Stuck with a magical needle, and then buried

In some foul dunghill; and yond's an excellent property For a tyrant, which I would account mercy.

Bos. What's that?

Duch. If they would bind me to that lifeless trunk, And let me freeze to death.

Bos. Come, you must live.

Leave this vain sorrow.

Things being at the worst, begin to mend.

The bee,

When he hath shot his sting into your hand,
May then play with your eyelid.

Duch. Good comfortable fellow,

Persuade a wretch that's broke upon the wheel
To have all his bones new set; entreat him live
To be executed again! Who must dispatch me?
I account this world a tedious theatre,

For I do play a part in't 'gainst my will.

Bos. Come, be of comfort; I will save your life.
Duch. Indeed, I have not leisure to attend

So small a business.

I will go pray.-No, I'll go curse!

Bos. Oh, fie!

Duch. I could curse the stars.

Bos. Oh, fearful!

Duch. And those three smiling seasons of the year

Into a Russian winter; nay, the world

To its first chaos.

Plagues (that make lanes through largest families)
Consume them!*

* Her brothers.

Let them, like tyrants,

Ne'er be remembered but for the ill they've done.
Let all the zealous prayers of mortified

Churchmen forget them.

Let Heaven a little while cease crowning martyrs,

To punish them! Go, howl them this; and say,

to bleed:

It is some mercy when men kill with speed.

FrDINAND enters.

I leng

[Exit.

Ferd. Excellent, . I would wish! she's plagued in art.

These presentations e but framed in wax,

By the curious master in that quality,

Vincentio Lauriola, and she takes them
For true substantial bodies.

Bos. Why do you do this?

Ferd. To bring her to despair.
Bos. Faith, end here;

And go no further in your cruelty.

Send her a penitential garment to put on

Next to her delicate skin, and furnish her

With beads and prayer-books.

Ferd. Damn her! that body of hers,

While that my blood ran pure in't, was more worth
Than that, which thou wouldst comfort, called a soul.

I'll send her masques of common courtezans,

Have her meat served up by bawds and ruffians,
And ('cause she'll need be mad) I am resolved

To remove forth the common hospital

All the mad folk, and place them near her lodging:
There let 'em practise together, sing, and dance,
And act their gambols to the full o' the moon.

She is kept waking with noises of Madmen; and, at last, is strangled by common Executioners.

DUCHESS, CARIOLA.

Duch. What hideous noise was that?

Car. 'Tis the wild consort

Of madmen, Lady, which your tyrant brother
Hath placed about your lodging: this tyranny
I think was never practised till this hour.

Duch. Indeed, I thank him; nothing but noise and folly
Can keep me in my right wits, whereas reason
And silence make me stark mad. Sit down;
Discourse to me some dismal tragedy.

Car. Oh, 'twill increase your melancholy!
Duch. Thou art deceived.

To hear of greater grief would lessen mine.
This is a prison?

Car. Yes: but thou shalt live

To shake this durance off.

Duch. Thou art a fool.

The robin red-breast and the nightingale

Never live long in cages.

Car. Pray, dry your eyes.

What think you of, Madam?

Duch. Of nothing:

When I muse thus, I sleep.

Car. Like a madman, with your eyes open?

Duch. Dost thou think we shall know one another

In the other world?

Car. Yes, out of question.

Duch. Oh, that it were possible we might

But hold some two days' conference with the dead!

From them I should learn somewhat I am sure

I never shall know here.

I'll tell thee a miracle:

I am not mad yet, to my cause of sorrow.

Th' heaven o'er my head seems made of molten brass,

The earth of flaming sulphur, yet I am not mad:

I am acquainted with sad misery,

As the tanned galley-slave is with his oar;

Necessity makes me suffer constantly,

And custom makes it easy. Who do I look like now?
Car. Like to your picture in the gallery;
A deal of life in show, but none in practice:
Or rather, like some reverend monument
Whose ruins are even pitied.

Duch. Very proper:

And Fortune seems only to have her eyesight,
To behold my tragedy.-How now!

What noise is that?

A Servant enters.

you,

Serv. I am come to tell

Your brother hath intended you some sport.

A great physician, when the pope was sick
Of a deep melancholy, presented him

With several sorts of madmen, which wild object
(Being full of change and sport) forced him to laugh,
And so th' imposthume broke: the self-same cure
The duke intends on you.

Duch. Let them come in.

Here follows a dance of madmen, with music answerable thereto; after which BosoLA (like an old man) enters.

Duch. Is he mad too?

Bos. I am come to make thy tomb.

Duch. Ha! my tomb?

Thou speak'st as if I lay upon my death-bed,

Gasping for breath: dost thou perceive me sick?

Bos. Yes, and the more dangerously, since thy sickness is insensible.

Duch. Thou art not mad, sure: dost know me?

Bos. Yes.......

Duch. Let me know fully, therefore, the effect

Of this thy dismal preparation. . . .

Bos. Now I shall. [A coffin, cords, and a bell, produced.

Here is a present from your princely brothers;

And may it arrive welcome, for it brings

Last benefit, last sorrow!

Duch. Let me see it;

I have so much obedience in my blood,
I wish it in their veins to do them good.
Bos. This is your last presence-chamber.
Car. O my sweet lady!

Duch. Peace!-it affrights not me.
Bos. I am the common bell-man,
That usually is sent to condemned persons
The night before they suffer.

Duch. Even now thou saidst,

Thou wast a tomb-maker.

Bos. 'Twas to bring you

By degrees to mortification. Listen!

Dirge.

Hark! now every thing is still;

This screech-owl, and the whistler shrill,

Call upon our dame aloud,