The Duchess of Malfi

Be sudden. – I am your adventure, am I not?
BOSOLA.  You are:  you must see your husband no more.
DUCHESS.  What devil art thou that counterfeit'st heaven's thunder?
BOSOLA.  Is that terrible?  I would have you tell me whether
Is that note worse that frights the silly birds
Out of the corn, or that which doth allure them
To the nets?  You have heark'ned to the last too much.
DUCHESS.  O misery! like to a rusty o'ercharg'd cannon,
Shall I never fly in pieces? – Come, to what prison?
BOSOLA.  To none.
DUCHESS.           Whither, then?
BOSOLA.                            To your palace.
DUCHESS.                                            I have heard
That Charon's boat serves to convey all o'er
The dismal lake, but brings none back again.
BOSOLA.  Your brothers mean you safety and pity.
DUCHESS.                                          Pity!
With such a pity men preserve alive
Pheasants and quails, when they are not fat enough
To be eaten.
BOSOLA.  These are your children?
DUCHESS.                           Yes.
BOSOLA.                                  Can they prattle?
DUCHESS.  No:
But I intend, since they were born accurs'd,
Curses shall be their first language.
BOSOLA.                                Fie, madam!
Forget this base, low fellow —
DUCHESS.                          Were I a man,
I 'd beat that counterfeit face[97 - His vizard.] into thy other.
BOSOLA.  One of no birth.
DUCHESS.                   Say that he was born mean,
Man is most happy when 's own actions
Be arguments and examples of his virtue.
BOSOLA.  A barren, beggarly virtue.
DUCHESS.  I prithee, who is greatest?  Can you tell?
Sad tales befit my woe:  I 'll tell you one.
A salmon, as she swam unto the sea.
Met with a dog-fish, who encounters her
With this rough language; 'Why art thou so bold
To mix thyself with our high state of floods,
Being no eminent courtier, but one
That for the calmest and fresh time o' th' year
Dost live in shallow rivers, rank'st thyself
With silly smelts and shrimps?  And darest thou
Pass by our dog-ship without reverence?'
'O,' quoth the salmon, 'sister, be at peace:
Thank Jupiter we both have pass'd the net!
Our value never can be truly known,
Till in the fisher's basket we be shown:
I' th' market then my price may be the higher,
Even when I am nearest to the cook and fire.'
So to great men the moral may be stretched;
Men oft are valu'd high, when they're most wretched. —
But come, whither you please.  I am arm'd 'gainst misery;
Bent to all sways of the oppressor's will:
There 's no deep valley but near some great hill.

Exeunt.

Act IV

Scene I[98 - Malfi. An apartment in the palace of the Duchess.]

[Enter] FERDINAND and BOSOLA

FERDINAND.  How doth our sister duchess bear herself
In her imprisonment?
BOSOLA.               Nobly:  I 'll describe her.
She 's sad as one long us'd to 't, and she seems
Rather to welcome the end of misery
Than shun it; a behaviour so noble
As gives a majesty to adversity:
You may discern the shape of loveliness
More perfect in her tears than in her smiles:
She will muse for hours together; and her silence,
Methinks, expresseth more than if she spake.
FERDINAND.  Her melancholy seems to be fortified
With a strange disdain.
BOSOLA.                  'Tis so; and this restraint,
Like English mastives that grow fierce with tying,
Makes her too passionately apprehend
Those pleasures she is kept from.
FERDINAND.                         Curse upon her!
I will no longer study in the book
Of another's heart.  Inform her what I told you.

Exit.

[Enter DUCHESS and Attendants]

BOSOLA.  All comfort to your grace!
DUCHESS.                             I will have none.
Pray thee, why dost thou wrap thy poison'd pills
In gold and sugar?
BOSOLA.  Your elder brother, the Lord Ferdinand,
Is come to visit you, and sends you word,
'Cause once he rashly made a solemn vow
Never to see you more, he comes i' th' night;
And prays you gently neither torch nor taper