Arcite. ... What worthy bless|ing
Can be, but our imaginatiöns
May make it ours? and here, being thus togeth|er,
We are an endless mine to one anoth|er:
We are one another's wife, ever beget|ting
New births of love; we are fathers, friends, acquaint|ance;
We are, in one another, families;
I am your heir and you are mine; this place
Is our inheritance; no hard oppress|or
Dare take this from us....
But the contentment of the prison is to be interrupted. The fair Emilia appears beneath, walking in the garden "full of branches green," skirting the wall of the tower in which the princes are confined. She converses with her attendant, and Palamon from the dungeon-grating beholds her as she gathers the flowers of spring. He ceases to reply to Arcite, and stands absorbed in silent ecstasy.
Arcite. Cousin! How do you, sir? Why, Palamon!
Palamon. Never till now I was in prison, Ar|cite.
Arcite. Why, what's the matter, man?
Palamon. Behold and won|der:
By heaven, she is a goddess;
Arcite. Ha!
Palamon. Do rev|erence;
She is a goddess, Arcite!
The beauty of the maiden impresses Arcite no less violently than it previously had his kinsman; and he challenges with great heat a right to love her. The sharp and spirited quarrel between the Kinsmen, not Shakspere's. An animated and acrimonious dialogue ensues, in which Palamon reproachfully pleads his prior admiration of the lady, and insists on his cousin's obligation to become his abettor instead of his rival. It is spirited even to excess; and probably Shakspeare would have tempered, or abstained from treating so sudden and perhaps unnatural an access of anger and jealousy, and so utter an abandonment to [38:1]its vehemence, as that under which the fiery Palamon is here represented as labouring.
Act II. scene i. Fletcher's.