Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Imogen and Posthumus were both taught by the same masters, and were play-fellows from their infancy: they loved each other tenderly when they were children, and their affection continuing to increase with their CYMBELINE AND THE QUEEN years, when they grew up they privately married. The disappointed queen soon learnt this secret, for she kept spies constantly to watch upon the actions of her dag4rter-in-law, andshe immediately told the king of the marriage of Imogen with Posthumus. Nothing could exceed the wrath of Cym- beline when he heard that his daughter had been so forgetful of her high dignity as to marry a subject. He commanded Posthumus to leave Britain, and banished him from his native country for ever. The queen, who pretended to pity Imogen for the grief she suffered at losing her husband, offered to procure them a private meeting before Posthumus set out on his journey to Rome, which place he had chosen for his residence in his banishment: this seeming kindness she showed, the better to succeed in her future designs in regard to her son Cloten; for she meant to persuade Imogen, when her husband was gone, that her marriage was not lawful, being contracted without the consent of the king. Imogen and Posthumus took a most affectionate leave of each other. Imogen gave her husband a diamond ring, which had been her mother’s, and Posthumus promised never to part with the ring; and he fastened a bracelet on the arm of his wife, which he IMOGEN ANLI POSTHUMUS begged she would preserve with great care, as a token of his love: they then bade each other farewell, with many vows of everlasting love and fidelity. Imogen remained a solitary and dejected lady in her father’s court, and Posthumus arrived at Rome, the place he had chosen for his banishme…
