_Enter_ POLYDORE. _Pol._ To live, and live a torment to myself! What dog would bear't, that knew but his condition? We've little knowledge, and that makes us cowards, Because it cannot tell us what's to come. _Cast._ Who's there? _Pol._ Why, what art thou? _Cast._ My brother Polydore? _Pol._ My name is Polydore. _Cast._ Canst thou inform me-- _Pol._ Of what? _Cast._ Of my Monimia? _Pol._ No. Good-day. _Cast._ In haste? Methinks my Polydore appears in sadness. _Pol._ Indeed, and so to me does my Castalio. _Cast._ Do I? _Pol._ Thou dost. _Cast._ Alas! I've wondrous reason; I'm strangely altered, brother, since I saw thee. _Pol._ Why? _Cast._ Oh! to tell thee would but put thy heart To pain. Let me embrace thee but a little, And weep upon thy neck; I would repose Within thy friendly bosom all my follies; For thou wilt pardon them, because they're mine. _Pol._ Be not too credulous; consider first; Friends may be false. Is there no friendship false? _Cast._ Why dost thou ask me that? does this appear Like a false friendship, when with open arms And streaming eyes I run upon thy breast? Oh, 'tis in thee alone I must have comfort! _Pol._ I fear, Castalio, I have none to give thee. _Cast._ Dost thou not love me then? _Pol._ Oh, more than life: I never had a thought of my Castalio Might wrong the friendship we had vowed together. Hast thou dealt so by me? _Cast._ I hope I have. _Pol._ Then tell me why this mourning; this disorder? _Cast._ O Polydore! I know not how to tell thee; Shame rises in my face, and interrupts The story of my tongue. _Pol._ I grieve my friend Knows anything which he's ashamed to tell me; Or didst thou e'er conceal thy thoughts from Polydore? _Cast._ Oh! much too oft; but let me here conjure thee, By all the kind affection of a brother,-- For I'm ashamed to call myself thy friend,-- Forgive me. _Pol._ Well, go on. _Cast._ Our destiny contrived To plague us both with one unhappy love: Thou, like a friend, a constant generous friend, In its first pangs didst trust me with thy passion; Whilst I still smoothed my pain with smiles before thee, And made a contract I ne'er meant to keep. _Pol._ How! _Cast._ Still new ways I studied to abuse thee, And kept thee as a stranger to my passion, Till yesterday I wedded with Monimia. _Pol._ Ah, Castalio, Was that well done? _Cast._ No; to conceal't from thee Was much a fault. _Pol._ A fault! When thou hast heard The tale I'll tell, what wilt thou call it then? _Cast._ How my heart throbs! _Pol._ First, for thy friendship, traitor, I cancel it thus; after this day I'll ne'er Hold trust or converse with the false Castalio: This witness Heaven!