ACT V.
SCENE I.
The cornets sound for the Act.
The dumb show.
Enter at one door Castilio and Forobosco, with halberts; four Pages with torches; Lucio, bare; Piero, Maria, and Alberto, talking; Alberto draws out his dagger, Maria her knife, aiming to menace the Duke. Then Galeatzo, betwixt two Senators, reading a paper to them, at which they all make semblance of loathing Piero, and knit their fists at him; two Ladies and Nutriche. All these go softly over the stage, whilst at the other door enters the ghost of Andrugio, who passeth by them, tossing his torch about his head in triumph. All forsake the stage, saving Andrugio, who, speaking, begins the Act.
Ghost of And. Venit dies, tempusque, quo reddat suis
Animam squalentem sceleribus.
The[314] fist of strenuous vengeance is clutch’d,
And stern Vindicta tow’reth up aloft,
That she may fall with a more weighty paise,
And crush life’s sap from out Piero’s veins.
Now ’gins the leprous cores of ulcered sins
Wheel to a head; now is his fate grown mellow,
Instant to fall into the rotten jaws
Of chap-fall’n death. Now down looks Providence, 10
T’attend the last act of my son’s revenge.
Be gracious, observation, to our scene,
For now the plot unites his scatter’d limbs
Close in contracted bands. The Florence Prince
(Drawn by firm notice of the Duke’s black deeds)
Is made a partner in conspiracy.
The states of Venice are so swoll’n in hate
Against the Duke for his accursèd deeds
(Of which they are confirm’d by some odd letters
Found in dead Strotzo’s study, which had past 20
Betwixt Piero and the murd’ring slave)
That they can scarce retain from bursting forth
In plain revolt. O, now triumphs my ghost,
Exclaiming, Heaven’s just, for I shall see
The scourge of murder and impiety!
[Exit.
[314] This line is ridiculed in The Poetaster, v. 1:—
“Break his back,
O poets all and some! for now we list
Of strenuous vengeance to clutch the fist.”