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Segasto, or else

       I die.

       SEGASTO.

       Alas, madam, there is no way but flight;

       Then haste and save your self.

       [Segasto runs away.]

       AMADINE.

       Why then I die; ah help me in distress!

       [Enter Mucedorus like a shepherd with a sword drawn and a bear’s head in his hand.]

       MUCEDORUS.

       Stay, Lady, stay, and be no more dismayed.

       That cruel beast most merciless and fell,

       Which hath bereaved thousands of their lives,

       Affrighted many with his hard pursues,

       Prying from place to place to find his prey,

       Prolonging thus his life by others’ death,

       His carcass now lies headless, void of breath.

       AMADINE.

       That foul deformed monster, is he dead?

       MUCEDORUS.

       Assure your self thereof, behold his head:

       Which if it please you, Lady, to accept,

       With willing heart I yield it to your majesty.

       AMADINE.

       Thanks, worthy shepherd, thanks a thousand times.

       This gift, assure thy self, contents me more

       Than greatest bounty of a mighty prince,

       Although he were the monarch of the world.

       MUCEDORUS.

       Most gracious goddess, more than mortal wight,

       Your heavenly hue of right imports no less,

       Most glad am I in that it was my chance

       To undertake this enterprise in hand,

       Which doth so greatly glad your princely mind.

       AMADINE.

       No goddess, shepherd, but a mortal wight,

       A mortal wight distressed as thou seest:

       My father here is king of Arragon.

       I Amadine his only daughter am,

       And after him sole heir unto the crown.

       Now, where as it is my father’s will

       To marry me unto Segasto, one,

       Whose wealth through father’s former usury

       Is known to be no less than wonderful,

       We both of custom oftentimes did use,

       Leaving the court, to walk within the fields

       For recreation, especially in the spring,

       In that it yields great store of rare delights:

       And passing further than our wonted walks,

       Scarce were entered within these luckless woods,

       But right before us down a steep fall hill

       A monstrous ugly bear did hie him fast,

       To meet us both. I faint to tell the rest,

       Good shepherd, but suppose the ghastly looks,

       The hideous fears, the thousand hundred woes,

       Which at this instant Amadine sustained.

       MUCEDORUS.

       Yet, worthy princess, let thy sorrow cease,

       And let this sight your former joys revive.

       AMADINE.

       Believe me, shepherd, so it doth no less.

       MUCEDORUS.

       Long may they last unto your heart’s content.

       But tell me, Lady, what is become of him,

       Segasto called, what is become of him?

       AMADINE.

       I know not, I; that know the powers divine,

       But God grant this: that sweet Segasto live.

       MUCEDORUS.

       Yet hard hearted he in such a case,

       So cowardly to save himself by flight:

       And leave so brave a princess to the spoil.

       AMADINE.

       Well, shepherd, for thy worthy valour tried,

       Endangering thy self to set me free,

       Unrecompensed, sure, thou shalt not be.

       In court thy courage shall be plainly known:

       Throughout the Kingdom will I spread thy name,

       To thy renown and never dying fame:

       And that thy courage may be better known,

       Bear thou the head of this most monstrous beast

       In open sight to every courtiers view:

       So will the king my father thee reward.

       Come, let’s away, and guard me to the court.

       MUCEDORUS.

       With all my heart.

       [Exeunt.]

      SCENE IV. Outskirts of the Forest.

       [Enter Segasto solus.]

       SEGASTO.

       When heaps of harms to hover over head,

       Tis time as then, some say, to look about,

       And of ensuing harms to choose the least:

       But hard, yea hapless, is that wretches chance,

       Luckless his lot and caytiffe like acourste,

       At whose proceedings fortune ever frowns.

       My self I mean, most subject unto thrall,

       For I, the more I seek to shun the worst,

       The more by proof I find myself accurst:

       Ere whiles assaulted with an ugly bear,

       Fair Amadine in company all alone,

       Forthwith by flight I thought to save my self,

       Leaving my Amadine unto her shifts:

       For death it was for to resist the bear,

       And death no less of Amadine’s harms to hear.

       Accursed I in lingering life thus long!

       In living thus, each minute of an hour

       Doth pierce my heart with darts of thousand deaths:

       If she by flight her fury do escape,

       What will she think?

       Will she not say—yea, flatly to my face,

       Accusing me of mere disloyalty—

       A trusty friend is tried in time of need,

       But I, when she in danger was of death

       And needed me, and cried, Segasto, help:

       I turned my back and quickly ran away.

       Unworthy I to bear this vital breath!

       But what! what needs these plaints?

       If Amadine do live, then happy I;

       She will in time forgive and so forget:

       Amadine is merciful, not Juno like,

       In harmful heart to harbor hatred long.

       [Enter Mouse, the Clown, running, crying: clubs.]

       MOUSE. Clubs, prongs, pitchforks, bills! O help! a bear, a bear, a bear, a bear!

       SEGASTO. Still bears,

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