Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: BETTUCCIO. Then come, Letizia, And we will be as glum and miserable As love will let us. [They all prepare to depart. The scene shifts. SCENE III. [The same as in Scene I., at Careggi; but a curtain is drawn across the stage, cutting off the interior of the apartment. Enter (left) Pico Della Mirandola and Luigi Pulci. At the same time enter (right) Leoni.] PULCI. What news, physician ? Leoni. News most ominous. Lorenzo, not contented to be shriven By his own confessor, Matteo Bossi, Nor by Fra Mariano, hath besought That Fra Girolamo will hither come, And ere he journey to the other world, Arrange his soul. Pico. The Prior of Saint Mark's, Savonarola! Leoni. Even he in sooth. He will be here anon. Pulci. You stagger me. But often so it is: the steadiest souls Seem to lose equilibrium when they stand Upon the narrow edge that doth divide This life from the deep precipice of death. I had not thought it. Pico. Doth he suffer much ? Leoni. He must, though his brave visage still belies The stomach's agonies, to which the gout, Routed from limbs, hath sulkily retired. He gleans no comfort from our tepid baths Nor Bono Avogradi's heliotrope. Pulci. Are we to lose him then ? Alas ! alas ! The loftiest leaves are blown away the first, While lowlier foliage melancholy hangs Through half the winter ! [PoLiziANO appears from behind the curtain, and draws it back. Lorenzo is seen reclining on a couch at the back of the stage, near the window overlooking Florence.] POLIZIANO. Lorenzo craves his dear familiars To come as near him as they are in thought. Will you approach ? Lorenzo. Come close, Mirandola! I could not die contented save I had With thy young aspect first refreshed myself. Learning and loveline...