40 Some that, in conquest of the perjured Christian,
Being a handful to a mighty host,
Think them in number yet sufficient
To drink the river Nile or Euphrates,
And, for their power, enow to win the world.
JERUSALEM
And I as many from Jerusalem,
Judaea, Gaza, and Scalonia’s bounds,
That on Mount Sinai with their ensigns spread,
Look like the parti-coloured clouds of heaven
That show fair weather to the neighbour morn.
TREBIZOND
50 And I as many bring from Trebizond,
Chio, Famastro, and Amasia,
All bord’ring on the Mare-Major Sea,
Riso, Sancina, and the bordering towns
That touch the end of famous Euphrates,
Whose courages are kindled with the flames
The cursèd Scythian sets on all their towns,
And vow to burn the villain’s cruel heart.
SORIA
From Soria with seventy thousand strong,
Ta’en from Aleppo, Soldino, Tripoli,
And so unto my city of Damasco,
60 I march to meet and aid my neighbour kings,
All which will join against this Tamburlaine
And bring him captive to your highness’ feet.
ORCANES
Our battle, then, in martial manner pitched,
According to our ancient use, shall bear
The figure of the semicircled moon,
Whose horns shall sprinkle through the tainted air
The poisoned brains of this proud Scythian.
CALLAPINE
Well then, my noble lords, for this my friend
That freed me from the bondage of my foe,
70 I think it requisite and honourable
To keep my promise and to make him king,
That is a gentleman, I know, at least.
ALMEDA
That’s no matter, sir, for being a king,
For Tamburlaine came up of nothing.
JERUSALEM
Your majesty may choose some ’pointed time,
Performing all your promise to the full.
’Tis nought for your majesty to give a kingdom.
CALLAPINE
Then will I shortly keep my promise, Almeda.
ALMEDA
80 Why, I thank your majesty.
Exeunt.
Scene 2
[Enter] TAMBURLAINE with USUMCASANE, and his three SONS [CALYPHAS, AMYRAS, CELEBINUS]; four [SOLDIERS] bearing the hearse of ZENOCRATE, and the drums sounding a doleful march, the town burning.
TAMBURLAINE
So, burn the turrets of this cursèd town.
Flame to the highest region of the air
And kindle heaps of exhalations
That, being fiery meteors, may presage
Death and destruction to th’inhabitants;
Over my zenith hang a blazing star
That may endure till heaven be dissolved,
Fed with the fresh supply of earthly dregs,
Threat’ning a death and famine to this land!
10 Flying dragons, lightning, fearful thunderclaps,
Singe these fair plains, and make them seem as black
As is the island where the Furies mask
Compassed with Lethe, Styx, and Phlegethon,
Because my dear Zenocrate is dead!
CALYPHAS
This pillar placed in memory of her,
Where in Arabian, Hebrew, Greek, is writ:
’This town, being burnt by Tamburlaine the Great,
Forbids the world to build it up again.’
AMYRAS
And here this mournful streamer shall be placed,
20 Wrought with the Persian and Egyptian arms
To signify she was a princess born
And wife unto the monarch of the East.
CELEBINUS
And here this table, as a register
Of all her virtues and perfections.
TAMBURLAINE
And here the picture of Zenocrate
To show her beauty which the world admired –
Sweet picture of divine Zenocrate
That, hanging here, will draw the gods from heaven
And cause the stars fixed in the southern arc,
Whose lovely faces never any viewed
30 That have not passed the centre’s latitude,
As pilgrims travel to our hemisphere
Only to gaze upon Zenocrate.
Thou shalt not beautify Larissa plains,
But keep within the circle of mine arms!
At every town and castle I besiege
And when I meet an army in the field,
Those looks will shed such influence in my camp
As if Bellona, goddess of the war,
40 Threw naked swords and sulphur balls of fire
Upon the heads of all our enemies.
And now, my lords, advance your spears again.
Sorrow no more, my sweet Casane, now.
Boys, leave to mourn. This town shall ever mourn,
Being burnt to cinders for your mother’s death.
CALYPHAS
If I had wept a sea of tears for her,
It would not ease the sorrow I sustain.
AMYRAS
As is that town, so is my heart consumed
50 With grief and sorrow for my mother’s death.
CELEBINUS
My mother’s death hath mortified my mind,
And sorrow stops the passage of my speech.
TAMBURLAINE
But now, my boys, leave off, and list to me
That mean to teach you rudiments of war.
I’ll have you learn to sleep upon the ground,
March in your armour thorough watery fens,
Sustain the scorching heat and freezing cold,
Hunger and thirst – right adjuncts of the war;
And after this to scale a castle wall,
Besiege a fort, to undermine a town,
60 And make whole cities caper in the air.
Then next, the way to fortify your men,
In champian grounds what figure serves you best;
For which the quinque-angle form is meet,
Because the corners there may fall more flat
Whereas the fort may fittest be assailed,
And sharpest where th’assault is desperate.
The ditches must be deep, the counterscarps
Narrow and steep, the walls made high and broad,
70 The bulwarks and the rampires large and strong,
With cavalieros and thick counterforts,
And room within to lodge six thousand men.
It must have privy ditches, countermines,
And secret issuings to defend the ditch,
It must have high argins and covered ways
To keep the bulwark fronts from battery,
And parapets to hide the musketeers,
Casemates to place the great artillery,
And store of ordnance, that from every flank
80 May scour the outward curtains of the fort,
Dismount the cannon of the adverse part,
Murder the foe, and save the walls from breach.
When this is learned for service on the land,
By plain and easy demonstration
I’ll teach you how to make the water mount,
That you may dry-foot march through lakes and pools,
Deep rivers, havens, creeks, and little seas,
And make a fortress in the raging waves,
Fenced with the concave of a monstrous rock,
90 Invincible by nature of the place.
When this is done, then are ye soldiers,
And worthy sons of Tamburlaine the Great.
CALYPHAS
My lord, but this is dangerous to be done.
We may be slain or wounded ere we learn.
TAMBURLAINE
Villain, art thou the son of Tamburlaine
And fear’st to die, or with a curtle-axe
To hew thy flesh and make a gaping wound?
Hast thou beheld a peal of ordnance strike
A ring of pikes, mingled with shot and horse,
Whose shattered limbs, being tossed as high as heaven,
100 Hang in the air as thick as sunny motes,
And canst thou, coward, stand in fear of death?
Hast thou not seen my horsemen charge the foe,
Shot through the arms, cut overthwart the hands,
Dyeing their lances with their streaming blood,
And yet at night carouse within my tent,
Filling their empty veins with airy wine
That, being concocted, turns to crimson blood,
And wilt thou shun the field for fear of wounds?
View me, thy father, that hath conquered kings
110 And with his host marched round about the earth
Quite void of scars and clear from any wound,
That by the wars lost not a dram of blood,
And see him lance his flesh to teach you all.
He cuts his arm.
A wound is nothing, be it ne’er so deep;
Blood is the god of war’s rich livery.
Now look I like a soldier, and this wound
As great a grace and majesty to me
As if a chair of gold enamellèd,
Enchased with diamonds, sapphires, rubies,
120 And fairest pearl of wealthy India,
Were mounted here under a canopy,
And I sat down, clothed with the massy robe
That late adorned the Afric potentate
Whom I brought bound unto Damascus’ walls.
Come, boys, and with your fingers search my wound
And in my blood wash all your hands at once,
While I sit smiling to behold the sight.
[They probe his wound with their fingers.]
Now, my boys, what think you of a wound?
CALYPHAS I know not what I should think of it. Methinks ’tis a pitiful sight.
130 CELEBINUS ’Tis nothing. Give me a wound, father.
AMYRAS And me another, my lord.
TAMBURLAINE [to CELEBINUS] Come, sirrah, give me your arm.
CELEBINUS Here, father, cut it bravely as you did your own.
TAMBURLAINE
It shall suffice thou dar’st abide a wound.
My boy, thou shalt not lose a drop of blood
Before we meet the army of the Turk.
140 But then run desperate through the thickest throngs,
Dreadless of blows, of bloody wounds and death.
And let the burning of Larissa walls,
My speech of war, and this my wound you see,
Teach you, my boys, to bear courageous minds
Fit for the followers of great Tamburlaine.
Usumcasane, now come let us march
Towards Techelles and Theridamas,
That we have sent before to fire the towns,
The towers and cities of these hateful Turks,
150 And hunt that coward, faint-heart runaway,
With that accursed traitor Almeda,
Till fire and sword have found them at a bay.
USUMCASANE
I long to pierce his bowels with my sword,
That hath betrayed my gracious sovereign,
That curst and damnèd traitor Almeda.
TAMBURLAINE
Then let us see if coward Callapine
Dare levy arms against our puissance,
That we may tread upon his captive neck
And treble all his father’s slaveries.
Exeunt.
Scene 3
[Enter] TECHELLES, THERIDAMAS, and their train [SOLDIERS and PIONERS].
THERIDAMAS
Thus have we marched northward from Tamburlaine
Unto the frontier point of Soria;
And this is Balsera, their chiefest hold,
Wherein is all the treasure of the land.
TECHELLES
Then let us bring our light artillery,
Minions, falc’nets, and sakers, to the trench,
Filling the ditches with the walls’ wide breach,
And enter in to seize upon the gold.
How say ye, soldiers, shall we not?
SOLDIERS
10 Yes, my lord, yes! Come, let’s about it.
THERIDAMAS
But stay a while. Summon a parley, drum.
It may be they will yield it quietly,
Knowing two kings, the friends to Tamburlaine,
Stand at the walls with such a mighty power.
[Drums] summon the battle.
[Enter above] CAPTAIN with his wife [OLYMPIA] and SON.
CAPTAIN
What require you, my masters?
THERIDAMAS
Captain, that thou yield up thy hold to us.
CAPTAIN
To you? Why, do you think me weary of it?
TECHELLES
Nay, captain, thou art weary of thy life
If thou withstand the friends of Tamburlaine.
THERIDAMAS
These pioners of Argier in Africa,
20 Even in the cannon’s face shall raise a hill
Of earth and faggots higher than thy fort,
And over thy argins and covered ways
Shall play upon the bulwarks of thy hold
Volleys of ordnance till the breach be made
That with his ruin fills up all the trench;
And when we enter in, not heaven itself
Shall ransom thee, thy wife, and family.
TECHELLES
Captain, these Moors shall cut the leaden pipes
30 That bring fresh water to thy men and thee,
And lie in trench before thy castle walls,
That no supply of victual shall come in,
Nor any issue forth but they shall die.
And therefore, captain, yield it quietly.
CAPTAIN
Were you, that are the friends of Tamburlaine,
Brothers to holy Mahomet himself,
I would not yield it. Therefore do your worst.
Raise mounts, batter, entrench, and undermine,
Cut off the water, all convoys that can,
40 Yet I am resolute. And so, farewell,
[Exeunt above.]
THERIDAMAS
Pioners, away! And where I stuck the stake
Entrench with those dimensions I prescribed.
Cast up the earth towards the castle wall,
Which, till it may defend you, labour low,
And few or none shall perish by their shot.
PIONERS We will, my lord.
Exeunt [PIONERS].
TECHELLES
A hundred horse shall scout about the plains
To spy what force comes to relieve the hold.
Both we, Theridamas, will entrench our men,
50 And with the Jacob’s staff measure the height
And distance of the castle from the trench,
That we may know if our artillery
Will carry full point-blank unto their walls.
THERIDAMAS
Then see the bringing of our ordinance
Along the trench into the battery,
Where we will have gabions of six foot broad
To save our cannoneers from musket shot,
Betwixt which shall our ordnance thunder forth,
And with the breach’s fall, smoke, fire, and dust,
The crack, the echo, and the soldiers’ cry,
60 Make deaf the air and dim the crystal sky.
TECHELLES
Trumpets and drums, alarum presently!
And, soldiers, play the men. The hold is yours!
[Exeunt.]
[Scene 4]
Enter the CAPTAI
N with his wife [OLYMPIA] and SON.
OLYMPIA
Come, good my lord, and let us haste from hence
Along the cave that leads beyond the foe.
No hope is left to save this conquered hold.
CAPTAIN
A deadly bullet gliding through my side
Lies heavy on my heart. I cannot live.
I feel my liver pierced, and all my veins
That there begin and nourish every part
Mangled and torn, and all my entrails bathed
In blood that straineth from their orifex.
Farewell, sweet wife! Sweet son, farewell! I die.
10 [He dies.]
OLYMPIA
Death, whither art thou gone, that both we live?
Come back again, sweet Death, and strike us both!
One minute end our days, and one sepulchre
Contain our bodies! Death, why com’st thou not?
[She draws a knife.]
Well, this must be the messenger for thee.
Now, ugly Death, stretch out thy sable wings,
And carry both our souls where his remains.
Tell me, sweet boy, art thou content to die?
These barbarous Scythians, full of cruelty,
20 And Moors in whom was never pity found,
Will hew us piecemeal, put us to the wheel,
Or else invent some torture worse than that.
Therefore, die by thy loving mother’s hand,
Who gently now will lance thy ivory throat
And quickly rid thee both of pain and life.
SON
Mother, dispatch me, or I’ll kill myself.
For think ye I can live, and see him dead?
Give me your knife, good mother, or strike home.
The Scythians shall not tyrannize on me.
30 Sweet mother, strike, that I may meet my father!
She stabs him.
OLYMPIA
Ah, sacred Mahomet, if this be sin,
Entreat a pardon of the God of heaven,
And purge my soul before it come to thee!
[She burns the bodies.] Enter THERIDAMAS, TECHELLES, and all their train. [OLYMPIA tries to kill herself.]
THERIDAMAS
How now, madam, what are you doing?
OLYMPIA
Killing myself, as I have done my son,
Whose body with his father’s I have burnt,
Lest cruel Scythians should dismember him.
TECHELLES
’Twas bravely done, and like a soldier’s wife.
Thou shalt with us to Tamburlaine the Great,
40 Who, when he hears how resolute thou wert,
Will match thee with a viceroy or a king.
OLYMPIA
My lord deceased was dearer unto me
Than any viceroy, king, or emperor,
And for his sake here will I end my days.
THERIDAMAS
But lady, go with us to Tamburlaine,