Our Jovial star reign'd at his birth, and in

Our temple was he married.-Rise, and fade !— He shall be lord of lady Imogen,

And happier much by his affliction made.
This tablet lay upon his breast; wherein
Our pleasure his full fortune doth confine;
And so, away: no further with your din

Express impatience, lest you stir up mine.-
Mount, eagle, to my palace crystaline. [Ascends.
Sici. He came in thunder; his celestial breath
Was sulphurous to smell: the holy eagle
Stoop'd, as to foot us: his ascension is

8

More sweet than our bless'd fields; his royal bird Prunes the immortal wing, and cloys his beak, As when his god is pleas'd.

All.

Thanks, Jupiter! Sici. The marble pavement closes, he is enter'd His radiant roof:-Away! and, to be blest,

Let us with care perform his great behest.

[Ghosts vanish.

Post. [Waking.] Sleep, thou hast been a grandsire, and begot

A father to me: and thou hast created

A mother and two brothers: But (0 scorn!)
Gone! they went hence so soon as they were born.
And so I am awake.-Poor wretches that depend
On greatness' favour, dream as I have done;
Wake, and find nothing.--But, alas, I swerve:
Many dream not to find, neither deserve,
And yet are steep'd in favours; so am I,
That have this golden chance, and know not why.

7 i. e. to grasp us in his pounces.

And till they foot and clutch their prey.'

Herbert.

8 In ancient language the cleys or clees of a bird or beast are the same with claws in modern speech. To claw their beaks is an accustomed action with hawks and eagles.

What fairies haunt this ground? A book? O,rare one!
Be not, as is our fangled9 world, a garment
Nobler than that it covers: let thy effects
So follow, to be most unlike our courtiers,
As good as promise.

[Reads.] When as a lion's whelp shall, to himself unknown, without seeking find, and be embraced by a piece of tender air; and when from a stately cedar shall be lopped branches, which, being dead many years, shall after revive, be jointed to the old stock, and freshly grow; then shall Posthumus end his miseries, Britain be fortunate, and flourish in peace and plenty.

'Tis still a dream; or else such stuff as madmen
Tongue, and brain not: either both, or nothing:
Or senseless speaking, or a speaking such
As sense cannot untie. Be what it is,
The action of my life is like it, which
I'll keep, if but for sympathy.

Re-enter Gaolers.

Gaol. Come, sir, are you ready for death? Post. Over-roasted rather: ready long ago. Gaol. Hanging is the word, sir; if you be ready for that, you are well cooked.

Post. So, if I prove a good repast to the spectators, the dish pays the shot.

Gaol. A heavy reckoning for you, sir: But the comfort is, you shall be called to no more payments, fear no more tavern bills; which are often the sadness of parting, as the procuring of mirth : you come in faint for want of meat, depart reeling with too much drink; sorry that you have paid too

9 i. e. trifling. Hence new-fangled, still in use for new toys or trifles.

much, and sorry that you are paid 10 too much; purse and brain both empty: the brain the heavier for being too light, the purse too light, being drawn of heaviness: O! of this contradiction you shall now be quit.-O the charity of a penny cord! it sums up thousands in a trice: you have no true debitor and creditor but it; of what's past, is, and to come, the discharge:-Your neck, sir, is pen, book, and counters; so the acquittance follows.

Post. I am merrier to die, than thou art to live. Gaol. Indeed, sir, he that sleeps feels not the tooth-ach: But a man that were to sleep your sleep, and a hangman to help him to bed, I think, he would change places with his officer: for, look you, sir, you know not which way you shall go.

Post. Yes, indeed, do I, fellow.

Gaol. Your death has eyes in's head then; I have not seen him so pictured: you must either be directed by some that take upon them to know; or take upon yourself that, which I am sure you do not know; or jump11 the after-inquiry on your own peril: and how you shall speed in your journey's end, I think you'll never return to tell one.

11

Post. I tell thee, fellow, there are none want eyes to direct them the way I am going, but such as wink, and will not use them.

Gaol. What an infinite mock is this, that a man should have the best use of eyes, to see the way of blindness! I am sure, hanging's the way of winking.

Enter a Messenger.

Mess. Knock off his manacles; bring your prisoner to the king.

10 Paid here means subdued or overcome by the liquor. i.e. hazard. See vol. iv. p. 234, note 2.

Post. Thou bringest good news;-I am called to me made free.

Gaol. I'll be hanged then.

Post. Thou shalt be then freer than a gaoler; no bolts for the dead.

[Exeunt POSTHUMUS and Messenger. Gaol. Unless a man would marry a gallows, and beget young gibbets, I never saw one so prone 12. Yet, on my conscience, there are verier knaves desire to live, for all he be a Roman: and there be some of them too, that die against their wills; so should I, if I were one. I would we were all of one mind, and one mind good; O, there were desolation of gaolers, and gallowses! I speak against my present profit; but my wish hath a preferment in't. [Exeunt.

SCENE V1. Cymbeline's Tent.

Enter CYMBELINE, BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, ARVIRAGUS, PISANIO, Lords, Officers, and Attendants.

Cym. Stand by my side, you whom the gods have made

Preservers of my throne. Woe is my heart,

12 Prone here signifies ready, prompt. As in Measure for Measure, Act i. Sc. 3, p. 15:

in her youth

There is a prone and speechless dialect,

Such as moves men.'

Thus also in Lucan's Pharsalia, translated by Sir Arthur Gorges, b. vi.:

+

Thessalian fierie steeds,

For use of war so prone and fit.'

And in Wilfride Holme's poem, entitled The Fall and Evil Success of Rebellion, &c. 1537 :

With bombard and basilisk, with men prone and vigorous.' In the scene before us, all the surviving characters are assembled; and at the expense of whatever incongruity the former events may have been produced, perhaps little can be dis

That the poor soldier, that so richly fought,

Whose rags sham'd gilded arms, whose naked breast Stepp'd before targe of proof, cannot be found:

He shall be happy that can find him, if

Our grace can make him so.

Bel.

I never saw

Such noble fury in so poor a thing;

Such precious deeds in one that promis'd nought But beggary and poor looks.

Cym.

No tidings of him? Pis. He hath been search'd among the dead and

living,

But no trace of him.

Cym.

To my grief, I am
The heir of his reward; which I will add
To you, the liver, heart, and brain of Britain,

[To BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, and ARV. By whom, I grant, she lives; 'Tis now the time To ask of whence you are:-report it.

Bel.

Sir,

In Cambria are we born, and gentlemen:
Further to boast, were neither true nor modest,
Unless I add, we are honest.

Cym.

Bow your knees:

Arise, my knights o' the battle: I create you
Companions to our person, and will fit you
With dignities becoming your estates.

Enter CORNELIUS and Ladies.

There's business in these faces 3.-Why so sadly

covered on this occasion to offend the most scrupulous advocate for regularity and as little is found wanting to satisfy the spectator by a catastrophe which is intricate without confusion, and not more rich in ornament than nature.'-Steevens.

? Thus in Stowe's Chronicle, p. 164, edit. 1615:- Philip of France made Arthur Plantagenet Knight of the Fielde.' 3 So in Macbeth:

The business of this man looks out of him.'