Song.

If you’d hear me sing, Why give me a skin of wine. Creatures have their several ways, Edod! and I have mine, CHOR. And I have mine. (ad lib.) Edod! and I have mine. If you’d see me fight, Why let me taste good cheer. Was not I as good as my word? Edod! am I not here?

CHOR. Am I not here? (ad lib.)

(Palicio gets up as before.)

Sq. Enough, enough! silence! Now were ye not A set of loons ... make silence for the captain.

Pal. Hark, men: I bid you leave, each silently And separately to his allotted task. Gather your companies at tryst to-night; Acquaint them of our plans. Once, ere ye go, Look on those tyrannous towers, and swear revenge. Revenge on them that grind the people down! That tax our bread and wine! To-morrow night Hugo shall need no candles.

Brigands. Revenge, revenge. Huzzah! Death to Hugo! Burn him!

Pal. Not him, the palace: ’tis to burn the palace. Him we must take alive.

Brigands. Not kill him, no. Treat him as he would us.

Pal. If ye love colour, His gold is ruddier than his coward blood.

Brigands. Ay, ay, his gold—a ransom. Bleed his bags.

Pal. Above all, none forget good Manuel’s kindness, And what I have told you. If any meet with him And hurt a hair of his head, ’tis ...

Brigands. Death.

Pal. ’Tis death. Swear all, ’tis death.

All. We swear.

Pal. Now to your work.

Brigands. Huzzah!

Pal. Secretly, then. Farewell! To-morrow night I’ll meet you all. God grant us a good meeting. Farewell. [Exit.

Brigands. Huzzah!

During following scene the brigands going, carrying off things to cave.

Sq. Come, help clear off this gear to the cave.

A brigand. Any wine in yon skin, good Squarcia?

Sq. Ay, for the chewing.

Brig. Thank ye. I’m off. Good-day, lads. [Exit.

Sq. Did I not well, I say?

A brigand. But how didst thou find him?—tell us.

Sq. Trust me. Not that ’twas a thing within the bounds of mortal cleverness if a man should want luck. But I’d buy the dog that would have run as straight for him, as ’twere denoted by scent or instinct. To climb the very wall, and in at the window, and there to see him just face to face: on a fine couch in a pleasant chamber enough, with his arm bandaged ...

Brig. Is his arm broke?

Sq. Ay, and where the nerve runs to the heart: the lady told me a thousand times that ’twere mortal to move it; and the surgeon who bound it said that his balance hung by a thread.

Brig. The lady was with him, then. Didst thou see her?

Sq. It’s not all I see I’m bound to tell. But if she was not there, how should she be here? And had I not persuaded her, would she have let him come, think you? And that a matter of disputation, an hour and more.

Brig. How could she stay him?

Sq. Let alone wounds and surgeons, shall a lady have nothing to say? And she’s hard hit, I take it. A fine piece, and brings money with her.

Brig. And what may spoil his fighting.

Sq. Wilt thou grudge the captain what he has fairly won? Or must thou be served first?

Brig. Serve me soon, and serve me well. Yet I like not the lady. [Exit.

Sq. Nay, nor the coin neither, I’ll go bound. How should he? Nay ... Wouldn’t old Beedo now have liked to have been here?

A brigand. Well, he would.

Another. Why came he not?

Sq. A bad reason, man, but a good excuse.

Brig. How mean you?

Sq. As if thou hadst never been on the wrong side of four walls! tell not me. [Exeunt.

Enter Palicio and Margaret.

Pal. Now thou know’st all.