The Complete Works of William Shakespeare - Israel Gollancz William Shakespeare [1973]
For that my friend hath let you that to understand,
The Marques Lubeck, to whom I am so bound
That whilest I live I count me only his.
MARIANA.
Surely you are beholding to the Marques,
For he hath been an earnest spokes-man in your cause.
WILLIAM.
And yields my Lady, then, at his request,
To grace Duke William with her gratious love?
MARIANA.
My Lord, I am a prisoner,
And hard it were to get me from the Court.
WILLIAM.
An easy matter to get you from the Court,
If case that you will thereto give consent.
MARIANA.
Put case I should, how would you use me than?
WILLIAM.
Not otherwise but well and honorably.
I have at Sea a ship that doth attend,
Which shall forthwith conduct us into England,
Where when we are, I straight will marry thee.
We may not stay deliberating long,
Least that suspicion, envious of our weal,
Set in a foot to hinder our pretence.
MARIANA.
But this I think were most convenient,
To mask my face, the better to scape unknowen.
WILLIAM.
A good devise: till then, Farwell, fair love.
MARIANA.
But this I must intreat your grace,
You would not seek by lust unlawfully
To wrong my chaste determinations.
WILLIAM.
I hold that man most shameless in his sin
That seeks to wrong an honest Ladies name
Whom he thinks worthy of his marriage bed.
MARIANA.
In hope your oath is true,
I leave your grace till the appointed time.
[Exit Mariana.]
WILLIAM.
O happy William, blessed in th love,
Most fortunate in Mariana's love!
Well, Lubeck, well, this courtesy of thine
I will requite, if God permit me life.
[Exit.]
SCENE II.
Manchester. Near the Mill.
[Enter Valingford and Mountney at two sundry doors, looking
angrily each on other with Rapiers drawn.]
MOUNTNEY.
Valingford, so hardly I disgest
An injury thou hast profered me,
As, were it not that I detest to do
What stands not with the honor of my name,
Thy death should pay thy ransom of thy fault.
VALINGFORD.
And, Mountney, had not my revenging wrath,
Incenst with more than ordinary love,
Been loth for to deprive thee of thy life,
Thou hadst not lived to brave me as thou doest.
Wretch as thou art,
Wherein hath Valingford offended thee?
That honourable bond which late we did
Confirm in presence of the Gods,
When with the Conqueror we arrived here,
For my part hath been kept inviolably,
Till now too much abused by thy villainy,
I am inforced to cancel all those bands,
By hating him which I so well did love.
MOUNTNEY.
Subtle thou art, and cunning in thy fraud,
That, giving me occasion of offence,
Thou pickst a quarrell to excuse thy shame.
Why, Valingford, was it not enough for thee
To be a rival twixt me and my love,
But counsell her, to my no small disgrace,
That, when I came to talk with her of love,
She should seem deaf, as faining not to hear?
VALINGFORD.
But hath she, Mountney, used thee as thou sayest?
MOUNTNEY.
Thou knowest too well she hath:
Wherein thou couldest not do me greater injury.
VALINGFORD.
Then I perceive we are deluded both.
For when I offered many gifts of Gold,
And Jewels to entreat for love,
She hath refused them with a coy disdain,
Alledging that she could not see the Sun.
The same conjectured I to be thy drift,
That faining so she might be rid of me.
MOUNTNEY.
The like did I by thee. But are not these
Naturall impediments?
VALINGFORD.
In my conjecture merely counterfeit:
Therefore lets join hands in friendship once again,
Since that the jar grew only by conjecture.
MOUNTNEY.
With all my heart: Yet lets try the truth hereof.
VALINGFORD.
With right good will. We will straight unto her father,
And there to learn whither it be so or no.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE III.
Outside the Danish Palace.
[Enter William and Blanch disguised, with a mask over her
face.]
WILLIAM.
Come on, my love, the comfort of my life.
Disguised thus we may remain unknowen,
And get we once to Seas, I force no then,
We quickly shall attain the English shore.
BLAUNCH.
But this I urge you with your former