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Moth. Since, Jupiter, our son is good,

Take off his miseries.

Sici. Peep through thy marble mansion; help!

Or we poor ghosts will cry,

To the shining synod of the rest,

Against thy deity.

2 Bro. Help, Jupiter! or we appeal, And from thy justice fly.

JUPITER descends in Thunder and Lightning, sitting upon an Eagle: he throws a Thunderbolt; the Ghosts fall on their Knees.

Jup. No more, you petty spirits of region low,

Offend our hearing: hush!-How dare you ghosts Accuse the thunderer, whose bolt you know, Sky-planted, batters all rebelling coasts? Poor shadows of Elysium, hence; and rest Upon your never-withering banks of flowers: Be not with mortal accidents opprest;

No care of yours it is; you know, 'tis ours.
Whom best I love, I cross; to make my gift,
The more delay'd, delighted. Be content;
Your low-laid son our godhead will uplift:

His comforts thrive, his trials well are spent.
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 farther with your din
Express impatience, lest you stir up mine.-
Mount, eagle, to my palace crystalline. [Ascends.
Sici. He came in thunder; his celestial breath
Was sulphurous to smell: the holy eagle

VOL. VIII.

R

Stoop'd, as to foot us: his ascension is

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 (O 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.
What fairies haunt this ground? A book? O, rare

one !

Be not, as is our fangled 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

5

to FOOT us:] i. e. to grasp us in his talons. So Herbert, as quoted by Steevens:

"And till they foot and clutch their prey."

6 our FANGLED world,] "Fangled" is almost invariably found with new before it, and only in this instance, as far as discoveries of the kind have gone, without it: the meaning seems to be much the same as new-fangled, and it has been derived from fengan, Sax. to undertake or attempt. The substantive fangle was in use by Shakespeare's contemporaries.

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 much, and sorry that you are paid 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 toothache; 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 jump 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.

Post. I tell thee, fellow, there are none want eyes to direct them the way I am going, but such as wink, and I 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.

Post. Thou bring'st good news. I am called to be

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. 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

7 ―or JUMP the after-inquiry on your own inquiry. See Vol. vi. p. 203; Vol. vii. p. 116. jump the life to come," is exactly in point.

peril :] i. e. risk the afterThe latter instance, “We'd

gallowses! I speak against my present profit, but my wish hath a preferment in't.

[Exeunt.

SCENE V.

CYMBELINE's Tent.

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

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

made

throne. Woe is my heart,

Preservers of my throne.

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,
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.
Farther to boast, were neither true nor modest,
Unless I add, we are honest.

Cym.

Bow your knees.

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