TOTTENHAM COURT. A COMEDY [PUBLISHED 1638: PRODUCED 1633]. BY THOMAS NABBS [FLOURISHED 1638]

Lovers Pursued.

WORTHGOOD, BELLAMIE, as travelling together before daylight.

Worth. Come, my Delight; let not such painted griefs

Press down thy soul: the darkness but presents

Shadows of fear: which should secure us best

From danger of pursuit.

Bell. Would it were day!

My apprehension is so full of horror;

I think each sound, the air's light motion
Makes in these thickets, is my Uncle's voice,
Threat'ning our ruins.

Worth. Let his rage persist

To enterprise a vengeance, we'll prevent it.
Wrapt in the arms of Night, that favours Lovers,
We hitherto have 'scaped his eager search;
And are arrived near London. Sure I hear

The Bridge's cataracts, and such-like murmurs

As night and sleep yield from a populous number.

Bell. But when will it be day? the light hath comfort; Our first of useful senses being lost,

The rest are less delighted.

Worth. Th' early Cock

Hath sung his summons to the day's approach:
"Twill instantly appear. Why startled, Bellamie?
Bell. Did no amazing sounds arrive thy ear?

Pray, listen.

Worth. Come, come; 'tis thy fear suggests Illusive fancies. Under Love's protection

We may presume of safety.

(Within.) Follow, follow, follow.

Bell. Aye me, 'tis sure my Uncle; dear Love Worthgood?
Worth. Astonishment hath seiz'd my faculties.

My Love, my Bellamie, ha!

Bell. Dost thou forsake me, Worthgood?

Worth. Where's my Love?

(Exit, as losing him.)

Dart from thy silver crescent one fair beam
Through this black air, thou Governess of Night,
To shew me whither she is led by fear.

Thou envious Darkness, to assist us here,

And then prove fatal!

(Within.) Follow, follow, follow.

Worth. Silence your noise, ye clamorous ministers Of this injustice. Bellamie is lost;

She's lost to me.

Not her fierce Uncle's rage,

Who whets your eager aptness to pursue me

With threats or promises; nor his painted terrors
Of laws' severity; could ever work

Upon the temper of my resolute soul

To soften it to fear, till she was lost.

Not all the illusive horrors, which the night
Presents unto th' imagination,

Taffright a guilty conscience, could possess me,
While I possess'd my Love. The dismal shrieks
Of fatal owls, and groans of dying mandrakes,
Whilst her soft palm warm'd mine, were music to me.-
Their light appears.-No safety does consist

In passion or complaints. Night, let thine arms
Again assist me; and, if no kind minister

Of better fate guide me to Bellamie,

Be thou eternal.

(Within.) Follow, follow, follow.

[Act i., Sc. 1.1]

BELLAMIE, alone, in Marybone Park.

Bell. The day begins to break; and trembling Light,
As if affrighted with this night's disaster,
Steals thro' the farthest air, and by degrees
Salutes my weary longings.2-O, my Worthgood,
Thy presence would have checkt these passions;
And shot delight thro' all the mists of sadness,
To guide my fear safe thro' the paths of danger:
Now [new] fears assault me.-'Tis a woman's voice.
She sings; and in her music's cheerfulness
Seems to express the freedom of a heart,
Not chain'd to any passions.*

Song, within.

3

What a dainty life the Milkmaid leads!

When over the flowery meads

She dabbles in the dew,

And sings to her cow;

And feels not the pain

[Nabbes's Works, ed. Bullen, 1887, vol. i.]

3 [Two lines.]

VOL. IV.-29

2[Two lines omitted.] [Two lines.]

Of Love or Disdain.

She sleeps in the night, tho' she toils in the day,
And merrily passeth her time away.

Bell. Oh, might I change my misery

For such a shape of quiet!1

[Act i., Sc. 3.]

THE [LIFE OF THE] DUCHESS OF SUFFOLK. AN HISTORICAL PLAY [PUBLISHED 1631]. BY T. HEYWOOD [REALLY BY THOMAS DREWE]

A Tragic Pursuit.

The Duchess, with her little child, preparing to escape by night from the relentless persecution of the Romanists.

Duch. (to the Nurse) Give me my child, and mantle ;—now
Heaven's pleasure:

Farewell;-come life or death, I'll hug my treasure.

Nay, chide not, pretty babe ; 2 our enemies come :
Thy crying will pronounce thy mother's doom.

Be thou but still;

This gate may shade us from their envious will.

(A noise of Pursuers. She re-enters.) Duch. Oh fear, what art thou? lend me wings to fly; Direct me in this plunge of misery.

Nature has taught the Child obedience;

Thou hast been humble to thy mother's wish.

O let me kiss these duteous lips of thine,
That would not kill thy mother with a cry.
Now forward, whither heav'n directs; for I
Can guide no better than thine infancy.
Here are two Pilgrims bound for Lyon Quay,
And neither knows one footstep of the way.

(Exit.)

(Ñoise again heard.)

Duch. Return you? then 'tis time to shift me hence.5

(Exit, and presently re-enters.) Duch. Thus far, but heav'n knows where, we have escaped

The eager pursuit of our enemies,

Having for guidance my attentive fear.

1[For another extract from Nabbes, see p. 501.] 2[Two and a half lines omitted.]

"From which place she hopes to embark for Flanders.

[A line.] "[Nine lines.]

What greater pain canst thou inflict on me,
Than still to keep as fire before my face
That lovely beauty, which I have betray'd;
That beauty, I have lost?

NIGHT breaks off her speech.1

[Act v., Sc. 3.]

Night. But stay! for there methinks I see the Sun,

Eternal Painter, now begin to rise,

And limn the heavens in vermilion dye;
And having dipt his pencil, aptly framed,
Already in the colour of the morn,
With various temper he doth mix in one
Darkness and Light: and drawing curiously
Strait golden lines quite thro' the dusky sky,
A rough draught of the day he seems to yield,
With red and tawny in an azure field.—
Already, by the clattering of their bits,

Their gingling harness, and their neighing sounds,

I hear Eous and fierce Pirous

Come panting on my back; and therefore I

Must fly away. And yet I do not fly,
But follow on my regulated course,
And these eternal Orders I received
From the First Mover of the Universe.

[Prologue.]

CHABOT, ADMIRAL OF FRANCE.

A TRAGEDY.

G. CHAPMAN AND J. SHIRLEY [See page 368]

No Advice to Self Advice.

-another's knowledge,

Applied to my instruction, cannot equal

My own soul's knowledge how to inform acts.

The sun's rich radiance shot thro' waves most fair,

Is but a shadow to his beams i' th' air;
His beams that in the air we so admire,
Is but a darkness to his flame in fire;
In fire his fervour but in vapour flies,

1 In the Prologue.

BY

To what his own pure bosom rarefies:
And the Almighty Wisdom having given
Each man within himself an apter light
To guide his acts than any light without him,
(Creating nothing, not in all things equal,)
It seems a fault in any that depend

On others' knowledge, and exile their own.

Virtue under Calumny.

-as in cloudy days we see the Sun

Glide over turrets, temples, richest fields
(All those left dark and slighted in his way);
And on the wretched plight of some poor shed
Pours all the glories of his golden head:
So heavenly Virtue on this envied Lord
Points all his graces.

[Act i., Sc. 1.1]

[Act iv., Sc. 1.]

CÆSAR AND POMPEY. A TRAGEDY, 1631. BY
G. CHAPMAN [See page 72]

Cato's Speech at Utica to a Senator, who had exprest fears on his account.

Away, Statilius; how long shall thy love

Exceed thy knowledge of me, and the Gods,

Whose rights thou wrong'st for my right? have not I

Their powers to guard me in a cause of theirs,

Their justice and integrity to guard me

In what I stand for? he that fears the Gods,

For guard of any goodness, all things fears;

Earth, seas, and air; heav'n; darkness; broad day-light;
Rumour, and silence, and his very shade:

And what an aspen soul has such a creature!

How dangerous to his soul is such a fear!

In whose cold fits, is all Heav'n's justice shaken

To his faint thoughts; and all the goodness there,
Due to all good men by the Gods' own vows;
Nay, by the firmness of their endless being;

1[Edited Dyce, vol. vi.]