A Room in CYMBELINE’S Palace. | |
| |
Enter IMOGEN and PISANIO. | |
| Imo. I would thou grew’st unto the shores of the haven, | |
| And question’dst every sail: if he should write, | 4 |
| And I not have it, ’twere a paper lost, | |
| As offer’d mercy is. What was the last | |
| That he spake to thee? | |
| Pis. It was his queen, his queen! | 8 |
| Imo. Then wav’d his handkerchief? | |
| Pis. And kiss’d it, madam. | |
| Imo. Senseless linen, happier therein than I! | |
| And that was all? | 12 |
| Pis. No, madam; for so long | |
| As he could make me with this eye or ear | |
| Distinguish him from others, he did keep | |
| The deck, with glove, or hat, or handkerchief, | 16 |
| Still waving, as the fits and stirs of ’s mind | |
| Could best express how slow his soul sail’d on, | |
| How swift his ship. | |
| Imo. Thou shouldst have made him | 20 |
| As little as a crow, or less, ere left | |
| To after-eye him. | |
| Pis. Madam, so I did. | |
| Imo. I would have broke mine eye-strings, crack’d them, but | 24 |
| To look upon him, till the diminution | |
| Of space had pointed him sharp as my needle, | |
| Nay, follow’d him, till he had melted from | |
| The smallness of a gnat to air, and then | 28 |
| Have turn’d mine eye, and wept. But, good Pisanio, | |
| When shall we hear from him? | |
| Pis. Be assur’d, madam, | |
| With his next vantage. | 32 |
| Imo. I did not take my leave of him, but had | |
| Most pretty things to say; ere I could tell him | |
| How I would think on him at certain hours | |
| Such thoughts and such, or I could make him swear | 36 |
| The shes of Italy should not betray | |
| Mine interest and his honour, or have charg’d him, | |
| At the sixth hour of morn, at noon, at midnight, | |
| To encounter me with orisons, for then | 40 |
| I am in heaven for him; or ere I could | |
| Give him that parting kiss which I had set | |
| Betwixt two charming words, comes in my father, | |
| And like the tyrannous breathing of the north | 44 |
| Shakes all our buds from growing. | |
| |
Enter a Lady. | |
| Lady. The queen, madam, | |
| Desires your highness’ company. | 48 |
| Imo. Those things I bid you do, get them dispatch’d. | |
| I will attend the queen. | |
| Pis. Madam, I shall. [Exeunt. | |
