Duke. A suddain change!
Bap. I dare not ask, dear friend
If Juliana live! for that's a blessing
I am unworthy of, but yet denie not
To let me know the place she hath made happy
By having there her Sepulchre.
Pros. If your Highness please to vouchsafe a patient
Ear, we shall make a true relation of a story
That shall call on your wonder.
Duke. Speak, we hear you.
Pros. Baptista's fortune in the Genoua Court,
His banishment, with his fair Wife's restraint
You are acquainted with; what since hath follow'd
I faithfully will deliver. E'r eight Moons
After Baptista's absence were compleat,
Fair Juliana found the pleasures, that
They had injoy'd together, were not barren,
And blushing at the burthen of her womb,
No father near to own it, it drew on
A violent sickness, which call'd down compassion
From the angry Duke, then careful of her health.
Physitians were enquir'd of, and their judgment
Prescrib'd the Baths of Luca as a means
For her recovery; to my charge it pleas'd her
To be committed; but as on the way
We journey'd, those throws only known to Women
Came thick upon her, in a private Village.
Bap. She died?
Pros. Have patience, she brought to the world
A hopeful Daughter; for her bodies sickness
It soon decay'd, but the grief of her mind
Hourly increas'd, and life grew tedious to her,
And desperate e'er to see you; she injoyn'd me
To place her in a Greekish Monastery,
And to my care gave up her pretty Daughter.
Bapt. What Monastery? as a Pilgrim bare-foot,
I'll search it out.
Pros. Pray you interrupt me not,
Now to my fortunes; the girl well dispos'd of
With a faithful friend of mine, my cruel fate
Made me a prisoner to the Turkish Gallies,
Where for 12 years, these hands tugg'd at the Oar,
But fortune tyr'd at length with my afflictions,
Some Ships of Maltha met the Ottoman Fleet,
Charg'd them, and boarded them, and gave me freedom.
With my deliverers I serv'd, and got
Such reputation with the great Master
That he gave me command over a tall
And lusty ship, where my first happy service
Was to redeem Alberto rumour'd dead,
But was like me surpriz'd by Cortugogly.
Alber. I would I had died there.