A wretch but lean relief on earth can find. Luc. Sweet Lord, abandon passion; and disarm. Let's clip all fortune, lest more low'ring fate Andr. More low'ring fate! O Lucio, choke that breath. Her venom's spit. Alas! what country rests, 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, And take 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: Whilst trumpets clamor 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. He who hath that, hath a battalion royal, Armor 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 66 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' Apocalypse, heard cry." ↑ Peels. Would suit the time with pleasing congruence. (As from his birth being hugged in the arms, Your favor will give crutches to our faults. 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, 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, When you were married to her. Buss me good truth, I love you better than my father, 'deed. • "Sleek favorites of Fortune." Preface to Poems by 8. T. Coleridge. Ant. Thy father? gracious, O bounteous heaven, Jul. Truth, since my mother died, I loved you best. O that I knew which joint, which side, which limb That I might rip it vein by vein, and carve revenge Jul. O God, you'll hurt me. For my sister's sake, Ant. Oh, for thy sister's sake I flag revenge. Andrugio's Ghost cries “Revenge." Ant. Stay, stay, dear father, fright mine eyes no more. Revenge as swift as lightning, bursteth forth And clears his heart. Come, pretty tender child, It is not thee I hate, or thee I kill. Thy father's blood that flows within thy veins, Is it I lothe; is that, revenge must suck. I love thy soul: and were thy heart lapt up In any flesh but in Piero's blood, I would thus kiss it: but, being his, thus, thus, Whilst thy wounds bleed, my brows shall gush out tears. [Dies. Now lions' half clam'd entrails roar for food; Now croaks the toad, and night-crows screech aloud, Now gape the graves, and through their yawns let loose And now, swart Night, to swell thy hour out Behold I spurt warm blood in thy black eyes. (From under the earth a groan.) Howl not, thou putry mould; groan not, ye graves; Be dumb, all breath. Here stands Andrugio's son, Worthy his father. So; I feel no breath; His jaws are fall'n, his dislodged soul is fled. And now there's nothing but Piero left. Ile is all Piero, father all. This blood, This breast, this heart, Piero all: Whom thus I mangle Spright of Julio, Forget this was thy trunk. I live thy friend. Mayst thou be twined with the soft'st embrace Of clear eternity; but thy father's blood I thus make incense of to Vengeance. * Day breaking. -see, the dapple grey coursers of the morn Beat up the light with their bright silver hoofs And chase it through the sky. One who died, slandered. Look on those lips, Those now lawn pillows, on whose tender softness From out so fair an Inn: look, look, they seem 'To stir, And breathe defiance to black obloquy. Wherein fools are happy. Even in that, note a fool's beatitude; "To lie immortal in the arms of Fire." Browne's Religio Medici. Of the punishments in hell. |