Tin. Not a step!
I, as your friend, may lead her to your lordship.
Fair lady, by your leave.
Julia. No! not to you.
Tin. I ask your hand to give it to his lordship.
Julia. Nor to his lordship—save he will accept
My hand without my heart! but I’ll present
My knee to him, and, by his lofty rank,
Implore him now to do a lofty deed
Will lift its stately head above his rank,—
Assert him nobler yet in worth than name,—
And, in the place of an unwilling bride,
Unto a willing debt or make him lord,—
Whose thanks shall be his vassals, night and day
That still shall wait upon him!
Tin. What means this?
Julia. What is’t behoves a wife to bring her lord?
Wal. A whole heart, and a true one.
Julia. I have none!
Not half a heart—the fraction of a heart!
Am I a woman it befits to wed?
Wal. Why, where’s thy heart?
Julia. Gone—out of my keeping!
Lost, past recovery: right and title to it—
And all given up! and he that’s owner on’t,
So fit to wear it, were it fifty hearts,
I’d give it to him all!