Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616 -- Adaptations; Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616 -- Stories, plots, etc. -- Juvenile literature
take her by the arm, and walk with her.' 'No, madam,' said Marina, 'I
pray you let me not deprive you of your servant': for Leonine was one
of Dionysia's attendants. 'Come, come,' said this artful woman, who
wished for a presence to leave her alone with Leonine, 'I love the
prince, your father, and I love you. We every day expect your father
here; and when he comes, and finds you so changed by grief from the
paragon of beauty we reported you, he will think we have taken no care
of you. Go, I pray you, walk, and be cheerful once again. Be careful of
that excellent complexion, which stole the hearts of old and young.'
Marina, being thus importuned, said: 'Well, I will go, but yet I have
no desire to it.' As Dionysia walked away, she said to Leonine:
'Remember what I have said!'--shocking words, for their meaning was
that he should remember to kill Marina.
Marina looked towards the sea, her birthplace, and said: 'Is the wind
westerly that blows?' 'South-west,' replied Leonine. 'When I was born
the wind was north,' said she: and then the storm and tempest, and all
her father's sorrows, and her mother's death, came full into her mind;
and she said: 'My father, as Lychorida told me, did never fear, but
cried, Courage, good seamen, to the sailors, galling his princely hands
with the ropes, and, clasping to the masts, he endured a sea that
almost split the deck.' 'When was this?' said Leonine. 'When I was
born,' replied Marina: 'never were wind and waves more violent'; and
then she described the storm, the action of the sailors, the
boatswain's whistle, and the loud call of the master, 'which,' said
she, 'trebled the confusion of the ship.' Lychorida had so often
recounted to Marina the story of her hapless birth that these things
seemed ever present to her imagination. But here Leonine interrupted
her with desiring her to say her prayers. 'What mean you?' said Marina,
who began to fear, she knew not why. 'If you require a little space for
prayer, I grant it,' said Leonine; 'but be not tedious, the gods are
quick of ear, and I am sworn to do my work in haste.' 'Will you kill
me?' said Marina: 'alas! why?' 'To satisfy my lady,' replied Leonine.
'Why would she have me killed?' said Marina: 'now, as I can remember, I
never hurt her in all my life. I never spake bad word, nor did any ill
turn to any living creature. Believe me now, I never killed a mouse,
nor hurt a fly. I trod upon a worm once against my will, but I wept for
it. How have I offended?' The murderer replied: 'My commission is not
to reason on the deed, but to do it.' And he was just going to kill
her, when certain pirates happened to land at that very moment, who
seeing Marina, bore her off as a prize to their ship.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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