Lys. 'Tis true; old Clytus is an oracle.
Put up, Hephestion did not passion blind
My reason, I on such occasion too
Could thus have urged.

Heph. Why is it then we love?
Cly. Because unmanned.

Why, is not Alexander grown example?
O that a face should thus bewitch a soul,
And ruin all that's right and reasonable !
Talk be my bane, yet the old man must talk:
Not so he loved, when he at Issus fought,
And joined in mighty duel great Darius,
Whom from his chariot, flaming all with gems,
He hurled to earth, and crushed the imperial

crown;

Nor could the gods defend their images, Which with the gaudy coach lay overturned: 'Twas not the shaft of love, that did the feat; Cupid had nothing there to do; but now Two wives he takes, two rival queens disturb The court; and while each hand does beauty, hold,

Where is there room for glory?

Heph. In his heart.

Cly. Well said;

You are his favourite, and I had forgot

Who I was talking to. See Sysigambis comes,
Reading a letter to your princess; go,
Now make your claim, while I attend the king.
[Exit.

Enter SYSIGAMBIS, PARISATIS.

Par. Did not you love my father? Yes, I see You did; his very name but mentioned brings The tears, howe'er unwilling, to your eyes.

I loved him too; he would not thus have forced My trembling heart, which your commands may break,

strong;

Judge my distresses, and my temper prize,
Who, though unfortunate, would still be wise.
Lys. To let you know, that misery doth sway
[Both kneel.
An humbler fate than yours, see at your feet
The lost Lysimachus: O mighty queen,
I have but this to beg,-impartial stand,
And, since Hephestion serves by your permis-
sion,

Disdain not me, who ask your royal leave
To cast a throbbing heart before her feet.
Heph. A blessing, like possession of the prin-

That circles in our bodies, can deserve: Therefore I take all helps, much more the king's, And what your majesty vouchsafed to give; Your word is past, where all my hopes must hang.

Lys. There perish too-all words want sense
in love;

But love and I bring such a perfect passion,
So nobly pure, 'tis worthy of her eyes,
Which, without blushing, she may justly prize.

Heph. Such arrogance, should Alexander woo, Would lose him all the conquests he has won. Lys. Let not a conquest once be named by you,

Who this dispute must to my mercy owe.

Sys. Rise, brave Lysimachus, Hephestion rise: 'Tis true Hephestion first declared his love; And 'tis as true, I promised him my aid; Your glorious king turned mighty advocate. How noble, therefore, were the victory, If we could vanquish this disordered love? Heph. 'Twill never be.

Lys. No, I will yet love on,

And hear from Alexander's mouth, in what
Hephestion merits more than I.

Sys. I grieve,

And fear the boldness, which your love inspires; But lest her sight should haste your enterprize, 'Tis just I take the object from your eyes.

[Exeunt SYS. and PAR. Lys. She's gone, and see, the day, as if her look

Had kindled it, is lost, now she is vanished. Heph. A sudden gloominess and horror come About me.

Lys. Let's away to meet the king;

You know my suit.

Heph. Yonder Cassander comes,

He may inform us.

Lys. No, I would avoid him;

There's something in that busy face of his,
That shocks my nature.

Heph. Where and what you please. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Enter CASSANDER.

Cass. The morning rises black, the lowering

sun,

As if the dreadful business he foreknew,
Drives heavily his sable chariot on;
The face of day now blushes scarlet deep,
As if it feared the stroke which I intend,
Like that of Jupiter.-Lightning and thunder!
The lords above are angry, and talk big,
Or rather walk the mighty cirque like mourners
Clad in long clouds, the robes of thickest night,
And seem to groan for Alexander's fall.
'Tis as Cassander's soul could wish it were,
Which, whensoe'er it flies at lofty mischief,
Would startle fate, and make all heaven con-
cerned.

A mad Chaldean, in the dead of night,
Came to my bed-side with a flaming torch;
And bellowing o'er me, like a spirit damned,

He cried, 'Well had it been for Babylon,
'If cursed Cassander never had been born."

Enter THESSALUS, and PHILIP, with letters.
Thess. My lord Cassander.
Cass. Ha! who's there?
Phil. Your friends.

Cass. Welcome, dear Thessalus, and brother
Philip.

Papers-with what contents?
Phil. From Macedon

A trusty slave arrived-great Antipater
Writes, that your mother laboured with you long,
Your birth was slow, and slow is all your life.
Cass. He writes, dispatch the king-Craterus
comes,

Who in my room must govern Macedon;
it Let him not live a day-he dies to-night;
And thus my father but forestalls my purpose:
Why am I slow then? If I rode on thunder,
I must a moment have to fall from heaven,
Ere I could blast the growth of this Colossus.
Thess. The haughty Polyperchon comes this

way;

A mal-content, on whom I lately wrought,
That for a slight affront, at Susa given,
Bears Alexander most pernicious hate.

Cass. So, when I mocked the Persians, that adored him,

He struck me in the face, and by the hair
He swung me to his guards to be chastised;
For which and for my father's weighty cause,
When I abandon what I have resolved,
May I again be beaten like a slave!

But lo, where Polyperchon comes: now fire him
With such complaints, that he may shoot to ruin.

Enter POLYPERCHON.

Pol. Sure I have found those friends, dare second me;

I hear fresh murmurs as I pass along:
Yet, rather than put up, I'll do't alone.
Did not Pausanias, a youth, a stripling,
A beardless boy, swelled with inglorious wrong,
For a less cause his father Philip kill?
Peace then, full heart! move like a cloud about,
And when time ripens thee to break, O shed
The stock of all thy poison on his head!

Cass. All nations bow their heads with homage down,

And kiss the feet of this exalted man:
The name, the shout, the blast from every mouth,
Is Alexander: Alexander bursts
Your cheeks, and with a crack so loud

It drowns the voice of Heaven; like dogs ye fawn,

The earth's commanders fawn, and follow him;
Mankind starts up to hear his blasphemy:
And if this hunter of this barbarous world
But wind himself a God, you echo him
With universal cry.

Pol. I echo him?

I fawn, or fall, like a far eastern slave,

To haunt some cloister with my senseless walk,
When thus the noble soul of Polyperchon
Lets go the aim of all his actions, honour.

Thess. The king shall slay me, cut me up alive, Ply me with fire and scourges, rack me worse Than once he did Philotas, e'er I bow.

Cass. Curse on thy tongue for mentioning
Philotas!

I had rather thou hadst Aristander been,
And to my soul's confusion raised up hell,
With all the furies brooding upon horrors,
Than brought Philotas' murder to remembrance.
Phil. I saw him racked, a sight so dismal sad
My eyes did ne'er behold.

Cass. So dismal? peace!

It is unutterable: let me stand,

And think upon the tragedy you saw;
By Mars it comes! ay! now the rack's set for
Bloody Craterus, his inveterate foe,
With pitiless Hephestion standing by:
Philotas, like an angel seized by fiends,
Is straight disrobed, a napkin ties his head,
His warlike arms with shameful cords are bound,
And every slave can now the valiant wound.

Pol. Now, by the soul of royal Philip fled,
I dare pronounce young Alexander, who
Would be a god, is cruel as a devil.

Cass. Oh, Polyperchon, Philip, Thessalus, Did not your eyes rain blood, your spirits burst, To see your noble fellow-soldier burn, Yet without trembling, or a tear, endure The torments of the damned? O barbarians, Could you stand by, and yet refuse to suffer? Ye saw him bruised, torn, to the bones made bare;

His veins wide lanced, and the poor quivering flesh

With pincers from his manly bosom ript,

Till

ye discovered the great heart lie panting. Pol. Why killed we not the king, to save Phi

lotas?

Phil. Wretched Philotas! bloody Alexander! Thess. Soon after him the great Parmenio fell, Stabbed in his orchard by the tyrant's doom. But where's the need to mention public loss, When each receives particular disgrace?

Pol. Late I remember, to a banquet called, After Alcides' goblet swift had gone The giddy round, and wine had made me bold, Stirring the spirits up to talk with kings, I saw Craterus with Hephestion enter In Persian robes; to Alexander's health

lace,

VOL. I.

Flat on the pavement, and adored the sun. T

Straight to the king they sacred reverence gave, With solemn words, ' O son of thundering Jove, Young Ammon, live for ever! then kissed the ground.

I laughed aloud, and scoffing, asked them why They kissed no harder;—but the king leapt up, And spurned me to the earth, with this reply:'Do thou !'—whilst with his foot he prest my neck,

Till from my ears, my nose, and mouth, the

blood

Gushed forth, and I lay foaming on the earthFor which I wish this dagger in his heart.

Cass. There spoke the spirit of Calisthenes!
Remember he's a man, his flesh as soft
And penetrable as a girl's: we have seen him
wounded,

A stone has struck him, yet no thunderbolt:
A pebble felled this Jupiter along:

A sword has cut him, a javelin pierced him,
Water will drown him, fire burn him,
A surfeit, nay a fit of common sickness,
Brings this immortal to the gate of death.

Pol. Why should we more delay the glorious business?

Are your hearts firm?

Phil. Hell cannot be more bent To any ruin, than I to the king's. Thess. And I.

Pol. Behold my hand; and if you doubt my truth,

Tear up my breast, and lay my heart upon it. Cass. Join then, O worthy, hearty, noble hands,

Fit instruments for such majestic souls!
Remember Hermolaus, and be hushed.

Pol. Still as the bosom of the desert night,
As fatal planets, or deep-plotting fiends.

Cass. To-day he comes from Babylon to Susa, With proud Roxana.

Ah! who's that?-look there!

Enter the Ghost of King PHILIP, shaking a truncheon at them, walks over the Stage. Cass. Now by the gods, or furies, which I ne'er Believed,- -there's one of them arrived to shake us.

What art thou? glaring thing, speak! What, the spirit

Of our king Philip, or of Polyphemus?
Nay hurl thy truncheon, second it with thunder;
We will abide--Thessalus, saw you nothing?
Thess. Yes, and am more amazed than you
can be.

Phil. 'Tis said, that many prodigies were seen
This morn, but none so horrible as this.
Pol. What can you fear? though the earth
yawned so wide,

That all the labours of the deep were seen,
And Alexander stood on the other side,
I'd leap the burning ditch to give him death,
Or sink myself for ever: Pray, to the business.
Cass. As I was saying, this Roxana, whom,
To aggravate my hate to him, I love,
Meeting him as he came triumphant from

The Indies, kept him revelling at Susa;
But as I found, a deep repentance since
Turns his affections to the queen Statira,
To whom he swore (before he could espouse her)
That he would never bed Roxana more.
Pol. How did the Persian queen receive the

news

Of his revolt?

Thess. With grief incredible:

Great Sysigambis wept, but the young queen Fell dead among her maids;

Nor could their care

With richest cordials, for an hour or more,
Recover life.

Cass. Knowing how much she loved,
I hoped to turn her all into Medea;
For, when the first gust of her grief was past,
I entered, and with breath prepared did blow
The dying sparks into a towering flame,
Describing the new love he bears Roxana,
Conceiving, not unlikely, that the line
Of dead Darius in her cause might rise.
Is any panther's, lioness's rage

So furious, any torrent's falls so swift,
As a wronged woman's hate? Thus far it helps-
To give him troubles; which perhaps may end
him,

And set the court in universal uproar.
But see! it ripens more than I expected:
The scene works up; kill him, or kill thyself;
So there be mischief any way, 'tis well;
Now change the vizor, every one disperse,
And with a face of friendship meet the king.

SCENE III.

[Exeunt.

Enter SYSIGAMBIS, STATIRA, PARISATIS, Attendants.

Stat. Give me a knife, a draught of poison, flames!

Swell heart, break, break, thou stubborn thing!
Now, by the sacred fire, I'll not be held;
Why do ye wish my life, yet stifle me
For want of air? pray give me leave to walk.

Sys. Is there no reverence to my person due? Darius would have heard me; trust not rumour. Stat. No, he hates,

He loaths the beauties, which he has enjoyed.
O, he is false, that great, that glorious man
Is tyrant midst of his triumphant spoils,
Is bravely false, to all the gods forsworn:
Yet, who would think it! no, it cannot be,
It cannot- -What, that dear protesting man!
He, that has warmed my feet with thousand
sighs,

Then cooled them with his tears, died on my knees,

Outwept the morning with his dewy eyes,
And groaned and swore the wandering stars away!
Sys. No, 'tis impossible, believe thy mother,
That knows him well.

Stat. Away, and let me die :
O'tis my fondness, and my easy nature,
That would excuse him; but I know he's false,

world,

False to Statira, false to her that loved him;
That loved him, cruel victor as he was,

And took him, bathed all o'er in Persian blood; Kissed the dear cruel wounds, and washed them o'er

And o'er in tears

hair,

-then bound them with my

Laid him all night upon my panting bosom,
Lulled like a child, and hushed him with my songs.
Par. If this be true, ah, who will ever trust
A man again!

Stat. A man! a man! my Parisatis ;

Thus with thy hand held up, thus let me swear thee

By the eternal body of the sun,
Whose body, O forgive the blasphemy,
I loved not half so well as the least part
Of my dear precious faithless Alexander ;·
For I will tell thee, and to warn thee of him,
Not the spring's mouth, nor breath of jessamin,
Nor violet's infant-sweets, nor opening buds,
Are half so sweet as Alexander's breast;
From every pore of him a perfume falls,
He kisses softer than a southern wind,
Curls like a vine, and touches like a god.

Sys. When will thy spirits rest, these transports
cease?

Stat. Will you not give me leave to warn my
sister?

As I was saying-but I told his sweetness;
Then he will talk-good gods, how he will talk!
Even when the joy he sighed for is possest,
He speaks the kindest words, and looks such
things,

Vows with such passion, swears with so much grace,

That 'tis a kind of heaven to be deluded by him. Par. But what was it, that you would have me swear?

Stat. Alas, I had forgot! let me walk by And weep awhile, and I shall soon remember. Sys. Have patience, child, and give her liberty; Passions, like seas, will have their ebbs and flows: Yet, while I see her thus, not all the losses We have received, since Alexander's conquest, Can touch my hardened soul; her sorrow reigns Too fully there.

Par. But what if she should kill herself? Stat. Roxana then enjoys my perjured love, Roxana clasps my monarch in her arms: Doats on my conqueror, my dear lord, my king, Devours his lips, eats him with hungry kisses: She grasps him all, she, the curst happy she! By heaven I cannot bear it, 'tis too much; I'll die, or rid me of the burning torture.

Or go distracted; madness may throw off
The mighty load, and drown the flaming pas-

sion.

Madam, draw near, with all that are in presence, And listen to the vow, which here I make.

Sys. Take heed, my dear Statira, and consider,

What desperate love enforces you to swear,
Stat. Pardon me, for I have considered well;
And here I bid adieu to all mankind.
Farewell, ye cozeners of the easy sex,
And thou the greatest, falsest, Alexander!
Farewell, thou most beloved, thou faithless dear!
If I but mention him, the tears will fall;
Sure there is not a letter in his name,
But is a charm to melt a woman's eyes.
Sys. Clear up thy griefs; thy king, thy Alex-
ander,

Comes on to Babylon.

Stat. Why, let him come,

Joy of all eyes but the forlorn Statira's.
Sys. Wilt hou not see him?

Stat. By heaven I never will,

This is my vow, my secret resolution; [Knecls. And when I break it—

Sys. Ah, do not ruin all!

Stat. May I again be flattered and deluded, May sudden death, and horrid, com instead Of what I wished, and take me unprepared! Sys. Still kneel, and with the same breath call again

The woeful imprecation thou hast made.

Stat. No, I will publish it through all the court,
Then, in the bowers of great Semiramis,
For ever lock my woes from human view.
Sys. Yet be persuaded.

Stat. Never urge me more,
Lest, driven to rage, I should my life abhor,
And in your presence put an end to all
The fast calamities, that round me fall.

Par. O angry heaven! what have the guiltless done!

And where shall wretched Parisatis run!

Sys. Captives in war, our bodies we resigned; But now made free, love does our spirits bind.

Stat. When to my purposed loneness I retire, Your sight I through the grates shall oft desire, And after Alexander's health enquire. And if this passion cannot be removed, Ask how my resolution he approved, How much he loves, how much he is beloved? Then, when I hear that all things please him well,

Thank the good gods, and hide me in my cell. [Exeunt.

SCENE I.

Noise of trumpets sounding far off-The scene draws, and discovers a battle of crows and ravens in the air; an eagle and a dragon meet and fight; the eagle drops down with all the rest of the birds, and the dragon flies away. Soldiers walk off, shaking their heads. The conspirators come forward.

Cass. HE comes, the fatal glory of the world, The headlong Alexander, with a guard Of thronging crowns, comes on to Babylon, Though warned, in spite of all the powers above, Who, by these prodigies, foretel his ruin.

Pol. Why all this noise, because a king must
die?

Or does heaven fear, because he swayed the earth,
His ghost will war with the high Thunderer?
Curse on the babbling fates, that cannot see
A great man tumble, but they must be talking!
Cass. The spirit of king Philip, in those arms
We saw him wear, passed groaning through the

court,

His dreadful eye-balls rolled their horror upwards;

He waved his arms, and shook his wondrous head.
I have heard, that, at the crowing of the cock,
Lions will roar, and goblins steal away;
But this majestic air stalks stedfast on,
Spite of the morn, that calls him from the east,
Nor minds the opening of the ivory door.
Phil. 'Tis certain, there was never day like

this.

Like silk-worms we are hid in our own web, But we shall burst at last through all the strings; And, when time calls, come forth in a new form, Not insects to be trod, but dragons winged.

Thess. The face of all the court is strangely

altered:

There's not a Persian I can meet, but stares
As if he were distracted. Oxyartes,
Statira's uncle, openly declaimed
Against the perjury of Alexander,

Phil. Others, more fearful, are removed to
Susa,
Dreading Roxana's rage,
who comes i'th' rear
To Babylon.

Cass. It glads my rising soul, That we shall see him racked before he dies: I know he loves Statira more than life, And on a crowd of kings in triumph borne, Comes big with expectation to enjoy her. But when he hears the oaths, which she has taken,

Her last adieu made public to the world, Her vowed divorce, how will remorse consume him,

Prey, like the bird of hell, upon his liver!

Pol. To baulk his longing, and delude his lust, Is more than death, 'tis earnest for damnation. Cass. Then comes Roxana, who must help our

party;

I know her, jealous, bloody, and ambitious.
Sure 'twas the likeness of her heart to mine,
And sympathy of natures, caused me love her:
'Tis fixed, I must enjoy her, and no way
So proper as to make her guilty first.

Pol. To see two rival queens of different humours,

With a variety of torments vex him!

Enter LYSIMACHUS, and HEPHESTION. Cass. Of that anon: But see Lysimachus, And the young favourite. Sort, sort yourselves, And, like to other mercenary souls,

Adore this mortal god, that soon must bleed. Lys. Here I will wait the king's approach, and