Volume II Part 4 (2/2)

_Bar._ In my house, my girl.

_Abig._ Then shall they ne'er be seen of Barabas: 250 For they have seized upon thy house and wares.

_Bar._ But they will give me leave once more, I trow, To go into my house.

_Abig._ That may they not: For there I left the governor placing nuns, Displacing me; and of thy house they mean To make a nunnery, where none but their own sect[30]

Must enter in; men generally barred.

_Bar._ My gold! my gold! and all my wealth is gone!

You partial heavens, have I deserved this plague?

What, will you thus oppose me, luckless stars, 260 To make me desperate in my poverty?

And knowing me impatient in distress, Think me so mad as I will hang myself, That I may vanish o'er the earth in air, And leave no memory that e'er I was?

No, I will live; nor loathe I this my life: And, since you leave me in the ocean thus To sink or swim, and put me to my s.h.i.+fts, I'll rouse my senses and awake myself.

Daughter! I have it: thou perceiv'st the plight 270 Wherein these Christians have oppressed me: Be ruled by me, for in extremity We ought to make bar of no policy.

_Abig._ Father, whate'er it be to injure them That have so manifestly wronged us, What will not Abigail attempt?

_Bar._ Why, so; Then thus, thou told'st me they have turned my house Into a nunnery, and some nuns are there?

_Abig._ I did.

_Bar._ Then, Abigail, there must my girl Entreat the abbess to be entertained. 280

_Abig._ How, as a nun?

_Bar._ I, daughter, for religion Hides many mischiefs from suspicion.

_Abig._ I, but, father, they will suspect me there.

_Bar._ Let 'em suspect; but be thou so precise As they may think it done of holiness.

Entreat 'em fair, and give them friendly speech, And seem to them as if thy sins were great, Till thou hast gotten to be entertained.

_Abig._ Thus, father, shall I much dissemble.

_Bar._ Tus.h.!.+

As good dissemble that thou never mean'st, 290 As first mean truth and then dissemble it,-- A counterfeit profession is better Than unseen[31] hypocrisy.

_Abig._ Well, father, say [that] I be entertained, What then shall follow?

_Bar._ This shall follow then; There have I hid, close underneath the plank That runs along the upper chamber floor, The gold and jewels which I kept for thee.

But here they come; be cunning, Abigail.

_Abig._ Then, father, go with me.

_Bar._ No, Abigail, in this 300 It is not necessary I be seen: For I will seem offended with thee for't: Be close, my girl, for this must fetch my gold.

[_They draw back_.

_Enter_ Friar[32] JACOMO, Friar BERNARDINE, Abbess, _and a_ Nun.

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