Cântico dos Cânticos 1:8

If thou know not. — With this verse one subsection of the poem plainly ends. Most of the supporters of the dramatic theory make Cântico dos Cânticos 1:9 begin the second scene of Act I.; and many of them understand this reply to the heroine’s question as an ironical allusion on the part of the court ladies to her low birth. We take it rather as one of the many playful ways in which the poet either recalls or arranges meetings with the object of his passion (comp. Cântico dos Cânticos 2:10). In the first seven verses he imagines her sighing for him, and in his absence, fancying, as lovers do, causes which might keep them asunder or make him forsake her, such as the loss of her complexion, her abduction into a royal harem; and then in Cântico dos Cânticos 1:8 shows how groundless her fears are by playfully suggesting a well known way of finding him.