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While with vain hopes our faculties we tire,
We seem to sweat in ice and freeze in fire.
What would I do, were this to do again?

I would not change my peace of conscience
For all the wealth of Europe. She stirs ; here's life
Return, fair soul, from darkness, and lead mine
Out of this sensible hell :—she's warm, she breathes:—
Upon thy pale lips I will melt my heart,

To store them with fresh colour.-Who's there!
Some cordial drink! Alas! I dare not call:
So pity would destroy pity. Her eye opes,
And heaven in it seems to ope, that late was shut,
To take me up to mercy.

DUTCH. Antonio !*

Bos. Yes, madam, he is living;

The dead bodies you saw, were but feign'd statues ; He's reconcil'd to your brothers; the Pope hath wrought

The attonement.

DUTCH. Mercy!

[Dies.

Bos. O, she's gone again! there the cords of life

broke.

O, sacred innocence, that sweetly sleeps

On turtles' feathers, whilst a guilty conscience

Is a black register, wherein is writ

All our good deeds and bad, a perspective

The idea of making the Dutchess speak a few words after she has been strangled, was doubtless taken from the death of Desdemona in Shakespeare's Othello, Act V.

That shews us hell! That we cannot be suffer'd
To do good when we have a mind to it!
This is manly sorrow;

These tears, I am very certain, never grew
In my mother's milk: my estate is sunk
Below the degree of fear: where were
These penitent fountains, while she was living?
O, they were frozen up! Here is a sight
As direful to my soul, as is the sword

Unto a wretch hath slain his father. Come,
I'll bear thee hence,

And execute thy last will; that's deliver
Thy body to the reverend dispose

Of some good women: that the cruel tyrant
Shall not deny me. Then I'll post to Milan,
Where somewhat I will speedily enact
Worth my dejection.

[Exit.

ACT V.-SCENE I.

Enter ANTONIO and DELIO.

ANT. What think you of my hope of reconcilement To the Arragonian brethren?

DELIO. I misdoubt it;

For though they have sent their letters of safe conduct For your repair to Milan, they appear

But nets to entrap you. The Marquis of Pescara,

last] Omitted in the 4to. of 1640.

Under whom you hold certain land in cheat,
Much 'gainst his noble nature hath been mov'd
To seize those lands, and some of his dependants
Are at this instant making it their suit

To be invested in your revenues.

I cannot think, they mean well to your life,
That do deprive you of your means of life,
Your living.

ANT. You are still an heretick

To any safety I can shape myself.

DELIO. Here comes the marquis: I will make

myself

Petitioner for some part of your land,

To know whither it is flying.

ANT. I pray do.

Enter PESCARA.

DELIO. Sir, I have a suit to you.

PES. To me?

DELIO. An easy one:

There is the citadel of St. Bennet,

With some demesnes, of late in the possession

Of Antonio Bologna,-please you bestow them on me?

PES. You are my friend; but this is such a suit, Nor fit for me to give, nor you to take.

DELIO. No, sir?

PES. I will give you ample reason for't, Soon in private: here's the cardinal's mistress.

Enter JULIA.

JULIA. My lord, I am grown your poor petitioner,

And should be an ill beggar, had I not
A great man's letter here, the cardinal's,
To court you in my favour.

PES. He entreats for you

The citadel of St. Bennet, that belong'd

To the banish'd Bologna.

JULIA. Yes.

PES. I could not have thought of a friend I

could rather

Pleasure with it: 'tis yours.

JULIA. Sir, I thank you ;

And he shall know how doubly I am engag'd

Both in your gift, and speediness of giving,
Which makes your grant the greater.
ANT. How they fortify

Themselves with my ruin!
DELIO. Sir, I am

Little bound to you.

PES. Why?

[Exit.

DELIO. Because you denied this suit to me, and

gave't

To such a creature.

PES. Do you know what it was?

It was Antonio's land; not forfeited

By course of law, but ravish'd from his throat
By the cardinal's entreaty: it were not fit
I should bestow so main a piece of wrong
Upon my friend; 'tis a gratification
Only due to a strumpet, for it is injustice.
Shall I sprinkle the pure blood of innocents
To make those followers I call my friends

Look ruddier upon me? I am glad

This land, ta'en from the owner by such wrong,

Returns again unto so
As salary for his lust.
To ask noble things of

I'll be a nobler giver.

foul an use,

Learn, good Delio,

me, and you shall find

DELIO. You instruct me well.

ANT. Why, here's a man now, would fright im

pudence

From sauciest beggars.

PES. Prince Ferdinand's come to Milan,
Sick, as they give out, of an apoplexy;
But some say, 'tis a frenzy: I am going

To visit him.

ANT. 'Tis a noble old fellow.

[Exit.

DELIO. What course do you mean to take, Antonio?

ANT. This night I mean to venture all my fortune, Which is no more than a poor lingering life, To the cardinal's worst of malice: I have got Private access to his chamber; and intend To visit him about the mid of night, As once his brother did our noble dutchess. It may be that the sudden apprehension Of danger, for I'll go in mine own shape, When he shall see it fraight with love and duty,

fraight] i. e. fraught: so Brathwait;

"And shall man fraight with knowledge and with reason, Act against God and Nature such high treason?"

The Honest Ghost, 1658, p. 9. See too the lines addressed to Watson in my ed. of Peele's Works, vol. ii. p. 164.

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