To dally with thee; I will take thy life,

For I do hate thee; I could curse thee now.

Bell. If you do hate, you could not curse me worse; The gods have not a punishment in store

Greater for me than is your hate.

Phi. Fie, fie,

3

So young and so dissembling! fear'st thou not death? Can boys contemn that?

Bell. O, what a boy is he

Can be content to live to be a man,

That sees the best of men thus passionate,

Thus without reason?

Phi. Oh, but thou dost not know what 'tis to die.

Bell. Yes, I do know, my lord.

"Tis less than to be born; a lasting sleep,

A quiet resting from all jealousy;

A thing we all pursue; I know besides
It is but giving over of a game

That must be lost.

Phi. But there are pains, false boy,

For perjur'd souls; think but on these, and then
Thy heart will melt, and thou wilt utter all.

Bell. May they fall all upon me whilst I live,
If I be perjured, or ever thought

Of that you charge me with; if I be false,
Send me to suffer in those punishments
You speak of; kill me.

Phi. O, what should I do?

Why, who can but believe him? He does swear

So earnestly, that if it were not true,

The gods would not endure him. Rise, Bellario,
Thy protestations are so deep, and thou

Dost look so truly when thou utterʼst them,

That though I know them false, as were my hopes,

I cannot urge thee further; but thou wert
To blame to injure me, for I must love
Thy honest looks, and take no revenge upon
Thy tender youth: a love from me to thee

Is firm whate'er thou dost it troubles me
That I have call'd the blood out of thy cheeks,
That did so well become thee: but, good boy,
Let me not see thee more; something is done
That will distract me, that will make me mad,
If I behold thee; if thou tender'st me,
Let me not see thee.

Bell. I will fly as far

As there is morning, ere I give distaste

To that most honor'd mind. But through these tears,
Shed at my hopeless parting, I can see

A world of treason practis'd upon you,

And her, and me. Farewell for ever more;

If you

shall hear that sorrow struck me dead,

And after find me loyal, let there be

A tear shed from you in my memory,

And I shall rest at peace.

Bellario, discovered to be a Woman, confesses the motive for her disguise to have been Love for Prince Philaster.

My father would oft speak

Your worth and virtue, and as I did grow
More and more apprehensive, I did thirst
To see the man so prais'd, but yet all this
Was but a maiden longing, to be lost
As soon as found, till sitting in my window,
Printing my thoughts in lawn, I saw a god
I thought (but it was you) enter our gates;
My blood flew out, and back again as fast
As I had puft it forth, and suck'd it in
Like breath; then was I call'd away in haste
To entertain you. Never was a man
Heav'd from a sheep-cot to a sceptre, rais'd
So high in thoughts as I; you left a kiss
Upon these lips then, which I mean to keep
From you for ever; I did hear
I did hear you talk
Far above singing; after you were gone,
I grew acquainted with my heart, and search'd

What stirr'd it so.

Alas! I found it love,

Yet far from lust, for could I have but liv'd
In presence of you, I had had my end.
For this I did delude my noble father
With a feign'd pilgrimage, and drest myself
In habit of a boy, and, for I knew

My birth no match for you, I was past hope
Of having you. And understanding well,
That when I made discovery of my sex,
I could not stay with you, I made a vow
By all the most religious things a maid
Could call together, never to be known,
Whilst there was hope to hide me from men's eyes,
For other than I seem'd; that I might ever

Abide with you: then sate I by the fount

Where first you took me up.

sex.

*

* The character of Bellario must have been extremely popular in its day. For many years after the date of Philaster's first exhibition on the stage, scarce a play can be found without one of these women pages in it, following in the train of some pre-engaged lover, calling on the gods to bless her happy rival (his mistress) whom no doubt she secretly curses in her heart, giving rise to many pretty equivoques by the way on the confusion of sex, and either made happy at last by some surprising turn of fate, or dismissed with the joint pity of the lovers and the audience. Our ancestors seem to have been wonderfully delighted with these transformations of Women's parts were then acted by young men. What an odd double confusion it must have made, to see a boy play a woman playing a man: one cannot disentangle the perplexity without some violence to the imagination. Donne has a copy of verses addrest to his mistress, dissuading her from a resolution, which she seems to have taken up from some of these scenical representations, of following him abroad as a page. It is so earnest, so weighty, so rich in poetry, in sense, in wit, and pathos, that I have thought fit to insert it, as a solemn close in future to all such sickly fancies as he there deprecates. The story of his romantic and unfortunate marriage with the daughter of Sir George Moore, the Lady here supposed to be addrest, may be read in Walton's Lives.

ELEGY.

By our first strange and fatal interview,
By all desires which thereof did ensue,
By our long striving hopes, by that remorse
Which my words' masculine persuasive force

Natural Antipathies.

Nature that loves not to be questioned
Why she did this, or that, but has her ends,

Begot in thee, and by the memory

Of hurts, which spies and rivals threatened me,
I calmly beg. But by thy father's wrath,
By all pains which want and divorcement hath,
I conjure thee; and all the oaths, which I
And thou have sworn to seal joint constancy,
I here unswear, and overswear them thus:
Thou shalt not love by means so dangerous.
Temper, O fair love, love's impetuous rage;
Be my true mistress, not my feigned page.
I'll go, and, by thy kind leave, leave behind
Thee, only worthy to nurse in my mind
Thirst to come back; O, if thou die before,
My soul from other lands to thee shall soar.

Thy (else almighty) beauty cannot move
Rage from the seas, nor thy love teach them love,
Nor tame wild Boreas' harshness; thou hast read.
How roughly he in pieces shivered

The fair Orithea, whom he swore he lov'd.
Fall ill or good, 'tis madness to have prov'd
Dangers unurged; feed on this flattery,
That absent lovers one in th' other be.
Dissemble nothing, not a boy, nor change
Thy body's habit, nor mind: be not strange
To thyself only. All will spy in thy face
A blushing womanly discovering grace.

Richly cloath'd apes are call'd apes, and as soon
Eclips'd as bright we call the moon the moon.
Men of France, changeable camelions,
Spittles of diseases, shops of fashions,
Lives' fuellers, and the rightest company
Of players which upon the world's stage be,
Will too too quickly know thee: and alas,
Th' indifferent Italian, as we pass

His warm land, well content to think thee page,
Will hunt thee with such lust, and hideous rage,
As Lot's fair guests were vext. But none of these,
Nor spungy Aydroptique Dutch shall thee displease,
If thou stay here. O stay here; for, for thee
England is only a worthy gallery,

To walk in expectation, till from thence
Our greatest king call thee to his presence.

And knows she does well, never gave the world
Two things so opposite, so contrary,

As he and I am: if a bowl of blood

Drawn from this arm of mine would poison thee
A draught of his would cure thee.

Interest in Virtue.

Why, my lord, are you so moved at this?
When any falls from virtue, I am distract,
I have an interest in 't.

CUPID'S REVENGE: A TRAGEDY. BY FRANCIS BEAUMONT AND JOHN FLETCHER.

Leucippus, the King's Son, takes to mistress Bacha, a Widow; but being questioned by his Father, to preserve her honor, swears that she is chaste. The old King admires her, and on the credit of that Oath, while his Son is absent, marries her. Leucippus, when he discovers the dreadful consequences of the deceit which he had used to his Father, counsels his friend Ismenus never to speak a falsehood in any case.

Leu. My sin, Ismenus, has wrought all this ill:
And I beseech thee to be warn'd by me,

And do not lie, if any man should ask thee
But how thou dost, or what o'clock 'tis now,
Be sure thou do not lie, make no excuse
For him that is most near thee; never let
The most officious falsehood 'scape thy tongue;
For they above (that are entirely truth)

When I am gone, dream me some happiness;
Nor let thy looks our long hid love confess;
Nor praise, nor dispraise me, nor bless, nor curse,
Openly love's force; nor in bed fright thy nurse
With midnights' startings, crying out, oh, oh,
Nurse, O my love is slain, I saw him go
O'er the white Alps alone; I saw him, I,

Assail'd, fight, taken, stabb'd, bleed, fall, and die.

Augur me better chance, except dread Jove

Think it enough for me to have had thy love