Plot. ’Tis done considerately. This heavy dulness
Is the disease of souls. Sleep in the night!
Dorm. Shall I wake my fellow Old-rat? he is refreshed.
Plot. Do; but return you with him: I have business with both—
Dorm. To hear us join in opinion of what’s a clock!
They talk of Endymion: now could I sleep three lives.
(exit.)
Plot. When other men measure the hours with sleep,
Careless of where they are and whom they trust,
Exposing their condition to danger
Of plots, I wake and wisely think prevention.
Night was not made to snore in; but so calm,
For our imaginations to be stirring
About the world; this subtle world, this world
Of plots and close conspiracy. There is
No faith in man nor woman. Where’s this Dormant?
Dorm. (re-entering with Old-rat.) Here is the sleepy vermin.
Old. It has been day this two hours.
Plot. Then ’tis time for me to go to bed.
Dorm. Would my hour were once come!
Plot. Keep out daylight, and set up a fresh taper.
Dorm. By that time we have dined, he will have slept out his first sleep.
Old. And after supper call for his breakfast.
Plot. You are sure ’tis morning?
Dorm. As sure as I am sleepy.
C. L.
For the Table Book.
IMPERIAL FATE.
——————Let us sit upon the ground,
And tell sad stories of the death of Kings:—
How some have been depos’d, some slain in war;
Some haunted by the ghosts they have depos’d;
Some poison’d by their wives, some sleeping killed;
All murder’d:—For within the hollow crown,
That rounds the mortal temples of a king,
Keeps Death his court—
Richard II.