A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume Xiv Part 49

[_Embraces her._

Behold thy Philip ransom'd from that prison, In which the Moor had cloistered him.

HOR. And here's Hortenzo.

ELE. Then am I betrayed and cosen'd in My own designs: I did contrive Their ruin; but their subtle policy Hath blasted my ambitious thoughts. Villains!

Where's Zarack? Where's Balthazar?

What have you done with them?

PHIL. They're gone to Pluto's kingdom, to provide A place for thee, and to attend thee there.

But, lest they should be tired with too long Expecting hopes, come, brave spirits of Spain, This is the Moor, the actor of these evils; Thus thrust him down to act among the devils.

[_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.