Mar. Come; let's return again, and suffice ourselves with the report of it. Well, Diana, take heed of this French earl: the honour of a maid is her name, and no legacy is so rich as honesty. Wid. I have told my neighbour, how you have been solicited by a gentleman his companion.

Mar. I know that knave; hang him! one Parolles: a filthy officer he is in those suggestions for the young earl: Beware of them, Diana; their promises, enticements, oaths, tokens, and all these engines of lust, are not the things they go under: many a maid hath been seduced by them; and the misery is, example, that so terrible shows in the wreck of maidenhood, cannot for all that dissuade succession, but that they are limed with the twigs that threaten them. I hope, I need not to advise you further; but, I hope, your own grace will keep you where you are, though there were no farther danger known, but the modesty which is so lost.

Dia. You shall not need to fear me.

Enter HELENA, in the dress of a Pilgrim.

Wid. I hope so.

Look, here comes a pilgrim: I know she will lie at my house; thither they send one another. I'll question her. God save you, pilgrim! Whither are you bound?

Hel.

To Saint Jaques le grand.

Where do the palmers lodge, I do beseech you?
Wid. At the Saint Francis here, beside the port.
Hel. Is this the way?

If you will tarry, holy pilgrim,

But till the troops come by,

I will conduct you where you shall be lodg'd;
The rather, for I think I know your hostess

Hark you! [A march afar off.

Hel. I thank you, and will stay upon your leisure.
Wid. You came, I think, from France?
Hel.
Wid. Here you shall see a countryman of yours,

That has done worthy service.

I did so.

Hel.
His name, I pray you.
Dia. The count Rousillon: know you such a one?

Hel. But by the ear, that hears most nobly of him: His face I know not.

He's bravely taken here. He stole from France,
As 't is reported, for the king had married him
Against his liking. Think you it is so?

Hel. Ay, surely, mere the truth: I know his lady.

Dia. There is a gentleman, that serves the count, Reports but coarsely of her.

Hel.

Dia. Monsieur Parolles.

Hel.

What's his name?

O! I believe with him,

In argument of praise, or to the worth

Of the great count himself, she is too mean
To have her name repeated: all her deserving
Is a reserved honesty, and that

I have not heard examin'd.

Dia.

Alas, poor lady!

'Tis a hard bondage, to become the wife

Of a detesting lord.

Wid. I write good creature: wheresoe'er she is,

Her heart weighs sadly. This young maid might do her A shrewd turn, if she pleas'd.

But she is arm'd for him, and keeps her guard

In honestest defence.

Enter with drum and colours, a party of the Florentine army,

BERTRAM, and PAROLLES.

That with the plume: 't is a most gallant fellow;

I would he lov'd his wife. If he were honester,

He were much goodlier: is 't not a handsome gentleman?
Hel. I like him well.

Dia. 'T is pity, he is not honest. Yond's that same knave, That leads him to these places: were I his lady,

I would poison that vile rascal.

Hel.

Which is he?

Dia. · That jackanapes with scarfs. Why is he melancholy?
Hel. Perchance he's hurt i' the battle.

Par. Lose our drum! well.

Mar.

spied us.

He's shrewdly vexed at something. Look, he has

Wid. Marry, hang you!

Mar.

And your courtesy, for a ring-carrier!

[Exeunt BERTRAM, PAROLLES, Officers, and Soldiers. Wid. The troop is past. Come, pilgrim, I will bring you Where you shall host: of enjoin'd penitents

There's four or five, to great Saint Jaques bound,

Already at my house.

Hel.

I humbly thank you.

Please it this matron, and this gentle maid,

To eat with us to-night, the charge and thanking
Shall be for me; and, to requite you farther,
I will bestow some precepts of this virgin,
Worthy the note.

Both.

We'll take your offer kindly.

[Exeunt.

-SCENE VI.

Camp before Florence.

Enter BERTRAM, and the two Frenchmen.

Fr. Env. Nay, good my lord, put him to 't: let him have

his way.

Fr. Gent. If your lordship find him not a hilding, hold me no more in your respect.

Fr. Env. On my life, my lord, a bubble.

Ber. Do you think I am so far deceived in him?

Fr. Env. Believe it, my lord: in mine own direct knowledge, without any malice, but to speak of him as my kinsman, he's a most notable coward, an infinite and endless liar, an hourly promise-breaker, the owner of no one good quality worthy your lordship's entertainment.

Fr. Gent. It were fit you knew him, lest reposing too far in his virtue which he hath not, he might, at some great and trusty business in a main danger, fail you.

Ber. I would I knew in what particular action to try him.

Fr. Gent. None better than to let him fetch off his drum, which you hear him so confidently undertake to do.

Fr. Env. I, with a troop of Florentines, will suddenly surprise him: such I will have, whom, I am sure, he knows not from the enemy. We will bind and hoodwink him so, that he shall suppose no other but that he is carried into the leaguer of the adversaries, when we bring him to our own tents. Be but your lordship present at his examination, if he do not, for the promise of his life, and in the highest compulsion of base fear, offer to betray you, and deliver all the intelligence in his power against you, and that with the divine forfeit of his soul upon oath, never trust my judgment in any thing.

Fr. Gent. O! for the love of laughter, let him fetch his drum: he says he has a stratagem for 't. When your lordship sees the bottom of his success in 't, and to what metal this counterfeit lump of ore will be melted, if you give him not John Drum's entertainment, your inclining cannot be removed. Here he comes.

Enter PAROLLES.

Fr. Env. 0! for the love of laughter, hinder not the honour of his design let him fetch off his drum in any hand.

:

Ber. How now, monsieur? this drum sticks sorely in your disposition.

Fr. Gent. A pox on 't! let it go: 't is but a drum.

Par. But a drum! Is 't but a drum? A drum so lost! There was an excellent command, to charge in with our horse upon our own wings, and to rend our own soldiers!

Fr. Gent. That was not to be blamed in the command of the service: it was a disaster of war that Cæsar himself could not have prevented, if he had been there to command.

Ber. Well, we cannot greatly condemn our success: some dishonour we had in the loss of that drum; but it is not to be recovered.

Par. It might have been recovered.

Ber. It might; but it is not now.

Par. It is to be recovered. But that the merit of service is seldom attributed to the true and exact performer, I would have that drum or another, or hic jacet

Ber. Why, if you have a stomach to 't, monsieur, if you think your mystery in stratagem can bring this instrument of honour again into his native quarter, be magnanimous in the enterprise, and go on ; I will grace the attempt for a worthy exploit: if you speed well in it, the duke shall both speak of it, and extend to you what farther becomes his greatness, even to the utmost syllable of your worthiness.

Par. By the hand of a soldier, I will undertake it.

Ber. But you must not now slumber in it.

Par. I'll about it this evening: and I will presently pen down my dilemmas, encourage myself in my certainty, put myself into my mortal preparation, and by midnight look to hear farther from me.

Ber. May I be bold to acquaint his grace you are gone about it?

Par. I know not what the success will be, my lord; but the attempt I vow.