The Complete Plays (24 page)

Now thrown to rooms of black abjection,

Smearèd with blots of basest drudgery,

And villeiness to shame, disdain, and misery.

Accursèd Bajazeth, whose words of ruth,

270   That would with pity cheer Zabina's heart

And make our souls resolve in ceaseless tears,

Sharp hunger bites upon and gripes the root

From whence the issues of my thoughts do break.

O poor Zabina, O my queen, my queen,

Fetch me some water for my burning breast,

To cool and comfort me with longer date,

That, in the shortened sequel of my life,

I may pour forth my soul into thine arms

With words of love, whose moaning intercourse

280   Hath hitherto been stayed with wrath and hate

Of our
expressless, banned inflictions.

ZABINA

Sweet Bajazeth, I will prolong thy life

As long as any blood or spark of breath

Can quench or cool the torments of my grief.

She goes out
.

BAJAZETH

Now, Bajazeth, abridge thy baneful days

And beat thy brains out of thy conquered head,

Since other means are all forbidden me

That may be ministers of my decay.

290   O highest lamp of ever-living Jove,

Accursèd day, infected with my griefs,

Hide now thy stainèd face in endless night

And shut the windows of the lightsome heavens!

Let ugly Darkness with her rusty coach,

Engirt with tempests wrapped in pitchy clouds,

Smother the earth with never-fading mists,

And let her horses from their nostrils breathe

Rebellious winds and dreadful thunderclaps,

That in this terror Tamburlaine may live,

300   And my pined soul,
resolved in
liquid air,

May still excruciate his tormented thoughts!

Then let the stony dart of senseless cold

Pierce through the centre of my withered heart

And make a passage for my loathèd life!

He brains himself against the cage.

Enter
ZABINA
.

ZABINA

What do mine eyes behold? My husband dead!

His skull all riven in twain, his brains dashed out!

The brains of Bajazeth, my lord and sovereign!

O Bajazeth, my husband and my lord,

O Bajazeth, O Turk, O emperor – give him his liquor? Not I.

310   Bring milk and fire, and my blood I bring him again; tear me

in pieces, give me the sword with a ball of
wildfire upon
it.

Down with him, down with him! Go to my child. Away,

away, away! Ah, save that infant, save him, save him! I, even

I, speak to her. The sun was down. Streamers white, red,

black, here, here, here. Fling the meat in his face. Tamburlaine,

Tamburlaine! Let the soldiers be buried. Hell, death,

Tamburlaine, hell! Make ready my coach, my chair,

my jewels. I come, I come, I come!

She runs against the cage and brains herself.

[
Enter
]
ZENOCRATE
with
ANIPPE
.

ZENOCRATE

Wretched Zenocrate, that livest to see

Damascus' walls dyed with Egyptian blood,

320   Thy father's subjects and thy countrymen,

Thy streets strewed with dissevered joints of men

And wounded bodies gasping yet for life,

But most accurst to see the sun-bright troop

Of heavenly virgins and unspotted maids,

Whose looks might make the angry god of arms

To break his sword and mildly treat of love,

On horsemen's lances to be hoisted up

And guiltlessly endure a cruel death!

For every fell and stout Tartarian steed,

330   That stamped on others with their thund'ring hoofs,

When all their riders
charged their
quivering spears,

Began to
check the
ground and rein themselves,

Gazing upon the beauty of their looks.

Ah, Tamburlaine, wert thou the cause of this,

That term'st Zenocrate thy dearest love,

Whose lives
were dearer to Zenocrate

Than her own life, or aught save thine own love?

[
She sees the bodies of
BAJAZETH
and
ZABINA
.]

But see, another bloody spectacle!

Ah, wretched eyes, the enemies of my heart,

340   How are ye glutted with these grievous objects,

And tell my soul more tales of bleeding ruth!

See, see, Anippe, if they breathe or no.

ANIPPE

No breath, nor sense, nor motion in them both.

Ah, madam, this their slavery hath enforced,

And ruthless cruelty of Tamburlaine.

ZENOCRATE

Earth, cast up fountains from thy
entrails,

And wet thy cheeks for their untimely deaths;

Shake with
their weight in sign of fear and grief;

Blush, heaven, that gave them honour at their birth,

350   And let them die a death so barbarous!

Those that are proud of fickle empery

And place their chiefest good in earthly pomp,

Behold the Turk and his great emperess!

Ah, Tamburlaine my love, sweet Tamburlaine,

That fight'st for sceptres and for slippery crowns,

Behold the Turk and his great emperess!

Thou that
in conduct of
thy happy stars,

Sleep'st every night with conquest on thy brows,

360   And yet wouldst shun the wavering turns
of war
,

In fear
and feeling of the like distress,

Behold the Turk and his great emperess!

Ah, mighty Jove and holy Mahomet,

Pardon my love, O, pardon his contempt

Of earthly fortune and respect of pity,

And let not conquest ruthlessly pursued

Be equally against his life incensed

In this great Turk and hapless emperess!

And pardon me that was not moved with ruth

370   To see them live so long in misery.

Ah, what may chance to thee, Zenocrate?

ANIPPE

Madam, content yourself, and be resolved

Your love hath Fortune so at his command

That she shall stay, and turn her wheel no more

As long as life maintains his mighty arm

That fights for honour to adorn your head.

Enter
[
PHILEMUS
,]
a messenger
.

ZENOCRATE

What other heavy news now brings Philemus?

PHILEMUS

Madam, your father and th'Arabian king,

The first affecter of your excellence,

380   Comes now as
Turnus ‘gainst Aeneas
did,

Armèd with lance into th'Egyptian fields,

Ready for battle ‘gainst my lord the king.

ZENOCRATE

Now shame and duty, love and fear, presents

A thousand sorrows to my martyred soul.

Whom should I wish the fatal victory,

When my poor pleasures are divided thus

And
racked by
duty from my cursèd heart?

My father and my first betrothèd love

Must fight against my life and present love,

Wherein the
change I use condemns
my faith

390   And makes my deeds infamous through the world.

But as the gods, to end the Trojans' toil,

Prevented Turnus
of Lavinia

And
fatally enriched
Aeneas' love,

So, for
a final issue to my griefs,

To pacify my country and my love,

Must Tamburlaine,
by their
resistless powers,

With virtue of a gentle victory

Conclude a league of honour to my hope;

Then, as
the powers divine have preordained,

400   With happy safety of my father's life

Send like defence of fair Arabia.

They sound to the battle, and
TAMBURLAINE
enjoys the victory. After, [the
KING OF] ARABIA
enters wounded
.

ARABIA

What cursèd power guides the murdering hands

Of this infamous tyrant's soldiers,

That no escape may save their enemies,

Nor fortune keep themselves from victory?

Lie down, Arabia, wounded to the death,

And let Zenocrate's fair eyes behold

That, as for her thou bear'st these wretched arms,

Even so for her thou diest in these arms,

410   Leaving thy blood for witness of thy love.

ZENOCRATE

Too dear a witness
for such love, my
lord.

Behold Zenocrate, the cursèd object

Whose fortunes never
masterèd her griefs!

Behold her wounded in conceit for thee,

As much as thy fair body is for me.

ARABIA

Then shall I die with full contented heart,

Having beheld divine Zenocrate,

Whose sight with joy would take away my life,

420   As now it bringeth sweetness to my wound,

If I had not been wounded as I am.

Ah, that the deadly pangs I suffer now

Would lend an hour's licence to my tongue

To make discourse of some
sweet accidents

Have chanced thy merits in this worthless bondage,

And that I might be privy to the state

Of thy deserved contentment and thy love!

But, making now a virtue of thy sight

To drive all sorrow from my fainting soul,

430   Since death denies me further cause of joy,

Deprived of care, my heart with comfort dies,

Since thy desirèd hand shall close mine eyes.

[
He dies
.]

Enter
TAMBURLAINE
leading the
SULTAN; TECHELLES, THERIDAMAS, USUMCASANE
[
bearing a crown for
ZENOCRATE
],
with others
.

TAMBURLAINE

Come, happy father of Zenocrate,

A title higher than thy Sultan's name.

Though my right hand have thus enthrallèd thee,

Thy princely daughter here shall set thee free;

She that hath calmed the fury of my sword,

Which
had ere this been
bathed in streams of blood

As vast and deep as Euphrates or Nile.

ZENOCRATE

440   O, sight thrice welcome to my joyful soul,

To see the king my father issue safe

From dangerous battle of my conquering love!

SULTAN

Well met, my only dear Zenocrate,

Though with the loss of Egypt and my crown.

TAMBURLAINE

'Twas I, my lord, that gat the victory.

And therefore grieve not at your overthrow,

Since I shall render all into your hands

And add more strength to your dominions

Than ever yet
confirmed th
'Egyptian crown.

The god of war resigns his room to me,

450   Meaning to make me general of the world.

Jove, viewing me in arms, looks pale and wan,

Fearing my power should pull him from his throne.

Where'er I come,
the Fatal Sisters sweat
,

And grisly Death, by running to and fro

To do their ceaseless homage to my sword;

And here in Afric, where it seldom rains,

Since I arrived with my triumphant host

Have
swelling clouds, drawn
from wide gasping wounds,

Been oft resolved in bloody purple showers –

460   A meteor that might terrify the earth

And make it quake at every drop it drinks.

Millions of souls sit on the banks of Styx,

Waiting the back return of Charon's boat;

Hell and Elysium swarm with ghosts of men

That I have sent from sundry
foughten fields

To spread my fame through hell and up to heaven.

And see, my lord, a sight of strange import:

Emperors and kings lie breathless at my feet.

The Turk and his great empress, as it seems,

470   Left to themselves while we were at the fight,

Have desperately dispatched their slavish lives.

With them Arabia too hath left his life –

All sights
of power to grace
my victory.

And such are objects fit for Tamburlaine,

Wherein as in a mirror may be seen

His honour, that consists in shedding blood

When men presume to manage arms with him.

SULTAN

Mighty hath God and Mahomet made thy hand,

Renownèd Tamburlaine, to whom all kings

480   Of force must yield their crowns and emperies.

And I am pleased with this my overthrow

If, as beseems a person of thy state,

Thou hast with honour used Zenocrate.

TAMBURLAINE

Her state and person wants no pomp, you see;

And for all blot of foul inchastity,

I
record heaven
, her heavenly self is clear.

Then let me
find no
further time to grace

Her princely temples with the Persian crown;

490   But here these kings, that on my fortunes wait,

And have been crowned for provèd worthiness

Even by this hand that shall establish them,

Shall now, adjoining all their hands with mine,

Invest her here my queen of Persia.

What saith the noble Sultan and Zenocrate?

SULTAN

I yield with thanks and protestations

Of endless honour to thee for
her love.

TAMBURLAINE

Then doubt I not but fair Zenocrate

Will soon consent to satisfy us both.