Page:A Series of Plays on the Passions Volume 1.pdf/159

Rh

Curse on it! leave this town, and be a soldier!

Bas. Have done, have done! why dost thou bait me thus? Thy words become disgusting to me, Rosinberg. What claim hast thou mine actions to controul? I'll Mantua leave, when it is fit I should.

Ros. Then, 'faith! 'tis fitting thou shouldst leave it now; Ay, on the instant. Is't not desperation To stay, and hazard ruin on thy fame, Tho' yet uncheer'd e'en by that tempting lure, No lover breathes without? thou hast no hope.

Bas. What dost thou mean? curse on the paltry thought That I should count and bargain with my heart, Upon the chances of unstinted favour, As little souls their base-bred fancies feed? O! were I conscious that within her breast I held some portion of her dear regard, Tho' pent for life within a prison's walls, Where thro' my grate I yet might sometimes see E'en but her shadow sporting in the sun; Tho' plac'd by fate where some obstructing bound, Some deep impassable, between us roll'd, And I might yet from some high tow'ring cliff, Perceive her distant mansion from afar, Or mark its blue smoke rising eve and morn; Nay, tho' within the circle of the moon Some spell did fix her, never to return, And I might wander in the hours of night, And upward turn mine ever-gazing eye,