with Aeneas. |
Doctor | What stuff’s here! poor soul! |
Gaoler | Even thus all day long. |
Daughter | Now for this charm that I told you of. You must bring a piece of silver on the tip of your tongue, or no ferry: then, if it be your chance to come where the blessed spirits—as there’s a sight now!—we maids that have our livers perished, cracked to pieces with love, we shall come there, and do nothing all day long but pick flowers with Proserpine; then will I make Palamon a nosegay; then let him—mark me—then— |
Doctor | How prettily she’s amiss! note her a little further. |
Daughter | Faith, I’ll tell you; sometime we go to barley-break, we of the blessed. Alas, ’tis a sore life they have i’ th’ other place, such burning, frying, boiling, hissing, howling, chattering, cursing! O, they have shrewd measure! Take heed: if one be mad, or hang, or drown themselves, thither they go; Jupiter bless us! and there shall we be put in a caldron of lead and usurers’ grease, amongst a whole million of cut-purses, and there boil like a gammon of bacon that will never be enough. |
Doctor | How her brain coins! |
Daughter | Lords and courtiers that have got maids with child, they are in this place; they shall stand in fire up to the navel, and in ice up to the heart, and there th’ offending part burns, and the deceiving part freezes; in troth, a very grievous punishment, as one would think, for such a trifle: believe me, one would marry a leprous witch to be rid on’t, I’ll assure you. |
Doctor | How she continues this fancy! ’Tis not an engraffed madness, but a most thick and profound melancholy. |
Daughter |
To hear there a proud lady and a proud city-wife howl together! I were a beast, an I’d call it good sport: one cries, “O, this smoke!” th’ other, “This fire!” one cries, “O, that ever I did it behind the arras!” and then howls; th’ other curses a suing fellow and her garden-house. Sings. I will be true, my stars, my fate, etc. Exit. |
Gaoler | What think you of her, sir? |
Doctor | I think she has a perturbed mind, which I cannot minister to. |
Gaoler | Alas, what then? |
Doctor | Understand you she ever affected any man ere she beheld Palamon? |
Gaoler | I was once, sir, in great hope she had fixed her liking on this gentleman, my friend. |
Wooer | I did think so too; and would account I had a great pen’worth on’t, to give half my state, that both she and I at this present stood unfeinedly on the same terms. |
Doctor | That intemperate surfeit of her eye hath distemper’d the other senses: they may return and settle again to execute their preordained faculties; but they are now in a most extravagant vagary. This you must do: confine her to a place where the light may rather seem to steal in than be permitted. Take upon you, young sir, her friend, the name of Palamon; say you come to eat with her, and to commune of love; this will catch her attention, for this her mind beats upon; other objects, that are inserted ’tween her mind and eye, become the pranks and friskins of her madness: sing to her such green songs of love as she says Palamon hath sung in prison; come to her, stuck in as sweet flowers as the season is mistress of, and thereto make an addition of some other compounded odours, which are grateful to the sense; all this shall become Palamon, for Palamon can sing, and Palamon is sweet, and every good thing: desire to eat with her, carve her, drink to her, and still among intermingle your petition of grace and acceptance into her favour: learn what maids have been her companions and play-feres; and let them repair to her with Palamon in their mouths, and appear with tokens, as if they suggested for him. It is a falsehood she is in, which is with falsehoods to be combated. This may bring her to eat, to sleep, and reduce what’s now out of square in her into their former law and regiment: I have seen it approved, how many times I know not; but to make the number more I have great hope in this. I will, between the passages of this project, come in with my appliance. Let us put it in execution; and hasten the success, which, doubt not, will bring forth comfort. Exeunt. |