TAMBURLAINE THE GREAT. Part the First. THE PROLOGUE. FROM jigging veins of rhyming mother wits, And then applaud his fortune as you please. ZENOCRATE, Daughter of the Soldan of Egypt. ZABINA, Empress of the Turks. EBEA, her Maid. Virgins of Damascus. 1 There is no list of characters in the old copies. TAMBURLAINE THE GREAT. Part the First. ACT THE FIRST. SCENE I. Enter MYCETES, COSROE, MEANDER, THERIDAMAS, ORTYGIUS, CENEUS, MENAPHON, with others. Myc. Brother Cosroe, I find myself aggrieved, For it requires a great and thundering speech: Cos. Unhappy Persia, that in former age. To shed their 1 influence in his fickle brain! Now Turks and Tartars shake their swords at thee, Myc. Brother, I see your meaning well enough, But I refer me to my noblemen That know my wit, and can be witnesses. I might command you to be slain for this: Meand. Not for so small a fault, my sovereign lord. Myc. I mean it not, but yet I know I might; Yet live; yea live, Mycetes wills it so. 20 Meander, thou, my faithful counsellor, Declare the cause of my conceivèd grief, Which is, God knows, about that Tamburlaine, 30 That, like a fox in midst of harvest time, And, as I hear, doth mean to pull my plumes: 1 Old copies "his." 40 But ere he march in Asia, or display His vagrant ensign in the Persian fields, Your Grace hath taken order by Theridamas, And bring him captive to your Highness' throne. Lord, Whom I may term a Damon for thy love: Therefore 'tis best, if so it like you all, To send my thousand horse incontinent1 How like you this, my honourable Lords? Cos. It cannot choose because it comes from you. The hope of Persia, and the very legs That holds us up, and foils our neighbour foes: Ther. Before the moon renew her borrowed light, But Tamburlaine and that Tartarian rout, 1 Immediately.. 50 бо 70 |