(Enter Escarpin.)
Escarpin.
All Rome is full of wonder and dismay.[16]
Nisida.
What has occurred?
Cynthia.
Oh! what has happened, say?
Escarpin.
Chrysanthus, being immured
By his stern sire, a thousand ills endured.
Daria too, the same,
But in a house my tongue declines to name.
It pleased the God they both adore
Both to their freedom strangely to restore,
And from their many pains
To free them, and to break their galling chains,
Giving Daria, as attendant squire,
A roaring lion, rolling eyes of fire:—
In fine the two have fled,
But each apart by separate instinct led
To this wild mountain near.
Numerianus coming then to hear
Of the event, assuming in his wrath,
That 't was Polemius who had oped the path
Of freedom for his son and for the maid,
Has not an hour delayed,
But follows them with such a numerous band,
That, see, his squadrons cover all the land.
Voices (within).
Scour the whole plain.
Others (within).