SIGISMUND. The violent efforts that you make
Show that you do not ask the leave you take.
ROSAURA. I hope to take it, if it is not given.
SIGISMUND. You rouse my courtesy to rage, by heaven!—
In me resistance, as it were, distils
A cruel poison that my patience kills.
ROSAURA. Then though that poison may be strong,
The source of fury, violence, and wrong,
Potent thy patience to subdue,
It dare not the respect to me that's due.
SIGISMUND. As if to show I may,
You take the terror of your charms away.
For I am but too prone
To attempt the impossible; I to-day have thrown
Out of this window one who said, like you,
I dare not do the thing I said I would do.
Now just to show I can,
I may throw out your honour, as the man.
CLOTALDO [aside]. More obstinate doth he grow;
What course to take, O heavens! I do not know,
When wild desire, nay, crime,
Perils my honour for the second time.
ROSAURA. Not vainly, as I see,
This hapless land was warned thy tyranny
In fearful scandals would eventuate,
In wrath and wrong, in treachery, rage and hate.
But who in truth could claim
Aught from a man who is but a man in name,
Audacious, cruel, cold,
Inhuman, proud, tyrannical and bold,
'Mong beasts a wild beast born?—
SIGISMUND. It was to save me from such words of scorn
So courteously I spoke,
Thinking to bind you by a gentler yoke;
But if I am in aught what you have said,
Then, as God lives, I will be all you dread.
Ho, there! here leave us. See to it at your cost,
The door be locked; let no one in.
[Exeunt CLARIN and the attendants.]
ROSAURA. I'm lost!
Consider . . . .