Hear me with patience.

Imo.

Talk thy tongue weary; speak:

I've heard I am a strumpet; and mine ear,

Therein false struck, can take no greater wound,

Nor tent 14 to bottom that. But speak.

But, if I were as wise as honest, then

My purpose would prove well. It cannot be

But that my master is abused:

Some villain, ay, and singular in his art,

Hath done you both this cursèd injury.

Imo. Some Roman courtezan.

Pis.
No, on my life.
I'll give but notice you are dead, and send him
Some bloody sign of it; for 'tis commanded

I should do so you shall be miss'd at Court,
And that will well confirm it.

Imo.

Why, good fellow,

What shall I do the while? where bide? how live?

Or in my life what comfort, when I am

Dead to my husband?

Pis.
If you'll back to th' Court, -
Imo. No Court, no father; nor no more ado
With that harsh, noble, simple nothing, Cloten;
That Cloten, whose love-suit hath been to me
As fearful as a siege.

Pis.

If not at Court,

Then not in Britain must you bide.

14 The language of surgery. To tent is to probe.

Imo.

What then?

Hath Britain all the Sun that shines? Day, night,

Are they not but in Britain? I' the world's volume,
Our Britain seems as in it, but not of't;

In a great pool a swan's nest: pr'ythee, think
There's livers out of Britain.

Pis.
I'm most glad
You think of other place. Th' ambassador,
Lucius the Roman, comes to Milford-Haven
To-morrow now, if you could wear a mind
Dark as your fortune is,15 and but disguise
That which, t' appear itself, must yet not be
But by self-danger, you should tread a course
Pretty and full of view; 16 yea, haply, near
The residence of Posthumus; so nigh at least
That though his actions were not visible, yet
Report should render him hourly to your ear
As truly as he moves.

Imo.
O, for such means!
Though peril to my modesty, not death on't,
I would adventure.

15" To wear a dark mind," says Johnson, "is to carry a mind impenetrable to the search of others. Darkness, applied to the mind, is secrecy; applied to the fortune, is obscurity." Pisanio's meaning probably is, to have Imogen carry out the disguise of her person by assuming a strange mental as well as personal attire. — Appear, in the next clause, is probably used as a transitive verb, and in the sense of to show, to evince, or to make apparent. The Poet has it repeatedly so. See vol. xvi. page 268, note 1.

16 Pretty must here be taken in the sense of apt or suitable to the purpose; as when Lady Capulet says of Juliet, "My daughter's of a pretty age"; meaning an age suitable for marriage. Should is an instance of the indiscriminate use, which I have often noted, of could, should, and would. Here would is required by our present idiom.—So that the meaning of the whole appears to be, "The course proposed would be apt for your purpose, and you would have a full view of what is going on, without being yourself known."

Pis.
Well, then, here's the point :
You must forget to be a woman; change
Command into obedience; fear and niceness
The handmaids of all women, or, more truly,
Woman its pretty self-into a waggish courage;
Ready in gibes, quick-answer'd, saucy, and
As quarrelous as the weasel; 17 nay, you must
Forget that rarest treasure of your cheek,
Exposing it but, O, the harder heart!
Alack, no remedy!-to the greedy touch
Of common-kissing Titan; 18 and forget
Your laboursome and dainty trims, wherein
You made great Juno angry.19

Imo.

Nay, be brief:

I see into thy end, and am almost

A man already.

Pis.

First, make yourself but like one.

Fore-thinking this, I have already fit 20

17 Weasels, it appears, were formerly kept in houses, instead of cats, for the purpose of destroying vermin. Shakespeare was doubtless well acquainted with their disposition.

18 So in Sidney's Arcadia: “And beautiful might have been, if they had not suffered greedy Phoebus over often and hard to kisse them." - In "O, the harder heart!" Pisanio apprehends that Imogen, in the part she is going to act, will feel the need of a man's harder, or tougher, heart.

-

19 It seems as if the Poet meant to gather up the whole train of womanly graces and accomplishments in this peerless heroine: so he here represents her as a perfect mistress in the art of dressing, - so much so as to provoke the jealousy of Juno herself. And he appears to have deemed it not the least of a lady's duties to make herself just as beautiful and attractive as she could by beauty and tastefulness of dress; this being one of her ways of delighting those about her.

20 Fit for fitted. The Poet several times has the preterit of that verb so formed. Thus in The Taming of the Shrew, Induction, 1: That part was aptly fit, and naturally perform'd." And in v. 5, of this play: "When she had fit you with her craft." Also in Jonson's Staple of News, i. 2: “What, are those desks fit yet?"

'Tis in my cloak-bag-doublet, hat, hose, all

That answer to them: would you, in their serving,
And with what imitation you can borrow

From youth of such a season, 'fore noble Lucius
Present yourself, desire his service, tell him

Wherein you're happy, which you'll make him know,
If that his head have ear in music, doubtless
With joy he will embrace you; for he's honourable,
And, doubling that, most holy.21 Your means abroad,
You have me,22 rich; and I will never fail

Beginning nor supplyment.

Imo.

Thou'rt all the comfort

The gods will diet me with. Pr'ythee, away:
There's more to be consider'd;

All that good time will give us :

but we'll even 23 this attempt

I'm soldier to, and will abide it with

A prince's courage. Away, I pr'ythee.

Pis. Well, madam, we must take a short farewell,
Lest, being miss'd, I be suspected of

Your carriage from the Court. My noble mistress,
Here is a box; I had it from the Queen:
What's in't is precious; if you're sick at sea,
Or stomach-qualm'd at land, a dram of this
Will drive away distemper. To some shade,
And fit you to your manhood: may the gods
Direct you to the best!

Imo.

Amen: I thank thee.

[Exeunt.

21 The Poet repeatedly uses holy in the sense of upright or just. See vol. vii. page 95, note II.

22 As for your subsistence abroad, you may rely on me.

23 To even is to equal, to make even, or to adjust: Johnson explains it here," we'll make our work even with our time, we'll do what time will allow."

SCENE V. The Same. A Room in CYMBELINE'S Palace.

Enter CYMBELINE, the Queen, CLOTEN, LUCIUS, and Lords.

Cym. Thus far; and so, farewell.

Luc.

Thanks, royal sir.

My Emperor hath wrote: I must from hence;

And am right sorry that I must report ye

Will not endure his yoke; and for ourself

To show less sovereignty than they, must needs
Appear unkinglike.

Luc.

So, sir, I desire of you

A conduct1 overland to Milford-Haven.

All joy befall your Grace ! — and, madam, you !

Cym. My lords, you are appointed for that office; The due of honour in no point omit.

So, farewell, noble Lucius.

Luc.

Your hand, my lord.

Clo. Receive it friendly; but from this time forth

Is yet to name the winner: fare you well.

Cym. Leave not the worthy Lucius, good my lords, Till he have cross'd the Severn. Happiness!

[Exeunt LUCIUS and Lords. Queen. He goes hence frowning: but it honours us That we have given him cause.

Clo.

'Tis all the better;

Your valiant Britons have their wishes in it.

Cym. Lucius hath wrote already to the Emperor

1 Conduct for conductor, guide, or escort. Often so.