Music. Let music Charm with her excellent voice an awful silence THE HISTORY OF ANTONIO AND MELLIDA. THE FIRST PART. BY JOHN MARSTON, Andrugio Duke of Genoa, banished his country, with the loss of a son supposed drowned, is cast upon the territory of his mortal enemy the Duke of Venice; with no attendants but Lucio an old nobleman, and a page. Andr. Is not yon gleam the shudd'ring Morn that flakes With silver tincture the east verge of heaven? Luc. I think it is, so please your Excellence. My thoughts are fixt in contemplation Why this huge earth, this monstrous animal That eats her children, should not have eyes and ears. Philosophy maintains that Nature's wise, And forms no useless nor unperfect thing. Did Nature make the earth, or the earth Nature? Go to, go to; thou ly'st, Philosophy. Exclaiming thus: O thou all bearing Earth, Which men do gape for till thou cramm'st their mouths Luc. Sweet Lord, abandon passion; and disarm. We are roll'd up upon the Venice marsh, Let's clip all fortune, lest more low'ring fate Andr. More low'ring fate! O Lucio, choak that breath. Now I defy chance. Fortune's brow hath frown'd, And that Nor mischief, force, distress, nor hell can take: Luc. Speak like yourself: but give me leave, my Lord, To wish you safety. If you are but seen, Your arms display you; therefore put them off, Andr. Would'st have me go unarm'd among my foes? Being besieg'd by Passion, entering lists To combat with Despair and mighty Grief: I'll muster forces, an unvanquish'd power: Cornets of horse shall press th' ungrateful earth: And murmur to sustain the weight of arms: Whilst trumpets clamour with a sound of death. Luc. Peace, good my lord, your speech is all too light. Alas, survey your fortunes, look what's left Of all your forces and your utmost hopes; A weak old man, a page, and your poor self. Andr. Andrugio lives; and a Fair Cause of Arms. Why, that's an army all invincible. He who hath that, hath a battalion royal, Armour of proof, huge troops of barbed steeds, [The situation of Andrugio and Lucio resembles that of Lear and Kent, in that King's distresses. Andrugio, like Lear, manifests a kind of royal impatience, a turbulent greatness, an affected resignation. The Enemies which he enters lists to combat, "Despair, and mighty Grief, and sharp Impatience," and the Forces ("Cornets of Horse," &c.) which he brings to vanquish them, are in the boldest style of Allegory. They are such a "race of mourners" as "the infection of sorrows loud" in the intellect might beget on "some pregnant cloud" in the imagination. ANTONIO'S REVENGE. THE SECOND PART OF THE HISTORY OF ANTONIO AND MELLIDA. BY JOHN MARSTON. The Prologue*. The rawish dank of clumsy winter ramps The fluent summer's vein; and drizzling sleet O now methinks a sullen tragic scene This prologue for its passionate earnestness, and for the tragic note of preparation which it sounds, might have preceded one of those old tales of Thebes, or Pelops' line, which Milton has so highly commended, as free from the common error of the poets in his days, "of intermixing comic stuff with tragic sadness and gravity, brought in without discretion corruptly to gratify the people."-It is as solemn a preparative as the "warning voice which he who saw th' Apocalyps, heard cry". + Peels. VOL. I. G Uncapable of weighty passion, (As from his birth being hugged in the arms, Antonio, Son to Andrugio Duke of Genoa, whom Piero the Venetian Prince and father-in-law to Antonio has cruelly murdered, kills Piero's little son Julio, as a sacrifice to the ghost of Andrugio.-The scene, a church-yard: the time, midnight. JULIO. ANTONIO. Jul. Brother Antonio, are you here i' faith? Why do you frown? Indeed my sister said, That I should call you brother, that she did, married to her. Buss me: good truth, you better than my father, 'deed. "Sleek favourites of Fortune." Preface to Poems by S. T Coleridge. |