A Select Collection of Old English Plays Part 49

[_Stabs him._

ELE. And am I thus despatch'd!

Had I but breath'd the s.p.a.ce of one hour longer, I would have fully acted my revenge: But O, now pallid death bids me prepare, And haste to Charon for to be his fare.

I come, I come: but ere my gla.s.s is run, I'll curse you all, and, cursing, end my life.

May'st thou, lascivious queen, whose d.a.m.ned charms Bewitch'd me to the circle of thy arms, Unpiti'd die, consum'd with loathed l.u.s.t, Which thy venereous mind hath basely nurs'd: And for you, Philip, may your days be long, But clouded with perpetual misery: May thou, Hortenzo, and thy Isabel Be fetch'd alive by furies into h.e.l.l, There to be d.a.m.n'd for ever. O, I faint; Devils, come claim your right, and when I am Confin'd within your kingdom, then shall I Outact you all in perfect villany.

[_Dies._

PHIL. Take down his body, while his blood streams forth; His acts are pa.s.s'd, and our last act is done.

Now do I challenge my hereditary right To the roy'l Spanish throne, usurp'd by him, In which, in all your sights, I thus do plant myself.

Lord Cardinal, and you the queen my mother, I pardon all those crimes you have committed.

QUEEN-M. I'll now repose myself in peaceful rest, And fly unto some solitary residence, Where I'll spin out the remnant of my life In true contrition for my pa.s.s'd offences.

PHIL. And now, Hortenzo, to close up your wound, I here contract my sister unto thee, With comic joy to end a tragedy.

And, for the barbarous Moor and his black train, Let all the Moors be banished from Spain.

ANDROMANA

OR

THE MERCHANT'S WIFE.

_EDITION._

_Andromana; or, The Merchant's Wife. The Scene Iberia. By J. S.

London: Printed for John Bellinger; and are to be sold at his shop, in Clifford's Inn Lane, in Fleet-street. 1660. 4^o._

This play was printed in the year 1660, and has the letters J. S.

in the t.i.tle-page. Chetwood, in his "British Theatre," p. 47, says that it was revived in 1671, when a prologue was spoken before it, in which were the following lines--

"'Twas Shirley's muse that labour'd for its birth, Though now the sire rests in the silent earth."

[But there is in fact no authority whatever for believing it to be from Shirley's pen; nor is it included in Gifford and Dyce's edition of that writer.[80]]

The plot is taken from the story of Plangus, in Sir Philip Sydney's "Arcadia." The same subject had before been made use of by Beaumont and Fletcher in their play of "Cupid's Revenge."

DRAMATIS PERSON?.

EPHORBAS, _King of Iberia_.

PLANGUS, _his son_.

EUBULUS, } ANAMEDES, } _three lords, and councillors to the king_.

RINATUS, } INOPHILUS, _son to Rinatus, and friend to the prince_.

ZOPIRO, } NICETES, } _captains_.

ARAMNES, } ARTESIO, _an informing courtier_.

ANDROMANA, _a merchant's wife_.

LIBACER, _her servant_.

_Messenger._ _Captains and Soldiers._

_Scene, Iberia._

ANDROMANA

OR

THE FATAL AND DESERVED END OF DISLOYALTY AND AMBITION.

ACT I., SCENE 1.

_Enter_ NICETES _and_ ARAMNES.

NIC. I have observ'd it too; but the cause is As unknown to me as actions done In countries not found out yet.

ARA. Some wench, my life to a bra.s.s farthing!

NIC. As like as may be: We soldiers are all given that way; especially, When our blood boils high, and [our] pulses beat Alarms to Cupid's battles; we are apter To sally on a young [in]flaming girl, Than on an enemy that braves it Before our trenches.

ARA. I ask it not to know his privacies; for if His freedom doth not acquaint me with them, Let them be secret still: yet I could wish An opportunity to tell him A little circ.u.mspection would Be handsome, and set a gloss upon all.

Times might be chosen of less public notice: It looks so poorly in a prince to be Thus careless of his own affairs: men do So talk on it. Here comes Inophilus; If anybody knows, it must be he.

_Enter_ INOPHILUS.

INO. Your servant, captains. Saw you the prince to-day?

NIC. Not we: we hop'd to hear of him from you.

INO. 'Tis strange a man, adorn'd with so much wisdom, Should on the sudden fall off from the care Of his own fame! I am his friend, and so, I know, are you; but to speak plainly to you, He's grown my wonder now as much As other men's. I, that have found a sweetness In his company beyond whatever Lovers dream of in a mistress, that as He spoke, methought have smell'd the air perfum'd; Nor could have wished a joy greater Than living with him, next those of heaven; And those preferr'd the more, because I knew Plangus would be there.

I say, even I of late am grown out of love With anything that's mortal; since I've found Plangus so far beneath (I will not say My expectations) but the a.s.surances All good men had of future gallantry.

He's melancholy now, and hath thrown off The spirit which so well became him; and all That sweetness which bewitch'd men's hearts is grown So rugged, so incompos'd to all commerce, Men fear he'll shortly quarrel with himself.

Nay more, he doth not answer the fondness Of his father's love with half that joy He us'd to do.