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Sardanapalus;

A HISTORICAL TRAGEDY.

PREFACE.

IN publishing the Tragedies of Sardanapalus, and of The Two Foscari, I have only to repeat that they were not composed with the most remote view to the stage.

On the attempt made by the managers in a former instance, the public opinion has been already expressed. With regard to my own private feelings, as it seems that they are to stand for nothing, I shall say nothing.

For the historical foundation of the compositions in question, the reader is referred to the Notes.

SARDANAPALUS.

ACT I.

SCENE I.

A Hall in the Palace.
SALEMENES (solus).

The author has in one instance attempted to pre-He hath wrong'd his queen, but still he is her lord; serve, and in the other to approach the "unities;" con- He hath wrong'd my sister, still he is my brother; ceiving that, with any very distant departure from He hath wrong'd his people, still he is their sovereign. them, there may be poetry, but can be no drama. He And I must be his friend as well as subject; is aware of the unpopularity of this notion, in preHe must not perish thus. I will not see sent English literature; but it is not a system of his The blood of Nimrod and Semiramis own, being merely an opinion which, not very long Sink in the earth, and thirteen hundred years ago, was the law of literature throughout the world, Of empire ending like a shepherd's tale; and is still so in the more civilized parts of it. But "Nous avons changé tout cela," and are reaping the advantages of the change. The writer is far from conceiving that any thing he can adduce by personal precept or example can at all approach his regular, or even irregular predecessors: he is merely giving a reason why he preferred the more regular formation of a structure, however feeble, to an entire abandonment of all rules whatsoever. Where he has failed, the failure is in the architect, and not in the art.

ADVERTISEMENT.

In this tragedy it has been my intention to follow the account of Diodorus Siculus, reducing it, however, to such dramatic regularity as I best could, and trying to approach the unities. I therefore suppose the rebellion to explode and succeed in one day by a sudden conspiracy, instead of the long war of the history.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

MEN.

SARDANAPALUS, King of Nineveh and Assyria, etc.
ARBACES, the Mede who aspired to the Throne.
BELESES, a Chaldean and Soothsayer.
SALEMENES, the King's Brother-in-law.
ALTADA, an Assyrian Officer of the Palace.
PANIA.

ZAMES.

SFERO.

BALEA.

WOMEN.

LARINA, the Queen.

He must be roused. In his effeminate heart
There is a careless courage, which corruption
Has not all quench'd, and latent energies,
Represt by circumstance, but not destroy'd-
Steep'd but not drown'd, in deep voluptuousness.
If born a peasant, he had been a man
To have reach'd an empire; to an empire born,
He will bequeath none; nothing but a name,
Which his sons will not prize in heritage:
Yet, not all lost, even yet he may redeem
His sloth and shame, by only being that
Which he should be, as easily as the thing
He should not be and is. Were it less toil
To sway his nations than consume his life?
To head an army than to rule a harem?
He sweats in palling pleasures, dulls his soul,
And saps his goodly strength, in toils which yield not
Health like the chase, nor glory like the war-
He must be roused. Alas! there is no sound

[Sound of soft music heard from within.
To rouse him, short of thunder. Hark! the lute,
The lyre, the timbrel; the lascivious tinklings
Of lulling instruments, the softening voices
Of women, and of beings less than women,
Must chime in to the echo of his revel,
While the great king of all we know of earth
Lolls crown'd with roses, and his diadem
Lies negligently by, to be caught up

By the first manly hand which dares to snatch it.
Lo, where they come! already I perceive
The reeking odours of the perfumed trains,
And see the bright gems of the glittering girls,
Who are his comrades and his council, flash

MYRRHA, an Ionian female slave, and the favourite Along the gallery, and amidst the damsels,
of SARDANAPALUS.

Women composing the Harem of SARDANAPALUS,
Guards, Attendants, Chaldean Priests,
Medes, etc., etc.

Scene a Hall in the Royal Palace of Nineveh.

As femininely garb'd, and scarce less female,
The grandson of Semiramis, the man-queen.—
He comes! Shall I await him? yes, and front him,
And tell him what all good men tell each other,
Speaking of him and his. They come, the slaves,
Led by the monarch subject to his slaves.

SCENE II.

Enter SARDANAPALUS, effeminately dressed, his Head crowned with Flowers, and his Robe negligently flowmg, attended by a Train of Women and young

Slaves.

SARDANAPALUS (speaking to some of his attendants).
Le: the pavilion over the Euphrates
Be garlanded, and lit, and furnish'd forth
For an especial banquet; at the hour

Of midnight we will sup there; see nought wanting,
And bid the galley be prepared. There is

A cooling breeze which crisps the broad clear river:
We will embark anon. Fair nymphs, who deign
To share the soft hours of Sardanapalus,
We'll meet again in that the sweetest hour,
When we shall gather like the stars above us,
And you will form a heaven as bright as theirs ;
Till then, let each be mistress of her time,
And thou, my own Ionian Myrrha, choose,
Wilt thou along with them or me?

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MYRRHA.

Sire! your brother

SALEMENES.

His consort's brother, minion of Ionia!. How darest thou name me and not blush? SARDANAPALUS.

Not blush'

Thou hast no more eyes than heart to make her crimson
Like to the dying day on Caucasus,

Where sunset tints the snow with rosy shadows,
And then reproach her with thine own cold blindness,
Which will not see it. What, in tears, my Myrrha?

SALEMENES.

Let them flow on; she weeps for more than one, And is herself the cause of bitterer tears.

SARDANAPALUS.

Cursed be he who caused those tears to flow! SALEMENES.

Curse not thyself-millions do that already.

SARDANAPALUS.

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Think'st thou there is no tyranny but that
Of blood and chains? The despotism of vice-
The weakness and the wickedness of luxury—
The negligence-the apathy-the evils

Of sensual sloth-produce ten thousand tyrants,
Whose delegated cruelty surpasses
The worst acts of one energetic master,
However harsh and hard in his own bearing.
The faise and fond examples of thy lusts
Corrupt no less than they oppress, and sar
In the same moment all thy pageant power,
And those who should sustain it; so that whether
A foreign foe invade, or civil broil

Distract within, both will alike prove fatal.
The first thy subjects have no heart to conquer ;
The last they rather would assist than vanquish.

SARDANAPALUS.

Who built up this vast empire, and wert made Why, what makes thee the mouth-piece of the people? A god, or at the least shinest like a god

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Through the long centuries of thy renown,
This, thy presumed descendant, ne'er beheld
As king the kingdoms thou didst leave as hero,
Won with thy blood, and toil, and time, and peril'
For what? to furnish him imposts for a revel
Or multiplied extortions for a minion.

SARDANAPALUS.

I understand thee-thou wouldst have me go
Forth as a conqueror. By all the stars
Which the Chaldeans read! the restless slaves
Deserve that I should curse them with their wishes,

Yet speak it, And lead them forth to glory.

SALEMENES.

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And how many

Even from the winds, if thou couldst listen Left she behind in India to the vultures? Unto the echoes of the nation's voice.

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SALEMENES.

Our annals say not.

SARDANAPALUS.

Then I will say for them-
That she had better woven within her palace
Some twenty garments, than with twenty guards
Have fled to Bactria, leaving to the ravens,
And wolves, and men-the fiercer of the three,
Her myriads of fond subjects. Is this glory?
Then let me live in ignominy ever.

SALEMENES.

All warlike spirits have not the same fate.
Semiramis, the glorious parent of

A hundred kings, although she fail'd in India,
Brought Persia, Media, Bactria, to the realm
Which she once sway'd-and thou mightst sway..

SARDANAPALUS.

A king.

SARDANAPALUS.

And what

She but subdued them.

SALEMENES.

SALEMENES.

I sway them

In their eyes a nothing; but

In mine a man who might be something still.

SARDANAPALUS.

The railing drunkards! why, what would they have?
Have they not peace and plenty?

SALEMENES.

Of the first,

More than is glorious; of the last, far less
Than the king recks of.

SARDANAPALUS.

Whose then is the crime, But the false satraps, who provide no better?

SALEMENES.

And somewhat in the monarch who ne'er looks
Beyond nis palace walls, or if he stirs
Beyond them, 'tis but to some mountain palace,
Till somer heats wear down. O glorious Baal!

It may be ere long

That they will need her sword more than your sceptre

SARDANAPALUS.

There was a certain Bacchus, was there not?
I've heard my Greek girls speak of such-they say
He was a god, that is, a Grecian god,

An idol foreign to Assyria's worship,
Who conquer'd this same golden realm of Ind
Thou pratest of, where Semiramis was vanquish'd.

SALEMENES.

I have heard of such a man; and thou perceivest
That he is deem'd a god for what he did.

SARDANAPALUS.

And in his gedship I will honour him-
Not much as man. What, ho! my cupbearer!

SALEMENES.

What means the king?

bod Entish. It would to That she had bether have woven

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Not so:-of all his conquests a few columns,
Which may be his, and might be mine, if I
Thought them worth purchase and conveyance, are
The landmarks of the seas of gore he shed,
The realms he wasted, and the hearts he broke.
But here, here in this goblet, is his title
To immortality-the immortal grape
From which he first express'd the soul, and gave
To gladden that of man, as some atonement
For the victorious mischiefs he had done.
Had it not been for this, he would have been
A mortal still in name as in his grave;
And, like my ancestor Semiramis,
A sort of semi-glorious human monster.
Here's that which deified him-let it now
Humanize thee; my surly, chiding brother,
Pledge me to the Greek god!

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The ungrateful and ungracious slaves! they murmu
Because I have not shed their blood, nor led them
To dry into the desert's dust by myriads,

Or whiten with their bones the banks of Ganges;
Nor decimated them with savage laws,
Nor sweated them to build up pyramids,
Or Babylonian walls.

SALEMENES.

Yet these are trophies

More worthy of a people and their prince
Than songs, and lutes, and feasts, and concubines,
And lavish'd treasures, and contemned virtues.

SARDANAPALUS.

Or for my trophies I have founded cities:
There's Tarsus and Anchialus, both built
In one day-what could that blood-loving beldame
My martial grandam, chaste Semiramis,
Do more, except destroy them?

SALEMENES.

"T is most true;

I own thy merit in those founded cities,
Built for a whim, recorded with a verse
Which shames both them and thee to coming ages.

SARDANAPALUS.

Shame me! By Baal, the cities, though weil buil [Exit Cupbearer. Are not more goodly than the verse! Say what Thou wilt 'gainst me, my mode of life or rule But nothing 'gainst the truth of that brief record. Why, those few lines contain the history

would but have recall'd thee from thy dream: Better by me awaken'd than rebellion.

Of all things human; hear-"Sardanapalus
The king, and son of Anacyndaraxes,
In one day built Anchialus and Tarsus.
Eat, drink, and love; the rest's not worth a fillip."

SALEMENES.

A worthy moral, and a wise inscription,
For a king to put up before his subjects!

SARDANAPALUS.

Oh, thou wouldst have me doubtless set up edicts-
"Obey the king-contribute to his treasure-
Recruit his phalanx-spill your blood at bidding—
Fall down and worship, or get up and toil."
Or thus-"Sardanapalus on this spot
Slew fifty thousand of his enemies.

These are their sepulchres, and this his trophy."

I leave such things to conquerors; enough
For me, if I can make my subjects feel
The weight of human misery less, and glide
Ungroaning to the tomb; I take no license
Which I deny to them. We all are men.

SALEMENES.

Thy sires have been revered as gods

SARDANAPALUS.

In dust

And death, where they are neither gods nor men.
Talk not of such to me! the worms are gods;
At least they banqueted upon your gods,
And died for lack of farther nutriment.

Those gods were merely men; look to their issue

I feel a thousand mortal things about me,
But nothing godlike, unless it may be
The thing which you condemn, a disposition
To love and to be merciful, to pardon

The follies of my species, and (that's human)
To be indulgent to my own.

SALEMENES.

Alas!

The doom of Nineveh is seal'd.-Woe-woe
To the unrivall'd city!

SARDANAPALUS.

What dost dread?

SALEMENES.

Thou art guarded by thy foes: in a few hours
The tempest may break out which overwhelms thee
And thine and mine; and in another day
What is shall be the past of Belus' race.

SARDANAPALUS.

What must we dread?

SALEMENES.

Ambitious treachery,

Which has environ'd thee with snares; but yet
There is resource: empower mc with thy signet
To quell the machinations, anu I lay
The heads of thy chief foes oefore thy feet.

SARDANAPALUS.

The heads-how many?

SALEMENES.

Must I stay to number When even thine own 's in peril? Let me go; Give me thy signet-trust me with the rest.

SARDANAPALUS.

I will trust no man with unlimited lives.

When we take those from others, we nor know
What we have taken, nor the thing we give.

SALEMENES.

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They dared not. They were kept to toil and combat,
And never changed their chains but for their armour:
Now they have peace and pastime, and the license
To revel and to rail; it irks me not.

i would not give the smile of one fair girl

For all the popular breath that e'er divided
A name from nothing. What! are the rank tongues

Woniust thou not take their lives who seek for thine? Of this vile herd grown insolent with feeding,

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