ACT I.

OCTAVIA. [1-34]
Octavia, weary of her existence, bewails her misery.

Aurora, that was shining brilliantly in the heavens, is now forsaking the wandering starry group, and Titan is rising from his Eastern couch, with his radiating flakes of fire, and is giving forth to the world another bright day. Let me pursue the recital of my woes burdened as I am with so many and such great misfortunes, and let me rehearse to thee my oft-repeated plaints, and let me surpass the Alcyons (Ceyx and Alcyon) which give out their dismal notes, as they hover over their aquatic abodes (during the nidifying season) and let me exceed too the Pandionian birds (Progne and Philomela) with my dolorous strains! for my troubles are greater, than ever theirs were - it is always a mother, ¹ a mother that is the prominent theme in my lamentations, the first cause of my misfortunes, hear then the sad plaints of a daughter - if any sense or feeling is to be looked for in those numbered with the shades; I wish that Clotho had broken the threads of my life, with her venerable fingers, before, ever plunged in the abyss of grief, I beheld the wounds on thy body (Messalina’s) and thy face besmeared with the unsightly blood! Oh! this access of the light of day, it is always distressing to my mind (from the repulsive reminiscences). Light is now more odious to me, than ever Stygian darkness could be, ever since that sorrowful time - I have had to submit to the imperious tyranny of a step-mother,² her hostile spirit, and her savage glances! It is she, she that, like cruel Erinnys, has imported her Stygian torches and disturbed the harmony of the marriage homestead! And she has destroyed thee. oh! my father a thousand times to be pitied, whom till now, the whole world beyond the very ocean! owed subjection - at whose appearance on their shores, the affrighted Britons fled in dismay; having never before owed allegiance to any foreign conqueror! Ah me! oh! my father, thou art laid low, fallen by the wicked snares of a wife (destroyed by one of the fungi, Boletus, a poisonous mushroom) and thy palace and thy off-spring are under the cruel rule of a tyrant.

OCTAVIA’S NURSE. [35-57]
On account of the sad misfortunes befalling her nurse-child Octavia, the nurse execrates the drawbacks which beset the proud surroundings of life in a Palace.

Anyone that is captivated at first sight by the outside splendor and fleeting advantages of the treacherous palace, can now behold with his own eyes, wonderstruck, and realize what remains of a once most powerful dynasty overthrown on a sudden by the insiduous advantages of adverse fate, and see what has befallen the offspring of Claudius, to whose imperial sway the whole world was once subject, and by whom that Ocean hitherto free, and unnavigated over, was brought under control and was constrained to afford an unopposed passage for our Roman fleets! Think that it was he who first placed the Britons under any foreign yoke, and covered the very seas, before unknown to the Romans, with his fleets, and amongst even such barbarous nations, and such tempestuous seas, he was, at all events, in a state of personal safety! But alas! he fell at last by the wickedness of a wife - presently she will share the same lot at the hands of a son (Nero), and a brother of whom is now lying dead from the effects of poison. (Britannicus was not a brother, by the ties of blood, Nero became a brother by adoption only.) That miserable sister (by marriage only) and likewise wife, is in a deep grief, nor does her restrained anger suffice to conceal her terrible woe - she always avoids being alone with her cruel husband, eschewing privacy, and her angry sentiments are quite on a par with the aversion which the husband entertains towards her! They burn with mutual hatred! The confidence, which she reposes in me, is in some sort a consolation to her grieving heart, but devoted affection is quite useless, in as much as her uncontrollable grief thwarts all my well-intentioned advice, nor can her resolute strong-mindedness, be in any way brought under by my efforts, but she even seems to have acquired increased determination, arising out of the very misfortunes she has undergone! Alas! what wicked crime do my alarms lead me on to foreshadow, would that the kind intervention of the Gods may avert such a climax!

OCTAVIA - NURSE. [58-272]
The Nurse consoles the grieving Octavia, and dissuades her from prosecuting any revenge, which she might be contemplating.

OCTAVIA.

OH! my cruel destiny, to be equalled by none, in the severity of my misfortunes, it may be, Electra, ³ that I shall rehearse thy griefs in my own personal sufferings - it was thy fate to have to bewail the loss of a murdered parent, but in thy case, there was a brother in view, to revenge, at some future time, by that terrible crime a brother, whom thy affection snatched away from the sword of the enemy and to whom thy fidelity gave its sheltering protection: but my fear for the consequences hinders me from even outwardly bewailing the loss of my parents, who were snatched away from me, by the cruel hand of fate; it forbids me, too, to bemoan the death of a brother, in whom my one, my only hope was centred! There was a brief interval of consolation afforded me amidst such great misfortunes (while the brother Britannicus lived), but now, forsooth, I am handed over alone, with no brother to look forward to, to my own bitter grief, and thus I remain only, now, as the shadow of a once great name!

NUR. Alas! a sorrowing voice has struck my ears! and why should I, although affected with the tardiness of old age, hesitate to hasten with quickened steps to the bedchamber of Octavia?

OCT. Trace these tears to their proper source, Nurse, thou art the one faithful witness of my grief.

NUR. What day will ever arrive, oh, thou one to be pitied, which will rid thee of thy troubles?

OCT. What day (dost thou mean) will arrive? (Is it) the day on which I shall be packed off to the Stygian Shades?

NUR. I beseech the Gods, may such an unpropitious day as that, then, be a long way off!

OCT. Unfortunately, thy wishes, Nurse, have no influence over such troubles as mine, but the Fates have!

NUR. Surely a merciful deity will vouchsafe better times for the one afflicted as thou art; but thou hast calmed thyself down somewhat, just try and prevail on thy husband’s susceptibilities, if he has any, and assume a bland, obsequious demeanour towards him.

OCT. I shall have to overcome, first the savage lion of the plains, and the fierce tiger of the jungle, before I can subjugate the adamant heart of the tyrant Nero. - The fact is, he has an instinctive hatred to start with, of any one descended from an illustrious race - he despises alike, the ignoble herd of mankind and the Gods above as well, nor has he received anything at the hands of fortune, but what a cruel parent has heaped upon him, as the proceeds of aggravated crime; although he is ungrateful enough to be ashamed of ever having received anything from that cruel mother, he has, nevertheless, taken upon himself, the dominion over this empire, and although, in return for such a great gift, he hands her over to be assassinated! But a woman will long hold the credit for her share in the transaction, even after her death, and it will continue to last for many a long year in the minds of the people.

NUR. Restrain the expressions of thy angered mind, weigh with care the words thou sufferest to escape thy lips.

OCT. Although I may patiently suffer these things, and appear to tolerate them, my misfortunes can never be brought to an end, but by the sad alternative means of Death! What with a murdered mother - a father snatched from me by a wicked crime - robbed of a brother - overwhelmed with all kinds of misery and grief - hateful in the eyes of a husband, and exposed to the insolent authority of a subject, ⁴ it cannot be supposed that I can enjoy my life vastly! My heart is perpetually in a kind of tremble, not from the fear of death, but from the possibility of some crime being committed! May I, however, never be fated to perpetrate one! It would please me to die, and the punishment of death itself could not be more dreadful to bear, especially by me in my miserable state, than having to encounter the angry and murderous looks of that tyrant (Nero) and then to have to exchange kisses with a downright enemy, which I know him to be, so as to dread his very nod! Whose caresses my inward grief could not permit me to entertain, and after that fate of my brother’s, who fell a victim to his crimes, and whose very empire he has usurped, and who glories in having been the author of that impious slaughter! How often is the tristful ghost of my brother brought before my mental vision, when a state of bodily repose relaxes my tired frame, and sleep invades the lids so wearied with weeping - Sometimes the ghost arms its feeble hands with funeral torches, and aims its blows at the eyes and face of his brother, (Nero was a brother by adoption only) who, in a state of alarm takes refuge in my couch - the enemy still pursuing him, and making a rush at him, as he is clinging to me, passes his sword through my side! Then the tremors come over me, and an intense dread drives away further sleep and my grief is renewed, and the alarms, as to my own miserable fate, return to me in force. - Then add to this - that insolent concubine (Poppaea) shining forth bedecked in all the finery which our palatial home affords her; to gratify whose whims and caprices, that son has caused his own mother to be embarked on board an unseaworthy craft, veritably only one meant to reach the Stygian banks! (that is, one which meant destruction, that would easily fall to pieces through the action of the waves, and be wrecked) and that mother whom, after the craft had become a wreck, and the difficulty of the waves had even been surmounted, he slew with his sword, and which proved to her a more cruel enemy than the waves of the sea! What prospect of safety dost thou think there can be, and security for me, after such a crime as that? That hostile woman, that Nero-conqueress, Poppaea is like some tempestuous cloud, hovering over my matrimonial bondage, and is burning with her hatred towards me, and she is now requiring at the hands of a husband, the life of a legitimate wife, as the price of her infamy! Oh my father, be thou emerged from the Stygian streams, and grant aid to thy daughter, or the earth being opened up, bring to my view that Stygian gulf, into which I would, myself, fain be borne headlong!

NUR. In vain thou invokest the Manes of thy father Oh! thou art much to be pitied - in vain I repeat, as amongst the manes, there is no anxiety with them, as to the offspring they left behind them (allusion is here implied to the Oblivion induced by Lethe), and he could prefer one of an alien race, to his own son, his own flesh and blood, and who took to himself by an incestuous marriage, a wife who was the daughter of a brother, has intermingled the race, by a most deplorable and unpropitious nuptial knot! Hence it is, that a whole series of crimes has been the outcome - murders - wholesale treacheries, the terrible grasping for power and that thirst for the cruel shedding of blood! The same day that the son-in-law of Claudius, Silanus, fell a victim, thy father’s marriage with Agrippina took place, lest he should be found to gather greater influence in consequence of thy marriage! Oh! that intense piece of wickedness! Silanus⁵ was presented to that vile woman, Agrippina, as a sort of wedding present and that noble young Roman stained with his blood his own paternal household gods, having been falsely accused, by a trumped up charge of fictitious crime! Woe is me! The arch-enemy has now entered the palace to which access has been gained by the treachery and wiles of a woman, and he that has been made a son-in-law of the Emperor Claudius, in the same way that he has been constituted a son by adoption, a young man of a most cruel disposition and capable of any crime, for whom that mother of his ignited the nuptial torches and joined thee by the marriage knot, although thou fearedst, and wast averse to such a union, and that ferocious woman, who accomplished whatever she set about, with great success, has actually dared to shed her imperious will over the cherished destinies of the very world! Who can describe the many forms in which crime has been served up, and the diabolical ambition of that woman, and her smooth, unsuspected treachery, whilst she is seeking to gain imperial power through every gradation of crime. Thus it is, that Piety with all its sacred associations quits the scene, in trembling horror! and thus cruel Erinnys, with all her ill-boding, advances into the palace to take her vacant place! She has defiled the sanctity of our household gods with her Stygian torches, in her fury, she has broken down the institutions of Nature herself, and set every human law at defiance - a cruel wife has prepared the poisoned bowl for a husband, and she, herself, has perished afterwards by the hands of a son - and thou also, Britannicus, hast been deprived of thy life, to be bewailed by us for ever! Oh! unhappy boy, till lately the great star of the Universe, the prop and mainstay of the Imperial Augustan Dynasty (the Caesars). Oh! Britannicus! woe is me! thou art now only a collection of flimsy ashes, and a tristful shade! For whom, be it said, even thy cruel step-mother shed a few tears, when she gave up thy body to be consumed on the funeral pile, resembling as thou didst, the winged God himself, (Cupid) in thy shapely form and comely face - the greedy flames, however, took all that away! Octavia!

OCT. And let them extinguish me in like manner, lest the tyrant fall by my hand.

NUR. Nature has not endowed thee, with such strength, as to enable thee to carry out such a threat.

OCT. Long continued grief, anger, heaviness of heart, misery of soul, lamentations would supply me with the necessary strength I should think.

NUR. No! rather subdue that fierce man, by wheedlings and caresses.

OCT. That I may induce him to restore to me a brother of whom he has deprived me by a cruel crime! Dost thou mean that?

NUR. No, not that; but that thou, thyself, might be in a state of security, that thou some day might build up the shattered dynasty, of which thy father was the dignified head, with thy own off-spring.

OCT. The palace of the Emperor is expecting another arrival in the shape of offspring, the cruel fate of my miserable brother will soon drag me towards a similar end.

NUR. So favorable is the feeling of the citizens towards thee, that this fact goes far to conform my hopes.

OCT. Yes! it is a good thing, to have one’s misfortunes pitied, but that does not remove nor even lessen the incubus resulting, therefrom - (the weight of troubles).

NUR. The power of the populace is great.

OCT. That, however, of an Emperor is greater.

NUR. But he surely will have some regard for a wife.

OCT. No! a concubine will stand in the way of that.

NUR. But it is granted, that she is odious in the sight of all the people.

OCT. But she is held dear by Nero.

NUR. She is not a wife as yet, remember!

OCT. But she will soon become one, and a mother as well!

NUR. Juvenile ardour, thou must remember, burns only as long as the early impressions operate, which called it forth, nor does it last long, ever, with these unlawful amours, it passes off like some flickering flame - on the other hand, the love of a chaste wife is an enduring possession - she is, as thou art aware, only the first who has ventured to violate the sanctity of thy marriage-bed, but this rival of thine, although a subject, has possessed the affections of thy husband for a long time - it is an old love affair - but this same woman is now evidently, more submissive and more subdued in her manner, as if she feared that some one else might be preferred to herself (lest in like manner, another may be preferred to herself as she, herself, was to Octavia), and she shows this by various indications, by which, as if tacitly confessing it, she openly portrays her fears! And the winged God (Cupid) may leave her in the lurch, let her beauty be never so transcendent, or however proud she may be of her wealth of physical attractions - all this sort of thing amounts to a very limited lease of human enjoyment. The Queen of the Gods herself, has, aforetime, undergone grief similar to thy own, when Jupiter, the lord of the heavens, and father of the Gods, changed himself into all kinds of shapes, and when, at one time, he assumed the plumage of a swan (to gain the better of Leda), at another time, he donned the horns of the Sidonian bull, (when he carried off Europa) then again, the same Jupiter has fallen upon another, as a golden shower (when he introduced himself to Danaë). The constellations of Leda are now shining in the heavens, Bacchus is duly installed in his father’s Olympian kingdom and Alcides possesses Hebe as a wife, now that he has been made a god, nor does Alcides any longer fear the anger of Juno, whose acknowledged son-in-law he is now, having married Hebe, but who was formerly considered in the light of an enemy! However, the wise submissiveness of an exalted wife like Juno, with her dissembled grief, has completely overcome the temper of Jupiter, and the mighty Juno reigns supreme in the ethereal marriage couch of the Thundering Jove! Nor does Jupiter, now desert the palaces on high, captivated by mortal beauties; and thou, Octavia, art another Juno, although a terrestrial one, thou art the sister and wife of an Augustus. (The emperors at that time assumed the title of “Augustus.”) Conquer therefore thy troubles as Juno did.

OCT. Let the stormy seas seek cordial companionship with the stars and let fire mingle with water, let the very heavens descend and take the place of grim Tartarus, let balmy light amicably join hands with hideous darkness, and bright clear day ally itself with the dewy night, before my mental tenderness could harmonize with the impious disposition of that wicked husband of mine. I am ever mindful of my murdered brother, I wish that the ruler of the heavenly gods would make ready to cut short with his lightnings, the terrible life of that cruel emperor - that deity, who so often shakes the earth with his frightful thunderbolts and terrifies our very souls with his awful igneous displays and novel wonders (fresh prodigies). But I have witnessed of late a blazing phenomenal splendor in the heavens, ⁶ a comet that has exposed to my view its ominous fiery torch, (tail) just where slow-moving Boötes, stiff as it were with the Arctic cold, drives his wagon at each turn of the night continually; behold, the very atmosphere seems polluted with the horrible breath of that cruel ruler. The angry stars actually seem to be threatening the people with some fresh disasters, whom that impious potentate holds in domination. Not so bad was it, even, when the indignant earth formerly became a parent, and brought forth a ferocious Typhoeus, when Jupiter was not so much looked up to, as he is now - this present monster is worse than any Typhoeus ever was, for he is in addition, the avowed enemy of the gods and of mankind alike, for he has expelled all the deities from their temples - he has driven away the citizens from their native land, and robbed my brother of his life - he has drawn the life-blood of his own mother - and is he not still allowed to behold the light of heaven? and, moreover, does he not seem to enjoy his vile existence and drag on his noxious life? Alas! Oh! thou supreme father of all, why dost thou, invincible as thou art, hurl thy lightnings, oftentimes, so harmlessly from thy regal hand? Why does thy hand hesitate, to hurl them with efficacy upon one so guilty as is Nero? - I wish that Nero could be made to pay the just penalty of his crimes - he (an adopted son of Dion Domitius, his adopting father) is the very tyrant of the universe, which he takes care to oppress with an ignominious yoke! he fairly contaminates and compromises the very name of Augustus, with his vicious tendencies and confirmed immoralities!

NUR. He is altogether unworthy, I am free to confess, of being married to a woman like thee, but is it not better, dost thou not think, to bow to the Fates (the inevitable) and to go on hoping for some favorable change on the part of fortune (chapter of events). My nurse-child, I beseech thee to ponder over all this and take it to heart and never excite the anger of thy violent husband - perhaps some avenging deity may crop up (exist) who will come to thy aid, and may that auspicious day arrive!

OCT. Already our dynasty is under the ban of oppression through the severe anger of the Gods - first, when cruel Venus stepped in and impregnated my wretched mother with those lustful desires, who, ignoring us, her children (in a state of sexual madness, nymphomania) and though, already married, contracted an illicit matrimonial union with Silius (a sham marriage), thinking nothing at all about the husband she had already, and not troubling her head in the slightest degree, as to the lawlessness of such a proceeding. With her hideous locks, hanging loosely, duly surrounded with their serpents, that avenging Erinnys was present at this veritably Stygian marriage ceremony, and only extinguished the nuptial torches, to be seized upon for the purpose of future blood-shedding! For it inflamed the outraged breast of the Emperor, with such murderous wrath, as to culminate in the cruel slaughter of my mother, and thus my unfortunate parent fell a victim to the sword, and her death has overwhelmed me with never-ending grief! As the consequence of all this, she has dragged in her train, her husband and her son, to the shades below! And has handed over our dynasty to its downfall!

NUR. Do refrain from a renewal of thy grief, and of those tears, which I know thou only sheddest out of affection for the Manes of thy parent, who has undergone a heavy punishment for her mad conduct!

CHORUS. [273-376]
The Chorus being in favor of Octavia, looks with detestation upon the marriage of Poppaea, and condemns the degenerate patience of the Romans, as being unworthy, too indifferent and servile, and inveighs against the crimes of Nero.

WHAT report is this, that has just reached our ears - we wish that if such a story be wrongfully believed, although it may have been so industriously, canvassed abroad, and in such a purposeless manner, that it may not meet with any future credence - let not a fresh wife, usurp the marriage-bed of our empress! let the wife sprung from the loins of Claudius still reign supreme, over her own household gods! And may she, by a happy child-birth, bring forth those guarantees of peace, which the tranquil universe will hail with joy, and let Rome preserve its everlasting glory (among nations). The mighty Juno has drawn a prize in the lottery, of fortune, and now shares the couch of her husband, and brother, in absolute security and why should not the sister of Augustus, (that now is) having reconciled her matrimonial feud, do the same thing! Why is she to be driven away from her paternal palace? If that is the case, what does her devoted piety (moral observances) profit her? What good has the having possessed Divus for a father done for her? What good has her virginity done her? And what earthly use has her chaste modesty been to her? But we are all forgetful of what we once were, since the death of our emperor, whose race we are inclined to ignore in a manner, owing to our fear of that Tyrant Nero! Once upon a time, there did exist the Roman type of bravery amongst our ancestors, and the genuine progeny of Mars, and the true racial blood flowed in the veins of the men of bye-gone days! They drove out, without the smallest hesitation, haughty, insufferable kings from their cities! And they nobly avenged thy manes, oh! Virgin thou! (Virginia) who wast slain by the hands of a parent, lest thou shouldst undergo an odious slavery, or that cruel lust should carry off victoriously its wicked prize! Sad war, too, followed on after thee, oh! thou daughter of Lucretius, so much, to be pitied, who was sacrificed by thine own hand, after having been ravished by a cruel tyrant (Sextus Tarquinius). At the hands of our outraged ancestors Tullia, the wife of Tarquinius, was punished for her cruel crimes - she who wickedly drove her cruel chariot over the body of her murdered father, and who, although a daughter, denied the accustomed funeral pile to the mutilated remains of the old man! Our own time, even, has witnessed an abominable crime, when the emperor, treacherously seizing upon the person of his parent, had her conveyed in a Stygian Craft (that is one meant for the purpose of destruction) across the Tyrrhenian Sea; the sailors receiving their orders, hastened to leave their tranquil harbours, and the waves soon resounded with the plash of their oars, and the craft shoving off, was quickly borne upon the sea, and which from the force of the waves soon springs a tremendous leak, letting in the sea, the hull giving way on account of the looseness of its timbers, and it ships a heavy sea! A great shout, thereupon is raised towards the sky, mixed with female cries, and cruel death, in various shapes, is now wandering before their eyes, each one seeks to escape from a watery grave - some in a state of nudity clung to the planks of the shattered craft, and with their aid, ply the waves successfully - others reach the shore by swimming - many are immerged, and hurry to their fate into a deep sea! Augusta (Agrippina) rends her garments, tears her hair, and deluges her face with her sad tears after a little. There is no prospect of safety, and burning with inward rage, and although fairly overpowered by the disaster, she exclaims: “Oh! my son, is this the reward, for the benefits I have lavished on thee? I am indeed worthy of having been caused to embark in such a craft, who have brought thee into the world and who have given thee thy very life, and in my motherly weakness have handed over to thee the proud name and empire of the Caesars! Oh! my husband, show thy face from out of the Acheron, and feast thy eyes on the punishment I am now undergoing - I, oh! thou to be pitied one, was the cause of thy death, and the instigatrix of the death of thy son (Britannicus) also! Behold! as I have richly deserved, let me, unburied, be borne off to join thy manes - let me be overwhelmed by the cruel waves of the sea” (at this moment the waves strike her in the face, as she is speaking) she plunges into the sea, sinks, but soon rises again to the surface, and impelled by her fear, she strikes out with her hands, but being soon tired out, gives up the struggle. - But a great deal of loyalty lurked in the silent hearts of the sturdy Roman sailors, this awful death being looked upon by them, at last, with excessive disgust! Many of the crew venture to render aid to their former empress, when they see that her strength is breaking down, and although they assist her with their hands, as she is feebly struggling with her own arms, and encourage her with kind words of sympathy, they remark: “What does it avail thee thus to have escaped the waves? thou art doomed to die by the sword of thy son, to which crime, distant posterity, although credulous as a rule, will scarcely lend their belief.” - He rages (Nero) and is angry that his mother has been rescued from the waves and is still alive; he then perpetrates a monstrous double crime! He madly rushes to effect the murder of his mother, and suffers no delay in the fulfilment of the crime: one of his followers is told off, and carries out his orders to the full! this fellow lays open with his sword the breast of Agrippina, and whilst she is dying, this unhappy mother, with her last breath, asks the perpetrator of her murder, to bury the cruel weapon into her very womb. “This is the place,” she says, “this is the spot that must be pierced with thy sword, the place which gave birth to that monster of a son!” After these words intermingled with much groaning, she surrendered her sad life, finally brought about by those cruel wounds!