Lys.  And may you long be so! ’tis true, this act May cause some wonder in your majesty.

Queen.  None, cousin, none; I ever thought you Ambitious, proud, designing.

Lys.  Yet all my pride, designs, and my ambition,
Were taught me by a master,
With whom you are not unacquainted, madam.

Queen.  Explain yourself; dark purposes, like yours, Need an interpretation.

Lys.  ’Tis love, I mean.

Queen.  Have my low fortunes given thee This insolence, to name it to thy queen?

Lys.  Yet you have heard, love named without offence.  As much below you as you think my passion, I can look down on yours.

Queen.  Does he know it too!  This is the extremest malice of my stars! [Aside.

Lys.  You see that princes’ faults,
(Howe’er they think them safe from public view)
Fly out thro the dark crannies of their closets: 
We know what the sun does,
Even when we see him not, in t’other world.

Queen.  My actions, cousin, never feared the light.

Lys.  Produce him, then, your darling of the dark.  For such an one you have.

Queen.  I know no such.

Lys.  You know, but will not own him.

Queen.  Rebels ne’er want pretence to blacken kings,
And this, it seems, is yours:  Do you produce him,
Or ne’er hereafter sully my renown
With this aspersion:—­Sure he dare not name him. [Aside.

Lys.  I am too tender of your frame; or else—­
Nor are things brought to that extremity: 
Provided you accept my passion,
I’ll gladly yield to think I was deceived.

Queen.  Keep in your error still; I will not buy
Your good opinion at so dear a rate,
And my own misery, by being yours.

Lys.  Do not provoke my patience by such scorns.  For fear I break through all, and name him to you.

Queen.  Hope not to fright me with your mighty looks; Know, I dare stem that tempest in your brow, And dash it back upon you.

Lys.  Spite of prudence it will out:—­’Tis Philocles! 
Now judge, when I was made a property
To cheat myself, by making him your prisoner,
Whether I had not right to take up arms?

Queen.  Poor envious wretch!  Was this the venom that swelled up thy breast?  My grace to Philocles mis-deemed my love!

Lys.  Tis true, the gentleman is innocent; He ne’er sinned up so high, not in his wishes; You know he loves elsewhere.

Queen.  You mean your sister.

Lys.  I wish some Sibyl now would tell me, Why you refused her to him.

Queen.  Perhaps I did not think him worthy of her.

Lys.  Did you not think him too worthy, madam? 
This is too thin a veil to hide your passion;
To prove you love him not, yet give her him,
And I’ll engage my honour to lay down my arms.