The Two Noble Kinsmen (1613)

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Online Critical Edition in Progress - Version 1.c.
Date variant: 1612
Shakespeare Network - https://shakespearenetwork.net/

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Act IV, Scene 3

A room in the prison.

DOCTOR
[Enter Jailer, Wooer, Doctor.]
Her distraction is more at some time of the
moon than at other some, is it not?

JAILER
She is continually in a harmless distemper,
sleeps little, altogether without appetite, save often
drinking, dreaming of another world, and a better;
and what broken piece of matter soe'er she's about,
the name Palamon lards it, that she farces ev'ry
business withal, fits it to every question.

[Enter Jailer's Daughter.]

Look where she comes; you shall perceive her behavior.

[They stand aside.]

DAUGHTER
I have forgot it quite. The burden on 't was
"down-a down-a," and penned by no worse man
than Geraldo, Emilia's schoolmaster. He's as fantastical,
too, as ever he may go upon 's legs, for in
the next world will Dido see Palamon, and then
will she be out of love with Aeneas.

DOCTOR
[aside to Jailer and Wooer]
What stuff's here?
Poor soul.

JAILER
E'en thus all day long.

DAUGHTER
Now for this charm that I told you of, you
must bring a piece of silver on the tip of your
tongue, or no ferry; then if it be your chance to
come where the blessed spirits are, there's a
sight now! We maids that have our livers perished,
cracked to pieces with love, we shall come there,
and do nothing all day long but pick flowers with
Proserpine. Then will I make Palamon a nosegay;
then let him mark me then.

DOCTOR
How prettily she's amiss! Note her a little further.

DAUGHTER
Faith, I'll tell you, sometime we go to
barley-break, we of the blessed. Alas, 'tis a sore life
they have i' th' other place--such burning, frying,
boiling, hissing, howling, chatt'ring, cursing--O,
they have shrewd measure, take heed! If one be
mad, or hang or drown themselves, thither they
go, Jupiter bless us, and there shall we be put in
a cauldron of lead and usurers' grease, amongst a
whole million of cutpurses, and there boil like a
gammon of bacon that will never be enough.

DOCTOR
How her brains coins!

DAUGHTER
Lords and courtiers that have got maids
with child, they are in this place. They shall stand
in fire up to the navel and in ice up to th' heart, and
there th' offending part burns and the deceiving
part freezes: in troth, a very grievous punishment,
as one would think, for such a trifle. Believe me,
one would marry a leprous witch to be rid on 't, I'll assure you.

DOCTOR
How she continues this fancy! 'Tis not an engraffed
madness, but a most thick and profound
melancholy.

DAUGHTER
To hear there a proud lady and a proud city
wife howl together--I were a beast an I'd call it
good sport. One cries "O this smoke!" th' other,
"This fire!"; one cries, "O, that ever I did it behind
the arras!" and then howls; th' other curses a suing
fellow and her garden house.

[Sings.]

I will be true, my stars, my fate, etc.

[Daughter exits.]

JAILER
What think you of her, sir?

DOCTOR
I think she has a perturbed mind, which I
cannot minister to.

JAILER
Alas, what then?

DOCTOR
Understand you she ever affected any man
ere she beheld Palamon?

JAILER
I was once, sir, in great hope she had fixed her
liking on this gentleman, my friend.

WOOER
I did think so, too, and would account I had a
great penn'orth on 't to give half my state that both
she and I, at this present, stood unfeignedly on the
same terms.

DOCTOR
That intemp'rate surfeit of her eye hath distempered
the other senses. They may return and
settle again to execute their preordained faculties,
but they are now in a most extravagant vagary.
This you must do: confine her to a place where
the light may rather seem to steal in than be
permitted.--Take upon you, young sir, her friend,
the name of Palamon; say you come to eat with
her, and to commune of love. This will catch her
attention, for this her mind beats upon; other
objects that are inserted 'tween her mind and eye
become the pranks and friskins of her madness.
Sing to her such green songs of love as she says
Palamon hath sung in prison. Come to her stuck
in as sweet flowers as the season is mistress of,
and thereto make an addition of some other compounded
odors which are grateful to the sense.
All this shall become Palamon, for Palamon can
sing, and Palamon is sweet and ev'ry good thing.
Desire to eat with her, carve her, drink to her, and
still among intermingle your petition of grace and
acceptance into her favor. Learn what maids have
been her companions and playferes, and let them
repair to her with Palamon in their mouths, and
appear with tokens, as if they suggested for him.--
It is a falsehood she is in, which is with falsehoods
to be combated. This may bring her to eat,
to sleep, and reduce what's now out of square in
her into their former law and regiment. I have seen
it approved, how many times I know not, but to
make the number more, I have great hope in this.
I will between the passages of this project come
in with my appliance. Let us put it in execution
and hasten the success, which doubt not will bring
forth comfort.

[They exit.]

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The Two Noble Kinsmen (1613)

Act IV, Scene 3

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