She languishes, fhe burns, fhe waftes away
In fruitless hopes, and dies upon thy name.
SYPHOCES.
O fatal love! which, ftung by jealousy,
Expell'd a life far dearer than my own,
By curfed poifon-Ah divine Apame!
And could the murd'refs hope fhe should inherit
This heart, and fill thy place within these arms?
But grief fhall yield-Revenge, I'm wholly thine!
The tyrant too is wanton in his age,
He fhews that all his thoughts are not in blood;
Love claims its fhare; he envies poor Rameses
The softness of his bed; and thinks Amelia
A mistress worthy of a monarch's arms.
But fee, Ramefes comes; a fullen gloom
Scowls on his brow, and marks him through the dusk.
Enter RAMESES, PHERON, and other confpirators.
To what, my friend, fhall Memnon bid you
To tombs, and melancholy fcenes of death ?
I have no coftly banquets, fuch as spread
Prince Myron's table, when your brother fell.
I have no gilded roof, no gay apartment,
Such as the queen prepar'd for thee, Syphoces.
Yet be not difcontent, my valiant friends,
Bufiris reigns, and 'tis not out of season
To look on aught may mind us of our fate:
His fword is ever drawn, and furious Myris
Thinks the day loft that is not mark'd with blood.
And have we felt a tyrant twenty years,
Felt him as the raw wound the burning steel;
And are we murmuring out our midnight curses,
Drying our tears in corners, and complaining?
Our hands are forfeited-Gods! ftrike them off.
No hands we need to faften our own chains,
Our masters will do that; and we want fouls
To raise them to an use more worthy men.
MEMNON.
Ruffles your temper at offences past?
Here then, to fting thee into madness.
[Gives the Letter. Ramefes reads.] RAMESES.
See how the struggling paffions fhake his frame!
My bofom joy, that crowns my happy bed
With tender pledges of our mutual love,
Far dearer than my foul! and fhall my wife,
The mother of my little innocents,
Be taken from us! Torn from me, from mine,
Who live but on her fight! And fhall I hear
Her cries for fuccour, and not rush upon him?
My infant hanging at the neck upbraids me,
And ftruggles with his little arms to fave her.-
These veins have ftill fome gen'rous blood in ftore,
The dregs of those rich streams his wars have drain'd;
I'll giv't in dowry with her.
A tardy vengeance fhares the tyrant's guilt.
Let me embrace thee, Pheron; thou art brave,
And dost difdain the coldness of delay.
Curfe on the man that calls Ramefes friend,
And keeps his temper at a tale like this;
When rage and rancour are the proper virtues,
And lofs of reafon is the mark of men.
Thus I've determin'd: When the midnight hour
Lulls this proud city, and her monarch dreams
Of humbler foes, or his new mistrefs' love,
Then we will rush at once, let loose the terrors
Of rage pent in, and struggling twenty years
To find a vent, and at one dreadful blow
A more aufpicious juncture could not happen.
The Perfian, who for years has join'd our counfels,
Stirr'd up the love of freedom, and in private
Long nurs'd that glorious appetite with gold,
This morn with transport snatch'd the wish'd occasion
Of throwing his refentment wide, and now
He frowns in arms, and gives th' event to fate.
This hand fhall drag the tyrant from the throne,
And ftab the royal victim on this altar.
O justly thought! Friends, caft your eyes around;
All that moft awful is, or great in nature,
This folemn scene prefents; the gods are here,
And here our fam'd forefathers' facred tombs ;
Who never brook'd a tyrant in this land.
Let us not act beneath the grand assembly!
The flighted altars tremble, and thefe tombs
Send forth a peal of groans to urge us on.
Come then, furround my father's monument,
And call his fhade to witness to your vows.
RAMESES.
Nor his alone. O all ye mighty dead!
Illuftrious shades! who nightly stalk around
The tyrant's couch, and fhake his guilty foul;
Whether already you converfe with gods,
Or ftray below in melancholy glooms,
From earth, from air, from heav'n, and even hell,
Come, I conjure you, by the pris'ner's chain,
The widow's fighing, and the orphan's tears,
The virgin's fhrieks, the hero's spouting veins,
By gods blafphem'd, and free-born men enflav'd.
ΜΕΜΝΟΝ.
Hear, Jove! and you most injur'd heroes, hear,
While we o'er this thrice-hallow'd monument
Thus join our hands, and, kneeling to the gods,
Faft bind our fouls to great revenge!
This night the tyrant and his minions bleed.
PHERON. [Afide.]
So, now my foe is taken in the toil,
And I've a fecond caft for this proud maid-
It is an oath well spent, a perjury
Of good account in vengeance, and in love.
ΜΕΜΝΟΝ.
We wrong the mighty dead, if we permit
Our eyes alone to count this grand assembly:
A thousand unfeen heroes walk among us;
My father rifes from his tomb; his wounds
Bleed all afresh, and confecrate the day:
He waves his arm, and chides our tardy vengeance :
More than this world fhall thank us. O my friends!
Such our condition, we have nought to lose;
And great may be our gain, if this be great,
To crush a Tyrant, and preferve a State;
To ftill the clamours of our fathers blood,
To fix the bafis of the Public good,
To leave a fame eternal; then to foar,
Mix with the gods, and bid the world adore.
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