"I am glad," quoth Ganymede. "I would Rosader were well here to make up a mess."
"Well remembered," quoth Saladyne; "I forgot I left my brother Rosader alone, and therefore lest being solitary he should increase his sorrows, I will haste me to him. May it please you, then, to command me any service to him, I am ready to be a dutiful messenger."
"Only at this time commend me to him," quoth Aliena, "and tell him, though we cannot pleasure him we pray for him."
"And forget not," quoth Ganymede, "my commendations; but say to him that Rosalynde sheds as many tears from her heart as he drops of blood from his wounds, for the sorrow of his misfortunes, feathering all her thoughts with disquiet, till his welfare procure her content: say thus, good Saladyne, and so farewell."
He having his message, gave a courteous adieu to them both, especially to Aliena, and so playing loath to depart, went to his brother. But Aliena, she perplexed and yet joyful, passed away the day pleasantly, still praising the perfection of Saladyne, not ceasing to chat of her new love till evening drew on; and then they, folding their sheep, went home to bed. Where we leave them and return to Phoebe.
Phoebe, fired with the uncouth[1] flame of love, returned to her father's house, so galled with restless passions, as now she began to acknowledge, that as there was no flower so fresh but might be parched with the sun, no tree so strong but might be shaken with a storm, so there was no thought so chaste, but time armed with love could make amorous; for she that held Diana for the goddess of her devotion, was now fain to fly to the altar of Venus, as suppliant now with prayers, as she was forward before with disdain. As she lay in her bed, she called to mind the several beauties of young Ganymede; first his locks, which being amber-hued, passeth the wreath that Phoebus puts on to make his front glorious; his brow of ivory was like the seat where love and majesty sits enthroned to enchain fancy; his eyes as bright as the burnishing of the heaven, darting forth frowns with disdain and smiles with favor, lightning such looks as would inflame desire, were she wrapped in the circle of the frozen zone; in his cheeks the vermilion teinture of the rose flourished upon natural alabaster, the blush of the morn and Luna's silver show were so lively portrayed, that the Troyan that fills out wine to Jupiter was not half so beautiful; his face was full of pleasance, and all the rest of his lineaments proportioned with such excellence, as Phoebe was fettered in the sweetness of his feature. The idea of these perfections tumbling in her mind made the poor shepherdess so perplexed, as feeling a pleasure tempered with intolerable pains, and yet a disquiet mixed with a content, she rather wished to die than to live in this amorous anguish. But wishing is little worth in such extremes, and therefore was she forced to pine in her malady, without any salve for her sorrows. Reveal it she durst not, as daring in such matters to make none her secretary;[2] and to conceal it, why, it doubled her grief; for as fire suppressed grows to the greater flame, and the current stopped to the more violent stream, so love smothered wrings the heart with the deeper passions.
[Footnote 1: unknown, unaccustomed.]
[Footnote 2: confidante.]
Perplexed thus with sundry agonies, her food began to fail, and the disquiet of her mind began to work a distemperature of her body, that, to be short, Phoebe fell extreme sick, and so sick as there was almost left no recovery of health. Her father, seeing his fair Phoebe thus distressed, sent for his friends, who sought by medicine to cure, and by counsel to pacify, but all in vain; for although her body was feeble through long fasting, yet she did magis aegrotare animo quam corpore. Which her friends perceived and sorrowed at, but salve it they could not.
The news of her sickness was bruited abroad through all the forest, which no sooner came to Montanus' ear, but he, like a madman, came to visit Phoebe. Where sitting by her bedside he began his exordium with so many tears and sighs, that she, perceiving the extremity of his sorrows, began now as a lover to pity them, although Ganymede held her from redressing them. Montanus craved to know the cause of her sickness, tempered with secret plaints, but she answered him, as the rest, with silence, having still the form of Ganymede in her mind, and conjecturing how she might reveal her loves. To utter it in words she found herself too bashful; to discourse by any friend she would not trust any in her amours; to remain thus perplexed still and conceal all, it was a double death. Whereupon, for her last refuge, she resolved to write unto Ganymede, and therefore desired Montanus to absent himself a while, but not to depart, for she would see if she could steal a nap. He was no sooner gone out of the chamber, but reaching to her standish,[1] she took pen and paper, and wrote a letter to this effect: