Cymbeline (15 page)

I would have left it on the
board
so
⁵³
soon

As I had made my meal, and
parted
⁵⁴

With prayers for the provider.

GUIDERIUS
    Money, youth?

ARVIRAGUS
    All gold and silver rather turn to dirt,

As ’tis no better
reckoned
but of
⁵⁸
those

Who worship dirty gods.

INNOGEN
    I see you’re angry:

Know, if you kill me for my fault, I
should
⁶¹

Have died had I not
made
⁶²
it.

BELARIUS
    
Whither bound?
⁶³

INNOGEN
    To Milford Haven.

BELARIUS
    What’s your name?

INNOGEN
    
Fidele
⁶⁶
, sir: I have a kinsman who

Is bound for Italy; he embarked at Milford,

To whom being going, almost
spent
⁶⁸
with hunger,

I am fall’n
in
⁶⁹
this offence.

BELARIUS
    Prithee, fair youth,

Think us no
churls
⁷¹
: nor measure our good minds

By this
rude
⁷²
place we live in. Well encountered!

’Tis almost night: you shall have better
cheer
⁷³

Ere you depart, and
thanks
⁷⁴
to stay and eat it.

Boys, bid him welcome.

GUIDERIUS
    Were you a woman, youth,

I should woo
hard
but be
your groom
in honesty
⁷⁷
:

Ay, bid for you as I’d buy.
⁷⁸

ARVIRAGUS
    I’ll make’t my comfort

He is a man, I’ll love him as my brother:

And such a welcome as I’d give to him

After long absence, such is yours. Most welcome!

Be
sprightly
⁸³
, for you fall ’mongst friends.

INNOGEN
    
’Mongst friends
⁸⁴

If brothers.— Would it had been so that they

Had been my father’s sons, then had my
prize
⁸⁶

Been less, and so more equal ballasting

To thee, Posthumus.

BELARIUS
    He
wrings
⁸⁹
at some distress.

GUIDERIUS
    Would I could
free’t.
⁹⁰

ARVIRAGUS
    Or I, whate’er it be,

What pain it cost, what danger. Gods!

BELARIUS
    Hark, boys.

INNOGEN
    Great men

That had a court no bigger than this cave,

That did
attend themselves
⁹⁶
and had the virtue

Which their own conscience
sealed them
—
laying by
⁹⁷

That
nothing-gift
of
differing multitudes
⁹⁸
—

Could not
out-peer
these
twain.
⁹⁹
Pardon me, gods,

I’d change my sex to be companion with them,

Since
Leonatus’
¹⁰¹
false.

BELARIUS
    It shall be so:

Boys, we’ll go
dress our hunt.
¹⁰³
Fair youth, come in:

Discourse is heavy, fasting
¹⁰⁴
: when we have supped

We’ll
mannerly
demand
¹⁰⁵
thee of thy story,

So far as thou wilt speak it.

GUIDERIUS
    Pray draw near.

ARVIRAGUS
    
The night to th’owl and morn to th’lark less welcome.
¹⁰⁸

INNOGEN
    Thanks, sir.

ARVIRAGUS
    I pray draw near.

FIRST SENATOR
    This is the
tenor
of the emperor’s
writ
¹
:

That since the common
men
²
are now in action

Gainst the
Pannonians and Dalmatians
³
,

And that the legions now in Gallia are

Full
⁵
weak to undertake our wars against

The
fall’n-off
Britons, that we do
incite
⁶

The gentry to this business. He creates

Lucius proconsul: and to you the tribunes,

For this immediate levy, he
commands
⁹

His
absolute commission.
¹⁰
Long live Caesar!

TRIBUNE
    Is Lucius general of the forces?

SECOND SENATOR
    Ay.

TRIBUNE
    Remaining now in Gallia?

FIRST SENATOR
    With those legions

Which I have spoke of, whereunto your levy

Must be
supplyant
¹⁶
: the words of your commission

Will tie you to the numbers and the time

Of their dispatch.

TRIBUNE
    We will discharge our duty.

CLOTEN
    I am near to th’place where they should meet, if

Pisanio have mapped it truly. How
fit
²
his garments serve me!

Why should his mistress, who was made by him that made

the tailor, not be
fit
too? The rather —
saving reverence of
⁴

the word — for ’tis said a woman’s fitness comes by
fits.
⁵

Therein I must
play the workman.
⁶
I dare speak it to myself,

for it is not
vainglory
for a man and his
glass
⁷
to confer in his

own chamber; I mean, the lines of my body are as well

drawn as his: no less young, more strong, not beneath him in

fortunes, beyond him in the
advantage of the time
¹⁰
, above

him in birth,
alike conversant
in
general services
¹¹
, and more

remarkable in
single oppositions
; yet this
imperceiverant
¹²

thing loves him
in my despite.
What
mortality
¹³
is! Posthumus,

thy head, which now is growing upon thy shoulders, shall

within this hour be off, thy mistress
enforced
¹⁵
, thy garments

cut to pieces before thy face: and all this done,
spurn
¹⁶
her

home to her father, who may
haply
¹⁷
be a little angry for my so

rough
usage
: but my mother, having
power of
his
testiness
¹⁸
,

shall turn all into my
commendations.
¹⁹
My horse is tied up

safe. Out, sword, and to a
sore
purpose!
Fortune
²⁰
put

them into my hand. This is the very description of their

meeting-place, and the fellow dares not deceive me.

BELARIUS
    You are not well: remain here in the cave,

We’ll come to you after hunting.

ARVIRAGUS
    Brother, stay here:

Are we not brothers?

INNOGEN
    So man and man should be,

But clay and clay differs in dignity,

Whose dust is both alike. I am very sick.

GUIDERIUS
    Go you to hunting, I’ll abide with him.

INNOGEN
    So sick I am not, yet I am not well:

But not so
citizen
a
wanton
¹⁰
as

To seem to die
ere
¹¹
sick: so please you, leave me,

Stick to your
journal
course: the
breach of custom
¹²

Is breach of all. I am ill, but your being by me

Cannot
amend me.
Society
¹⁴
is no comfort

To one not sociable: I am not very sick,

Since I can
reason of
¹⁶
it: pray you trust me here,

I’ll rob
none
¹⁷
but myself, and let me die,

Stealing so poorly.
¹⁸

GUIDERIUS
    I love thee: I have spoke it,

How much the quantity, the
weight
²⁰
as much,

As I do love my father.

BELARIUS
    What? How? How?

ARVIRAGUS
    If it be sin to say so, sir, I
yoke me
²³

In my good brother’s fault: I know not why

I love this youth, and I have heard you say

Love’s reason’s without reason. The
bier at door
²⁶
,

And a demand who is’t shall die, I’d say

‘My father, not this youth.’

BELARIUS
    O noble
strain!
²⁹

O worthiness of nature,
breed
³⁰
of greatness!

Cowards father cowards, and base things sire base:

Nature hath
meal and bran
³²
, contempt and grace.

I’m not their father,
yet who this should be
³³

Doth miracle itself, loved before me.—

’Tis the ninth hour o’th’morn.

ARVIRAGUS
    Brother, farewell.

INNOGEN
    I wish ye sport.

ARVIRAGUS
    You health.—
So please you, sir.
³⁸

INNOGEN
    These are kind creatures.

Gods, what lies I have heard!

Our courtiers say all’s savage
but
⁴¹
at court;

Experience, O, thou disprov’st report!

Th’imperious seas breeds monsters; for the dish

Poor
tributary
⁴⁴
rivers as sweet fish:

I am sick still, heart-sick. Pisanio,

I’ll now taste of thy drug.

GUIDERIUS
    I could not
stir
⁴⁷
him:

He said he was
gentle
⁴⁸
, but unfortunate;

Dishonestly afflicted
⁴⁹
, but yet honest.

ARVIRAGUS
    Thus did he answer me, yet said hereafter

I might know more.

BELARIUS
    
To th’field
⁵²
, to th’field!

We’ll leave you for this time, go in and rest.

ARVIRAGUS
    We’ll not be long away.

BELARIUS
    Pray be not sick,

For you must be our housewife.

INNOGEN
    Well or ill,

I am
bound
⁵⁸
to you.

BELARIUS
    And shalt be ever.

This youth, howe’er
distressed
⁶⁰
, appears he hath had

Good ancestors.

ARVIRAGUS
    How angel-like he sings!

GUIDERIUS
    But his neat cookery! He cut our
roots
in
characters
⁶³
,

And sauced our broths
as
Juno
⁶⁴
had been sick

And he her
dieter.
⁶⁵

ARVIRAGUS
    Nobly he
yokes
⁶⁶

A smiling with a sigh, as if the sigh

Was
that
⁶⁸
it was for not being such a smile:

The smile mocking the sigh, that it would fly

From so divine a temple, to
commix
⁷⁰

With winds that sailors
rail
⁷¹
at.

GUIDERIUS
    I do note

That grief and patience, rooted in him both,

Mingle their
spurs
⁷⁴
together.

ARVIRAGUS
    
Grow patience
⁷⁵
,

And let the stinking elder, grief, untwine

His perishing root
with
⁷⁷
the increasing vine.

BELARIUS
    It is
great morning.
⁷⁸
Come away.— Who’s there?