Gen.

I shall, my liege.

[Exit Gen.

King. What says he to your daughter? have you

spoke ?

La. All that he is hath reference to your high

ness.

King. Then shall we have a match. I have letters

sent me,

That set him high in fame.

La.

Enter BERTRAM.

He looks well on 't.

King. I am not a day of season,

For thou mayst see a sunshine and a hail

In me at once: but to the brightest beams
Distracted clouds give way; so stand thou forth :
The time is fair again.

Ber.

My high-repented blames,1

Dear sovereign, pardon to me.

King.

All is whole;

Not one word more of the consumed time.
Let's take the instant by the forward top;
For we are old, and on our quickest decrees
The inaudible and noiseless foot of time
Steals ere we can effect them.

The daughter of this lord?

You remember

Ber. Admiringly, my liege: at first, choice upon her, ere my heart

I stuck my

1 Faults repented of to the utmost.

Durst make too bold a herald of my tongue :
Where the impression of mine eye infixing,
Contempt his scornful perspective did lend me,
Which warp'd the line of every other favor;
Scorn'd a fair color, or express'd it stolen;
Extended or contracted all proportions,

To a most hideous object. Thence it came,
That she, whom all men praised, and whom myself,
Since I have lost, have loved, was in mine eye
The dust that did offend it.

King.

Well excused:

That thou didst love her, strikes some scores awav From the great count: but love, that comes too

late,

Like a remorseful pardon slowly carried,
To the great sender turns a sour offence,
Crying, that's good that's gone: our rash faults
Make trivial price of serious things we have,
Not knowing them, until we know their grave.
Oft our displeasures, to ourselves unjust,
Destroy our friends, and after weep their dust:
Our own love waking cries to see what's done,
While shameful hate sleeps out the afternoon.
Be this sweet Helen's knell, and now forget her.
Send forth your amorous token for fair Maudlin
The main consents are had; and here we 'll stay
To see our widower's second marriage-day.

:

Count. Which better than the first, O dear Heaven, bless;

Or, ere they meet, in me, O Nature, cease!

La. Come on my son, in whom my house's nam

Must be digested; give a favor from you,
To sparkle in the spirits of my daughter,
That she may quickly come.—By my old beard,
And every hair that's on 't, Helen, that's dead,
Was a sweet creature: such a ring as this,
The last that ere I took her leave at court,1
I saw upon her finger.

King. Now, pray you, let me see it; for mine

eye,

While I was speaking, oft was fasten'd to it.—
This ring was mine; and, when I gave it Helen,
I bade her, if her fortunes ever stood

Necessitied to help, that by this token

I would relieve her. Had you that craft, to reave

I have seen her wear it; and she reckon’d it

At her life's rate.

La.

I am sure, I saw her wear it.

Ber. You are deceived, my lord; she never saw

it:

In Florence was it from a casement thrown me,

'The last time that I saw her, when she was leaving the

court.

Wrapp'd in a paper, which contain’d the name
Of her that threw it: noble she was, and thought
I stood ingaged: 1 but when I had subscribed
To mine own fortune, and inform'd her fully,
I could not answer in that course of honor
As she had made the overture, she ceased,
In heavy satisfaction, and would never
Receive the ring again.

That knows the tinct and multiplying medicine,
Hath not in nature's mystery more science,

Than I have in this ring: 'twas mine, 'twas Helen's,
Whoever gave it you. Then, if you

know

That you are well acquainted with yourself,3

Confess 'twas hers, and by what rough enforcement You got it from her. She call'd the saints to surety, That she would never put it from her finger,

Unless she gave it to yourself in bed,

(Where you have never come) or sent it us Upon her great disaster.

Ber.

She never saw it.

King. Thou speak'st it falsely, as I love mine

honor ;

And makest conjectural fears to come into me,
Which I would fain shut out.
If it should prove

That thou art so inhuman;-'twill not prove so ;—
And yet I know not :-thou didst hate her deadly,

In the sense of unengaged.

2 The philosopher's stone.

3 That you have a proper consciousness of your own actions.

And she is dead; which nothing, but to close
Her eyes myself, could win me to believe,
More than to see this ring.-Take him away.—
[guards seise Bertram
My fore-past proofs, howe'er the matter fall,
Shall tax my fears of little vanity,

Having vainly fear'd too little. Away with him ;—
We'll sift this matter farther.

Ber.

If you shall prove

[Exit Bertram guarded.

This ring was ever hers, you shall as easy
Prove that I husbanded her bed in Florence,
Where yet she never was.

Here's a petition from a Florentine,
Who hath, for four or five removes,1 come short
To tender it herself. I undertook it,
Vanquish'd thereto by the fair grace and speech
Of the poor suppliant, who by this, I know,
Is here attending: her business looks in her
With an important visage; and she told me,
In a sweet verbal brief, it did concern

Your highness with herself.

King. [reads.] Upon his many protestations to marry me when his wife was dead, I blush to say it,

1 Journeys or post-stages.