Mar. What mean you? Leon. If you require a little space for prayer, I grant it: pray; but be not tedious, for To do my work with haste. Mar. Leon. To satisfy my lady. Why will you Mar. Why would she have me kill'd? 70 kill me? I trod upon a worm once 'gainst my will, Leon. My commission Is not to reason of the deed, but do 't. Mar. You will not do 't for all the world, I hope. You are well-favour'd, and your looks foreshow You have a gentle heart. I saw you lately, When you caught hurt in parting two that fought: Good sooth, it show'd well in you: do so now: Your lady seeks my life; come you between, And save poor me, the weaker. Leon. And will dispatch. I am sworn, 80 90 Enter Pirates. [LEONINE runs away. First Pirate. Hold, villain! Sec. Pirate. A prize! a prize! Third Pirate. Half-part, mates, half-part. Come, let's have her aboard suddenly. [Exeunt Pirates with MARINA. Enter LEONINE. Leon. These roguing thieves serve the great pirate Valdes; And they have seized Marina. Let her go: There's no hope she will return. I'll swear she's dead, And thrown into the sea. But I'll see further: Perhaps they will but please themselves upon her, Not carry her aboard. If she remain, Whom they have ravisht must by me be slain. [Exit. SCENE II. Mytilene. A room in a brothel. Enter Pander, Bawd, and Boult. Pand. Boult, Boult. Sir? Pand. Search the market narrowly; Mytilene is full of gallants. We lost too much money this mart by being too wenchless. Bawd. We were never so much out of creatures. We have but poor three, and they can do no more than they can do; and they with continual action are even as good as rotten. 100 Pand. Therefore let's have fresh ones, whate'er we 10 pay for them. If there be not a conscience to be used in every trade, we shall never prosper. Bawd. Thou sayest true: 'tis nót our bringing up of poor bastards, as, I think, I have brought up some eleven, 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 sayest true: they're too unwholesome, 20 o' conscience. The poor Transylvanian is dead, that lay with the little baggage. Boult. Ay, she quickly poopt him; she made him roast-meat for worms.-But I'll go search the market. [Exit. 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: 30 therefore, if in our youths we could pick up some pretty estate, 'twere not amiss to keep our door hatcht. 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 no calling. But here comes Boult. 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 further 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. 40 50 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 60 this done as I command you. Boult. Performance shall follow. [Exit. Mar. Alack that Leonine was so slack, so slow! He should have struck, not spoke; or that these piratesNot 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 light into my hands, where like to live. Mar. The more my fault To scape his hands where I was like to die. Mar. No. 70 you are 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're a young foolish sapling, and must be bow'd as I would have you. Mar. The gods defend me! 80 Bawd. If it please the gods to defend you by men, then men must comfort you, men must feed you, men 90 must stir you up.-Boult 's return'd. 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 listen'd to me as they would have hearken'd to their father's testament. There was a Spaniard's mouth so water'd, 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' th' hams? Bawd. Who, Monsieur Veroles? Boult. Ay, he: he offer'd to cut a caper at the proclamation; but he made a groan at it, and swore he would see her to-morrow. 100 Bawd. Well, well; as for him, he brought his disease hither: here he does but repair it. I know he will come 110 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. [to MARINA] Pray you, come hither awhile. You have fortunes coming upon you. Mark me: you must seem to do that fearfully which you commit 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 quencht 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. 120 |