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, Much less in blood than virtue, yet a princess I' the justice of compare! O villain Leonine, If thou had'st drunk to him, it had been a kindness 1 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? 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. 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." Though not his pre-consent, he did not flow Dion. Be it so, then ; Yet none does know, but you, how she came dead, 1 She did distain 1 my child, and stood between Her and her fortunes. None would look on her, Whilst ours was blurted 2 at, and held a malkin,3 It greets me as an enterprise of kindness, Cle. Dion. And as for Pericles, Heavens forgive it! What should he say? We wept after her hearse, Is almost finished, and her epitaphs Cle. Thou art like the harpy, Which, to betray, doth with thine angel's face 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; From bourn to bourn, region to region. By you being pardoned, we commit no crime Is now again thwarting the wayward seas, 3 Well-sailing ships, and bounteous winds, have brought Dumb Show. 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. the tomb of MARINA; whereat PERICLES makes lamentation, puts on sackcloth, and in a mighty passion departs. Then CLEON and DIONYZA retire. Gow. See how belief may suffer by foul show! With sighs shot through, and biggest tears o'ershowered, By wicked Dionyza. [Reads the inscription on MARINA's monument. The fairest, sweet'st, and best, lies here, She was of Tyrus, the king's daughter, 4 Thetis, being proud, swallowed some part o'the earth. Hath Thetis birth-child on the Heavens bestowed; [Exit. 1 i. e. for such tears as were shed when dissimulation was unknown. 2 What is here called his mortal vessel (i. e. his body) is styled by Cleopatra her mortal house. 3 í. e. know. 4 The inscription alludes to the violent storm which accompanied the birth of Marina. 5 i. e. never cease. SCENE V. Mitylene. A Street before the Brothel. Enter, from the brothel, two Gentlemen. 1 Gent. Did you ever hear the like? 2 Gent. No, nor never shall do in such a place as this, she being once gone. 1 Gent. But to have divinity preached there! did you ever dream of such a thing? 2 Gent. No, no. Come, I am for no more bawdyhouses; shall we go hear the vestals sing? 1 Gent. I'll do any thing now that is virtuous; but I am out of the road of rutting, forever. SCENE VI. The same. [Exeunt. A Room in the Brothel. Enter PANDER, Bawd, and BOULT. Pand. Well, I had rather than twice the worth of her, she had ne'er come here. Bawd. Fie, fie upon her; she is able to freeze the god Priapus, and undo a whole generation. We must either get her ravished, or be rid of her. When she should do for clients her fitment, and do me the kindness of our profession, she has me her quirks, her reasons, her master-reasons, her prayers, her knees; that she would make a puritan of the devil, if he should cheapen a kiss of her. Boult. 'Faith, I must ravish her, or she'll disfurnish us of all our cavaliers, and make all our swearers priests. Pand. Now, the pox upon her green-sickness for me! Bawd. 'Faith, there's no way to be rid on't, but by the way to the pox. Here comes the lord Lysimachus, disguised. Boult. We should have both lord and lown, if the peevish baggage would but give way to customers. |