Act 3, Scene 6

Wales. Before the cave of Belarius.

[Enter IMOGEN, in boy's clothes]
Imogen
2035 I see a man's life is a tedious one:
2036 I have tired myself, and for two nights together
2037 Have made the ground my bed. I should be sick,
2038 But that my resolution helps me. Milford,
2039 When from the mountain-top Pisanio show'd thee,
2040 Thou wast within a ken: O Jove! I think
2041 Foundations fly the wretched; such, I mean,
2042 Where they should be relieved. Two beggars told me
2043 I could not miss my way: will poor folks lie,
2044 That have afflictions on them, knowing 'tis
2045 A punishment or trial? Yes; no wonder,
2046 When rich ones scarce tell true. To lapse in fulness
2047 Is sorer than to lie for need, and falsehood
2048 Is worse in kings than beggars. My dear lord!
2049 Thou art one o' the false ones. Now I think on thee,
2050 My hunger's gone; but even before, I was
2051 At point to sink for food. But what is this?
2052 Here is a path to't: 'tis some savage hold:
2053 I were best not to call; I dare not call:
2054 yet famine,
2055 Ere clean it o'erthrow nature, makes it valiant,
2056 Plenty and peace breeds cowards: hardness ever
2057 Of hardiness is mother. Ho! who's here?
2058 If any thing that's civil, speak; if savage,
2059 Take or lend. Ho! No answer? Then I'll enter.
2060 Best draw my sword: and if mine enemy
2061 But fear the sword like me, he'll scarcely look on't.
2062 Such a foe, good heavens!
[Exit, to the cave]
[Enter BELARIUS, GUIDERIUS, and ARVIRAGUS]
Belarius
2063 You, Polydote, have proved best woodman and
2064 Are master of the feast: Cadwal and I
2065 Will play the cook and servant; 'tis our match:
2066 The sweat of industry would dry and die,
2067 But for the end it works to. Come; our stomachs
2068 Will make what's homely savoury: weariness
2069 Can snore upon the flint, when resty sloth
2070 Finds the down pillow hard. Now peace be here,
2071 Poor house, that keep'st thyself!
Guiderius
2072 I am thoroughly weary.
Arviragus
2073 I am weak with toil, yet strong in appetite.
Guiderius
2074 There is cold meat i' the cave; we'll browse on that,
2075 Whilst what we have kill'd be cook'd.
[Looking into the cave]
Belarius
2076 Stay; come not in.
2077 But that it eats our victuals, I should think
2078 Here were a fairy.
Guiderius
2079 What's the matter, sir?
Belarius
2080 By Jupiter, an angel! or, if not,
2081 An earthly paragon! Behold divineness
2082 No elder than a boy!
[Re-enter IMOGEN]
Imogen
2083 Good masters, harm me not:
2084 Before I enter'd here, I call'd; and thought
2085 To have begg'd or bought what I have took:
2086 good troth,
2087 I have stol'n nought, nor would not, though I had found
2088 Gold strew'd i' the floor. Here's money for my meat:
2089 I would have left it on the board so soon
2090 As I had made my meal, and parted
2091 With prayers for the provider.
Guiderius
2092 Money, youth?
Arviragus
2093 All gold and silver rather turn to dirt!
2094 As 'tis no better reckon'd, but of those
2095 Who worship dirty gods.
Imogen
2096 I see you're angry:
2097 Know, if you kill me for my fault, I should
2098 Have died had I not made it.
Belarius
2099 Whither bound?
Imogen
2100 To Milford-Haven.
Belarius
2101 What's your name?
Imogen
2102 Fidele, sir. I have a kinsman who
2103 Is bound for Italy; he embark'd at Milford;
2104 To whom being going, almost spent with hunger,
2105 I am fall'n in this offence.
Belarius
2106 Prithee, fair youth,
2107 Think us no churls, nor measure our good minds
2108 By this rude place we live in. Well encounter'd!
2109 'Tis almost night: you shall have better cheer
2110 Ere you depart: and thanks to stay and eat it.
2111 Boys, bid him welcome.
Guiderius
2112 Were you a woman, youth,
2113 I should woo hard but be your groom. In honesty,
2114 I bid for you as I'd buy.
Arviragus
2115 I'll make't my comfort
2116 He is a man; I'll love him as my brother:
2117 And such a welcome as I'd give to him
2118 After long absence, such is yours: most welcome!
2119 Be sprightly, for you fall 'mongst friends.
Imogen
2120 'Mongst friends,
2121 If brothers.
[Aside]
Imogen
2122 Would it had been so, that they
2123 Had been my father's sons! then had my prize
2124 Been less, and so more equal ballasting
2125 To thee, Posthumus.
Belarius
2126 He wrings at some distress.
Guiderius
2127 Would I could free't!
Arviragus
2128 Or I, whate'er it be,
2129 What pain it cost, what danger. God's!
Belarius
2130 Hark, boys.
[Whispering]
Imogen
2131 Great men,
2132 That had a court no bigger than this cave,
2133 That did attend themselves and had the virtue
2134 Which their own conscience seal'd them—laying by
2135 That nothing-gift of differing multitudes—
2136 Could not out-peer these twain. Pardon me, gods!
2137 I'd change my sex to be companion with them,
2138 Since Leonatus's false.
Belarius
2139 It shall be so.
2140 Boys, we'll go dress our hunt. Fair youth, come in:
2141 Discourse is heavy, fasting; when we have supp'd,
2142 We'll mannerly demand thee of thy story,
2143 So far as thou wilt speak it.
Guiderius
2144 Pray, draw near.
Arviragus
2145 The night to the owl and morn to the lark
2146 less welcome.
Imogen
2147 Thanks, sir.
Arviragus
2148 I pray, draw near.
[Exeunt]

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Notes

TLN 2041syntax grammar
“Foundations fly the wretched; such, I mean, Where they should be relieved”
The syntax inverts the expected: 'foundations' (solid shelters, houses, charitable institutions) flee from the very people who need them, rather than offering refuge. Imogen means that when she, as a wandering beggar, most needed to find a house, every one seemed to vanish. The construction 'such, I mean, / Where they should be relieved' glosses 'the wretched' mid-sentence — a relative clause looped back to explain the subject.
TLN 2046archaic vocab
“To lapse in fulness Is sorer than to lie for need”
'To lapse' means to slip or fall into error. 'Fulness' means abundance, prosperity. Imogen is saying that it is a graver fault to lie when you have everything you need (as the rich do) than to lie out of desperation and want. 'Sorer' means more painful, more grievous.
TLN 2052archaic vocab
“'tis some savage hold”
'Hold' means a stronghold, a fortified place, or a den — here a rough cave-dwelling. 'Savage' means wild and uncultivated, not necessarily violent. Imogen is noting that the cave looks like the den of some creature or wild man, not a civilized dwelling.
TLN 2054rhetorical device
“famine, Ere clean it o'erthrow nature, makes it valiant: Plenty and peace breeds cowards: hardness ever Of hardiness is mother”
Imogen strings together three balanced, sententious clauses to steel herself to enter the cave. 'Ere clean it o'erthrow nature' means 'before it utterly destroys the body'; 'hardness ever / Of hardiness is mother' is polyptoton (the same root in two forms): 'hardship is always the mother of courage.' 'Cowards' and 'valiant' are the paired opposites that frame the argument: deprivation breeds bravery; comfort breeds cowardice.
TLN 2063cultural context
“Polydote, have proved best woodman and Are master of the feast: Cadwal and I Will play the cook”
'Polydote' and 'Cadwal' are the false names under which Belarius has raised the kidnapped princes Guiderius and Arviragus in the Welsh wilderness. The audience knows these are Cymbeline's lost sons, but the characters do not. 'Woodman' means a hunter; 'master of the feast' credits Guiderius with bringing home the best kill. The domestic division — hunter, cook, servant — shows the three living a Spartan, self-sufficient life stripped of courtly rank.
TLN 2069archaic vocab
“resty sloth Finds the down pillow hard”
'Resty' (also spelled 'rusty' or 'restic') means restive, sluggish, or lazy — one who has grown stiff from idleness. Belarius is saying that the lazy person finds even a feather pillow uncomfortable, while the genuinely tired man can sleep on flint. The maxim reinforces the scene's Stoic theme: hardship is relative to habit.
TLN 2080classical allusion
“By Jupiter, an angel! or, if not, An earthly paragon! Behold divineness No elder than a boy”
Belarius swears 'By Jupiter' — the supreme Roman god — and immediately escalates: this page is either an angel (a Christian supernatural being of perfect beauty) or an 'earthly paragon,' meaning the finest example of humanity on earth. The exclamation fuses pagan and Christian registers, both reaching for supernatural terms to describe Imogen's beauty — visible even through her male disguise.
classical Jupiter, king of the gods
TLN 2093cultural context
“All gold and silver rather turn to dirt! As 'tis no better reckon'd, but of those Who worship dirty gods”
Arviragus rejects Imogen's offer of payment with a contemptuous outburst: gold and silver are no better than dirt to those who do not make money their god. 'Dirty gods' is an allusion to the worship of money as an idol — those who prize it above honour worship a base, material deity. The speech marks the princes as uncorrupted by courtly greed despite their royal blood.
TLN 2100historical topical
“To Milford-Haven”
Milford Haven is a large natural harbour in west Wales toward which Imogen has been walking — lured there by the forged letter saying Posthumus would meet her. In the play it is the convergence point for almost every character and for the Roman invasion force. For Shakespeare's Jacobean audience the name had a dynastic ring: Henry Tudor had landed there in 1485 on his way to the throne, founding the dynasty whose line James I claimed.
historical Milford Haven
TLN 2102cultural context
“Fidele, sir”
This is the assumed name Imogen gives herself when disguised as a boy-page. 'Fidele' is Italian and Latin for 'faithful.' The name is pointed: she is loyal to Posthumus even as he has ordered her killed. The irony will deepen when her 'brothers' mourn the page 'Fidele' as dead.
TLN 2107archaic vocab
“Think us no churls, nor measure our good minds By this rude place we live in”
'Churls' means rude, low-born, boorish people — peasants with bad manners. Belarius asks Imogen not to judge their behaviour by their rough dwelling: the cave is crude but its inhabitants are not. 'Rude place' means rough, uncultivated dwelling. The line is central to the play's argument that true nobility is inward, not architectural.
TLN 2122syntax grammar
“Would it had been so, that they Had been my father's sons! then had my prize Been less, and so more equal ballasting To thee, Posthumus”
Imogen (aside) wishes these admirable young men had been her brothers — true sons of Cymbeline. Her reasoning: had they been royal, her own value as a princess ('my prize') would have been less (she would not have been a unique dynastic prize), and thus a 'more equal ballasting' to the low-born Posthumus. 'Ballasting' means counterweight — as a ship needs equal weight on both sides to stay level. She is saying the marriage would have been less unequal.
TLN 2134archaic vocab
“laying by That nothing-gift of differing multitudes”
'Nothing-gift of differing multitudes' means the worthless, unreliable praise given by crowds who constantly change their minds ('differing' = shifting, inconsistent). Imogen argues that the princes, measured by their own inner virtue ('which their own conscience seal'd them'), outshine great men of court who depend on the fickle approval of the public.