Re-enter PISANIO, and Ladies. To taste of too. So, so;-well done, well done: Bear to my closet:-Fare thee well, Pisanio; But when to my good lord I prove untrue, I'll choke myself: there's all I'll do for you. [Exit. SCENE VII. Another Room in the same. Enter IMOGEN. Imo. A father cruel, and a step-dame false; A foolish suitor to a wedded lady, That hath her husband banish'd;-O, that husband! As my two brothers, happy! but most miserable Enter PISANIO and IACHIMO. Pis. Madam, a noble gentleman of Rome; Comes from my lord with letters. Iach. madam? Change you, The worthy Leonatus is in safety, And greets your highness dearly. [Presents a Letter. 9 Some words, which rendered this sentence less abrupt, and perfected the metre of it, appear to have been omitted in the old copies. 1 Imogen's sentiment appears to be, Had I been stolen by thieves in my infancy, I had been happy. But how pregnant with misery is that station which is called glorious, and so much desired. Happier far are those, how mean soever their condition, that have their honest wills; it is this which seasons comfort, (i. e. tempers it, or makes it more pleasant and acceptable). See Hamlet, Acti. Sc. 3: My blessing season this in you.' Imo. You are kindly welcome. Thanks, good sir: Iach. All of her, that is out of door, most rich! [Aside. friend! If she be furnish'd with a mind so rare, Imo. [Reads.]-He is one of the noblest note, to whose kindnesses I am most infinitely tied. Reflect upon him accordingly, as you value your truest? So far I read aloud: LEONATUS. But even the very middle of my heart Is warm'd by the rest, and takes it thankfully.— You are as welcome, worthy sir, as I Have words to bid you; and shall find it so, In all that I can do. Iach. Imo. eyes What makes your admiration? Iach. It cannot be i' the eye; for apes and monkeys 2 The old copy reads, trust. The emendation was suggested by Mason; is defended by Steevens; and, of course, opposed by Malone. 3 We must either believe that the poet by 'number'd beach' means numerous beach,' or else that he wrote th' unnumber'd beach;' which, indeed, seems most probable. "Twixt two such shes, would chatter this way, and Imo. What is the matter, trow? (That satiate yet unsatisfied desire, The cloyed will That tub both fill'd and running), ravening first Imo. Thus raps you? Are you well? What, dear sir, Tach. Thanks, madam; well:-'Beseech you, sir, desire [TO PISANIO. My man's abode where I did leave him: he Is strange and peevish 6. Pis. To give him welcome. I was going, sir, [Exit PISANIO. Imo. Continues well my lord? His health, be seech you? Iach. Well, madam. Imo. Is he dispos'd to mirth? I hope, he is. 4 To mow, or moe, is to make mouths. 5 Iachimo, in his counterfeited rapture, has shown how the eyes and the judgment would determine in favour of Imogen, comparing her with the supposititious present mistress of Posthumus, he proceeds to say, that appetite too would give the same suffrage. Desire (says he) when it approached sluttery, and considered it in comparison with such neat excellence, would not only be not so allured to feed, but, seized with a fit of loathing, would vomit emptiness, would feel the convulsions of disgust, though, being unfed, it had no object. 6 i. e. he is a foreigner and foolish, or silly. See vol. iv. p. 172, note 6. Iachimo says again at the latter end of this scene:And I am something curious, being strange, To have them in safe stowage.' Here also strange means a stranger or foreigner. So Iach. Exceeding pleasant: none a stranger there merry and so gamesome: he is call'd The Briton reveller. Imo. When he was here, He did incline to sadness; and oft-times Not knowing why. Iach. I never saw him sad. There is a Frenchman his companion, one An eminent monsieur, that, it seems, much loves A Gallian girl at home: he furnaces 7 The thick sighs from him; whiles the jolly Briton (Your lord, I mean), laughs from's free lungs, cries, O! Can my sides hold, to think, that man,-who knows What woman is, yea, what she cannot choose say so? Iach. Ay, madam; with his eyes in flood with laughter. It is a recreation to be by, And hear him mock the Frenchman: But, heavens know, Some men are much to blame. Imo. Not he, I hope. Iach. Not he: But yet heaven's bounty towards him might Be us'd more thankfully. In himself, 'tis much8; In you,—which I count his, beyond all talents,— 7 We have the same expression in Chapman's preface to his translation of the Shield of Homer, 1598:-'Furnaceth the universal sighes and complaintes of this transposed world.' And in As You Like It: Sighing like furnace, with a woful ballad.' 8 If he merely regarded his own character, without any consideration of his wife, his conduct would be unpardonable.' Whilst I am bound to wonder, I am bound To pity too. What do you pity, sir? Iach. Two creatures, heartily. Imo. Am I one, sir? You look on me; What wreck discern you in me, Deserves your pity? Iach. Lamentable! What! To hide me from the radiant sun, and solace Imo. I pray you, sir, Deliver with more openness your answers To my demands. Why do you pity me? Iach. That others do, I was about to say, enjoy your -But It is an office of the gods to venge it, Not mine to speak on't. Imo. You do seem to know Something of me, or what concerns me; 'Pray you Had I this cheek Iach. To bathe my lips upon; this hand, whose touch, Whose every touch, would force the feeler's soul To the oath of loyalty; this object, which Takes prisoner the wild motion of mine eye, Fixing it only here: should I (damn'd then), Slaver with lips as common as the stairs 9 It seems probable that knowing is here an error of the press for known. 10 The information which you seem to press forward and yet withhold.' The allusion is to horsemanship. So in Sidney's Arcadia: She was like a horse desirous to runne, and miserably spurred, but so short-reined, as he cannot stirre forward.' |