Char.

Alexas, sweet Alexas, most any thing Alexas, almost most absolute Alexas, where's the Scothsayer that you prais'd

to th' Queen? Oh! that I knew this husband, which you say, must change his horns with garlands.

Alex.
Soothsayer.

Sooth.
Your will?

Char.
Is this the man? Is't you, Sir, that know things?

Sooth.
In nature's infinite book of secrecy, a little I can read.

Alex.
Shew him your hand.

Eno.
Bring in the banquet quickly: wine enough,
Cleopatra's health to drink.

Char.
Good Sir, give me good fortune.

Sooth.
I make not, but foresee.

Char.
Pray then, foresee me one.

Sooth.
You shall be yet far fairer than you are.

Char.
He means in flesh.

Iras.
No, you shall paint when you are old.

Char.
Wrinkles forbid.

Alex.
Vex not his ^{a note}prescience, be attentive.

Char.
Hush!

Sooth.
You shall be more beloving, than beloved.

Char.

I had rather heat my liver with drinking.

Alex.

Nay, hear him.

Char.

Good now, some excellent fortune. Let me be married to three Kings in a forenoon, and widow them all; let me have a child at fifty, to whom Herod of Jewry may do homage. Find me, to marry me with Octavius Cæsar, and companion me with my mistress.

Sooth.

You shall out-live the lady whom you serve.

Char.

Oh excellent, I love long life better than figs.

Sooth.

You have seen and proved a fairer former fortune, than that which is to approach.

Char.
Then belike my children shall have no names;
Pr'ythee how many boys and wenches must I have?

Sooth.
If every of your wishes had a womb,

And foretold every wish, a million.

Char.
Out fool, I forgive thee for a witch

Alex.

You think none but your sheets are privy to your wishes.

Char.

Nay come, tell Iras hers.

Alex.

We'll know all our fortunes.

Eno.

Mine, and most of our fortunes to-night, shall be to go drunk to bed.

Iras.

There's a palm presages chastity, if nothing else.

Char.

E'en as the o'erflowing Nylus presageth famine.

Iras.

Go you wild bedfellow, you cannot soothsay.

Char.

Nay, if an oily palm be not a fruitful prognostication, I cannot scratch mine ear. Pr'ythee tell her but a workyday fortune.

Sooth.

Your fortunes are alike.

Iras.

But how, but how—give me particulars.

Sooth.

I have said.

Iras.

Am I not an inch of fortune better than she?

Char.

Well, if you were but an inch of fortune better than I; where would you chuse it?

Iras.

Not in my husband's nose.

Char.

Our worser thoughts heav'ns mend.

Alex.

Come, his fortune, his fortune. Oh let him marry a woman that cannot go, sweet Isis, I beseech thee, and let her die too, and give him a worse, and let worse follow worse, 'till the worst of all follow him laughing to his grave, fifty-fold a cuckold. Good Isis, hear me this prayer, though thou deny me a matter of more weight; good Isis, I beseech thee.

Char.

Amen, dear Goddess, hear that prayer of the people. For, as it is a heart-breaking to see a handsome man loose-wiv'd, so it is a deadly sorrow, to behold a foul knave uncuckolded; therefore dear Isis, keep decorum, and fortune him accordingly.

Iras.

Amen.

Alex.

Lo now, if it lay in their hands to make me a cuckold, they would make themselves whores, but they'd do't.