English drama -- Early modern and Elizabethan, 1500-1600
_Enter Teniente, Henrico, Manuell, Pedro (as a fryer);
at another dore Eleonora_.
_Mac_. Give the Lady roome there!
_Clark_. Peace!
_Mac_. Your facts are both so foule your hated lives
Cannot be too soone shortned; therefore these Lords
Hold it not fitt to lend you breath till morning,
But now to cutt you off.
_Both_. The stroke is welcome.
_Pedro_. Shall I prepare you?
_Hen_. Save your paynes, good father.
_Man_. We have allready cast up our accounts
And sent, we hope, our debts up into heaven.
_Fer_. Our sorrowes & our sighes fly after them.
_Ped_. Then your confession of the murther stands
As you your selfe did sett it downe?
_Man_. It does;
But on my knees I beg this marginall note
May sticke upon the paper; that no guilt,
But feare of Tortures frighted me to take
That horrid sin upon me. I am as innocent
And free as are the starres from plotting treason
Gainst their first mover.
_Pedro_. I was then in _France_
When of your fathers murther the report
Did fill all _Paris_.
_Man_. Such a reverend habit
Should not give harbour to so blacke a falshood.
_Hen_. Tis blacke, & of my dying; for 'twas I
To cheate my brother of my fathers lands,
Layd this most hellish plott.
_Fer_. 3[55] hellish sins, Robbery, Rape & Murther.
_Hen_. I'me guilty of all Three; his soul's as white
And cleare from murther as this holy man
From killing mee.
_Pedro_. No [know], there's a thing about me
Shall strike thee into dust & make thy tongue
With trembling to proclayme thyselfe a Villaine
More then thou yet hast done:--See, tis my Eye.
_Hen_. Oh, I am confounded! [_Falls_.
_Man_. But I comforted
With the most heavenly apparition
Of my deare honourd father.
_Fer_. Take thou comfort
By two more apparitions, of a father
And a lost daughter, yet heere found for thee.
_Man_. Oh, noble sir, I pray forgive my brother.
_Ele_. See, sir, I doe; & with my hand reach to him
My heart to give him new life.
_Fer_. Rise, my _Henrico_!
_Mac_. Rise & receive a noble minded wife
Worth troupes of other weomen.
_Hen_. Shame leaves me speechles.
_Pedro_. Gett thee a tongue againe, & pray, & mend.
_Mac_. Letters shall forthwith fly into _Madrid_
To tell the King the storyes of Two Brothers,
Worthy the Courtiers reading. Lovers, take hands:
_Hymen_ & gentle faeryes strew your way:
Our Sessions turnes into a Bridall day.
_All_. Fare thee well, _Englishman_.
_Pike_. I will ring peales of prayers of you all,
My Lords & noble Dons.
_Mac_. Doe soe, if thou hast iust cause: howsoever,
When thy swift ship cutts through the curled mayne,
Dance to see _England_, yet speake well of _Spayne_.
_Pike_. I shall.--Where must I leave my pistoletts?
_Gent_. Follow mee.
[_Exeunt Omnes_.
FINIS.
INTRODUCTION TO _THE LADY MOTHER_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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