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Both heal and poison; how your thoughts are

Woven

With thousand changes in one subtle web,

And worn so by you; how that foolish man,
That reads the story of a woman's face
And dies believing it, is lost for ever;

How all the good you have is but a shadow,

I' the morning with you, and at night behind you
Past and forgotten; how your vows are frosts,
Fast for a night, and with the next sun gone; 120
How you are, being taken all together,

A mere confusion, and so dead a chaos,

That love cannot distinguish. These sad texts,
Till my last hour, I am bound to utter of you.
So, farewell all my woe, all my delight!

[Exit.

Are. Be merciful, ye gods, and strike me dead!
What way have I deserved this? Make my breast
Transparent as pure crystal, that the world,

Jealous of me, may see the foulest thought

My heart holds. Where shall a woman turn her

eyes,

To find out constancy?

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Enter Bellario.

Save me, how black

And guiltily, methinks, that boy looks now!
Oh, thou dissembler, that, before thou spak'st
Wert in thy cradle false, sent to make lies

Bel.

And betray innocents! Thy lord and thou
May glory in the ashes of a maid

Fooled by her passion; but the conquest is
Nothing so great as wicked. Fly away!

Let my command force thee to that which shame
Would do without it. If thou understood'st
The loathed office thou hast undergone,

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Why, thou wouldst hide thee under heaps of hills,
Lest men should dig and find thee.

Oh, what God,
Angry with men, hath sent this strange disease
Into the noblest minds! Madam, this grief
You add unto me is no more than drops

To seas, for which they are not seen to swell;
My lord hath struck his anger through my heart,
And let out all the hope of future joys.

You need not bid me fly; I came to part,

To take my latest leave. Farewell for ever!
I durst not run away in honesty

From such a lady, like a boy that stole

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Or made some grievous fault. The power of gods
Assist you in your sufferings!

Hasty time

Reveal the truth to your abusèd lord

And mine, that he may know your worth; whilst I
Go seek out some forgotten place to die!

[Exit Bellario.

Thou hast overthrown me

Are. Peace guide thee!

once ;

Yet, if I had another Troy to lose,

Thou, or another villain with thy looks,
Might talk me out of it, and send me naked,
My hair dishevelled, through the fiery streets.

Enter a Lady.

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Lady. Madam, the King would hunt, and calls for you With earnestness.

Are.

I am in tune to hunt!
Diana, if thou canst rage with a maid
As with a man, let me discover thee
Bathing, and turn me to a fearful hind,
That I may die pursued by cruel hounds,
And have my story written in my wounds!

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[Exeunt.

ACT THE FOURTH

SCENE I

Before the Palace.

Enter King, Pharamond, Arethusa, Galatea, Megra, Dion, Cleremont, Thrasiline, and Attendants.

King. What, are the hounds before and all the wood

men,

Our horses ready and our bows bent?

Dion.
All, sir.
King. You are cloudy, sir: come, we have forgotten

[To Pharamond.

Your venial trespass; let not that sit heavy Upon your spirit; here's none dare utter it. Dion. He looks like an old surfeited stallion after his leaping, dull as a dormouse. See how he sinks ! The wench has shot him between wind and water, and, I hope, sprung a leak. Thra. He needs no teaching, he strikes sure enough: his greatest fault is, he hunts too much in the purlieus; would he would leave off poaching!

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Dion. And for his horn, h'as left it at the lodge where

he lay late. Oh, he's a precious limehound! turn him loose upon the pursuit of a lady, and if he lose her, hang him up i' the slip. When my fox-bitch Beauty grows proud, I'll borrow him.

King. Is your boy turned away?

Are.

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You did command, sir,

And I obeyed you.

'Tis well done.

King.

Hark ye further. [They talk apart.

Cle. Is't possible this fellow should repent? methinks, that were not noble in him; and yet he looks like a mortified member, as if he had a sick man's salve in's mouth. If a worse man had done this fault now, some physical justice or other would presently (without the help of an almanack) have opened the obstructions of his liver, and let him blood with a dog-whip. 27 Dion. See, see how modestly yon lady looks, as if she came from churching with her neighbour! Why, what a devil can a man see in her face but that she's honest!

Thra. Faith, no great matter to speak of; a foolish twinkling with the eye, that spoils her coat; but he must be a cunning herald that finds it.

Dion. See how they muster one another! Oh, there's a rank regiment where the devil carries the colours and his dam drum-major! now the world and the flesh come behind with the carriage.

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