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ing stream; The subtler flames, emitted from the sky, Flash out at once, with strength above resistance. CALI. How did Aspasia welcome your address? Did you proclaim this unexpected conquest? Or pay, with speaking eyes, a lover's homage? ABDALLA. Confounded, aw'd, and lost in admiration, I gaz'd, I trembled; but I could not speak; When e'en, as love was breaking off from wonder, And tender accents quiver'd on my lips, She mark'd my sparkling eyes, and heaving breast, And smiling, conscious of her charms, withdrew. [_Enter_ Demetrius _and_ Leontius. CALI. Now be, some moments, master of thyself; Nor let Demetrius know thee for a rival. Hence! or be calm--To disagree is ruin. SCENE II. CALI, DEMETRIUS, LEONTIUS, ABDALLA. DEMETRIUS. When will occasion smile upon our wishes, And give the tortures of suspense a period? Still must we linger in uncertain hope? Still languish in our chains, and dream of freedom, Like thirsty sailors gazing on the clouds, Till burning death shoots through their wither'd limbs? CALI. Deliverance is at hand; for Turkey's tyrant, Sunk in his pleasures, confident and gay, With all the hero's dull security, Trusts to my care his mistress and his life, And laughs, and wantons in the jaws of death. LEONTIUS. So weak is man, when destin'd to destruction!-- The watchful slumber, and the crafty trust. CALI. At my command, yon iron gates unfold; At my command, the sentinels retire; With all the license of authority, Through bowing slaves, I range the private rooms, And of to-morrow's action fix the scene. DEMETRIUS. To-morrow's action! Can that hoary wisdom, Borne down with years, still dote upon to-morrow? That fatal mistress of the young, the lazy, The coward, and the fool, condemn'd to lose An useless life, in waiting for to-morrow, To gaze with longing eyes upon to-morrow, Till interposing death destroys the prospect! Strange! that this gen'ral fraud, from day to day, Should fill the world with wretches undetected. The soldier, lab'ring through a winter's march, Still sees to-morrow drest in robes of triumph; Still to the lover's long-expecting arms To-morrow brings the visionary bride. But thou, too old to bear another cheat, Learn, that the present hour alone is man's. LEONTIUS. The present hour, with open arms, invites; Seize the kind fair, and press her to thy bosom. DEMETRIUS. Who knows, ere this important morrow rise, But
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