Which cast obscure reflections from the throne.

_Mal._ Then tell me thy surmises of the future.

_Mel._ I took the revolution of the year,
Just when the Sun was entering in the Ham:
The ascending Scorpion poisoned all the sky,
A sign of deep deceit and treachery.
Full on his cusp his angry master sate,
Conjoined with Saturn, baleful both to man:
Of secret slaughters, empires overturned,
Strife, blood, and massacres, expect to hear,
And all the events of an ill-omened year.

_Mal._ Then flourish hell, and mighty mischief reign!
Mischief, to some, to others must be good.
But hark! for now, though 'tis the dead of night,
When silence broods upon our darkened world,
Methinks I hear a murmuring hollow sound,
Like the deaf chimes of bells in steeples touched.

_Mel._ It is truly guessed;
But know, 'tis from no nightly sexton's hand.
There's not a damned ghost, nor hell-born fiend,
That can from limbo 'scape, but hither flies;
With leathern wings they beat the dusky skies,
To sacred churches all in swarms repair;
Some crowd the spires, but most the hallowed bells, }
And softly toll for souls departing knells: }
Each chime, thou hear'st, a future death foretells, }