LOCRINE.

Hast not thou
Held counsel--played the talebearer whose tales
Bear plague abroad and poison, knowing not how -
Not with my wife nor brother?

DEBON.

Nought avails
Falsehood: and truth it is, the king of Wales
So plied me, sir, with force of craft and threat -

LOCRINE.

That thou, whose faith swerves never, flags nor fails
Nor falters, being as stars are loyal, yet
Wast found as those that fall from heaven, forget
Their station, shoot and shudder down to death
Deep as the pit of hell? What snares were set
To take thy soul--what mist of treasonous breath
Made blind in thee the sense that quickeneth
In true men's inward eyesight, when they know
And know not how they know the word it saith,
The warning word that whispers loud or low -
I ask not: be it enough these things are so.
Thou hast played me false.

DEBON.