| ACT I SCENE V | Britain. A room in Cymbeline's palace. | |
| | Enter QUEEN, Ladies, and CORNELIUS | |
| QUEEN | Whiles yet the dew's on ground, gather those flowers; | |
| | Make haste: who has the note of them? | |
| First Lady | I, madam. | |
| QUEEN | Dispatch. | 5 |
| | Exeunt Ladies | |
| | Now, master doctor, have you brought those drugs? | |
| CORNELIUS | Pleaseth your highness, ay: here they are, madam: | |
| | Presenting a small box | |
| | But I beseech your grace, without offence,-- | |
| | My conscience bids me ask--wherefore you have | |
| | Commanded of me those most poisonous compounds, | 10 |
| | Which are the movers of a languishing death; | |
| | But though slow, deadly? | |
| QUEEN | I wonder, doctor, | |
| | Thou ask'st me such a question. Have I not been | |
| | Thy pupil long? Hast thou not learn'd me how | 15 |
| | To make perfumes? distil? preserve? yea, so | |
| | That our great king himself doth woo me oft | |
| | For my confections? Having thus far proceeded,-- | |
| | Unless thou think'st me devilish--is't not meet | |
| | That I did amplify my judgment in | 20 |
| | Other conclusions? I will try the forces | |
| | Of these thy compounds on such creatures as | |
| | We count not worth the hanging, but none human, | |
| | To try the vigour of them and apply | |
| | Allayments to their act, and by them gather | 25 |
| | Their several virtues and effects. | |
| CORNELIUS | Your highness | |
| | Shall from this practise but make hard your heart: | |
| | Besides, the seeing these effects will be | |
| | Both noisome and infectious. | 30 |
| QUEEN | O, content thee. | |
| | Enter PISANIO. | |
| | Aside | |
| | Here comes a flattering rascal; upon him | |
| | Will I first work: he's for his master, | |
| | An enemy to my son. How now, Pisanio! | |
| | Doctor, your service for this time is ended; | 35 |
| | Take your own way. | |
| CORNELIUS | Aside I do suspect you, madam; | |
| | But you shall do no harm. | |
| QUEEN | To PISANIO Hark thee, a word. | |
| CORNELIUS | Aside I do not like her. She doth think she has | |
| | Strange lingering poisons: I do know her spirit, | |
| | And will not trust one of her malice with | |
| | A drug of such damn'd nature. Those she has | 40 |
| | Will stupefy and dull the sense awhile; | |
| | Which first, perchance, she'll prove on | |
| | cats and dogs, | |
| | Then afterward up higher: but there is | |
| | No danger in what show of death it makes, | 45 |
| | More than the locking-up the spirits a time, | |
| | To be more fresh, reviving. She is fool'd | |
| | With a most false effect; and I the truer, | |
| | So to be false with her. | |
| QUEEN | No further service, doctor, | 50 |
| | Until I send for thee. | |
| CORNELIUS | I humbly take my leave. | |
| | Exit | |
| QUEEN | Weeps she still, say'st thou? Dost thou think in time | |
| | She will not quench and let instructions enter | |
| | Where folly now possesses? Do thou work: | 55 |
| | When thou shalt bring me word she loves my son, | |
| | I'll tell thee on the instant thou art then | |
| | As great as is thy master, greater, for | |
| | His fortunes all lie speechless and his name | |
| | Is at last gasp: return he cannot, nor | 60 |
| | Continue where he is: to shift his being | |
| | Is to exchange one misery with another, | |
| | And every day that comes comes to decay | |
| | A day's work in him. What shalt thou expect, | |
| | To be depender on a thing that leans, | 65 |
| | Who cannot be new built, nor has no friends, | |
| | So much as but to prop him? | |
| | The QUEEN drops the box: PISANIO takes it up. | |
| | Thou takest up | |
| | Thou know'st not what; but take it for thy labour: | |
| | It is a thing I made, which hath the king | 70 |
| | Five times redeem'd from death: I do not know | |
| | What is more cordial. Nay, I prethee, take it; | |
| | It is an earnest of a further good | |
| | That I mean to thee. Tell thy mistress how | |
| | The case stands with her; do't as from thyself. | 75 |
| | Think what a chance thou changest on, but think | |
| | Thou hast thy mistress still, to boot, my son, | |
| | Who shall take notice of thee: I'll move the king | |
| | To any shape of thy preferment such | |
| | As thou'lt desire; and then myself, I chiefly, | 80 |
| | That set thee on to this desert, am bound | |
| | To load thy merit richly. Call my women: | |
| | Think on my words. | |
| | Exit PISANIO. | |
| | A sly and constant knave, | |
| | Not to be shaked; the agent for his master | 85 |
| | And the remembrancer of her to hold | |
| | The hand-fast to her lord. I have given him that | |
| | Which, if he take, shall quite unpeople her | |
| | Of liegers for her sweet, and which she after, | |
| | Except she bend her humour, shall be assured | 90 |
| | To taste of too. | |
| | Re-enter PISANIO and Ladies. | |
| | So, so: well done, well done: | |
| | The violets, cowslips, and the primroses, | |
| | Bear to my closet. Fare thee well, Pisanio; | |
| | Think on my words. | 95 |
| | Exeunt QUEEN and Ladies. | |
| PISANIO | And shall do: | |
| | But when to my good lord I prove untrue, | |
| | I'll choke myself: there's all I'll do for you. | |
| | Exit | |
