resolution, wherever I wander, to be as I were ever kneeling before Sapho my loyalty unspotted, though unrewarded. With as little malice will I go to my grave, as I did lie withal in my cradle. My life shall be spent in sighing and wishing; the one for my bad fortune, the other for Sapho's good.

[Act v., Sc. 3.1]

THE TRUE TROJANS; OR FUIMUS TROES. AN HISPLAY [PUBLISHED 1633].

TORICAL
UNKNOWN.

1639)]

PLAY

AUTHOR

[BY JASPER FISHER (FLOURISHED

Invocation of the Druids to the Gods of Britain, on the

invasion of Cæsar.

Draw near, ye Heav'nly Powers,

Who dwell in starry bowers;
And ye, who in the deep
On mossy pillows sleep;
And ye who keep the centre,
Where light did never enter;
And ye whose habitations.
Are still among the nations,
To see and hear our doings,

Our births, our wars, our wooings;
Behold our present grief:

Belief doth beg relief.

By the vervain and lunary,

By fern seed planetary,

By the dreadful misletoe

Which doth on holy oak grow,

Draw near, draw near, draw near.

Help us beset with danger,
And turn away your anger;
Help us begirt with trouble,
And now your mercy
double ;
Help us opprest with sorrow
And fight for us to-morrow.
Let fire consume the foeman,
Let air infest the Roman,

1[See also Appendix, p. 594.]

Let seas intomb their fury,
Let gaping earth them bury,
Let fire, and air, and water,
And earth conspire their slaughter.
By the vervain, &c.

We'll praise then your great power,
Each month, each day, each hour,
And blaze in lasting story
Your honour and your glory.
High altars lost in vapour,
Young heifers free from labour,
White lambs for suck still crying,
Shall make your music dying,
The boys and girls around,
With honeysuckles crown'd;
The bards with harp and rhiming,
Green bays their brows entwining,
Sweet tune and sweeter ditty,
Shall chaunt your gracious pity.
By the vervain, &c.1

Another, to the Moon.

Thou Queen of Heav'n, Commandress of the deep,
Lady of lakes, Regent of woods and deer;
A Lamp, dispelling irksome night; the Source
Of generable moisture; at whose feet?
Wait twenty thousand Naiades !-thy crescent
Brute elephants adore, and man doth feel
Thy force run through the zodiac of his limbs.
O thou first Guide of Brutus to this isle,
Drive back these proud usurpers from this isle.
Whether the name of Cynthia's silver globe,
Or chaste Diana with a gilded quiver,
Or dread Proserpina, stern Dis's spouse,
Or soft Lucina, call'd in child-bed throes,
Doth thee delight: rise with a glorious face,
Green drops of Nereus trickling down thy cheeks,
And with bright horns united in full orb
Toss high the seas, with billows beat the banks,
Conjure up Neptune, and th' Æolian slaves,
Protract both night and winter in a storm,
That Romans lose their way, and sooner land
At sad Avernus' than at Albion's strand.

3

[Three lines omitted.] "[" With garments blue and rushy garlands dressed.”] 3 [Should be "contract ".]

So may'st thou shun the Dragon's head and tail!
So may Endymion snort on Latmian bed!
So may the fair game fall before thy bow!
Shed light on us, but light'ning on our foe.

[Act ii., Sc. 6.1]

THE TWINS. A COMEDY [PUBLISHED 1655].

RIDER, A.M.

BY W.

[Act i., Sc. 1.2]

My noble mind has not yet lost all shame.
I will desist. My love, that will not serve me
As a true subject, I'll conquer as an enemy.3
O Fame, I will not add another spot

To thy pure robe. I'll keep my ermine honour
Pure and alive in death; and with my end
I'll end my sin and shame: like Charicles,
Who living to a hundred years of age
Free from the least disease, fearing a sickness,
To kill it killed himself, and made his death
The period of his health.

[Act i., Sc. 1.]

SIR GILES GOOSECAP. A COMEDY. AUTHOR
UNKNOWN, 1606

Friendship in a Lord; modesty in a Gentleman.

Clarence (to some musicians). Thanks, gentle friends;

Is your good lord, and mine, gone up to bed yet?

Momford. I do assure you not, Sir, not yet, nor yet, my deep and studious friend, not yet, musical Clarence.

Clar. My Lord

Mom. Nor yet, thou sole divider of my Lordship.

'[Dodsley, ed. Hazlitt, vol. xii.]

2[Ed. of 1655.]

[A line omitted.]

Clar. That were a most unfit division,

And far above the pitch of my low plumes.

I am your bold and constant guest, my Lord.

Mom. Far, far from bold, for thou hast known me long,
Almost these twenty years, and half those years
Hast been my bedfellow, long time before
This unseen thing, this thing of nought indeed,
Or atom, call'd my Lordship, shined in me;
And yet thou mak'st thyself as little bold
To take such kindness, as becomes the age
And truth of our indissoluble love,

As our acquaintance sprung but yesterday;
Such is thy gentle and too tender spirit.

Clar. My Lord, my want of courtship makes me fear
I should be rude; and this my mean estate
Meets with such envy and detraction,

Such misconstructions and resolv'd misdooms
Of my poor worth, that should I be advanced
Beyond my unseen lowness but one hair,
I should be torn in pieces by the spirits
That fly in ill-lung'd tempests thro' the world,
Tearing the head of virtue from her shoulders,
If she but look out of the ground of glory;
"Twixt whom, and me, and every worldly fortune,
There fights such sour and curst antipathy,
So waspish and so petulant a star,

That all things tending to my grace and good
Are ravish'd from their object, as I were
A thing created for a wilderness,

And must not think of any place with men.

[Act i., Sc. 4.1]

THE ENGLISH MONSIEUR.

A COMEDY [ACTED 1666: PUBLISHED 1674]. BY THE HON. JAMES HOWARD [FLOURISHED 1674]

The humour of a conceited Traveller, who is taken with every thing that is French.

English Monsieur. Gentlemen, if you please, let us dine together.

Vaine. I know a cook's shop, has the best boiled and roast beef in town.

[Bullen, Old English Plays, vol. iii.]

Atreus, to entrap his brother Thyestes; who has lived a concealed life, lurking in woods, to elude his vengeance; sends Philisthenes and old Peneus to him with offers of reconciliation, and an invitation to Court, to be present at the nuptials of Antigone with Philisthenes.

THYESTES. PHILISTHENES. PENEUS.

Thy. Welcome to my arms,

My hope, my comfort! Time has roll'd about
Several months since I have seen thy face,

And in its progress has done wond'rous things.
Phil. Strange things indeed to chase you to this sad
Dismal abode; nay, and to age, I think:

I see that winter thrusting itself forth

Long, long before its time, in silver hairs.

Thy. My fault, my son; I would be great and high;
Snow lies in summer on some mountain tops.

Ah, Son! I am sorry for thy noble youth,
Thou hast so bad a father; I am afraid,
Fortune will quarrel with thee for my sake.
Thou wilt derive unhappiness from me,
Like an hereditary ill disease.

Phil. Sir, I was born, when you were innocent;

And all the ill you have contracted since,

You have wrought out by painful penitence;

For healthy joy returns to us again;

Nay, a more vigorous joy that e'er we had.
Like one recover'd from a sad disease,
Nature for damage pays him double cost,
And gives him fairer flesh than e'er he had.

[Act iii., Sc. 2.]

Thyestes is won from his retirement by the joint representations of Philisthenes and Peneus, of the apparent good faith, and returning kindness of his brother; and visits Mycena:-his confidence; his returning misgivings.

Thy. O wondrous pleasure to a banish'd man,

I feel my loved long look'd-for native soil!1

And oh my weary eyes, that all the day

Had from some mountain travell'd toward this place,
Now rest themselves upon the royal towers

Of that great palace where I had my birth.

[Three lines omitted.]