Act III, Scene iv

Enter the CAPTAIN 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.	5
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
[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?
Well, this must be the messenger for thee.	15
[Drawing a knife]
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,
And Moors in whom was never pity found,	20
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.	25
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.
Sweet mother, strike, that I may meet my father.	30
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 of her husband and son]
Enter THERIDAMAS, TECHELLES and all their train
THERIDAMAS
How now madam, what are you doing?
OLYMPIA
Killing myself, as I have done my son,	35
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,
Who when he hears how resolute thou wert	40
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	45
And thou shalt see a man greater than Mahomet,
In whose high looks is much more majesty
Than from the concave superficies
Of Jove’s vast palace the empyreal orb,
Unto the shining bower where Cynthia sits	50
Like lovely Thetis in a crystal robe;
That treadeth fortune underneath his feet
And makes the mighty god of arms his slave;
On whom Death and the Fatal Sisters wait
With naked swords and scarlet liveries;	55
Before whom, mounted on a lion’s back,
Rhamnusia bears a helmet full of blood
And strews the way with brains of slaughtered men;
By whose proud side the ugly Furies run,
Harkening when he shall bid them plague the world;	60
Over whose zenith clothed in windy air,
And eagle’s wings joined to her feathered breast,
Fame hovereth, sounding of her golden trump,
That to the adverse poles of that straight line
Which measureth the glorious frame of heaven,	65
The name of mighty Tamburlaine is spread.
And him, fair lady, shall thy eyes behold.
Come.
OLYMPIA
Take pity of a lady’s ruthful tears,
That humbly craves upon her knees to stay	70
And cast her body in the burning flame
That feeds upon her son’s and husband’s flesh.
TECHELLES
Madam, sooner shall fire consume us both
Than scorch a face so beautiful as this,
In frame of which nature hath showed more skill	75
Than when she gave eternal chaos form,
Drawing from it the shining lamps of heaven.
THERIDAMAS
Madam, I am so far in love with you
That you must go with us, no remedy.
OLYMPIA
Then carry me I care not where you will,	80
And let the end of this my fatal journey
Be likewise end to my accursèdlife.
TECHELLES
No madam, but the beginning of your joy –
Come willingly therefore.
THERIDAMAS
Soldiers, now let us meet the general	85
Who by this time is at Natolia,
Ready to charge the army of the Turk.
The gold, the silver, and the pearl ye got
Rifling this fort, divide in equal shares.
This lady shall have twice so much again	90
Out of the coffers of our treasury.                  Exeunt