Page 568 - Shakespeare - Vol. 4

BELARIUS

Sir,
In Cambria are we born, and gentlemen:
Further to boast were neither true nor modest,

Unless I add we are honest.

CYMBELINE

Bow your knees:
Arise my knights o’ th’ battle, I create you [20]
Companions to our person, and will fit you
With dignities becoming your estates.

Enter Cornelius and Ladies.
There’s business in these faces; why so sadly
Greet you our victory? you look like Romans,
And not o’ th’ court of Britain.

CORNELIUS

Hail, great king! [25]
To sour your happiness, I must report
The queen is dead.

CYMBELINE
Who worse than a physician
Would this report become? But I consider,

By med’cine life may be prolong’d, yet death
Will seize the doctor too. How ended she? [30]

CORNELIUS
With horror, madly dying, like her life,
Which (being cruel to the world) concluded

Most cruel to herself. What she confess’d
I will report, so please you. These her women
Can trip me, if I err, who with wet cheeks [35]
Were present when she finish’d.

CYMBELINE
Prithee say.