Act Three, Scene Three
Enter Dido, Aeneas, Anna, Iarbus, Achates, [Cupid for Ascanius,] and followers.Dido
Aeneas, thinke not but I honor thee,
That thus in person goe with thee to hunt:
My princely robes thou seest are layd aside,
Whose glittering pompe Dianas shrowdes supplies,
All fellowes now, disposde alike to sporte,
The woods are wide, and we have store of game:
Faire Troian, hold my golden bowe awhile,
Untill I gird my quiver to my side:
Lords goe before, we two must talke alone.
Iarbus
Ungentle, can she wrong Iarbus so?
Ile dye before a stranger have that grace:
We two will talke alone, what words be these?
Dido
What makes Iarbus here of all the rest?
We could have gone without your companie.
Aeneas
But love and duetie led him on perhaps,
To presse beyond acceptance to your sight.
Iarbus
Why, man of Troy, doe I offend thine eyes?
Or art thou grievde thy betters presse so nye?
Dido
How now Getulian, are ye growne so brave,
To challenge us with your comparisons?
Pesant, goe seeke companions like thy selfe,
And meddle not with any that I love:
Aeneas, be not movde at what he sayes,
For otherwhile he will be out of joynt.
Iarbus
Women may wrong by priviledge of love:
But should that man of men (Dido except)
Have taunted me in these opprobrious termes,
I would have either drunke his dying bloud,
Or els I would have given my life in gage.
Dido
Huntsmen, why pitch you not your toyles apace,
And rowse the light foote Deere from forth their laire?
Anna
Sister, see see Ascanius in his pompe,
Bearing his huntspeare bravely in his hand.
Dido
Yea little sonne, are you so forward now?
Cupid
I mother, I shall one day be a man,
And better able unto other armes.
Meane time these wanton weapons serve my warre,
Which I will breake betwixt a Lyons jawes.
Dido
What, darest thou looke a Lyon in the face?
Cupid
I, and outface him to, doe what he can.
Anna
How like his father speaketh he in all?
Aeneas
And mought I live to see him sacke rich Thebes,
And bade his speare with Grecian Princes heads,
Then would I wish me with Anchises Tombe,
And dead to honour that hath brought me up.
Iarbus
And might I live to see thee shipt away,
And hoyst aloft on Neptunes hideous hilles,
Then would I wish me in faire Didos armes,
And dead to scorne that hath pursued me so.
Aeneas
Stoute friend Achates, doest thou know this wood?
Achates
As I remember, here you shot the Deere,
That sav'd your famisht souldiers lives from death,
When first you set your foote upon the shoare,
And here we met faire Venus Virgine like,
Bearing her bowe and quiver at her backe.
Aeneas
O how these irksome labours now delight,
And overjoy my thoughts with their escape:
Who would not undergoe all kind of toyle,
To be well stor'd with such a winters tale?
Dido
Aeneas, leave these dumpes and lets away,
Some to the mountaines, some unto the soyle,
You to the vallies, thou unto the house.
[To Iarbus.]
Exeunt omnes: manet [Iarbus].
Iarbus
I, this it is which wounds me to the death,
To see a Phrigian far fet on the sea,
Preferd before a man of majestie:
O love, O hate, O cruell womens hearts,
That imitate the Moone in every chaunge,
And like the Planets ever love to raunge:
What shall I doe thus wronged with disdaine?
Revenge me on Aeneas, or on her:
On her? fond man, that were to warre gainst heaven,
And with one shaft provoke ten thousand darts:
This Troians end will be thy envies aime,
Whose bloud will reconcile thee to content,
And make love drunken with thy sweete desire:
But Dido that now holdeth him so deare,
Will dye with very tidings of his death:
But time will discontinue her content,
And mould her minde unto newe fancies shapes:
O God of heaven, turne the hand of fate
Unto that happie day of my delight,
And then, what then? Iarbus shall but love:
So doth he now, though not with equall game,
That resteth in the rivall of thy paine,
Who nere will cease to soare till he be slaine.
Exit.