When instantly I plung'd into the sea,
Aud buffeting the billows to her rescue,
Redeem'd her life with half the loss of mine.
Like a rich conquest, in one hand I bore her,
And with the other dash'd the saucy waves,
That throng'd and press'd to rob me of my prize.
I brought her, gave her to your despairing arms:
Indeed you thank'd me; but a nobler gratitude
Rose in her soul: for from that hour she lov'd me,
Till for her life she paid me with herself.

Pri. You stole her from me; like a thief you stole her,

At dead of night! that cursed hour you chose

To rifle me of all my heart held dear.

May all your joys in her prove false, like mine!

A sterile fortune and a barren bed

Attend you both: continual discord make

Your days and nights bitter, and grievous still :
May the hard hand of a vexatious need

Oppress and grind you; till at last you find
The curse of disobedience all your portion.

Jaf.. Half of your curse you have bestow'd in vain.
Heav'n has already crown'd our faithful loves
With a young boy, sweet as his mother's beauty:
May he live to prove more gentle than his grand-sire,
And happier than his father!

Pri. Rather live

To bait thee for his bread, and din your ears
With hungry cries; whilst his unhappy mother
Sits down and weeps in bitterness and want.
Jaf. You talk as if 'twould please you.
Pri.

Twould, by heaven!

Jaf. Would I were in my grave!

Pri. And she, too, with thee;

For, living here, you 're but my curs'd remembrancers
I once was happy!

Jaf. You use me thus, because you know my soul
Is fond of Belvidera. You perceive

My life feeds on her, therefore thus you treat me.
Were I that thief, the doer of such wrongs

As you upbraid me with, what hinders me

But I might send her back to you with contumely,
And court my fortune where she would be kinder.
Pri. You dare not do 't.

Jaf. Indeed, my lord, I dare not.

My heart, that awes me, is too much my master:

Three years have past since first our vows were plighted,

During which time the world must bear me witness

I've treated Belvidera like your daughter,

The daughter of a senator of Venice:

Distinction, place, attendance, and observance,

Due to her birth, she always has commanded:

Out of my little fortune I've done this;

Because (though hopeless e'er to win your nature,)

The world might see I lov'd her for herself;
Not as the heiress of the great Priuli.

Pri. No more.

Jaf. Yes, all, and then adieu forever.

There's not a wretch that lives on common charity,
But 's happier than me; for I have known
The luscious sweets of plenty; every night
Have slept with soft content about my head,
And never wak'd but to a joyful morning:

Yet now must fall, like a full ear of corn,
Whose blossom 'scaped, yet 's wither'd in the ripening.
Pri. Home, and be humble; study to retrench;
Discharge the lazy vermin in thy hall,

Those pageants of thy folly:

Reduce the glittering trappings of thy wife

To humble weeds, fit for thy little state:
Then to some suburb cottage both retire;

Drudge to feed loathsome life; get brats and starve.
Home, home, I say.

Jaf. Yes, if my heart would let me―

This proud, this swelling heart; home I would go, •
But that my doors are hateful to my eyes,
Fill'd and damm'd up with gaping creditors:
I've now not fifty ducats in the world,
Yet still I am in love and pleas'd with ruin.
O Belvidera! Oh! she is my wife-

And we will bear our wayward fate together,
But ne'er know comfort more.

Bel. My lord, my love, my refuge! Happy my eyes when they behold thy face!

My heavy heart will leave its doleful beating

At sight of thee, and bound with sprighly joys.

Oh, smile, as when our loves were in their spring,

And cheer my fainting soul!

Jaf. As when our loves

Were in their spring! Has, then, my fortune chang'd thee?

Art thou not, Belvidera, still the same,

Kind, good, and tender, as my arms first found thee?

If thou art alter'd, where shall I have harbour?
Where ease my loaded heart? Oh! where complain?

Bel. Does this appear like change, or love decaying,
When thus I throw myself into thy bosom,

With all the resolution of strong truth?

I joy more in thee

Than did thy mother, when she hugg'd thee first,

And bless'd the gods for all her travail past.

Jaf. Can there in woman be such glorious faith?
Sure, all ill stories of thy sex are false!

Oh, woman! lovely woman! Nature made thee
To temper man: we had been brutes without you!
Angels are painted fair, to look like you:

[Exit.

There's in you all that we believe of Heav'n;
Amazing brightness, purity, and truth,

Eternal joy and everlasting love!

Bel. If love be treasure, we'll be wondrous rich;
Oh! lead me to some desert, wide and wild,
Barren as our misfortunes, where my soul
May have its vent, where I may tell aloud
To the high heavens, and ev'ry list'ning planet,
With what a boundless stock my bosom 's fraught.
Jaf. Oh, Belvidera! doubly I'm a beggar:

Undone by fortune, and in debt to thee.

Want, worldly want, that hungry meagre friend,
Is at my heels, and chases me in view.

Canst thou bear cold and hunger? Can these limbs,
Fram'd for the tender offices of love,

Endure the bitter gripes of smarting poverty?
When banish'd by our miseries abroad

(As suddenly we shall be.) to seek out

In some far climate, where our names are strangers,
For charitable succour, wilt thou then,

When in a bed of straw we shrink together,

And the bleak winds shall whistle round our heads;
Wilt thou then talk thus to me? Wilt thou then
Hush my cares thus, and shelter me with love?

Bel. Oh! I will love, even in madness love thee!
Though my distracted senses should forsake me,
I'd find some intervals when my poor heart
Should 'suage itself, and be let loose to thine.
Though the bare earth be all our resting place,
Its roots our food, some cliff our habitation,

I'll make this arm a pillow for thine head;

And, as thou sighing liest, and swelled with sorrow,
Creep to thy bosom, pour the balm of love

Into thy soul, and kiss thee to thy rest;

Then praise our God, and watch thee 'till the morning.

Jaf. Hear this, you Heav'ns, and wonder how you made her!

Reign, reign ye monarchs, that divide the world;

Busy rebellion ne'er will let you know

Tranquillity and happiness like mine;

Like gaudy ships, the obsequious billows fall,

And rise again, to lift you in your pride;

They wait but for a storm, and then devour you!

I, in my private bark already wreck'd,

Like a poor merchant, driven to unknown land,

That had, by chance, pack'd up his choicest treasure

In one dear casket, and sav'd only that:

Since I must wander farther on the shore,

Thus hug my little, but my precious store,

Resolv'd to scorn and trust my fate no more.

[Exeunt.]

a

NATHANIEL LEE, another tragic poet of this period, and also the son of clergyman, was born in Hertfordshire in 1651. He was instructed in classical learning at Westminster school, and thence passed to Trinity College, CamVOL. II.-F

bridge, where he took his bachelor's degree, in 1668; but failing to obtain a fellowship, he quitted the university to try his fortune at court. Here, being also disappointed, he had recourse to dramatic writing for a subsistence, and produced, in 1675, his first tragedy, Nero, Emperor of Rome. This play was so well received as to induce the author to give up all other projects, and devote himself exclusively to the drama. He produced a new play every year, until 1681, and from the effectiveness with which he read his pieces to the actors, they were led to persuade him to go on the stage. As an actor, however, he entirely failed; and the mortification consequent, upon this failure, brought upon him habits of irregularity and extravagance that frequently plunged him into the lowest depths of misery. Gifted by nature to a remarkable degree, but uncontrolled, either by moral feelings or a sense of propriety, he let loose the reins of his imagination, till at length poverty and poetic enthusiasm transported him into madness. In November, 1684, Lee was taken to a mad-house, where he remained for nearly four years, a raving maniac. At length, in 1688, his physicians pronounced him sufficiently recovered, and he was accordingly set at liberty. After his release from Bedlam Lee produced two tragedies, The Princess of Cleve, and The Massacre of Paris; but notwithstanding the profits arising from these performances, his poverty was still so great that during the last year or two of his life he was supported by public charity. His death occurred on the sixth of April, 1692, and he was buried in St. Clement's Church, London.

Lee was the author of eleven tragedies, the best of which are The Rival Queens, or Alexander the Great, Mithridates, Theodosius, and Lucius Junius Brutus. In praising The Rival Queens' Dryden alludes to Lee's power in moving the passions, and counsels him to despise those critics who condemn

'The too great vigour of his youthful muse.'

This line indicates the source, both of Lee's strength and his weakness. In tenderness and genuine passion he excels most of his contemporaries; but his style often degenerates into bombast and extravagant frenzy-a defect which was heightened, in his later productions, by his mental malady. The author was himself aware of his weakness, and frequently alludes to it in touching terms. He wanted discretion to temper his fiery genius, and reduce his poetical conceptions to consistency and order; yet amid his wild ardor and martial enthusiasm we often find very soft and graceful lines. Few things are finer in this way than the following declaration of love :—

I disdain

All pomp when thou art by: far be the noise
Of kings and courts from us, whose gentle souls
Our kinder stars have steer'd another way.
Free as the forest birds we'll pair together,
Fly to the arbours, grots, and flowery meads,
And, in soft murmurs, interchange our souls:
Together drink the crystal of the stream,

Or taste the yellow fruit which autumn yields;
And when the golden evening calls us home,
Wing to our downy nest, and sleep till morn.

We shall conclude this sketch with the following scene from 'Lucius Junius Brutus.' Titus, the son of Brutus, having joined the Tarquin conspiracy, is taken prisoner, and condemned by the Consul, his own father, to suffer the death of a traitor. Brutus thus takes a last farewell of him :

Brutus. Well, Titus, speak; how is it with thee now?

I would attend awhile this mighty motion,

Wait till the tempest were quite overblown,

That I might take thee in the calm of nature

With all thy gentler virtues brooding on thee.

So hush'd a stillness, as if all the gods

Look'd down and listen'd to what we were saying:

Speak then, and tell me, O my best beloved,

My son, my Titus, is all well again?

Titus. So well that saying how, must make it nothing;

So well, that I could wish to die this moment,

For so my heart with powerful throbs persuades me:

That were indeed to make you reparation

That were, my lord, to thank you home, to die;

And that for Titus too, would be most happy.

Bru. How's that, my son? would death for thee be happy?

Tit. Most certain, sir; for in my grave I 'scape

All those affronts which I in life must look for,
All those reproaches which the eyes, and fingers,
And tongues of Rome will daily cast upon me;
From whom, to a soul so sensible as mine,
Each single scorn would be far worse than dying:
Besides, I 'scape the stings of my own conscience,
Which will forever rack me with remembrance,
Haunt me by day, and torture me by night,
Casting my blotted honour in the way
Where'er my melancholy thoughts shall guide me.
Bru. But is not death a very dreadful thing?
Tit. Not to a mind resolved. No, sir; to me
It seems as natural as to be born:

Groans, and convulsions, and discolour'd faces,
Friends weeping round us, blocks, and obsequies,
Make it a dreadful thing; the pomp of death

Is far more terrible than death itself.

Yes, sir; I call the powers of heaven to witness

Titus dares die, if so you have decreed;

Nay, he shall die with joy, to honour Brutus,
To make your justice famous through the world,

And fix the liberty of Rome forever:

Not but I must confess my weakness too:
Yet it is great thus to resolve against it,
To have the frailty of a mortal man,
But the security of the immortal gods.

Bru. O Titus, O thou absolute young man!