forthwith left me and seeing my self lost in a Love upon my own advice without hope I began wholly to abandon the care of my health So that in a few dayes I seemed wholly altered from my self in the eyes of the world I sometimes attempted to suppresse that fervent amorous passion which did afflict me but the more I forced my self to conceal it the more invigorating it self did it blaze out with greater impetuosity whence my malady continually increasing I saw my self in a little space reduced miserably to perish in the arms of melancholy and desperation But Necessity the discreet inventer of healthfull contrivances would have me live for my hurt suggesting to me that I ought not utterly despair of my health since that though the sight of and speech to Lucinda was not by fortune permitted me I might notwithstanding easily be able to penetrate her meaning finding among my Pages a youth which by being formerly a servant to her father had accesse to the house with much liberty and without suspition Whereupon I made known to him more with tears which unawares betrayed my constancy then with words the internal grief of my heart and I desired him he would follow his wonted visits more frequently and report to me what he could discover of the person and wit of Lucinda The Page obeyed me with sufficient discretion and modesty and observing for some time what seemed to him opportune to my interests he thrust me on finally with his perswasions to write a Letter to my fair Enemy in this manner I had rather most lovely Lucinda that you should draw the truth of those griefs which inviron my Soul from the sight of me than in the dead Letters of this Paper you should discover their appearances But although the black lines of the ink cannot sufficiently expresse the abundance of the tears which the bitternesse of my dysasters distil from my heart I shall at least attempt thereby to manifest to you in some part the cruel passions of my Soul which heretofore transfused into your beautifull breast stands expecting from your goodnesse some gale of grace which may suffice to keep it alive Be therefore pleased to know Madam that from that day which you celebrated in the Temple the exequies of your most worthy father I remained in such manner fettered by the inchantments of your Divine beauty that when you returned to your house to consumate with flouds of tears the paternal funerals I retired to my Chamber to commence with the deluge of my plaints the celebration of the grief of my heart which I had left inclosed in the radiant Sepulcher of your fair eyes I will not deny Madam but that I have striven to force my self to cast off the yoak of servitude which the Soveraign Majesty of your looks hath imposed by vertue of Love upon the liberty of my spirit but in sum the insuperable power of your beauty binding my Reason with Adamantine cords would have me follow chained the Chariot of its triumphs I set my self therefore to love you because destiny hath commanded it and will love you eternally because my Inclination imposeth it I request no other of you Madam but onely that you would please to accept the sacrifice of my affections which all contracted in one sigh of Love I offer to the Idol of your super-humane beauty and that you would not at least deny me the happiness of your presence that I may in the consolation of your celestial remembrance sweeten the bitterness of my sufferings and that you may discover in my mortified looks the lively pledges of my fidelity ARNALDO Having written this Letter consigned it to Diffilus the Page and instructed him in the manner with which he should transact the message to Lucinda I retired into the solitude of my Closet strongly assaulted by fear and hope to expect the issue Diffilus went and by good fortune observed that Lucinda accompanied by a Girle her slave was busied about her feminine imployments he suddenly accosted her giving her my Letter intreating her to receive it But she presently clouded her face to which the mind imparted the sudden motions of its displeasure and beholding him with a fierce look commanded him presently to get himself out of her sight and never dare to do the like to her as he tendered his life But the cunning Groom that knew the anger of a beautifull woman to be just like the stop of a Noble Courser not a jot affrighted by those angry appearances multiplied his intreaties with no lesse affection than discretion whereupon Lucinda seeing her self importuned with so much prudence and being unwilling to yield to so affectionate an assault arose to retire into some more private room where it was not permitted Diffilus to follow her Whence he perceiving of her intention just as she was rising up to depart cast the Letter into her bosom with so civil a behaviour that she was necessitated to take it An unhappy necessity for me since as if it had been a Viper she presently tore it reducing it to smoak and ashes This unhappy accident related to me by the Page gave me easily to understand what I might expect from this my unfortunate Love My torments therefore did in such manner increase that I esteemed nothing but death able to deliver me Thence I became so much an Enemy to my self that my pain become familiar to me left me to fall irrecoverably into a Gulf of desperate thoughts among which miserably consuming my dayes there came to me one morning Diffilus a curious observer of the actions of Lucinda to tell me she would be the following night in an adjacent Temple to celebrate the rites of a grand solemnity It ran in my mind that I might peradventure be able hid amongst the nocturnal umbrages and covered with womans apparel to weave a pleasant snare for my proud enemy from which if I should get no other I should at least with discourse in some part vent my grief and perhaps that Love would second with greater successe the lively force of my words than he had done the dead Characters of my Letter This proposition being resolved on and the night desired being come I drest my self in a sute of Belisa my sister and with the onely attendance of Diffilus who in like manner habited did conduct me into the Temple and just in the place where he knew Lucinda would sit he placed me And though the tendernesse of my age which then scarce passing the eighteenth year had not yet covered my face with the first down and the uncertain twilight which in the nocturnal darkresse the burning Tapers formed did exceedingly favour our design I kept neverthelesse with pretext of the coldnesse of the winter-season my face covered with a Vail to avoid the curiosity of the eyes of them who frequent the Temple for no other end than with their looks to lay siege to Ladies Scarce was I setled in that place when
through the small knowledge I drew from thence the desire of beholding them came to foment The Divine functions ended the Knight after having augurated to me that day to be happy took me by the hand and led me out of the Temple dismissing the people which did follow him and carried me all alone through a narrow path into the Forrest just where a little Mountain dividing it self into three equal parts did form with natural pleasures the prospect of a delightfull Theater There did issue from its foot a transparent rivolet but so scant at that time of water that it did reveal to the negligence of the eye all the secrets of its bottom There were seen through those fresh streams little fishes to sport themselves among the candid pebles But about the moistned banks did grow as in well ordered knots a hundred varieties of odoriferous Herbs embroidered with a thousand sorts of flowers which opening as it were their breasts to the ruddy morning did emit the aire of so delicate a perfume that it had power to efface in great part from my heart the annoyance which through the past waking and through the dolefulnesse of the things which I saw was there so deeply rooted The backside of the Tripartite hill overspread with Oaks and Pines by nature dispersed and disposed with a negligent art did overshadow some very green Meadows which in the middle of the Forrest haply through the benefit of the neighbouring Brook renouncing to the commerce of the plants did conserve in their pleasant largenesse the roots of the flowers inviolate In one of these the Knight sat down and I placing my self over against him after many sighs in a languishing and sad tone he gave beginning to his Narration after this manner From the first Original which it may be you will not believe I must derive to you most dear guest the dolorous relation of my uncomfortable disadventures and though the mind abhorreth the remembrance of past griefs yet because notwithstanding custom hath converted grief into nature I shall fully make relation of as much as I shall think necessary that you may be able another day to manifest to the World the cruelty of a woman and the dysasters of a Lover abused I was born Philiternus in the famous Citie of Thebes Queen of Boetia of a stock both generous and nearly-allied to the Royal family with replicated bonds of consanguinity and from my birth had given me the name of Arnaldo for thus my father was called himself a Knight no lesse renowned in the Counsels of State then in the matters of War Being grown to boy's estate the puissant King Agenor my Uncle would have me dwell in his Court to be brought up in the noble Company of his sons whence I learnt in a little space the qualities convenient to a Knight of great birth nor did I indure much labour to attain to the highest Dignities of the Court and Kingdom nor was I envied if it be lawfull for me to say it by any having preobliged the affections of all hearts with the affability of my manners with the complacency of my conditions and the profusenesse of my riches I obtained in gift from Heaven a Wit greater then my Fortune Now it befell for my fatal disease that I being with the Court in Thebes there pass'd from this life to a better Osiander a principal Knight and well deserving from the Crown whose obsequies the King himself was pleased to honour with his presence with all the flower of the Nobility of his Kingdom Oh that dolorous Dagger wounded me to the very heart with the mournfull remembrance of that most unfortunate day Among the other friends of the defunct Cavalier which assisted at his Funeral there was a young Lady his daughter which besides her being very beautifull of face and complacential of deportment with so pitifull a dejectednesse did bewail the death of her father that each circumstance in the Ocean of those tears made shipwrack of a heart She had disordered with her tender hands her silver tresses whence one part of them descending on her shoulders in precious Rings did incatenate the mind of the Spectators in stupor of her extream beauty the other but ill retained by her hair-laces ran to bathe themselves in the dolefull floud of sorrow which overran the face ambitious peradventure to inrich with Pearls the nudity of their Gold Thence her amiable face appeared a Sun which arose from the Sea with locks moistened with celestial Dew and even had usurped the property of the rising Sun whil'st that fair face obfuscated by the Clouds of perplexity suffered it self to be seen without offence of the beholders whereas in the noon-tide of cheerfulness there was no eye so firm as to be able to sustain without peril of blindness the reflexion of its splendors As soon as on this prodigious Creature I fix'd my looks I presently felt a fatal shivering to seise my Soul which calling my bloud to the succour of my heart left my face overcast with a mortal paleness And well might it be that he seemed dead from whom one onely look of Lucinda had ravished his Soul Fair Lucinda was she called who was the happy cause of all my deplorable unhappiness I desired really to fly from that perilous sight my mind being desirous to avoid the mortal danger which I foresaw but Pity a chaste companion that never separates from Love recalled me to compassionate the grief of the weeping Damsel by little and little introducing into my mind and impressing in my heart those languishing beauties of which they finally became an Idolater though they be now reduced to ashes the sparks of my love live notwithstanding and shall live perpetually buried in those Cinders That magnificent Funeral being ended and having waited upon the King back to his lodging I incontinent returned to that Temple in which I had left my Soul deposited under the credit of Lucinda's beauty and Love was for my misfortune so courteous that I had an opportunity of incountring her whil'st among the sad troup of her Allies she returned to the forsaken house of her father into which being entred she carried with her and included between those blessed Walls my perplexed spirit whereupon remaining almost an exanimate Carkass I withdrew my self with a slow pace to my house without knowing where I was or whither I went but onely that the privation of my spirit transmigrated into the object beloved made me with reiterated stingings to know that yet I remained without a Soul in the World of the living Being come there I withdrew with the violent companion of my new thoughts from the conversation of my familiars conceiting unexperienced that I was to find in solitude a comfort for my pain but it did the more foment it and I perceived in the end that retirednesse from the commerce of people wrought no other in me than a perplexing multitude of torments Sleep Appetite to food
favour you may easily obtain pardon for the many injuries you have so often done me For this onely be not I beseech you so mortal an Enemy for if you desire I should dye I also will not much desire to live and so we may with little labour both receive satisfaction where as on the other side denying me this the memory of your cruelty and my death would be eternalliz'd I verily believe that if you would but follow for a little the impulse of reason you should see how that it 's an act unworthy of a noble and courteous Lady to torment those that offend you not unlesse you can call offence my constancy in loving you and the resolution I have taken of alwayes serving you But if you continue in the same opinion which you have formerly exprest remember a little remember Lucinda the sufferings that I undergo I am confident that if my torments were but considered by you according to what they are you would rather repent them then perpetuallize them with so much severity And really it 's a strange thing and almost incredible that you had rather be cruel to those that love you than be served by those that adore you For did you but condescend to consider the sorrow you return me in recompence of the services I tender to you I assure my self that you would plainly see how in glorious it is to insult in my ruin I conclude this my passionate discourse words being superfluous after that my presence hath presented you with so many demonstrations of my torments Look upon me onely look upon me O beautifull occasion of all my dysasters least otherwise deprived of the blessed gales of your serene looks the desperation which I have of my life provoke me to sollicit the death so much desired by ARNALDO THis Letter being written and seal'd I returned into the Hall where coming in a certain throng near to Lucinda I put it in the slieve of her upper Garment and withdrew to observe how she would entertain it But for a long time that I had watcht her I could observe nothing Whereupon I flattered my self with the hope of some prosperous successe to my attempt I was therefore so distracted with this perplexity of thoughts that I either answered nothing or else besides the purpose to those who entertained me with some discourse of the present Occurrences either of the Ball or Court And he that in that instant had toucht my breast might easily have felt the palpitations of my heart caused by desire and perplexing fear the daughters of a desperate Love The time being come at last that the Ball being ended every one retired to their own house observing that Lucinda would take leave of the Queen I waited on her disguised in an unknown Garb not onely home to her house but into her Chamber without being able to observe any thing in her that contributed so much as an atome to my hope Hence being little inclined to rest for that night I dispatcht Diffilus thither at the same time to bring me back some news of the fortune of that Paper which I had adventured in the slieve of Lucinda but he could hear nothing good or bad Whereupon my natural vigour diminishing by this fixt application and my grief encreasing continually scalding my heart in the inextinguishable flames of sighs I became wholly melancholy and solitary never desiring to see the face of the Sun more out of my Chamber Hereupon Belisa my sister moved to compassion of my misery as one who felt a great part of it her self sitting down close by me one day she weeping said Ah! my dear brother I intreat thee to acquaint me with the fatal cause of this grief which so much afflicts thee Seest thou not that thy affliction is my torment and that the love I bear thee makes me to live for thy sorrow a most unhappy life Thou hast many times confest thy self to be my debter and that thou wouldest recompence my love with a reciprocal affection But you deny me that with your actions which you confirm to me with your words You know very well that such like dissimulation ought not to have place near me make therefore my breast the depository of thy passions And to whom wilt thou commit them if thou wilt not intrust them to me Do but think that if thou desirest death I will not wish for life If thou hatest pleasure I will love sorrow If thou delightest in trouble I will be displeased with repose so that thy malady and my torment are one and the same thing to excruciate my heart If therefore you desire to ventilate your passion with whom better can you do it then with me that am never sparing in wishing your good I am sure that discharging one part of it upon me we shall together be the better able to bear it For if thou hast a desire to weep I will weep if you will comfort your self in your grief I will expedite my consolation and if you desire to conceal and nourish it we two can be better able then thou alone to hide and feed it Shew not I pray thee so little confidence in her which hath nothing in all the world that is not thine and make it believed in the end that thy dissimulation cannot falsify my judgement whilest thy tears and thy sighs thy sadnesse and thy solitude accuse me and too plainly discover that which you seek with such care to hide and conceal It 's certain death ought to be lesse powerfull then brotherly love and that therefore death it self shall be most welcom to me when by it thou shalt come to acquire a joyfull life since that I see thee arrived to that passe that thou canst not long continue alive But I had rather you would assume the spirits of your generosity and cheer up your self considering that fortune is alwayes an Enemy of the happy and favourable to the afflicted and therefore she being by nature fickle and inconstant whereas it befits the fortunate to fear I would have thee accustom thy self to hope in her vicissitude She ever causeth new actions for the tryal of our minds because her puissance is better known by the prosperous then by the calamitous Reserve not therefore thy anxious solitude to thy self alone for if greater is the evil that 's hid than the evil that is manifest thy communicating of it to me may afford thee some succour I intreat thee dear brother I intreat thee let the Key of my counsel open for thee the Door of thy comfort and health the peril that 's concealed being alwayes greater in every occurrence then that which is discovered Speak to me therefore if you love me and love that we should live together whether it be dolefully or cheerfully Here Belisa sighing held her peace I reply'd Thou hast so afflicted me dear sister with thy passion that in some measure to comfort thee I must be forced to tell thee what
to bear the victory from the bravest Cavaliers in the world should'st be overcome by a Feminine feeblenesse And for the further increase of my disgusts I see that thy Soul is that which falsifieth thy faith and tenders thee in a manner a rebel to reason for thou makest thy self the minister to thy own servitude and calamity Fly therefore such extreams of Love which transport thee to an extream unworthinesse not that I would have thee banish it wholly from thy knowledge there being no lesse peril in too much solicitude to avoid it then in too much assiduity to pursue it but that thou esteem it fear it seek it and contemne it with a generosity and liberty worthy of thy noble bloud and of thy great Soul For if Love be of it self a deceitfull affect do thou also deceive him his Laws being such that he who loveth least obtaineth the greatest recompence and who serveth most receiveth the greatest ingratitude In sum I consent that thou shalt follow Love but not make thy self his Slave and that thou despise him not but much lesse that thou trust him at any hand Consider that hope in easie things deceiveth in difficult betrayeth and that Fortune gives an unexpected issue to all humane affairs and therefore seeing it 's the cause of thy sorrow do thou also deceive it in making it the means of thy joy For I assure thee if thou wouldest follow my counsel now that I request thee thou shalt easily by this means obtain that which thou shalt certainly lose by going to my house in which neverthelesse thou art absolute master when and how thou pleasest And certainly thou hast done thy self great wrong to delay so long to contribute to thy comfort knowing that thou art more lord of my will then I am of my own house and for that cause I am obliged to serve thee in all occurrences wherein I may be usefull I shall say no more for words are fruitlesse where my thought is onely of comforting thee and not to perplex thee with talk And therefore now if you so please let us go to make a tryal of my Wit and of thy Fortune Thus said Jersus but whilest I hear'd him talk so sinisterly of Lucinda I felt my heart equally to boil with disdain and my mind to freeze with suspition and jealousie Yet with dissembling speeches he sought to make me believe that superfluity of Love would make me rave in my thoughts So I partly distrusted him partly assured my self that in regard of our ancient friendship he would observe that which he promised Seeing therefore that he had so freely offered me his house I resolved to go live there for some dayes but I soon found my self frustrated in my hopes for with all the diligence I could possibly use I could not in all the time I stayed there come so much as once to the sight of her for whose sake I had removed unto that Lodging Hereupon Belisa afflicted in my present peril by the consideration of my future pain at last investigating the cause of my malady she changed her course of life and without making me in the least privy to her design began to frequent the house of Lucinda with whom she had before upon some other account contracted friendship so that one day she being entered into discourse with her finding her in a good humour she thus spake to her I intreat thee my friend that using thy prudence thou will not blame me for that which I am about to tell thee presuming rather to merit applause then reprehension whil'st my compassion of another's misery excuseth my shame Dear Lucinda my deplorable brother Arnaldo for his great affection to thee dayly increaseth his affliction impaireth his health impoisoning even those remedies which should restore him to it Not that I have the least intimation from him of his Love having alwayes denied the true cause of his torments but yet I have been so sollicitous to sift out the truth that I have come to know that thou onely art the cause of his misery and mayest become the restorer of his life I have for this reason resolved to strain modesty to provide if I can possible for his safety and my sorrow And I professe that if I did not see his life in danger thou shouldest not have known the least hint of my trouble Moved therefore by a compassionate zeal for his conservation and to redresse my own calamity because wanting him who in the quality of an onely brother supplieth the place of my deceased Parents I should be left solitary and disconsolate I come to intreat thee that thou wouldest not at once with his life annihilate my consolation decollate our family acquiring to thy self instead of a perpetual glory an eternal infamy for thy cruelty and his death for certain I am he cannot so ill treated as he is prolong his life beyond the date of a few moneths O consider I beseech thee consider how much thou art oblig'd to him whil'st the more thou slightest him the more he loves thee and onely desireth death because thou art displeased with his life Herein while he for love of thee joyes in his torments and none know that thou art she which so much afflictest him thou art doubly ingaged to him and therefore at last relent into commiseration of his so great indurance and permit not his fidelity to perish by thy ingratiude What though thou art not pleased to receive him to the honour of thy conversation wilt not thou therefore gratify him at least with an answer to his Letter And if yet thou wilt not do it by instinct of a gratefull mind towards him yet do it dear Lucâ—nda for courtesie towards me who in so doing of a faithfull friend that I am thou shalt oblige me to become thy perpetuall slave Let it content thee that it 's now two years that I have languished under these sufferings and restore me since thou maist do it without trouble Lucinda presently replyed My dear friend and companion Thou hast no ground to fear that thou hast in any kind prejudiced thy Modesty whilst the pitty of a Brother and the confidence of a Friend absolves thee of all suspition and frees thee from all aspersion For though thou hast in part offended me with thy propositions thou hast also satisfyed me with thy honest innocence there being more cause thou shouldest grieve at thy brother's misfortunes than for any fault thou mightest commit against my person It exceedingly grieves me that I cannot give thee the satisfaction which thou desirest for although the misery of thy brother afflicts me yet I cannot apply my self to give him a remedy that being a thing would reflect upon my reputation to which I ought to have greater regard than to his health And thou art not ignorant how much the honour of a woman is diminished when to succour Lovers they forget themselves Request me not therefore to do that which thou
the sixth day of this our Hermetical course of life about noon we discovered a Fly-boat making towards us whereupon drawing our Bark ashore we fortified our selves so that we could have defended our selves with ease from a greater number in that Mountainous and impenetrable Fort especially with the assistance of Argosthenia who being perfect in Archery could have sent death at a good distance to our Enemies They of the ship perceiving our design put forth a white flag in token of peace and friendship Alexander for all this as being alwayes a Lover of blows and quarrels would not agree that we should trust them to approach us but Argosthenia having discovered amongst them the Master of the ship-wrack't Vessel she took occasion to treat him courteously to get some news of Arnaldo We made therefore to understand at a good distance that we intended to let none land but onely himself and one companion He readily accorded to our pleasure being the Commander of all the rest but coming on shoar he stood like one half dead to see Argosthenia with a countenance more resembling a Goddesse then a Mortal and but that he saw her ravished and carried away with his own eyes he would have sworn she had never stirr'd thence The first word we asked him was What was become of Arnaldo and he told us that having learnt by the Processe formed by the Criminal Court the death of the Captain her Ravisher and that she was put to Sea for some other place with two young Cavaliers in her Company whereas before he was comforted with the death of that Traitor he now received a greater affliction in this new separation having a conceit that one of those young Gentlemen was the same Knight who said he was destinated by heaven perpetually to oblige him so that he could never live in quiet within himself for him having therefore now three dayes since departed towards Corinth in hope to find him there together with his Spouse But three dayes after his departure he the said Methrodorus had heard some rumour that we were upon that Rock for two Fishermen of those Coasts being accused of having sold goods that were prohibited and being apprehended by Justice and having confest against themselves where they had done that robbery they were likewise accused of their errour in abandoning us in that manner And that he was come thither to fetch away the residue of the goods hid in those caves and to see withall if he might meet with the happinesse of being able in any measure to serve us I knew what construction Arnaldo's turbulent nature would put upon my actions but I reserved my thoughts to my self thanking Methrodorus for his courtesie and saying that we would onely trouble him once more so far as to borrow some of his Marriners to go as far as Argos or Corinth for that we intended to go thither in search of Arnaldo Methrodorus presently made a voluntary offer to wait upon us himself to that Port with two of his Marriners which attended him in that Fly-boat Then Argosthenia with a Soul truely generous took him aside and shewed him what she had found in Money and Jewels asking him If they were his He answered they were but that he presented her with them and because she should not think that he was so liberal of things that were lost giving her that which was not in his power he took his other riches out of the Cave and made her an exceeding noble Present of Cloaths both Silk and Gold of Oriental workmanship very beautifull and costly Then lading his Bark he kept with himself onely some of the preciousest things and he sent her under conduct of his Mate towards Athens whither he before was bound that he might stay himself with us to guide his Skiffe Then I complemented Alexander entreating him to acquaint me with his intention for I thought it not civil longer to impede his return into his Countrey But he being offended by my Courtesie said He knew not in honour how to desert us till he saw us in a place of security So we both mounted the Skiff which was excellent well provided for all occurrences steering with a prosperous wind towards Corinth and coming to fall upon a discourse about the writings found by Argosthenia we came to know that Methrodorus was not what he appeared to be a Master of a Cretan ship but a Knight of Calcides father of Calisthenes formerly spoken of as the Lover of Argosthenia treacherously slain by her brother Aristheus in Athens Whereupon the insurrections of Calcides ensuing which had almost put the whole Isle into a revolt he was forced to depart thence with the confiscation of his goods and went to Candia where he built the ship that was cast away and had so good successe in the management of that imployment that he was at that present worth little lesse then twenty thousand Ducats which he had in Athens Argosthenia wept exceedingly at the dolorous remembrance of her betrayed Calisthenes nor was Methrodorus lesse moved when knowing her for the innocent cause of all his losses and misfortunes he understood moreover that she was already contracted to Arnaldo a Knight of the bloud Royal of Thebes and might one day ascend the Throne of Negropont He respected her therefore thence-forward as his Lady and Mistresse and he entreated her that at her return to her own Countrey whither he offered to carry her she would please to think upon his ruined family and restore it by some act of beneficence Argosthenia promised that when it should be in her power she would remember him not so much for being the father of Calisthenes and injuriously persecuted as for the Courtesies shewn her in that her necessity In such kind of recognitions remonstrances and promises it grew towards the evening when Methrodorus advised us to land at a little Castle between the confines of Argos and Corinth where he assured us we should find good accommodations Here therefore we landed and rested that night when upon the next morning going out of my Chamber to visit Argosthenia I met the Host which attended to present me with a Letter I knew it presently to be from Alexander and opening it with exceeding great commotion of spirit I found that it said Alexander to Philiternus SIR I Accompt it my happy fortune to have had an occasion to serve you together with the Princesse Argosthenia for the adventures that accosted me within this few dayes have given me advice what I may hope from the World and of that which I ought to procure to my self in Heaven Argosthenia being born to be the innocent occasion of ruin to many I will make use of it as a just motive to provide for my own safety I confesse Sir that her prodigious beauty hath made a deep impression in my heart but were it so that she had not been espoused to Arnaldo her being in your company would have taught me to behold her