University of Virginia Library

SCENA QVARTA.

Hylas, Mirtillus, Charinus, Daphnis.
Pan be as cruell to his flocks and him,
As he has bin to me.

Mi.
Go, leave your cursing,
And follow her, let me alone with him.

Cha.
Ha! have I found you? Hoh! Nerina, stay,
Your father calls you; was not that my daughter
That made away so fast?

Mi.
Who, she thats gon?
Beleeve your eies no more, they are false to you.
Could you take one for her, thats nothing like her.
Twas Cloris went from us.

Cha.
Ist possible?

Mi.
Tis true.

Da.
I thought, that it had bin my love.

Cha.
I durst have sworne that she had bin my daughter,
What made she here? 'Twill nere be otherwise;
Young women will be chatting with young men,
What ere their father say. It was not so
When I was young, a boy, as you are, shepheards.

Mi.
Wee are not men with him, till after fiftie.

Cha.
We never durst keepe company with women,
Nor they with us, each one did carefully
Attend his charge: And when the time was come
That we grew ripe in yeares, and were staid youths,
Our Fathers would provide us wives: we did not
Carve for our selves, as now a daies they doe:
But now our children thinke themselves as wise,
Nay wiser then their Fathers, and will rule 'em:
They can no sooner peepe out of the shell,
But they must love forsooth; I would faine know,
Whether 'twere fit a Maide should be in love,
(I speak now of that skittish girle my daughter
Before she aske her Fathers leave and liking?

Da.
Tis true Charinus, 'twere not fit indeed:
Who should bestow the daughter, but the Father?

Mi.
But Shepheards did you never heare, that once
There was an Age, the nearest to the Gods:
An age we rather praise then imitate;
When no mans will, nor womans was inforc'd,
To any bent, but its owne motion:
Each follow'd Natures lawes, and by instinct
Did love the fairest, and injoy'd their wishes;
Love then not ty'd to any interest
Of blood or fortune, hastned to his end,
Without controll, nor did the Shepheard number
Her sheepe that was his choice, but every grace
That did adorne her beauteous minde or face;
Riches with love then were not valued,
Pure uncompounded love, that could despise
The whole worlds riches for a Mistresse eyes.
Pray tell me Daphnis, you are young and handsome,
The lover of our fairest Nymph Nerina:
Would you for all that fruitfull Sicilie
Can yeeld, or all the wealth of Persia,
Change one poore locke of your faire Mistresse haire,
Whilst she is yours, and you her shepheard are.

Da.
Would she were mine, I'de aske no portion.

Mi.
Spoke like a Lover of the ancient stampe.

Cha.
Sonne, sonne, she shall be yours: why? am not I
Her Father, she my daughter; may not I
Bestow her where I please?

Mi.
Yes if she like
The man, she will bestow her selfe, ne're feare it.

Cha.
What? she bestow herselfe without my leave?
No, no, Mirtillus, you mistake my daughter.
I cannot get her once to thinke of marriage,
And truely I do muse to see a wench,
That in all other things (although I say it)
Has wit at will, can pin her sheepe in fold
As well as any, knowes when to drive them home:
And there she can do twenty things as well:
Yet when I speake to her of marriage,
She turnes the head, shee'le be a Dryade, she
Or one of those fond Nymphs of Dians traine.

Mi.
Old man, beleeve her not, she meanes not so,
She loves to keepe the thing for which she is
So much belov'd, I meane her Maidenhead;
Which, whilst she has, she knowes to play the Tyrant,
And make us slaves unto her scornefull lookes:
For beauty then it selfe most justifies,
When it is courted, if not lov'd, it dies.

Cha.
Well, we will thinke of this: Come Daphnis, come,
I see you love my daughter, and you onely
Shall have her, it is I that tell you so,
That am her Father.

Da.
Thanke you good Charinus:
But I had rather she had told me so.