ACT IV. SCENE I.

_The Governor's Palace._

ANTONINUS _on a couch, asleep, with Doctors about him_; SAPRITIUS _and_ MACRINUS.

_Sap._ O you, that are half gods, lengthen that life Their deities lend us; turn o'er all the volumes Of your mysterious Æsculapian science, T' increase the number of this young man's days: And, for each minute of his time prolong'd, Your fee shall be a piece of Roman gold With Cæsar's stamp, such as he sends his captains When in the wars they earn well: do but save him, And, as he's half myself, be you all mine.

_1 Doct._ What art can do, we promise; physic's hand As apt is to destroy as to preserve, If heaven make not the med'cine: all this while, Our skill hath combat held with his disease; But 'tis so arm'd, and a deep melancholy, To be such in part with death, we are in fear The grave must mock our labours.

_Mac._ I have been His keeper in this sickness, with such eyes As I have seen my mother watch o'er me. Stand by his pillow, and, in his broken slumbers, Him shall you hear cry out on Dorothea; And, when his arms fly open to catch her, Closing together, he falls fast asleep, Pleased with embracings of her airy form. Physicians but torment him; his disease Laughs at their gibberish language: let him hear The voice of Dorothea, nay, but the name, He starts up with high colour in his face: She, or none, cures him; and how that can be, The princess' strict command barring that happiness, To me impossible seems.

_Sap._ To me it shall not; I'll be no subject to the greatest Cæsar Was ever crown'd with laurel, rather than cease To be a father. [_Exit._

_Mac._ Silence, sir; he wakes.

_Anton._ Thou kill'st me, Dorothea; oh, Dorothea!

_Mac._ She's here

_Anton._ Here! Where? Why do you mock me, sir? Age on my head hath stuck no white hairs yet, Yet I'm an old man, a fond doting fool Upon a woman. I, to buy her beauty, (In truth I am bewitch'd) offer my life, And she, for my acquaintance, hazards hers: Yet, for our equal sufferings, none holds out A hand of pity.

_1 Doct._ Let him have some music.

_Anton._ Hell on your fiddling! [_Starting from his couch._

_1 Doct._ Take again your bed, sir; Sleep is a sovereign physic.

_Anton._ Confusion on your fooleries! Where's the rest Thy pills and base apothecary drugs Threaten'd to bring unto me? Out, you impostors! Quacksalving, cheating mountebanks! your skill Is to make sound men sick, and sick men kill.

_Mac._ Oh, be yourself, dear friend.

_Anton._ Myself, Macrinus! How can I be myself, when I am mangled Into a thousand pieces? here moves my head, But where's my heart? wherever--that lies dead.

_Re-enter_ SAPRITIUS, _dragging in_ DOROTHEA _by the hair_, ANGELO _following_.

_Sap._ Follow me, thou damn'd sorceress! Call up thy spirits, And, if they can, now let them from my hand Untwine these witching hairs.

_Anton._ I am that spirit: Or, if I be not, were you not my father, One made of iron should hew that hand in pieces, That so defaces this sweet monument Of my love's beauty.

_Sap._ Art thou sick?

_Anton._ To death.

_Sap._ Would'st thou recover?

_Anton._ Would I live in bliss!

_Sap._ And do thine eyes shoot daggers at that man That brings thee health?

_Anton._ It is not in the world.

_Sap._ It's here.

_Anton._ To treasure, by enchantment lock'd In caves as deep as hell, am I as near.

_1 Doct._ Shall the boy stay, sir?

_Sap._ No matter for the boy. [_Exeunt_ SAP. MAC. _and Doct._

_Dor._ O, guard me, angels! What tragedy must begin now?

_Anton._ When a tiger Leaps into a timorous herd, with ravenous jaws, Being hunger-starved, what tragedy then begins?

_Dor._ Death; I am happy so: you, hitherto, Have still had goodness sphered within your eyes; Let not that orb be broken.

_Ang._ Fear not, mistress; If he dare offer violence, we two Are strong enough for such a sickly man.

_Dor._ What is your horrid purpose, sir? your eye Bears danger in it.

_Anton._ I must----

_Dor._ Oh, kill me, [_Kneels._ And heaven will take it as a sacrifice; But, if you play the ravisher, there is A hell to swallow you.

_Anton._ Rise:--for the Roman empire, Dorothea, I would not wound thine honour. My father's will Would have me seize upon you, as my prey; Which I abhor, as much as the blackest sin The villany of man did ever act. [SAPRITIUS _breaks in with_ MACRINUS.

_Dor._ Die happy for this language!

_Sap._ Die a slave, A blockish idiot!

_Mac._ Dear sir, vex him not.

_Sap._ Yes, and vex thee too: where's this lamia[46]?

_Dor._ I'm here; do what you please.

_Sap._ Spurn her to the bar.

_Dor._ Come, boy, being there, more near to heaven we are.

_Sap._ Kick harder; go out, witch! [_Exeunt._

_Anton._ O bloody hangmen! Thine own gods give thee breath! Each of thy tortures is my several death. [_Exit._

FOOTNOTE:

[46] _Lamia_,] i. e. _sorceress_, _hag_. The word is pure Latin.