Act 4, Scene II - Page 2

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!

Bawd
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.

Bawd
You are light into my hands, where you are like to live.

MARINA
The more my fault
To scape his hands where I was like to die.

Bawd
Ay, and you shall live in pleasure.

MARINA
No.

Bawd
Yes, indeed shall you, and taste gentlemen of all
fashions: you shall fare well; you shall have the
difference of all complexions. What! do you stop your ears?

MARINA
Are you a woman?

Bawd
What would you have me be, an I be not a woman?

MARINA
An honest woman, or not a woman.

Bawd
Marry, whip thee, gosling: I think I shall have
something to do with you. Come, you're a young
foolish sapling, and must be bowed as I would have
you.

MARINA
The gods defend me!

Bawd
If it please the gods to defend you by men, then men
must comfort you, men must feed you, men must stir
you up. Boult's returned.

Re-enter BOULT

Now, sir, hast thou cried her through the market?

BOULT
I have cried her almost to the number of her hairs;
I have drawn her picture with my voice.

Bawd
And I prithee tell me, how dost thou find the
inclination of the people, especially of the younger sort?

BOULT
'Faith, they listened to me as they would have
hearkened to their father's testament. There was a
Spaniard's mouth so watered, that he went to bed to
her very description.

Bawd
We shall have him here to-morrow with his best ruff on.

BOULT
To-night, to-night. But, mistress, do you know the
French knight that cowers i' the hams?

Bawd
Who, Monsieur Veroles?

BOULT
Ay, he: he offered to cut a caper at the
proclamation; but he made a groan at it, and swore
he would see her to-morrow.

Bawd
Well, well; as for him, he brought his disease
hither: here he does but repair it. I know he will
come in our shadow, to scatter his crowns in the