The Prince's Chamber.

A NTIOCHUS solus .

Ant. Oh! night, night, night — beautiful, matchless night!
Thy charms are all divine, far, far beyond
The gaudy glare of day; and ye, fair stars,
Soft, silent, bright, how beautiful are you,
Ye gorgeous wanderers through the pathless skies,
Conducting heaven's own light to our dim sphere,
And from your bountiful and shining urns
Raining the happy night-dews down on earth,
Till her full cup o'erflows with blessedness!

Sel. Ah, Demetrius,
Thy looks bode evil. I dare scarcely give
My heart's inquiry words. My noble boy,
How fares he?
Dem. Like a weed upon the shore,
Which only waits the next wave's visiting
To waft it hence for ever.
Sel. Righteous Gods!
If ye war not with man's best feelings; if
Ye build not up the fabric of his bliss
But as a toy to tear asunder, when
Ye lack amusement, save him, save my son!
What has he done, or I, that thus untimely
Your fatal bolts have found him?

The Prince's Chamber — Antiochus discovered reclining on a Couch.

Enter S TRATONICE .

Str. Antiochus!
Ant. Ha! Is't a dream, a cruel mockery,
Shaped to deride my bosom's loneliness;
Or does Stratonice indeed stand there,
And smile on lost Antiochus? Oh! speak
One word.
Str. Antiochus!
Ant. Say on — say on. —
I know it is delusion; but 'tis sweeter
To dream of sounds like those, than wake and hear

Another Chamber in the same. The Queen, the Countess of Argyll, Rizzio, and others, are discovered seated at a clarichord, on which the Queen is playing — Rizzio accompanying her on the harp, and singing the following

RONDO .

Oh! touch the ivory key again,
Thou who mak'st Orpheus' boastings vain,
And fiercer monsters charm'st to rest —
The vultures of the human breast!
Thou, whose sweet notes can lull despair,
Rouse slumbering hope, soothe anxious care,
Bid memory cease to pain,

A Chamber in the Palace.

Enter D ARNLEY and R UTHVEN .

Dar. Away — away! why will you conjure up
The horrors of the past? Though much I loved him,
I would forget him now. Alas! alas!
The rose, that withers gently on its stalk,
Smells sweetly after death, but if 'tis pluck'd
Away untimely, its rank breath offends
The shuddering sense — so are the memories
Of friends, who go down calmly to their graves,
Cherish'd within our breasts: but from the tombs
Of those (howe'er beloved), whom violence

Moonlight — A Terrace in the Garden of the Palace — Rizzio discovered playing on his harp, and singing — The Queen behind listening.

SONG .

Thou warbling lyre! to thee alone,
My trembling spirit dares to own
Its deep, soul-seated illness;
For the cold world would scorn my grief,
And friends would vainly seek relief,
And foes would chide my wild hopes down,
And she, for whom it bleeds, would frown
My heart to marble stillness.

The same as Scene the first.

Enter E LVIRA .

He parted strangely from me. His black brow
Lower'd like the gathering tempest; and his eye,
In hate or scorn averted, would not deign
One passing glance on me. Can he prove false?
Can all my dark forebodings come to pass?
Yet wherefore should I doubt him? wherefore write
Thus painfully on memory's tablet one
Cold act of grief or haste, while all his love,
All his kind words, and all his generous deeds,
I bury in oblivion. But, alas!

Another Apartment in the same.

MATILDA sola .

His heart is spell-bound. This pale girl has woven
Her fascinations round it, till it beats
For her, and her alone. Her hand shall moulder
In the cold grave ere it shall wed with Julio's.
Shall the last scion of that stately tree,
Whose top-branch dallied with the winds which ne'er
Blew on the world below, bow its proud head
To the base dust beneath it? Shall disdain
Point its lean finger at Savona's sons?
Sons who will blush to hear their grandsire named,

SCENE I.

An Apartment in Elvira's House.

Enter E LVIRA and A SPATIA .

Elv. Here at this casement let us sit, and wile
The hours away till Julio comes. How sweetly
Through the green vale the tranquil stream is gliding,
While the pale stars are studding it with gems
Immaculate, and silence reigns unbroken,
Save by the soft toned rippling of the waves,
And that low night-wind, which, scarce audible,
Rises and softly dies away, as 'twere

THE FIRST FYTTE

Merry it was in green forest,
Among the leaves green,
Where that men walk both east and west
With bows and arrows keen,
To raise the deer out of their den,
Such sights as hath oft been seen;
As by three yeomen of the North Countrey:
By them is as I mean.

The one of them hight Adam Bell,
The other Clym of the Clough,
The third was William of Cloudeslie,
An archer good enough.
They were outlawed for venison,
These three yeomen every one;
They swore them brethren upon a day,