The most excellent, most wise, most dainty, precious, loving, kind, sweet, intolerably fair lady Thamasta commends to your little hands this letter of importance. By your leave, let me first kiss, and then deliver it in fashion to your own proper beauty. [Delivers a letter. Cleo. To me, from her? 'tis strange! I dare peruse it. [Reads. Cuc. Good.-O, that I had not resolved to live a single life! Here's temptation, able to conjure up a spirit with a witness. So, so! she has read it. [Aside. Cleo. Is't possible? Heaven, thou art great and boun tiful. Sir, I much thank your pains; and to the princess Cuc. They shall mad-dam. Cleo. When we of hopes or helps are quite bereaven, Our humble prayers have entrance into Heaven. Cuc. That's my opinion clearly and without doubt. [Exeunt. SCENE III.-A Room in the Palace. Enter ARETUS and SOPHRONOS. Are. The prince is throughly moved. So much distempered. Are. I never saw him What should this young man be? 'Tis to me Nor I. Enter PALADOR, AMETHUS, and PELIAS. The mockery ye make of my dull patience, Yet ye shall know, the best of ye, that in me Which, once provoked, shall, like a bearded comet, Pel. Good sir, Pal. Good sir! 'tis not your active wit or language, Nor your grave politic wisdoms, lords, shall dare To check-mate and control my just commands. Enter MENAPHON. Where is the youth, your friend? is he found yet? Pal. Fly, then, to the desert, Where thou didst first encounter this fantastic, This airy apparition; come no more In sight! Get ye all from me: he that stays Is not my friend. Amet. Are. Soph. 'Tis strange. We must obey. [Exeunt all but PALADOR. Pal. Some angry power cheats with rare delusions My credulous sense; the very soul of reason Is troubled in me;-the physician Presented a strange masque, the view of it Enter RHETIAS. Rhetias, thou art acquainted with my griefs : into every corner There is some Pal. There is; there is some practice, sleight, or plot. Rhe. I have apprehended a fair wench in an odd pri vate lodging in the city, as like the youth in face as can by possibility be discerned. Pal. How, Rhetias! Rhe. If it be not Parthenophil in long-coats, 'tis a spirit in his likeness; answer I can get none from her: you shall see her. Pal. The young man in disguise, upon my life, To steal out of the land. Rhe. Pal. Do, do, my Rhetias. I'll send him t’ye. [Exit RHETIAS. As there is by nature In everything created contrariety, So likewise is there unity and league Between them in their kind: but man, the abstract Of Heaven hath modelled, in himself contains [Enter behind EROCLEA (PARTHENOPHIL), The music Of man's fair composition best accords When 'tis in consort, not in single strains : True harmony consisted. Living here, We are Heaven's bounty all, but Fortune's exercise. Doth waste us to our graves, and we look on it: At last, and ends in sorrow; but the life, Wailing in sighs, until the last drop down; So to conclude calamity in rest. Pal. What echo yields a voice to my complaints? Can I be nowhere private? Ero. [Comes forward, and kneels] Let the substance As suddenly be hurried from your eyes As the vain sound can pass, sir, from your ear, Retain a constant memory. Pal. Stand up. 'Tis not the figure stamped upon thy cheeks, [She rises. Ero. I am so worn away with fears and sorrows, That the bright sun of your life-quickening presence Pal. Cunning impostor! Untruth hath made thee subtle in thy trade. Some bolder act of treachery by cutting Hast thou assumed a shape that would make treason As holy as the sacrifice of peace? Ero. The incense of my love-desires are flamed Sir, O, sir, turn me back into the world, A burial without pity in your scorn! Pal. My scorn, disdainful boy, shall soon unweave And so I may be gentle as thou art, In thy demeanours; turn, turn from me, prithee, For my belief is armed else. Yet, fair subtility, Before we part, for part we must,—be true: Great goodness, The unfortunate Eroclea. In this seducing counterfeit. Hath honesty and virtue left the time? Are we become so impious, that to tread Give me thy name. Ero. Whilst I was lost to memory Parthenophil did shroud my shame in change Of sundry rare misfortunes; but, since now A convoy to my grave, I must not blush To let Prince Palador, if I offend, Know, when he dooms me, that he dooms Eroclea : Pal. Join not too fast Thy penance with the story of my sufferings:-- So martyrdom and holiness are twins, As innocence and sweetness on thy tongue. But, let me by degrees collect my senses; I may abuse my trust. Tell me, what air Hast thou perfumed, since tyranny first ravished The contract of our hearts ? Ero. Have I been buried. Pal. Dear sir, in Athens Buried! Right; as I In Cyrus.--Come to trial; if thou beest |