Cyd.  But are you sure she’s dead? 
I must embrace you fast, before I know,
Whether my life be yet secure, or no: 
Some other hour I will to tears allow,
But, having you, can shew no sorrow now.

Enter GUYOMAR and ALIBECH bound, with Soldiers.

Cort.  Prince Guyomar in bonds!  O friendship’s shame!  It makes me blush to own a victor’s name. [Unbinds him, CYDARIA, ALIBECH.

Cyd.  See, Alibech, Almeria lies there; But do not think ’twas I that murdered her.

[ALIBECH kneels, and kisses her dead sister.

Cort.  Live, and enjoy more than your conqueror:  [To GUYOMAR.  Take all my love, and share in all my power.

Guy.  Think me not proudly rude, if I forsake
Those gifts I cannot with my honour take: 
I for my country fought, and would again,
Had I yet left a country to maintain: 
But since the gods decreed it otherwise,
I never will on its dear ruins rise.

Alib.  Of all your goodness leaves to our dispose,
Our liberty’s the only gift we chuse: 
Absence alone can make our sorrows less;
And not to see what we can ne’er redress.

Guy.  Northward, beyond the mountains, we will go,
Where rocks lie covered with eternal snow,
Thin herbage in the plains and fruitless fields,
The sand no gold, the mine no silver yields: 
There love and freedom we’ll in peace enjoy;
No Spaniards will that colony destroy. 
We to ourselves will all our wishes grant;
And, nothing coveting, can nothing want.

Cort.  First your great father’s funeral pomp provide: 
That done, in peace your generous exiles guide;
While I loud thanks pay to the powers above,
Thus doubly blest, with conquest, and with love. [Exeunt.

EPILOGUE

BY A MERCURY.

To all and singular in this full meeting,
Ladies and gallants, Phoebus sends ye greeting. 
To all his sons, by whate’er title known,
Whether of court, or coffee-house, or town;
From his most mighty sons, whose confidence
Is placed in lofty sound, and humble sense,
Even to his little infants of the time,
Who write new songs, and trust in tune and rhyme: 
Be’t known, that Phoebus (being daily grieved
To see good plays condemned, and bad received)
Ordains, your judgment upon every cause,
Henceforth, be limited by wholesome laws. 
He first thinks fit no sonnetteer advance
His censure, farther than the song or dance. 
Your wit burlesque may one step higher climb,
And in his sphere may judge all doggrel rhyme: 
All proves, and moves, and loves, and honours too;
All that appears high sense, and scarce is low. 
As for the coffee-wits, he says not much;
Their proper business is to damn the Dutch: 
For the great dons of wit—­
Phoebus gives them full privilege alone,
To damn all others, and cry up their own. 
Last, for the ladies, ’tis Apollo’s will,
They should have power to save, but not to kill: 
For love and he long since have thought it fit,
Wit live by beauty, beauty reign by wit.