Page 842 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

Let me see what he writes, and when he means [10] to come.
She opens the letter.

CLOWN
I have no mind to Isbel since I was at court. Our old lings and our Isbels
o’th’country are nothing like your old ling and your Isbels o’th’court. The
brains of my Cupid’s knocked out, and I begin to love as an [15] oldman loves

money, with no stomach.

COUNTESS
What have we here?

CLOWN
E’en that you have there.
Exit.

COUNTESS
(reading the letter aloud) I have sent you a daughter-in-law; she hath

recovered the King and undone me. [20] I have wedded her, not bedded her,
and sworn to make the ‘not’ eternal. You shall hear I am run away; know it
before the report come. If there be breadth enough in the world I will hold a
long distance. My duty to you.

Your unfortunate son, [25]
Bertram.
This is not well, rash and unbridled boy,
To fly the favours of so good a King,

To pluck his indignation on thy head
By the misprizing of a maid too virtuous [30]
For the contempt of empire.

Enter Clown.

CLOWN
O madam, yonder is heavy news within, between two soldiers and my young

lady.

COUNTESS