Boult. Ay, to eleven; and brought them down again. But shall I search the market?

Bawd. What else, man? The stuff we have, a strong wind will blow it to pieces, they are so pitifully sodden.

Pand. Thou say'st true; they're too unwholesome o' conscience. The poor Transilvanian is dead, that lay with the little baggage.

Boult. Ay, she quickly pooped him; she made him roast-meat for worms. But I'll go search the market. [Exit BOULT.

Pand. Three or four thousand chequins were as pretty a proportion to live quietly, and so give over— Bawd. Why, to give over, I pray you? is it a shame to get when we are old?

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 over.

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 no calling. But here comes Boult.

Enter BOULT, and the Pirates with MARINA.

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

1 Pirate. O, sir! we doubt it not.

Boult. Master, I have gone thorough for this piece, you see if you like her, so; if not, I have lost my

earnest.

3 THEY'RE TOO unwholesome o' conscience.] The old copies all read, "there's two unwholesome o' conscience;" but the Pander does not appear to be speaking of any particular number.

Bawd. Boult, has she any qualities?

Boult. She has a good face, speaks well, and has excellent good clothes: there's no farther 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 Pander 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 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.

[Exit BOULT. Mar. Alack, that Leonine was so slack, so slow! 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.

Bawd. Come, the gods have done their part in you. Mar. I accuse them not.

Bawd. You are lit 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 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 are 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 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 pr'ythee, 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?

Boult. Ay: he offered to cut a caper at the proclamation; 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

so watered, THAT he went-] "So" and "that" are not in the first edition, but in all others. Nevertheless, the original reading may be right, and it is intelligible: we should therefore prefer it, if we had not ancient authority to the contrary.

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.

You have

Bawd. Pray you, come hither awhile. fortunes coming upon you. Mark me: you must seem to do that fearfully, which you commit willingly; to despise profit, where you have most gain. To weep that you live as you do, makes pity in your lovers: seldom, but that pity begets you a good opinion, and that opinion a mere profit3.

Mar. I understand you not.

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

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

to go

Boult. Faith, some do, and some do not. But, mistress, if I have bargained for the joint,—

Bawd. Thou may'st cut a morsel off the spit.

Boult. I may so?

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

Boult. Ay, by my faith, they shall not be changed yet.

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 tonight.

5

-

profit.

and that opinion a MERE profit.] i. e. an absolute or, in this place, certain

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 IV.

Tharsus. A Room in CLEON'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'd 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, it had been a kindness
Becoming well thy face: 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,

Unless you play the PIOUS innocent,] It stands "impious innocent" in the quarto, 1609 all the later impressions omit the incongruous epithet. Monck Mason proposed to read “pious innocent," and his conjecture is fully confirmed by the novel founded upon the play, for there Dionyza says to her husband, “If such a pious innocent as yourself do not reveal it unto him."