Seb.
As in a dream,
I see thee here, and scarce believe mine eyes.
Dor. Is it so strange to find me where my wrongs,
And your inhuman tyranny, have sent me?
Think not you dream; or, if you did, my injuries
Shall call so loud, that lethargy should wake;
And death should give you back to answer me.
A thousand nights have brush'd their balmy wings
Over these eyes; but ever, when they closed,
Your tyrant image forced them ope again,
And dried the dews they brought.
The long-expected hour is come at length,
By manly vengeance to redeem my fame;
And, that once cleared, eternal sleep is welcome.
Seb. I have not yet forgot I am a king,
Whose royal office is redress of wrongs;
If I have wronged thee, charge me face to face;
I have not yet forgot I am a soldier.
Dor. 'Tis the first justice thou hast ever done me; Then, tho' I loath this woman's war of tongue, Yet shall my cause of vengeance first be clear; And, Honour, be thou judge.
Seb. Honour, befriend us both.
Beware! I warn thee yet to tell thy griefs
In terms becoming majesty to hear:
I warn thee thus, because I know thy temper
Is insolent and haughty to superiors:
How often hast thou brav'd my peaceful court,
Fill'd it with noisy brawls, and windy boasts;
And with past service, nauseously repeated,
Reproached even me, thy prince!
Dor. And well I might, when you forgot reward.
I must and will reproach thee with my service,
Tyrant! (it irks me so to call my prince)
But just resentment and hard usage coined
Th' unwilling word; and, grating as it is,
Take it, for 'tis thy due.
Seb.
How, tyrant!
Dor.
Tyrant!
Seb. Traitor that name thou canst not echo back; That robe of infamy, that circumcision
Ill hid beneath that robe, proclaim thee traitor :
And, if a name
More foul than traitor be, 'tis renegade.
Dor. If I'm a traitor, think, and blush, thou tyrant, Whose injuries betrayed me into treason.
Seb. Thy old presumptuous arrogance again,
That bred my first dislike, and then my loathing.
Once more be warn'd, and know me for thy king.
Dor. Too well I know thee, but for king no more:
This is not Lisbon, nor the circle this,
Where, like a statue, thou hast stood besieged
By sycophants and fools, the growth of courts;
Where thy gull'd eyes in all the gaudy round
Met nothing but a lie in every face;
And the gross flattery of a gaping crowd,
Envious who first should catch and first applaud
The stuff or royal nonsense; when I spoke,
My honest homely words were carped and censured,
For want of courtly style related actions,
Though modestly reported, passed for boasts;
Secure of merit, if I ask reward,
Thy hungry minions thought their rights invaded,
And the bread snatched from worthless parisites.
Henriquez answered, with a ready lie,
To save his king's, the boon was begged before.
Seb. What say'st thou of Henriquez ?
Thou mov'st me more by barely naming him,
Than all thy foul unmannered scurril taunts.
Dor. And therefore 'twas to gall thee, that I nam'd him, That thing, that nothing but a cringe and smile.
Seb. I meant thee a reward of greater worth.
Dor. When justice wanted, could reward be hoped?
Could the rob'd passenger expect a bounty
From those rapacious hands who stripp'd him first?
Seb. He had my promise, ere I knew thy love.
Dor. My services deserved thou shouldst revoke it.
Seb. Thy insolence had cancell'd all thy service;
To violate my laws, even in my court,
Sacred to peace, and safe from all affronts ;
Even to my face, and done in my despite,
Under the wing of awful majesty,
To strike the man I lov'd! So was I forced
To do a sovereign justice to myself,
And spurn thee from my presence.
Dor.
Thou hast dared
To tell me what I durst not tell myself;
I durst not think that I was spurn'd, and live;
And live to hear it boasted to my face;
All my long avarice of honour lost,
Heaped up in youth, and hoarded up for age;
Has honour's fountain then sucked back the stream?
He has; and hooting boys may dryshod pass,
And gather pebbles from the naked ford.
Give me my love, my honour; give them back:
Give me revenge while I have breath to ask it.
Seb. Now by this honoured order which I wear, More gladly would I give than thou dar'st ask it: Nor shall the sacred character of king
Be urged to shield me from thy bold appeal.
If I have injured thee, that makes us equal:
The wrong, if done, debased me down to thee.
But thou hast charg'd me with ingratitude; .
Hast thou not charged me? Speak.
Thou know'st I have:
Dor.
If thou disown'st that imputation, draw,
And prove my charge a lie.
Seb. No; to disprove that charge I must not draw : Be conscious to thy worth, and tell thy soul What thou hast done this day in my defence; To fight thee after this, what where it else Than owning that ingratitude thou urgest? That isthmus stands between two rushing seas; Which mounting view each other from afar, And strive in vain to meet.
Dor.
I'll cut that isthmus : Thou know'st I meant not to preserve thy life, But to reprieve it for my own revenge.
I saved thee out of honourable malice:
Now draw; I should be loth to think thou dar'st not:
Beware of such another vile excuse.
Beware of patience too! That's a suspicious word; it had been proper, Before thy foot had spurned me; now 'tis base : Yet to disarm thee of thy last defence,
I have thy oath for my security:
The only boon I begg'd was this fair combat;
Fight, or be perjur'd now; that's all thy choice.
Seb. Now can I thank thee as thou wouldst be thank'd:
Never was vow of honour better paid,
If my true sword but hold, than this shall be.
Go; bear my message to Henriquez' ghost,
And say his master and his friend reveng'd him.
Dor. His ghost! then is my hated rival dead? Seb. The question is beside our present purpose. Thou seest me ready; we delay too long.
Dor. A minute is not much in either's life, When there's but one betwixt us; throw it in, And give it him of us who is to fall.
:
Seb. He's dead make haste, and thou may'st yet o'ertake him.
Dor. When I was hasty, thou delay'st me longer.
I pr'ythee let me hedge one moment more
Into thy promise: for thy life preserved,
Be kind and tell me how that rival died,
Whose death, next thine, I wished.
Seb. If it would please thee, thou shouldst never know:
But thou, like jealousy, inquir'st a truth,
Which found, will torture thee: he died in fight;
Fought next my person, as in concert fought;
Kept pace for pace, and blow for every blow;
Save when he heav'd his shield in my defence,
And on his naked side received my wound:
Then, when he could no more, he fell at once,
But roll'd his falling body cross their way,
And made a bulwark of it for his prince.
Dor. I never can forgive him such a death!
Seb.
Confess, proud spirit,
(For I will have it from thy very mouth)
That better he deserved my love than thou.
Dor. For you he fought and died; I fought against you:
Through all the mazes of the bloody field
Hunted your sacred life; which that I miss'd
Was the propitious error of my fate,
Not of my soul; my soul's a regicide.
Seb. Thou might'st have given it a more gentle name: Thou mean'st to kill a tyrant, not a king. Speak, didst thou not, Alonzo?
Dor.
Can I speak?
Alas, I cannot answer to Alonzo:
No, Dorax cannot answer to Alonzo:
Alonzo was too kind a name for me.
Then, when I fought and conquer'd with your arms,
In that blest age I was the man you named;
Till rage and pride debased me into Dorax;
And lost, like Lucifer, my name above.
Seb. Yet twice this day I owed my life to Dorax.
Dor. I saved you but to kill you: there's my grief.
Seb. Nay, if thou canst be grieved, thou canst repent: Thou couldst not be a villain, tho' thou would'st: Thou own'st too much in owning thou hast erred: And I too little, who provoked thy crime.
Dor. O, stop this, headlong torrent of your goodness!
It comes too fast upon a feeble soul,
Half-drown'd in tears before; spare my confusion,
For pity spare, and say not first you err'd.
For yet I have not dar'd, through guilt and shame,
To throw myself beneath your royal feet.
Now spurn this rebel, this proud renegade;
'Tis just you should, nor will I more complain.
Seb. Indeed thou shouldst not ask forgiveness first,
But thou prevent'st me still in all that's noble.
Here let me ever hold thee in my arms;
And all our quarrels be but such as these,
Who shall love best, and closest shall embrace :
Be what Henriquez was—
s-be my Alonzo.
Dor. What, my Alonzo, said you? my Alonzo!
Let my tears thank you, for I cannot speak;
And if I could,
Words were not made to vent such thoughts as mine.
ANTONY-VENTIDIUS.....Ibid.
Antony. ART thou Ventidius?
Ventidius.
I'm liker what I was, than you to him
When that I left you last.
I'm angry.
I would be private: leave me.
Ant.
Ven. Sir, I love you,
And therefore will not leave you.
Ant. Will not leave me?
Where have you learnt that answer? Who am I?
Ven. My emperor: the man I love next Heaven.
If I said more, I think 'twere scarce a sin
You're all that's good and noble.
Ant.
All that's wretched.
You will not leave me, then?
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