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Thy death which is no more.

Thour't not thyself;

For thou exift'ft on many a thousand grains
That issue out of duft. Happy thou art not;
For what thou haft not, still thou striv'st to get;
And what thou haft, forget'ft. Thou art not certain;
For thy complexion fhifts to ftrange effects,
After the moon. If thou art rich, thou'rţ poor;
For, like an ass, whose back with ingots bows,

Thou bear'ft thy heavy riches but a journey,
And death unloadeth thee. Friend thou haft none;
For thy own bowels, which do call thee fire,
The mere effufion of thy proper loins,

To curfe the Gout, Serpigo, and the Rheum,

For ending thee no fooner. Thou haft nor youth nor age;
But as it were an after dinner's fleep,
Dreaming on both; for all thy blessed youth
Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms

Of palfied Eld; and when thou'rt old and rich,
Thou haft neither heat, affection, limb, nor bounty,
To make thy riches pleafant. What's yet in this
That bears the name of life? yet in this life
Lie hid more thousand deaths; yet death we fear,
That makes thefe odds all even.

SHAKESPEARE.

CHAP. XXI.

HOTSPUR's DESCRIPTION OF A FOP.

I REMEMBER, when the fight was done,

When I was dry with rage, and extreme toil,
Breathlefs and faint, leaning upon my fword,

Came

Came there a certain lord, neat trimly dress'd;
Fresh as a bridegroom, and his chin, new reap'd,'
Shew'd like a ftubble-land at harvest home.
He was perfum'd like a milliner ;

And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon
He gave his nofe; and took't away again;
Who therewith angry, when it next came there,
Took it in fnuff.—And still he smil'd and talk’d;
And as the foldiers bare dead bodies by,
He call'd them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a flovenly, unhandsome corfe
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.

With many holiday and lady terms

He question'd me: amongst the reft demanded.
My prifoners, in your majefty's behalf,

I then, all smarting with the wounds; being gall'd
To be fo pefter'd with a popinjay,

Out of my grief, and my impatience,
Anfwer'd, neglectingly, I know not what :

He should, or fhould not; for he made me mad,
To fee him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet,

And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman,

Of guns, and drums, and wounds; (God fave the mark) And telling me the fovereign't thing on earth,

Was parmacity, for an inward bruife;

And that it was great pity, fo it was,
This villainous faltpetre fhould be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd

:

So cowardly and but for these vile guns,

He would himself have been a foldier.

3

CHAP.

CHAP. XXII.

CLARENCE's DREAM.

CLARENCE AND BRAKENBURY.

BRAK. WHY looks your grace fo heavily to-day?

CLAR. O! I have pass'd a miserable night,
So full of ugly fights, of ghaftly dreams,
That as I am a Chriftian faithful man,
I would not spend another such a night,
Though 'twere to buy a world of happy days;
So full of difmal terror was the time.

BRAK. What was your dream, my lord? I pray you

tell me.

CLAR. Methought that I had broken from the Tow'r, And was embark'd to crofs to Burgundy,

And in my company my brother Glo'ster ;

Who from my. cabin tempted me to walk

Upon the hatches. Thence we look'd tow'rd England,
And cited up a thousand heavy times,
During the wars of York and Lancaster,

That had befall'n us. As we pafs'd along

Upon the giddy footing of the hatches,

Methought that Glo'fter ftumbled, and in falling

Struck me (that fought to stay him) overboard,
Into the tumbling billows of the main.

Lord, Lord, methought, what pain it was to drown!
What dreadful noife of waters in my ears!
What fights of ugly death within mine eyes!
I thought I faw a thousand fearful wrecks;

A thou

A thousand men, that fishes gnaw'd upon:

Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Ineftimable ftones, unvalued jewels;

Some lay in dead men's fculls: and in thofe holes
Where eyes did once inhabit, there were crept,
As 'twere in fcorn of eyes, reflecting gems,
That woo'd the flimy bottom of the deep,
And mock'd the dead bones that lay scatter'd by.
BRAK. Had you fuch leisure in the time of death,
To gaze upon the fecrets of the deep.

CLAR. Methought I had; and often did I ftrive
To yield the ghoft; but ftill the envious flood
Kept in my foul, and would not let it forth
To find the empty, vaft, and wand'ring air;
But fmother'd it within my panting bulk,
Which almoft burft to belch it in the fea.

BRAK. Awak'd you not with this fore agony
CLAR. No, no; my dream was lengthen'd after life :
O then became the tempeft to my foul!

I pafs'd, methought, the melancholy flood,
With that grim ferryman which poets write of,
Unto the kingdom of perpetual Night.

The first that there did greet my stranger-soul,
Was my great father-in-law, renowned Warwick,
Who cry'd aloud" What fcourge for perjury
Can this dark monarchy afford falfe Clarence ?”
And so he vanish'd. Then came wand'ring by
A fhadow like an angel, with bright hair
Dabbled in blood, and he fhriek'd out aloud.
"Clarence is come! falfe, fleeting, perjured Clarence,
That stabb'd me in the field by Tewksbury;

Seize on him, furies, take him to your torments!'
!"

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With that, methought, a legion of foul fiends
- Environ'd me, and howled in mine ears
Such hideous cries, that with the very noise
I trembling wak'd; and for a season after
Could not believe but that I was in hell:
Such terrible impreffion made my dream.

BRAK. No marvel, lord, that it affrighted you;
I am afraid, methinks, to hear you tell it.

CLAR. Ah, Brakenbury! I have done those things
That now give evidence against my foul,

For Edward's fake; and see how he requites me!
O God! if my deep prayers cannot appease thee,
But thou wilt be aveng'd on my misdeeds,

Yet execute thy wrath on me alone :

O fpare my guiltlefs wife, and my poor children!
I pr'ythee, Brakenbury, ftay by me :

My foul is heavy, and I fain would fleep.

SHAKSPEARE.

CHAP. XXIII.

QUEEN MA B.

THEN I fee Queen Mab hath been with

She is the Fancy's midwife, and she comes
In fhape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman;
Drawn by a team of little atomies,
Athwart men's noses as they lie afleep;

you,

Her waggon spokes made of long spinner's legs;
The cover of the wings of grasshoppers;
The traces of the smallest spider's web;
The collars of the moonshine's watery beams;

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