than speech: the moon heareth thee not, or if she do, regardeth thee not.

End. Vain Eumenides, whose thoughts never grow higher than the crown of thy head. Why troublest thou me, having neither head to conceive the cause of my love, or heart to receive the impression? Follow thou thine own fortunes, which creep on the earth, and suffer me to fly to mine, whose fall, though it be desperate, yet shall it come by daring. Farewell. [Exit.

Eum. Without doubt Endymion is bewitched, otherwise in a man of such rare virtues, there could not harbour a mind of such extreme madness. I will follow him, lest, in this fancy of the moon, he deprive himself of the sight of the [Exit.

sun.

SCENE II.

TELLUS and FLOSCULA.

Tel. Treacherous and most perjured Endymion; is Cynthia the sweetness of thy life, and the bitterness of my death? what revenge may be devised so full of shame, as my thoughts are replenished with malice? Tell me, Floscula, if falseness in love can possibly be punished with extremity of hate. As long as sword, fire or poison may be hired, no traitor to my love shall live unrevenged: were thy oaths without number, thy kisses without measure, thy sighs without end, forged to deceive a poor credulous virgin, whose simplicity had been worth thy favour and

better fortune? If the gods sit unequal beholders of injuries, or laughers at lovers' deceits, then let mischief be as well forgiven in women, as perjury winked at in men.

Flos. Madam, if you would compare the state of Cynthia with your own, and the height of Endymion his thoughts, with the meanness of your fortune, you would rather yield than contend, being between you and her no comparison, and rather wonder than rage at the greatness of his mind, being affected with a thing more than mortal.

Tel. No comparison, Floscula? and why so? Is not my beauty divine, whose body is decked with fair flowers, and veins are vines, yielding sweet liquor to the dullest spirits, whose ears are corn, to bring strength; and whose hairs are grass, to bring abundance? Doth not frankincense and myrrh breathe out of my nostrils, and all the sacrifice of the gods breed in my bowels? Infinite are my creatures, without which, neither thou, nor Endymion, nor any could love or live*.

Flos. But know you not, fair lady, that Cynthia governeth all things? Your grapes would be

* The attentive reader will not fail to remark, that in the description which Endymion gives of Cynthia, and in that which Tellus in this scene gives of herself, sometimes the moon and earth are meant, considered as mere planets, and sometimes as females capable of human passions. When Tellus first describes herself as a poor virgin, and soon afterwards tells us that her veins are vines, her ears are corn, and her hairs are grass, &c. &c. it is needless to add that this is very applicable to the earth, but not to the lady. Milton, it has been observed by Johnson, sometimes describes Satan as invested with a bodily substance, and at other times as being a mere spirit; our poet seems to be somewhat embarrassed with difficulties of the same kind.

1

but dry husks, your corn but chaff, and all your virtues vain, were it not that Cynthia preserveth the one in the bud, and nourisheth the other in the blade, and by her influence both comforteth all things, and by her authority commandéth all creatures: suffer then, Endymion, to follow his affections, though to obtain her be impossible, and let him flatter himself in his own imaginations because they are immortal.

Tel. Loth I am, Endymion, thou shouldst die, because I love thee well; and that thou, shouldst live it grieveth me, because thou lovest Cynthia too well. In these extremities what shall I do? Floscula, no more words, I am resolved he shall neither live nor die.

Flos. A strange practice if it be possible.

Tel. Yes, I will entangle him in such a sweet. net, that he shall neither find the means to come out, nor desire it. All allurements of pleasure will I cast before his eyes, insomuch that he shall slake that love which he now voweth to Cynthia, and burn in mine, of which he seemeth careless. In this languishing, between my amorous devices and his own loose desires, there shall such desolute thoughts take root in his head, and over his heart grow so thick a skin, that neither hope of prefer ment, nor fear of punishment, nor counsel of thewisest, nor company of the worthiest, shall alter his humour, nor make him once to think of his honour.

Flos. A revenge incredible, and if it may be, unnatural.

Tel. He shall know the malice of a woman, to have neither mean, nor end; and of

woman

deluded in love, to have neither rule nor reason. I can do it. I must, I will. All his virtues will I shadow with vices; his person (ah! sweet person) shall he deck with such rich robes as he shall forget it is his own person; his sharp wit (ah! wit too sharp that hath cut off all my joys) shall he use, in flattering of my face, and devising sonnets in my favour. The prime of his youth, and pride of his time, shall be spent in melancholy passions, careless behaviour, untamed thoughts, and unbridled affections.

Flos. When this is done, what then? shall it continue till his death, or shall he doat for ever in this delight?

Tel. Ah! Floscula, thou rendest my heart in sunder in putting me in remembrance of the end. Flos. Why, if this be not the end, all the rest is to no end.

Tel. Yet suffer me to imitate Juno, who would turn Jupiter's lovers to beasts on the earth, though she knew afterwards they should be stars in heaven.

Flos. Affection that is bred by enchantment, is like a flower that is wrought in silk, in colour and form most like, but nothing at all in substance or savour.

Tel. It shall suffice me if the world talk that I am favoured of Endymion.

Flos. Well, use your own will; but but you shall find that love gotten with witchcraft, is as unpleasant as fish taken with medicines unwhole

some.

Tel. Floscula, they that be so poor that they have neither net nor hook, will rather poison dough than pine with hunger: and she that is so

oppressed with love, that she is neither able with beauty nor wit to obtain her friend, will rather use unlawful means, than try intolerable pains. I will do it. [Exit.

Flos. Then about it. Poor Endymion, what traps are laid for thee, because thou honourest one that all the world wondereth at. And what plots are cast to make thee unfortunate, that studiest of all men to be the faithfulest. [Exit.

SCENE III.

DARES and SAMIAS.

Dares. Now our masters are in love up to the ears, what have we to do, but to be in knavery up to the crowns?

Sam. Oh, that we had Sir Tophas, that brave squire, in the midst of our mirth, and ecce autem, will you see the devil*.

Enter SIR TOPHAS and EPITON.

Top. Epi.

Epi. Here, sir.

Top. I brook not this idle humour of love, it tickles not my liver, from whence love-mongers in former ages seemed to infer it should proceed t.

* Samias alludes to the proverb, "Talk of the devil,” &c. &c. + That the liver was supposed the seat of amorous affection would appear from several passages in the dramatic poets of the time, if the writers on the subject were all lost. Thus in the "Merry Wives of Windsor:"