My master, my dear lord he is; and I
His servant live, and will his vassal die.
He must not be my brother.
Count.

Nor I your mother?

I Hel. You are my mother, madam : would you

were

2

(So that my lord, your son, were not my brother) Indeed

my mother!-or were you both our mothers, I care no more for, than 1 I do for heaven, So I were not his sister. Can 't no other, But, I your daughter, he must be my brother? Count. Yes, Helen, you might be my daughter

in-law : God shield, you mean it not! daughter, and mother, So strive ? upon your pulse. What, pale again?

. My fear hath catch'd your fondness. Now I see The mystery of your loneliness, and find Your salt tears' head.3 Now to all sense 'tis gross, You love my son; invention is ashamed, Against the proclamation of thy passion, To say, thou dost not: therefore tell me true ; But tell me then, 'tis so :—for, look, thy cheeks Confess it, one to the other; and thine eyes See it so grossly shown in thy behaviors, That in their kind 4 they speak it; only sin And hellish obstinacy tie thy tongue, That truth should be suspected. Speak, is 't su:

:

If it be su, you have wound a goodly clew;
If it be not, forswear't: howe'er, I charge thee,
As Heaven shall work in me for thine avail,
To tell me truly.

Hel. Good madam, pardon me.
Count. Do you love my son ?
Hel.

Your pardon, noble mistress ! Count. Love you my son

n? Hel.

Do not you love him, madam? Count. Go not about; my love hath in 't a bond. Whereof the world takes note : come, come, dis

close
The state of your affection ; for your passions
Have to the full appeach'd.1
Hel.

Then, I confess,
Here on my knee, before high Heaven and you.
That before you, and next unto high Heaven,
I love your son :-
My friends were poor, but honest; so 's my

love :
Be not offended ; for it hurts not him,
That he is loved of me: I follow him not
By any token of presumptuous suit;
Nor would I have him, till I do deserve him;
Yet never know how that desert should be.
I know I love in vain, strive against hope ;
Yet, in this captious 2 and intenible sieve,
I still pour in the waters of my love,
And lack not to lose still : thus, Indian-like,

Religious in mine error, I adore
The sun, that looks

upon his worshipper,
But knows of him no more. My dearest madam,
Let not your hate encounter with my love,
For loving where you do: but, if yourself,
Whose aged honor cites 1 a virtuous youth,
Did ever, in so true a flame of liking,
Wish chastely, and love dearly, that your Dian
Was both herself and Love; 2 O, then, give pity
To her, whose state is such, that cannot choose
But lend and give, where she is sure to lose;
That seeks not to find that her search implies,
But, riddle-like, lives sweetly where she dies.

Count. Had you not lately an intent, speak truly, To go to Paris ? Hel. Madam, I had.

Wherefore ? tell true. Hel. I will tell truth; by grace itself, I swear. You know, my father left me some prescriptions Of rare and proved effects, such as his reading And manifest experience had collected For general sovereignty; and that he will’d me In heedfullest reservation to bestow them, As notes, whose faculties inclusive were, More than they were in note : 3 amongst the rest There is a remedy, approved, set down, To cure the desperate languishes, whereof