KING. Every torment that doth dwell For ever with the thirsty fiends of hell -- Dark brood of that dread mother, The seven-necked snake, whose poisoned breath doth smother The fourth celestial sphere; In fine, its horror and its misery drear Within me reach so far, That I myself upon myself make war, When in the arms of sleep A living corse am I, for it doth keep Such mastery o'er my life, that, as I dream, A pale foreshadowing threat of coming death I seem. POLONIA. How could a dream, my lord, provoke you so? KING. Alas! my daughters, listen, you shall know. From out the lips of a most lovely youth (And though a miserable slave, in sooth I dare not hurt him, and I speak his praise), Well, from the mouth of a poor slave, a blaze Of lambent lustre came, Which mildly burned in rays of gentlest flame; Till reaching you, The living fire at once consumed ye two. I stood betwixt ye both, and though I sought To stay its fury, the strange fire would not Molest or wound me, passing like the wind, So that despairing, blind, I woke from out a deep abysm Of dream, a lethargy, a paroxysm; But find my pains the same, For still it seems to me I see that flame, And flying, at every turn See you consumed; but now I also burn.* [footnote] *The Dream of Egerius, as given by Calderon, agrees substantially with Jocelin's description, and differs only in one slight particular (the number of the flames) from that in Montalvan's "Vida y Purgatorio de San Patricio". In the latter, the name of the Irish prince to whom Patrick was sold is not given; in Jocelin he is called "Milcho." Calderon was either ignorant of this, and gave the king a name that was purely imaginary, or, considering it less musical than he would wish, gave him the more harmonious one of Egerio. The following is Jocelin's version: "And Milcho beheld a vision in the night: and behold Patrick entered his palace as all on fire, and the flames, issuing from his mouth, and from his nose, and from his eyes, and from his ears, seemed to burn him; but Milcho repelled from himself the flaming hair of the boy, nor did it prevail to touch him any nearer; but the flame, being spread, turned aside to the right and catching on his two little daughters, who were lying in one bed, burned them even to ashes: then the south wind blowing strongly dispersed their ashes over many parts of Ireland." -- "Jocelin's Life of St. Patrick, translated by Swift" (Dublin, 1804), pp. 17, 18. LESBIA. Light phantoms these, Chimeras which an entrance find with ease Into the dreamer's brain. [A trumpet sounds. But wherefore sounds this trumpet? CAPTAIN. It is plain Ships are approaching to our port below.