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On whose most sovereign Æsculapian hand, Fame, with her richest miracles, attends; Be fortunate, as ever heretofore,

That we may quite thee both with gold and honour,

And by thy happy means have power to make

My son and his much injured love amends, Whose well-proportion'd choice we now applaud,

And bless all those that ever further'd it. Where is your discreet usher, my good lord,

The special furtherer of this equal match? Ju. Brought after by a couple of your guard.

Al. Let him be fetch'd, that we may do him grace.

Po. I'll fetch him, my lord; away, you must not go. Oh, here he comes. Oh, master Usher, I am sorry for you: you must presently be chopped in pieces.

Ba. Woe to that wicked prince that e'er

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twixt you two; did not you think so, my Lord Vincentio? Lord uncle, did not I say at first of the duke: " Will his antiquity never leave his iniquity?"

St. Go to, too much of this; but ask this lord if he did like it.

Po. Who, my Lord Medice?

St. Lord Stinkard, man, his name is. Ask him. Lord Stinkard, did you like the match? Say.

Po. My Lord Stinkard, did you like the match betwixt the duke and my Lady Margaret?

Me. Presumptuous sycophant! I will have thy life.

Al. Unworthy lord, put up thirst'st thou more blood?

Thy life is fittest to be call'd in question For thy most murtherous cowardice on my

son;

Thy forwardness to every cruelty
Calls thy pretended noblesse in suspect.

St. Noblesse, my lord? set by your princely favour

That gave the lustre to his painted state, Who ever view'd him but with deep contempt,

As reading vileness in his very looks? And if he prove not son of some base drudge,

Trimm'd up by Fortune, being disposed to jest

And dally with your state, then that good angel

That by divine relation spake in me, Foretelling these foul dangers to your son, And without notice brought this reverend

man

To rescue him from death, now fails my tongue,

And I'll confess I do him open wrong.

Me. And so thou dost; and I return all note

Of infamy or baseness on thy throat:
Damn me, my lord, if I be not a lord.

St. My liege, with all desert, even now
you said

His life was duly forfeit, for the death Which in these barbarous wounds he sought your son;

Vouchsafe me then his life, in my friend's right,

For many ways I know he merits death; Which (if you grant) will instantly appear, And that I feel with some rare miracle.

Al. His life is thine, Lord Strozza; give him death.

Me. What, my lord,

Will your grace cast away an innocent life?

St. Villain, thou liest; thou guilty art of death

A hundred ways, which now I'll execute. Me. Recall your word, my lord.

Al. Not for the world.

St. Oh, my dear liege, but that my spirit prophetic

Hath inward feeling of such sins in him
As ask the forfeit of his life and soul,

I would, before I took his life, give leave
To his confession, and his penitence :
Oh, he would tell you most notorious
wonders

Of his most impious state; but life and soul
Must suffer for it in him, and my hand
Forbidden is from heaven to let him live
Till by confession he may have forgive-

ness.

Die therefore, monster.

Vi. Oh, be not so uncharitable, sweet friend,

Let him confess his sins, and ask heaven pardon.

St. He must not, princely friend; it is heaven's justice

To plague his life and soul, and here's heaven's justice.

Me. Oh, save my life, my lord.
La. Hold, good Lord Strozza.

Let him confess the sins that heaven hath told you,

And ask forgiveness.

Me. Let me, good my lord,

And I'll confess what you accuse me of; Wonders indeed, and full of damn'd deserts. St. I know it, and I must not let thee live To ask forgiveness.

Al. But you shall, my lord,

Or I will take his life out of your hand.
St. A little then I am content, my liege:
Is thy name Medice?

Me. No, my noble lord,
My true name is Mendice.

St. Mendice? see,

At first a mighty scandal done to honour. Of what country art thou?

Me. Of no country I,

But born upon the seas, my mother passing "Twixt Zant and Venice.

St. Where wert thou christen'd?
Me. I was never christen'd,

A captain of the gipsies entertain'd me, And many years I lived a loose life with them.

At last I was so favour'd, that they made me The king of gipsies; and being told my fortune

By an old sorceress that I should be great In some great Prince's love, I took the

treasure

Which all our company of gipsies had
In many years by several stealths collected;
And leaving them in wars, I lived abroad
With no less show than now; and my last
wrong

I did to noblesse, was in this high Court. Al. Never was heard so strange a counterfeit.

St. Didst thou not cause me to be shot in hunting?

Me. I did, my lord; for which, for heaven's love, pardon.

St. Now let him live, my lord; his blood's least drop

Would stain your Court, more than the sea could cleanse;

His soul's too foul to expiate with death.

Al. Hence then; be ever banish'd from my rule,

And live a monster, loathed of all the world. Po. I'll get boys and bait him out a' th' Court, my lord.

Al. Do so, I pray thee; rid me of his sight. Po. Come on, my Lord Stinkard, I'll play Fo, Fox, come out of thy hole with you, i'faith.

Me. I'll run and hide me from the sight of heaven.

Po. Fox, fox, go out of thy hole; a twolegged fox, a two-legged fox!

[Exit with Pages beating Medice. Be. Never was such an accident disclosed. Al. Let us forget it, honourable friends, And satisfy all wrongs with my son's right, In solemn marriage of his love and him.

Vi. I humbly thank your highness: honour'd doctor,

The balsam you infused into my wounds, Hath eased me much, and given me sudden strength

Enough t'assure all danger is exempt
That any way may let the general joy

But being brought up with beggars, call'd My princely father speaks of in our nuptials.

Mendice.

Al. Strange and unspeakable!

St. How camest thou then

To bear the port thou didst, entering this Court?

Me. My lord, when I was young, being able-limb'd,

Al. Which, my dear son, shall, with thy full recure,

Be celebrate in greater majesty
Than ever graced our greatest ancestry.
Then take thy love, which heaven with all
joys bless,

And make ye both mirrors of happiness.

Monsieur D'Olive.*

Monsieur D'Olive. Philip, the Duke.

S. Anne, count.

Vaumont, count.
Vandome.
Rhoderique.
Mugeron.

ACTORS.

Pacque,

Dicque, } two pages.

Gueaquin, the Duchess. Hieronime, lady. Marcellina, countess.

Eurione, her sister.

ACT THE FIRST.

SCENE I.

Vandome, with servants and sailors laden.

Vaumont, another way walking.

Va. Convey your carriage to my brotherin-law's,

The Earl of Saint Anne, to whom and to my sister

Commend my humble service; tell them both

Of my arrival, and intent t'attend them: When in my way I have perform'd fit duties

To Count Vaumont, and his most honour'd Countess.

Ser. We will, sir; this way; follow, honest
sailors.
[Exeunt Servants.
Va. Our first observance, after any
absence,

Must be presented ever to our mistress;
As at our parting she should still be last.
Hine Amor ut circulus, from hence 'tis
said

That love is like a circle, being th'efficient
And end of all our actions; which excited
By no worse object than my matchless

mistress

Were worthy to employ us to that likeness;

"Monsieur D'Olive. A Comedie, as it vvas sundrie times acted by her Maiesties children at the Blacke-Friers. By George Chapman. London Printed by T. C. for William Holmes, and are to be sold at his Shop in Saint Dumstons Church-yard in Fleete-streete, 1606." VOL. I.

And be the only ring our powers should beat.

Noble she is by birth, made good by virtue,
Exceeding fair, and her behaviour to it
Is like a singular musician

To a sweet instrument, or else as doctrine
Is to the soul that puts it into act,
And prints it full of admirable forms,
Without which 'twere an empty idle flame.
Her eminent judgment to dispose these
parts

Sits on her brow and holds a silver sceptre, With which she keeps time to the several musics

Placed in the sacred consort of her beauties:

Love's complete armoury is managed in her,

To stir affection, and the discipline
To check and to affright it from attempting
Any attaint might disproportion her,
Or make her graces less than circular.
Yet her even carriage is as far from coy-

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But (knowing in her, more than women's judgment,

That she should nothing wrong her husband's right,

To use a friend only for virtue, chosen With all the rights of friendship) took such

care

After the solemn parting to your travel, And spake of you with such exceeding passion,

That I grew jealous, and with rage excepted

Against her kindness, utterly forgetting I should have weigh'd so rare a woman's words,

As duties of a free and friendly justice; Not as the headstrong and incontinent

vapours,

Of other ladies' bloods, enflamed with lust,
Wherein I injured both your innocencies,
Which I approve, not out of flexible
dotage

By any cunning flatteries of my wife,
But in impartial equity, made apparent
Both by mine own well-weigh'd com-
parison

Of all her other manifest perfections
With this one only doubtful levity,
And likewise by her violent apprehension
Of her deep wrong and yours, for she hath
vow'd,

Never to let the common pandress light
(Or any doom as vulgar) censure her
In any action she leaves subject to them.
Never to fit the day with her attire,
Nor grace it with her presence, nourish in
it,

(Unless with sleep), nor stir out of her chamber;

And so hath muffled and mew'd up her beauties

In never-ceasing darkness, never sleeping But in the day transform'd by her to night,

With all sun banish'd from her smother'd graces;

And thus my dear and most unmatched wife,

That was a comfort and a grace to me,
In every judgment, every company,

I, by false jealousy, have no less than lost,

Murther'd her living, and entomb'd her quick.

Va. Conceit it not so deeply, good my lord,

Your wrong to me or her was no fit ground To bear so weighty and resolved a vow From her incensed and abused virtues.

Vau. There could not be a more im-
portant cause

To fill her with a ceaseless hate of light,
To see it grace gross lightness with full
beams,

And frown on continence with her oblique
glances :

As nothing equals right to virtue done,
So is her wrong past all comparison.

Va. Virtue is not malicious, wrong done
her

Is righted ever when men grant they err,
But doth my princely mistress so contemn
The glory of her beauties, and the applause
Given to the worth of her society,
To let a voluntary vow obscure them?

Vau. See all her windows and her
doors made fast,

And in her chamber lights for night en-
flamed;

Now others rise, she takes her to her bed.
Va. This news is strange, heaven grant
I be encounter'd

With better tidings of my other friends,
Let me be bold, my lord, t'inquire the
state

Of my dear sister, in whose self and me
Survives the whole hope of our family,
Together with her dear and princely hus-
band,

Th' Earl of Saint Anne.

Vau. Unhappy that I am,

I would to heaven your most welcome steps

Had brought you first upon some other friend,

To be the sad relator of the changes Chanced in your three years' most lamented absence.

Your worthy sister, worthier far of heaven Than this unworthy hell of passionate earth,

Is taken up amongst her fellow stars.

Va. Unhappy man that ever I return'd, And perish'd not ere these news pierced mine ears.

Vau. Nay, be not you that teach men comfort, grieved;

I know your judgment will set willing
shoulders

To the known burthens of necessity,
And teach your wilful brother patience,
Who strives with death, and from his
caves of rest

Retains his wife's dead corse amongst the
living;

For with the rich sweets of restoring balms
He keeps her looks as fresh as if she lived,
And in his chamber (as in life attired)

She in a chair sits leaning on her arm,
As if she only slept ; and at her feet
He, like a mortified hermit clad,
Sits weeping out his life, as having lost
All his life's comfort; and that she being
dead

(Who was his greatest part) he must

consume,

As in an apoplexy strook with death.

| Nor can the duke nor duchess comfort him,

Nor messengers with consolatory letters From the kind King of France, who is allied

To her and you. But to lift all his thoughts

Up to another world where she expects
him,

He feeds his ears with soul-exciting music,
Solemn and tragical, and so resolves
In those sad accents to exhale his soul.

Va. Oh, what a second ruthless sea of
woes,

Wracks me within my haven, and on the shore.

What shall I do? mourn, mourn, with
them that mourn,

And make my greater woes their less expel.
This day I'll consecrate to sighs and tears,
And this next even, which is my mistress'
morning,

I'll greet her, wondering at her wilful
humours,

And with rebukes, breaking out of my love

And duty to her honour, make her see How much her too much curious virtue wrongs her.

Vau. Said like the man the world hath ever held you,

Welcome, as new lives to us our good,

now,

Shall wholly be ascribed and trust to you. [Exeunt.

Enter Rhoderique and Mugeron. Mu. See, see, the virtuous countess hath bidden our day good night; her stars are now visible. When was any lady seen to be so constant in her vow, and able to forbear the society of men so sincerely?

Rh. Never in this world, at least exceeding seldom. What shame it is for men to see women so far surpass them; for when was any man known (out of judgment) to perform so staid an abstinence from the society of women? Mu. Never in this world.

Rh. What an excellent creature an

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