University of Virginia Library

SCENE II.

Clodio and his Retinue.
[Leon.]
Clodio, thrice welcome.
A word, with your good pleasure; and that word,
As you are a valiant Roman, asks no witness.—
Might not your train proceed?—

Clod.
Yes—forward—on!
[To his Retinue, who go out.
I'll follow—Now, your will.—

Leon.
You bear, in mind,
Your insult, and late offer'd enterprize
Against my wife.

Clod.
You named her not as such.
I hold my friend's connubial couch for sacred,
Although his spouse should place the pillow for me,
And wooe me to the parley.

Leon.
Well—pass that—
And say, what rich returns thou hast brought home
From thy bold venture to the coast of beauty.
Is there no worth, save what is masculine?
Or, does the weather-gage of thine opinion
Turn from that restive point?

Clod.
Your pardon, sir.
You menaced me at parting. I hold not
My life so cheap to risque it for a woman.
Grant a safe course and latitude of converse,
Or here my tale is ended.

Leon.
I do swear it.
Give me fair facts. I quarrel not with truth,
Though it should blast me—Thou hast seen a princess—

Clod.
Unparagon'd—a wonder, even to eyes
That have seen all things else!

Leon.
And her chaste name,
Still unimpeach'd.

Clod.
It is my soul's firm faith—
No woman chaster, or more fondly bound
To the memorial of an absent husband.

Leon.
O, I did know my Imogen was chaste,
As snow new-fallen upon the mountain top;
And constant as the vine that clasps its elm,
And dies upon division—Say, good Clodio,
Wast thou not welcomed?

Clod.
Yes—at once—most warmly.
In that I was a debtor to her love
For Leonatus—At the kindly close
Of our first interview, I did advise her
Of some rare matters that I brought from Rome,
And begg'd permission at her shrine to lay
Great Cæsar's offering—with a gracious nod,
The goddess gave assent.

Leon.
On—what ensued?

Clod.
Our audience at the British court—'twas long—
The night was then advanced—'twas late—time press'd.
I urged, and was admitted to her chamber.

Leon.
Her chamber!—was it her's?—art thou assured?—
But, say it were—and so thou might'st have been
To that of Lucrece—

Clod.
True.—I laid before her
Rich robings, gems of curious set, and pearls
That left the Orient poor—no futile nets
For feminine affections.

Leon.
Well—the process.

Clod.
While she retired, in safety to dispose
Her precious lading, I did mark the chamber—
The tale-recording tapestry and paintings,
Storied, I doubt, with more of nuptial truth
Than quondam husbands met with.—Soon return'd,
She held me to discourse, with pleasant questions
Touching our Roman gallantries and customs.

Leon.
Was thy stay long?

Clod.
Long?—no—our present nights
Serve but as prologue to an early dawning.

Leon.
Plague and perdition!—
[Aside.
How were ye employ'd?

Clod.
Nay, take your colour to you—No harm done;
Nothing but chat, and inoffensive dalliance.

Leon.
Slave, villain, lyar!—by the gods, 'tis false—
Dalliance!

Clod.
Your oath is forfeit—fare you well—

[Going,
Leon.
Come back, thou scap'st not so—Produce me, here,
Some token, but the lightest feather, won
From her high-plumed virtue—or, by hell,
Whereto thou goest, thy latest glass is run!

Clod.
You shall be satisfied—But will you, then,
Be peaceful?

Leon.
I do swear it—though the proof,
Like the Tarantula's envenom'd touch,
Should sting me into madness.

Clod.
Know you this?—

[Shews the bracelet.
Leon.
Gape hell, and swallow all affiance up!
All faith and trust, and fabled truth, in woman!
Know it?—too well!—it was our band of nuptials,
With these confiding fingers fondly tied,
Even on the marriage night.—How gott'st thou this?
Tempter acccurs'd!—the means—the circumstance—

Clod.
Half by consent—and half, by sweet constraint—
I loosed, and toy'd it from her.

Leon.
O, I see
It is enough!—thy triumph is accomplish'd
Over our peace and honour.—Get thee hence!—
It must, yet cannot be—Hold, Clodio—answer!
Hast thou not practised on her cooler blood,
With some infernal drug?—or, by thyself,
Or some confederate villainy, purloin'd
That specious trophy?—Have I found thee, Cacus?
Traced thy steps backward to thy den?

Clod.
So leave it.—
Why, what have I affirm'd to touch you, thus,
With jealous frenzy?—
Have I yet told you of the crimson gem,
That sweetly nestles under the left swell
Of her descending bosom?

Leon.
O, I am choak'd!—
She's wreck'd—the world's bright pinnace sunk for ever!
Should thousands of concurring witnesses
Rise to her honour now, I'd not believe them.—
Is there no hook to hold me from the brink,
Where the brain turns?—Yet—arm me with a reed,
And I will fight for her departed truth,
Though demonstration should be sheath'd in steel,
And weapon'd right and left—Fiend! damn'd magician!
[Seizes Clodio.
How hast thou wrought impossibilities?
Soft—I have sworn—your pardon, gods!—All's well—
Depart in peace—Quick—hence—lest sudden wrath
Grind out thy soul, and scatter thee as dust!
[Exit Clodio.
Down, climbing passions! whither would ye mount—
To spurn at Heaven and fate, who made things so,
As cannot now be mended?—Ruin! ruin!
Worse than the wreck of nature!—Is it thus?—
Or is it a negation—all, a whirl
Of things that are but dreamt of?—Hold, hold fast
The seat of reason, gods! a little space—
For somewhat is to do—Racks, dying pangs,
What are ye, to the fall of Heaven's own house,
The human mind o'erthrown?—I must be speedy.
Faustus!—

Enter Faustus.
Faust.
My lord.—

Leon.
Come hither, my good Faustus—
Thou seest thy master at the heaviest plunge
That ever call'd for help.—Thou hast lost thy master!

Faust.
Alas!—

Leon.
His name and honours laid, all, low in earth,
No fosterer, friend, or mournful step attending!—
I thank thy tears—mine cannot chuse but follow.
—Faustus!

Faust.
What would my heart's belov'd master?

Leon.
I snatch'd thee, once, from twenty circling deaths,
At peril of my life.—

Faust.
You did, you did.

Leon.
And thou art sworn, on any quick extreme
Of life or death, to do my fearful bidding,
No question ask'd.

Faust.
I live, but till you say,
Die, Faustus!

Leon.
Didst thou hear aught that past?

Faust.
Too much!—What's to be done?

Leon.
I had a wife!

Faust.
Dispatch her!

Leon.
And, so, quench the kindling fires
Of lust and foul dishonour, that must, else,
Blaze to a pointing world!—

Faust.
Right.

Leon.
Wilt thou?—

Faust.
Yes.
It shall be done.

Leon.
Not butcher-like, my Faustus—
But gently, as the nurse would lay to sleep
Her querulous babe—
O, give her not the twenty thousandth pang
Such as now grapple at my soul!—Be speedy—
And, when the deed is done, thou mayst expect me
Near the great oak, that neighbours to the temple.

Faust.
Farewell, farewell!—be happy, as you can,
My best, my noblest master!

[Exit Faustus.
Leon.
This Clodio, too, must be provided for,
At the next turn—Why, this is gallant!—soon,
I shall be deep in blood.
These buffettings of fortune, how they harden
A heart, once, not inhuman!—
The sources of my living shame once stopt,
What follows?—what is to be reap'd from seeds,
Sown thus, or thus?—Eternity, to me,
Can yield no future harvest!—If I look
For peace in Heaven, or o'er the travell'd earth,
Through life, or time, or aught beyond, still, still,
I meet it so bound up in Imogen,
As never to be sunder'd!—O, my love!
O, my lost love!—O wretched, past resource!
Undone, undone, lost, ruin'd Leonatus!

[Exit.