 | The Jealous Lovers |  |
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ACTUS IIII.
SCEN. I.
Ballio, Asotus, Chærilus, and Bomolochus, bearing the coffin of Techmessa; Hyperocus, Thrasimachus bearing the coffin of Tyndarus, a servant.Ball.
Carry these letters unto Chremylus house.
Give this to Pamphilus, to Evadne that,
And certifie 'um of this sad event.
It will draw teares from theirs—As from my eyes,
Because they are not reall obsequies.
Asot.
So great my grief, so dolorous my disaster,
I know not in what language to expresse it,
Unlesse I should be dumbe!—Sob—sob Asotus,
Sob till thy buttons break, and crack thy bandstrings
With lamentation, and distress'd condoling,
With blubberd eyes behold this spectacle
Of mans mortality.—O my dearest Tyndarus!
Thras.
Learn of us Captains to outface grimme death,
And gaze the lean-chapt monster in the face.
Asot.
I, and I could but come to see his face,
I'de scratch his eyes out.—O the ugly Rogue!
Could none but Tyndarus and fair Techmessa
Serve the vile varlet to lead apes in hell?
Hyper.
I have seen thousands sigh out souls in grones
And yet have laugh'd:—it has been sport to see,
A mangled carcasse broach'd with so many wounds
That life has been in doubt which to get out at.
Asot.
Are crawling vermine of so choice a diet?
Would I were then a worm, freely to feed
On such a delicate and Ambrosian dish:
Fit to be serv'd a banquet to my bed!
But O—Techmessa death has swallowed thee,
Too sweet a sop for such a fiend as he.
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Chase hence these showres, for since they both were dead,
Teares will not bribe the fates for a new thread.
Bom.
Inexorable sisters,—Be not sorry:
For Clotho's distaffe will be peremptory!
Asot.
Go then, and dip your pens in gall and vineger
To rail on Mors, cruel—impartiall Mors:
The salvage Tyrant—all-devouring Mors:
The envious, wicked, and malicious Mors:
Mors that respects not valour, Mors that cares not
For wit or learning, Mors that spares not honour:
Mors whom wealth bribes not, Mors whom beauty tempts not.
Thus loudly rail on Mors, that Mors may know it
To be reveng'd on Mors I keep a Poet.
Thras.
If Mors were here, the Skeleton should know
I'de cut his charnell bones to dice, for grieving
Our noble Generall—Courage bon chevalier!
SCEN. II.
Simo, Asotus, Ballio, Thrasimachus, Hyperbolus, Chærilus, Bomolochus.Sim.
Why is my boy so sad?—Tell me Asotus:
If dissolv'd gold will cure thee, melt a Treasure.
Asot.
O sad mischance!
Sim.
What grieves my hope—my joy.
My staff, my comfort?
Asot.
Wofull accident!
Sim.
Have I not barricadoed all my doores,
And stop't each chink and cranny in my house,
To keep out poverty and lean misfortune?
Where crept this sorrow in?
Asot.
Here, through my heart.
O father, I will tell you such a story
Of such a sad and lamentable nature,
'Twill crack your purse-strings.
Sim.
Ha? what story, boy?
My friend, my deare friend Tyndarus, Sir, is dead.
—And, to augment my sorrow,—kill'd himself.
And yet to adde more to my heap of griefs,
Left me and Ballio—his estate—
Sim.
Alas!
Is not this counterfeit sorrow well exprest?
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But I grieve truely that I grieve in jest:
Sim.
Half his estate to thee, and half to Ballio?
A thousand pities.—Gently rest his bones.
I cannot but weep with thee.
Ball.
Sir, you see
If you had left him nothing, my instructions
Can draw in patrimonies.
Sim.
He is rich
In nothing but a Tutour.—Good Asotus,
Though sorrow be a debt due to the herse
Of a dead friend, and we must wet the turf
Under whose roof he lodges: yet we must not
Be too immoderate.
Asot.
Beare me witnesse, heaven!
I us'd no force of Rhetorick, no perswasions
(What e're the wicked and malicious world
May rashly censure) to instigate these two
To their own deaths. I knew not of the plot,
All of you know that I am ignorant.
Phryn.
Where is my love? shall sorrow rivall me,
Enter Phryne.
And hang about thy neck? If grief be got
Into thy cheeks, I'le clap it out.—Deare chicken,
You sha'not be so sad, indeed you sha' not.
Be merry: by this kisse I'le make you merry.
Asot.
Then wipe my eyes.—Thus when the clouds are gone,
The day again is gilded by the sunne.
SCEN. III.
Ballio, Asotus, Simo, Phryne, Thrasimachus, Hyperb. Chærilus, Bomolochus, Sexton.Asot.
VVho's within here?
Sext.
What's the matter without there?
Asot.
Ha! What art thou?
Sext.
The last of tailours, Sir,
that ne're take measure of you, while you have hope to weare a
new suit.
Asot.
How dost thou live?
Sext.
As worms do:—by the dead.
Asot.
A witty rascall. Let's have some discourse with him.
Thras.
Are any souldiers bones in garrison here?
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Faith, Sir, but few: they like poore travellers
Take up their inne by chance: but some there be.
Thras.
Do not those warlike bones in dead of night
Rise up in arms, and with tumultuous broyls
Waken the dormise that dull peace hath lull'd
Into a lethargie?—Dost not heare 'um knock
Against their coffins, till they crack and break
The marble into shivers that intombes 'um?
Making the temple shake as with an earthquake,
And all the statues of the gods grow pale,
Affrighted with the horrour?
Sext.
No such matter.
Hyper.
Do they not call for arms? and fright thee, mortall,
Out of thy wits? Do they not break the legs,
And crush the skuls that dare approach too neare
Their honour'd graves?—When I shall come to dwell
In your dark family, if a noysome carcase
Offend my nostrils with too ranck a sent,
Know—I shall rage—and quarrell,—till I fright
The poore inhabitants of the charnell house:
That here shall run a toe, a shin-bone there:
Here creeps a hand, there trowles an arm away.
One way a crooked rib shall halting hie,
Another you shall trundling finde a skull.
Like the distracted citizens of a town
Beleaguer'd,—and in danger to be taken.
Asot.
For heavens sake, Sexton, lay my quiet bones
By some precise religious officer,
One that will keep the peace.—These roaring captains,
With blustring words and language full of dread,
Will make me quit my tombe, and run away
Wrap't in my winding sheet,—as if grim Minos,
Stern Æacus, and horrid Rhadamanth
Enjoyn'd the corps a penance.
Sext.
Never fear it.
This was a captains skull, one that carried a storm in his countenance,
and a tempest in his tongue. The great bug-beare of the
citie, that threw drawers down the stairs as familiarly as quartpots;
and had a pension from the Barbour-chirurgeons for breaking
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and pandars, then the disease belonging to the trade.—And
yet I remember when he went to buriall, another corse took the
wall of him, and the ban-dog ne're grumbled.
Asot.
Then skull (although thou be a captains skull)
I say thou art a coward,—and no Gentleman;
Thy mother was a whore,—and thou liest in thy throat.
Hyper.
Do not, live hare, pull the dead lions beard.
Asot.
No, good Hyperbolus, I but make a jest
To show my reading in moralitie.
Chær.
Do not the ashes of deceased Poets
Inspir'd with sacred fury, carroll forth
Enthusiastick raptures? Dost not heare 'um
Sing mysteries, and talk of things conceal'd
The rest of mortall judgements? Dost not see
Apollo and the Muses every night
Dance rings about their tombes?
Bom.
Do not roses,
Lilies, and violets grow upon their graves?
Shoots not the laurell that impal'd their brows
Into a tree, to shadow their blest marble?
Do they not rise out of their shrowds to read
Their Epitaphs? and if they like 'um not,
Expunge 'um, and write new ones? Do they not
Rore in caliginous terms, and vapour forth
From reeking entrals fogs Egyptian,
To puzzle even an oculate intellect?
Prate they not cataracts of insensible noise,
That with obstreperous cadence cracks the organs
Acroamatick, till the deaf auditor
Admires the words he heares not?
Sext.
This was a poeticall noddle. O the sweet lines, choice
language, eloquent figures, besides the jests, half jests, quarter
jests, and quibbles that have come out o'these chaps that yawn so!
He has not now so much as a new-coyn'd-complement to procure
him a supper. The best friend he has may walk by him now,
and yet have ne're a jeere put upon him. His mistresse had a little
dog deceased the other day, and all the wit in this noddle could
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seven yeares, and in all that while I never heard him rail against
the times, or complain of the neglect of learning. Melpomene
and the rest of the Muses have a good time on't that he is dead:
for while he lived, he ne're left calling upon 'um. He was buried
(as most of the tribe) at the charge of the parish, and is happier
dead then alive: for he has now as much money as the best in the
company,—and yet has left off the poeticall way of begging,
call'd Borrowing.
Asot.
I scorn thy Lyrick and Heroick strain,
Thy tart Iambick, and Satyrick vein.
Where be thy querks and tricks? show me again
The strange conundrums of thy frisking brain,
Thou Poets skull, and say, What's rime to chimney?
Sext.
Alas! Sir, you ha' pos'd him: he cannot speak to give
you an answer, though his mouth be alwayes open. A man may
safely converse with him now, and never fear stifling in a crowd
of verses. And now a Play of his may be freely censur'd, without a
libel upon the audience. The boyes may be bold to cry it down.
Ball.
I cannot yet contrive it handsomely.
Me thinks the darknesse of the night should prompt me
To a plot of that complexion.—Ruminate,
Ruminate Ballio.
Phryn.
Pray, Sir, how does death
Deal with the Ladies? Is he so unmannerly
As not to make distinction of degrees?
I hope the rougher bones of men have had
More education, then to trouble theirs
That are of gentler stuffe.
Sext.
Death is a blunt villain, Madam: he makes no distinction
betwixt Jone and my Lady. This was the prime Madam in
Thebes, the generall mistresse, the onely adored beauty. Little
would you think there were a couple of starres in these two augur-holes:
or that this pit had been arch'd over with a handsome
nose, that had been at the charges to maintain half a dozen of severall
silver arches to uphold the bridge. It had been a mighty favour
once, to have kiss'd these lips that grin so. This mouth out
of all the Madams boxes cannot now be furnished with a set of
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chambermaids misplacing of a hair, was as much as her place
came to.—Oh! if that Lady now could but behold this
physnomie of hers in a looking-glasse, what a monster would she
imagine her self! Will all her perrukes, tyres and dresses, with
her chargeable teeth, with her cerusse and pomatum, and the benefit
of her painter and doctor, make this idol up again?
Paint Ladies while you live, and plaister fair,
But when the house is fallne 'tis past repair.
Phryn.
No matter, my Asotus: Let death do
His pleasure then, we'le do our pleasures now.
Each minute that is lost is past recall.
This is the time alotted for our sports,
'Twere sinne to passe it. While our lips are soft,
And our embraces warm, we'le twine and kisse.
When we shall be such things as these, let worms
Crawl through our eyes, and eat our noses off,
It is no matter. While we liv'd, we liv'd.
Asot.
And when we die, we die. We will be both embalm'd
In precious unguents to delight our sense,
And in our grave we'le busse, and hug, and dally
As we do here: for death can nothing be
To him that after death shall lie with thee.
Sexton, receive these coffins to the temple;
But not interre them,—for they both are guilty
Of their own bloud,—till we make expiation
T'assoyl the fact.—Tutour reward the Sexton.
I'le come sometimes and talk moralitie with him.
Ball.
This, Sir, my Pupill gives you:—but hereafter
I'le more then treble it, if you be no enemie
To your own profit.
Sext.
Profit's my religion.
Asot.
Now you that bore my dead friends to the grave,
Usher my living mistresse home again.
Thus joy with grief alternate courses shares,
Fortune, I see thy wheel in all affairs.
Exeunt omnes præter Sexton.
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SCEN. IIII.
Sexton, and his wife Staphyla.Sext.
Staphyla, why Staphyla: I hope she has ta'ne her last
sleep. Why when, Staphyla?
Staph.
What a life have I? I, that can never be quiet. I can
no sooner lie down to take my rest, but presently Staphyla, Staphyla.
What's the news?
Sext.
A prize, my rogue, a prize.
Staph.
Where? or from whom?
Sext.
Why, thou knowest I rob no where but on the highway
to heaven, such as are upon their last journey thither. Thou
and I have been land-pyrats this six and thirty yeares, and have
pillaged our share of Charons passengers. Here are a couple of
sound sleepers, and perchance their clothes will fit us. Then will
I walk like a Lord, and thou shalt be my Madam, Staphyla.
Staph.
Truely, husband, I have had such fearfull dreams to
night, that I am perswaded (though I think I shall never turn
truely honest again) to rob the dead no more. For, me thought,
as you and I were robbing the dead, the dead took heart, and
rob'd us.
Sex.
Tush, dreams are idle things. There is no felonie warrantable
but ours, for it is grounded on rules of charity. Is it fitting
the dead should be cloath'd, and the living go naked? Besides,
what is it to them whether they lie in sheets or no? Did you ever
heare of any that caught cold in his coffin? Moreover, there is
safety and security in these attempts: What inhabitant of the
grave that had his house broke open, accus'd the thief of Burglarie?
Look here: This is a Lawyers skull. There was a
tongue in't once, a damnable eloquent tongue, that would almost
have perswaded any man to the gallows. This was a turbulent
busie fellow, till death gave him his Quietus est. And yet I ventured
to rob him of his gown, and the rest of his habillements,
to the very buckrum-bag, not leaving him so much as a poore
half-peny to pay for his waftage: and yet the good man ne're repin'd
at it. Had he been alive, and were to have pleaded against
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Judges) a fact of that horrour and height in sinne, so abominable,
so detestable in the eyes of heaven and earth, that never any but
this dayes cause presented to the admiration of your eares. I cannot
speak it without trembling, 'tis so new, so unus'd, so unheard
of a villanie! But that I know your Lordships confident of the
honestie of your poore Oratour, I should not hope by all my
reasons, grounds, testimonies, arguments, and perswasions to gain
your belief. This man, said I man? this monster rather: but
monster is too easie a name: this devil, this incarnate devil, having
lost all honesty, and abjur'd the profession of vertue, Rob'd,
(a sinne in the action.) But who? The dead. What need I)
aggravate the fault? the naming the action is sufficient to condemne
him. I say, he rob'd the dead. The dead! Had he rob'd
the living, it had been more pardonable: but to rob the dead of
their clothes, the poore impotent dead, that can neither card, nor
spin, nor make new ones, O 'tis most audacious and intolerable!
—Now you have well spoke, why do you not after all this
Rhetorick, put your hand behinde you, to receive some more instructions
backward? Now a man may clappe you o'th' coxcombe
with his spade, and never stand in fear of an action of
batterie.
Staph.
For this one time, husband, I am induced; but insooth
I will not make a common practise of it. Knock you up
that coffin, and I'le knock up this.—Rich and glorious!
Sex.
Bright as the sunne! Come, we must strip you Gallants,
the worms care not for having the dishes serv'd up to their table
cover'd.
O, O, O!
Tyndarus, and Techmessa rise from the coffins, and the Sexton and his wife affrighted, fall into a swoon.
Staph.
Heaven shield me! O, O, O!
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SCEN. V.
Tyndarus and Techmessa.Tyn.
How poore a thing is man, whom death it self
Cannot protect from injuries! O ye gods!
Is't not enough our wretched lives are toss'd
On dangerous seas, but we must stand in fear
Of Pyrates in the haven too? Heaven made us
So many buts of clay, at which the gods
In cruell sport shoot miseries.—Yet, I hope,
Their spleen's grown milder, and this blest occasion
Offers it self an earnest of their mercy.
Their sinnes have furnisht us with fit disguises
To quiet our perplexed souls. Techmessa,
Let me aray you in this womans robes.
I'le weare the Sextons garments in exchange.
Our sheets and coffins shall be theirs.
Tech.
Deare Tyndarus!
In all my life I never found such peace
As in this coffin: it presented me
The sweets that death affords.—Man has no libertie
But in this prison.—Being once lodg'd here,
He's fortified in an impregnable fort,
Through which no doubts, suspicions, jealousies,
No sorrows, cares, or wilde distractions
Can force an entrance to disturb our sleeps.
Tyn.
Yet to those prisons will we now commit
These two offenders.
Tech.
But what benefit
Shall we enjoy by this disguise?
Tyn.
A great one:
If my Evadne, or thy Pamphilus
E're lov'd us living, they will haste to make
Atonement for our souls, stain'd with the guilt
Of our own bloud: if not, they will rejoyce
Our deaths have opened them so cleare a passage
To their close loves: and with those thoughts possess'd,
They will forget the torments hell provides
For those, that leave the warfare of this life
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Tech.
I hope they may prove constant!
Tyn.
So pray I.
I will desire yon statue, be so courteous
To part with's beard a while.—So we are now
Beyond discovery.
Sex.
O, O, O!
Staph.
O, O, O!
Tyn.
Let's use a charm for these.
[Tyn.]
Quiet sleep, or I will make
Erinnys whip thee with a snake.
And cruell Rhadaman thus take
Thy body to the boyling lake,
Where fire and brimstone never slake.
Thy heart shall burn, thy head shall ake,
And every joynt about thee quake.
And therefore dare not yet to wake.
Tech.
Quiet sleep, or thou shalt see
The horrid hags of Tartarie.
Whose tresses ugly serpents he,
And Cerberus shall bark at thee.
And all the Furies that are three,
The worst is call'd Tisiphone,
Shall lash thee to eternitie.
And therefore sleep thou peacefully.
Tyn.
But who comes hither? Ballio, what's his businesse?
SCEN. VI.
Ballio, Tyndarus, Techmessa.Ball.
Sexton, I'le open first thine eares with these,
To make 'um fit to let perswasions in.
Tyn.
These, Sir, will cure my deafnesse.
Ball.
Art thou mine?
Tyn.
Sir, you have bought me.
Ball.
I'le pay double for thee.
Shall I prevail in my request?
Tyn.
Ask these.—
Ball.
Th'art apprehensive, to the purpose then;
Have you not in the temple some deep vault
Ordain'd for buriall?
Tyn.
Yes.
Ball.
Then I proceed:
We have to night perform'd the last of service
That piety can pay to our dead friends.
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'Twas charitably done.
Ball.
We brought 'um hither
To their last home.—Now Sir, they both being guilty
Of their own deaths, I fear the laws of Thebes
Deny 'um buriall. It would grieve me, Sir,
(For friendship cannot be so soon forgot;
Especially, so firm a one as ours)
To have 'um cast a prey to Wolves and Eagles.
Sir, these religious thoughts have brought me hither
Now at the dead of night; to intreat you,
To cast their coffins into some deep vault,
And to interre 'um.—O my Tyndarus,
All memory shall fail me, e're my thoughts
Can leave th' impression of that love I beare thee.
Thou left'st me half of all the land thou hadst;
And should I not provide thee so much earth
As I can measure by thy length, heaven curse me!
Tyn.
Sir, if your courtesie had not bound me yours,
This act of goodnesse had.
Ball.
So true a friend
No age records.—Farewell.—This work succeeds!
Posterity, that shall this story get,
May learn from hence an art to counterfeit.
Exit Ball.
SCEN. VII.
Tyndarus, Techmessa.Tyn.
Here was a strange deliverance! who can be
So confident of fortune, as to say,
I now am safe?
Tech.
This villain has reveal'd
All our designes to Pamphilus and Evadne:
And they with bribes and hopes of an inheritance,
If you were dead indeed, have won this rascall
To this black treason.—What foul crimes can Lust
Prompt her base vassals to!—Here let us end
Our busie search, and travell o're the world,
To see if any cold and Northern climat
Have entertain'd lost Vertue, long since fled
Our warmer countrey.
Tyn.
Ha!—'Tis so!—'Tis so!
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And are you brooding crocodiles? I may chance
To break the serpents egge, e're you have hatch'd
The viper to perfection. Come Techmessa,
My anger will no longer be confin'd
To patient silence: Tedious expectation
Is but a foolish fire by night, that leads
The traveller out on's way.—Break forth, my wrath:
Break like a deluge of consuming fire,
And scorch 'um both to ashes, in a flame
Hot as their lust.—No:—'Tis too base a bloud
For me to spill.—Let 'um e'ne live t' ingender
A brood of monsters:—May perpetuall jealousie
Wait on their beds, and poyson their embraces
With just suspicions: may their children be
Deform'd, and fright the mother at the birth:
May they live long, and wretched; all mens hate,
And yet have misery enough for pity:
May they be long a dying—of diseases
Painfull, and loathsome:—Passion, do not hurrie me
To this unmanly womanish revenge.
Wilt thou curse Tyndarus when thou wear'st a sword?
But ha, heark, observe!—
SCEN. VIII.
Pamphilus, Evadne, Tyndarus, Techmessa.Pam.
VVait till we call.
Heaven, if thou hast not emptied all thy treasury
Of wrath upon me; here I challenge thee
To lay on more. What torments hast thou left,
In which thou hast not exercis'd my patience?
Yet cast up all th' accounts of all my sorrows,
And the whole summe is trebled in the losse
Of deare Techmessa.
Tech.
If this grief were reall!
Tyn.
Be not too credulous.
Pam.
I have stood the rest
Of your afflictions, with this one I fell,
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Of thousand violent billows, and withstood
Their fierce assaults, untill the working Tide
Had undermin'd him: then he falls, and draws
Part of the mountain with him.
Evad.
Pamphilus,
When did you see my sweet-heart? prithee tell me,
Is he not gone a maying?—he will bring me
Some pincks and daysies home to morrow morning.
Pray heaven he meet no theeves.
Pam.
Alas Evadne!
Thy Tyndarus is dead.
Evad.
What shall I do?
I cannot live without him.
Tyn.
I am mov'd:
Yet I will make this triall full and perfect.
What, at this dismall houre, when nothing walks
But souls tormented, calls you from your sheets
To visit our dark cells, inhabited
By death and melancholy?
Evad.
I am come
To seek my true-love here. Did you not see him?
He's come to dwell with you, pray use him well,
He was a proper Gentleman.
Tech.
Sir, what cause
Inforc'd you hither?
Pam.
I am come to pay
The tribute of my eyes to a dead Love.
Tyn.
Fair Lady, may I ask one question of you?
Did you admit no love into your bosome
But onely his?
Evad.
Alas! you make me weep.
Could any woman love a man, but him!
No Tyndarus, I will not long outlive thee:
We will be married in Elysium,
And arm in arm walk through th'-blessed groves,
And change a thousand kisses,—you sha'nt see us.
Tyn.
I know not whether it be joy or grief
Forces teares from me.
Tech.
Were you constant, Sir,
To her whose death you now so much lament?
For by those prodigies and apparitions
That have to night shak'd the foundations
Of the whole temple, your inconstancy
Hath caus'd your Mistresses untimely end.
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The Sunne shall change his course, and finde new paths
To drive his chariot in: The Load-stone leave
His faith unto the North:—The Vine withdraw
Those strict embraces that infold the Elme
In her kinde arms:—But, if I change my love
From my Techmessa, may I be recorded
To all posterity, Loves great Apostate
In Cupids annalls.
Evad.
If you see my Tyndarus,
Pray tell him I will make all haste to meet him.
I will but weep a while first.
Tyn.
Pretie sorrow!
Tech.
Sir, you may veil your falshood in smooth language,
And gild it o're with fair hypocrisie:
But here has been such grones: Ghosts that have cried
In hollow voices, Pamphilus, O false Pamphilus!
Revenge on Pamphilus! Such complaints as these
The gods ne're make in vain.
Pam.
Then there is witch-craft in't. And are the gods
Made parties too against me?—Pardon then
If I grow stubborn.—While they prest my shoulders
No more then I could beare, they willingly
Submitted to the burden.—Now they wish
To cast it off.—What treacherie has brib'd you,
Celestiall forms, to be my false accusers?
I chalenge you (for you can view my thoughts,
And reade the secret characters of my heart.)
Give in your verdict, did you ever finde
Another image graven in my soul
Besides Techmessa? No! 'Tis hell has forg'd
These flie impostures! all these plots are coyn'd
Out of the devils mintage?
Tech.
Certainly
There's no false fire in this.
Tyn.
There cannot be.
Evad.
Pray, Sir, direct me where I may embalm
My Tyndarus with my teares.
Tyn.
There gentle Lady.
Evad.
Is this a casket fit to entertain
A jewell of such value?
Pam.
Where must I
Pay my devotions?
Tech.
There your dead Saint lies.
Evad.
Hail Tyndarus, may earth but lightly presse thee:
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As true as my affection. Now I know
Thou canst not choose but love me, and with longing
Expect my quick arrivall: for the soul
Freed from the cloud of flesh, clearely discerns
Forms in their perfect nature. If there be
A guilt upon thy bloud, thus I'le redeem it,
(offers to kill herself.
And lay it all on mine.
Tyn.
What mean you, Lady?
Evad.
Stay not my pious hand.
Tyn.
Your impious rather.
If you were dead, who then were left to make
Lustration for his crime? shall foolish zeal
Perswade you to a hasty death, and so
Leave Tyndarus to eternity of flames?
Evad.
Pardon me, Tyndarus, I will onely see
That office done, and then I'le follow thee.
Pam.
Thou gentle soul of my deceased love,
If thou still hoverst here abouts, accept
The vows of Pamphilus.—If I ever think
Of woman with affection, but Techmessa,
Or keep the least spark of a love alive
But in her ashes: let me never see
Those blessed fields where gentle lovers walk
In endlesse joyes.—Why do I idlely weep!
I'le write my grief in bloud.
Tech.
What do you mean?
Pam.
Techmessa, I am yet withheld; but suddenly
I'le make escape to finde thee.
Tech.
O blest minute!
SCEN. IX.
Dypsas, Tyndarus, Evadne, Pamphilus, Techmessa.Dyps.
Where shall I flie to hide me from my guilt?
It follows me, like those that run away
From their own shadows: that which I would shun
I beare about me.—Whom shall I appease?
The living, or the dead? for I have injur'd
Both you, and them.—O Tyndarus, here I kneel,
And do confesse my self thy cruel murdresse;
71
But how shall I make satisfaction,
That have but one poore life, and have lost two?
Oh Pamphilus! my malice ruin'd thee,
But most Evadne: for at her I aim'd,
Because she is no issue of my wombe,
But trusted by her father to my care.
Her have I followed with a stepdames hate,
As envious that her beauty should eclipse
My daughters honour.—But the gods in justice
Have ta'ne her hence to punish me.—My sinnes
March up in troops against me.—But this potion
Shall purge out life and them.
Tyn.
Be not too rash:
I will revive Techmessa.
Dyps.
O sweet daughter!
Pam.
Thou hast reviv'd two lives at once.
Evad.
But I
Still live a widowed virgin.
Tyn.
No, Evadne,
Receive me new created, of a clay
Purg'd from all dregs; my thoughts do all run cleare.
Take hence those coffins. I will have them born
Trophies before me, when we come to tie
The nuptiall knot: for death has brought us life.
Suspicion made us confident, and weak jealousie
Hath added strength to our resolved love.
Cupid hath run his maze, this was his day:
But the next part Hymen intends to play.
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