 | The Tvrke |  |
Timo.
Blush not thou chast and modest Queene of night,
Nor hide thy siluer crescent in a clowde,
To see me thus Rhamnusia like attir'd:
Stare on ye Argus eyed heauens and sea woman
More full of vengeance, then your iealous Queene.
Medusa sometime the loue of Neptune,
(But after for thy lust transformd a monster)
Lend me those serpents that about thy head
Curle vp like Elfe-knots, at whose horrid sight
The Sun may vanish or stand still affright.
Or you you Furies ministers of feare,
(That at Astreas feet lye bound in snakes
Attending her iust sentence to begin
Terror of conscience in the brest of sin)
This night be powerfull in me and inspire
My face with feare, my heart with racke-swolne ire.
Venice, Venice, great Venice:
Uen.
Who speakes to Venice?
Within.
Timo.
Iulia thy loue.
Ven.
Delusiue voyce, why dost renew my griefe
By naming Iulia?
Didst thou loue Iulia?
Ven.
Thou wrongst me to make question of my loue.
Whatsoere thou art.
Enter Venice.
Timo.
Then see thy Iulia and reuenge her wrongs.
Ven.
Dissolue ye glassy pearles and melt in drops,
Or with the teare-spent mother Niobe
Turne into stones: shall I beleue my thoughts,
And credit what thy shape presents to me?
Thou art the Ghost of murdred Iulia.
Timo.
I am.
Ven.
Immortall essence Virgin-element
So may I tearme thy ayry substance freed
From the grosse mixture of our earthly load:
Oh I am throngd with passions & each crauing vent
None can haue passage till some teares be spent,
Fall fall ye siluer pearles, and of the earth
Purchase a soft relenting at my griefes.
Shoure downe like rainie drops, and pearce the stones
Make them receiue my sorrowes, or from mine eyes
Run like to christall riuers through the world,
Slyde ore the flowry medowes that the Nimphs
Dancing in feary rings vpon the grasse,
May leaue their sport, and weepe to see you passe,
Where by the dolefull murmur as you goe,
The hils may here you mourne and sound my woe,
Pardon: if I be tedious virgin spirit,
Or if my griefe be too effeminate:
Thy habit is an Index to reuenge,
Which thy wrongs seeme to pleade for of my loue,
Speake them, or deale them through the yeelding aire
Into my eares, and they shall be to me
Like the sterne drumme, or musique of the warre
Vnto the coward, or the fainting souldiour.
Venice I was murdered.
Ven.
Murder is open mouthd, and as the Sea
Whose couetous waues inprisond by thy land,
Bellow for griefe and roare vpon the sand.
So from the earth it cries, and like a childe
Wrongd by his carelesse nurse will not be stilld:
Are ye then deafe yea gods, ye cannot heare it?
Or is iust Libra falne out of your Spheares,
That wronged States must to the earth appeale
For iustice and reuenge. Then tis not prophane
T'usurpe your functions: my hand shall be as iust
As my soule louing: and they both shall leaue
A story to the world of my reuenge.
Nor in succeeding times shall be forgot.
Venice reuengd those wrongs the heauens would not.
I interrupt what that wouldst say, and seeme
To crowne all vengeance in a passion.
Speake but his name.
Timo.
My vncle Borgias.
Uen.
Enough.
O that the genious that attends on man,
Should be a doubtfull Oracle to the soule
And whispering to our intellect what fate
Hangs like a falling tower vpon his state,
Yet be no more of force to length our ioy,
Then were Cassandras prophecies to Troy.
Disloyall trecherous villaine Borgias,
Some Hydras poyson, or the blood of Nessus
Cleaue to thy flesh:
Oh my blood swells beyond my power: my voyce
Louder then his that thunders through the cloudes,
Shall speake this monstrous murder to the world,
Ile be thy Orator wrongd spirit and plead
Blood and reuenge for thee though thou best dead.
Timo.
Stay.
Ven:
What wouldst thou more?
Heare and be aduisde:
To morrow when the Senate sits be there,
And in the eares of the whole state proclaime,
And iustifie my words gainst Borgias:
In this alone I will great Uenice proue,
Do it as euer thou didst Iulia loue.
Ven.
I will.
Timo.
Whilst I borne vpon aire attend my blisse.
Ven.
Peace to thy soule: Adieu.
Exit.
Timo.
Remember Iulia.
Yet prosper and go on, for Iulias ghost
My false shape takes: th'abused Duke's afire,
Through Borgias blood I'le runne to my desire.
Enter Bordello solus.
Whome haue we heere?
Bord.
Priapus thou womans God assist me with a Iouiall ability:
this night I may beget a Hercules: Fortune I must confesse
thou hast turnd vp thy muffler: and cast a gratious aspect on
Bordello: for I am not onely in the state of cleane linnen; but also
thou hast made me gratious in the eye of Signior Diaspermaton my
Apothecary, who hath furnished me with this receipt: heere is a
compound of Cantharides Diositerion, marrow of an Oxe, haires of
a Lyon, stones of a Goate, Cock-sparrowes braines, and such
like this after an houres receipt, hath a fourefold operation: and
least I should be like a Peacocke all taile and no heart, heere is a
distillation of ten pound a pinte, that comforts the inward, fires
the braines, cheeres vp the spirit, and makes a man lay about him
like a dutchman. Let me see, it is more then time that I commit
this deuine pill to his hopefull working: least my staffe be out of
the rest when my aduersary is in the carriere. So Cupids faire
mother be thy midwife: out and alas I am mare rid, what Somners
Ghost or limme of Lucifer, puts poore Bordello in minde of
pennance before he hath trespassed?
I am espied: his feare doth apprehend me for a ghost,
And I must feed it.
Bord.
Se, it makes toward me: infortunate Bordello that the deuill
should be an enemy to lechery.
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