The last CHANGE.

Cal. So! let us breathe a while.-[Music ceases.] -Hath not this motion

Rais'd fresher colours on our cheeks?

Near. Sweet princess,

A perfect purity of blood enamels
The beauty of your white.

Cal. We all look cheerfully:

And, cousin, 't is methinks a rare presumption
In any who prefer our lawful pleasures

Before their own sour censure, to interrupt

The custom of this ceremony bluntly.

Near. None dares, lady.

Cal. Yes, yes; some hollow voice deliver'd to me How that the king was dead.

Arm. The king is dead:

That fatal news was mine; for in mine arms

He breath'd his last, and with his crown bequeath'd

you

Your mother's wedding-ring; which here I tender. Crot. Most strange!

Cal. Peace crown his ashes! We are queen then.

Near. Long live Calantha! Sparta's sovereign queen!

All. Long live the queen!

Cal. What whisper'd Bassanes?

Bass. That my Penthea, miserable soul,

Was starv'd to death.

Cal. She's happy; she hath finish'd

A long and painful progress.-A third murmur
Pierced mine unwilling ears.

Org. That Ithocles

Was murther'd;-rather butcher'd, had not bravery Of an undaunted spirit, conquering terror,

Proclaim'd his last act triumph over ruin.

Arm. How! murther'd!

Cal. By whose hand?

VOL. I.-19

Org. By mine; this weapon

Was instrument to my revenge; the reasons

Are just, and known: quit him of these, and then Never lived gentleman of greater merit,

Hope, or abiliment to steer a kingdom.

Crot. Fy, Orgilus!

Euph. Fy, brother!

Cal. You have done it?

Bass. How it was done, let him report, the forfeit

Of whose allegiance to our laws doth covet
Rigour of justice; but, that done it is,

Mine eyes have been an evidence of credit

Too sure to be convinced.' Armostes, rend not
Thine arteries with hearing the bare circumstances
Of these calamities: thou hast lost a nephew,
A niece, and I a wife: continue man still;
Make me the pattern of digesting evils,
Who can outlive my mighty ones, not shrinking
At such a pressure as would sink a soul

Into what's most of death, the worst of horrors.
But I have seal'd a covenant with sadness,
And enter'd into bonds without condition,

To stand these tempests calmly; mark me, nobles,
I do not shed a tear, not for Penthea!
Excellent misery!

Cal. We begin our reign

With a first act of justice: thy confession,
Unhappy Orgilus, dooms thee a sentence;
But yet thy father's or thy sister's presence
Shall be excus'd. Give, Crotolon, a blessing
To thy lost son; Euphranea, take a farewell,
And both be gone.

Crot. [to ORG.] Confirm thee, noble sorrow,
In worthy resolution!

1 Mine eyes have been an evidence of credit

Too sure to be convinced.] Convince is used here in the primitive sense of conquered, overthrown. In modern terms, "my evidence is too true to be confuted"-GIFFORD

Euph. Could my tears speak,

My griefs were slight.

Org. All goodness dwell among ye! Enjoy my sister, Prophilus; my vengeance Aim'd never at thy prejudice.

Cal. Now withdraw.

[Exeunt CROT. PRO. and EUPH.'

Bloody relater of thy stains in blood,

For that thou hast reported him, whose fortunes And life by thee are both at once snatch'd from him,

With honourable mention, make thy choice

Of what death likes thee best; there's all our bounty.

But to excuse delays, let me, dear cousin,
Entreat you and these lords see execution,
Instant, before you part.

Near. Your will commands us.

Org. One suit, just queen, my last: vouchsafe your clemency,

That by no common hand I be divided
From this my humble frailty.

Cal. To their wisdoms

Who are to be spectators of thine end,

I make the reference: those that are dead,

Are dead; had they not now died, of necessity They must have paid the debt they owed to nature, One time or other.-Use despatch, my lords;

We'll suddenly prepare our coronation.

[Exeunt CAL. PHIL. and CHRIS.

Arm. 'Tis strange, these tragedies should never

touch on

Her female pity.

Bass. She has a masculine spirit:

And wherefore should I pule, and, like a girl,

Put finger in the eye? let's be all toughness,
Without distinction betwixt sex and sex.
Near. Now, Orgilus, thy choice?
Org. To bleed to death.

Arm. The executioner?

Org. Myself, no surgeon;

I am well skill'd in letting blood. Bind fast

This arm, that so the pipes may from their conduits
Convey a full stream; here's a skilful instrument:
[Shows his dagger.
Only I am a beggar to some charity

To speed me in this execution,

By lending th' other prick to th' other arm,
When this is bubbling life out.

Bass. I am for you,

It most concerns my art, my care, my credit;
Quick fillet both his arms.

Org. Gramercy, friendship!

Such courtesies are real, which flow cheerfully
Without an expectation of requital.

Reach me a staff in this hand.-[They give him a staff-If a proneness,

Or custom in my nature, from my cradle,
Had been inclined to fierce and eager bloodshed,
A coward guilt, hid in a coward quaking,
Would have betray'd me to ignoble flight,
And vagabond pursuit of dreadful safety;
But look upon my steadiness, and scorn not
The sickness of my fortune; which, since Bassanes
Was husband to Penthea, had lain bedrid.
We trifle time in words :-thus I show cunning
In opening of a vein too full, too lively.

[Pierces the vein with his dagger.

Arm. Desperate courage!
Near. Honourable infamy!
Hem. I tremble at the sight.
Gron. 'Would I were loose!

Bass. It sparkles like a lusty wine new broach'd;
The vessel must be sound from which it issues.
Grasp hard this other stick-I'll be as nimble-
But prithee, look not pale-Have at ye!—stretch out

1 This was for the purpose of being grasped during the bleeding; a practice familiar to every village doctor in the kingdom.-GIFFORD.

Thine arm with vigour, and unshak[en] virtue.

Good! oh, I envy not a rival, fitted

[Opens the vein.

To conquer in extremities: this pastime
Appears majestical; some high-tuned poem,
Hereafter, shall deliver to posterity

The writer's glory, and his subject's triumph.
How is 't, man?-droop not yet.

Org. I feel no palsies.

On a pair-royal do I wait in death;

My sovereign as his liegeman; on my mistress,
As a devoted servant; and on Ithocles,

As if no brave, yet no unworthy enemy:

Nor did I use an engine to entrap

His life, out of a slavish fear to combat

Youth, strength, or cunning; but for that I durst

not

Engage the goodness of a cause on fortune,

By which his name might have outfaced my vengeance.

Oh, Tecnicus, inspired with Phœbus' fire!

I call to mind thy augury, 't was perfect;
Revenge proves its own executioner.

When feeble man is bending to his mother,
The dust he was first framed on, thus he totters-
Bass. Life's fountain is dried up.

Org. So falls the standard

Of my prerogative in being a creature!

A mist hangs o'er mine eyes, the sun's bright splen

dour

Is clouded in an everlasting shadow;

Welcome, thou ice, that sit'st about my heart,

No heat can ever thaw thee.

Near. Speech hath left him.

[Dies.

Bass. He hath shook hands with time; his funeral

urn

1 Youth, strength, or cunning,] L. e. practical skill in the use of arms. -GIFFORD.