A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) | Page 2

I here? the sight constraines Me woefull man this woefull place to leaue.

SCENE III.
TANCRED cometh out of GISMOND'S Chamber.
TANCRED. O dolorous happe, ruthefull and all of woe Alas I carefull wretche what resteth me? Shall I now live that with these eyes did soe Beholde my daughter die? what, shall I see Her death before my face that was my lyfe And I to lyve that was her lyves decay? Shall not this hand reache to this hart the knife That maye bereve bothe sight and life away, And in the shadowes darke to seke her ghoste And wander there with her? shall not, alas, This spedy death be wrought, sithe I have lost My dearest ioy of all? what, shall I passe My later dayes in paine, and spende myne age In teres and plaint! shall I now leade my life All solitarie as doeth bird in cage, And fede my woefull yeres with waillfull grefe? No, no, so will not I my dayes prolonge To seke to live one houre sith she is gone: This brest so can not bende to suche a wronge, That she shold dye and I to live alone. No, this will I: she shall have her request And in most royall sorte her funerall Will I performe. Within one tombe shall rest Her earle and she, her epitaph withall Graved thereon shal be. This will I doe And when these eyes some aged teres have shed The tomb my self then will I crepe into And with my blood all bayne their bodies dead. This heart there will I perce, and reve this brest The irksome life, and wreke my wrathful ire Upon my self. She shall have her request, And I by death will purchace my desyre.
FINIS.

EPILOGUS.
If now perhappes ye either loke to see Th'unhappie lovers, or the cruell sire Here to be buried as fittes their degree Or as the dyeng ladie did require Or as the ruthefull kinge in deepe despaire Behight of late (who nowe himself hath slayen) Or if perchaunse you stand in doutfull fere Sithe mad Megera is not returnde againe Least wandring in the world she so bestowe The snakes that crall about her furious face As they may raise new ruthes, new kindes of woe Bothe so and there, and such as you percase Wold be full lothe so great so nere to see I am come forth to do you all to wete Through grefe wherin the lordes of Salerne be The buriall pompe is not prepared yet: And for the furie, you shall onderstand That neither doeth the litle greatest god Finde such rebelling here in Britain land Against his royall power as asketh rod Of ruth from hell to wreke his names decaie Nor Pluto heareth English ghostes complaine Our dames disteyned lyves. Therfore ye maye Be free from feare, sufficeth to maintaine The vertues which we honor in you all, So as our Britain ghostes when life is past Maie praise in heven, not plaine in Plutoes hall Our dames, but hold them vertuous and chast, Worthie to live where furie never came, Where love can see, and beares no deadly bowe, Whoes lyves eternall tromp of glorious fame With joyfull sounde to honest eares shall blowe.
FINIS.
The Tragedie of Gismonde of Salerne.
Such is a specimen of the play as it was originally acted before Queen Elizabeth, at the Inner Temple, in the year 1568. It was the production of five gentlemen, who were probably students of that society; and by one of them, Robert Wilmot, afterwards much altered and published in the year 1591.[1] [Wilmot had meanwhile become rector of North Okenham, in Essex];[2] and in his Dedication to the Societies of the Inner and Middle Temples, he speaks of the censure which might be cast upon him from the indecorum of publishing a dramatic work arising from his calling. When he died, or whether he left any other works, are points equally uncertain.
"Nearly a century after the date of that play," observes Lamb, in his 'Extracts from the Garrick Plays,' "Dryden produced his admirable version of the same story from Boccaccio. The speech here extracted (the scene between the messengers and Gismunda) may be compared with the corresponding passage in the 'Sigismunda and Guiscardo' with no disadvantage to the older performance. It is quite as weighty, as pointed, and as passionate."

To the Right Worshipful and Virtuous Ladies, the Lady MARY PETER and the Lady ANNE GRAY, long health of body, with quiet of mind, in the favour of God and men for ever.
It is most certain (right virtuous and worshipful) that of all human learning, poetry (how contemptible soever it is in these days) is the most ancient; and, in poetry, there is no argument of more antiquity and elegancy