JOHN
Go in with me,
And pray for the peace of our unquiet minds?

MARGARET
That I will, John.--
(_Exeunt_.)

SCENE.--_An inner Apartment_.

(_John is discovered kneeling.--Margaret standing over him_.)

JOHN (_rises_)
I cannot bear
To see you waste that youth and excellent beauty,
('Tis now the golden time of the day with you,)
In tending such a broken wretch as I am.

MARGARET
John will break Margaret's heart, if he speak so.
O sir, sir, sir, you are too melancholy,
And I must call it caprice. I am somewhat bold
Perhaps in this. But you are now my patient,
(You know you gave me leave to call you so,)
And I must chide these pestilent humours from you.

JOHN
They are gone.--
Mark, love, how cheerfully I speak!
I can smile too, and I almost begin
To understand what kind of creature Hope is.

MARGARET
Now this is better, this mirth becomes you, John.

JOHN
Yet tell me, if I over-act my mirth.
(Being but a novice, I may fall into that error,)
That were a sad indecency, you know.

MARGARET
Nay, never fear.
I will be mistress of your humours,
And you shall frown or smile by the book.
And herein I shall be most peremptory,
Cry, "this shews well, but that inclines to levity,
This frown has too much of the Woodvil in it,
But that fine sunshine has redeem'd it quite."

JOHN
How sweetly Margaret robs me of myself!

MARGARET
To give you in your stead a better self!
Such as you were, when these eyes first beheld
You mounted on your sprightly steed, White Margery,
Sir Rowland my father's gift,
And all my maidens gave my heart for lost.
I was a young thing then, being newly come
Home from my convent education, where
Seven years I had wasted in the bosom of France:
Returning home true protestant, you call'd me
Your little heretic nun. How timid-bashful
Did John salute his love, being newly seen.
Sir Rowland term'd it a rare modesty,
And prais'd it in a youth.

JOHN
Now Margaret weeps herself.
(_A noise of bells heard_.)

MARGARET
Hark the bells, John.

JOHN
Those are the church bells of St. Mary Ottery.

MARGARET
I know it.

JOHN
Saint Mary Ottery, my native village
In the sweet shire of Devon.
Those are the bells.