Imagine Pericles arrived at Tyre,

Welcomed and settled to his own desire.

His woeful queen we leave at Ephesus,

Unto Diana there a votaress.

Now to Marina bend your mind,

Whom our fast-growing scene must find

At Tarsus, and by Cleon train’d

In music’s letters; who hath gain’d

Of education all the grace,

Which makes her both the heart and place

Of general wonder. But, alack,

That monster envy, oft the wrack

Of earned praise, Marina’s life

Seeks to take off by treason’s knife,

And in this kind our Cleon hath

One daughter, and a full grown wench

Even ripe for marriage-rite; this maid

Hight Philoten: and it is said

For certain in our story, she

Would ever with Marina be.

Be’t when she weaved the sleided silk

With fingers long, small, white as milk;

Or when she would with sharp needle wound,

The cambric, which she made more sound

By hurting it; or when to th’ lute

She sung, and made the night-bird mute

That still records with moan; or when

She would with rich and constant pen

Vail to her mistress Dian; still

This Philoten contends in skill

With absolute Marina: so

The dove of Paphos might with the crow

Vie feathers white. Marina gets

All praises, which are paid as debts,

And not as given. This so darks

In Philoten all graceful marks,

That Cleon’s wife, with envy rare,

A present murderer does prepare

For good Marina, that her daughter

Might stand peerless by this slaughter.

The sooner her vile thoughts to stead,

Lychorida, our nurse, is dead:

And cursed Dionyza hath

The pregnant instrument of wrath

Prest for this blow. The unborn event

I do commend to your content:

Only I carry winged time

Post on the lame feet of my rhyme;

Which never could I so convey,

Unless your thoughts went on my way.

Dionyza does appear,

With Leonine, a murderer.

Scene I. Tarsus. An open place near the seashore.

Thy oath remember; thou hast sworn to do’t:

’Tis but a blow, which never shall be known.

Thou canst not do a thing in the world so soon,

To yield thee so much profit. Let not conscience,

Which is but cold, inflaming love i’ thy bosom,

Inflame too nicely; nor let pity, which

Even women have cast off, melt thee, but be

A soldier to thy purpose.

I will do’t; but yet she is a goodly creature.

The fitter, then, the gods should have her. Here she comes weeping for

her only mistress’ death. Thou art resolved?

I am resolved.

No, I will rob Tellus of her weed

To strew thy green with flowers: the yellows, blues,

The purple violets, and marigolds,

Shall as a carpet hang upon thy grave,

While summer days do last. Ay me! poor maid,

Born in a tempest, when my mother died,

This world to me is like a lasting storm,

Whirring me from my friends.

How now, Marina! why do you keep alone?

How chance my daughter is not with you?

Do not consume your blood with sorrowing;

Have you a nurse of me? Lord, how your favour’s

Changed with this unprofitable woe!

Come, give me your flowers, ere the sea mar it.

Walk with Leonine; the air is quick there,

And it pierces and sharpens the stomach.

Come, Leonine, take her by the arm, walk with her.

No, I pray you;

I’ll not bereave you of your servant.

Come, come;

I love the king your father, and yourself,

With more than foreign heart. We every day

Expect him here: when he shall come and find

Our paragon to all reports thus blasted,

He will repent the breadth of his great voyage;

Blame both my lord and me, that we have taken

No care to your best courses. Go, I pray you,

Walk, and be cheerful once again; reserve

That excellent complexion, which did steal

The eyes of young and old. Care not for me;

I can go home alone.

Well, I will go;

But yet I have no desire to it.

Come, come, I know ’tis good for you.

Walk half an hour, Leonine, at the least:

Remember what I have said.

I warrant you, madam.

I’ll leave you, my sweet lady, for a while:

Pray, walk softly, do not heat your blood:

What! I must have a care of you.

My thanks, sweet madam.

Is this wind westerly that blows?

South-west.

When I was born the wind was north.

Was’t so?

My father, as nurse said, did never fear,

But cried ‘Good seamen!’ to the sailors,

Galling his kingly hands, haling ropes;

And clasping to the mast, endured a sea

That almost burst the deck.

When was this?

When I was born:

Never was waves nor wind more violent;

And from the ladder tackle washes off

A canvas-climber. ‘Ha!’ says one, ‘wolt out?’

And with a dropping industry they skip

From stem to stern: the boatswain whistles, and

The master calls and trebles their confusion.

Come, say your prayers.

What mean you?

If you require a little space for prayer,

I grant it: pray; but be not tedious,

For the gods are quick of ear, and I am sworn

To do my work with haste.

Why will you kill me?

To satisfy my lady.

Why would she have me kill’d now?

As I can remember, by my troth,

I never did her hurt in all my life:

I never spake bad word, nor did ill turn

To any living creature: believe me, la,

I never kill’d a mouse, nor hurt a fly:

I trod upon a worm against my will,

But I wept for it. How have I offended,

Wherein my death might yield her any profit,

Or my life imply her any danger?

My commission

Is not to reason of the deed, but do it.

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.

I am sworn,

And will dispatch.

Hold, villain!

A prize! a prize!

Half part, mates, half part,

Come, let’s have her aboard suddenly.

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 ravish’d must by me be slain.

Scene II. Mytilene. A room in a brothel.

Boult!

Sir?

Search the market narrowly; Mytilene is full of gallants. We lost too

much money this mart by being too wenchless.

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.

Therefore let’s have fresh ones, whate’er we pay for them. If there be

not a conscience to be used in every trade, we shall never prosper.

Thou sayest true: ’tis not our bringing up of poor bastards,—as, I

think, I have brought up some eleven—

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

market?

What else, man? The stuff we have, a strong wind will blow it to

pieces, they are so pitifully sodden.

Thou sayest true; they’re too unwholesome, o’ conscience. The poor

Transylvanian is dead, that lay with the little baggage.

Ay, she quickly pooped him; she made him roast-meat for worms. But I’ll

go search the market.

Three or four thousand chequins were as pretty a proportion to live

quietly, and so give over.

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

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.

Come, others sorts offend as well as we.

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.

BOULT

O sir, we doubt it not.

Master, I have gone through for this piece, you see: if you like her,

so; if not, I have lost my earnest.

Boult, has she any qualities?

She has a good face, speaks well and has excellent good clothes:

there’s no farther necessity of qualities can make her be refused.

What is her price, Boult?

I cannot be baited one doit of a thousand pieces.

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.

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.

Performance shall follow.

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!

Why lament you, pretty one?

That I am pretty.

Come, the gods have done their part in you.

I accuse them not.

You are light into my hands, where you are like to live.

The more my fault

To scape his hands where I was like to die.

Ay, and you shall live in pleasure.

No.

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?

Are you a woman?

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

An honest woman, or not a woman.

Marry, whip the 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.

The gods defend me!

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.

Now, sir, hast thou cried her through the market?

I have cried her almost to the number of her hairs; I have drawn her

picture with my voice.

And I prithee tell me, how dost thou find the inclination of the

people, especially of the younger sort?

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.

We shall have him here tomorrow with his best ruff on.

Tonight, tonight. But, mistress, do you know the French knight that

cowers i’ the hams?

Who, Monsieur Veroles?

Ay, he: he offered to cut a caper at the proclamation; but he made a

groan at it, and swore he would see her tomorrow.

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.

Well, if we had of every nation a traveller, we should lodge them with

this sign.

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.

I understand you not.

O, take her home, mistress, take her home: these blushes of hers must

be quenched with some present practice.

Thou sayest true, i’faith so they must; for your bride goes to that

with shame which is her way to go with warrant.

Faith, some do and some do not. But, mistress, if I have bargained for

the joint,—

Thou mayst cut a morsel off the spit.

I may so.

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

garments well.

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

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.

I warrant you, mistress, thunder shall not so awake the beds of eels as

my giving out her beauty stirs up the lewdly inclined. I’ll bring home

some tonight.

Come your ways; follow me.

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

Untied I still my virgin knot will keep.

Diana, aid my purpose!

What have we to do with Diana? Pray you, will you go with us?

Why, are you foolish? Can it be undone?

O, Dionyza, such a piece of slaughter

The sun and moon ne’er look’d upon!

I think you’ll turn a child again.

Were I chief lord of all this spacious world,

I’d give it to undo the deed. A 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 face. What canst thou say

When noble Pericles shall demand his child?

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.’

O, go to. Well, well,

Of all the faults beneath the heavens, the gods

Do like this worst.

Be one of those that thinks

The petty wrens of Tarsus will fly hence,

And open this to Pericles. I do shame

To think of what a noble strain you are,

And of how coward a spirit.

To such proceeding

Whoever but his approbation added,

Though not his prime consent, he did not flow

From honourable courses.

Be it so, then:

Yet none does know, but you, how she came dead,

Nor none can know, Leonine being gone.

She did distain my child, and stood between

Her and her fortunes: none would look on her,

But cast their gazes on Marina’s face;

Whilst ours was blurted at and held a malkin

Not worth the time of day. It pierced me through;

And though you call my course unnatural,

You not your child well loving, yet I find

It greets me as an enterprise of kindness

Perform’d to your sole daughter.

Heavens forgive it!

And as for Pericles, what should he say?

We wept after her hearse, and yet we mourn.

Her monument is almost finish’d, and her epitaphs

In glittering golden characters express

A general praise to her, and care in us

At whose expense ’tis done.

Thou art like the harpy,

Which, to betray, dost, with thine angel’s face,

Seize with thine eagle’s talons.

You are like one that superstitiously

Doth swear to the gods that winter kills the flies:

But yet I know you’ll do as I advise.

Thus time we waste, and long leagues make short;

Sail seas in cockles, have and wish but for’t;

Making, to take your imagination,

From bourn to bourn, region to region.

By you being pardon’d, we commit no crime

To use one language in each several clime

Where our scenes seem to live. I do beseech you

To learn of me, who stand i’the gaps to teach you,

The stages of our story. Pericles

Is now again thwarting the wayward seas

Attended on by many a lord and knight,

To see his daughter, all his life’s delight.

Old Helicanus goes along. Behind

Is left to govern, if you bear in mind,

Old Escanes, whom Helicanus late

Advanced in time to great and high estate.

Well-sailing ships and bounteous winds have brought

This king to Tarsus,—think his pilot thought;

So with his steerage shall your thoughts go on,—

To fetch his daughter home, who first is gone.

Like motes and shadows see them move awhile;

Your ears unto your eyes I’ll reconcile.

Dumb-show. Enter Pericles at one door with all his train; Cleon and

Dionyza at the other. Cleon shows Pericles the tomb; whereat Pericles

makes lamentation, puts on sackcloth and in a mighty passion departs.

Then exeunt Cleon and Dionyza.

See how belief may suffer by foul show;

This borrow’d passion stands for true old woe;

And Pericles, in sorrow all devour’d,

With sighs shot through; and biggest tears o’ershower’d,

Leaves Tarsus and again embarks. He swears

Never to wash his face, nor cut his hairs:

He puts on sackcloth, and to sea he bears

A tempest, which his mortal vessel tears,

And yet he rides it out. Now please you wit

The epitaph is for Marina writ

By wicked Dionyza.