KING. How! ye immortal deities, Would you still try by threatenings such as these What I can bear? Is it your wish that I should mount and tear This azure palace down, as if the shape Of a new Nimrod* I assumed, to show How on my shoulders might the world escape, Nor as I gazed below Feel any fear, though all the abysses under Were rent with fire and flame, with lightning and with thunder. [footnote] *Nimrod is here used for Atlas. "Nimrod aber ist hier, was den Profandichtern und auch dem Calderon oft Atlas ist." -- Schmidt, 'Die Schauspiele Calderon's' etc.,' p. 426. * * * * * SCENE II. PATRICK, and then LUIS ENIUS. PATRICK [within]. Ah me! LEOGAIRE. Some mournful voice. KING. What's this? CAPTAIN. The form, As of a man who has escaped the storm, Swims yonder to the land. LESBIA. And strives to give a life-sustaining hand Unto another wretch, when he Appeared about to sink in death's last agony. POLONIA. Poor traveller from afar, Whom evil fate and thy malignant star On this far shore have cast, Let my voice guide thee, if amid the blast My accents thou canst hear; since it is only To rouse thy courage that I speak to thee. Come! [Enter PATRICK and LUIS ENIUS, clasping each other. PATRICK. Oh, God save me! LUIS. Oh, the devil save ME! LESBIA. They move my pity, these unhappy two. KING. Not mine, for what it is I never knew. PATRICK. Oh, sirs, if wretchedness Can move most hearts to pity man's distress, I will not think that here A heart can be so cruel and severe As to repel a wretch from out the wave. Pity, for God's sake, at your feet I crave. LUIS. I don't, for I disdain it. From God or man I never hope to gain it. KING. Say who you are; we then shall know What hospitable care your needs we owe. But first I will inform you of my name, Lest ignorance of that perchance might claim Exemption from respect, and words be said Unworthy of the deference and the dread That here my subjects show me, Or wanting the due homage that you owe me. I am the King Egerius, The worthy lord of this small realm, for thus I call it being mine; Till 'tis the world, my sword shall not resign Its valorous hope. The dress, Not of a king, but of wild savageness I wear: to testify, Thus seeming a wild beast, how wild am I. No god my worship claims; I do not even know the deities' names: Here they no service nor respect receive; To die and to be born is all that we believe. Now that you know how much you should revere My royal state, say who you are.