Children, or wife?... Or hath the merciless scythe
Of this abhorr’d and jealous tyranny
Made my house desolate at one wide sweep?
They are as thou couldst wish, the old man replied,
Wert thou but lord of thine own house again,
And Spain were Spain once more. A tale of ill
I bear, but one that touches not the heart
Like what thy fears forebode. The renegade
Numacian woos thy sister, and she lends
To the vile slave, unworthily, her ear: