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I am indeed the daughter of Sir Malcolm;

The child thou rescuedst from the flood is mine.

Pris. Blest be the hour that made me a poor man;

My poverty hath saved my master's house!

Lady R. Thy words surprise me; sure thou dost not feign!

The tear stands in thine eye; such love from thee

Sir Malcolm's house deserved not, if aright

Thou told'st the story of thy own distress.

Pris. Sir Malcolm of our barons was the flower;
The safest friend, the best, the kindest master;
But, ah! he knew not of my sad estate.
After that battle, where his gallant son,

Your own brave brother, fell, the good old lord
Grew desperate and reckless of the world;
And never, as he erst was wont, went forth
To overlook the conduct of his servants.

By them I was thrust out, and them I blame :
May Heaven so judge me as I judge my master,

And God so love me as I love his race!

Lady R. His race shall yet reward thee. On thy faith
Depends the fate of thy loved master's house.
Rememb'rest thou a little, lonely hut,
That like a holy hermitage appears
Among the cliffs of Carron?

Pris. I remember the cottage of the cliffs.
Lady R. "Tis that I mean:

There dwells a man of venerable age,
Who in my father's service spent his youth:
Tell him I sent thee, and with him remain,
Till I shall call upon thee to declare,
Before the king and nobles, what thou now

To me hast told. No more but this, and thou
Shalt live in honour all thy future days:

Thy son so long shall call thee father still,

And all the land shall bless the man who saved
The son of Douglas, and Sir Malcolm's heir.
Remember well my words; if thou shouldst meet
Him whom thou call'st thy son, still call him so;
And mention nothing of his nobler father.

Pris. Fear not that I shall mar so fair a harvest,
By putting in my sickle ere 'tis ripe.

Why I did leave my home and ancient dame
To find the youth, to tell him all I knew,
And make him wear these jewels on his arm;
Which might, I thought, be challenged, and so bring
To light the secret of his noble birth.

[LADY RANDOLPH goes towards the Servants.
Lady R. This man is not the assassin you suspected,
Though chance combined some likelihood against him.
He is the faithful bearer of the jewels

To their right owner, whom in haste he seeks.
"Tis meet that you should put him on his way,
Since
your mistaken zeal hath dragged him hither.

[Exeunt Prisoner and Servants.

My faithful Anna, dost thou share my joy?

I know thou dost. Unparalleled event!

Reaching from heaven to earth, Jehovah's arm
Snatched from the waves, and brings me to my son !
Judge of the widow, and the orphan's Father,
Accept a widow's and a mother's thanks
For such a gift! What does my Anna think
Of the young eaglet of a valiant nest?

How soon he gazed on bright and burning arms,

Spurned the low dunghill where his fate had thrown him, And towered up to the regions of his sire!

Anna. How fondly did your eyes devour the boy! Mysterious Nature, with the unseen cord

Of powerful instinct, drew you to your own.

Lady R. The ready story of his birth believed, Suppressed my fancy quite; nor did he owe

Το

any likeness my so sudden favour:

But now I long to see his face again,
Examine every feature, and find out
The lineaments of Douglas, or my own.
But, most of all, I long to let him know
Who his true parents are, to clasp his neck,
And tell him all the story of his father.

Anna. With wary caution you must bear yourself
In public, lest your tenderness break forth,
And in observers stir conjectures strange.

To-day the baron started at your tears.

Lady R. He did so, Anna; well thy mistress knows

If the least circumstance, mote of offence,

Should touch the baron's eye, his sight would be
With jealousy disordered. But the more

It does behoove me instant to declare

The birth of Douglas, and assert his rights. . . .

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SURE I am 'tis madness,

Inhuman madness, thus from half the world

To drain its blood and treasure, to neglect
Each art of peace, each care of government;
And all for what? By spreading desolation,
Rapine, and slaughter o'er the other half,
To gain a conquest we can never hold.
I venerate this land. Those sacred hills,

Those vales, those cities, trod by saints and prophets,
By God Himself, the scenes of heavenly wonders,
Inspire me with a certain awful joy.

But the same God, my friend, pervades, sustains,
Surrounds, and fills this universal frame;

And every land, where spreads His vital presence,
His all-enlivening breath, to me is holy.

Excuse me, Theald, if I go too far:

I meant alone to say, I think these wars
A kind of persecution. And when that-
That most absurd and cruel of all vices,
Is once begun, where shall it find an end?
Each, in his turn, or has or claims a right
To wield its dagger, to return its furies,
And first or last they fall upon ourselves.

TANCRED AND SIGISMUNDA.

Miscalculations of Old Men.

THOSE old men, those plodding, grave state pedants, Forget the course of youth; their crooked prudence, To baseness verging stili, forgets to take

Into their fine-spun schemes the generous heart,
That, through the cobweb system bursting, lays
Their labours waste.

SOPHONISBA.

Love.

WHY should we kill the best of passions, Love?
It aids the hero, bids Ambition rise

To nobler heights, inspires immortal deeds,
Even softens brutes, and adds a grace to Virtue.

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The Fable of this Tragedy is founded on the well-known Historical Incident of the filial Piety of the Grecian Daughter, EUPHRASIA, preserving the Life of her Father, EVANDER, condemned to Death by Starvation, by DIONYSIUS, King of Syracuse. EUPHRASIA obtains permission from PHILOTAS to visit her Father in Prison, conducted by ARCAS, an Officer of the Court.

SCENE-The Cavern where EVANDER is confined.

Enter ARCAS and EUPHRASIA.

Arc. No; on my life, I dare not.

Euph. But a small,

A wretched pittance; one poor cordial drop
To renovate exhausted, drooping ae.

I ask no more.

Arc. Not the smallest store

Of scanty nourishment must pass these walls.
Our lives were forfeit else: a moment's parley
Is all I grant; in yonder cave he lies.

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