_First Jailer._ Bind fast his corky arms. _Essex._ Help,--help,--help,--help! Here’s a man would murder me. Help,--help,--help! I will not struggle, I will stand stone still. _First Jailer._ Bind him, I say. _Second Jailer._ Hard, hard! O filthy traitor! _First Jailer._ Give me the iron, I say, and bind him here: To this chair bind him. _Essex._ Let me not be bound: Alas, why need you be so boistrous rough? O I am undone, O I am undone! Do me no foul play, friend! _First Jailer._ Read here, traitor. Can you not read it? Is it not writ fair? _Essex._ How now, foolish rheume; Must you, with hot irons, burn out both mine eyes? O Heaven, that there were but a moth in yours, A grain, a dust, a gnat, a wandering hair, Any annoyance in that precious sense: Then feeling what small things are boisterous there, Your vile intents must needs seem horrible. O spare mine eyes, though to no use but still to look on you! Lo, by my troth, the instrument is cold, And would not harm me--O men, if you will, Cut out my tongue, so that I may still keep Both mine eyes to see. _First Jailer._ To see some mischief! See shall thou never: (fellow, hold the chair:) Upon these eyes of thine I’ll set my foot! _Essex._ He that will think to live till he be old, Give me some help! O save me,--save me!--help! (_They tear out one of his eyes._) Oh cruel! Oh God,--O God,--O God! my eyes are out! Oh, I am slain! _First Jailer._ My Lord, you have one eye left! One side will mock another; th’ other too. Out, vile jelly! where is thy lustre now? (_They tear out the other eye._) _Essex._ All dark and comfortless!-- O God, enkindle all the sparks of nature To quit this horrid act. _First Jailer._ Away with him; lead him to the block. [_Exeunt Omnes._ In the epilogue, the two jailers blackmail Mr. Secretary Cecil as he walks in his garden with his decipherer, and the book ends with the following cryptic lines: “This is the cruel man (Cecil) that was employed To execute that execrable tragedy, And you can witness with me this is true.” (_Omnes_) “This is the strangest tale that e’er I heard.” This amazing adaptation of a perfect piece of dramatic writing to the exigencies of biography is, it may be assumed, without parallel in the history of literature. Comment would be superfluous: imagine Mr. Daniel Leno sustaining the part of Essex in a performance of the drama, and the illusion is complete. _Bacon, the Poet._