"One that did force your valiant son to yield, "While your valiant son did take him prisoner. "Vice. Be deaf, my senses, I can hear no more. "King. Fall, heaven, and cover us with thy sad "ruins. "Cast. Roll all the world within thy pitchy "cloud. "Hier. Now do I applaud what I have acted. 4310 Nunc mors cede manus. "Now to express the rapture of my part, Cast. Yet can he write. King. And if in this he satisfy us not, We will devise th' extremest kind of death That ever was invented for a wretch. King. What age hath ever heard such mon My brother, and the whole succeeding hope Vice. And thou, Don Pedro, do the like for us: 312 Enter Ghost and REVENGE. Ghost. Aye, now my hopes have end in their When blood and sorrow finish my desires. [He makes Signs for a Knife to mend his Pen. Cast. O, he would have a knife to mend his pen. Vice. Here, and advise thee that thou write the troth. Look to my brother, save Hieronimo. But never shalt thou force me to reveal The thing which I have vow'd inviolate; And therefore, in despite of all thy threats, Pleased with their deaths, and eased with their revenge, 308 Inward,-i. e. intimate. So, in the Malecontent, A. 4. S. 3.: "Come, we must be inward, thou and I all one." The Revengers Tragedy, A. 2.: "My lord, most sure on't; for 'twas spoke by one, 309 Thou omitted, 1623. 33. -Nunc mens cade manus, 1623. 33. I'll lead Hieronimo where Orpheus plays, Where 313 none but furies, bugs, 314 and tortures dwell. Ghost. Then, sweet Revenge, do this at my re- Let me be judge, and doom them to unrest. And let the lovers' endless pains surcease; Juno forgets old wrath, and grants him ease. Rev. Then haste we down to meet thy friends and foes; To place thy friends in "ease, the rest in woes: For here, though death 315 hath end their misery. I'll there begin their endless tragedy. THE SPANISH TRAGEDY, Containing the Lamentable Murder of HORATIO and BElimperia; with the Pitiful Death of Old HIERONIMO. "And in their place came fearful bugges, "With bellies big, and swagging dugges, Churchyard's Worthiness of Wales, p. 16. edit. 1776: 315 Doth, 1623. 33. "A kynd of sound, that makes a hurling noyse, THEN Isabella, my dear wife, Finding her son bereaved of breath, And loving him dearer than life, THE SECOND PART. To the same Tune. Her own hand straight doth work her death. Then frantickly I ran about, I rent and tore each thing I got, Thus as I passed the streets, hard by Which Belimperia forth had flung, Then to the court forthwith I went, I hindred was, which made me rave. But false Lorenzo put me out, And said, 'twere good I would resign The Duke of Castile hearing then, Whereto I straightway gave consent, Sweet Belimperia comes to me, But when we knew each other's mind, Then bloody Balthezar enters in, Which gladly I prepared to shew, And from the chronicles of Spain, I did record Erastus life, And how the Turk had him so slain, And straight revenge wrought by his wife. Sweet Belimperia Balthezar kills, Then for to specify my wrongs, And said-my son was as dear to me But when they did behold this thing, To torture me they do prepare, But that I would not tell it then, They knowing well that I could write, Then fained I my pen was naught, The kings that scorned my griefs before, Here have you heard my tragic tale, Printed at London for H. GossoN. EDITIONS. Of this Play, Mr Hawkins says, there are many Editions, viz. 1603, 1615, 1618, 1623, 1633; and one without a date," printed by Edward Allde, amended of such gross blunders as passed in the "first." None of these several Editions have come under my notice, except those of 1623 and 1633; but, by comparing the collation of Mr Hawkins with these copies, I can so far bear testimony to that gentleman's accuracy, as to think myself warranted to follow his Edition of this Play, as printed in the Origin of the English Drama, Vol. II. Mr Hawkins printed from Alide's Edition, compared with those of 1618, 1623, and 1633. The foregoing Ballad is printed from a Black Letter Copy in the valuable Collection of Thomas Pearson, Esq. It seems to have been written after the Play. THE HONEST WHORE. THOMAS DEKKAR wrote in the reign of James the First. He was, says Langbaine,' more famous for the contention he had with Ben Jonson for the bayes, than for any great reputation he had gained by his own writings. He was, however, not destitute of genius; and among his contemporaries, several of whom joined with him in writing, was much esteemed, especially by Richard Brome, who always gave him the title of Father. We know very few particulars concerning him. Oldys says, he was in the King's Bench Prison from the year 1613 to 1616, if not longer. We may therefore conclude, that, like the generality of his poetical friends, he was in indigent circumstances. At what time he died we do not know with certainty; but the same writer says, he was alive in 1638, and at that time full threescore years of age. From a passage in the dedication to Match me in Loudon, published in 1631, it may be conjectured that he was older than Oldys imagines, as he there says, “ I have beene a priest in Apollo's temple many years, my voyce is decaying with my age." He was a voluminous writer; and, besides a great number of pamphlets, of which a list is hereafter given of as many as can at present be discovered, he wrote the following plays: 1. "The Pleasant Comedie of OLD FORTUNATUS. As it was plaied before the Queen's Majestie "this Christmas, by the Right Honourable the Earle of Nottingham, Lord High Admirall of Eng"land his Servants, 4to, 1600." 2. "Satiro-mastix, or the Untrussing of the Humorous Poet. As it hath bin presented publikely, "by the Right Honourable the Lord Chamberlaine his Servants; and, privately, by the Children of "Paules, 1602, 4to,-1610, 4to." 3. The Honest Whore, with the Humours of the Patient Man and the Longing Wife, 1604, 4to,— 1615, 4to,-1616, 4to,-1635, 4to. 4. Westward Hoe. As it hath beene divers times acted by the Children of Paules. Written by Thomas Decker and John Webster, 1607, 4to. 5. Northward Hoe. Sundry times acted by the Children of Paules. By Thomas Decker and John Webster, 1607, 4to. 6. The Famous History of Sir Thomas Wyat; with the Coronation of Queen Mary, and the comingin of King Philip. As it was plaied by the Queen's Majestie's Servants. Written by Thomas Deckers and John Webster, 1607, 4to. 7. The Whore of Babylon. Acted by the Prince's Servants, 1607, 4to. 8. "If it be not good, the Divel is in it. A new Play. As it hath bin lately acted, with great ap"plause, by the Queenes Majestie's Servants, at the Red Bull, 1612, 4to." 9. The Second Part of the Honest Whore, with the Humors of the Patient Man, the Impatient "Wife: the Honest Whore perswaded, by strong arguments, to turne Curtizan againe; her brave "refuting those arguments; and, lastly, the Comicall Passages of an Italian Bridewell, where the "Scene ends, 1630, 4to." 10. "A Tragi-Comedy, called, Match mee in London. As it hath beene often presented; first, "at the Bull in Saint John's Street; and lately at the Private House in Drury-Lane, called the "PHOENIX, 1631, 4to." 11. The Wonder of a Kingdome, 4to, 1636. He also joined with Massinger in writing The Virgin Martyr; with Rowley and Ford, in The Witch of Edmonton; Middleton and Rowley, in The Roaring Girl; and with Ford, in The Sun's Darling. 1 Page 112. |