Edward.  Why, there it goes! that very smile of hers Hath ransomed captive France; and set the king, The dauphin, and the peers, at liberty.—­ Go, leave me, Ned, and revel with thy friends. [Exit PRINCE.  Thy mother is but black; and thou, like her, Dost put into my mind how foul she is.  Go, fetch the countess hither in thy hand, And let her chase away these winter clouds; For she gives beauty both to heaven and earth. [Exit LODOWICK.  The sin is more, to hack and hew poor men, Than to embrace in an unlawful bed The register of all rarieties {263a} Since leathern Adam till this youngest hour.

   Re-enter LODOWICK with the COUNTESS.

   Go, Lodowick, put thy hand into my purse,
   Play, spend, give, riot, waste; do what thou wilt,
   So thou wilt hence awhile, and leave me here. [Exit LODOWICK.

Having already, out of a desire and determination to do no possible injustice to the actual merits of this play in the eyes of any reader who might never have gone over the text on which I had to comment, exceeded in no small degree the limits I had intended to impose upon my task in the way of citation, I shall not give so full a transcript from the next and last scene between the Countess and the King.

   Edward.  Now, my soul’s playfellow! art thou come
   To speak the more than heavenly word of yea
   To my objection in thy beauteous love?

(Again, this singular use of the word objection in the sense of offer or proposal has no parallel in the plays of Shakespeare.)

   Countess.  My father on his blessing hath commanded—­

   Edward.  That thou shalt yield to me.

   Countess.  Ay, dear my liege, your due.

   Edward.  And that, my dearest love, can be no less
   Than right for right, and render {263b} love for love.

Countess.  Than wrong for wrong, and endless hate for hate.  But, sith I see your majesty so bent, That my unwillingness, my husband’s love, Your high estate, nor no respect respected, Can be my help, but that your mightiness Will overbear and awe these dear regards, I bind my discontent to my content, And what I would not I’ll compel I will; Provided that yourself remove those lets That stand between your highness’ love and mine.

   Edward.  Name them, fair countess, and by heaven I will.

   Countess.  It is their lives that stand between our love
   That I would have choked up, my sovereign.

   Edward.  Whose lives, my lady?

Countess.  My thrice loving liege, Your queen, and Salisbury my wedded husband; Who living have that title in our love That we can not bestow but by their death.

   Edward.  Thy opposition {264a} is beyond our law.