own the skies. [_Exit_ MUL. ZEYD.

_Bend._ He comes:--Now, heart,
Be ribbed with iron for this one attempt;
Set ope thy sluices, send the vigorous blood
Through every active limb for my relief;
Then take thy rest within thy quiet cell,
For thou shalt drum no more.

_Enter Emperor, and Guards attending him._

_Emp._ What news of our affairs, and what of Dorax?
Is he no more? say that, and make me happy.

_Bend._ May all your enemies be like that dog,
Whose parting soul is labouring at the lips.

_Emp._ The people, are they raised?

_Bend._ And marshalled too;
Just ready for the march.

_Emp._ Then I'm at ease.

_Bend._ The night is yours; the glittering host of heaven
Shines but for you; but most the star of love,
That twinkles you to fair Almeyda's bed.
Oh, there's a joy to melt in her embrace,
Dissolve in pleasure,
And make the gods curse immortality,
That so they could not die.
But haste, and make them yours.

_Emp._ I will; and yet
A kind of weight hangs heavy at my heart;
My flagging soul flies under her own pitch,
Like fowl in air too damp, and lugs along,
As if she were a body in a body,
And not a mounting substance made of fire.
My senses, too, are dull and stupified,
Their edge rebated:--sure some ill approaches,
And some kind sprite knocks softly at my soul,
To tell me, fate's at hand[6].

_Bend._ Mere fancies all.
Your soul has been before-hand with your body,
And drunk so deep a draught of promised bliss,
She slumbers o'er the cup; no danger's near,
But of a surfeit at too full a feast.

_Emp._ It may be so; it looks so like the dream
That overtook me, at my waking hour,
This morn; and dreams, they say, are then divine,
When all the balmy vapours are exhaled,
And some o'erpowering god continues sleep.
'Twas then, methought, Almeyda, smiling, came,
Attended with a train of all her race,
Whom, in the rage of empire, I had murdered:
But now, no longer foes, they gave me joy
Of my new conquest, and, with helping hands,
Heaved me into our holy prophet's arms,
Who bore me in a purple cloud to heaven[7].

_Bend._ Good omen, sir; I wish you in that heaven
Your dream portends you,--
Which presages death. [_Aside._

_Emp._ Thou too wert there;
And thou, methought, didst push me from below,
With thy full force, to Paradise.

_Bend._ Yet better.

_Emp._ Ha! what's that grizly fellow, that attends thee?

_Bend._ Why ask