A table and chairs.
Enter (after a shout crying Antonio) the Governor and Count Machiavel.
Gov. Hell take their spacious throats! we shall ere long
Be pointed as a prodigy!
Antonio is the man they load with praise,
And we stand as a cypher to advance
Him by a number higher.
Mach. Now, Mach'vel, plot his ruin.
[Aside.
It is not to be borne; are not you our
Master's substitute? then why should he
Usurp a privilege without your leave
To preach unto the people a doctrine
They ought not hear?
He incites 'em not to obey your charge,
Unless it be to knit a friendly league
With the opposing French, laying before 'em
A troop of feigned dangers will ensue,
If we do bid 'em battle.
Gov. Dares he do this?
Mach. 'Tis done already;
Smother your anger, and you shall see here
At the council-board he'll break into a
Passion, which [Aside] I'll provoke him to.
To them Antonio, Alerzo, Fulgentio, and Pandolpho: they sit in council.
Gov. Never more need, my worthy partners in
The dangerous brunts of iron war, had we
Of counsel: the hot-reined French, led by
That haughty Moor, upon whose sword sits victory
Enthroned, daily increase;
And, like the army of another Xerxes,
Make the o'erburthen'd earth groan at their weight.
We cannot long hold out; nor have we hope
Our royal master can raise up their siege,
Ere we be forc'd to yield:
My lord, your counsel; 'tis a desperate grief.