will be dead or ere I come. It is too late: the life of all his blood Is touch'd corruptibly, and his pure brain, Which some suppose the soul's frail dwelling-house, Doth by the idle comments that it makes Foretell the ending of mortality. His highness yet doth speak, and holds belief That, being brought into the open air, It would allay the burning quality Of that fell poison which assaileth him. Let him be brought into the orchard here. Doth he still rage? He is more patient Than when you left him; even now he sung. O vanity of sickness! fierce extremes In their continuance will not feel themselves. Death, having prey'd upon the outward parts, Leaves them invisible, and his siege is now Against the mind, the which he pricks and wounds With many legions of strange fantasies, Which, in their throng and press to that last hold, Confound themselves. 'Tis strange that death should sing. I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan, Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death, And from the organ-pipe of frailty sings His soul and body to their lasting rest. Be of good comfort, prince; for you are born To set a form upon that indigest Which he hath left so shapeless and so rude. Ay, marry, now my soul hath elbow-room; It would not out at windows nor at doors. There is so hot a summer in my bosom, That all my bowels crumble up to dust: I am a scribbled form, drawn with a pen Upon a parchment, and against this fire Do I shrink up. How fares your majesty? Poison'd,--ill fare--dead, forsook, cast off: And none of you will bid the winter come To thrust his icy fingers in my maw, Nor let my kingdom's rivers take their course Through my burn'd bosom, nor entreat the north To make his bleak winds kiss my parched lips And comfort me with cold. I do not ask you much, I beg cold comfort; and you are so strait And so ingrateful, you deny me that. O that there were some virtue in my tears, That might relieve you! The salt in them is hot. Within me is a hell; and there the poison Is as a fiend confined to tyrannize On unreprievable condemned blood. O, I am scalded with my violent motion, And spleen of speed to see your majesty! O cousin, thou art come to set mine eye: The tackle of my heart is crack'd and burn'd, And all the shrouds wherewith my life should sail Are turned to one thread, one little