own grace will keep you where you are, though there were no further danger known but the modesty which is so lost.

Dia. You shall not need to fear me.

Wid. I hope so.

Enter HELENA, disguised like a Pilgrim.

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

30

Wid. Ay, marry, is 't.

[A march afar.]

40

Hark you! they come this way.

If you will tarry, holy pilgrim,

But till the troops come by,

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

As ample as myself.

Hel.

Is it yourself?

Wid. If you shall please so, pilgrim.

Hel. I thank you, and will stay upon your

leisure.

Wid. You came, I think, from France?

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.

Dia.

Whatsome'er he is,

He's bravely taken here. He stole from France,
As 'tis 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

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 examined.

Dia.

Alas, poor lady!

'Tis a hard bondage to become the wife Of a detesting lord.

Wid. I warrant, good creature, wheresoe'er she is,

Her heart weighs sadly this young maid might

do her

:

70

66. examined, called in question.

69. I warrant. So Globe editors for Ff I write or I right.

In the unlawful purpose.

Wid.

He does indeed;

And brokes with all that can in such a suit
Corrupt the tender honour of a maid:

But she is arm'd for him and keeps her guard
In honestest defence.

Mar.

The gods forbid else!

Wid. So, now they come:

Drum and Colours.

Enter BERTRAM, PAROLLES, and the whole army.

That is Antonio, the duke's eldest son ;

That, Escalus.

Hel.

Dia.

Which is the Frenchman ?

He; 80

That with the plume: 'tis a most gallant fellow.
I would he loved his wife: if he were honester
He were much goodlier: is 't not a handsome
gentleman ?

Hel. I like him well.

Dia. 'Tis 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 jack-an-apes with scarfs: why is he melancholy?

Hel. Perchance he's hurt i' the battle.

Par. Lose our drum! well.

Mar. He's shrewdly vexed at something: look,

he has spied us.

Wid. Marry, hang you!

Mar. And your courtesy, for a ring-carrier !

[Exeunt Bertram, Parolles, and army.

74. brokes, plays the procurer.

90

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 further,
I will bestow some precepts of this virgin
Worthy the note.

Both.

We'll take your offer kindly.

[Exeunt.

100

SCENE VI. Camp before Florence.

Enter BERTRAM and the two French Lords.

Sec. Lord. Nay, good my lord, put him to't; let him have his way.

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

Sec. Lord. On my life, my lord, a bubble. Ber. Do you think I am so far deceived in him?

Sec. Lord. 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.

First Lord. It were fit you knew him; lest, reposing too far in his virtue, which he hath not,

103. of, on.

4. hilding, base fellow.

10. as, as if he were.

ΤΟ

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.

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

Sec. Lord. 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 judgement in any thing.

20

30

First Lord. 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 40 Drum's entertainment, your inclining cannot be removed. Here he comes.

27. leaguer, camp.

40. John Drum's entertainment, the entertainment that a drum gets, a 'drumming'; hence, an unceremonious expulsion. Holinshed relates of a hospitable Mayor of Dublin that his porter, or any other officer, durst not, for both his ears, give the simplest man that

·

resorted to his house Tom Drum's entertainment, which is, to hale a man in by the head and thrust him out by both the shoulders.' The phrase was thus proverbial. There is no reason to suppose that Marston's Interlude, Jack Drum's Entertainment (1601), is specially alluded to.