Of our dead kings that we may chapel them;
And of thy boundless goodness take some note
That for our crowned heads we have no roof,
Save this, which is the lion’s and the bear’s,
And vault to everything.
THESEUS
Pray you, kneel not: I was transported with your speech, and suffered
Your knees to wrong themselves. I have heard the
fortunes
Of your dead lords, which gives me such lamenting
As wakes my vengeance and revenge for ’em.
King Capaneus was your lord: the day
That he should marry you—at such a season
As now it is with me—I met your groom
By Mars’s altar. You were that time fair,
Not Juno’s mantle fairer than your tresses,
Nor in more bounty spread her. Your wheaten wreath
Was then nor threshed nor blasted; fortune at you 6
Dimpled her cheek with smiles; Hercules our
kinsman—
Then weaker than your eyes—laid by his club.
He tumbled down upon his Nemean hide
And swore his sinews thawed. O grief and time,
Fearful consumers, you will all devour.
FIRST QUEEN ⌈kneeling still⌉
O, I hope some god, Some god hath put his mercy in your manhood,
Whereto he’ll infuse power and press you forth
Our undertaker.
THESEUS
O no knees, none, widow:
⌈The First Queen rises⌉
Unto the helmeted Bellona use them
And pray for me, your soldier. Troubled I am.
He turns away
SECOND QUEEN ⌈kneeling still⌉
Honoured Hippolyta, Most dreaded Amazonian, that hast slain
The scythe-tusked boar, that with thy arm, as strong
As it is white, wast near to make the male
To thy sex captive, but that this, thy lord—
Born to uphold creation in that honour
First nature styled it in—shrunk thee into
The bound thou wast o‘erflowing, at once subduing
Thy force and thy affection; soldieress,
That equally canst poise sternness with pity,
Whom now I know hast much more power on him
Than ever he had on thee, who ow’st his strength,
And his love too, who is a servant for
The tenor of thy speech; dear glass of ladies,
Bid him that we, whom flaming war doth scorch,
Under the shadow of his sword may cool us.
Require him he advance it o‘er our heads.
Speak’t in a woman’s key, like such a woman
As any of us three. Weep ere you fail.
Lend us a knee:
But touch the ground for us no longer time
Than a dove’s motion when the head’s plucked off.
Tell him, if he i’th’ blood-sized field lay swoll’n,
Showing the sun his teeth, grinning at the moon,
What you would do.
HIPPOLYTA
Poor lady, say no more.
I had as lief trace this good action with you
As that whereto I am going, and never yet
Went I so willing way. My lord is taken
Heart-deep with your distress. Let him consider.
I’ll speak anon.
⌈The Second Queen rises⌉
THIRD QUEEN (kneeling ⌈still⌉ to Emilia)
O, my petition was
Set down in ice, which by hot grief uncandied
Melts into drops; so sorrow, wanting form,
Is pressed with deeper matter.
EMILIA
Pray stand up:
Your grief is written in your cheek.
THIRD QUEEN
O woe,
You cannot read it there; there, through my tears,
Like wrinkled pebbles in a glassy stream,
You may behold ’em.
⌈The Third Queen rises⌉
Lady, lady, alack—
He that will all the treasure know o’th’ earth
Must know the centre too; he that will fish
For my least minnow, let him lead his line
To catch one at my heart. O, pardon me:
Extremity, that sharpens sundry wits,
Makes me a fool.
EMILIA
Pray you, say nothing, pray you.
Who cannot feel nor see the rain, being in’t,
Knows neither wet nor dry. If that you were
The ground-piece of some painter, I would buy you
T’instruct me ’gainst a capital grief, indeed
Such heart-pierced demonstration; but, alas,
Being a natural sister of our sex,
Your sorrow beats so ardently upon me
That it shall make a counter-reflect ’gainst
My brother’s heart, and warm it to some pity,
Though it were made of stone. Pray have good
comfort.
THESEUS
Forward to th’ temple. Leave not out a jot
O’th’ sacred ceremony.
FIRST QUEEN
O, this celebration
Will longer last and be more costly than
Your suppliants’ war. Remember that your fame
Knolls in the ear o’th’ world: what you do quickly
Is not done rashly; your first thought is more
Than others’ laboured meditance; your premeditating
More than their actions. But, O Jove, your actions,
Soon as they move, as ospreys do the fish,
Subdue before they touch. Think, dear Duke, think
What beds our slain kings have.
SECOND QUEEN
What griefs our beds,
That our dear lords have none.
THIRD QUEEN
None fit for th’ dead.
Those that with cords, knives, drams, precipitance,
Weary of this world’s light, have to themselves