I have him! I've got him, father! Oh, now I'll smuggle him! My love! my dear! my blessing! help me! help me! They have hold on me, and drag me to the bottom.
Nay, now they pull so hard.Farewell.

[_She dies._ MAID.

She's dead.
Breathless and dead.
This may seem very sad stuff, but it would be unfair to judge Otway's plays by this one extract.

"Venice Preserved" is now shelved as an acting drama, but it was formerly received with extraordinary favour, and is by no means deficient in poetic merit.

Campbell, the poet, speaks of it, in his life of Mrs.Siddons, as "a tragedy which so constantly commands the tears of audiences that it would be a work of supererogation for me to extol its tenderness.