Act 3 — ACT III.

SCENE I.

Venice.—Outside Lady Lentulus’ house.

Claridiana and Rogero, being in a readiness, are received in at one another’s houses by their Maids.

Then enter Mendoza, with a Page, to the Lady Lentulus’ window.

Men. Night, like a solemn mourner, frowns on earth, Envying that day should force her doff her robes, Or Phœbus chase away her melancholy. Heaven’s eyes look faintly through her sable masque, And silver Cynthia hides[238] her in her sphere, Scorning to grace black Night’s solemnity. Be unpropitious, Night, to villain thoughts, But let thy diamonds shine on virtuous love. This is the lower house of high-built heaven, 9 Where my chaste Phœbe sits inthroned ’mong thoughts So purely good, brings her to heaven on earth. Such power hath souls in contemplation! Sing, boy (though night yet), like the morning’s lark—

[Music plays.

A soul that’s clear is light, though heaven be dark.

The Lady Lentulus at her window.

Lady Len. Who speaks in music to us?

Men. Sweet, ’tis I. Boy, leave me and to bed.

[Exit Page.

Lady Len. I thank you for your music; now, good-night.

Men. Leave not the world yet, Queen of Chastity; Keep promise with thy love Endymion, And let me meet thee there on Latmus’ top. 20 ’Tis I, whose virtuous hopes are firmly fix’d On the fruition of thy chaste vow’d love.

Lady Len. My lord, Your honour made me promise you ascent Into my house, since my vow barr’d my doors, By some wit’s engine made for theft and lust; Yet for your honour, and my humble fame, Check your blood’s passions, and return, dear lord. Suspicion is a dog that still doth bite Without a cause: this act gives food to envy; 30 Swoll’n big, it bursts, and poisons our clear flames.

Men. Envy is stingless when she looks on thee.

Lady Len. Envy is blind, my lord, and cannot see.

Men. If you break promise, fair, you break my heart.

Lady Len. Then come,—yet[239] stay! ascend,—yet let us part. I fear,—yet know not what I fear. Your love [i]s precious, yet mine honour’s dear.

Men. If I do stain thy honour with foul lust, May thunder strike me to show Jove is just!

Lady Len. Then come, my lord; on earth your vow is given. 40 This aid I’ll lend you.

[He throws up a ladder of cords, which she makes fast to some part of the window; he ascends, and at top falls.

Men. Thus I mount my heaven: Receive me, sweet!

Lady Len. O me, unhappy wretch! How fares your honour? Speak, fate-cross’d lord! If life retain his seat within you, speak! Else like that Sestian dame, that saw her love Cast by the frowning billows on the sands, And lean death, swoll’n big with the Hellespont, In bleak Leander’s body—like his love, Come I to thee. One grave shall serve us both!

Men. Stay, miracle of women! yet I breathe. 50 Though death be entered in this tower of flesh, He is not conqueror; my heart stands out, And yields to thee, scorning his tyranny!

Lady Len. My doors are vow’d shut, and I cannot help you. Your wounds are mortal; wounded is mine honour If there the town-guard find you. Unhappy dame! Relief is perjur’d,—my vow kept, shame! What hellish destiny did twist my fate!

Men. Rest seize thine eyelids; be not passionate; Sweet, sleep secure; I’ll remove myself, 60 That viper Envy shall not spot thy fame: I’ll take that poison with me, my soul’s rest, For like a serpent I’ll creep on my breast.

Lady Len. Thou more than man! Love-wounded, joy and grief Fight in my blood. Thy wounds and constancy Are both so strong, none can have victory!

Men. Darken the world, earth’s queen; get thee to bed; The earth is light while those two stars are spread: Their splendour will betray me to men’s eyes. Veil thy bright face; for if thou longer stay, 70 Phœbus will rise to thee and make night day.

Lady Len. To part and leave you hurt my soul doth fear.

Men. To part from hence I cannot, you being there.

Lady Len. We’ll move together, then fate love controls; And as we part, so bodies part from souls.

Men. Mine is the earth, thine the refinèd fire; I am mortal, thou divine; then soul mount higher.

Lady Len. Why then, take comfort, sweet; I’ll see you[240] to-morrow.

Men. My wounds are nothing; thy loss breeds my sorrow.

[Exit Lady Lentulus.

See now ’tis dark! 80 Support your master, legs, a little further; Faint not, bold heart, with anguish of my wound; Try further yet. Can blood weigh down my soul? Desire is vain without ability.

[He staggers on, and then falls down.

Thus falls a monarch, if fate push at him.

Enter a Captain and the Watch.

Cap. Come on, my hearts; we are the city’s security. I’ll give you your charge, and then, like courtiers, every man spy out. Let no man in my company be afraid to speak to a cloak lined with velvet, nor tremble at the sound of a gingling spur. 90

Watch. May I never be counted a cock of the game if I fear spurs, but be gelded like a capon for the preserving of my voice.

Cap. I’ll have none of my band refrain to search a venereal house, though his wife’s sister be a lodger there; nor take two shillings of the bawd to save the gentlemen’s credits that are aloft, and so, like voluntary panders, leave them, to the shame of all halberdiers.

2. Nay, the wenches, we’ll tickle them, that’s flat. 99

Cap. If you meet a shevoiliero, that’s in the gross phrase a knight that swaggers in the street, and, being taken, has no money in his purse to pay for his fees, it shall be a part of your duty to entreat me to let him go.

1. O marvellous! is there such shevoiliers?

2. Some two hundred, that’s the least, that are reveal’d.

[Mendoza groans.

Cap. What groan is that? Bring a light. Who lies there? It is the Lord Mendoza, kinsman to our duke. Speak, good my lord: relate your dire mischance; Life, like a fearful servant, flies his master; 110 Art must atone them, or th’ whole man is lost. Convey him to a surgeon’s, then return;

[Part of the Watch bear away Mendoza.

No place shall be unsearch’d until we find The truth of this mischance. Make haste again. Whose house is this stands open? In and search What guests that house contains, and bring them forth.

[Exit the Watch to search the houses of Rogero and Claridiana.

This noble man’s misfortune stirs my quiet, And fills my soul with fearful fantasies; But I’ll unwind this labyrinth of doubt, Else industry shall lose part of itself’s labour. 120

[Re-enter[241] the Watch with Claridiana and Rogero taken in one another’s houses in their shirts and night-gowns. They see one another.

Who have we there? Signiors, cannot you tell us How our prince’s kinsman came wounded to the death Nigh to your houses?

Rog. Heyday! cross-ruff[242] at midnight! Is’t Christmas, You go a-gaming to your neighbour’s house?

Cla. Dost make a mummer of me, ox-head?

Cap. Make answer, gentlemen, it doth concern you.

Rog. Ox-head will bear an action; I’ll ha’ the law; I’ll not be yoked. Bear witness, gentlemen, he calls me ox-head. 130

Cap. Do you hear, sir?

Cla. Very well, very well; take law and hang thyself; I care not. Had she no other but that good face to dote upon? I’d rather she had dealt with a dangerous Frenchman than with such a pagan.

Cap. Are you mad? Answer my demand.

Rog. I am as good a Christian as thyself, Though my wife have now new christen’d me.

Cap. Are you deaf, you make no answer? 139

Cla. Would I had had the circumcising of thee, Jew; I’d ha’ cut short your cuckold-maker; I would i’faith, I would i’faith!

Cap. Away with them to prison! they’ll answer better there.

Rog. Not too fast, gentlemen; what’s our crime?

Cap. Murder of the duke’s kinsman, Signior Mendoza.

Ambo. Nothing else? We did it, we did it, we did it!

Cap. Take heed, gentlemen, what you confess.

Cla. I’ll confess anything, since I am made a fool by a knave. I’ll be hang’d like an innocent, that’s flat. 151

Rog. I’ll not see my shame. Hemp instead of a quacksalver. You shall put out mine eyes, and my head shall be bought to make ink-horns of.

Cap. You do confess the murder?

Cla. Sir, ’tis true, Done by a faithless Christian and a Jew.

Cap. To prison with them; we will hear no further; The tongue betrays the heart of guilty murther.

[Exeunt omnes.

SCENE II.

Pavia.

Enter Count Massino,[243] Isabella, Anna, and Servants.

Mass. Welcome to Pavy, sweet; and may this kiss Chase melancholy from thy company; Speak, my soul’s joy, how fare you after travel?

Isa. Like one that scapeth danger on the seas, Yet trembles with cold fears, being safe on land, With bare imagination of what’s past.

Mass. Fear keep with cowards, air[244]-stars cannot move.

Isa. Fear in this kind, my lord, doth sweeten love.

Mass. To think fear joy, dear, I cannot conjecture.

Isa. Fear’s sire to fervency, 10 Which makes love’s sweet prove nectar; Trembling desire, fear, hope, and doubtful leisure, Distil from love the quintessence of pleasure.

Mass. Madam, I yield to you; fear keeps with love, My oratory is too weak against you: You have the ground of knowledge, wise experience, Which makes your argument invincible.

Isa. You are Time’s scholar, and can flatter weakness.

Mass. Custom allows it, and we plainly see Princes and women maintain flattery. 20

Isa. Anna, go see my jewels and my trunks Be aptly placèd in their several rooms.

[Exit Anna.

Enter Gniaca Count of Gaza, with Attendants.

My lord, Know you this gallant? Tis a complete gentleman.

Mass. I do; ’tis Count Gniaca, my endeared friend.

Gni. Welcome to Pavy; welcome, fairest lady. Your sight, dear friend, is life’s restorative; This day’s the period of long-wish’d content, More welcome to me than day to the world, Night to the wearied, or gold to a miser: 30 Such joy feels friendship in society.

Isa. [Aside.] A rare-shaped man: compare them both together.

Mass. Our loves are friendly twins, both at a birth; The joy you taste, that joy do I conceive. This day’s the jubilee of my desire.

Isa. [Aside.] He’s fairer than he was when first I saw him. This little time makes him more excellent.

Gui. Relate some news. Hark you; what lady’s that? Be open-breasted, so will I to thee.

[They whisper.

Isa. [Aside.] Error did blind him that paints love blind; 40 For my love plainly judges difference: Love is clear-sighted, and with eagle’s eyes, Undazzled, looks upon bright sun-beam’d beauty. Nature did rob herself when she made him, Blushing to see her work excel herself; ’Tis[245] shape makes mankind femelacy. Forgive me, Count Massino,[246] ’tis my fate To love thy friend, and quit thy love with hate. I must enjoy him; let hope thy passions smother; Faith cannot cool blood; I’ll clip him were ’t my brother. Such is the heat of my sincere affection, 51 Hell nor earth can keep love in subjection!

Gni. I crave your honour’s pardon; my ignorance Of what you were may gain a courteous pardon.

Isa. There needs no pardon where there’s no offence. [Aside.] His tongue strikes music ravishing my sense: I must be sudden, else desire confounds me.

Mass. What sport affords this climate for delight?

Gni. We’ll hawk and hunt to-day; as for to-morrow, Variety shall feed variety. 60

Isa. Dissimulation women’s armour is, Aid love, belief, and female constancy.— O I am sick, my lord! Kind Massino,[247] help me!

Mass. Forfend it, Heaven! Madam, sit; how fare you? My life’s best comfort, speak—O speak, sweet saint!

Isa. Fetch art to keep life; run, my love, I faint; My vital breath runs coldly through my veins; I see lean death, with eyes imaginary, Stand fearfully before me; here my end, A wife unconstant, yet thy loving friend! 70

Mass. As swift as thought fly I to wish thee aid.

[Exit.

Isa. Thus innocence by craft is soon betray’d.— My Lord Gniaca, ’tis your art must heal me; I am love-sick for your love; love, love, for loving! I blush for speaking truth; fair sir, believe me, Beneath the moon nought but your frown can grieve me.

Gni. Lady, by Heaven, methinks this fit is strange.

Isa. Count not my love light for this sudden change: By Cupid’s bow I swear, and will avow, I never knew true perfect love till now. 80

Gni. Wrong not yourself, me, and your dearest friend; Your love is violent, and soon will end. Love is not love unless love doth persever; That love is perfect love that loves for ever.

Isa. Such love is mine; believe it, well-shaped youth, Though women use to lie, yet I speak truth. Give sentence for my life, or speedy death. Can you affect me?

Gni. I should belie my thoughts to give denial; But then to friendship I must turn disloyal. 90 I will not wrong my friend; let that suffice.

Isa. I’ll be a miracle; for love a woman dies.

[Offers to stab herself.

Gni. Hold, madam; these are soul-killing passions. I’d rather wrong my friend than you yourself.

Isa. Love me, or else, by Jove, death’s but delay’d. My vow is fix’d in heaven; fear shall not move me; My life is death with tortures ’less you love me.

Gni. Give me some respite, and I will resolve you.

Isa. My heart denies it; My blood is violent; now or else never. 100 Love me! and like love’s queen I’ll fall before thee, Enticing dalliance from thee with my smiles, And steal thy heart with my delicious kisses. I’ll study art in love, that in a rapture[248] Thy soul shall taste pleasure’s excelling nature. Love me! Both art and nature in large recompense Shall be profuse in ravishing thy sense.

Gni. You have prevail’d; I am yours from all the world; Thy wit and beauty have entranced my soul; 110 I long for dalliance, my blood burns like fire. Hell’s pain on earth is to delay desire!

Isa. I kiss thee for that breath. This day you hunt; In midst of all your sports leave you Massino;[249] Return to me, whose life rests in thy sight, Where pleasure shall make nectar our delight.

Gni. I condescend to what thy will implores me; He that but now neglected thee adores thee. But see, here comes my friend; fear makes him tremble.

Enter Massino,[250] Anna, and Doctor.

Isa. Women are witless that cannot dissemble: 120 Now I am sick again.—Where’s my Lord Massino?[250] His love and my health’s vanish’d both together.

Mass. Wrong not thy friend, dear friend, in thy extremes; Here’s a profound Hippocrates, my dear, To administer to thee the spirit of health.

Isa. Your sight to me, my lord, excels all physic; I am better far, my love, than when you left me; Your friend was comfortable to me at the last. ’Twas but a fit, my lord, and now ’tis past. Are all things ready, sir? 130

Anna. Yes, madam, the house is fit.

Gni. Desire in women is the life of wit.

[Exeunt omnes.

SCENE III.

Venice.—A Street.

Enter Abigail and Thais at several doors.

Abi. O partner, I am with child of laughter, and none but you can be my midwife. Was there ever such a game at noddy?[251]

Tha. Our husbands think they are foremen of the jury; they hold the heretic point of predestination, and sure they are born to be hanged!

Abi. They are like to prove men of judgment; but not for killing of him that’s yet alive and well recovered.

Tha. As soon as my man saw the watch come up, All his spirit was down. 10

Abi. But though they have made us good sport in speech, They did hinder us of good sport in action. O wench! imagination is strong in pleasure!

Tha. That’s true; for the opinion my good man had of enjoying you made him do wonders.

Abi. Why should a weak man, that is so soon satisfied, desire variety?

Tha. Their answer is, to feed on pheasants continually would breed a loathing.

Abi. Then if we seek for strange flesh that have stomachs at will, ’tis pardonable. 21

Tha. Ay, if men had any feeling of it; but they judge us by themselves.

Abi. Well, we will bring them to the gallows, and then, like kind virgins,[252] beg their lives; and after live at our pleasures, and this bridle shall still rein them.

Tha. Faith, if we were disposed, we might sin[253] as safe as if we had the broad seal to warrant it; but that night’s work will stick by me this forty weeks. Come, shall we go visit the discontented Lady Lentulus, whom the Lord Mendoza has confess’d to his chirurgion he would have robb’d? I thought great men would but have robb’d the poor, yet he the rich. 33

Abi. He thought that the richer purchase, though with the worse conscience; but we’ll to comfort her, and then go hear our husband’s lamentations. They say mine has compiled an ungodly volume of satires against women, and calls his book The Snarl.

Tha. But he’s in hope his book will save him.

Abi. God defend that it should, or any that snarl in that fashion! 41

Tha. Well, wench, if I could be metamorphosed into thy shape, I should have my husband pliant to me in his life, and soon rid of him; for being weary with his continual motion, he’d die of a consumption.

Abi. Make much of him, for all our wanton prize; Follow the proverb, “Merry be and wise.”

[Exeunt.

SCENE IV.

Isabella’s house at Pavia.

Enter Isabella, Anna, and Servants.

Isa. Time, that devour’st all mortality, Run swiftly these few hours, And bring Gniaca on thy aged shoulders, That I may clip the rarest model of creation. Do this, gentle Time, And I will curl thine agèd silver lock, And dally with thee in delicious pleasure: Medea-like I will renew thy youth, But if thy frozen steps delay my love, I’ll poison thee, with murder curse thy paths, 10 And make thee know a time of infamy.— Anna, give watch, and bring me certain notice When Count Gniaca doth approach my house.

Anna. Madam, I go.— I am kept for pleasure, though I never taste it; For ’tis the usher’s office still to cover His lady’s private meetings with her lover.

[Exit.

Isa. Desire, thou quenchless flame that burn’st our souls, Cease to torment me; The dew of pleasure shall put out thy fire, 20 And quite consume thee with satiety. Lust shall be cool’d with lust, wherein I’ll prove The life of love is only saved by love.

Enter Anna.

Anna. Madam, he’s coming.

Isa. Thou blessed Mercury, Prepare a banquet fit to please the gods; Let sphere-like[254] music breathe delicious tones Into our mortal ears; perfume the house With odoriferous scents, sweeter than myrrh, Or all the spices in Panchaia. His sight and touching we will recreate, 30 That his five senses shall be fivefold happy. His breath like roses casts out sweet perfume; Time now with pleasure shall itself consume.

Enter Gniaca in his hunting weeds.

How like Adonis in his hunting weeds, Looks this same goddess-tempter! And art thou come? This kiss entrance thy[255] soul! Gods, I do not envy you; for, know this, Way’s[256] here on earth complete, excels your bliss: I’ll not change this night’s pleasure with you all.

Gni. Thou creature made by love, composed of pleasure, 40 That makest true use of thy creation, In thee both wit and beauty’s resident; Delightful pleasure, unpeer’d excellence. This is the fate fix’d fast unto thy birth, That thou alone shouldst be man’s heaven on earth. If I alone may but enjoy thy love, I’ll not change earthly joy to be heaven’s Jove: For though that women-haters now are common, They all shall know earth’s joy consists in woman.

Isa. My love was dotage till I lovèd thee, 50 For thy soul truly tastes our petulance; Condition’s[257] lover, Cupid’s Intelligencer, That makes man[258] understand what pleasure is: These are fit tributes unto thy knowledge; For women’s beauty o’er men bear that rule, Our power commands the rich, the wise, the fool. Though scorn grows big in man, in growth and stature, Yet women are the rarest works of[259] nature.

Gni. I do confess the truth, and must admire That women can command rare man’s desire. 60

Isa. Cease admiration, sit to Cupid’s feast, The preparation to Paphian dalliance; Harmonious music, breathe thy silver airs To stir up appetite to Venus’ banquet, That breath of pleasure that entrances souls, Making that instant happiness a heaven, In the true taste of love’s deliciousness.

Gni. Thy words are able to stir cold desire Into his flesh that lies entomb’d in ice, Having lost the feeling use of warmth in blood; 70 Then how much more in me, whose youthful veins, Like a proud river, overflow their bounds? Pleasure’s ambrosia, or love’s nourisher, I long for privacy; come, let us in; ’Tis custom, and not reason, makes love sin.

Isa. I’ll lead the way to Venus’ paradise, Where thou shalt taste that fruit that made man wise.

[Exit Isabella.

Gni. Sing notes of pleasure to elate our blood: Why should heaven frown on joys that do us good? I come, Isabella, keeper of love’s treasure, 80 To force thy blood to lust, and ravish pleasure.

[Exit.

After some short song, enter Isabella and Gniaca again, she hanging about his neck lasciviously.

Gni. Still I am thy captive, yet thy thoughts are free; To be love’s bondman is true liberty. I have swum in seas of pleasure without ground, Ventrous desire past depth itself hath drown’d. Such skill has beauty’s art in a true lover, That dead desire to life it can recover. Thus beauty our desire can soon advance, Then straight again kill it with dalliance. Divinest women, your enchanting breaths 90 Give lovers many lives and many deaths!

Isa. May thy desire to me for ever last, Not die but surfeit on my delicates; And as I tie this jewel about thy neck, So may I tie thy constant love to mine, Never to seek weaking variety, That greedy curse of man and woman’s hell, Where nought but shame and loath’d diseases dwell.

Gni. You counsel well, dear; learn it then; For change is given more to you than men. 100

Isa. My faith to thee, like rocks, shall never move, The sun shall change his course ere I my love.

Enter Anna.

Ann. Madam, the Count Massino[260] knocks.

Isa. Dear love, into my chamber, till I send My hate from sight.

Gni. Lust makes me wrong my friend.

[Exit Gniaca.

Isa. Anna, stand here and entertain Lord Massino;[260] I from my window straight will give him answer. The serpent’s wit to woman rest in me; By that man fell, then why not he by me? 109 Feign’d sighs, and tears dropp’d from a woman’s eye, Blinds man of reason, strikes his knowledge dumb. Wit arms a woman; Count Massino,[260] come.

[Exit Isabella.

Ann. My office still is under: yet in time Ushers prove masters, degrees makes us climb.

[Massino[261] knocks.

Who knocks? Is’t you, my noble lord?

Enter Massino[261] in his hunting weeds.

Mass. Came my friend hither—Count Gniaca?

Ann. No, my good lord.

Mass. Where’s my Isabella?

Ann. In her chamber.

Mass. Good: I’ll visit her. 120

Ann. The chamber’s lock’d, my lord: she will be private.

Mass. Lock’d against me—my saucy malapert?

Ann. Be patient, good my lord; she’ll give you answer.

Mass. Isabella! life of love, speak, ’tis I that calls.

[Isabella at her window.[262]

Isa. I must desire your lordship pardon me.

Mass. Lordship? what’s this? Isabella, art thou blind?

Isa. My lord, My lust was blind, but now my soul’s clear-sighted, And sees the spots that did corrupt my flesh: Those tokens sent from hell, brought by desire, 130 The messenger of everlasting death!

Ann. My lady’s in her pulpit, now she’ll preach.

Mass. Is not thy lady mad? In verity I always Took her for a puritan, and now she shows it.

Isa. Mock not repentance. Profanation Brings mortals laughing to damnation. Believe it, lord, Isabella’s ill-pass’d life, Like gold refined, shall make a perfect wife. I stand on firm ground now, before on ice; We know not virtue till we taste of vice. 140

Mass. Do you hear dissimulation, woman sinner?

Isa. Leave my house, good my lord, and for my part, I look for a most wish’d reconciliation Betwixt myself and my most wrongèd husband. Tempt not contrition then, religious lord.

Mass. Indeed I was one of your family once; But do not I know these are but brain-tricks: And where the devil has the fee-simple, He’ll keep possession; and will you halt Before me that yourself has made a cripple? 150

Isa. Nay, then, you wrong me; and, disdainèd lord, I paid then for thy pleasures vendible— Whose mercenary flesh I bought with coin. I will divulge thy baseness, ’less with speed Thou leave my house and my society.

Mass. Already turn’d apostate! but now all pure, Now damn’d your faith is, and [your] loves endure Like dew upon the grass; when pleasure’s sun Shines on your virtues, all your virtue’s done. I’ll leave thy house and thee; go, get thee in, 160 Thou gaudy child of pride, and nurse of sin.

Isa. Rail not on me, my lord; for if you do, My hot desire of vengeance shall strike wonder; Revenge in women falls like dreadful thunder!

[Exit.

Ann. Your lordship will command me no further service?

Mass. I thank thee for thy watchful service past; Thy usher-like attendance on the stairs, Being true signs of thy humility.

Ann. I hope I did discharge my place with care. 169

Mass. Ushers should have much wit, but little hair;[263] Thou hast of both sufficient: prithee leave me, If thou hast an honest lady, commend me to her, But she is none.

[Exit Anna.

Farewell, thou private strumpet, worse than common! Man were on earth an angel but for woman. That sevenfold branch of hell from them doth grow; Pride, lust, and murder, they raise from below, With all their fellow-sins. Women are made Of blood, without souls; when their beauties fade, And their lust’s past, avarice or bawdry 180 Makes them still loved; then they buy venery, Bribing damnation, and hire brothel-slaves: Shame’s their executors, infamy their graves. Your painting will wipe off, which art did hide, And show your ugly shape in spite of pride. Farewell, Isabella, poor in soul and fame, I leave thee rich in nothing but in shame. Then, soulless women, know, whose faiths are hollow, Your lust being quench’d a bloody act must follow.

[Exit.