Which shall confirm more peace unto my death, Roberto. Freely thou hast it. Farewell, my Isabella ; Executioner. Madam, tie up your hair. That have insnared so many wanton youths! What else? [Exit. Executioner. Madam, I must entreat you blind your eyes. Isabella. I have lived too long in darkness, my friend : And yet mine eyes with their majestic light Have got new Muses in a Poet's spright. They've been more gaz'd at than the God of day; Yet thou command'st a fixed cloud of lawn To eclipse eternally these minutes of light. . [Act v., Sc. 1.2] Women's inconstancy. Who would have thought it? She that could no more Forsake my company, than can the day Forsake the glorious presence of the sun, When they drown'd all the world: yet now forsakes me. WHAT YOU WILL. [Act ii., Sc. 4.] A COMEDY [PUBLISHED 1607]. BY JOHN MARSTON Venetian Merchant. No knight, But one (that title off), was even a prince, ["Pardon belongs unto my holy weeds" omitted here.] [Vol. iii.] In dangerous arms, Venice' Providetore. And therefore should you have him pass the bridge In a black bever belt, ash colour plain, A Florentine cloth-o'-silver jerkin, sleeves White satin cut on tinsel, then long stock; French panes embroider'd, goldsmith's work: O God! With what a jolly presence he would pace Round the Rialto.2 Scholar and his Dog. I was a scholar: seven useful springs Did I deflower in quotations Of cross'd opinions 'bout the soul of man; Of Antick Donate: still my spaniel slept. [Act i., Sc. 1.3] 1"Her whose merchant Sons were Kings." Collins [" Ode to Liberty"]. 2 To judge of the liberality of these notions of dress we must advert to the days of Gresham, and the consternation which a phenomenon habited like the Merchant here described would have excited among the flat round caps, and cloth stockings, upon Change, when those "original arguments or tokens of a Citizen's vocation were in fashion not more for thrift and usefulness than for distinction and grace." The blank uniformity to which all professional distinctions in apparel have been long hastening, is one instance of the Decay of Symbols among us, which whether it has contributed or not to make us a more intellectual, has certainly made us a less imaginative people. Shakspeare knew the force of signs:-"a malignant and a turban'd Turk" ["Othello," v., 2, 353]. "This meal-cap Miller," says the Author [John Reynolds] of God's Revenge against Murder, to express his indignation at an atrocious outrage committed by the miller Pierot upon the person of the fair Marieta. [Vol. ii.] Still on went I; first, an sit anima; Then, an it were mortal. O hold, hold; at that Stood banding factions, all so strongly propt, [Act ii., Sc. 2.] Preparations for Second Nuptials. Now is Albano's marriage-bed new hung Now work the cooks, the pastry sweats with slaves, The tailors, starchers, semsters, butchers, poulterers, [Act iii., Sc. 2.] BY GEORGE CESAR AND POMPEY: A TRAGEDY [PUBLISHED 1631: PERFORMED LONG BEFORE]. CHAPMAN [1559?-1634] Sacrifice. Imperial Cæsar, at your sacred charge 2 Fiddles. 1 Albano, the first husband, speaks; supposed dead. That should prepare him for the holy rites, -the beast cut up, and laid on the altar, Joy unexpected, best. Joys unexpected, and in desperate plight, [Act iii.1] Are still most sweet, and prove from whence they come ; Is at her full: True Joy descending far From past her sphere, and from that highest heaven Inward Help the best Help. -I will stand no more On others' legs, nor build one joy without me. I'll build all inward: not a light shall ope The common out-way: no expence, no art, That still batters All reason piece-meal; and, for earthly greatness I'll therefore live in dark; and all my light, Like ancient Temples, let in at my top. That were to turn one's back to all the world, -When our diseas'd affections Harmful to human freedom, and storm-like Oppress our comforts; 'tis but letting in [Act v.] 1[Chapman's Works, ed. Shepherd, 1874. The Acts are not divided into Scenes.] The light of reason, and a purer spirit Take in another way; like rooms that fight [Act v.] BUSSY D'AMBOIS, A TRAGEDY [PUBLISHED 1607]. BY GEORGE CHAPMAN A Nuntius (or Messenger) in the presence of King Henry the Third of France and his court tells the manner of a combat, to which he was witness, of three to three; in which D'Ambois remained sole survivor; begun upon an affront passed upon D'Ambois by some courtiers. HENRY, GUISE, BEAUPRE, NUNTIUS, ETC. Nuntius. I saw fierce D'Ambois and his two brave friends Turn'd head, drew all their rapiers, and stood rank'd ; Alike prepar'd, and resolute alike. Like bonfires of contributory wood Every man's look shew'd, fed with other's spirit; As one had been a mirror to another, Like forms of life and death each took from other: That "life and death in all respects are one." Henry. Past there no sort of words at their encounter? When Paris and the Spartan king should end The nine years' war, held up his brazen lance For signal that both hosts should cease from arms, 1[For other extracts from this play see pages 484, 569.] |