A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 10
General
A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 10
English drama
CYP. My Philocles, my queen! O, double pardon me,
My jealousy, his envy, and your virtues,
Are sprung from such impatient contraries,
I cannot reconcile them; yet, O, pardon me:
My faith in life shall make you recompense.
For thee, rare Mariana, thou hast wrought
A work of noble constant magnitude.
As for this monster, this my tempting devil,
Whose forfeit life is witness to his shame,
I give his life and fortunes to the queen,
She, whom his malice would have brought to death,
Shall now be judge and juror of his breath.
MAR. In which commission, madam, let it be enroll'd,
He is my brother and my next[226] of blood.
QUEEN. And only that is charter for his life--
Live, envious lord, more envious than thou'rt great,
Live to lament thy worst of wretchedness,
Live to repent, since this I certain know,
Thine own gall'd conscience will be thy worst woe.
_Enter a guard of_ WATCHMEN _with_ ALPHONSO.
1ST WATCHMAN. Come, bring away, thrust him forward, though
favour and a great purse were against him.
CYP. How now, what tumult have we there?
2D WATCH. An't please your majesty, we have brought you here a
slip,[227] a piece of false coin: one that is neither stamped
with true coin for his excuse, nor with good clothes for his
redemption.
CYP. Alphonso! in the name of madness, how comes this
metamorphosis? Nay, stand forth, discourse: if thou dost lie,
thou art mine enemy.
MECH. Nay more, if thou stick in any bog, and by a trick seek
to wind out, I will discover you.
ALPH. This conjuration (believe it, my lord), shall make me
leap out of all fetters, and briefly thus: I have long time
loved the fair wife of the orator, and, having no opportunity
but his absence at the senate, I took that season; he, out of
negligence, omitting his papers, returned unseasonably, found
me [clothed] insufficiently, and forced to take sanctuary
strangely, which, however, I purchased; yet he found mine
apparel, and mistaken in the tenure, reached it presently, put
it on immediately; and now in the senate-house is pleading in
it seriously.
CYP. I cannot blame him, you having got so much within his
inward garment.
MECH. Of all which, my lord, I being, in a strict conceit, a
bawdy witness, and having, both from the orator's scorns and
delays received many indignities, thought by this discovery to
cry quittance with my proud enemy.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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