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Bel.

I had no mind

To hunt this day: the boy Fidele's sickness
Did make my way long forth."

With his own sword,

Gui. Which he did wave against my throat, I have ta'en His head from him: I'll throw't into the creek Behind our rock; and let it to the sea,

And tell the fishes, he's the queen's son, Cloten: That's all I reck.

Bel.

[Exit. I fear, 'twill be reveng'd: 'Would, Polydore, thou had'st not done't! though

valour

Becomes thee well enough.

Arv.

'Would I had done't,

So the revenge alone pursued me!-Polydore,

I love thee brotherly; but envy much,

Thou hast robb'd me of this deed: I would, revenges, That possible strength might meet, would seek us

through,

And put us to our answer,

Bel.

Well, 'tis done:

We'll hunt no more to-day, nor seek for danger

Where there's no profit. I pr'ythee, to our rock; You and Fidele play the cooks: I'll stay

Till hasty Polydore return, and bring him

To dinner presently.

Arv.

Poor sick Fidele!

I'll willingly to him: To gain his colour,
I'd let a parish of such Clotens blood,
And praise myself for charity.

[Exit.

O thou goddess,

Bel.
Thou divine Nature, how thyself thou blazon'st
In these two princely boys! They are as gentle

5 Did make my way long forth.] Fidele's sickness made my walk forth from the cave tedious.

..6

To gain his colour,] i. e. to restore him to the bloom of health, to recall the colour of it into his cheeks.

As zephyrs, blowing below the violet,

Not wagging his sweet head: and yet as rough,
Their royal blood enchaf'd, as the rud'st wind,
That by the top doth take the mountain pine,
And make him stoop to the vale. 'Tis wonderful,
That an invisible instínct should frame them
To royalty unlearn'd; honour untaught;
Civility not seen from other; valour,

That wildly grows in them, but yields a crop
As if it had been sow'd! Yet still it's strange,
What Cloten's being here to us portends;
Or what his death will bring us,

Gui.

Re-enter GUIderius.

Where's my brother?

I have sent Cloten's clotpoll down the stream,
In embassy to his mother; his body's hostage
For his return.

Bel.

[Solemn Musick,

My ingenious instrument! Hark, Polydore, it sounds! But what occasion Hath Cadwal now to give it motion! Hark!

Gui. Is he at home?

Bel.

He went hence even now.

Gui. What does he mean? since death of my

dear'st mother

It did not speak before. All solemn things
Should answer solemn accidents.

The matter?

Triumphs for nothing, and lamenting toys,'
Is jollity for apes, and grief for boys,

Is Cadwal mad?

Re-enter ARVIRAGUS, bearing IMOGEN as dead, in

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7- lamenting toys,] Toys formerly signified freaks, or frolicks.

And brings the dire occasion in his arms,
Of what we blame him for!

Arv.
The bird is dead,
That we have made so much on. I had rather
Have skipp'd from sixteen years of age to sixty,
To have turn'd my leaping time into a crutch,
Than have seen this.

Gui.

O sweetest, fairest lily! My brother wears thee not the one half so well, As when thou grew'st thyself.

Bel. O, melancholy! Who ever yet could sound thy bottom? find The ooze, to show what coast thy sluggish crare Might easiliest harbour in?-Thou blessed thing! Jove knows what man thou might'st have made; but I,

Thou diedst, a most rare boy, of melancholy!How found you him?

Arv.

Stark, as you see:

Thus smiling, as some fly had tickled slumber,
Not as death's dart, being laugh'd at: his right

cheek

Reposing on a cushion.

Gui.

Arv.

Where?

O'the floor;

His arms thus leagu'd: I thought, he slept; and put My clouted brogues' from off my feet, whose rude

ness

Answer'd my steps too loud.

Gui.

Why, he but sleeps:

what coast thy sluggish crare] A crare, is a small trading vessel, called in the Latin of the middle ages crayera. 9 Stark,] i. e. stiff.

1

clouted brogues-] are shoes strengthened with clout or hob-nails. In some parts of England, thin plates of iron called clouts, are likewise fixed to the shoes of ploughmen and other rusticks. Brog is the Irish word for a kind of shoe peculiar to that kingdom.

If he be gone, he'll make his grave a bed;
With female fairies will his tomb be haunted,
And worms will not come to thee.

Arv. With fairest flowers, Whilst summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele, I'll sweeten thy sad grave: Thou shalt not lack The flower, that's like thy face, pale primrose; nor The azur'd hare-bell, like thy veins; no, nor The leaf of eglantine, whom not to slander, Out-sweeten'd not thy breath: the ruddock' would, With charitable bill (O bill, sore-shaming Those rich-left heirs, that let their fathers lie Without a monument!) bring thee all this;

Yea, and furr'd moss besides, when flowers are none, To winter-ground thy corse.3

Gui.

Pr'ythee, have done; And do not play in wench-like words with that Which is so serious. Let us bury him,

And not protract with admiration what

Is now due debt.-To the grave.

Arv.

Say, where shall's lay him?

Gui. By good Euriphile, our mother.
Arv.

Be't so:

And let us, Polydore, though now our voices
Have got the mannish crack, sing him to the ground,
As once our mother; use like note, and words,
Save that Euriphile must be Fidele.

Gui. Cadwal,

I cannot sing: I'll weep, and word it with thee:
For notes of sorrow, out of tune, are worse
Than priests and fanes that lie.

2 The ruddock is the red-breast, and is so called by Chaucer and Spenser.

To winter-ground thy corse.] To winter-ground a plant, is to protect it from the inclemency of the winter-season, by straw, dung, &c. laid over it. This precaution is commonly taken in respect of tender trees or flowers, such as Arviragus, who loved Fidele, represents her to be.

Arv.

We'll speak it then. Bel. Great griefs, I see, medicine the less: for

Cloten

Is quite forgot. He was a queen's son, boys:
And, though he came our enemy, remember,
He was paid for that :3 Though mean and mighty.
rotting

Together, have one dust; yet reverence,

(That angel of the world,*) doth make distinction
Of place 'tween high and low. Our foe was princely;
And though you took his life, as being our foe,
Yet bury him as a prince.

Gui.
Pray you, fetch him hither.
Thersites' body is as good as Ajax,

When neither are alive.

Arv.

If you'll go fetch him.

We'll say our song the whilst.-Brother, begin.

[Exit BELARIUS. Gui. Nay, Cadwal, we must lay his head to the

east;

My father hath a reason for't.

Arv.

'Tis true.

Gui. Come on then, and remove him.

Arv.

So,-Begin.

4

SONG.

GUI. Fear no more the heat o'the sun,
Nor the furious winter's rages;
Thou thy worldly task hast done,

Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages:
Golden lads and girls all must,
As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.

He was paid for that:] Paid is for punished.

reverence,

(That angel of the world,)—] Reverence, or due regard to

ubordination, is the power that keeps peace and order in the world,

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