 | The Tragedy of Tancred and Gismund |  |
Scæna 3.
Gismunda commeth alone out of her chamber.Gis.
By this I hope my aunt hath mou'd the king.
And knows his mind, & makes return to me
To end at once all this perplexitie.
Lo where she stands. Oh how my trembling heart
In doubtfull thoughts panteth within my brest.
For in her message doth relie my smart.
Or the sweet quiet of my troubled minde.
Luc.
Neece, on the point you lately willed me
To treat of with the king in your behalfe,
I brake euen now with him so farre, till he
In sodain rage of griefe, ere I scarce had
My tale out tolde, praid me to stint my suite,
As that from which his minde abhorred most.
And well I see his fansie to refute,
Is but displeasure gainde, and labor lost.
So firmely fixed stands his kingly will,
That til his body shalbe laid in graue,
He will not part from the desired sight
Of your presence, which silder he should haue,
If he had once allied you againe,
In marriage to any prince or peere.
Gis.
A resolution that resolues my bloud
Into the Ice-sie drops of Lethes flood,
Luc.
Therefore my counsel is, you shall not sturre,
Nor further wade in such a case as this:
But since his will, is grounded on your loue,
And that it lies in you, to saue or spill,
His old fore-wasted age: you ought t'eschew,
The thing that greeues so much his crazed heart,
And in the state you stand, content your selfe:
And let this thought, appease your troubled mind,
That in your hands, relies your fathers death,
Or blisfull life, and since without your sight,
He cannot liue, nor can his thoughts indure,
Your hope of marriage, you must then relent,
And ouer-rule these fond affections:
Least it be said, you wrought your fathers end.
Gis.
Deare Aunt, I haue with patient eares indurde,
The hearing of my fathers hard behest:
And since I see, that neither I my selfe,
Nor your request, can so preuaile with him,
Nor anie sage aduice perswade his mind
To grant me my desire, In willing wise,
I must submit me vnto his command,
And frame my heart to serue his maiestie.
And (as I may) to driue awaie the thoughts
That diuersly distract my passions,
Which as I can, Ile labour to subdue,
But sore I feare, I shall but toile in vaine,
Wherein (good Ant) I must desire your paine.
Luc.
What lies in me by comfort or aduice,
I shall discharge with all humilitie.
Gismund and Lucre depart into Gismunds chamber.
Who markes our former times and present yeres,
What we are now, and lookes what we haue bin,
He cannot but lament with bitter teares,
The great decay and change of all women.
For as the world wore on and waxed olde,
So vertue quaild, and vice began to grow.
So that, that age, that whilome was of golde,
Is worse than brasse, more vile than yron now,
The times were such, that if we ought beleeue
Of elder daies) women examples were,
Of rare vertues: Lucre disdaind to liue
Longer then chast: and boldly without feare
Tooke sharpe reuenge on her inforced heart,
With her owne hands: for that it not withstood
The wanton will, but yeelded to the force
Of proud Tarquin, who bought hir fame with blood.
Chor. 2.
Queene Artemissa thought an hepe of stones,
(Although they were the wonder of that age)
A worthlesse graue, wherein to rest the bones
Of her deare Lord, but with bold courage,
She dranke his heart, and made her louely breast
His tombe, and failed not of wifely faith,
Of promist loue, and of her bound behest,
Vntill she ended had her daies by death.
Vlysses wife (such was her stedfastnesse)
Abode his slow returne whole twentie yeeres:
And spent her youthfull daies in pensiuenes,
Bathing her widdowes bed with brinish teares.
Chor. 3
The stout daughter of Cato Bratus wife, Portia
When she had heard his death, did not desire
Longer to liue: and lacking vse of knife,
And eat whot burning coales: O worthy dame!
O vertues worthy of eternall praise!
The floud of Lethe cannot wash out thy fame,
To others great reproach, shame, and dispraise.
Chor. 4.
Rare are those vertues now in womens mind,
Where shall we seeke such iewels passing strange?
Scarse can you now among a thousand finde
One woman stedfast: all delight in change.
Marke but this princesse that lamented here,
Of late so sore her noble husbands death,
And thought to liue alone without a pheare,
Behold how soone she changed hath that breath.
I thinke those Ladies that haue liu'd to fore,
A mirror and a glasse to womenkinde,
By those their vertues they did set such store,
That vnto vs they none bequeath'd behinde.
Els in so many yeeres we might haue seene
As vertuous as euer they haue beene.
Chor. 1.
Yet let not vs maydens condemne our kinde,
Because our vertues are not all so rare:
For we may freshly yet record in minde,
There liues a virgin, one without compare:
Who of all graces hath her heauenly share.
In whose renowme, and for whose happie daies,
Let vs record this Pæan of her praise.
Cantant.
Per Hen. No.
| The Tragedy of Tancred and Gismund | |