furie, you shall onderstand
That neither doeth the litle greatest god
Finde such rebelling here in Britain land
Against his royall power as asketh rod
Of ruth from hell to wreke his names decaie
Nor Pluto heareth English ghostes complaine
Our dames disteyned lyves. Therfore ye maye
Be free from feare, sufficeth to maintaine
The vertues which we honor in you all,
So as our Britain ghostes when life is past
Maie praise in heven, not plaine in Plutoes hall
Our dames, but hold them vertuous and chast,
Worthie to live where furie never came,
Where love can see, and beares no deadly bowe,
Whoes lyves eternall tromp of glorious fame
With joyfull sounde to honest eares shall blowe.

FINIS.

The Tragedie of Gismonde of Salerne.

Such is a specimen of the play as it was originally acted before Queen
Elizabeth, at the Inner Temple, in the year 1568. It was the production
of five gentlemen, who were probably students of that society; and by
one of them, Robert Wilmot, afterwards much altered and published in the
year 1591.[1] [Wilmot had meanwhile become rector of North Okenham, in
Essex];[2] and in his Dedication to the Societies of the Inner and
Middle Temples, he speaks of the censure which might be cast upon him
from the indecorum of publishing a dramatic work arising from his
calling. When he died, or whether he left any other works, are points
equally uncertain.

"Nearly a century after the date of that play," observes Lamb, in his
'Extracts from the Garrick Plays,' "Dryden produced his admirable
version of the same story from Boccaccio. The speech here extracted
(the scene between the messengers and Gismunda) may be compared with
the corresponding passage in the 'Sigismunda and Guiscardo' with no
disadvantage to the older performance. It is quite as weighty, as
pointed, and as passionate."

To the Right Worshipful and Virtuous Ladies, the Lady MARY PETER
and the Lady ANNE GRAY, long health of body, with quiet of mind,
in the favour of God and men for ever.

It is most certain (right virtuous and worshipful) that of all human
learning, poetry (how contemptible soever it is in these days) is the
most ancient; and, in poetry, there is no argument of more antiquity and
elegancy than is the matter of love; for it seems to be as old as the
world, and to bear date from the first time that man and woman was:
therefore in this, as in the finest