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The Works of Christopher Marlowe

Act: 3 Scene: 3

Thus have wee martcht Northwarde from Tamburlaine,

Unto the frontier point of Soria :

And this is Balsera their chiefest hold,

Wherein is all the treasure of the land.

But stay a while, summon a parle, Drum,

It may be they will yeeld it quietly,

Knowing two kings, the friends to Tamburlain,

Stand at the walles, with such a mighty power.

Captaine, that thou yeeld up thy hold to us.

These Pioners of Argier in Affrica ,

Even in the cannons face shall raise a hill

Of earth and fagots higher than thy Fort,

And over thy Argins and covered waies

Shal play upon the bulwarks of thy hold

Volleies of ordinance til the breach be made,

That with his wine fils up all the trench.

And when we enter in, not heaven it selfe

Shall ransome thee, thy wife and family.

Pioners away, and where I stuck the stake,

Intrench with those dimensions I prescribed:

Cast up the earth towards the castle wall,

Which til it may defend you, labour low:

And few or none shall perish by their shot.

Then see the bringing of our ordinance

Along the trench into the battery,

Where we will have Gabions of sixe foot broad,

To save our Cannoniers from musket shot,

Betwixt which, shall our ordinance thunder foorth,

And with the breaches fall, smoake, fire, and dust,

The cracke, the Ecchoe and the souldiers crie

Make deafe the aire, and dim the Christall Sky.