The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. William Shakespeare
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MARINA.
What mean you?
LEONINE.
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.
MARINA.
Why will you kill rne?
LEONINE.
To satisfy my lady.
MARINA.
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 spoke 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?
LEONINE.
My commission
Is not to reason of the deed, but do it.
MARINA.
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.
LEONINE.
I am sworn,
And will dispatch.
[He seizes her.]
[Enter Pirates.]
FIRST PIRATE.
Hold, villain!
[Leonine runs away.]
SECOND PIRATE.
A prize! a prize!
THIRD PIRATE.
Half-part, mates, half-part,
Comes, let’s have her aboard suddenly.
[Exeunt Pirates with Marina.]
[Re-enter Leonine.]
LEONINE.
These roguing thieves serve the great pirate Valdes;
And they hav seized Marina. Let her go:
Thre’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.
[Exit.]
Scene II. Mytilene. A room in a brothel.
[Enter Pandar, Bawd, and Boult.]
PANDAR.
Boult!
BOULT.
Sir?
PANDAR. Search the market narrowly; Mytilene is full of gallants. We lost too much money this mart by being too wenchless.
BAWD. 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.
PANDAR. Therefore let’s have fresh ones, whate’r we pay for them. If there be not a conscience to be used in every trade, we shall never prosper.
BAWD. Thou sayest true: ‘tis not our bringing up of poor bastards, — as, I think, I have bought up some eleven —
BOULT. Ay, to eleven; and brought them down again. But shall I search the market?
BAWD. What else, man? The stuff we have, a strong wind will blo it to pieces, they are so pitifully sodden.
PANDAR. Thou sayest true; they’re too unwholesome, o’ conscience. The poor Transylvanian is dead, that lay with the little baggage.
BOULT.
Ay, she quickly pooped him; she made him roast-meat for worms.
But I’ll go search the market.
[Exit.]
PANDAR. Three or four thousand chequins were as pretty a proportion to live quietly, and so give over.
BAWD. Wgy to give over, I pray you? is it a shame to get when we are old?
PANDAR. O, our credit comes not in like the commodity , nor the commodity wages not with the danger: therfore, 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.
BAWD.
Come, others sorts offend as well as we.
PANDAR. 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.
[Re-enter Boult, with the Pirates and Marina.]
BOULT
[To Marina.]
Come your ways. My masters, you say she’s a virgin?
FIRST PIRATE.
O, sir, we doubt it not.
BOULT. Master, I have gone through for this piece, you see: if you like her, so; if not, I have lost my earnest.
BAWD.
Boult, has she any qualities?
BOULT. She has a good face, speaks well, and has excellent clothes: ther’s no further necessity of qualities can make her be refused.
BAWD.
What is her price, Boult?
BOULT.
I cannot be baited one doit of a thousand pieces.
PANDAR.
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.
[Exeunt Pandar and Pirates.]
BAWD. Boult, take you the marks of her, the colour of her hair, complexion, height, 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.
BOULT.
Performance shall follow.
[Exit.
MARINA.
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!
BARD.
Why lament you, pretty one?
MARINA.
That I am pretty.
BAWD.
Come, the gods have done their part in you.
MARINA.
I accuse them not.