Oh my, how did this happen again? I blinked and you all conjured your parts into a play...
Lucky for me, Tomas was so kind as to read all my lines for me in Act 3 during his soliloquy....
I wonder why that is... Did the Romans use men to play women and the actor couldn't change into his dress quickly enough to come onto the stage and say Myrrhina's lines himself?
If I were directing this play today, I would have Pamphilus downstage right start his soliloquy:
PAM. I can not discover any fitting commencement of my troubles, at which to begin to narrate the things that have so unexpectedly befallen me...
Then when it came to Myrrhina's lines, I would have a spotlight shine on her upstage left, talking to someone whose back we only see, but who has the same outfit and hair as Pamphilus, when she says:
"O my {dear} Pamphilus, you see the reason why she left
your house; for violence was offered to her when formerly a maid, by
some villain to us unknown. Now, she took refuge here then, that from
you and others she might conceal her labor."
THEN PAMPHILUS: "But when I call to mind her entreaties, I can not, wretched as I am, refrain from tears."
THEN MYRRHINA AGAIN:
"Whatever chance or fortune it is," said she, "which has brought you
here to-day, by it we do both conjure you, if with equity and justice
we may, that her misfortune may be concealed by you, and kept a secret
from all. If ever you were sensible, my {dear} Pamphilus, that she was
tenderly disposed toward you, she now asks you to grant her this favor
in return, without making any difficulty of it. But as to taking her
back, act quite according to your own convenience. You alone are aware
of her lying-in, and that the child is none of yours. For it is said
that it was two months after the marriage before she had commerce with
you. And then, this is but the seventh month since she came to
you.[41] That you are sensible of this, the circumstances themselves
prove. Now, if it is possible, Pamphilus, I especially wish, and will
use my endeavors, that her labor may remain unknown to her father, and
to all, in fact. But if that can not be managed, and they do find it
out, I will say that she miscarried; I am sure no one will suspect
otherwise than, what is so likely, the child was by you. It shall be
instantly exposed; in that case there is no inconvenience whatever to
yourself, and you will be concealing an outrage so undeservingly
committed upon her,[42] poor thing!"
This would be true to the text, but would give Myrrhina's character some more stage-time (not to mention depth -- no offense to the actor playing Pamphilus, but "showing" is always better than "telling").
But anyway, here is Myrrhina's one offstage line for Act 3 (and the voice credit):
https://librivox.org/uploads/toddhw/hecyra_myrrhina_3_128kb.mp3
