University of Virginia Library

SCEN: 3d.

App: a Royal Presence Chamber.
Enter Nicostrate (from the left); Antiopa & Penthesilea (from the right.)
Ant.
Myriads of wellcomes to you.

[To Nic., who shakes hands with Ant. & Pen.
Nic.
Thô I before had qualify'd the Army,
I could not draw the heads of the sedition
Into your Noose, but now they're fast, and will
Sneak hither strait.

Ant.
Happy beyond our Hopes!

Enter Alcymen & Coloness's (from the left.)
Nic.
Seiz[e] those two Traytors.

[To Alcy. & Colo., who disarm and manacle Anti. resisting; Pen. repulses them; Nic. attacks Pen.; & Alcymen, coming with Colo. at her back, tyes her hands behind her.
Pen.
Let who dares Approach my poyson'd steel.

Nic.
Intreat the Queen, sister.

[To Alcy., who exit (at ye right.)
Ant.
Tumbl'd o'th'sodain from the Zenith of
Greatness, by our own side? I see to climb
The Top of Empire on an Armys wings,
Is as a Paper Kite to mount the clouds
Upon the back of the deceitfull wind.

Nic.
They who do first from their Allegiance stray,
Teach those whom the[y] would Rule to disobey;
Brats of example still such parents slay.

Ant.
To found on Frauds a Politic Device,
Is not to build on rock, or sand, but Ice.

Nic.
Such grow besotted before Perishing;
As malefactors blinded are then swing.

Pen.
Oh! That I could a fiery deluge call,
'Cause Heaven to rain Hell on you at my fall,
To burn, and drown, & styx in both forestall;
Or the whole Globe with one great Earthquake tear,
To make a grave, and bury Nature there;
Then having all to its first Chaos hurl'd,
Not leave an Attom for a future world.

Nic.
Peace, Hothead! I have pay'd the Army off
With the Queens Treasure, hid within her Palace:
Which secret known to none besides, still made me,
When most distress'd, hope for success, or safety.

Enter Queen with Cymitar, Alcy., Erib., & Atten. (from the right.)
All.
Long live Orithya, Queen of Amazons!

Que.
Intreat King Sagalus hither.
[To Alcy., who exit (at ye right.)
Call Laranda.
[To Erib., who exit (at the left.)
Dear Cozen—
To find you mine contents me more alone,
[Nic. kisses the Queens hand kneeling: Qu. helps her up.
Then all delights beside which crowd a Throne;
But how got you these scars?

Nic.
By my own hand to make these credit me,
[Nic. points to Ant. & Pen.
Which the same hand can cure. The rest in private.

Enter Laranda, Erib., & Thal. (from the right.)
Que.
Laranda, you deserve my choicest care.

[Lar. kisses the Queens hand.
Pen.
This was yr cursed wisdome to admit
[Nic. aside relates to ye Queene the transactions in her absence.
Nicostrate, that Syren, to our councels.

Ant.
No, it was your severity to Laranda;
And breaking Articles with our own consorts.

Pen.
Are you yrself, & thus presume to brave me?

Ant.
You are, because y'are Mad.

Pen.
Hellhound & Fiends, my very Anger mock'd.

Ant.
'Tis toothless barking.

Pen.
Thou Viper!

Ant.
Thou Tiger!

Pen.
Thou Hag!

Ant.
Thou Fury!

Pen.
Thou weeping Crocodile!

Ant.
Thou bloody saint!

Pen.
O! Thou preaching Divel!

Que.
But where's my Grandmother?

Ant.
Where she must starve, except we name the Place.

Que.
Save her Life, and Live.
Release the Trojans, I'll reward 'em amply;
And then proclaim a general Indemnity.

[To Erib., who exit with Pen., Ant., & Colo. (at the left.)
Lar.

I see the Queen will never be Loyal; she grants these
Rebells ingrain, a writ of ease for a Torment; the only use she makes
of her Prerogative, is to be a Tyrant to her self.

Tha.

Here's no talk of prefering me, yet, 'tis well known, I have
been more true of all sides than any one.

Lar.

God've mercy, you a glove for both hands, a Time-ist that
can be of every party togather.

Tha.

Yes, and of every Religion too; how else could I be certain
to be of the True?

Lar.

Sure you have a Theology windmill in your sconce, will
veer with every wind.

Tha.

No, 'tis a way I have Invented to be of the Universal Church.

Lar.

But who shall judge of your deserts?

Tha.

Nay, I'll have no body judge in my own cause but my self;
I think I have most reason to understand it.

Lar.

'Tis pity preferments are not set apart for eminent Fops of
a new edition.

Tha.

Well! I'll run home, &, right or wrong, take Justice for
this on my Consort, that whipping post in ordinary, He shall have a
basting before hand, against he deserves it, & I'll come no more
hither, till the Court tryes for my Joking Golgotha to make 'em laugh,
& petitions me to save 'em the keeping of an overgrown Child in
hanging sleves, for a state officer.

Lar.

Were not this Humourist the Courtiers standing dish of
mirth, They'd languish for want of laughing; & 'twere both Pity &
wonder the court should stand without one great fool in't.

Enter Sagalus, Lanthi., & Alcymen (from the left): exit Alc. (at ye right.)
Sag.
Madam, I more rejoyce to see you reign,
Then if I did myself ten Empires gain.

[Queen & King embrace.
Que.
And, Sr, when I'd to you my thanks impart,
The finite world's too narrow for my heart:
You went for me into death's gloomy cave.

Sag.
But you, whats more, redeem me from the grave.

Enter Celeno (from the right.)
Cel.
Some without desire to congratulate your Majesty in a masq.

Que.
We accept it.

[exit Celeno (at the right.)
Queen and King sit in state, Nicostrate and Lanthinus by them. Enter Queens attendants (from the right) & sit lower. Enter Celeno there; then Alcymen with seven Coloness's, who dance a warlike masq, expressing a discontented Army, to the sound of trumpets, Spectators rise, & Masquers disarm Queen, King, & Nic.
Enter Jasius, Ericthonius, & Ilus (from the left.)
Cel.
Madam, thô the great Councel voted yr last march
Against the Scythians, & concessions,
Then a foundation for a peace; yet th'Army's
Dissatisfy'd until you choose a consort.

Que.
Unhappy Soveraigns! may Peasant[s] elect
When they think fit, and whom they please reject;
But we, unless our Wills we subjugate
Unto their choice, are objects of their hate:
We wear the fetters, thô aloft we goe;
They share the freedom, though they creep below.

[Exeunt all but Trojans (at the right.)
Ilu.

Hey brave doings! This goverment's a mere weather cock,
it has chang'd owners, as fast as if they had thrown dice for't.

Eric.

I never heard the like but once of the Island Eutopia,
wc h ran into slavery to acquire Liberty, till early Mushroom sects of
the Nation usurp'd supremacy by turns.

Jas.

These Apostating Demagogues, though from Traytors they
were pardon'd into Peers, by their old leven are sour'd into new fits
of sedition; in spight of Amnesty, they revive the memory of their
crimes by reaching them.

Nic.

They are still as round as a Bowle, & every way so like,
they can not but fallow their natural Bias.

Ilu.

These foul humours of the Body politic, imposthum'd into
Nobles, make high sinning their Privilege, & stigmatize their lives
with vices, as Indians brand their foreheads, for a mark of honour,
yet count all Satyr upon their enormitys, a slander of their Peerage,
whereas there is nothing so much a Scandalum Magnatum as themselves.

Enter Queen, King, & Nicostrate discoursing, blind Ortera in Jewells, Celeno, Laranda, & Lanthinus (from the right.)
Nic.
Do you for Progeny so little care?
If not t'yourself, t'your Country pitty bear.

Que.
For their least good I'd cast all mine away,
Do, suffer anything, but them obey;
I from the Sacred Crown must crop no flower,
They want what they reserve that part with Power:
Soveraignity should entirely be possest,
Who ask a part, do it to take the rest.

Nic.
If you Love's Passion quite detest, declare.

Que.
I don't, with all its faults 'tis best by far:
And thô Virginity is not th'high way
Where nature leads, but where the will doth stray,
Which might all human kind annihilate;
Who'd have a Phenix live, ne're to have mate?

Nic.
Why are your words and deeds at such Hostility?
Love, & the King you like, yet fly them both.

Que.
No humour cross, nor oath keeps me a maid:
But, since you press me so, know you are the cause.

[To Nic.
Nic.
O, how, I pray? our Sphynx ne're spoke such riddle.

Que.
'Tis thus, you too well understand the souldiers
Dethron'd your Mother Lampedo, & then
Enthron'd Marpesia, her younger sister,
Whose daughter I am, in my nonage crown'd,
Who, when I came to years, resolv'd to dy
A Virgin, that the Scepter might revert
In you to my Aunts line, whose right it is.

Nic.
Madam, the Crown by Law clears all attainders.

Que.
But Equity, that Law of Nature,
Of Nations says, whate're's unjust at first,
Can never by continuance grow just:
And no time antiquates a royal claim.

Sag.
Then why don't you devolve the Rule now on her?

Que.
I would but cant; For the camp (who disrelish her
For her mothers sterness) wont permit it.
But when I'm dead, she alone, left o'th'Royal
Race, will have no competitour to cross her.
Yet, if she die first without Heir, I here
Declare to have King Sagalus, & none else.

Sag.
I'm thoroughly pleas'd with this kind Declaration.

Que.
How weak a Tryal were my Death to prove
What I would do for him—I must not love.

Sag.
Then since my Queen is dead, and son alive,
In expectation I'll, like you, live single.

Que.
Yet let yr son her consort be, that you
[Queen points to Nic.
Or he may fix an Interest here, & answer
My Peoples Importunity for succession.

Sag.
Pasanagoras's heart has long been hers.

Nic.
And mine must move, as you shall please to set it.
[To Qu., Nic. kneels, Que. raises her.
Yet, Madam, all my right I prostrate at
Yr Feet; nor would I e're accept the Crown,
Tho offer'd by all Partys, while you live.

Que.
Why not? My blood might reign if you enjoy'd it,
Here by yr daughters, by yr sons in Scythia.

[Queen confers with Cel. aside. Exit Cel. (at the right.)
Jas.

Now, fellow sufferers, if we had but the haltering of score of
those holy faith breakers, those right honourable submechanicks.

Ilu.

With a dozen of the Kirk Boutefeus, who call vehement
nonsence breathings of the Spirit: And nose their black piety as they
do their smoke.

Eric.

The Tragedy of those superreformers would be a comedy to
the whole Nation.

Ilu.

At least we'd turn 'em back to their dungcarts of Inheritance,
& close body'd shops, where the[y] first mended shoes and Church-goverment.

Enter Celeno & maskers (from the right.)
Cel.
Before a Child of Lampedo shall reign
[she points to ye maskers.
They're enjealoused, they'l remain a state.

Que.
Let them rage on, my just resolve shall stand.

Lan.
A Third defection! now what Power can save her!

[Ortera talks aside with the Queen.
Jas.

Leave these cutthroat Imps of camp Antipathy to concord, &
are most afraid of being out of danger, nothing like Peace kills 'em.
They are Salamanders that choose to live in the Flames of contention.

Eric.

They are resolv'd to fall out with the Queen, because they
alone, these Boutefeus, will not endure that themselves should be
happy, Quarrelling at the bad times, when only their quarrells make
'em such.

Ilu.

And will needs have a blank Licence, call'd liberty of
conscience, when they have no conscience at all.

Ort.
Not take the King to have the Empire?

[To Que.
Que.
No.

Ort.
Then hear Ortera.—Your two mothers were
My Twins, But I ne're published which was eldest,
That so I might confer the scepter on the worthyest;
And b'cause Lampedo proved fiercest
In War, I (by my loss of sight disabled
[Ort. points to her eys.
For fight, or conduct) did resign it to her;
[speaks to Nic.
Besides, I thought she might be first begot,
Because she lay deepest, But Marpesia was
First born, & therefore by Law heir Apparent.

[To Queen.
Sag.
Can you prove this by witness?

Ort.
By the Midwifes.
But this discovery ne're till now was needfull.

Nic.
Blest news! my Plea is quash'd, and ye Queens title
To th'Empire is most clear.

Sag.
And mine to Her.
[Queen & King joyn both their hands across.
Thus Cappadocia may with Scythia bound
A Champion breed, To whom some King will found
An Order, to make Brittain more renown'd.

Qu.
Yet, Sr, let her match with your son proceed.

Sag.
Madam, it shall effectually with speed.

Lar.

A Pair royal of such seraphic Rivals in glory, are able to
make the Angells Translate their mansions hither for more heavenly
society.

[Cel. & Maskers unmasked kneel, & lay their cymitars at the Queens feet, then kiss her [hand].
Qu.
Rise all, & be my Councellers; you have
Drawn out a secret which new crowns yr Queen.
Now let our thanks be to that throne addrest,
[Qu. looks upwards.
Which does to Usurpation grant no rest.
For as the needle by the Loadstone grac'd,
If by Irregular motion 'tis displac'd,
Suffers Vibrations, and will never stay,
Till to its proper Pole it points the Way.