Page 783 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

of work. Would for the King’s sake he were living! I think it would be the
death of the King’s disease.

LAFEW
How called you the man you speak of, madam?

COUNTESS
He was famous, sir, in his profession, and it was his great right to be so:
Gerard de Narbon. [25]

LAFEW
He was excellent indeed, madam. The King very lately spoke of him

admiringly, and mourningly. He was skilful enough to have lived still, if
knowledge could be set up against mortality.

BERTRAM
What is it, my good lord, the King languishes [30] of?

LAFEW
A fistula, my lord.

BERTRAM
I heard not of it before.

LAFEW

I would it were not notorious. Was this gentlewoman the daughter of Gerard
de Narbon? [35]

COUNTESS
His sole child, my lord, and bequeathed to my overlooking. I have those
hopes of her good, that her education promises her dispositions she inherits
− which makes fair gifts fairer; for where an unclean mind carries virtuous

qualities, there commendations go with pity: [40] they are virtues and
traitors too. In her they are the better for their simpleness. She derives her
honesty and achieves her goodness.

LAFEW