His mistress lost! If aught could glad my soul
Beyond th' enjoyment of so bright a prize,
'Twould be to torture that young, gay barbarian.
But hark! what noise? Death to my hopes! 'tis he,
'Tis Juba's self! There is but one way left!
He must be murdered, and a passage cut
Through those his guards.'

"Pray, what are 'those guards'? I thought at present that Juba's
guards had been Sempronius's tools, and had been dangling after his
heels.

"But now let us sum up all these absurdities together. Sempronius
goes at noon-day, in Juba's clothes and with Juba's guards, to
Cato's palace, in order to pass for Juba, in a place where they were
both so very well known: he meets Juba there, and resolves to
murder him with his own guards. Upon the guards appearing a little
bashful, he threatens them:--

"'Hah! dastards, do you tremble?
Or act like men; or, by yon azure heav'n!'--

"But the guards still remaining restive, Sempronius himself attacks
Juba, while each of the guards is representing Mr. Spectator's sign
of the Gaper, awed, it seems, and terrified by Sempronius's threats.
Juba kills Sempronius, and takes his own army prisoners, and carries
them in triumph away to Cato. Now I would fain know if any part of
Mr. Bayes's tragedy is so full of absurdity as this?

"Upon hearing the clash of swords, Lucia and Marcia come in. The