The Complete Plays (22 page)

That Tamburlaine shall rue the day, the hour,

Wherein he wrought such ignominious wrong

Unto the hallowed person of a prince,

Or kept the fair Zenocrate so long

As concubine, I fear, to feed his lust.

ARABIA

Let grief and fury hasten on revenge!

Let Tamburlaine for his offences feel

Such plagues as heaven and we can pour on him.

I long to break my spear upon his crest

And prove the weight of his victorious arm,

For Fame, I fear, hath been too prodigal

In sounding through the world his
partial praise
.

SULTAN

Capolin, hast thou surveyed our powers?

CAPOLIN

Great emperors of Egypt and Arabia,

The number of your hosts united is

A hundred and fifty thousand horse,

Two hundred thousand foot, brave men-at-arms,

Courageous and full of hardiness,

As frolic as the hunters in the chase

Of savage beasts amid the desert woods.

ARABIA

My mind presageth fortunate success.

And, Tamburlaine, my spirit doth foresee

The utter ruin of thy men and thee.

SULTAN

Then rear your standards! Let your sounding drums

Direct our soldiers to Damascus' walls.

Now, Tamburlaine, the mighty Sultan comes

And leads with him the great Arabian king

To dim thy baseness and obscurity,

Famous for nothing but for theft and spoil,

To raze and scatter thy inglorious crew

Of Scythians and slavish Persians.

[
Sound drums
].

Exeunt
.

The banquet
[
is brought on
],
and to it cometh
TAMBURLAINE
all in scarlet,
[
ZENOCRATE
,]
THERIDAMAS, TECHELLES
,
USUMCASANE
,
the
TURK
[
BAJAZETH
,
drawn in his cage
,
ZABINA
,]
with others.

TAMBURLAINE

Now hang our bloody colours by Damascus,

Reflexing hues of blood upon their heads

While they walk quivering on their city walls,

Half dead for fear before they feel my wrath.

Then let us freely banquet and carouse

Full bowls of wine unto the god of war,

That means to fill your helmets full of gold

And make Damascus' spoils as rich to you

As was to Jason Colchis' golden fleece.

10   And now, Bajazeth, hast thou any
stomach?

BAJAZETH
Ay, such a stomach, cruel Tamburlaine, as I could willingly feed upon thy blood-raw heart.

TAMBURLAINE
Nay, thine own is easier to come by; pluck out that, and 'twill serve thee and thy wife. Well, Zenocrate, Techelles, and the rest, fall to your victuals.

BAJAZETH

Fall to, and never may your meat digest!

Ye Furies, that
can
mask invisible
,

Dive to the bottom of Avernus' pool,

And in your hands bring hellish poison up

20   And squeeze it in the cup of Tamburlaine!

Or, wingèd snakes of Lerna, cast your stings,

And leave your venoms in this tyrant's dish!

ZABINA

And may this banquet prove as ominous

As
Procne's
to th'adulterous Thracian king

That fed upon the substance of his child!

ZENOCRATE
My lord, how can you suffer these outrageous curses by these slaves of yours?

TAMBURLAINE

To let them see, divine Zenocrate,

I glory in the curses of my foes,

Having the power from the empyreal heaven

30   To turn them all upon their
proper heads
.

TECHELLES
I pray you, give them leave, madam. This speech is a goodly refreshing to them.

THERIDAMAS
But if his highness would let them be fed, it would do them more good.

TAMBURLAINE
[
to
BAJAZETH
] Sirrah, why fall you not to? Are you so daintily brought up you cannot eat your own flesh?

BAJAZETH

First, legions of devils shall tear thee in pieces.

USUMCASANE

Villain, knowest thou to whom thou speakest?

TAMBURLAINE
O, let him alone. Here, eat, sir. Take it from my
40               sword's point, or I'll thrust it to thy heart.

He
[
BAJAZETH
]
takes it and stamps upon it.

THERIDAMAS
He stamps it under his feet, my lord.

TAMBURLAINE
[
to
BAJAZETH
] Take it up, villain, and eat it, or I will make thee slice the
brawns of
thy arms into carbonadoes and eat them.

USUMCASANE
Nay, 'twere better he killed his wife, and then she shall be sure not to be starved, and he be provided for a month's victual beforehand.

TAMBURLAINE
[
to
BAJAZETH
] Here is my dagger; dispatch her
while she
is fat, for if she live but a while longer, she will fall
50         into a consumption with fretting, and then she will not be
worth the eating.

THERIDAMAS
[
to
TECHELLES
] Dost thou think that Mahomet will suffer this?

TECHELLES
‘Tis like he will, when he cannot let it.

TAMBURLAINE
[to
BAJAZETH
] Go to, fall to your meat. What, not a bit? Belike he hath not been watered today. Give him some drink.

They give him water to drink, and he flings it on the ground.

Fast, and welcome, sir, while hunger make you eat. How

60                 now, Zenocrate, doth not the Turk and his wife make a

goodly show at a banquet?

ZENOCRATE
Yes, my lord.

THERIDAMAS
Methinks ‘tis a great deal better than a
consort of music.

TAMBURLAINE
Yet music would do well to cheer up Zenocrate. [
To
ZENOCRATE
] Pray thee, tell: why art thou so sad? If thou wilt have a song, the Turk shall strain his voice. But why is it?

ZENOCRATE

My lord, to see my father's town besieged,

The country wasted where myself was born,

70   How can it but afflict my very soul?

If any love remain in you, my lord,

Or if my love unto your majesty

May merit favour at your highness' hands,

Then raise your siege from fair Damascus' walls

And with my father take a friendly truce.

TAMBURLAINE

Zenocrate, were Egypt Jove's own land,

Yet would I with my sword make Jove to stoop.

I will confute those blind geographers

That make a
triple region in
the world,

80   Excluding regions which I mean to
trace,

And with this
pen
reduce them to a
map,

Calling the provinces, cities, and towns

After my name and thine, Zenocrate.

Here at Damascus will I make the point

That shall begin
the perpendicular.

And wouldst thou have me buy thy father's love

With such a loss? Tell me, Zenocrate.

ZENOCRATE

Honour
still wait
on happy Tamburlaine!

Yet give me leave to plead for him, my lord.

TAMBURLAINE

90   Content thyself. His person shall be safe,

And all the
friends of
fair Zenocrate,

If with their lives they will be pleased to yield

Or may be forced to make me emperor;

For Egypt and Arabia must be mine.

[
To
BAJAZETH
]

Feed, you slave; thou may'st think thyself happy to be fed from my trencher.

BAJAZETH

My empty stomach, full of idle heat,

Draws
bloody humours from
my feeble parts,

Preserving life by hasting cruel death.

My veins are pale, my sinews hard and dry,

100   My joints benumbed. Unless I eat, I die.

ZABINA
Eat, Bajazeth. Let us live in spite of them,
looking some
happy power will pity and enlarge us.

TAMBURLAINE
[
offering
BAJAZETH
an empty plate
] Here, Turk, wilt thou have a clean trencher?

BAJAZETH
Ay, tyrant, and more meat.

TAMBURLAINE
Soft, sir
, you must be dieted; too much eating will make you
surfeit.

THERIDAMAS
[
to
TAMBURLAINE]
So it Would, my lord, specially having so small a walk and so little exercise.

110       
Enter a
second course of crowns.

TAMBURLAINE
Theridamas, Techelles, and Casane, here are the cates you desire to finger, are they not?

THERIDAMAS
Ay, my lord, but none save kings must feed with these.

TECHELLES
'Tis enough for us to see them and for Tamburlaine only to enjoy them.

TAMBURLAINE
[
raising a toast
] Well, here is now to the Sultan
of Egypt, the King of Arabia, and the Governor of Damascus.
Now take these three crowns, and pledge me, my contributory
kings. [
He presents the crowns
. I crown you here, Therid-
120        amas, King of Argier; Techelles, King of Fez; and Usumcasane,
King of Moroccus. How say you to this, Turk? These are not
your contributory kings.

BAJAZETH

Nor shall they long be thine, I warrant them.

TAMBURLAINE

Kings of Argier, Moroccus, and of Fez,

You that have marched with happy Tamburlaine

As far as
from the frozen
plage of
heaven

Unto the wat'ry morning's ruddy
bower

And thence by land unto the torrid zone,

130   Deserve these titles I endow you with

By
valour and
by magnanimity.

Your births shall be no blemish to your fame,

For virtue is the fount whence honour springs,

And
they are
worthy she investeth kings.

THERIDAMAS

And since your highness hath
so well vouchsafed,

If we deserve them not with higher meeds

Than erst our
states and
actions have retained,

Take them away again and make us slaves.

TAMBURLAINE

Well said, Theridamas! When holy Fates

140   Shall ‘stablish me in strong Egyptia,

We mean to travel to th'Antarctic Pole,

Conquering the people
underneath our feet,

And be renowned as never emperors were.

Zenocrate, I will not crown thee yet,

Until with greater honours I be graced.

[
Exeunt
.]

[
Enter] the
GOVERNOR OF DAMASCUS
,
with three or four
CITIZENS
,
and four
VIRGINS
with
branches of laurel in
their hands
.

GOVERNOR

Still doth this man, or rather god of war,

Batter our walls and beat our turrets down;

And to resist with longer stubbornness

Or hope of rescue from the Sultan's power

Were but to bring our wilful overthrow

And make us desperate of our threatened lives.

We see his tents have now been alterèd

With terrors to the last and cruell'st hue;

His coal-black colours everywhere advanced

Threaten our city with a general spoil;

10   And if we should with common rites of arms

Offer our safeties to his clemency,

I fear the
custom proper to his sword,

Which he observes as
parcel of
his fame,

Intending so to terrify the world,

By any innovation or remorse

Will never be dispensed with till our deaths.

Therefore, for these our harmless virgins' sakes,

Whose honours and whose lives rely on him,

Let us have hope that their
unspotted prayers
,

20   Their
blubbered cheeks
, and hearty humble moans

Will melt his fury into some remorse,

And use us like a loving conqueror.

FIRST VIRGIN

If humble suits or imprecations,

Uttered with
tears of
wretchedness and blood

Shed from the heads and hearts of all our sex –

Some
made your
wives, and some your children –

Might have entreated your obdurate breasts

To entertain some care of our securities

30   Whiles
only danger beat
upon our walls,

These more than dangerous
warrants of
our death

Had never been erected as they be,

Nor you depend on such weak helps as we.

GOVERNOR

Well, lovely virgins, think our country's care,

Our love of honour, loath to be enthralled

To foreign powers and rough imperious yokes,

Would not with too much cowardice or fear,

Before all hope of rescue were denied,

Submit yourselves and us to servitude.

40   Therefore,
in that your
safeties and our own,