And like a harpy tires1 on my life.

50

Theridamas and Tamburlaine, I die :

And fearful vengeance light upon you both!

[COSROE dies.-TAMBURLAINE takes the crown and puts it on.

Tamb. Not all the curses which the 2 furies breathe, Shall make me leave so rich a prize as this.

Theridamas, Techelles, and the rest,

Who think you now is king of Persia?

All. Tamburlaine! Tamburlaine !

Tamb. Though Mars himself, the angry god of arms, And all the earthly potentates conspire

To dispossess me of this diadem,

Yet will I wear it in despite of them,

As great commander of this eastern world,

If you but say that Tamburlaine shall reign.

All. Long live Tamburlaine and reign in Asia!
Tamb. So now it is more surer on my head,
Than if the gods had held a Parliament,
And all pronounced me king of Persia.

60

[Exeunt.

1 Preys.

2 So 4to.-8vo. "thy."

ACT THE THIRD.

SCENE I.

Enter BAJAZETH, the Kings of FEZ, MOROCCO, and ARGIER, with others in great pomp.

Baj. Great kings of Barbary and my portly bassoes,1
We hear the Tartars and the eastern thieves,
Under the conduct of one Tamburlaine,
Presume a bickering with your emperor,
And think to rouse us from our dreadful siege
Of the famous Grecian Constantinople.
You know our army is invincible;

As many circumcisèd Turks we have,
And warlike bands of Christians renied,2

As hath the ocean or the Terrene sea
Small drops of water when the moon begins
To join in one her semicircled horns.

Yet would we not be braved with foreign power,
Nor raise our siege before the Grecians yield,
Or breathless lie before the city walls.

10

1 The old form of Pashas.

2 I.e. Christians who have abjured their faith. Dyce compares a passage of Sir John Maundevile (p. 209, ed. 1725) :—“And that Ydole is the God of false Christen that han reneyed hire feythe."

K. of Fez. Renowmèd emperor, and mighty general,
What, if you sent the bassoes of your guard
To charge him to remain in Asia,

Or else to threaten death and deadly arms
As from the mouth of mighty Bajazeth.

Baj. Hie thee, my basso, fast to Persia,
Tell him thy lord, the Turkish emperor,
Dread lord of Afric, Europe, and Asia,
Great king and conqueror of Græcia,
The ocean Terrene, and the Coal-black sea,
The high and highest monarch of the world
Wills and commands (for say not I entreat),
Not once to set his foot on Africa,

Or spread his colours [once] in Græcia,
Lest he incur the fury of my wrath.
Tell him I am content to take a truce,
Because I hear he bears a valiant mind:
But if, presuming on his silly power,
He be so mad to manage arms with me,
Then
stay thou with him; say, I bid thee so:
And if, before the sun have measured heaven
With triple circuit, thou regreet us not,
We mean to take his morning's next arise
For messenger he will not be reclaimed,

And mean to fetch thee in despite of him.

Bas. Most great and puissant monarch of the earth, Your basso will accomplish your behest,

And show your pleasure to the Persian,
As fits the legate of the stately Turk.

VOL. I.

20

30

40

[Exit BAS.

D

Arg. They say he is the king of Persia ;
But, if he dare attempt to stir your siege,
'Twere requisite he should be ten times more,
For all flesh quakes at your magnificence.

Baj. True, Argier; and tremble[s] at my looks.

K. of Mor. The spring is hindered by your smother

ing host,

For neither rain can fall upon the earth,

Nor sun reflex1 his virtuous beams thereon,
The ground is mantled with such multitudes.
Baj. All this is true as holy Mahomet;

50

And all the trees are blasted with our breaths. K. of Fez. What thinks your greatness best to be achieved

In pursuit of the city's overthrow?

Baj. I will the captive pioners 2 of Argier

Cut off the water that by leaden pipes
Runs to the city from the mountain Carnon.

60

Two thousand horse shall forage up and down,

That no relief or succour come by land:

And all the sea my gallies countermand.

Then shall our footmen lie within the trench,

And with their cannons mouthed like Orcus' gulf,
Batter the walls, and we will enter in ;

And thus the Grecians shall be conquerèd.

[Exeunt.

1 Cf. iv. 4, l. 2, "Reflexing hues of blood upon their heads."

2 The old form (found in Shakespeare, Milton, &c.) of "pioneers."

SCENE II.

Enter ZENOCRATE, Agydas, AnIPPE, with others.

Agyd. Madam Zenocrate, may I presume
To know the cause of these unquiet fits,
That work such trouble to your wonted rest?
'Tis more than pity such a heavenly face
Should by heart's sorrow wax so wan and pale,
When your offensive rape by Tamburlaine,
(Which of your whole displeasures should be most,)
Hath seemed to be digested long ago.

Zeno. Although it be digested long ago,
As his exceeding favours have deserved,
And might content the Queen of Heaven, as well
As it hath changed my first conceived disdain,
Yet since a farther passion feeds my thoughts
With ceaseless and disconsolate conceits,
Which dyes my looks so lifeless as they are,
And might, if my extremes had full events,
Make me the ghastly counterfeit1 of death.
Agyd. Eternal heaven sooner be dissolved,
And all that pierceth Phoebus' silver eye,
Before such hap fall to Zenocrate!

Zeno. Ah, life and soul, still hover in his breast
And leave my body senseless as the earth.

Or else unite you to his life and soul,

That I may live and die with Tamburlaine !

1 Image, picture.