Read Cymbeline Online

Authors: William Shakespeare

Cymbeline (18 page)

To Pisanio

We’ll
slip you for a season
, but our
jealousy
25

Does yet depend.
26

FIRST LORD
    So please your majesty,

The Roman legions, all from Gallia drawn,

Are landed on your coast with a supply

Of Roman
gentlemen
30
by the senate sent.

CYMBELINE
    
Now for
31
the counsel of my son and queen!

I am
amazed with matter.
32

FIRST LORD
    Good my liege,

Your preparation can
affront
34
no less

Than what you hear of.
Come more
35
, for more you’re ready:

The want is but
36
to put those powers in motion

That long to move.

CYMBELINE
    I thank you: let’s withdraw

And meet the time as it seeks us. We fear not

What can from Italy
annoy
40
us, but

We grieve at
chances
41
here. Away.

Exeunt
[
all but Pisanio
]

PISANIO
    I heard
no letter
42
from my master since

I wrote him Innogen was slain. ’Tis strange:

Nor hear I from my mistress, who did promise

To yield me often tidings. Neither know I

What
is betid
46
to Cloten, but remain

Perplexed in all. The heavens still must work.

Wherein I am false I am honest: not true, to be true.

These present wars shall
find
49
I love my country,

Even to the note o’th’king
, or I’ll
fall
50
in them.

All other doubts, by time let them be cleared:

Fortune brings in some boats that are not steered.
52

Exit

Act 4 Scene 4

running scene 16

Enter Belarius, Guiderius and Arviragus

GUIDERIUS
    The
noise
1
is round about us.

BELARIUS
    Let us from it.

ARVIRAGUS
    What pleasure, sir, find we in life, to
lock it
3

From action and adventure?

GUIDERIUS
    Nay, what hope

Have we in hiding us?
This way
6
the Romans

Must
or for
Britons slay us or
receive us
7

For barbarous and unnatural revolts

During their use, and slay us after.

BELARIUS
    Sons,

We’ll higher to the mountains, there
secure us.
11

To the king’s party there’s no going: newness

Of Cloten’s death — we being
not known, not
mustered
13

Among the bands — may
drive us to a render
14

Where we have lived, and so
extort from’s
15
that

Which we have done, whose
answer
16
would be death

Drawn on with
17
torture.

GUIDERIUS
    This is, sir, a doubt

In such a time nothing becoming you,

Nor satisfying us.

ARVIRAGUS
    It is not likely

That when they hear the Roman horses neigh,

Behold their
quartered fires
23
, have both their eyes

And ears so
cloyed importantly
24
as now,

That they will waste their time
upon our note
25
,

To know from whence we are.

BELARIUS
    O, I am known

Of
28
many in the army: many years,

Though Cloten
then
but young, you see, not
wore
29
him

From my
remembrance.
30
And besides, the king

Hath not deserved my service nor your loves,

Who find in my exile the
want of breeding
32
,

The
certainty
of this hard life,
aye hopeless
33

To have the
courtesy
your
cradle
34
promised,

But to be
still
hot summer’s
tanlings
35
and

The
shrinking
slaves
of
winter.
36

GUIDERIUS
    Than be so,

Better to cease to be. Pray, sir, to th’army:

I and my brother are not known; yourself

So
out of thought
, and
thereto so o’ergrown
40
,

Cannot be
questioned.
41

ARVIRAGUS
    By this sun that shines,

I’ll thither: what
thing is’t
43
that I never

Did see man die, scarce ever looked on blood

But that of coward hares,
hot
goats and
venison!
45

Never bestrid a horse, save one that had

A rider like myself, who ne’er wore
rowel
47

Nor
iron
48
on his heel! I am ashamed

To look upon the holy sun, to have

The benefit of his blest beams, remaining

So long a poor unknown.

GUIDERIUS
    By heavens, I’ll go:

If you will bless me, sir, and give me leave,

I’ll take the better
care
54
: but if you will not,

The
hazard therefore due
55
fall on me by

The hands of Romans.

ARVIRAGUS
    So say I, amen.

BELARIUS
    No reason I, since of your lives you set

So slight a valuation, should reserve

My
cracked
60
one to more care. Have with you, boys!

If in your
country
61
wars you chance to die,

That is my bed too, lads, and there I’ll lie.

Aside

Lead, lead.— The time seems long,
their blood thinks
63

   scorn

Till it fly out and show them princes born.

Exeunt

Act 5 Scene 1

running scene 17

Enter Posthumus alone

With a bloody handkerchief

POSTHUMUS
    Yea,
bloody cloth
1
, I’ll keep thee: for I wished

Thou shouldst be coloured thus. You married ones,

If each of you should take this
course
3
, how many

Must murder wives much better than themselves

For
wrying
5
but a little? O Pisanio,

Every good servant
does not
6
all commands:

No bond but
7
to do just ones. Gods, if you

Should have
8
ta’en vengeance on my faults, I never

Had lived to
put on this
9
: so had you saved

The noble Innogen to
repent
10
, and struck

Me, wretch, more
worth
11
your vengeance. But alack,

You snatch some hence for little faults; that’s love,

To have them
fall
13
no more: you some permit

To
second
ills with ills, each
elder
14
worse,

And
make them dread it
, to the doer’s
thrift.
15

But Innogen is your own: do your best wills,

And make me blest to obey. I am brought hither

Among th’Italian gentry, and to fight

Against my lady’s kingdom: ’tis enough

That, Britain, I have killed thy mistress: peace,

I’ll give no wound to thee. Therefore, good heavens,

Hear patiently my purpose: I’ll disrobe me

Of these Italian
weeds
and
suit
23
myself

As does a Briton peasant: so I’ll fight

Against the
part
25
I come with: so I’ll die

For thee, O Innogen, even for whom my life

Is every breath a death: and thus, unknown,

Pitied
28
nor hated, to the face of peril

Myself I’ll dedicate. Let me make men know

More valour in me than my
habits
30
show.

Gods, put the strength o’th’Leonati in me!

To shame the
guise
32
o’th’world, I will begin

The fashion,
less without and more within.
33

Exit

Act 5 Scene 2

running scene 18

Enter Lucius, Iachimo and the Roman army at one door: and the Briton
army at another: Leonatus Posthumus following like a poor soldier
.
They march over and go out. Then enter again, in skirmish, Iachimo
and Posthumus: he vanquisheth and disarmeth Iachimo, and then
leaves him

IACHIMO
    The heaviness and guilt within my
bosom
1

Takes
off
my manhood: I have
belied
2
a lady,

The princess of this country, and the air
on’t
3

Revengingly enfeebles me;
or could
this
carl
4
,

A
very drudge of nature’s
5
, have subdued me

In my
profession?
6
Knighthoods and honours, borne

As I wear mine, are titles
but of scorn.
7

If that thy gentry, Britain,
go before
8

This lout as he exceeds our lords, the
odds
9

Is that we scarce are men and you are gods.

Exit

The battle continues, the Britons fly, Cymbeline is taken: then enter, to his rescue, Belarius, Guiderius and Arviragus

BELARIUS
    Stand, stand, we have th’advantage of the ground.

The lane is guarded: nothing
routs
12
us but

The villainy of our fears.

GUIDERIUS

and
ARVIRAGUS
    Stand, stand and fight.

Enter Posthumus and
seconds
the Britons. They rescue Cymbeline, and exeunt. Then enter Lucius, Iachimo and Innogen

LUCIUS
    Away, boy, from the troops, and save thyself:

For friends kill friends, and the disorder’s such

As
war were
hoodwinked.
17

IACHIMO
    ’Tis their fresh supplies.

LUCIUS
    It is a day turned strangely:
or betimes
19

Let’s reinforce, or fly.

Exeunt

Act 5 Scene 3

running scene 18 continues

Enter Posthumus and a Briton Lord

LORD
    Cam’st thou from where they made the stand?

POSTHUMUS
    I did.

Though you, it seems, come from the
fliers.
3

LORD
    I did.

POSTHUMUS
    No blame be to you, sir, for all was lost,

But
6
that the heavens fought: the king himself

Of his
wings
7
destitute, the army broken,

And
but
8
the backs of Britons seen, all flying

Through a
strait
lane: the enemy
full-hearted
9
,

Lolling the tongue
10
with slaught’ring, having work

More plentiful than tools to do’t, struck down

Some
mortally
, some slightly
touched
12
, some falling

Merely through fear, that the strait pass was
dammed
13

With dead men hurt behind, and cowards living

To die with
lengthened
15
shame.

LORD
    Where was this lane?

POSTHUMUS
    Close by the battle, ditched and walled with turf,

Which gave advantage to an
ancient
18
soldier,

An honest one, I warrant,
who deserved
19

So long a breeding as his white beard came to

In doing this for’s country. Athwart the lane,

He, with two
striplings
— lads more like to
run
22

The country base than to commit such slaughter,

With faces fit for
masks
24
, or rather fairer

Than those for preservation cased, or shame —

Made good
26
the passage, cried to those that fled,

‘Our Britain’s
harts
27
die flying, not our men:

To darkness fleet souls that fly backwards.
28
Stand,

Or we are Romans, and will give you
that
29

Like beasts
which you shun
beastly
30
, and may save

But to look back in
frown
31
: stand, stand.’ These three,

Three thousand confident, in act as many
32

For three performers are the
file
33
when all

The rest do nothing — with this word ‘Stand, stand’,

Accommodated
by the place, more
charming
35

With their own nobleness, which could have turned

A
distaff
to a lance,
gilded pale looks
37
;

Part
38
shame, part spirit renewed, that some, turned coward

But by example
39
— O, a sin in war,

Damned in the first beginners! —
’gan to look
40

The way that they did, and to
grin
like
lions
41

Upon the pikes o’th’hunters. Then began

A
stop i’th’chaser
; a
retire
:
anon
43

A rout, confusion thick: forthwith they fly

Chickens the way which
they stooped eagles
:
slaves
45
,

The strides they victors made: and now our cowards,

Like fragments in hard voyages, became
47

The life o’th’need:
having found the back door open
48

Of the unguarded hearts, heavens, how they wound!

Some slain before, some dying
,
some their friends
50

O’erborne i’th’former wave, ten chased by one,

Are now each one the slaughter-man of twenty:

Those that would die
or ere resist
are grown
53

The
mortal bugs
o’th’field.
54

LORD
    This was strange chance:

A narrow lane, an old man, and two boys.

POSTHUMUS
    Nay, do not
wonder at it
57
: you are made

Rather to wonder at the things you hear

Than to
work any.
Will you rhyme
upon’t
59
,

And
vent
it
for a mock’ry?
60
Here is one:

‘Two boys, an old man —
twice a boy
61
— a lane,

Preserved the Britons, was the Romans’
bane.
62

LORD
    Nay, be not angry, sir.

POSTHUMUS
    
’Lack, to what end?
64

Who dares not
stand
65
his foe, I’ll be his friend:

For if he’ll do as he is
made
66
to do,

I know he’ll quickly
fly my friendship
67
too.

You have put me into rhyme.

LORD
    Farewell, you’re angry.

Other books

Claws of the Dragon by Craig Halloran
Prep: A Novel by Curtis Sittenfeld
The VIP Room by Lauren Landish, Emilia Winters, Sarah Brooks, Alexa Wilder, Layla Wilcox, Kira Ward, Terra Wolf, Crystal Kaswell, Lily Marie
Cassie's Chance by Paul, Antonia
In a Gilded Cage by Rhys Bowen
Turnabout's Fair Play by Kaye Dacus
Darkness Falls (DA 7) by Keri Arthur


readsbookonline.com Copyright 2016 - 2024