De Stancy’s mode of presenting the necklace, though unauthorized by Shakespeare, had the full approval of the company, and set them in good humour to receive Major Camperton as Armado the braggart. Nothing calculated to stimulate jealousy occurred again till the fifth act; and then there arose full cause for it. The scene was the outside of the Princess’s pavilion. De Stancy, as the King of Navarre, stood with his group of attendants awaiting the Princess, who presently entered from her door. The two began to converse as the play appointed, De Stancy turning to her with this reply-- ‘Rebuke me not for that which you provoke; The virtue of your eye must break my oath.’ So far all was well; and Paula opened her lips for the set rejoinder. But before she had spoken De Stancy continued-- ‘If I profane with my unworthy hand (Taking her hand) This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this-- My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.’ Somerset stared. Surely in this comedy the King never addressed the Princess in such warm words; and yet they were Shakespeare’s, for they were quite familiar to him. A dim suspicion crossed his mind. Mrs. Goodman had brought a copy of Shakespeare with her, which she kept in her lap and never looked at: borrowing it, Somerset turned to ‘Romeo and Juliet,’ and there he saw the words which De Stancy had introduced as gag, to intensify the mild love-making of the other play. Meanwhile De Stancy continued-- ‘O then, dear Saint, let lips do what hands do; They pray, grant thou, lest faith turn to despair. Then move not, while my prayer’s effect I take. Thus from my lips, by yours, my sin is purg’d!’ Could it be that De Stancy was going to do what came next in the stage direction--kiss her? Before there was time for conjecture on that point the sound of a very sweet and long-drawn osculation spread through the room, followed by loud applause from the people in the cheap seats. De Stancy withdrew from bending over Paula, and she was very red in the face. Nothing seemed clearer than that he had actually done the deed. The applause continuing, Somerset turned his head. Five hundred faces had regarded the act, without a consciousness that it was an interpolation; and four hundred and fifty mouths in those faces were smiling. About one half of them were tender smiles; these came from the women. The other half were at best humorous, and mainly satirical; these came from the men. It was a profanation without parallel, and his face blazed like a coal.