1    Imagine Pericles arrived at Tyre,
2    Welcomed and settled to his own desire.
3    His woeful queen we leave at Ephesus,
4    Unto Diana there a votaress.
5    Now to Marina bend your mind,
6    Whom our fast-growing scene must find
7    At Tarsus, and by Cleon train'd
8    In music, letters; who hath gain'd
9    Of education all the grace,
10   Which makes her both the heart and place
11   Of general wonder. But, alack,
12   That monster envy, oft the wrack
13   Of earned praise, Marina's life
14   Seeks to take off by treason's knife.
15   And in this kind hath our Cleon
16   One daughter, and a wench full grown,
17   Even ripe for marriage-rite; this maid
18   Hight Philoten: and it is said
19   For certain in our story, she
20   Would ever with Marina be:
21   Be't when she weaved the sleided silk
22   With fingers long, small, white as milk;
23   Or when she would with sharp needle wound
24   The cambric, which she made more sound
25   By hurting it; or when to the lute
26   She sung, and made the night-bird mute,
27   That still records with moan; or when
28   She would with rich and constant pen
29   Vail to her mistress Dian; still
30   This Philoten contends in skill
31   With absolute Marina: so
32   With the dove of Paphos might the crow
33   Vie feathers white. Marina gets
34   All praises, which are paid as debts,
35   And not as given. This so darks
36   In Philoten all graceful marks,
37   That Cleon's wife, with envy rare,
38   A present murderer does prepare
39   For good Marina, that her daughter
40   Might stand peerless by this slaughter.
41   The sooner her vile thoughts to stead,
42   Lychorida, our nurse, is dead:
43   And cursed Dionyza hath
44   The pregnant instrument of wrath
45   Prest for this blow. The unborn event
46   I do commend to your content:
47   Only I carry winged time
48   Post on the lame feet of my rhyme;
49   Which never could I so convey,
50   Unless your thoughts went on my way.
51   Dionyza does appear,
52   With Leonine, a murderer.