Page 576 - Shakespeare - Vol. 4

Than I did truly find her, stakes this ring,
And would so, had it been a carbuncle
Of Phoebus’ wheel; and might so safely, had it [190]
Been all the worth of’s car. Away to Britain

Post I in this design: well may you, sir,
Remember me at court, where I was taught
Of your chaste daughter the wide difference
’Twixt amorous and villainous. Being thus quench’d [195]

Of hope, not longing, mine Italian brain
Gan in your duller Britain operate
Most vilely: for my vantage, excellent.
And to be brief, my practice so prevail’d,

That I return’d with simular proof enough [200]
To make the noble Leonatus mad,
By wounding his belief in her renown,
With token thus, and thus: averring notes

Of chamber-hanging, pictures, this her bracelet
(O cunning, how I got it!) nay, some marks [205]
Of secret on her person, that he could not
But think her bond of chastity quite crack’d,

I having ta’en the forfeit. Whereupon −
Methinks I see him now −

POSTHUMUS
[advancing]
Ay, so thou dost

Italian fiend! Ay me, most credulous fool, [210]
Egregious murderer, thief, any thing
That’s due to all the villains past, in being,
To come. O, give me cord, or knife, or poison
Some upright justicer! Thou, king, send out

For torturers ingenious: it is I [215]
That all th’ abhorred things o’ th’ earth amend
By being worse than they. I am Posthumus,

That kill’d thy daughter; villain-like, I lie;
That caus’d a lesser villain than myself,
A sacrilegious thief, to do’t. The temple [220]
Of Virtue was she; yea, and she herself.