queen

Shakes all our buds from growing.-See, the
Those things I bid you do, get them dispatch'd. [Exit.
Pisanio. Madam, I shall.

Enter QUEEN, meeting CORNELIUS.

[Exit.

Queen. Now, master doctor; have you brought those drugs?

Corn. Pleaseth your highness, ay:

[Gives the QUEEN a Phial,

But I beseech your grace, without offence,

you

My conscience bids me ask, wherefore have Commanded of me these most poisonous compounds? Queen. I do wonder, doctor,

Thou ask'st me such a question: Have I not been Thy pupil long?

I will try the forces

Of these thy compounds,
And apply

Allayments to their act; and by them gather
Their several virtues and effects.

[Aside.] Here comes a flattering rascal; upon him Will I first work; he's for his master,

And enemy to my son.

Enter PISANIO.

How now, Pisanio? Hark thee, a word.
Doctor, your service for this time is ended.
Corn. [Aside I do suspect you, madam;
But you shall do no harm.

I know her spirit,

And will not trust one of her malice with
A drug of such damn'd nature: Those, she has,
Will stupify, and dull the sense a while;

But there is

No danger in what show of death it makes,
More than the locking up the spirits a time,
To be more fresh, reviving. She is fool'd

With a most false effect; and I the truer,
So to be false with her.

[Exit.

Queen. Weeps she still, say'st thou? Dost thou think, in time

She will not quench; and let instructions enter
Where folly now possesses? Do thou work:
When thou shalt bring me word, she loves my son,
I'll tell thee, on the instant, thou art then
As great as is thy master: greater; for
His fortunes all lie speechless, and his name
Is at last gasp:

What shalt thou expect,

To be depender on a thing that leans?

Who cannot be new built? nor has no friends,
So much as but to prop him?

[The QUEEN drops the Phial; PISANIO takes

it up. Thou tak'st up

Thou know'st not what; but take it for thy labour:
It is a thing I made, which hath the king

Five times redeem'd from death; I do not know
What is more cordial:-Nay, I pr'ythee take it;
It is an earnest of a further good

I mean to thee. Tell thy mistress how

The case stands with her; do't as from thyself.
I'll move the king

To

any shape of thy preferment, such

As thou'lt desire; and then myself, I chiefly,
That set thee on this desert, am bound

To load thy merit richly.

Think on my words.→

[Aside.] I have given him that,

Which, if he take, shall quite unpeople her

Of leigers for her sweet; and which she, after,

Except she bend her humour, shall be assured
To taste of too.

Fare thee well, Pisanio;,
Think on my words.

[Exit.

Pisanio. And shall do ;

But when to my good lord I prove untrue,
I'll choke myself: there's all I'll do for you.
By this he is at Rome, and good Philario,
With open arms, and grateful heart, receives
His friend's reflected image in his son,
Old Leonatus in young Posthumus :
Sweet Imogen, what thou endur'st the while,
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- -Heaven keep unshaken
That temple, thy fair mind, that thou may'st stand
T' enjoy thy banish'd lord, and this great land!

{Exit.

SCENE II.

Rome.

An Apartment in PHILARIO's House.

PHILARIO, with a Letter, IACHIMO, and LEWIS, discovered.

Iach. Believe it, sir: I have seen him in Britain: he was then of a crescent note; expected to prove so worthy, as since he hath been allowed the name of: but I could then have looked on him without the help of admiration; though the catalogue of his endowments had been tabled by his side, and I to peruse him by items.

Phil. You speak of him when he was less furnished than now he is.

Lewis. I have seen him in France; we had

very

many there, could behold the sun with as firm eyes as he.

Iach. This matter of marrying his king's daughter, (wherein he must be weighed rather by her value than his own,) words liim, I doubt not, a great deal from

the matter.

Lewis. And then his banishment,

Iach. Ay, and the approbation of those, that weep this lamentable divorce, under her colours, are wonderfully to extend him; be it but to fortify her judgment, which else an easy battery might lay flat, for taking a beggar without more quality. But how comes it, he is to sojourn with you? How creeps acquaintance?

Phil. His father and I were soldiers together; to whom I have been often bound for no less than my life. Here comes the Briton: let him be so entertained amongst you, as suits, with gentlemen of your knowing, to a stranger of his quality.

Enter POSTHumus.

-I beseech you all, be better known to this gentleman; whom I commend to you, as a noble friend of mine how worthy he is, I will leave to appear hereafter, rather than story him in his own hearing.

Lewis. Sir, we have known together in Orleans. Post. Since when I have been debtor to you for courtesies, which I will be ever to pay, and yet pay still:

Lewis. Sir, you o'er-rate my poor kindness: I was glad I did atone my countryman and you; it had been pity, you should have been put together with so mortal a purpose, as then each bore, upon importance of so slight and trivial a nature.

Post. By your pardon, sir,-I was then a young traveller; but, upon my mended judgment, (if I of

fend not to say it is mended,) my quarrel was not altogether slight.

Lewis. 'Faith, yes, to be put to the arbitrement of swords.

Iach. Can we, with manners, ask what was the difference?

Lewis. Safely, I think; 'twas a contention in public, which may, without contradiction, suffer the report. It was much like an argument that fell out last night, where each of us fell in praise of our country mistresses: this gentleman at that time vouching, (and upon warrant of bloody affirmation,) his to be more fair, virtuous, wise, chaste, constantqualified, and less attemptible, than any the rarest of our ladies in France.

mind.

Iach. That lady is not now living; or this gentleman's opinion, by this, worn out. Post. She holds her virtue still, and I I my Iach. You must not so far prefer her 'fore ours of Italy.

Post. Being so far provoked as I was in France, I would abate her nothing; though I profess myself her adorer, not her friend.

Iach. As fair, and as good, (a kind of hand-in-hand comparison,) had been something too fair, and too good, for any lady in Britany. If she went before others I have seen, as that diamond of yours outJustres many I have beheld, I could not but believe she excelled many; but I have not seen the most precious diamond that is, nor you the lady.

Post. I praised her as I rated her: so do I my

stone.

Iach. What do you esteem it at ?

Post. More than the world enjoys.

Iach. Either your unparagoned mistress is dead, or she's outprized by a trifle.

Post. You are mistaken; the one may be sold, or

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