Anton. O bloody hangmen! Thine own gods give thee breath!
Each of thy tortures is my several death. [Exit.
SCENE II.[47]
The Place of Execution. A scaffold, block, &c.
Enter Antoninus, supported by Macrinus, and Servants.
Anton. Is this the place, where virtue is to suffer,
And heavenly beauty, leaving this base earth,
To make a glad return from whence it came?
Is it, Macrinus?
Mac. By this preparation,
You well may rest assured that Dorothea
This hour is to die here.
Anton. Then with her dies
The abstract of all sweetness that's in woman!
Set me down, friend, that, ere the iron hand
Of death close up mine eyes, they may at once
Take my last leave both of this light and her:
For, she being gone, the glorious sun himself
To me's Cimmerian darkness.
Mac. Strange affection[48]!
Cupid once more hath changed his shafts with Death,
And kills, instead of giving life.
Anton. Nay, weep not;
Though tears of friendship be a sovereign balm,
On me they're cast away. It is decreed
That I must die with her; our clue of life
Was spun together.
Mac. Yet, sir, 'tis my wonder,
That you, who, hearing only what she suffers,
Partake of all her tortures, yet will be,
To add to your calamity, an eyewitness
Of her last tragic scene, which must pierce deeper,
And make the wound more desperate.