GIACOMO With five times so much conversation I should get ground of your fair mistress, make her go back even to the yielding, had I admittance and opportunity to friend.
POSTHUMUS No, no.
GIACOMO I dare thereupon pawn the moiety of my estate to your ring, which in my opinion o’ervalues it something. But I make my wager rather against your confidence than her reputation, and, to bar your offence herein too, I durst attempt it against any lady in the world. in
POSTHUMUS You are a great deal abused in too bold a persuasion, and I doubt not you sustain what you’re worthy of by your attempt.
GIACOMO What’s that?
POSTHUMUS A repulse; though your attempt, as you call it, deserve more—a punishment, too.
FILARIO Gentlemen, enough of this. It came in too suddenly. Let it die as it was born; and, I pray you, be better acquainted.
GIACOMO Would I had put my estate and my neighbour’s on th’approbation of what I have spoke.
POSTHUMUS What lady would you choose to assail?
GIACOMO Yours, whom in constancy you think stands so safe. I will lay you ten thousand ducats to your ring that, commend me to the court where your lady is, with no more advantage than the opportunity of a second conference, and I will bring from thence that honour of hers which you imagine so reserved.
POSTHUMUS I will wage against your gold, gold to it; my ring I hold dear as my finger, ’tis part of it.
GIACOMO You are a friend, and therein the wiser. If you buy ladies’ flesh at a million a dram, you cannot preserve it from tainting. But I see you have some religion in you, that you fear.
POSTHUMUS This is but a custom in your tongue. You bear a graver purpose, I hope.
GIACOMO I am the master of my speeches, and would undergo what’s spoken, I swear.
POSTHUMUS Will you? I shall but lend my diamond till your return. Let there be covenants drawn between ’s. My mistress exceeds in goodness the hugeness of your unworthy thinking. I dare you to this match. Here’s my ring.
FILARIO I will have it no lay.
GIACOMO By the gods, it is one. If I bring you no sufficient testimony that I have enjoyed the dearest bodily part of your mistress, my ten thousand ducats are yours; so is your diamond too. If I come off and leave her in such honour as you have trust in, she your jewel, this your jewel, and my gold are yours, provided I have your commendation for my more free entertainment.
POSTHUMUS I embrace these conditions; let us have articles betwixt us. Only thus far you shall answer: if you make your voyage upon her and give me directly to understand you have prevailed, I am no further your enemy; she is not worth our debate. If she remain unseduced, you not making it appear otherwise, for your ill opinion and th’assault you have made to her chastity you shall answer me with your sword.
GIACOMO Your hand, a covenant. We will things set down by lawful counsel, and straight away for Britain, lest the bargain should catch cold and starve. I will fetch my gold and have our two wagers recorded.
POSTHUMUS Agreed.
⌈Exit with Giacomo⌉
FRENCHMAN Will this hold, think you?
FILARIO Signor Giacomo will not from it. Pray let us follow ’em.
Exeunt. ⌈Table is removed⌉
1.5 Enter Queen, Ladies, and Cornelius, a doctor
QUEEN
Whiles yet the dew’s on ground, gather those flowers.
Make haste. Who has the note of them?
A LADY
I, madam.
QUEEN Dispatch.
Exeunt Ladies
Now, Master Doctor, have you brought those drugs?
CORNELIUS
Pleaseth your highness, ay. Here they are, madam.
He gives her a box
But I beseech your grace, without offence—
My conscience bids me ask—wherefore you have
Commanded of me these most poisonous compounds,
Which are the movers of a languishing death,
But though slow, deadly.
QUEEN
I wonder, doctor,
Thou ask‘st me such a question. Have I not been
Thy pupil long? Hast thou not learned me how
To make perfumes, distil, preserve—yea, so
That our great King himself doth woo me oft
For my confections? Having thus far proceeded,
Unless thou think’st me devilish, is’t not meet
That I did amplify my judgement in
Other conclusions? I will try the forces
Of these thy compounds on such creatures as
We count not worth the hanging, but none human,
To try the vigour of them, and apply
Allayments to their act, and by them gather
Their several virtues and effects.
CORNELIUS
Your highness
Shall from this practice but make hard your heart.
Besides, the seeing these effects will be
Both noisome and infectious.
QUEEN
O, content thee.
Enter Pisanio
(Aside) Here comes a flattering rascal; upon him
Will I first work. He’s factor for his master,
And enemy to my son. (Aloud) How now, Pisanio?—
Doctor, your service for this time is ended.
Take your own way.
CORNELIUS (aside)
I do suspect you, madam.
But you shall do no harm.
QUEEN (to Pisanio)
Hark thee, a word.
CORNELIUS (aside)
I do not like her. She doth think she has
Strange ling’ring poisons. I do know her spirit,
And will not trust one of her malice with
A drug of such damned nature. Those she has
Will stupefy and dull the sense a while,
Which first, perchance, she’ll prove on cats and dogs,
Then afterward up higher; but there is
No danger in what show of death it makes
More than the locking up the spirits a time,
To be more fresh, reviving. She is fooled
With a most false effect, and I the truer
So to be false with her.
QUEEN
No further service, doctor,
Until I send for thee.
CORNELIUS I humbly take my leave.
Exit
QUEEN (to Pisanio)
Weeps she still, sayst thou? Dost thou think in time
She will not quench, and let instructions enter
Where folly now possesses? Do thou work.
When thou shalt bring me word she loves my son
I’ll tell thee on the instant thou art then
As great as is thy master—greater, for
His fortunes all lie speechless, and his name
Is at last gasp. Return he cannot, nor
Continue where he is. To shift his being