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,
I'd give it to undo the deed. O lady,

Much less in blood than virtue, yet a princess
To equal any single crown o' the earth,

I' the justice of compare! O villain Leonine,
Whom thou hast poisoned too!

If thou had'st drunk to him, it had been a kindness
Becoming well thy feat; what canst thou say,

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?
Unless you play the impious innocent,2

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.
Be one of those that think
The pretty wrens of Tharsus will fly hence,
And open this to Pericles. I do shame
To think of what a noble strain you are,
And of how coward a spirit.

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
From honorable courses.

Dion.

Be it so, then ;

Yet none does know, but you, how she came dead,
Nor none can know, Leonine being gone.

1

She did distain 1 my child, and stood between

Her and her fortunes. None would look on her,
But cast their gazes on Marina's face;

Whilst ours was blurted 2 at, and held a malkin,3
Not worth the time of day. It pierced me thorough;
And though you call my course unnatural,
You not your child well loving, yet I find,

It greets me as an enterprise of kindness,
Performed to your sole daughter.

Cle.

Dion. And as for Pericles,

Heavens forgive it!

What should he say? We wept after her hearse,
And even yet we mourn; her monument

Is almost finished, and her epitaphs
In glittering, golden characters express
A general praise to her, and care in us
At whose expense 'tis done.

Cle.

Thou art like the harpy,

Which, to betray, doth with thine angel's face
Seize with thine eagle's talons.5

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;
Making' (to take your imagination)

From bourn to bourn, region to region.

By you being pardoned, we commit no crime
To use one language, in each several clime,
Where our scenes seem to live. I do beseech you
To learn of me, who stand i' the gap to teach you
The stages of our story. Pericles

Is now again thwarting the wayward seas,
(Attended on by many a lord and knight,)
To see his daughter, all his life's delight.
Old Escanes, whom Helicanus late 2
Advanced in time to great and high estate,
Is left to govern. Bear you it in mind,
Old Helicanus goes along behind.

3

Well-sailing ships, and bounteous winds, have brought
This king to Tharsus (think this pilot-thought;
So with his steerage shall your thoughts grow on,)
To fetch his daughter home, who first is gone.*
Like motes and shadows see them move awhile;
Your ears unto your eyes I'll reconcile.

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!
This borrowed passion stands for true old woe;1
And Pericles, in sorrow all devoured,

With sighs shot through, and biggest tears o'ershowered,
Leaves Tharsus, and again embarks. He swears
Never to wash his face, nor cut his hairs;
He puts on sackcloth, and to sea. He bears
A tempest, which his mortal vessel 2 tears,
And yet he rides it out. Now please you wit3
The epitaph is for Marina writ

By wicked Dionyza.

[Reads the inscription on MARINA's monument.

The fairest, sweet'st, and best, lies here,
Who withered in her spring of year.

She was of Tyrus, the king's daughter,
On whom foul death hath made this slaughter.
Marina was she called; and at her birth,

4

Thetis, being proud, swallowed some part o'the earth.
Therefore the earth, fearing to be o'erflowed,

Hath Thetis birth-child on the Heavens bestowed;
Wherefore she does (and swears she'll never stint)5
Make raging battery upon shores of flint.
No visor does become black villany,
So well as soft and tender flattery.
Let Pericles believe his daughter's dead,
And bear his courses to be ordered
By lady Fortune; while our scenes display
His daughter's woe and heavy well-a-day,
In her unholy service. Patience, then,
And think you now are all in Mitylen.

[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.