Act III, Scene I

Enter DEMIPHO and CHREMES.

DEM. Well, have you brought your daughter with you, Chremes, for whom you went to Lemnos?

CHREM. No.

DEM. Why not?

CHREM. When her mother found that I staid here longer than usual, and at the same time the age of the girl did not suit with my delays, they told me that she, with all her family, set out in search of me.

DEM. Pray, then, why did you stay there so long, when you had heard of this?

CHREM. Why, faith, a malady detained me.

DEM. From what cause? Or what was it?

CHREM. Do you ask me? Old age itself is a malady. However, I heard that they had arrived safe, from the captain who brought them.

DEM. Have you heard, Chremes, what has happened to my son in my absence?

CHREM. ’Tis that, in fact, that has embarrassed me in my plans. For if I offer my daughter in marriage to any person that’s a stranger, it must all be told how and by whom I had her. You I knew to be fully as faithful to me as I am to myself; if a stranger shall think fit to be connected with me by marriage, he will hold his tongue, just as long as good terms exist between us: but if he takes a dislike to me, he’ll be knowing more than it’s proper he should know. I am afraid, too, lest my wife should, by some means, come to know of it; if that is the case, it only remains for me to shake myself and leave the house; for I’m the only one I can rely on at home.

DEM. I know it is so, and that circumstance is a cause of anxiety to me; and I shall never cease trying, until I’ve made good what I promised you.