SCENE V. Britain. A room in Cymbeline's palace. Cymbeline  Shakespeare homepage  |  Cymbeline  | Act 1, Scene 5 

 Previous scene  |  Next scene  SCENE V. Britain. A room in Cymbeline's palace. 

 Enter QUEEN, Ladies, and CORNELIUS  QUEEN  Whiles yet the dew's on ground, gather those flowers; 

 Make haste: who has the note of them? 

 First Lady  I, madam. 

 QUEEN  Dispatch. 



 Exeunt Ladies  Now, master doctor, have you brought those drugs? 

 CORNELIUS  Pleaseth your highness, ay: here they are, madam: 



 Presenting a small box  But I beseech your grace, without offence,-- 

 My conscience bids me ask--wherefore you have 

 Commanded of me those most poisonous compounds, 

 Which are the movers of a languishing death; 

 But though slow, deadly? 

 QUEEN  I wonder, doctor, 

 Thou ask'st me such a question. Have I not been 

 Thy pupil long? Hast thou not learn'd me how 

 To make perfumes? distil? preserve? yea, so 

 That our great king himself doth woo me oft 

 For my confections? Having thus far proceeded,-- 

 Unless thou think'st me devilish--is't not meet 

 That I did amplify my judgment in 

 Other conclusions? I will try the forces 

 Of these thy compounds on such creatures as 

 We count not worth the hanging, but none human, 

 To try the vigour of them and apply 

 Allayments to their act, and by them gather 

 Their several virtues and effects. 

 CORNELIUS  Your highness 

 Shall from this practise but make hard your heart: 

 Besides, the seeing these effects will be 

 Both noisome and infectious. 

 QUEEN  O, content thee. 



 Enter PISANIO 

 Aside  Here comes a flattering rascal; upon him 

 Will I first work: he's for his master, 

 An enemy to my son. How now, Pisanio! 

 Doctor, your service for this time is ended; 

 Take your own way. 

 CORNELIUS  [Aside]          I do suspect you, madam; 

 But you shall do no harm. 

 QUEEN  [To PISANIO]            Hark thee, a word. 

 CORNELIUS  [Aside]  I do not like her. She doth think she has 

 Strange lingering poisons: I do know her spirit, 

 And will not trust one of her malice with 

 A drug of such damn'd nature. Those she has 

 Will stupefy and dull the sense awhile; 

 Which first, perchance, she'll prove on 

 cats and dogs, 

 Then afterward up higher: but there is 

 No danger in what show of death it makes, 

 More than the locking-up the spirits a time, 

 To be more fresh, reviving. She is fool'd 

 With a most false effect; and I the truer, 

 So to be false with her. 

 QUEEN  No further service, doctor, 

 Until I send for thee. 

 CORNELIUS  I humbly take my leave. 



 Exit  QUEEN  Weeps she still, say'st thou? Dost thou think in time 

 She will not quench and let instructions enter 

 Where folly now possesses? Do thou work: 

 When thou shalt bring me word she loves my son, 

 I'll tell thee on the instant thou art then 

 As great as is thy master, greater, for 

 His fortunes all lie speechless and his name 

 Is at last gasp: return he cannot, nor 

 Continue where he is: to shift his being 

 Is to exchange one misery with another, 

 And every day that comes comes to decay 

 A day's work in him. What shalt thou expect, 

 To be depender on a thing that leans, 

 Who cannot be new built, nor has no friends, 

 So much as but to prop him? 



 The QUEEN drops the box: PISANIO takes it up  Thou takest up 

 Thou know'st not what; but take it for thy labour: 

 It is a thing I made, which hath the king 

 Five times redeem'd from death: I do not know 

 What is more cordial. Nay, I prethee, take it; 

 It is an earnest of a further good 

 That I mean to thee. Tell thy mistress how 

 The case stands with her; do't as from thyself. 

 Think what a chance thou changest on, but think 

 Thou hast thy mistress still, to boot, my son, 

 Who shall take notice of thee: I'll move the king 

 To any shape of thy preferment such 

 As thou'lt desire; and then myself, I chiefly, 

 That set thee on to this desert, am bound 

 To load thy merit richly. Call my women: 

 Think on my words. 



 Exit PISANIO  A sly and constant knave, 

 Not to be shaked; the agent for his master 

 And the remembrancer of her to hold 

 The hand-fast to her lord. I have given him that 

 Which, if he take, shall quite unpeople her 

 Of liegers for her sweet, and which she after, 

 Except she bend her humour, shall be assured 

 To taste of too. 



 Re-enter PISANIO and Ladies  So, so: well done, well done: 

 The violets, cowslips, and the primroses, 

 Bear to my closet. Fare thee well, Pisanio; 

 Think on my words. 



 Exeunt QUEEN and Ladies  PISANIO  And shall do: 

 But when to my good lord I prove untrue, 

 I'll choke myself: there's all I'll do for you. 



 Exit  Shakespeare homepage  |  Cymbeline  | Act 1, Scene 5 

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