Pericles Prince of Tyre IV.iv

GOWER
59 Thus time we waste, and longest leagues make short;
60 Sail seas in cockles, have an wish but for't;
61 Making, to take your imagination,
62 From bourn to bourn, region to region.
63 By you being pardon'd, we commit no crime
64 To use one language in each several clime
65 Where our scenes seem to live. I do beseech you
66 To learn of me, who stand i' the gaps to teach you,
67 The stages of our story. Pericles
68 Is now again thwarting the wayward seas,
69 Attended on by many a lord and knight.
70 To see his daughter, all his life's delight.
71 Old Escanes, whom Helicanus late
72 Advanced in time to great and high estate,
73 Is left to govern. Bear you it in mind,
74 Old Helicanus goes along behind.
75 Well-sailing ships and bounteous winds have brought
76 This king to Tarsus,--think his pilot thought;
77 So with his steerage shall your thoughts grow on,--
78 To fetch his daughter home, who first is gone.
79 Like motes and shadows see them move awhile;
80 Your ears unto your eyes I'll reconcile.
81 DUMB SHOW.
Enter PERICLES, at one door, with all his train; CLEON and DIONYZA, at the other. CLEON shows PERICLES the tomb; whereat PERICLES makes lamentation, puts on sackcloth, and in a mighty passion departs. Then exeunt CLEON and DIONYZA
82 See how belief may suffer by foul show!
83 This borrow'd passion stands for true old woe;
84 And Pericles, in sorrow all devour'd,
85 With sighs shot through, and biggest tears
o'ershower'd,
87 Leaves Tarsus and again embarks. He swears
88 Never to wash his face, nor cut his hairs:
89 He puts on sackcloth, and to sea. He bears
90 A tempest, which his mortal vessel tears,
91 And yet he rides it out. Now please you wit.
92 The epitaph is for Marina writ
93 By wicked Dionyza.
Reads the inscription on MARINA's monument 'The fairest, sweet'st, and best lies here,
95 Who wither'd in her spring of year.
96 She was of Tyrus the king's daughter,
97 On whom foul death hath made this slaughter;
98 Marina was she call'd; and at her birth,
Thetis, being proud, swallow'd some part o' the earth:
100 Therefore the earth, fearing to be o'erflow'd,
101 Hath Thetis' birth-child on the heavens bestow'd:
102 Wherefore she does, and swears she'll never stint,
103 Make raging battery upon shores of flint.'
104 No visor does become black villany
105 So well as soft and tender flattery.
106 Let Pericles believe his daughter's dead,
107 And bear his courses to be ordered
108 By Lady Fortune; while our scene must play
109 His daughter's woe and heavy well-a-day
110 In her unholy service. Patience, then,
111 And think you now are all in Mytilene.
Exit

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