JUGURTHA IN PRISON.....Rev. C. Wolfe.
WELL-is the rack prepared-the pincers heated?
Where is the scourge? How-not employed in Rome?
We have them in Numidia. Not in Rome ?
I'm sorry for it; I could enjoy it now;
I might have felt them yesterday; but now,-
Now I have seen my funeral procession;
The chariot-wheels of Marius have roll'd o'er me:
His horses' hoofs have trampled me in triumph ;
1 have attain'd that terrible consummation
My soul could stand aloof, and from on high
Look down upon the ruins of my body
Smiling in apathy; I feel no longer ;
I challenge Rome to give another pang.
Oh! how he smiled, when he beheld me pause
Before his car, and scowl upon the mob;
The curse of Rome was burning on my lips,
And I had gnaw'd my chain, and hurl'd it at them,
But that I knew he would have smiled again.
A king! and led before the gaudy Marius,
Before those shouting masters of the world,
As if I had been conquer'd: while each street,
Each peopled wall, and each insulting window,
Peal'd forth their brawling triumphs o'er my head.
Oh! for a lion from thy woods, Numidia !—
Or had I, in that moment of disgrace,
Enjoy'd the freedom but of yonder slave,
I would have made my monument in Rome.
Yet am I not that fool, that Roman fool,
To think disgrace entombs the hero's soul,-
For ever damps his fires, and dims his glories;
That no bright laurel can adorn the brow
That once has bow'd; no victory's trumpet-sound
Can drown in joy the rattling of his chains?
That my proud views despised the narrow limits,
Which minds that span and measure out ambition
Had fix'd to mine; and, while I seem'd intent
On savage subjects and Numidian forests,
My soul had pass'd the bounds of Africa!-
Defeated, overthrown! yet to the last
Ambition taught me hope, and still my mind,
Through danger, flight, and carnage, grasp'd dominion;
And had not Bocchus-curses, curses on him!-
What Rome has done, she did it for ambition;
What Rome has done, I might—I would have done;
What thou hast done, thou wretch !-Oh had she proved
Nobly deceitful: had she seized the traitor,
And joined him with the fate of the betrayed,
I had forgiven her all; for he had been
The consolation of my prison hours;
I could forget my woes in stinging him;
And if, before this day, his little soul
Had not in bondage wept itself away,
Rome and Jugurtha should have triumph'd o'er him.
Look here, thou caitiff, if thou canst, and see
The fragments of Jugurtha; view him wrapt
In the last shred he borrow'd from Numidia;
'Tis cover'd with the dust of Rome; behold
His rooted gaze upon the chains he wears,
And on the channels they have wrought upon him;
Then look around upon his dungeon walls,
And view yon scanty mat, on which his frame
He flings, and rushes from his thoughts to sleep.
Sleep!
I'll sleep no more, until I sleep for ever:
When I slept last, I heard Adherbal scream.
I'll sleep no more! I'll think until I die:
My eyes shall pore upon my miseries,
Until my miseries shall be no more.
Yet wherefore did he scream? Why, I have heard
His living scream,-it was not half so frightful.
Whence comes the difference? When the man was living,
Why, I did gaze upon his couch of torments
With placid vengeance, and each anguish'd cry
Gave me stern satisfaction; now he's dead,
And his lips move not;-yet his voice's image
Flash'd such a dreadful darkness o'er my soul,
I would not mount Numidia's throne again,
Did ev'ry night bring such a scream as that.
WOLFORT-HUBERT.....Beaumont.
WOULD you leave me,
Without a farewell, Hubert? Fly a friend
Unwearied in his study to advance you?
What have I e'er possess'd which was not yours?
Or rather did not court you to command it?
Who ever yet arrived to any grace,
Reward, or trust from me, but his approaches
Were by your fair reports of him preferr'd?
And what is more, I made myself your servant,
In making you the master of those secrets
Which not the rack of conscience could draw from me,
Nor I, when I ask'd mercy, trust my prayers with;
Yet, after these assurances of love,
These ties and bonds of friendship, to forsake me!
Forsake me as an enemy! Come, you must
If I may do't in private, and you hear it.
Wol. You have your will; sit down,
And use the liberty of our first friendship.
Hub. Friendship? When you prov'd traitor first, that vanish'd ;
Nor do I owe you any thought but hate.
I know my flight hath forfeited my head;
And, so I may make you first understand
What a strange monster you have made yourself,
I welcome it.
To me this is strange language.
Hub. To you? why, what are you?
Rais'd to't by cunning, circumvention, force,
Blood, and proscriptions!
Had I not reason, when, by Gerrard's plots,
I should have first been called to a strict account,
How, and which way I had consum'd that mass
Of money, as they term it, in the war;
Who underhand had by his ministers
Detracted my great actions, made my faith
And loyalty suspected; in which failing
He sought my life by practice?
Do you speak this to me, who (as I know't)
Must and will say, 'tis false?
You bade me sit, and promis'd you would hear,
Which I now say you shall! Not a sound more!
For I, that am contemner of mine own,
Am master of your life! then, here's a sword
Between you and all aids, sir. Though you blind
The credulous beast, the multitude, you pass not
These gross untruths on me.
How? gross untruths? Hub. Ay, and it is favourable language;
They had been in a mean man lies, and foul ones. Wol. You take strange license.
Hub. Yes; were not those rumours,
Of being called unto your answer, spread
By your own followers? and weak Gerrard wrought,
But by your cunning practice, to believe
That you were dangerous; yet not to be
Punish'd by any former course of law,
But first to be made sure, and have your crimes
Laid open after? which your quaint train taking,
You fled unto the camp, and there crav'd humbly
Protection for your innocent life, and that,
Since you had 'scap'd the fury of the war,
You might not fall by treason; and for proof,
You did not for your own ends make this danger,
Some that had been before by you suborn'd,
Came forth and took their oaths they had been hir'd
By Gerrard to your murder. This once heard,
And easily believed, th' enraged soldier,
Seeing no further than the outward man,
Snatch'd hastily his arms, ran to the court,
Kill'd all that made resistance, cut in pieces
Such as were servants, or thought friends to Gerrard,
Vowing the like to him.
Hub. Which he foreseeing, with his son, the earl, Forsook the city; and by secret ways,
(As you give out, and we would gladly have it)
Escap'd their fury; though 'tis more than fear'd
They fell among the rest. Nor stand you there,
To let us only mourn the impious means
By which you got it;
but your cruelties since
So far transcend your former bloody ills,
As, if compar'd, they only would appear
Essays of mischief. Do not stop your ears;
More are behind yet!
'Tis death to hear them nam'd! Hub.
That such would be your punishment when you did them! A prince in nothing but your princely faults,
Hub. Who was the lord of house or land, that stood Within the prospect of your covetous eye?
Wol. You are in this to me a greater tyrant,
Than e'er I was to any.
Hub. Think you that I had reason now to leave you, When you are grown so justly odious,
That e'en my stay here, with your grace and favour,
Makes my life irksome? Here, securely take it!
And do me but this fruit of all your friendship,
That I may die by you, and not your hangman.
Wol. Oh, Hubert, these your words and reasons have
As well drawn drops of blood from my griev'd heart,
As these tears from mine eyes: Despise them not !
By all that's sacred, I am serious, Hubert.
You now have made me sensible what furies,
Whips, hangmen, and tormentors, a bad man
Does ever bear about him! Let the good
That you this day have done, be ever number'd
The first of your best actions.
I will resign what I usurp, or have
Unjustly forc'd. The days I have to live
Are too, too few, to make them satisfaction
With any penitence: Yet I vow to practise
All of a man.
Oh, that your heart and tongue
By my griefs they do not!
Take the good pains to search them out; 'tis worth it.
You have made clean a leper; trust me, you have,
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