Alfred. Here comes the Dutches with proud Fredericks hearse.
Enter, Valentia, Montano, Vandermas, with others, bearing the hearse, with Fredericke on, covered with a black robe.
Duke. So, set it downe: why have you honored it
With such a sable coverture? A traytor,
Deserves no cloth of sorrow: set it downe,
And let our other offspring be brought foorth.
My beauteous, lovely, and admired love,
Come, sit by us in an imperiall chayre,
And grace this state throne with a state more fayre.
Valen. My gracious Lord, I hope your Excellence
Will not be so forgetfull of your honour,
Prove so unnaturall to your loving daughter
As to bereave her of her life
Because she hath wedded basely gainst your will.
Though Fredericke dyed deservedly, yet shee
May by her loves death clear her indignitie.
Duke. She and her love we have sentenced to die,
Not for her marriage onely, tho that deede
Crownes the contempt with a deserved death,
But chiefly for she raild against thy worth,
Upbraided thee with tearmes so monstrous base
That nought but death can cleare the great disgrace.
How often shall I charge they be brought foorth?
Were my heart guilty of a crime so vilde,
I'de rend it forth, then much more kill my childe.
Val. O, that this love may last! 'tis sprung so hie, Like flowers at full growth that grow to die.
Enter Julia, with a vaile over her head, Otho with another, with Officers.
Duke. What means these sable vailes upon their faces?
Val. In signe they sorrow for your high displeasure.
For since the houre they were imprisoned,
They have liv'd like strangers, hood-winkt together.
You may atchieve great fame, victorious Lord,
To save the lives of two such innocents.
Duke. Tis pretty in thee, my soule lov'd Dutchesse,
To make this Princely motion for thy foes.
Let it suffice, the'are traitors to the state,
Confederators with those that sought my life,
A kinne to Fredericke, that presumptious boy,
That durst beare armes against his naturall father:
Are they more deare then he? off with their vailes.