Mar. The gods defend me!

Bawd. If it please the gods to defend you by men, then men must comfort you, men must feed you, men must stir you up.-Boult's returned.

Re-enter BoULT.

Now, sir, hast thou cried her through the market? Boult. I have cried her almost to the number of her hairs; I have drawn her picture with my voice.

Bawd. And I pr'ythee tell me, how dost thou find the inclination of the people, especially of the younger

sort?

Boult. 'Faith, they listened to me, as they would have hearkened to their father's testament. There was a Spaniard's mouth so watered, that he went to bed to her very description.

Bawd. We shall have him here to-morrow with his best ruff on.

Boult. To-night, to-night. But, mistress, do you know the French knight that cowers1 i' the hams? Bawd. Who? Monsieur Veroles?

Boult. Ay; he offered to cut a caper at the proclamation; but he made a groan at it, and swore he would see her to-morrow.

Bawd. Well, well; as for him, he brought his disease hither here he does but repair it. I know he will come in our shadow, to scatter his crowns in the sun.3

Boult. Well, if we had of every nation a traveller, we should lodge them with this sign.*

Bawd. Pray you, come hither awhile. You have fortunes coming upon you. Mark me; you must seem

1 To cower is to sink or crouch down.

2 i. e. renovate it.

3 The allusion is to the French coin écus de soleil. The meaning is merely this, "That the French knight will seek the shade of their house to scatter his money there."

4 "If a traveller from every part of the globe were to assemble in Mitylene, they would all resort to this house, while we had such a sign to it as this virgin."

to do that fearfully, which you commit willingly; to despise profit, where you have most gain. To weep that you live as you do, makes pity in your lovers. Seldom, but that pity begets you a good opinion, and that opinion a mere 1 profit.

Mar. I understand you not.

Boult. O, take her home, mistress, take her home; these blushes of hers must be quenched with some present practice.

Bawd. Thou say'st true, i' faith, so they must; for your bride goes to that with shame, which is her way to go with warrant.

Boult. 'Faith, some do, and some do not. But, mistress, if I have bargained for the joint,

Bawd. Thou may'st cut a morsel off the spit.
Boult. I may so.

Bawd. Who should deny it? Come, young one, I like the manner of your garments well.

Boult. Ay, by my faith, they shall not be changed yet.

Bawd. Boult, spend thou that in the town; report what a sojourner we have; you'll lose nothing by custom. When nature framed this piece, she meant thee a good turn; therefore say what a paragon she is, and thou hast the harvest out of thine own report.

2

Boult. I warrant you, mistress, thunder shall not so awake the beds of eels, as my giving out her beauty stir up the lewdly-inclined. I'll bring home some to-night.

Bawd. Come your ways; follow me.

Mar. If fires be hot, knives sharp, or waters deep, Untied I still my virgin knot will keep.

Diana, aid my purpose!

Bawd. What have we to do with Diana? Pray you,

will you go with us?

1 i. e. a certain profit.

[Exeunt.

2 Thunder is supposed to have the effect of rousing eels from the mud, and so render them more easy to take in stormy weather.

SCENE IV. Tharsus. A Room in Cleon's House.

Enter CLEON and DIONYZA.

Dion. Why, are you foolish? Can it be undone? Cle. O Dionyza, such a piece of slaughter

The sun and moon ne'er looked upon!

Dion.

You'll turn a child again.

I think

Cle. Were I chief lord of all the spacious world,
I'd give it to undo the deed. O lady,

Much less in blood than virtue, yet a princess
To equal any single crown o' the earth,

I' the justice of compare! O villain Leonine,
Whom thou hast poisoned too!

If thou had'st drunk to him, it had been a kindness
Becoming well thy feat; what canst thou say,
When noble Pericles shall demand his child?

Dion. That she is dead. Nurses are not the fates,

To foster it, nor ever to preserve.

She died at night; I'll say so. Who can cross it?
Unless you play the impious innocent,2

And for an honest attribute, cry out,

She died by foul play.

Cle.

O, go to. Well, well,

Of all the faults beneath the heavens, the gods

Do like this worst.

Dion.
Be one of those that think
The pretty wrens of Tharsus will fly hence,
And open this to Pericles. I do shame
To think of what a noble strain you are,
And of how coward a spirit.

Cle.

To such proceeding Who ever but his approbation added,

1 The old copy reads face. The emendation is Mason's. Feat is deed, or exploit.

2 An innocent was formerly a common appellation for an idiot. She calls him an impious simpleton, because such a discovery would touch the life of one of his own family, his wife. Mason thinks that we should read, the pious innocent."

66

Though not his pre-consent, he did not flow
From honorable courses.

Dion.

Be it so, then ;

Yet none does know, but you, how she came dead,
Nor none can know, Leonine being gone.
She did distain' my child, and stood between
Her and her fortunes. None would look on her,
But cast their gazes on Marina's face;

Whilst ours was blurted at, and held a malkin,3
Not worth the time of day. It pierced me thorough;
And though you call my course unnatural,
You not your child well loving, yet I find,

It greets me as an enterprise of kindness,
Performed to your sole daughter.

Cle.

Dion. And as for Pericles,

Heavens forgive it!

What should he say? We wept after her hearse,

And even yet we mourn; her monument

Is almost finished, and her epitaphs
In glittering, golden characters express
A general praise to her, and care in us
At whose expense 'tis done.

Cle.
Which, to betray, doth with thine angel's face
Seize with thine eagle's talons.5

Thou art like the harpy,

6

Dion. You are like one, that superstitiously Doth swear to the gods, that winter kills the flies; " But yet I know you'll do as I advise.

[Exeunt.

1 The old copy reads, "She did disdain my child." But Marina was not of a disdainful temper. The verb distain is several times used by Shakspeare in the sense of to eclipse, to throw into the shade.

2 This contemptuous expression frequently occurs in our ancient dramas.

3 A coarse wench, not worth a good-morrow.

4 "It greets me

appears to mean it salutes me, or is grateful to me. 5" With thine angel's face," &c. means, You having an angel's face, a look of innocence, have, at the same time, an eagle's talons."

6 This passage appears to mean, You are so affectedly humane, that you would appeal to Heaven against the cruelty of winter in killing the flies. Superstitious is explained by Johnson, scrupulous beyond need.— Boswell.

Enter GowER, before the monument of MARINA at

Tharsus.

Gow. Thus time we waste, and longest leagues make short;

Sail seas in cockles, have, and wish but for't;
Making (to take your imagination)
From bourn to bourn, region to region.
By you being pardoned, we commit no crime
To use one language, in each several clime,
Where our scenes seem to live. I do beseech
you
To learn of me, who stand i' the gap to teach you
The stages of our story. Pericles

Is now again thwarting the wayward seas,
(Attended on by many a lord and knight,)
To see his daughter, all his life's delight.
Old Escanes, whom Helicanus late 2
Advanced in time to great and high estate,
Is left to govern. Bear you it in mind,
Old Helicanus goes along behind.

Well-sailing ships, and bounteous winds, have brought
This king to Tharsus (think this pilot-thought; 3
So with his steerage shall your thoughts grow on,)
To fetch his daughter home, who first is gone.
Like motes and shadows see them move awhile;
Your ears unto your eyes I'll reconcile.

Dumb Show.

4

Enter, at one door, PERICLES, with his Train; CLEON and DIONYZA at the other. CLEON shows PERICLES

1 So in a former passage:-" O, make for Tharsus."-We still use a phrase exactly corresponding with take your imagination; i. e. “to take one's fancy."

2 These lines are strangely misplaced in the old copy. The transposition and corrections are by Steevens.

3 This is the reading of the old copy, which Malone altered to "his pilot thought." The passage, as it is, will bear the interpretation given to the correction :-"Let your imagination steer with him, be his pilot, and by accompanying him in his voyage, think this pilot-thought."

4 Who has left Tharsus before her father's arrival there.