Act 3 — SCENE VII.

Maria’s Apartment.

Enter Maria.

Mar. Gerardine, come forth, Maria calls!

Those ribs shall not enfold thy buxom limbs

162One minute longer: the cincture of mine arms

Shall more securely keep thy soul from harms.

Ger. [coming out of the trunk] What heavenly breath, of Phitonessa’s power,^[309]

That rais’d the dead corpse of her friend^[310] to life,

Prevails no less on me! for even this urn,

The figure of my sadder requiem,

Gives up my bones, my love, my life, and all,

To her that gives me freedom in my thrall.

Mar. Be brief, sweet friend, salute and part in one;

For niggard time now threats with imminent danger

Our late joy’d scope. Thy earnest, then, of love,

Ere Sol have compass’d half the signs, I fear

Will shew a blushing fault; but ’twas thine aim,^[311]

T’ enforce consent in him that bars thy claim.

Ger. Love salves that fault: let time our guilt reveal,

I’ll ne’er deny my deed, my hand, and seal.

The elements shall lose their ancient force,

Water and earth suppress the fire and air,

163Nature in all use a preposterous course,

Each kind forget his likeness to repair,

Before I’ll falsify my faith to thee.

Mar. The humorous bodies’ elemental kind

Shall sooner lose th’ innated heat of love,

The soul in nature’s bounds shall be confin’d,

Heaven’s course shall retrograde and leave to move,

Ere I surcease^[312] to cherish mutual fire,

With thoughts refin’d in flames of true desire.

Ger. These words are odours on^[313] the sacred shrine

Of love’s best deity: the marriage-god

Longs to perform those^[314] ceremonious rites

Which terminate our hopes: till mine grow full,

I’ll use that intercourse amongst my friends

That erst I did; then, in the height of joy,

I’ll come to challenge interest in my boy.

Till then, farewell.

Mar. You’ll come upon your cue?

Ger. Doubt not of that.

Mar. Then twenty times adieu. [Exeunt.