I'll bear it all; but cursed to the degree
That I am now, 'tis this must give me patience:
Thus I find rest, and shall complain no more.
[Stabs himself.

Pol. Castalio! oh!
Cast. I come.
Chamont, to thee my birth-right I bequeath;
Comfort my mourning father, heal his griefs,

[ACAS. faints into the arms of a servant.
For I perceive they fall with weight upon him.
And, for Monimia's sake, whom thou wilt find
I never wronged, be kind to poor Serina.
Now, all I beg, is, lay me in one grave
Thus with my love. Farewell. I now am-no- |

thing.

[Dies. Cha. Take care of good Acasto, whilst I go To search the means, by which the fates have plagued us.

'Tis thus that heaven its empire does maintain; It may afflict, but man must not complain. [Exeunt omnes.

YOU'VE seen one Orphan ruin'd here, and I
May be the next, if old Acasto die;
Should it prove so, I'd fain amongst you find,
Who 'tis would to the fatherless be kind.
To whose protection might I safely go?
Is there amongst you no good nature? No.
What should I do? should I the godly seek,
And go a conventicling twice a week?
Quit the lewd stage, and its prophane pollution,
Affect each form and saint-like institution,
So draw the brethren all to contribution?

Or shall I (as I guess the poet may
Within these three days) fairly run away?
No, to some city-lodging I'll retire,
Seem very grave, and privacy desire:
Till I am thought some heiress rich in lands,
Fled to escape a cruel guardian's hands;
Which may produce a story worth the telling,
Of the next sparks that go a fortune-stealing.

OR,

IN these distracted times, when each man dreads
The bloody stratagems of busy heads;
When we have feared three years we know not
what,

Till witnesses begin to die o'th' rot,
What made our poet meddle with a plot?
Was't that he fancied, for the very sake
And name of plot, his trifling play might take?
For there's not in't one inch-broad evidence,
But 'tis, he says, to reason plain and sense,
And that he thinks a plausible defence.
Were truth by sense and reason to be tried,
Sure all our swearers might be laid aside.
No, of such tools our author has no need,
To make his plot, or make his play succeed.
He, of black bills, has no prodigious tales,
Or, Spanish pilgrims cast ashore in Wales;
Here's not one murdered magistrate at least:
Kept rank like ven'son for a city feast:

Grown four days stiff, the better to prepare,
And fit his pliant limbs to ride in chair:
Yet here's an army raised, though under ground,
But no man seen, nor one commission found:
Here is a traitor too, that's very old,
Turbulent, subtle, mischievous, and bold,
Bloody, revengeful, and, to crown his part,
Loves fumbling with a wench, with all his heart;
Till after having many changes past,

In spite of age, (thanks t'heaven) is hang'd at last.
Next is a senator that keeps a whore;
In Venice none a higher office bore;
To lewdness every night the letcher ran,
Shew me, all London, such another man,
Match him at Mother Creswold's, if you can.
Oh Poland! Poland! had it been thy lot,
T'have heard in time of this Venetian plot,
Thou surely chosen had'st one king from thence,
And honour'd them as thou hast England since

SCENE L-A Street in Venice.

Enter PRIULI and JAFFIER.

Pri. No more! I'll hear no more! Begone and leave me.

Jaf. Not hear me! By my suffering but you shall! My lord, my lord, I'm not that abject wretch You think me. Patience! where's the distance throws

Me back so far, but I may boldly speak
In right, though proud oppression will not hear me?
Pri. Have you not wronged me?
Jaf. Could my nature e'er

Have brooked injustice, or the doing wrongs,
I need not now thus low have bent myself,
To gain a hearing from a cruel father.
Wronged you!

You

Pri. Yes, wronged me! In the nicest point, The honour of my house, you have done me wrong. may remember (for I now will speak, And urge its baseness) when you first came home From travel, with such hopes as made you looked on,

By all men's eyes, a youth of expectation,
Pleased with your growing virtue, I received you,
Courted, and sought to raise you to your merits:
My house, my table, nay, my fortune too,
My very self was yours; you might have used me
To your best service; like an open friend
I treated, trusted you, and thought you mine:
When, in requital of my best endeavours,
You treacherously practised to undo me;
Seduced the weakness of my age's darling,
My only child, and stole her from my bosom.
Oh Belvidera!

Jaf. 'Tis to me you owe her!
Childless you had been else, and in the grave
Your name extinct; no more Priuli heard of.
You may remember, scarce five years are past,
Since in your brigantine you sailed to see
The Adriatic wedded by our duke;
And I was with you: your unskilful pilot
Dashed us upon a rock; when to your boat
You made for safety; entered first yourself;
The affrighted Belvidera, following next,
As she stood trembling on the vessel's side,
Was by a wave washed off into the deep;
When instantly I plunged into the sea,
And, buffetting the billows to her rescue,
Redeemed her life with half the loss of mine.)
Like a rich conquest, in one hand I bore her,
And with the other dashed the saucy waves,
That thronged and pressed to rob me of my prize.
I brought her, gave her to your despairing arms:
Indeed you thanked me; but a nobler gratitude
Rose in her soul: for from that hour she loved me,
"Till for her life she paid me with herself.

Pri. You stole her from me; like a thief you stole her,

At dead of night! that cursed hour you chose,

To rifle me of all my heart held dear.
May all your joys in her prove false, like mine;
A sterile fortune, and a barren bed,
Attend you both; continual discord make
Your days and nights bitter and grievous: still
May the hard hand of a vexatious need
Oppress and grind you; till at last
you find
The curse of disobedience all your portion!
Jaf. Half of your curse you have bestowed in

vain;

Heaven has already crowned our faithful loves With a young boy, sweet as his mother's beauty, May he live to prove more gentle than his grandsire: And happier than his father!

Pri. Rather live

To bait thee for his bread, and din your ears
With hungry cries; whilst his unhappy mother
Sits down and weeps in bitterness of want,

Jaf. You talk as if 'twould please you.
Pri. 'Twould, by heaven!

Once she was dear indeed; the drops that fell
From my sad heart, when she forgot her duty,
The fountain of my life was not so precious-
But she is gone, and, if I am a man,
I will forget her.

Jaf. Would I were in my grave!
Pri. And she too with thee:

For, living here, you're but my cursed remembrancers,

I once was happy.

Jaf. You use me thus, because you know my soul Is fond of Belvidera. You perceive My life feeds on her, therefore thus you treat me. Oh! could my soul ever have known satiety, Were I that thief, the doer of such wrongs

As

you upbraid me with, what hinders me But I might send her back to you with contumely, And court my fortune, where she would be kinder? Pri. You dare not do it.

Jaf. Indeed, my lord, I dare not.

My heart, that awes me, is too much my master: Three years are past, since first our vows were plighted,

During which time, the world must bear me wit

ness,

I've treated Belvidera like your daughter,
The daughter of a senator of Venice:
Distinction, place, attendance, and observance,
Due to her birth, she always has commanded.
Out of my little fortune I've done this;
Because (though hopeless e'er to win your na-
ture)

The world might see I loved her for herself;
Not as the heiress of the great Priuli.
Pri. No more.

Jaf. Yes, all, and then adieu for ever. There's not a wretch, that lives on common charity,

But's happier than me: for I have known
The luscious sweets of plenty; every night

Have slept with soft content about my head,
And never waked, but to a joyful morning;
Yet now must fall, like a full ear of corn,
Whose blossom 'scaped, yet's withered in the
ripening.

Pri. Howe, and be humble; study to retrench;
Discharge the lazy vermin of thy hall,
Those pageants of thy folly:

Reduce the glittering trappings of thy wife
To humble weeds, fit for thy little state:
Then, to some suburb cottage both retire;
Drudge to feed loathsome life; get brats and

starve

Pier. My friend, good-morrow. How fares the honest partner of my heart? What, melancholy! not a word to spare me? Jaf. I'm thinking, Pierre, how that damned starving quality,

Called honesty, got footing in the world.

Pier. Why, powerful villany first set it up, For its own ease and safety. Honest men Are the soft easy cushions, on which knaves Repose and fatten. Were all mankind villains, They'd starve each other; lawyers would want practice,

Cut-throats rewards: each man would kill his brother

Himself; none would be paid or hanged for murder.

Honesty! 'twas a cheat invented first

To bind the hands of bold deserving rogues,
That fools and cowards might sit safe in power,
And lord it uncontrouled above their betters.
Jaf. Then honesty is but a notion?
Pier. Nothing else;

Like wit, much talked of, not to be defined.
He, that pretends to most, too, has least share
in it.

'Tis a ragged virtue: Honesty! no more of it.
Jaf. Sure thou art honest?

Pier. So, indeed, men think me;
But they are mistaken, Jaffier: I am a rogue
As well as they;

A fine, gay, bold-faced villain, as thou seest me. 'Tis true, I pay my debts, when they're contracted;

I steal from no man; would not cut a throat,
To gain admission to a great man's purse,
Or a whore's bed; I'd not betray my friend
To get his place or fortune; I scorn to flatter
A blown-up fool above me, or crush the wretch
beneath me;

Yet, Jaffier, for all this, I am a villain.
Jaf. A villain!

Pier. Yes, a most notorious villain ;
To see the sufferings of my fellow-creatures,
And own myself a man: to see our senators
Cheat the deluded people with a shew
Of liberty, which yet they ne'er must taste of.
They say, by them our hands are free from fet-
ters;

Yet, whom they please, they lay in basest bonds;
Bring whom they please to infamy and sorrow;
Drive us, like wrecks, down the rough tide of
power,

While no 'hold's left to save us from destruction.
All that bear this are villains, and I one,
Not to rouse up at the great call of nature,
And check the growth of these domestic spoilers,
That make us slaves, and tell us, 'tis our charter.

Jaf. Oh, Aquilina! Friend, to lose such beauty!
The dearest purchase of thy noble labours!
She was thy right by conquest, as by love.

Pier. Oh! Jaffer! I had so fixed my heart upon her,

That, wheresoe'er I framed a scheme of life,
For time to come, she was my only joy,
With which I wished to sweeten future cares:
I fancied pleasures; none but one, that loves
And doats as I did, can imagine like them:
When in the extremity of all these hopes,
In the most charming hour of expectation,
Then, when our eager wishes soared the highest,
Ready to stoop and grasp the lovely game,
A haggard owl, a worthless kite of prey,
With his foul wings, sailed in, and spoiled my
quarry.

Jaf. I know the wretch, and scorn him as thou hatest him.

Pier. Curse on the common good, that's so pro

tected,

Where every slave, that heaps up wealth enough
To do much wrong, becomes the lord of right!
I, who believed no ill could e'er come near me,
Found in the embraces of my Aquilina
A wretched, old, but itching senator;
A wealthy fool, that had bought out my title;
A rogue, that uses beauty like a lamb-skin,
Barely to keep him warm; that filthy cuckoo too
Was, in my absence, crept into my nest,
And spoiling all my brood of noble pleasure.
Jaf. Didst thou not chase him thence?
Pier. I did, and drove

The rank old bearded Hirco stinking home.
The matter was complained of in the senate,
I summoned to appear, and censured basely,
For violating something they called privilege
This was the recompence of all my service.
World I'd been rather beaten by a coward!
A soldier's mistress, Jaffier, is his religion;
When that's profaned, all other ties are broken:
That even dissolves all former bonds of service;
And from that hour I think myself as free
To be the foe, as e'er the friend, of Venice-
Nay, dear revenge, whene'er thou call'st, I'm
ready.

Jaf. I think no safety can be here for virtue,

And grieve, my friend, as much as thou, to live
In such a wretched state as this of Venice,
Where all agree to spoil the public good;
And villains fatten with the brave man's labours.
Pier. We have neither safety, unity, nor peace,
For the foundation's lost, of common good:
Justice is lame, as well as blind, amongst us;
The laws (corrupted to their ends that make
them)

Serve but for instruments of some new tyranny,
That every day starts up, to enslave us deeper.
Now, could this glorious cause but find out friends
To do it right, oh, Jaffier! then might'st thou
Not wear these seals of woe upon thy face;
The proud Priuli should be taught humanity,
And learn to value such a son as thou art.

I dare not speak, but my heart bleeds this mo

ment.

Jaf. Cursed be the cause, though I, thy friend, be part on't!

Let me partake the troubles of thy bosom,
For I am used to misery, and perhaps
May find a way to sweeten it to thy spirit.
Pier. Too soon 'twill reach thy knowledge-
[ Jaf. Then from thee

Let it proceed. There's virtue in thy friendship,
Would make the saddest tale of sorrow pleasing,
Strengthen my constancy, and welcome ruin,
Pier. Then thou art ruined!
Jaf. That I long since knew;

I and ill fortune have been long acquainted.
Pier. I passed this very moment by thy doors,
And found them guarded by a troop of villains:
The sons of public rapine were destroying.
They told me, by the sentence of the law,
They had commission to seize all thy fortune:
Nay, more, Priuli's cruel hand had signed it.
Here stood a ruffian with a horrid face,
Lording it o'er a pile of massy plate,
Tumbled into a heap for public sale;
There was another, making villainous jests
At thy undoing: he had taken possession
Of all thy ancient, most domestic, ornaments,
Rich hangings intermixed and wrought with gold;
The very bed, which on thy wedding-night
Received thee to the arms of Belvidera,
The scene of all thy joys, was violated
By the coarse hands of filthy dungeon villains,
And thrown amongst the common lumber.
Jaf. Now thank heaven-
Pier. Thank heaven! for what?
Jaf. That I'm not worth a ducat.

Pier. Curse thy dull stars, and the worse fate

of Venice,

Where brothers, friends, and fathers, are all false; Where there's no truth, no trust; where inno

cence

Stoops under vile oppression, and vice lords it.
Hadst thou but seen, as I did, how at last
Thy beauteous Belvidera, like a wretch
That's doomed to banishment, came weeping
forth,
Shining through tears, like April suns in showers,
That labour to o'ercome the cloud that loads

them;

Whilst two young virgins, on whose arms she leaned,

Kindly looked up, and at her grief grew sad,
As if they catched the sorrows, that fell from her!
Even the lewd rabble, that were gathered round
To see the sight, stood mute, when they beheld
her,

Governed their roaring throats, and grumbled pity.

I could have hugged the greasy rogues: they pleased me.

Jaf. I thank thee for this story, from my soul; Since now I know the worst, that can befal me. Ah, Pierre! I have a heart, that could have borne The roughest wrong, my fortune could have done

me;

But, when I think what Belvidera feels,
The bitterness her tender spirit tastes of,
I own myself a coward: bear my weakness,
If, throwing thus my arms about thy neck,
I play the boy, and blubber in thy bosom.
Oh! I shall drown thee with my sorrows.
Pier. Burn,

First burn and level Venice to thy ruin!
What! starve, like beggars' brats, in frosty wea-
ther,

Under a hedge, and whine ourselves to death! Thou, or thy cause, shall never want assistance, Whilst I have blood or fortune fit to serve thee: Command my heart! thou art every way its mas

Man knows a braver remedy for sorrowRevenge, the attribute of gods; they stamped it With their great image on our natures: Die! Consider well the cause, that calls upon thee, And, if thou'rt base enough, die then. Remember,

Thy Belvidera suffers; Belvidera!

Die-damn first-What! be decently interred In a church-yard, and mingle thy brave dust With stinking rogues, that rot in winding-sheets, Surfeit-slain fools, the common dung o' th' soil! Jaf. Oh!

little

Pier. Well said, out with't, swear a
Jaf. Swear! by sea and air; by earth, by hea-
ven and hell,

I will revenge my Belvidera's tears.
Hark thee, my friend-Priuli is—a senator.
Pier. A dog.

Juf. Agreed.

Pier. Shoot him.

Jaf. With all my heart.

No more; where shall we meet at night?
Pier. I'll tell thee;

On the Rialto, every night at twelve,
I take my evening's walk of meditation;
There we two will meet, and talk of precious
Mischief-

Jaf. Farewell.

Pier. At twelve.

Jaf. At any hour; my plagues Will keep me waking.

[Exit PIERRE