Bawd. Why to give over, I pray you? is it a shame to get when we are old ?

30

Pand. O, our credit comes not in like the commodity, nor the commodity wages not with the danger : therefore, if in our youths we could pick up some pretty estate, 'twere not amiss to keep our door hatched. Besides, the sore terms we stand upon with the gods will be strong with us for

giving o'er.

Bawd. Come, other sorts offend as well as we.
Pand. As well as we! ay, and better too; we offend

worse. Neither is our profession any trade; it's 40 no calling. But here comes Boult.

Re-enter Boult, with the Pirates and Marina.

Boult. [To Marina] Come your ways. My masters, you say she's a virgin?

First Pirate. O, sir, we doubt it not.

Boult. Master, I have gone through for this piece, you

see: if you like her, so; if not, I have lost my

earnest.

Bawd. Boult, has she any qualities?
Boult. She has a good face, speaks well, and has

excellent good clothes: there's no farther 50 necessity of qualities can make her be refused. Bawd. What's her price, Boult? Boult. I cannot be bated one doit of a thousand pieces. Pand. Well, follow me, my masters, you shall have your money presently. Wife, take her in; instruct her what she has to do, that she may not be raw in her entertainment.

[Exeunt Pandar and Pirates.

Bawd. Boult, take you the marks of her, the colour of her hair, complexion, height, her age, with warrant of her virginity; and cry 'He that will 60 give most shall have her first.' Such a maidenhead were no cheap thing, if men were as they have been. Get this done as I command you. Boult. Performance shall follow.

Mar. Alack that Leonine was so slack, so slow!

[Exit.

He should have struck, not spoke; or that these

pirates,

Not enough barbarous, had not o'erboard thrown me
For to seek my mother!

Bawd. Why lament you, pretty one?

Mar. That I am pretty.

70

Bawd. Come, the gods have done their part in you.

Mar. I accuse them not.

Bawd. You are light into my hands, where you are

like to live.

Mar. The more my fault,

To 'scape his hands where I was like to die.

Bawd. Ay, and you shall live in pleasure.
Mar. No.

Bawd. Yes, indeed shall you, and taste gentlemen

of all fashions: you shall fare well: you shall 80
have the difference of all complexions. What!
do you stop your ears?

Mar. Are you a woman?

Bawd. What would you have me be, an I be not a woman?

Mar. An honest woman, or not a woman.

Bawd. Marry, whip thee, gosling: I think I shall have something to do with you. Come, you're

a young foolish sapling, and must be bowed as
I would have you.

Mar. The gods defend me!

Bawd. If it please the gods to defend you by men, then men must comfort you, men must feed you, men must stir you up. Boult's returned.

Re-enter Boult.

Now, sir, hast thou cried her through the market? Boult. I have cried her almost to the number of her

hairs; I have drawn her picture with my voice. Bawd. And I prithee tell me, how dost thou find the inclination of the people, especially of the younger sort?

Boult. Faith, they listened to me as they would have hearkened to their father's testament. There was a Spaniard's mouth so watered, that he went to bed to her very description.

Bawd. We shall have him here to-morrow with his best ruff on.

Boult. To-night, to-night. But, mistress, do you know the French knight that cowers i' the hams?

Bawd. Who, Monsieur Veroles?

90

100

Boult. Ay, he: he offered to cut a caper at the pro- 110 clamation; but he made a groan at it, and swore he would see her to-morrow.

Bawd. Well, well; as for him, he brought his disease hither: here he does but repair it. I know he will come in our shadow, to scatter his crowns in the sun.

Boult. Well, if we had of every nation a traveller, we should lodge them with this sign.

Bawd. Pray you, come hither awhile. You have

fortunes coming upon you. Mark me: you 120
must seem to do that fearfully which you com-
mit willingly, despise profit where you have
most gain. To weep that you live as ye do
makes pity in your lovers: seldom but that pity
begets you a good opinion, and that opinion a
mere profit.

Mar. I understand you not.

Boult. O, take her home, mistress, take her home: these blushes of hers must be quenched with some present practice.

Bawd. Thou sayest true, i' faith, so they must; for your bride goes to that with shame which is her way to go with warrant.

Boult. Faith, some do, and some do not.

mistress, if I have bargained for the joint,

Bawd. Thou mayst cut a morsel off the spit.
Boult. I may so.

But,

Bawd. Who should deny it? Come, young one, I like the manner of your garments well.

130

Boult. Ay, by my faith, they shall not be changed yet. 140
Bawd. Boult, spend thou that in the town: report

what a sojourner we have; you'll lose nothing
by custom. When nature framed this piece,
she meant thee a good turn; therefore say what
a paragon she is, and thou hast the harvest out
of thine own report.

Boult. I warrant you, mistress, thunder shall not so
awake the beds of eels as my giving out her
beauty stir up the lewdly-inclined. I'll bring
home some to-night.

150

Bawd. Come your ways; follow me.

Mar. If fires be hot, knives sharp, or waters deep,

Untied I still my virgin knot will keep.

Diana, aid my purpose!

Bawd. What have we to do with Diana? Pray you,

will you go with us?

[Exeunt

Scene III.

Tarsus. A room in the Governor's house.

Enter Cleon and Dionyza.

Dion. Why, are you foolish? Can it be undone ?
Cle. O Dionyza, such a piece of slaughter
The sun and moon ne'er look'd upon !

Dion.

You'll turn a child again.

I think

Cle. Were I chief lord of all this spacious world,
I'ld give it to undo the deed. O lady,
Much less in blood than virtue, yet a princess
To equal any single crown o' the earth
I' the justice of compare ! O villain Leonine !
Whom thou hast poison'd too:
If thou hadst drunk to him, 't had been a kindness
Becoming well thy fact: what canst thou say
When noble Pericles shall demand his child?
Dion. That she is dead. Nurses are not the fates,

To foster it, nor ever to preserve.

She died at night; I'll say so.

Who can cross it?

Unless you play the pious innocent,

And for an honest attribute cry out

'She died by foul play.'

Cle.

O, go to. Well, well,