And our return, to excuse :-but first, how get hence.
Why should excuse be born, or e'er begot?
We'll talk of that hereafter. Pr'ythee, speak,
How many score of miles may we well ride
"Twixt hour and hour?

Pis.

One score 'twixt sun and sun,

Madam, 's enough for you, and too much, too.

Imo. Why, one that rode to 's execution, man,

Could never go so slow: I have heard of riding wagers, Where horses have been nimbler than the sands

That run i' the clock's behalf.-But this is foolery.-
Go, bid my woman feign a sickness; say
She'll home to her father; and provide me, presently,
A riding suit, no costlier than would fit

A franklin's housewife.

Pis.

Madam, you're best consider.

Imo. I see before me, man: nor here, nor here,
Nor what ensues, but have a fog in them,
That I cannot look through. Away, I pr'ythee:
Do as I bid thee. There's no more to say;
Accessible is none but Milford way.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.

Wales. A mountainous Country, with a Cave.

Enter BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, and ARVIRAGUS.

Bel. A goodly day not to keep house, with such Whose roof's as low as ours. Stoop, boys': this gate Instructs you how t' adore the heavens, and bows you To a morning's holy office: the gates of monarchs

1 STOOP, boys :] The old copies misprint "stoop" sleep; an error which was corrected by Sir T. Hanmer: the context confirms the amendment, but, nevertheless, sleep runs through all the folios.

2

Are arch'd so high, that giants may jet through'
And keep their impious turbands on, without
Good morrow to the sun.-Hail, thou fair heaven!
We house i' the rock, yet use thee not so hardly
As prouder livers do.

Gui.

Arv.

Hail, heaven!

Hail, heaven!

Bel. Now, for our mountain sport. Up to yond'

hill:

Your legs are young; I'll tread these flats. Consider, When you above perceive me like a crow,

That it is place which lessens and sets off:

And you may then revolve what tales I have told you,
Of courts, of princes, of the tricks in war:
This service is not service, so being done,
But being so allow'd: to apprehend thus,
Draws us a profit from all things we see;
And often, to our comfort, shall we find
The sharded beetle in a safer hold
Than is the full-wing'd eagle.

O! this life

Is nobler, than attending for a check;

Richer, than doing nothing for a bribe';
Prouder, than rustling in unpaid-for silk:
Such gain the cap of him, that makes him fine,
Yet keeps his book uncross'd*.

Gui Out of your proof you

fledg'd,

No life to ours.
speak: we, poor un-

Have never wing'd from view o' the nest; nor know

2

not

that giants may JET through] To "jet" is to strut. We have had the same word in Vol. iii. p. 366; Vol. v. p. 401; and Vol. vi. p. 294.

3

for a BRIBE ;] Here again occurs an evident corruption, babe for "bribe," in the folio, 1623. Sir T. Hanmer made the judicious change, which is preferable to Warburton's substitution, bauble. Steevens would justify the old reading by reference to the law of wards and infants, but such an allusion would hardly have been intelligible to the audience.

4 Yet keeps his book UNCROSS'D.] The tradesman's book was crossed when the account was paid. The allusions to this circumstance in old writers are frequent.

What air's from home. Haply this life is best,
If quiet life be best; sweeter to you,

That have a sharper known, well corresponding
With your stiff age; but unto us it is
A cell of ignorance, travelling abed,
A prison for a debtors, that not dares
To stride a limit.

Arv.

What should we speak of,

When we are old as you? when we shall hear
The rain and wind beat dark December, how
In this our pinching cave shall we discourse
The freezing hours away? We have seen nothing:
We are beastly: subtle as the fox for prey;
Like warlike as the wolf for what we eat :
Our valour is, to chase what flies; our cage
We make a quire, as doth the prison'd bird,
And sing our bondage freely.

Bel.

Did

you

How you speak!

but know the city's usuries,

And felt them knowingly: the art o' the court,
As hard to leave, as keep; whose top to climb
Is certain falling, or so slippery, that

The fear's as bad as falling: the toil of the war,

A pain that only seems to seek out danger

I' the name of fame, and honour; which dies i' the search,

And hath as oft a slanderous epitaph,

As record of fair act; nay, many times,

Doth ill deserve by doing well; what's worse,
Must court'sy at the censure.-O, boys! this story
The world may read in me: my body's mark'd
With Roman swords, and my report was once
First with the best of note. Cymbeline lov'd me;
And when a soldier was the theme, my name
Was not far off: then, was I as a tree,

A prison FOR a debtor,] All the old copies read, " A prison or a debtor”— Pope's correction.

Whose boughs did bend with fruit; but, in one night,
A storm, or robbery, call it what you will,
Shook down my mellow hangings, nay, my leaves,
And left me bare to weather.

Gui.

Uncertain favour!

Bel. My fault being nothing (as I have told you oft) But that two villains, whose false oaths prevail'd Before my perfect honour, swore to Cymbeline, I was confederate with the Romans: so, Follow'd my banishment; and this twenty years This rock, and these demesnes, have been my world; Where I have liv'd at honest freedom, paid

More pious debts to heaven, than in all

The fore-end of my time.-But, up to the mountains!
This is not hunter's language.-He that strikes

The venison first shall be the lord o' the feast;
To him the other two shall minister,

And we will fear no poison, which attends

In place of greater state. I'll meet you in the valleys.

[Exeunt GUI. and ARV.

How hard it is, to hide the sparks of nature!

These boys know little, they are sons to the king;

Nor Cymbeline dreams that they are alive.

They think, they are mine: and, though train'd up thus meanly

I' the cave wherein they bow, their thoughts do hit
The roofs of palaces; and nature prompts them,

In simple and low things, to prince it, much
Beyond the trick of others. This Polydore,-
The heir of Cymbeline and Britain, whom
The king his father call'd Guiderius,-Jove!
When on my three-foot stool I sit, and tell
The warlike feats I have done, his spirits fly out
Into my story, say,-"Thus mine enemy fell;

"I' the cave WHEREIN THEY BOW,] The folios read, whereon the bow. Warburton amended the text, in consistency with what has gone before.

And thus I set my foot on's neck;" even then
The princely blood flows in his check, he sweats,
Strains his young nerves, and puts himself in posture
That acts my words. The younger brother, Cadwal,
(Once Arviragus) in as like a figure,

Strikes life into my speech, and shows much more
His own conceiving. Hark! the game is rous'd.-
O Cymbeline! heaven, and my conscience, knows,
Thou didst unjustly banish me; whereon

At three, and two years old, I stole these babes,
Thinking to bar thee of succession, as

Thou reft'st me of my lands. Euriphile,

Thou wast their nurse; they took thee for their mother,

And every day do honour to her grave:

Myself, Belarius, that am Morgan call'd,

They take for natural father.-The game is up. [Erit.

SCENE IV.

Near Milford-Haven.

Enter PISANIO and IMOGEN.

Imo. Thou told'st me, when we came from horse, the place

Was near at hand.-Ne'er long'd my mother so

To see me first, as I have now',-Pisanio! Man!
Where is Posthumus?

What is in thy mind,

To see ME first, as I have now,] The folio, 1632, misprints "see me," of the folio, 1623, seeme, and it stands seem in the two later folios. Southern altered his copy of the folio, 1685, thus :

"Ne'er long'd his mother so

To see him first, as I have now ;"

which certainly is more consistent with Imogen's state of mind, and renders the words" as I have now " more relative. It may have been an original misprint in the folio, 1623.

VOL. VIII.