SCENE IX.
JOHANNA, People. Afterwards her Sisters.
JOHANNA (she has freed herself from the crowd and comes forward).
Remain I cannot--spirits chase me forth!
The organ's pealing tones like thunder sound,
The dome's arched roof threatens to overwhelm me!
I must escape and seek heaven's wide expanse!
I left my banner in the sanctuary,
Never, oh, never, will I touch it more!
It seemed to me as if I had beheld
My sisters pass before me like a dream.
'Twas only a delusion!--they, alas!
Are far, far distant--inaccessible--
E'en as my childhood, as mine innocence!
MARGOT (stepping forward).
'Tis she! It is Johanna!
LOUISON (hastening toward her).
Oh, my sister!
JOHANNA.
Then it was no delusion--you are here--
Thee I embrace, Louison! Thee, my Margot?
Here in this strange and crowded solitude,
I clasp once more my sisters' faithful breasts!
MARGOT.
She knows us still, she is our own kind sister.
JOHANNA.
Your love hath led you to me here so far!
So very far! You are not wroth with her
Who left her home without one parting word!
LOUISON.
God's unseen providence conducted thee.
MARGOT.
Thy great renown, which agitates the world,
Which makes thy name the theme of every tongue,
Hath in our quiet village wakened us,
And led us hither to this festival.
To witness all thy glory we are come;
And we are not alone!
JOHANNA (quickly).
Our father's here!
Where is he? Why doth he conceal himself?
MARGOT.
Our father is not with us.
JOHANNA.
Not with you?
He will not see me, then! You do not bring
His blessing for his child?
LOUISON.
He knoweth not
That we are here.
JOHANNA.
Not know it! Wherefore not?
You are embarrassed, and you do not speak;
You look upon the ground! Where is our father?
MARGOT.
Since thou hast left----
LOUISON (making a sign to MARGOT).
Margot!
MARGOT.
Our father hath
Become dejected.
JOHANNA.
Ah!
LOUISON.
Console thyself!
Our sire's foreboding spirit well thou knowest!
He will collect himself, and be composed,
When he shall learn from us that thou art happy.
MARGOT.
And thou art happy? Yes, it must be so,
For thou art great and honored!
JOHANNA.
I am so,
Now I again behold you, once again
Your voices hear, whose fond, familiar tones
Bring to my mind my dear paternal fields.
When on my native hills I drove my herd,
Then I was happy as in paradise--
I ne'er can be so more, no, never more!
[She hides her face on LOUISON'S bosom. CLAUDE MARIE,
ETIENNE, and BERTRAND appear, and remain timidly standing
in the distance.
MARGOT.
Come, Bertrand! Claude Marie! come, Etienne!
Our sister is not proud: she is so gentle,
And speaks so kindly,--more so than of yore,
When in our village she abode with us.
[They draw near, and hold out their hands; JOHANNA
gazes on them fixedly, and appears amazed.
JOHANNA.
Where am I? Tell me! Was it all a dream,
A long, long dream? And am I now awake?
Am I away from Dom Remi? Is't so?
I fell asleep beneath the Druid tree,
And I am now awake; and round me stand
The kind, familiar forms? I only dreamed
Of all these battles, kings, and deeds of war,--
They were but shadows which before me passed;
For dreams are always vivid 'neath that tree.
How did you come to Rheims? How came I here?
No, I have never quitted Dom Remi!
Confess it to me, and rejoice my heart.
LOUISON.
We are at Rheims. Thou hast not merely dreamed
Of these great deeds--thou hast achieved them all.
Come to thyself, Johanna! Look around--
Thy splendid armor feel, of burnished gold!
[JOHANNA lays her hand upon her breast, recollects herself,
and shrinks back.
BERTRAND.
Out of my hand thou didst receive this helm.
CLAUDE MARIE.
No wonder thou shouldst think it all a dream;
For nothing in a dream could come to pass
More wonderful than what thou hast achieved.
JOHANNA (quickly).
Come, let us fly! I will return with you
Back to our village, to our father's bosom.
LOUISON.
Oh, come! Return with us!
JOHANNA.
The people here
Exalt me far above what I deserve.
You have beheld me weak and like a child;
You love me, but you do not worship me.
MARGOT.
Thou wilt abandon this magnificence.
JOHANNA.
I will throw off the hated ornaments
Which were a barrier 'twixt my heart and yours,
And I will be a shepherdess again,
And like a humble maiden I will serve you,
And will with bitter penitence atone,
That I above you vainly raised myself.
[Trumpets sound.
SCENE X.
The KING comes forth from the church. He is in the coronation
robes. AGNES SOREL, ARCHBISHOP, BURGUNDY, DUNOIS, LA HIRE,
DUCHATEL, KNIGHTS, COURTIERS, and PEOPLE.
Many voices shout repeatedly, while the KING advances,--
Long live the king! Long live King Charles the Seventh!
[The trumpets sound. Upon a signal from the KING, the HERALDS
with their staves command silence.
KING.
Thanks, my good people! Thank you for your love!
The crown which God hath placed upon our brow
Hath with our valiant swords been hardly won:
With noble blood 'tis wetted; but henceforth
The peaceful olive branch shall round it twine.
Let those who fought for us receive our thanks;
Our pardon, those who joined the hostile ranks,
For God hath shown us mercy in our need,
And our first royal word shall now be, mercy!
PEOPLE.
Long live the king! Long live King Charles the good!
KING.
From God alone, the highest potentate,
The monarchs of the French receive the crown;
But visibly from his Almighty hand
Have we received it.
[Turning to the MAIDEN.
Here stands the holy delegate of heaven,
Who hath restored to you your rightful king,
And rent the yoke of foreign tyranny.
Her name shall equal that of holy Denis,
The guardian and protector of this realm,
And to her fame an altar shall be reared.
PEOPLE.
Hail to the maiden, the deliverer!
[Trumpets.
KING (to JOHANNA).
If thou art born of woman, like ourselves,
Name aught that can augment thy happiness.
But if thy fatherland is there above,
If in this virgin form thou dost conceal
The radiant glory of a heavenly nature,
From our deluded sense remove the veil,
And let us see thee in thy form of light
As thou art seen in heaven, that in the dust
We may bow down before thee.
[A general silence; every eye is fixed upon the MAIDEN.
JOHANNA (with a sudden cry).
God! my father!
SCENE XI.
THIBAUT comes forth from the crowd, and stands opposite to her.
Many voices exclaim,--
Her father!
THIBAUT.
Yes, her miserable father,
Who did beget her, and whom God impels
Now to accuse his daughter.
BURGUNDY.
Ha! What's this?
DUCHATEL.
Now will the fearful truth appear!
THIBAUT (to the KING).
Thou think'st
That thou art rescued through the power of God?
Deluded prince! Deluded multitude!
Ye have been rescued through the arts of hell!
[All step back with horror.
DUNOIS.
Is this man mad?
THIBAUT.
Not I, but thou art mad.
And this wise bishop, and these noble lords,
Who think that through a weak and sinful maid
The God of heaven would reveal himself.
Come, let us see if to her father's face
She will maintain the specious, juggling arts
Wherewith she hath deluded king and people.
Now, in the name of the blest Trinity,
Belongst thou to the pure and holy ones?
[A general silence; all eyes are fixed upon her;
she remains motionless.
SOREL.
God! she is dumb!
THIBAUT.
Before that awful name,
Which even in the depths of hell is feared,
She must be silent! She a holy one,
By God commissioned? On a cursed spot
It was conceived; beneath the Druid tree
Where evil spirits have from olden time
Their Sabbath held. There her immortal soul
She bartered with the enemy of man
For transient, worldly glory. Let her bare
Her arm, and ye will see impressed thereon
The fatal marks of hell!
BURGUNDY.
Most horrible!
Yet we must needs believe a father's words
Who 'gainst his daughter gives his evidence.
DUNOIS.
The madman cannot be believed
Who in his child brings shame upon himself.
SOREL (to JOHANNA).
Oh, maiden, speak! this fatal silence break!
We firmly trust thee! we believe in thee!
One syllable from thee, one single word
Shall be sufficient. Speak! annihilate
This horrid accusation. But declare
Thine innocence, and we will all believe thee.
[JOHANNA remains motionless; AGNES steps back with horror.
LA HIRE.
She's frightened. Horror and astonishment
Impede her utterance. Before a charge
So horrible e'en innocence must tremble.
[He approaches her.
Collect thyself, Johanna! innocence
Hath a triumphant look, whose lightning flash
Strikes slander to the earth! In noble wrath
Arise! look up, and punish this base doubt,
An insult to thy holy innocence.
[JOHANNA remains motionless; LA HIRE steps back;
the excitement increases.
DUNOIS.
Why do the people fear, the princes tremble?
I'll stake my honor on her innocence!
Here on the ground I throw my knightly gage;
Who now will venture to maintain her guilt?
[A loud clap of thunder; all are horror-struck.
THIBAUT.
Answer, by Him whose thunders roll above!
Give me the lie! Proclaim thine innocence;
Say that the enemy hath not thy heart!
[Another clap of thunder, louder than the first;
the people fly on all sides.
BURGUNDY.
God guard and save us! What appalling signs!
DUCHATEL (to the KING).
Come, come, my king! Forsake this fearful place!
ARCHBISHOP (to JOHANNA).
I ask thee in God's name. Art thou thus silent
From consciousness of innocence or guilt?
If in thy favor the dread thunder speaks,
Touch with thy hand this cross, and give a sign!
[JOHANNA remains motionless. More violent peals of thunder.
The KING, AGNES SOREL, the ARCHBISHOP, BURGUNDY, LA HIRE,
DUCHATEL retire.
SCENE XII.
DUNOIS, JOHANNA.
DUNOIS.
Thou art my wife; I have believed in thee
From the first glance, and I am still unchanged.
In thee I have more faith than in these signs,
Than in the thunder's voice, which speaks above.
In noble anger thou art silent thus;
Enveloped in thy holy innocence,
Thou scornest to refute so base a charge.
Still scorn it, maiden, but confide in me;
I never doubted of thine innocence.
Speak not one word; only extend thy hand
In pledge and token that thou wilt confide
In my protection and thine own good cause.
[He extends his hand to her; she turns from him with
a convulsive motion; he remains transfixed with horror.
SCENE XIII.
JOHANNA, DUCHATEL, DUNOIS, afterwards RAIMOND.
DUCHATEL (returning).
Johanna d'Arc! uninjured from the town
The king permits you to depart. The gates
Stand open to you. Fear no injury,--
You are protected by the royal word.
Come follow me, Dunois! You cannot here
Longer abide with honor. What an issue!
[He retires. DUNOIS recovers from his stupor, casts
one look upon JOHANNA, and retires. She remains standing
for a moment quite alone. At length RAIMOND appears;
he regards her for a time with silent sorrow, and then
approaching takes her hand.
RAIMOND.
Embrace this opportunity. The streets
Are empty now. Your hand! I will conduct you.
[On perceiving him, she gives the first sign of consciousness.
She gazes on him fixedly, and looks up to heaven; then taking
his hand she retires.
ACT V.
A wild wood: charcoal-burners' huts in the distance.
It is quite dark; violent thunder and lightning;
firing heard at intervals.
SCENE I.
CHARCOAL-BURNER and his WIFE.
CHARCOAL-BURNER.
This is a fearful storm, the heavens seem
As if they would vent themselves in streams of fire;
So thick the darkness which usurps the day,
That one might see the stars. The angry winds
Bluster and howl like spirits loosed from hell.
The firm earth trembles, and the aged elms
Groaning, bow down their venerable tops.
Yet this terrific tumult, o'er our heads,
Which teacheth gentleness to savage beasts,
So that they seek the shelter of their caves,
Appeaseth not the bloody strife of men--
Amidst the raging of the wind and storm
At intervals is heard the cannon's roar;
So near the hostile armaments approach,
The wood alone doth part them; any hour
May see them mingle in the shock of battle.
WIFE.
May God protect us then! Our enemies,
Not long ago, were vanquished and dispersed.
How comes it that they trouble us again?
CHARCOAL-BURNER.
Because they now no longer fear the king,
Since that the maid turned out to be a witch
At Rheims, the devil aideth us no longer,
And things have gone against us.
WIFE.
Who comes here?
SCENE II.
RAIMOND and JOHANNA enter.
RAIMOND.
See! here are cottages; in them at least
We may find shelter from the raging storm.
You are not able longer to endure it.
Three days already you have wandered on,
Shunning the eye of man--wild herbs and root
Your only nourishment. Come, enter in.
These are kind-hearted cottagers.
[The storm subsides; the air grows bright and clear.
CHARCOAL-BURNER.
You seem
To need refreshment and repose--you're welcome
To what our humble roof can offer you!
WIFE.
What has a tender maid to do with arms?
Yet truly! these are rude and troublous times
When even women don the coat of mail!
The queen herself, proud Isabel, 'tis said,
Appears in armor in the hostile camp;
And a young maid, a shepherd's lowly daughter,
Has led the armies of our lord the king.
CHARCOAL-BURNER.
What sayest thou? Enter the hut, and bring
A goblet of refreshment for the damsel.
[She enters the hut.
RAIMOND (to JOHANNA).
All men, you see, are not so cruel; here
E'en in the wilderness are gentle hearts.
Cheer up! the pelting storm hath spent its rage,
And, beaming peacefully, the sun declines.
CHARCOAL-BURNER.
I fancy, as you travel thus in arms,
You seek the army of the king. Take heed!
Not far remote the English are encamped,
Their troops are roaming idly through the wood.
RAIMOND.
Alas for us! how then can we escape?
CHARCOAL-BURNER.
Stay here till from the town my boy returns.
He shall conduct you safe by secret paths.
You need not fear-we know each hidden way.
RAIMOND (to JOHANNA).
Put off your helmet and your coat-of-mail,
They will not now protect you, but betray.
[JOHANNA shakes her head.
CHARCOAL-BURNER.
The maid seems very sad--hush! who comes here?
SCENE III.
CHARCOAL-BURNER'S WIFE comes out of the hut
with a bowl. A Boy.
WIFE.
It is our boy whom we expected back.
[To JOHANNA.
Drink, noble maiden! may God bless it to you!
CHARCOAL-BURNER (to his son).
Art come, Anet? What news?
[The boy looks at JOHANNA, who is just raising the
bowl to her lips; he recognizes her, steps forward,
and snatches it from her.
BOY.
Oh, mother! mother!
Whom do you entertain? This is the witch
Of Orleans!
CHARCOAL-BURNER (and his WIFE).
God be gracious to our souls!
[They cross themselves and fly.
SCENE IV.
RAIMOND, JOHANNA.
JOHANNA (calmly and gently)
Thou seest, I am followed by the curse,
And all fly from me. Do thou leave me, too;
Seek safety for thyself.
RAIMOND.
I leave thee! now
Alas, who then would bear thee company?
JOHANNA.
I am not unaccompanied. Thou hast
Heard the loud thunder rolling o'er my head--
My destiny conducts me. Do not fear;
Without my seeking I shall reach the goal.
RAIMOND.
And whither wouldst thou go? Here stand our foes,
Who have against thee bloody vengeance sworn--
There stand our people who have banished thee.
JOHANNA.
Naught will befall me but what heaven ordains.
RAIMOND.
Who will provide thee food? and who protect thee
From savage beasts, and still more savage men?
Who cherish thee in sickness and in grief?
JOHANNA.
I know all roots and healing herbs; my sheep
Taught me to know the poisonous from the wholesome.
I understand the movements of the stars,
And the clouds' flight; I also hear the sound
Of hidden springs. Man hath not many wants,
And nature richly ministers to life.
RAIMOND (seizing her hand).
Wilt thou not look within? Oh, wilt thou not
Repent thy sin, be reconciled to God,
And to the bosom of the church return?
JOHANNA.
Thou hold'st me guilty of this heavy sin?
RAIMOND.
Needs must I--thou didst silently confess----
JOHANNA.
Thou, who hast followed me in misery,
The only being who continued true,
Who slave to me when all the world forsook,
Thou also hold'st me for a reprobate
Who hath renounced her God----
[RAIMOND is silent.
Oh, this is hard!
RAIMOND (in astonishment).
And thou wert really then no sorceress?
JOHANNA.
A sorceress!
RAIMOND.
And all these miracles
Thou hast accomplished through the power of God
And of his holy saints?
JOHANNA.
Through whom besides?
RAIMOND.
And thou wert silent to that fearful charge?
Thou speakest now, and yet before the king,
When words would have availed thee, thou wert dumb!
JOHANNA.
I silently submitted to the doom
Which God, my lord and master, o'er me hung.
RAIMOND.
Thou couldst not to thy father aught reply?
JOHANNA.
Coming from him, methought it came from God;
And fatherly the chastisement will prove.
RAIMOND.
The heavens themselves bore witness to thy guilt!
JOHANNA.
The heavens spoke, and therefore I was silent.
RAIMOND.
Thou with one word couldst clear thyself, and hast
In this unhappy error left the world?
JOHANNA.
It was no error--'twas the will of heaven.
RAIMOND.
Thou innocently sufferedst this shame,
And no complaint proceeded from thy lips!
--I am amazed at thee, I stand o'erwhelmed.
My heart is troubled in its inmost depths.
Most gladly I receive the word as truth,
For to believe thy guilt was hard indeed.
But could I ever dream a human heart
Would meet in silence such a fearful doom!
JOHANNA.
Should I deserve to be heaven's messenger
Unless the Master's will I blindly honored?
And I am not so wretched as thou thinkest.
I feel privation--this in humble life
Is no misfortune; I'm a fugitive,--
But in the waste I learned to know myself.
When honor's dazzling radiance round me shone,
There was a painful struggle in my breast;
I was most wretched, when to all I seemed
Most worthy to be envied. Now my mind
Is healed once more, and this fierce storm in nature,
Which threatened your destruction, was my friend;
It purified alike the world and me!
I feel an inward peace--and come, what may,
Of no more weakness am I conscious now!
RAIMOND.
Oh, let us hasten! come, let us proclaim
Thine innocence aloud to all the world!
JOHANNA.
He who sent this delusion will dispel it!
The fruit of fate falls only when 'tis ripe!
A day is coming that will clear my name,
When those who now condemn and banish me,
Will see their error and will weep my doom.
RAIMOND.
And shall I wait in silence, until chance----
JOHANNA (gently taking her hand).
Thy sense is shrouded by an earthly veil,
And dwelleth only on external things,
Mine eye hath gazed on the invisible!
--Without permission from our God no hair
Falls from the head of man. Seest thou the sun
Declining to the west? So certainly
As morn returneth in her radiant light,
Infallibly the day of truth shall come!
SCENE V.
QUEEN ISABEL, with soldiers, appears in the background.
ISABEL (behind the scene).
This is the way toward the English camp!
RAIMOND.
Alas! the foe!
[The soldiers advance, and perceiving JOBANNA fall back in terror.
ISABEL.
What now obstructs the march?
SOLDIERS.
May God protect us!
ISABEL.
Do ye see a spirit?
How! Are ye soldiers! Ye are cowards all!
[She presses forward, but starts back on beholding the MAIDEN.
What do I see!
[She collects herself quickly and approaches her.
Submit thyself! Thou art
My prisoner!
JOHANNA.
I am.
[RAIMOND flies in despair.
ISABEL (to the soldiers).
Lay her in chains!
[The soldiers timidly approach the MAIDEN;
she extends her arms and is chained.
Is this the mighty, the terrific one,
Who chased your warriors like a flock of lambs,
Who, powerless now, cannot protect herself?
Doth she work miracles with credulous fools,
And lose her influence when she meets a man?
[To the MAIDEN.
Why didst thou leave the army? Where's Dunois,
Thy knight and thy protector.
JOHANNA.
I am banished.
[ISABEL, stepping back astonished.
ISABEL.
What say'st thou? Thou art banished? By the Dauphin?
JOHANNA.
Inquire no further! I am in thy power,
Decide my fate.
ISABEL.
Banished, because thou hast
Snatched him from ruin, placed upon his brow
The crown at Rheims, and made him King of France?
Banished! Therein I recognize my son!
--Conduct her to the camp, and let the host
Behold the phantom before whom they trembled!
She a magician? Her sole magic lies
In your delusion and your cowardice!
She is a fool who sacrificed herself
To save her king, and reapeth for her pains
A king's reward. Bear her to Lionel.
The fortune of the French! send him bound;
I'll follow anon.
JOHANNA.
To Lionel?
Slay me at once, ere send me unto him.
ISABEL (to the soldiers).
Obey your orders, soldiers! Bear her hence.
[Exit.
SCENE VI.
JOHANNA, SOLDIERS.
JOHANNA (to the soldiers).
Ye English, suffer not that I escape
Alive out of your hands! Revenge yourselves!
Unsheath your weapons, plunge them in my heart,
And drag me lifeless to your general's feet!
Remember it was I who slew your heroes,
Who never showed compassion, who poured forth
Torrents of English blood, who from your sons
Snatched the sweet pleasure of returning home!
Take now a bloody vengeance! Murder me!
I now am in your power; I may perchance
Not always be so weak.
CONDUCTOR OF THE SOLDIERS.
Obey the queen!
JOHANNA.
Must I be yet more wretched than I was!
Unpitying Virgin! Heavy is thy hand
Hast thou completely thrust me from thy favor?
No God appears, no angel shows himself;
Closed are heaven's portals, miracles have ceased.
[She follows the SOLDIERS.
SCENE VII.
The French Camp.
DUNOIS, between the ARCHBISHOP and DUCHATEL.
ARCHBISHOP.
Conquer your sullen indignation, prince!
Return with us! Come back unto your king!
In this emergency abandon not
The general cause, when we are sorely pressed,
And stand in need of your heroic arm.
DUNOIS.
Why are ye sorely pressed? Why doth the foe
Again exalt himself? all was achieved;--
France was triumphant--war was at an end;--
The savior you have banished; you henceforth
May save yourselves; I'll not again behold
The camp wherein the maid abideth not.
DUCHATEL.
Think better of it, prince! Dismiss us not
With such an answer!
DUNOIS.
Silence, Duchatel!
You're hateful to me; I'll hear naught from you;
You were the first who doubted of her truth.
ARCHBISHOP.
Who had not wavered on that fatal day,
And been bewildered, when so many signs
Bore evidence against her! We were stunned,
Our hearts were crushed beneath the sudden blow.
--Who in that hour of dread could weigh the proofs?
Our calmer judgment now returns to us,
We see the maid as when she walked with us,
Nor have we any fault to charge her with.
We are perplexed--we fear that we have done
A grievous wrong. The king is penitent,
The duke remorseful, comfortless La Hire,
And every heart doth shroud itself in woe.
DUNOIS.
She a deluder? If celestial truth
Would clothe herself in a corporeal form,
She needs must choose the features of the maiden.
If purity of heart, faith, innocence,
Dwell anywhere on earth, upon her lips
And in her eyes' clear depths they find their home.
ARCHBISHOP.
May the Almighty, through a miracle,
Shed light upon this awful mystery,
Which baffles human insight. Howsoe'er
This sad perplexity may be resolved,
One of two grievous sins we have committed!
Either in fight we have availed ourselves
Of hellish arms, or banished hence a saint!
And both call down upon this wretched land
The vengeance and the punishment of heaven.
SCENE VIII.
The same, a NOBLEMAN, afterwards RAIMOND.
NOBLEMAN.
A shepherd youth inquires after your highness,
He urgently entreats an interview,
He says he cometh from the maiden----
DUNOIS.
Haste!
Conduct him hither! He doth come from her!
[The NOBLEMAN opens the door to RAIMOND, DUNOIS hastens to meet him.
Where is she? Where is the maid?
RAIMOND.
Hail! noble prince!
And blessed am I that I find with you
This holy man, the shield of the oppressed,
The father of the poor and destitute!
DUNOIS.
Where is the maiden?
ARCHBISHOP.
Speak, my son, inform us!
RAIMOND.
She is not, sir, a wicked sorceress!
To God and all his saints I make appeal.
An error blinds the people. You've cast forth
God's messenger, you've banished innocence!
DUNOIS.
Where is she?
RAIMOND.
I accompanied her flight
Towards the woods of Ardennes; there she hath
Revealed to me her spirit's inmost depths.
In torture I'll expire, and will resign
My hopes of everlasting happiness,
If she's not guiltless, sir, of every sin!
DUNOIS.
The sun in heaven is not more pure than she!
Where is she? Speak!
RAIMOND.
If God hath turned your hearts,
Oh hasten, I entreat you--rescue her
She is a prisoner in the English camp.
DUNOIS.
A prisoner say you?
ARCHBISHOP.
Poor unfortunate!
RAIMOND.
There in the forest as we sought for shelter,
We were encountered by Queen Isabel,
Who seized and sent her to the English host.
Oh, from a cruel death deliver her
Who hath full many a time delivered you!
DUNOIS.
Sound an alarm! to arms! up! beat the drums.
Forth to the field! Let France appear in arms!
The crown and the palladium are at stake!
Our honor is in pledge! risk blood and life!
She must be rescued ere the day is done!
[Exit.
SCENE IX.
A watch-tower--an opening above. JOHANNA and LIONEL.
FASTOLFE (entering hastily).
The people can no longer be restrained.
With fury they demand the maiden's death.
In vain your opposition. Let her die
And throw her head down from the battlements!
Her blood alone will satisfy the host.
ISABEL (coming in).
With ladders they begin to scale the walls.
Appease the angry people! Will you wait
Till in blind fury they o'erthrow the tower,
And we beneath its towers are destroyed?
Protect her here you cannot. Give her up!
LIONEL.
Let them storm on. In fury let them rage!
Firm is this castle, and beneath its ruins
I will be buried ere I yield to them.
--Johanna, answer me! only be mine,
And I will shield thee 'gainst a world in arms.
ISABEL.
Are you a man?
LIONEL.
Thy friends have cast thee off.
To thy ungrateful country then dost owe
Duty and faith no longer. The false cowards
Who sought thy hand, forsake thee in thy need.
They for thy honor venture not the fight,
But I, against my people and 'gainst thine,
Will be thy champion. Once thou didst confess
My life was dear to thee; in combat then
I stood before thee as thine enemy--
Thou hast not now a single friend but me.
JOHANNA.
Thou art my people's enemy and mine.
Between us there can be no fellowship.
Thee I can never love, but if thy heart
Cherish affection for me, let it bring
A blessing on my people. Lead thy troops
Far from the borders of my fatherland;
Give up the keys of all the captured towns,
Restore the booty, set the captives free,
Send hostages the compact to confirm,
And peace I offer thee in my king's name.
ISABEL.
Wilt thou, a captive, dictate laws to us?
JOHANNA.
It must be done; 'tis useless to delay.
Never, oh never, will this land endure
The English yoke; sooner will France become
A mighty sepulchre for England's hosts.
Fallen in battle are your bravest chiefs.
Think how you may achieve a safe retreat;
Your fame is forfeited, your power is lost.
ISABEL.
Can you endure her raving insolence?
SCENE X.
A CAPTAIN enters hastily.
CAPTAIN.
Haste, general! Prepare the host for battle.
The French with flying banners come this way,
Their shining weapons glitter in the vale.
JOHANNA (with enthusiasm).
My people come this way! Proud England now
Forth in the field! now boldly must you fight!
FASTOLFE.
Deluded woman, moderate your joy!
You will not see the issue of this day.
JOHANNA.
My friends will win the fight and I shall die!
The gallant heroes need my arm no more.
LIONEL.
These dastard enemies I scorn. They have
In twenty battles fled before our arms,
Ere this heroic maiden fought for them.
All the whole nation I despise, save one,
And this one they have banished. Come, Fastolfe,
We soon will give them such another day
As that of Poictiers and of Agincourt.
Do you remain with the fortress, queen,
And guard the maiden till the fight is o'er.
I leave for your protection fifty knights.
FASTOLFE.
How! general, shall we march against the foe
And leave this raging fury in our rear?
JOHANNA.
What! can a fettered woman frighten thee?
LIONEL.
Promise, Johanna, not to free thyself.
JOHANNA.
To free myself is now my only wish.
ISABEL.
Bind her with triple chains. I pledged my life
That she shall not escape.
[She is bound with heavy chains.
LIONEL (to JOHANNA).
Thou will'st it so!
Thou dost compel us! still it rests with thee!
Renounce the French--the English banner bear,
And thou art free, and these rude, savage men
Who now desire thy blood shall do thy will.
FASTOLFE (urgently).
Away, away, my general!
JOHANNA.
Spare thy words,
The French are drawing near. Defend thyself!
[Trumpets sound, LIONEL hastens forth.
FASTOLFE.
You know your duty, queen! if fate declares
Against us, should you see our people fly.
ISABEL (showing a dagger).
Fear not. She shall not live to see our fall.
FASTOLFE (to JOHANNA).
Thou knowest what awaits thee, now implore
A blessing on the weapons of thy people.
[Exit.
SCENE XI.
ISABEL, JOHANNA, SOLDIERS.
JOHANNA.
Ay! that I will! no power can hinder me.
Hark to that sound, the war-march of my people!
How its triumphant notes inspire my heart!
Ruin to England! victory to France!
Up, valiant countrymen! The maid is near;
She cannot, as of yore, before you bear
Her banner--she is bound with heavy chains;
But freely from her prison soars her soul,
Upon the pinions of your battle-song.
ISABEL (to a SOLDIER).
Ascend the watch-tower which commands the field,
And thence report the progress of the fight.
[SOLDIER ascends.
JOHANNA.
Courage, my people! 'Tis the final struggle--
Another victory, and the foe lies low!
ISABEL.
What see'st thou?
SOLDIER.
They're already in close fight.
A furious warrior on a Barbary steed,
In tiger's skin, leads forward the gens d'armes.
JOHANNA.
That's Count Dunois! on, gallant warrior!
Conquest goes with thee.
SOLDIER.
The Burgundian duke
Attacks the bridge.
ISABEL.
Would that ten hostile spears
Might his perfidious heart transfix, the traitor!
SOLDIER.
Lord Fastolfe gallantly opposes him.
Now they dismount--they combat man to man
Our people and the troops of Burgundy.
ISABEL.
Behold'st thou not the Dauphin? See'st thou not
The royal wave?
SOLDIER.
A cloud of dust
Shrouds everything. I can distinguish naught.
JOHANNA.
Had he my eyes, or stood I there aloft,
The smallest speck would not elude my gaze!
The wild fowl I can number on the wing,
And mark the falcon in his towering flight.
SOLDIER.
There is a fearful tumult near the trench;
The chiefs, it seems, the nobles, combat there.
ISABEL.
Still doth our banner wave?
SOLDIER.
It proudly floats.
JOHANNA.
Could I look through the loopholes of the wall,
I with my lance the battle would control.
SOLDIER.
Alas! What do I see? Our general's
Surrounded by the foe!
ISABEL (points the dagger at JOHANNA).
Die, wretch!
SOLDIER (quickly).
He's free!
The gallant Fastolfe in the rear attacks
The enemy--he breaks their serried ranks.
ISABEL (withdrawing the dagger).
There spoke thy angel!
SOLDIER.
Victory! They fly.
ISABEL.
Who fly?
SOLDIER.
The French and the Burgundians fly;
The field is covered o'er with fugitives.
JOHANNA.
My God! Thou wilt not thus abandon me!
SOLDIER.
Yonder they lead a sorely wounded knight;
The people rush to aid him--he's a prince.
ISABEL.
One of our country, or a son of France?
SOLDIER.
They loose his helmet--it is Count Dunois.
JOHANNA (seizes her fetters with convulsive violence).
And I am nothing but a fettered woman!
SOLDIER.
Look yonder! Who the azure mantle wears
Bordered with gold?
JOHANNA.
That is my lord, the king.
SOLDIER.
His horse is restive, plunges, rears and falls--
He struggles hard to extricate himself.
[JOHANNA accompanies these words with passionate movements.
Our troops are pressing on in full career,
They near him, reach him--they surround him now.
JOHANNA.
Oh, have the heavens above no angels more!
ISABEL (laughing scornfully).
Now is the time, deliverer--now deliver!
JOHANNA (throws herself upon her knees, and prays with passionate
violence).
Hear me, O God, in my extremity!
In fervent supplication up to Thee,
Up to thy heaven above I send my soul.
The fragile texture of a spider's web,
As a ship's cable, thou canst render strong;
Easy it is to thine omnipotence
To change these fetters into spider's webs--
Command it, and these massy chains shall fall,
And these thick walls be rent, Thou, Lord of old,
Didst strengthen Samson, when enchained and blind
He bore the bitter scorn of his proud foes.
Trusting in thee, he seized with mighty power
The pillars of his prison, bowed himself,
And overthrew the structure.
SOLDIER.
Triumph!
ISABEL.
How?
SOLDIER.
The king is taken!
JOHANNA (springing up).
Then God be gracious to me!
[She seizes her chains violently with both hands, and
breaks them asunder. At the same moment rushing upon the
nearest soldier, she seizes his sword and hurries out.
All gaze after her, transfixed with astonishment.
SCENE XII.
The same, without JOHANNA.
ISABEL (after a long pause).
How was it? Did I dream? Where is she gone?
How did she break these ponderous iron chains?
A world could not have made me credit it,
If I had not beheld it with these eyes.
SOLDIER (from the tower).
How? Hath she wings? Hath the wind borne her down?
ISABEL.
Is she below?
SOLDIER.
She strides amidst the fight:
Her course outspeeds my sight--now she is here--
Now there--I see her everywhere at once!
--She separates the troops--all yield to her:
The scattered French collect--they form anew!
--Alas! what do I see! Our people cast
Their weapons to the ground, our banners sink----
ISABEL.
What? Will she snatch from us the victory?
SOLDIER.
She presses forward, right towards the king.
She reaches him--she bears him from the fight--
Lord Fastolfe falls--the general is taken!
ISABEL.
I'll hear no more! Come down!
SOLDIER.
Fly, queen! you will be taken by surprise.
Armed soldiers are advancing tow'rds the tower.
[He comes down.
ISABEL (drawing her sword).
Then fight, ye cowards!
SCENE IV.
LA HIRE with soldiers. At his entrance the people
of the QUEEN lay down their arms.
LA HIRE (approaching her respectfully).
Queen, submit yourself--
Your knights have yielded--to resist is vain!
--Accept my proffered services. Command
Where you would be conducted.
ISABEL.
Every place
The same, where I encounter not the Dauphin.
[She resigns her sword, and follows him with the soldiers.
The Scene changes to the battle-field.
SCENE XIV.
Soldiers with flying banners occupy the background. Before them the
KING and the DUKE OF BURGUNDY appear, bearing JOHANNA in their arms;
she is mortally wounded, and apparently lifeless. They advance
slowly to the front of the stage. AGNES SOREL rushes in.
SOREL (throwing herself on the bosom of the KING).
You're free--you live--I have you back again!
KING.
Yes, I am free--I am so at this price!
[Pointing to JOHANNA.
SOREL.
Johanna! God! she's dying!
BURGUNDY.
She is gone
An angel passeth hence! See, how she lies,
Easy and tranquil, like a sleeping child!
The peace of heaven around her features plays,
The breath of life no longer heaves her breast,
But vital warmth still lingers in her hand.
KING.
She's gone! She never will awaken more,
Her eye will gaze no more on earthly things.
She soars on high, a spirit glorified,
She seeth not our grief, our penitence.
SOREL.
Her eyes unclose--she lives!
BURGUNDY (in astonishment).
Can she return
Back from the grave, triumphant e'en o'er death?
She riseth up! She standeth!
JOHANNA (standing up, and looking round).
Where am I?
BURGUNDY.
With thine own people, maiden--with thy friends!
KING.
Supported by thy friend, and by thy king.
JOHANNA (after looking at him fixedly for some time).
No! I am not a sorceress! Indeed
I am not one.
KING.
Thou'rt holy, as an angel;
A cloud of error dimmed our mental sight.
JOHANNA (gazing round her with a joyful smile).
And am I really, then, among my friends,
And am no more rejected and despised?
They curse me not--kindly they look on me!
--Yes, all around me now seems clear again!
That is my king!--the banners these of France!
My banner I behold not--where is it?
Without my banner I dare not appear;
To me it was confided by my Lord,
And I before his throne must lay it down;
I there may show it, for I bore it truly.
KING (averting his face).
Give her the banner!
[It is given to her. She stands quite unsupported,
the banner in her hand. The heaven is illumined
by a rosy light.
JOHANNA.
See you the rainbow yonder in the air?
Its golden portals heaven doth wide unfold,
Amid the angel choir she radiant stands,
The eternal Son she claspeth to her breast,
Her arms she stretcheth forth to me in love.
How is it with me? Light clouds bear me up--
My ponderous mail becomes a winged robe;
I mount--I fly--back rolls the dwindling earth--
Brief is the sorrow--endless is the joy!
[Her banner falls and she sinks lifeless on the ground.
All remain for some time in speechless sorrow. Upon a
signal from the KING, all the banners are gently placed
over her, so that she is entirely concealed by them.
THE BRIDE OF MESSINA
AND
ON THE USE OF THE CHORUS IN TRAGEDY.
By Frederich Schiller
THE BRIDE OF MESSINA
DRAMATIS PERSONAE.
ISABELLA, Princess of Messina.
DON MANUEL | her Sons.
DON CAESAR |
BEATRICE.
DIEGO, an ancient Servant.
MESSENGERS.
THE ELDERS OF MESSINA, mute.
THE CHORUS, consisting of the Followers of the two Princes.
SCENE I.
A spacious hall, supported on columns, with entrances on both sides;
at the back of the stage a large folding-door leading to a chapel.
DONNA ISABELLA in mourning; the ELDERS OF MESSINA.
ISABELLA.
Forth from my silent chamber's deep recesses,
Gray Fathers of the State, unwillingly
I come; and, shrinking from your gaze, uplift
The veil that shades my widowed brows: the light
And glory of my days is fled forever!
And best in solitude and kindred gloom
To hide these sable weeds, this grief-worn frame,
Beseems the mourner's heart. A mighty voice
Inexorable--duty's stern command,
Calls me to light again.
Not twice the moon
Has filled her orb since to the tomb ye bore
My princely spouse, your city's lord, whose arm
Against a world of envious foes around
Hurled fierce defiance! Still his spirit lives
In his heroic sons, their country's pride:
Ye marked how sweetly from their childhood's bloom
They grew in joyous promise to the years
Of manhood's strength; yet in their secret hearts,
From some mysterious root accursed, upsprung
Unmitigable, deadly hate, that spurned
All kindred ties, all youthful, fond affections,
Still ripening with their thoughtful age; not mine
The sweet accord of family bliss; though each
Awoke a mother's rapture; each alike
Smiled at my nourishing breast! for me alone
Yet lives one mutual thought, of children's love;
In these tempestuous souls discovered else
By mortal strife and thirst of fierce revenge.
While yet their father reigned, his stern control
Tamed their hot spirits, and with iron yoke
To awful justice bowed their stubborn will:
Obedient to his voice, to outward seeming
They calmed their wrathful mood, nor in array
Ere met, of hostile arms; yet unappeased
Sat brooding malice in their bosoms' depths;
They little reek of hidden springs whose power
Can quell the torrent's fury: scarce their sire
In death had closed his eyes, when, as the spark
That long in smouldering embers sullen lay,
Shoots forth a towering flame; so unconfined
Burst the wild storm of brothers' hate triumphant
O'er nature's holiest bands. Ye saw, my friends,
Your country's bleeding wounds, when princely strife
Woke discord's maddening fires, and ranged her sons
In mutual deadly conflict; all around
Was heard the clash of arms, the din of carnage,
And e'en these halls were stained with kindred gore.
Torn was the state with civil rage, this heart
With pangs that mothers feel; alas, unmindful
Of aught but public woes, and pitiless
You sought my widow's chamber--there with taunts
And fierce reproaches for your country's ills
From that polluted spring of brother's hate
Derived, invoked a parent's warning voice,
And threatening told of people's discontent
And princes' crimes! "Ill-fated land! now wasted
By thy unnatural sons, ere long the prey
Of foeman's sword! Oh, haste," you cried, "and end
This strife! bring peace again, or soon Messina
Shall bow to other lords." Your stern decree
Prevailed; this heart, with all a mother's anguish
O'erlabored, owned the weight of public cares.
I flew, and at my children's feet, distracted,
A suppliant lay; till to my prayers and tears
The voice of nature answered in their breasts!
Here in the palace of their sires, unarmed,
In peaceful guise Messina shall behold
The long inveterate foes; this is the day!
E'en now I wait the messenger that brings
The tidings of my sons' approach: be ready
To give your princes joyful welcome home
With reverence such as vassals may beseem.
Bethink ye to fulfil your subject duties,
And leave to better wisdom weightier cares.
Dire was their strife to them, and to the State
Fruitful of ills; yet, in this happy bond
Of peace united, know that they are mighty
To stand against a world in arms, nor less
Enforce their sovereign will against yourselves.
[The ELDERS retire in silence; she beckons to
an old attendant, who remains.
Diego!
DIEGO.
Honored mistress!
ISABELLA.
Old faithful servant, then true heart, cone near me;
Sharer of all a mother's woes, be thine
The sweet communion of her joys: my treasure
Shrined in thy heart, my dear and holy secret
Shall pierce the envious veil, and shine triumphant
To cheerful day; too long by harsh decrees,
Silent and overpowered, affection yet
Shall utterance find in Nature's tones of rapture!
And this imprisoned heart leap to the embrace
Of all it holds most dear, returned to glad
My desolate halls;
So bend thy aged steps
To the old cloistered sanctuary that guards
The darling of my soul, whose innocence
To thy true love (sweet pledge of happier days)!
Trusting I gave, and asked from fortune's storm
A resting place and shrine. Oh, in this hour
Of bliss; the dear reward of all thy cares.
Give to my longing arms my child again!
[Trumpets are heard in the distance.
Haste! be thy footsteps winged with joy--I hear
The trumpet's blast, that tells in warlike accents
My sons are near:
[Exit DIEGO. Music is heard in an opposite direction,
and becomes gradually louder.
Messina is awake!
Hark! how the stream of tongues hoarse murmuring
Rolls on the breeze,--'tis they! my mother's heart
Feels their approach, and beats with mighty throes
Responsive to the loud, resounding march!
They come! they come! my children! oh, my children!
[Exit.
The CHORUS enters.
(It consists of two semi-choruses which enter at the same time
from opposite sides, and after marching round the stage range
themselves in rows, each on the side by which it entered. One
semi-chorus consists of young knights, the other of older ones,
each has its peculiar costume and ensigns. When the two choruses
stand opposite to each other, the march ceases, and the two leaders
speak.) [The first chorus consists of Cajetan, Berengar, Manfred,
Tristan, and eight followers of Don Manuel. The second of Bohemund,
Roger, Hippolyte, and nine others of the party of Don Caesar.
First Chorus (CAJETAN).
I greet ye, glittering halls
Of olden time
Cradle of kings! Hail! lordly roof,
In pillared majesty sublime!
Sheathed be the sword!
In chains before the portal lies
The fiend with tresses snake-entwined,
Fell Discord! Gently treat the inviolate floor!
Peace to this royal dome!
Thus by the Furies' brood we swore,
And all the dark, avenging Deities!
Second Chorus (BOHEMUND).
I rage! I burn! and scarce refrain
To lift the glittering steel on high,
For, lo! the Gorgon-visaged train
Of the detested foeman nigh:
Shall I my swelling heart control?
To parley deign--or still in mortal strife
The tumult of my soul?
Dire sister, guardian of the spot, to thee
Awe-struck I bend the knee,
Nor dare with arms profane thy deep tranquillity!
First Chorus (CAJETAN).
Welcome the peaceful strain!
Together we adore the guardian power
Of these august abodes!
Sacred the hour
To kindred brotherly ties
And reverend, holy sympathies;--
Our hearts the genial charm shall own,
And melt awhile at friendship's soothing tone:--
But when in yonder plain
We meet--then peace away!
Come gleaming arms, and battle's deadly fray!
The whole Chorus.
But when in yonder plain
We meet--then peace away!
Come gleaming arms, and battle's deadly fray!
First Chorus (BERENGAR).
I hate thee not--nor call thee foe,
My brother! this our native earth,
The land that gave our fathers birth:--
Of chief's behest the slave decreed,
The vassal draws the sword at need,
For chieftain's rage we strike the blow,
For stranger lords our kindred blood must flow.
Second Chorus (BOHEMUND).
Hate fires their souls--we ask not why;--
At honor's call to fight and die,
Boast of the true and brave!
Unworthy of a soldier's name
Who burns not for his chieftain's fame!
The whole Chorus.
Unworthy of a soldier's name
Who burns not for his chieftain's fame!
One of the Chorus (BERENGAR).
Thus spoke within my bosom's core
The thought--as hitherward I strayed;
And pensive 'mid the waving store,
I mused, of autumn's yellow glade:--
These gifts of nature's bounteous reign,--
The teeming earth, and golden grain,
Yon elms, among whose leaves entwine
The tendrils of the clustering vine;--
Gay children of our sunny clime,--
Region of spring's eternal prime!
Each charm should woo to love and joy,
No cares the dream of bliss annoy,
And pleasure through life's summer day
Speed every laughing hour away.
We rage in blood,--oh, dire disgrace!
For this usurping, alien race;
From some far distant land they came,
Beyond the sun's departing flame.
And owned upon our friendly shore
The welcome of our sires of yore.
Alas! their sons in thraldom pine,
The vassals of this stranger line.
A second (MANFRED).
Yes! pleased, on our land, from his azure way,
The sun ever smiles with unclouded ray.
But never, fair isle, shall thy sons repose
'Mid the sweets which the faithless waves enclose.
On their bosom they wafted the corsair bold,
With his dreaded barks to our coast of old.
For thee was thy dower of beauty vain,
'Twas the treasure that lured the spoiler's train.
Oh, ne'er from these smiling vales shall rise
A sword for our vanquished liberties;
'Tis not where the laughing Ceres reigns,
And the jocund lord of the flowery plains:--
Where the iron lies hid in the mountain cave,
Is the cradle of empire--the home of the brave!
[The folding-doors at the back of the stage are thrown open.
DONNA ISABELLA appears between her sons, DON MANUEL and DON CAESAR.
Both Choruses (CAJETAN).
Lift high the notes of praise!
Behold! where lies the awakening sun,
She comes, and from her queenly brow
Shoots glad, inspiring rays.
Mistress, we bend to thee!
First Chorus.
Fair is the moon amid the starry choir
That twinkle o'er the sky,
Shining in silvery, mild tranquillity;--
The mother with her sons more fair!
See! blooming at her side,
She leads the royal, youthful pair;
With gentle grace, and soft, maternal pride,
Attempering sweet their manly fire.
Second Chorus (BERENGAR).
From this fair stem a beauteous tree
With ever-springing boughs shall smile,
And with immortal verdure shade our isle;
Mother of heroes, joy to thee!
Triumphant as the sun thy kingly race
Shall spread from clime to clime,
And give a deathless name to rolling time!
ISABELLA (comes forward with her SONS).
Look down! benignant Queen of Heaven, and still,
This proud tumultuous heart, that in my breast
Swells with a mother's tide of ecstasy,
As blazoned in these noble youths, my image
More perfect shows;--Oh, blissful hour! the first
That comprehends the fulness of my joy,
When long-constrained affection dares to pour
In unison of transport from my heart,
Unchecked, a parent's undivided love:
Oh! it was ever one--my sons were twain.
Say--shall I revel in the dreams of bliss,
And give my soul to Nature's dear emotions?
Is this warm pressure of thy brother's hand
A dagger in thy breast?
[To DON MANUEL.
Or when my eyes
Feed on that brow with love's enraptured gaze,
Is it a wrong to thee?
[To DON CAESAR.
Trembling, I pause,
Lest e'en affection's breath should wake the fires
Of slumbering hate.
[After regarding both with inquiring looks
Speak! In your secret hearts
What purpose dwells? Is it the ancient feud
Unreconciled, that in your father's halls
A moment stilled; beyond the castle gates,
Where sits infuriate war, and champs the bit--
Shall rage anew in mortal, bloody conflict?
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
Concord or strife--the fate's decree
Is bosomed yet in dark futurity!
What comes, we little heed to know,
Prepared for aught the hour may show!
ISABELLA (looking round).
What mean these arms? this warlike, dread array,
That in the palace of your sires portends
Some fearful issue? needs a mother's heart
Outpoured, this rugged witness of her joys?
Say, in these folding arms shall treason hide
The deadly snare? Oh, these rude, pitiless men,
The ministers of your wrath!--trust not the show
Of seeming friendship; treachery in their breasts
Lurks to betray, and long-dissembled hate.
Ye are a race of other lands; your sires
Profaned their soil; and ne'er the invader's yoke
Was easy--never in the vassal's heart
Languished the hope of sweet revenge;--our sway
Not rooted in a people's love, but owns
Allegiance from their fears; with secret joy--
For conquest's ruthless sword, and thraldom's chains
From age to age, they wait the atoning hour
Of princes' downfall;--thus their bards awake
The patriot strain, and thus from sire to son
Rehearsed, the old traditionary tale
Beguiles the winter's night. False is the world,
My sons, and light are all the specious ties
By fancy twined: friendship--deceitful name!
Its gaudy flowers but deck our summer fortune,
To wither at the first rude breath of autumn!
So happy to whom heaven has given a brother;
The friend by nature signed--the true and steadfast!
Nature alone is honest--nature only--
When all we trusted strews the wintry shore--
On her eternal anchor lies at rest,
Nor heeds the tempest's rage.
DON MANUEL.
My mother!
DON CAESAR.
Hear me
ISABELLA (taking their hands).
Be noble, and forget the fancied wrongs
Of boyhood's age: more godlike is forgiveness
Than victory, and in your father's grave
Should sleep the ancient hate:--Oh, give your days
Renewed henceforth to peace and holy love!
[She recedes one or two steps, as if to give them space
to approach each other. Both fix their eyes on the ground
without regarding one another.
ISABELLA (after awaiting for some time, with suppressed emotion,
a demonstration on the part of her sons).
I can no more; my prayers--my tears are vain:--
'Tis well! obey the demon in your hearts!
Fulfil your dread intent, and stain with blood
The holy altars of your household gods;--
These halls that gave you birth, the stage where murder
Shall hold his festival of mutual carnage
Beneath a mother's eye!--then, foot to foot,
Close, like the Theban pair, with maddening gripe,
And fold each other in a last embrace!
Each press with vengeful thrust the dagger home,
And "Victory!" be your shriek of death:--nor then
Shall discord rest appeased; the very flame
That lights your funeral pyre shall tower dissevered
In ruddy columns to the skies, and tell
With horrid image--"thus they lived and died!"
[She goes away; the BROTHERS stand as before.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
How have her words with soft control
Resistless calmed the tempest of my soul!
No guilt of kindred blood be mine!
Thus with uplifted hands I prey;
Think, brothers, on the awful day,
And tremble at the wrath divine!
DON CAESAR (without taking his eyes from the ground).
Thou art my elder--speak--without dishonor
I yield to thee.
DON MANUEL.
One gracious word, an instant,
My tongue is rival in the strife of love!
DON CAESAR.
I am the guiltier--weaker----
DON MANUEL.
Say not so!
Who doubts thy noble heart, knows thee not well;
The words were prouder, if thy soul were mean.
DON CAESAR.
It burns indignant at the thought of wrong--
But thou--methinks--in passion's fiercest mood,
'Twas aught but scorn that harbored in thy breast.
DON MANUEL.
Oh! had I known thy spirit thus to peace
Inclined, what thousand griefs had never torn
A mother's heart!
DON CAESAR.
I find thee just and true:
Men spoke thee proud of soul.
DON MANUEL.
The curse of greatness!
Ears ever open to the babbler's tale.
DON CAESAR.
Thou art too proud to meanness--I to falsehood!
DON MANUEL.
We are deceived, betrayed!
DON CAESAR.
The sport of frenzy!
DON MANUEL.
And said my mother true, false is the world?
DON CAESAR.
Believe her, false as air.
DON MANUEL.
Give me thy hand!
DON CAESAR.
And thine be ever next my heart!
[They stand clasping each other's hands,
and regard each other in silence.
DON MANUEL.
I gaze
Upon thy brow, and still behold my mother
In some dear lineament.
DON CAESAR.
Her image looks
From thine, and wondrous in my bosom wakes
Affection's springs.
DON MANUEL.
And is it thou?--that smile
Benignant on thy face?--thy lips that charm
With gracious sounds of love and dear forgiveness?
DON CAESAR.
Is this my brother, this the hated foe?
His mien all gentleness and truth, his voice,
Whose soft prevailing accents breathe of friendship!
[After a pause.
DON MANUEL.
Shall aught divide us?
DON CAESAR.
We are one forever!
[They rush into each other's arms.
First CHORUS (to the Second).
Why stand we thus, and coldly gaze,
While Nature's holy transports burn?
No dear embrace of happier days
The pledge--that discord never shall return!
Brothers are they by kindred band;
We own the ties of home and native land.
[Both CHORUSES embrace.
A MESSENGER enters.
Second CHORUS to DON CAESAR (BOHEMUND).
Rejoice, my prince, thy messenger returns
And mark that beaming smile! the harbinger
Of happy tidings.
MESSENGER.
Health to me, and health
To this delivered state! Oh sight of bliss,
That lights mine eyes with rapture! I behold
Their hands in sweet accord entwined; the sons
Of my departed lord, the princely pair
Dissevered late by conflict's hottest rage.
DON CAESAR.
Yes, from the flames of hate, a new-born Phoenix,
Our love aspires!
MESSENGER.
I bring another joy;
My staff is green with flourishing shoots.
DON CAESAR (taking him aside).
Oh, tell me
Thy gladsome message.
MESSENGER.
All is happiness
On this auspicious day; long sought, the lost one
Is found.
DON CAESAR.
Discovered! Oh, where is she? Speak!
MESSENGER.
Within Messina's walls she lies concealed.
DON MANUEL (turning to the First SEMI-CHORUS).
A ruddy glow mounts in my brother's cheek,
And pleasure dances in his sparkling eye;
Whate'er the spring, with sympathy of love
My inmost heart partakes his joy.
DON CAESAR (to the MESSENGER).
Come, lead me;
Farewell, Don Manuel; to meet again
Enfolded in a mother's arms! I fly
To cares of utmost need.
[He is about to depart.
DON MANUEL.
Make no delay;
And happiness attend thee!
DON CAESAR (after a pause of reflection, he returns).
How thy looks
Awake my soul to transport! Yes, my brother,
We shall be friends indeed! This hour is bright
With glad presage of ever-springing love,
That in the enlivening beam shall flourish fair,
Sweet recompense of wasted years!
DON MANUEL.
The blossom
Betokens goodly fruit.
DON CAESAR.
I tear myself
Reluctant from thy arms, but think not less
If thus I break this festal hour--my heart
Thrills with a holy joy.
DON MANUEL (with manifest absence of mind).
Obey the moment!
Our lives belong to love.
DON CESAR.
What calls me hence----
DON MANUEL.
Enough! thou leav'st thy heart.
DON CAESAR.
No envious secret
Shall part us long; soon the last darkening fold
Shall vanish from my breast.
[Turning to the CHORUS.
Attend! Forever
Stilled is our strife; he is my deadliest foe,
Detested as the gates of hell, who dares
To blow the fires of discord; none may hope
To win my love, that with malicious tales
Encroach upon a brother's ear, and point
With busy zeal of false, officious friendship.
The dart of some rash, angry word, escaped
From passion's heat; it wounds not from the lips,
But, swallowed by suspicion's greedy ear,
Like a rank, poisonous weed, embittered creeps,
And hangs about her with a thousand shoots,
Perplexing nature's ties.
[He embraces his brother again, and goes away
accompanied by the Second CHORUS.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Wondering, my prince,
I gaze, for in thy looks some mystery
Strange-seeming shows: scarce with abstracted mien
And cold thou answered'st, when with earnest heart
Thy brother poured the strain of dear affection.
As in a dream thou stand'st, and lost in thought,
As though--dissevered from its earthly frame--
Thy spirit roved afar. Not thine the breast
That deaf to nature's voice, ne'er owned the throbs
Of kindred love:--nay more--like one entranced
In bliss, thou look'st around, and smiles of rapture
Play on thy cheek.
DON MANUEL.
How shall my lips declare
The transports of my swelling heart? My brother
Revels in glad surprise, and from his breast
Instinct with strange new-felt emotions, pours
The tide of joy; but mine--no hate came with me,
Forgot the very spring of mutual strife!
High o'er this earthly sphere, on rapture's wings,
My spirit floats; and in the azure sea,
Above--beneath--no track of envious night
Disturbs the deep serene! I view these halls,
And picture to my thoughts the timid joy
Of my sweet bride, as through the palace gates,
In pride of queenly state, I lead her home.
She loved alone the loving one, the stranger,
And little deems that on her beauteous brow
Messina's prince shall 'twine the nuptial wreath.
How sweet, with unexpected pomp of greatness,
To glad the darling of my soul! too long
I brook this dull delay of crowning bliss!
Her beauty's self, that asks no borrowed charm,
Shall shine refulgent, like the diamond's blaze
That wins new lustre from the circling gold!
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Long have I marked thee, prince, with curious eye,
Foreboding of some mystery deep enshrined
Within thy laboring breast. This day, impatient,
Thy lips have burst the seal; and unconstrained
Confess a lover's joy;--the gladdening chase,
The Olympian coursers, and the falcon's flight
Can charm no more:--soon as the sun declines
Beneath the ruddy west, thou hiest thee quick
To some sequestered path, of mortal eye
Unseen--not one of all our faithful train
Companion of thy solitary way.
Say, why so long concealed the blissful flame?
Stranger to fear--ill-brooked thy princely heart
One thought unuttered.
DON MANUEL.
Ever on the wing
Is mortal joy;--with silence best we guard
The fickle good;--but now, so near the goal
Of all my cherished hopes, I dare to speak.
To-morrow's sun shall see her mine! no power
Of hell can make us twain! With timid stealth
No longer will I creep at dusky eve,
To taste the golden fruits of Cupid's tree,
And snatch a fearful, fleeting bliss: to-day
With bright to-morrow shall be one! So smooth
As runs the limpid brook, or silvery sand
That marks the flight of time, our lives shall flow
In continuity of joy!
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Already
Our hearts, my prince, with silent vows have blessed
Thy happy love; and now from every tongue,
For her--the royal, beauteous bride--should sound
The glad acclaim; so tell what nook unseen,
What deep umbrageous solitude, enshrines
The charmer of thy heart? With magic spells
Almost I deem she mocks our gaze, for oft
In eager chase we scour each rustic path
And forest dell; yet not a trace betrayed
The lover's haunts, ne'er were the footsteps marked
Of this mysterious fair.
DON MANUEL.
The spell is broke!
And all shall be revealed: now list my tale:--
'Tis five months flown,--my father yet controlled
The land, and bowed our necks with iron sway;
Little I knew but the wild joys of arms,
And mimic warfare of the chase;--
One day,--
Long had we tracked the boar with zealous toil
On yonder woody ridge:--it chanced, pursuing
A snow-white hind, far from your train I roved
Amid the forest maze;--the timid beast,
Along the windings of the narrow vale,
Through rocky cleft and thick-entangled brake,
Flew onward, scarce a moment lost, nor distant
Beyond a javelin's throw; nearer I came not,
Nor took an aim; when through a garden's gate,
Sudden she vanished:--from my horse quick springing,
I followed:--lo! the poor scared creature lay
Stretched at the feet of a young, beauteous nun,
That strove with fond caress of her fair hands
To still its throbbing heart: wondering, I gazed;
And motionless--my spear, in act to strike,
High poised--while she, with her large piteous eyes
For mercy sued--and thus we stood in silence
Regarding one another.
How long the pause
I know not--time itself forgot;--it seemed
Eternity of bliss: her glance of sweetness
Flew to my soul; and quick the subtle flame
Pervaded all my heart:--
But what I spoke,
And how this blessed creature answered, none
May ask; it floats upon my thought, a dream
Of childhood's happy dawn! Soon as my sense
Returned, I felt her bosom throb responsive
To mine,--then fell melodious on my ear
The sound, as of a convent bell, that called
To vesper song; and, like some shadowy vision
That melts in air, she flitted from my sight,
And was beheld no more.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Thy story thrills
My breast with pious awe! Prince, thou hast robbed
The sanctuary, and for the bride of heaven
Burned with unholy passion! Oh, remember
The cloister's sacred vows!
DON MANUEL.
Thenceforth one path
My footsteps wooed; the fickle train was still
Of young desires--new felt my being's aim,
My soul revealed! and as the pilgrim turns
His wistful gaze, where, from the orient sky,
With gracious lustre beams Redemption's star;--
So to that brightest point of heaven, her presence,
My hopes and longings centred all. No sun
Sank in the western waves, but smiled farewell
To two united lovers:--thus in stillness
Our hearts were twined,--the all-seeing air above us
Alone the faithful witness of our joys!
Oh, golden hours! Oh, happy days! nor Heaven
Indignant viewed our bliss;--no vows enchained
Her spotless soul; naught but the link which bound it
Eternally to mine!
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Those hallowed walls,
Perchance the calm retreat of tender youth,
No living grave?
DON MANUEL.
In infant innocence
Consigned a holy pledge, ne'er has she left
Her cloistered home.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
But what her royal line?
The noble only spring from noble stem.
DON MANUEL.
A secret to herself,--she ne'er has learned
Her name or fatherland.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
And not a trace
Guides to her being's undiscovered springs?
DON MANUEL.
An old domestic, the sole messenger
Sent by her unknown mother, oft bespeaks her
Of kingly race.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
And hast thou won naught else
From her garrulous age?
DON MANUEL.
Too much I feared to peril
My secret bliss!
Chorus (CAJETAN).
What were his words? What tidings
He bore--perchance thou know'st.
DON MANUEL.
Oft he has cheered her
With promise of a happier time, when all
Shall be revealed.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Oh, say--betokens aught
The time is near?
DON MANUEL.
Not distant far the day
That to the arms of kindred love once more
Shall give the long forsaken, orphaned maid--
Thus with mysterious words the aged man
Has shadowed oft what most I dread--for awe
Of change disturbs the soul supremely blest:
Nay, more; but yesterday his message spoke
The end of all my joys--this very dawn,
He told, should smile auspicious on her fate,
And light to other scenes--no precious hour
Delayed my quick resolves--by night I bore her
In secret to Messina.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Rash the deed
Of sacrilegious spoil! forgive, my prince,
The bold rebuke; thus to unthinking youth
Old age may speak in friendship's warning voice.
DON MANUEL.
Hard by the convent of the Carmelites,
In a sequestered garden's tranquil bound,
And safe from curious eyes, I left her,--hastening
To meet my brother: trembling there she counts
The slow-paced hours, nor deems how soon triumphant
In queenly state, high on the throne of fame,
Messina shall behold my timid bride.
For next, encompassed by your knightly train,
With pomp of greatness in the festal show,
Her lover's form shall meet her wondering gaze!
Thus will I lead her to my mother; thus--
While countless thousands on her passage wait
Amid the loud acclaim--the royal bride
Shall reach my palace gates!
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Command us, prince,
We live but to obey!
DON MANUEL.
I tore myself
Reluctant from her arms; my every thought
Shall still be hers: so come along, my friends,
To where the turbaned merchant spreads his store
Of fabrics golden wrought with curious art;
And all the gathered wealth of eastern climes.
First choose the well-formed sandals--meet to guard
And grace her delicate feet; then for her robe
The tissue, pure as Etna's snow that lies
Nearest the sun-light as the wreathy mist
At summer dawn--so playful let it float
About her airy limbs. A girdle next,
Purple with gold embroidered o'er, to bind
With witching grace the tunic that confines
Her bosom's swelling charms: of silk the mantle,
Gorgeous with like empurpled hues, and fixed
With clasp of gold--remember, too, the bracelets
To gird her beauteous arms; nor leave the treasure
Of ocean's pearly deeps and coral caves.
About her locks entwine a diadem
Of purest gems--the ruby's fiery glow
Commingling with the emerald's green. A veil,
From her tiara pendent to her feet,
Like a bright fleecy cloud shall circle round
Her slender form; and let a myrtle wreath
Crown the enchanting whole!
Chorus (CAJETAN).
We haste, my prince.
Amid the Bazar's glittering rows, to cull
Each rich adornment.
DON MANUEL.
From my stables lead
A palfrey, milk-white as the steeds that draw
The chariot of the sun; purple the housings,
The bridle sparkling o'er with precious gems,
For it shall bear my queen! Yourselves be ready
With trumpet's cheerful clang, in martial train
To lead your mistress home: let two attend me,
The rest await my quick return; and each
Guard well my secret purpose.
[He goes away accompanied by two of the CHORUS.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
The princely strife is o'er, and say,
What sport shall wing the slow-paced hours,
And cheat the tedious day?
With hope and fear's enlivening zest
Disturb the slumber of the breast,
And wake life's dull, untroubled sea
With freshening airs of gay variety.
One of the Chorus (MANFRED).
Lovely is peace! A beauteous boy,
Couched listless by the rivulet's glassy tide,
'Mid nature's tranquil scene,
He views the lambs that skip with innocent joy,
And crop the meadow's flowering pride:--
Then with his flute's enchanting sound,
He wakes the mountain echoes round,
Or slumbers in the sunset's ruddy sheen,
Lulled by the murmuring melody.
But war for me! my spirit's treasure,
Its, stern delight, and wilder pleasure:
I love the peril and the pain,
And revel in the surge of fortune's boisterous main!
A second (BERENGAR).
Is there not love, and beauty's smile
That lures with soft, resistless wile?
'Tis thrilling hope! 'tis rapturous fear
'Tis heaven upon this mortal sphere;
When at her feet we bend the knee,
And own the glance of kindred ecstasy
For ever on life's checkered way,
'Tis love that tints the darkening hues of care
With soft benignant ray:
The mirthful daughter of the wave,
Celestial Venus ever fair,
Enchants our happy spring with fancy's gleam,
And wakes the airy forms of passion's golden dream.
First (MANFRED).
To the wild woods away!
Quick let us follow in the train
Of her, chaste huntress of the silver bow;
And from the rocks amain
Track through the forest gloom the bounding roe,
The war-god's merry bride,
The chase recalls the battle's fray,
And kindles victory's pride:--
Up with the streaks of early morn,
We scour with jocund hearts the misty vale,
Loud echoing to the cheerful horn
Over mountain--over dale--
And every languid sense repair,
Bathed in the rushing streams of cold, reviving air.
Second (BERENGAR).
Or shall we trust the ever-moving sea,
The azure goddess, blithe and free.
Whose face, the mirror of the cloudless sky,
Lures to her bosom wooingly?
Quick let us build on the dancing waves
A floating castle gay,
And merrily, merrily, swim away!
Who ploughs with venturous keel the brine
Of the ocean crystalline--
His bride is fortune, the world his own,
For him a harvest blooms unsown:--
Here, like the wind that swift careers
The circling bound of earth and sky,
Flits ever-changeful destiny!
Of airy chance 'tis the sportive reign,
And hope ever broods on the boundless main
A third (CAJETAN).
Nor on the watery waste alone
Of the tumultuous, heaving sea;--
On the firm earth that sleeps secure,
Based on the pillars of eternity.
Say, when shall mortal joy endure?
New bodings in my anxious breast,
Waked by this sudden friendship, rise;
Ne'er would I choose my home of rest
On the stilled lava-stream, that cold
Beneath the mountain lies
Not thus was discord's flame controlled--
Too deep the rooted hate--too long
They brooded in their sullen hearts
O'er unforgotten, treasured wrong. In warning visions oft dismayed,
I read the signs of coming woe;
And now from this mysterious maid
My bosom tells the dreaded ills shall flow:
Unblest, I deem, the bridal chain
Shall knit their secret loves, accursed
With holy cloisters' spoil profane.
No crooked paths to virtue lead;
Ill fruit has ever sprung from evil seed!
BERENGAR.
And thus to sad unhallowed rites
Of an ill-omened nuptial tie,
Too well ye know their father bore
A bride of mournful destiny,
Torn from his sire, whose awful curse has sped
Heaven's vengeance on the impious bed!
This fierce, unnatural rage atones
A parent's crime--decreed by fate,
Their mother's offspring, strife and hate!
[The scene changes to a garden opening on the sea.
BEATRICE (steps forward from an alcove. She walks to and fro with an
agitated air, looking round in every direction. Suddenly she
stands still and listens).
No! 'tis not he: 'twas but the playful wind
Rustling the pine-tops. To his ocean bed
The sun declines, and with o'erwearied heart
I count the lagging hours: an icy chill
Creeps through my frame; the very solitude
And awful silence fright my trembling soul!
Where'er I turn naught meets my gaze--he leaves me
Forsaken and alone!
And like a rushing stream the city's hum
Floats on the breeze, and dull the mighty sea
Rolls murmuring to the rocks: I shrink to nothing
With horrors compassed round; and like the leaf,
Borne on the autumn blast, am hurried onward
Through boundless space.
Alas! that e'er I left
My peaceful cell--no cares, no fond desires
Disturbed my breast, unruffled as the stream
That glides in sunshine through the verdant mead:
Nor poor in joys. Now--on the mighty surge
Of fortune, tempest-tossed--the world enfolds me
With giant arms! Forgot my childhood's ties
I listened to the lover's flattering tale--
Listened, and trusted! From the sacred dome
Allured--betrayed--for sure some hell-born magic
Enchained my frenzied sense--I fled with him,
The invader of religion's dread abodes!
Where art thou, my beloved? Haste--return--
With thy dear presence calm my struggling soul!
[She listens.
Hark! the sweet voice! No! 'twas the echoing surge
That beats upon the shore; alas! he comes not.
More faintly, o'er the distant waves, the sun
Gleams with expiring ray; a deathlike shudder
Creeps to my heart, and sadder, drearier grows
E'en desolation's self.
[She walks to and fro, and then listens again.
Yes! from the thicket shade
A voice resounds! 'tis he! the loved one!
No fond illusion mocks my listening ear.
'Tis louder--nearer: to his arms I fly--
To his breast!
[She rushes with outstretched arms to the extremity
of the garden. DON CAESAR meets her.
DON CASAR. BEATRICE.
BEATRICE (starting back in horror)
What do I see?
[At the same moment the Chorus comes forward.
DON CAESAR.
Angelic sweetness! fear not.
[To the Chorus.
Retire! your gleaming arms and rude array
Affright the timorous maid.
[To BEATRICE.
Fear nothing! beauty
And virgin shame are sacred in my eyes.
[The Chorus steps aside. He approaches and takes her hand.
Where hast thou been? for sure some envious power
Has hid thee from my gaze: long have I sought thee:
E'en from the hour when 'mid the funeral rites
Of the dead prince, like some angelic vision,
Lit with celestial brightness, on my sight
Thou shonest, no other image in my breast
Waking or dreaming, lives; nor to thyself
Unknown thy potent spells; my glance of fire,
My faltering accents, and my hand that lay
Trembling in thine, bespoke my ecstasy!
Aught else with solemn majesty the rite
And holy place forbade:
The bell proclaimed
The awful sacrifice! With downcast eyes,
And kneeling I adored: soon as I rose,
And caught with eager gaze thy form again,
Sudden it vanished; yet, with mighty magic
Of love enchained, my spirit tracked thy presence;
Nor ever, with unwearied quest, I cease
At palace gates, amid the temple's throng,
In secret paths retired, or public scenes,
Where beauteous innocence perchance might rove,
To mark each passing form--in vain; but, guided
By some propitious deity this day
One of my train, with happy vigilance,
Espied thee in the neighboring church.
[BEATRICE, who had stood trembling with averted eyes,
here makes a gesture of terror.
I see thee
Once more; and may the spirit from this frame
Be severed ere we part! Now let me snatch
This glad, auspicious moment, and defy
Or chance, or envious demon's power, to shake
Henceforth my solid bliss; here I proclaim thee,
Before this listening warlike train my bride,
With pledge of knightly honors!
[He shows her to the Chorus.
Who thou art,
I ask not: thou art mine! But that thy soul
And birth are pure alike one glance informed
My inmost heart; and though thy lot were mean,
And poor thy lowly state, yet would I strain thee
With rapture to my arms: no choice remains,
Thou art my love--my wife! Know too, that lifted
On fortune's height, I spurn control; my will
Can raise thee to the pinnacle of greatness--
Enough my name--I am Don Caesar! None
Is nobler in Messina!
[BEATRICE starts back in amazement. He remarks her agitation,
and after a pause continues.
What a grace
Lives in thy soft surprise and modest silence!
Yes! gentle humbleness is beauty's crown--
The beautiful forever hid, and shrinking
From its own lustre: but thy spirit needs
Repose, for aught of strange--e'en sudden joy--
Is terror-fraught. I leave thee.
[Turning to the Chorus.
From this hour
She is your mistress, and my bride; so teach her
With honors due to entertain the pomp
Of queenly state. I will return with speed,
And lead her home as fits Messina's princess.
[He goes away.
BEATRICE and the Chorus.
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
Fair maiden--hail to thee
Thou lovely queen!
Thine is the crown, and thine the victory!
Of heroes to a distant age,
The blooming mother thou shalt shine,
Preserver of this kingly line.
(ROGER).
And thrice I bid thee hail,
Thou happy fair!
Sent in auspicious hour to bless
This favored race--the god's peculiar care.
Here twine the immortal wreaths of fame
And evermore, from sire to son,
Rolls on the sceptered sway,
To heirs of old renown, a race of deathless name!
(BOHEMUND).
The household gods exultingly
Thy coming wait;
The ancient, honored sires,
That on the portals frown sedate,
Shall smile for thee!
There blooming Hebe shall thy steps attend;
And golden victory, that sits
By Jove's eternal throne, with waving plumes
For conquest ever spread,
To welcome thee from heaven descend.
(ROGER.)
Ne'er from this queenly, bright array
The crown of beauty fades,
Departing to the realms of day,
Each to the next, as good and fair,
Extends the zone of feminine grace,
And veil of purity:--
Oh, happy race!
What vision glads my raptured eye!
Equal in nature's blooming pride,
I see the mother and the virgin bride.
BEATRICE (awaking from her reverie).
Oh, luckless hour!
Alas! ill-fated maid!
Where shall I fly
From these rude warlike men?
Lost and betrayed!
A shudder o'er me came,
When of this race accursed--the brothers twain--
Their hands embrued with kindred gore,
I heard the dreaded name;
Oft told, their strife and serpent hate
With terror thrilled lay bosom's core:--
And now--oh, hapless fate!
I tremble, 'mid the rage of discord thrown,
Deserted and alone!
[She runs into the alcove.
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
Son of the immortal deities,
And blest is he, the lord of power;
His every joy the world can give;
Of all that mortals prize
He culls the flower.
(ROGER).
For him from ocean's azure caves
The diver bears each pearl of purest ray;
Whate'er from nature's boundless field
Or toil or art has won,
Obsequious at his feet we lay;
His choice is ever free;
We bow to chance, and fortune's blind decree.
(BOHEMUND.)
But this of princes' lot I deem
The crowning treasure, joy supreme--
Of love the triumph and the prize,
The beauty, star of neighboring eyes!
She blooms for him alone,
He calls the fairest maid his own.
(ROGER).
Armed for the deadly fray,
The corsair bounds upon the strand,
And drags, amid the gloom of night, away,
The shrieking captive train,
Of wild desires the hapless prey;
But ne'er his lawless hands profane
The gem--the peerless flower--
Whose charms shall deck the Sultan's bower.
(BOHEMUND.)
Now haste and watch, with curious eye,
These hallowed precincts round,
That no presumptuous foot come nigh
The secret, solitary ground
Guard well the maiden fair,
Your chieftain's brightest jewel owns your care.
[The Chorus withdraws to the background.
[The scene changes to a chamber in the interior of the palace.
DONNA ISABELLA between DON MANUEL and DON CAESAR.
ISABELLA.
The long-expected, festal day is come,
My children's hearts are twined in one, as thus
I fold their hands. Oh, blissful hour, when first
A mother dares to speak in nature's voice,
And no rude presence checks the tide of love.
The clang of arms affrights mine ear no more;
And as the owls, ill-omened brood of night,
From some old, shattered homestead's ruined walls,
Their ancient reign, fly forth a dusky swarm,
Darkening the cheerful day; when absent long,
The dwellers home return with joyous shouts,
To build the pile anew; so Hate departs
With all his grisly train; pale Envy, scowling Malice,
And hollow-eyed Suspicion; from our gates,
Hoarse murmuring, to the realms of night; while Peace,
By Concord and fair Friendship led along,
Comes smiling in his place.
[She pauses.
But not alone
This day of joy to each restores a brother;
It brings a sister! Wonderstruck you gaze!
Yet now the truth, in silence guarded long,
Bursts from my soul. Attend! I have a daughter!
A sister lives, ordained by heaven to bind ye
With ties unknown before.
DON CAESAR.
We have a sister!
What hast thou said, my mother? never told
Her being till this hour!
DON MANUEL.
In childhood's years,
Oft of a sister we have heard, untimely
Snatched in her cradle by remorseless death;
So ran the tale.
ISABELLA.
She lives!
DON CAESAR.
And thou wert silent!
ISABELLA.
Hear how the seed was sown in early time,
That now shall ripen to a joyful harvest.
Ye bloomed in boyhood's tender age; e'en then
By mutual, deadly hate, the bitter spring
Of grief to this torn, anxious heart, dissevered;
Oh, may your strife return no more! A vision,
Strange and mysterious, in your father's breast
Woke dire presage: it seemed that from his couch,
With branches intertwined, two laurels grew,
And in the midst a lily all in flames,
That, catching swift the boughs and knotted stems,
Burst forth with crackling rage, and o'er the house
Spread in one mighty sea of fire: perplexed
By this terrific dream, my husband sought
An Arab, skilled to read the stars, and long
The trusted oracle, whose counsels swayed
His inmost purpose: thus the boding sage
Spoke Fate's decrees: if I a daughter bore,
Destruction to his sons and all his race
From her should spring. Soon, by heaven's will, this child
Of dreadful omen saw the light; your sire
Commanded instant in the waves to throw
The new-born innocent; a mother's love
Prevailed, and, aided by a faithful servant,
I snatched the babe from death.
DON CAESAR.
Blest be the hands
The ministers of thy care! Oh, ever rich
Of counsels was a parent's love!
ISABELLA.
But more
Than Nature's mighty voice, a warning dream
Impelled to save my child: while yet unborn
She slumbered in my womb, sleeping I saw
An infant, fair as of celestial kind,
That played upon the grass; soon from the wood
A lion rushed, and from his gory jaws,
Caressing, in the infant's lap let fall
His prey, new-caught; then through the air down swept
An eagle, and with fond caress alike
Dropped from his claws a trembling kid, and both
Cowered at the infant's feet, a gentle pair.
A monk, the saintly guide whose counsels poured
In every earthly need, the balm of heaven
Upon my troubled soul, my dream resolved.
Thus spoke the man of God: a daughter, sent
To knit the warring spirits of my sons
In bonds of tender love, should recompense
A mother's pains! Deep in my heart I treasured
His words, and, reckless of the Pagan seer,
Preserved the blessed child, ordained of heaven
To still your growing strife; sweet pledge of hope
And messenger of peace!
DON MANUEL (embracing his brother).
There needs no sister
To join our hearts; she shall but bind them closer.
ISABELLA.
In a lone spot obscure, by stranger hands
Nurtured, the secret flower has grown; to me
Denied the joy to mark each infant charm
And opening grace from that sad hour of parting;
These arms ne'er clasped my child again! her sire,
To jealousy's corroding fears a prey,
And brooding dark suspicion, restless tracked
Each day my steps.
DON CAESAR.
Yet three months flown, my father
Sleeps in the tranquil grave; say, whence delayed
The joyous tidings? Why so long concealed
The maid, nor earlier taught our hearts to glow
With brother's love?
ISABELLA.
The cause, your frenzied hate,
That raging unconfined, e'en on the tomb
Of your scarce buried father, lit the flames
Of mortal strife. What! could I throw my daughter
Betwixt your gleaming blades? Or 'mid the storm
Of passion would ye list a woman's counsels?
Could she, sweet pledge of peace, of all our hopes
The last and holy anchor, 'mid the rage
Of discord find a home? Ye stand as brothers,
So will I give a sister to your arms!
The reconciling angel comes; each hour
I wait my messenger's return; he leads her
From her sequestered cell, to glad once more
A mother's eyes.
DON MANUEL.
Nor her alone this day
Thy arms shall fold; joy pours through all our gates;
Soon shall the desolate halls be full, the seat
Of every blooming grace. Now hear my secret:
A sister thou hast given; to thee I bring
A daughter; bless thy son! My heart has found
Its lasting shrine: ere this day's sun has set
Don Manuel to thy feet shall lead his bride,
The partner of his days.
ISABELLA.
And to my breast
With transport will I clasp the chosen maid
That makes my first-born happy. Joy shall spring
Where'er she treads, and every flower that blooms
Around the path of life smile in her presence!
May bliss reward the son, that for my brows
Has twined the choicest wreath a mother wears.
DON CAESAR.
Yet give not all the fulness of thy blessing
To him, thy eldest born. If love be blest,
I, too, can give thee joy. I bring a daughter,
Another flower for thy most treasured garland!
The maid that in this ice-cold bosom first
Awoke the rapturous flame! Ere yonder sun
Declines, Don Caesar's bride shall call thee mother.
DON MANUEL.
Almighty Love! thou godlike power--for well
We call thee sovereign of the breast! Thy sway
Controls each warring element, and tunes
To soft accord; naught lives but owns thy greatness.
Lo! the rude soul that long defied thee melts
At thy command!
[He embraces DON CAESAR.
Now I can trust thy heart,
And joyful strain thee to a brother's arms!
I doubt thy faith no more, for thou canst love!
ISABELLA.
Thrice blest the day, when every gloomy care
From my o'erlabored breast has flown. I see
On steadfast columns reared our kingly race,
And with contented spirit track the stream
Of measureless time. In these deserted halls,
Sad in my widow's veil, but yesterday
Childless I roamed; and soon, in youthful charms
Arrayed, three blooming daughters at my side
Shall stand! Oh, happiest mother! Chief of women,
In bliss supreme; can aught of earthly joy
O'erbalance thine?
But say, of royal stem,
What maidens grace our isle? For ne'er my sons
Would stoop to meaner brides.
DON MANUEL.
Seek not to raise
The veil that hides my bliss; another day
Shall tell thee all. Enough--Don Manuel's bride
Is worthy of thy son and thee.
ISABELLA.
Thy sire
Speaks in thy words; thus to himself retired
Forever would he brood o'er counsels dark,
And cloak his secret purpose;--your delay
Be short, my son.
[Turning to DON CAESAR.
But thou--some royal maid,
Daughter of kings, hath stirred thy soul to love;
So speak--her name----
DON CAESAR.
I have no art to veil
My thoughts with mystery's garb--my spirit free
And open as my brows; which thou wouldst know
Concerned me never. What illumes above
Heaven's flaming orb? Himself! On all the world
He shines, and with his beaming glory tells
From light he sprung:--in her pure eyes I gazed,
I looked into her heart of hearts:--the brightness
Revealed the pearl. Her race--her name--my mother,
Ask not of me!
ISABELLA.
My son, explain thy words,
For, like some voice divine, the sudden charm
Has thralled thy soul: to deeds of rash emprise
Thy nature prompted, not to fantasies
Of boyish love:--tell me, what swayed thy choice?
DON CAESAR.
My choice? my mother! Is it choice when man
Obeys the might of destiny, that brings
The awful hour? I sought no beauteous bride,
No fond delusion stirred my tranquil breast,
Still as the house of death; for there, unsought,
I found the treasure of my soul. Thou know'st
That, heedless ever of the giddy race,
I looked on beauty's charms with cold disdain,
Nor deemed of womankind there lived another
Like thee--whom my idolatrous fancy decked
With heavenly graces:--
'Twas the solemn rite
Of my dead father's obsequies; we stood
Amid the countless throng, with strange attire
Hid from each other's glance; for thus ordained
Thy thoughtful care lest with outbursting rage,
E' en by the holy place unawed, our strife
Should mar the funeral pomp.
With sable gauze
The nave was all o'erhung; the altar round
Stood twenty giant saints, uplifting each
A torch; and in the midst reposed on high
The coffin, with o'erspreading pall, that showed,
In white, redemption's sign;--thereon were laid
The staff of sovereignty, the princely crown,
The golden spurs of knighthood, and the sword,
With diamond-studded belt:--
And all was hushed
In silent prayer, when from the lofty choir,
Unseen, the pealing organ spoke, and loud
From hundred voices burst the choral strain!
Then, 'mid the tide of song, the coffin sank
With the descending floor beneath, forever
Down to the world below:--but, wide outspread
Above the yawning grave, the pall upheld
The gauds of earthly state, nor with the corpse
To darkness fell; yet on the seraph wings
Of harmony, the enfranchised spirit soared
To heaven and mercy's throne:
Thus to thy thought,
My mother, I have waked the scene anew,
And say, if aught of passion in my breast
Profaned the solemn hour; yet then the beams
Of mighty love--so willed my guiding star--
First lit my soul; but how it chanced, myself
I ask in vain.
ISABELLA.
I would hear all; so end
Thy tale.
DON CAESAR.
What brought her to my side, or whence
She came, I know not:--from her presence quick
Some secret all-pervading inward charm
Awoke; 'twas not the magic of a smile,
Nor playful Cupid in her cheeks, nor more,
The form of peerless grace;--'twas beauty's soul,
The speaking virtue, modesty inborn,
That as with magic spells, impalpable
To sense, my being thralled. We breathed together
The air of heaven:--enough!--no utterance asked
Of words, our spiritual converse;--in my heart,
Though strange, yet with familiar ties inwrought
She seemed, and instant spake the thought--'tis she!
Or none that lives!
DON MANUEL (interposing with eagerness).
That is the sacred fire
From heaven! the spark of love--that on the soul
Bursts like the lightning's flash, and mounts in flame,
When kindred bosoms meet! No choice remains--
Who shall resist? What mortal break the band
That heaven has knit? Brother, my blissful fortune
Was echoed in thy tale--well thou hast raised
The veil that shadows yet my secret love.
ISABELLA.
Thus destiny has marked the wayward course
Of my two sons: the mighty torrent sweeps
Down from the precipice; with rage he wears
His proper bed, nor heeds the channel traced
By art and prudent care. So to the powers
That darkly sway the fortunes of our house,
Trembling I yield. One pledge of hope remains;
Great as their birth--their noble souls.
ISABELLA, DON MANUEL, DON CAESAR.
DIEGO is seen at the door.
ISABELLA.
But see,
My faithful messenger returns. Come near me,
Honest Diego. Quick! Where is she? Tell me,
Where is my child? There is no secret here.
Oh, speak! No longer from my eyes conceal her;
Come! we are ready for the height of joy.
[She is about to lead him towards the door.
What means this pause? Thou lingerest--thou art dumb--
Thy looks are terror-fraught--a shudder creeps
Through all my frame--declare thy tidings!--speak!
Where is she? Where is Beatrice?
[She is about to rush from the chamber.
DON MANUEL (to himself abstractedly).
Beatrice!
DIEGO (holding back the PRINCESS).
Be still!
ISABELLA.
Where is she? Anguish tears my breast!
DIEGO.
She comes not.
I bring no daughter to thy arms.
ISABELLA.
Declare
Thy message! Speak! by all the saints!
What has befallen?
DON MANUEL.
Where is my sister? Tell us,
Thou harbinger of ill!
DIEGO.
The maid is stolen
By corsairs! lost! Oh! that I ne'er had seen
This day of woe!
DON MANUEL.
Compose thyself, my mother!
DON CAESAR.
Be calm; list all this tale.
DIEGO.
At thy command
I sought in haste the well-known path that leads
To the old sanctuary:--joy winged my footsteps;
The journey was my last!
DON CAESAR.
Be brief!
DON MANUEL.
Proceed!
DIEGO.
Soon as I trod the convent's court--impatient--
I ask--"Where is thy daughter?" Terror sate
In every eye; and straight, with horror mute,
I heard the worst.
[ISABELLA sinks, pale and trembling, upon a chair;
DON MANUEL is busied about her.
DON CAESAR.
Say'st thou by pirates stolen?
Who saw the band?--what tongue relates the spoil?
DIEGO.
Not far a Moorish galley was descried,
At anchor in the bay----
DON CAESAR.
The refuge oft
From tempests' rage; where is the bark?
DIEGO.
At down,
With favoring breeze she stood to sea.
DON CAESAR.
But never
One prey contents the Moor; say, have they told
Of other spoil?
DIEGO.
A herd that pastured near
Was dragged away.
DON CAESAR.
Yet from the convent's bound
How tear the maid unseen?
DIEGO.
'Tis thought with ladders
They scaled the wall.
DON CAESAR.
Thou knowest what jealous care
Enshrines the bride of Heaven; scarce could their steps
Invade the secret cells.
DIEGO.
Bound by no vows
The maiden roved at will; oft would she seek
Alone the garden's shade. Alas! this day,
Ne'er to return!
DON CAESAR.
Saidst thou--the prize of corsairs?
Perchance, at other bidding, she forsook
The sheltering dome----
ISABELLA (rising suddenly).
'Twas force! 'twas savage spoil!
Ne'er has my child, reckless of honor's ties
With vile seducer fled! My sons! Awake!
I thought to give a sister to your arms;
I ask a daughter from your swords! Arise!
Avenge this wrong! To arms! Launch every ship!
Scour all our coasts! From sea to sea pursue them!
Oh, bring my daughter! haste!
DON CAESAR.
Farewell--I fly
To vengeance!
[He goes away.
[DON MANUEL arouses himself from a state of abstraction,
and turns, with an air of agitation, to DIEGO.
DON MANUEL.
Speak! within the convent's walls
When first unseen----
DIEGO.
This day at dawn.
DON MANUEL (to ISABELLA).
Her name
Thou say'st is Beatrice?
ISABELLA.
No question! Fly!
DON MANUEL.
Yet tell me----
ISABELLA.
Haste! Begone! Why this delay?
Follow thy brother.
DON MANUEL.
I conjure thee--speak----
ISABELLA (dragging him away).
Behold my tears!
DON MANUEL.
Where was she hid? What region
Concealed my sister?
ISABELLA.
Scarce from curious eyes
In the deep bosom of the earth more safe
My child had been!
DIEGO.
Oh! now a sudden horror
Starts in my breast.
DON MANUEL.
What gives thee fear?
DIEGO.
'Twas I
That guiltless caused this woe!
ISABELLA.
Unhappy man!
What hast thou done?
DIEGO.
To spare thy mother's heart
One anxious pang, my mistress, I concealed
What now my lips shall tell: 'twas on the day
When thy dead husband in the silent tomb
Was laid; from every side the unnumbered throng
Pressed eager to the solemn rites; thy daughter--
For e'en amid the cloistered shade was noised
The funeral pomp, urged me, with ceaseless prayers,
To lead her to the festival of Death.
In evil hour I gave consent; and, shrouded
In sable weeds of mourning, she surveyed
Her father's obsequies. With keen reproach
My bosom tells (for through the veil her charms
Resistless shone), 'twas there, perchance, the spoiler
Lurked to betray.
DON MANUEL (to himself).
Thrice happy words! I live!
It was another!
ISABELLA (to DIEGO).
Faithless! Ill betide
Thy treacherous age!
DIEGO.
Oh, never have I strayed
From duty's path! My mistress, in her prayers
I heard the voice of Nature; thus from Heaven
Ordained,--methought, the secret impulse moves
Of kindred blood, to hallow with her tears
A father's grave: the tender office owned
Thy servant's care, and thus with good intent
I wrought but ill.
DON MANUEL (to himself).
Why stand I thus a prey
To torturing fears! No longer will I bear
The dread suspense---I will know all!
DON CAESAR (who returns).
Forgive me,
I follow thee.
DON MANUEL.
Away! Let no man follow.
[Exit.
DON CAESAR (looking after him in surprise).
What means my brother? Speak----
ISABELLA.
In wonder lost
I gaze; some mystery lurks----
DON CAESAR.
Thou mark'st, my mother,
My quick return; with eager zeal I flew
At thy command, nor asked one trace to guide
My footsteps to thy daughter. Whence was torn
Thy treasure? Say, what cloistered solitude
Enshrined the beauteous maid?
ISABELLA.
'Tis consecrate
To St. Cecilia; deep in forest shades,
Beyond the woody ridge that slowly climbs
Toward's Etna's towering throne, it seems a refuge
Of parted souls!
DON CAESAR.
Have courage, trust thy sons;
She shall be thine, though with unwearied quest
O'er every land and sea I track her presence
To earth's extremest bounds: one thought alone
Disturbs,--in stranger hands my timorous bride
Waits my return; to thy protecting arms
I give the pledge of all my joy! She comes;
Soon on her faithful bosom thou shalt rest
In sweet oblivion of thy cares.
[Exit.
ISABELLA.
When will the ancient curse be stilled that weighs
Upon our house? Some mocking demon sports
With every new-formed hope, nor envious leaves
One hour of joy. So near the haven smiled--
So smooth the treacherous main--secure I deemed
My happiness: the storm was lulled; and bright
In evening's lustre gleamed the sunny shore!
Then through the placid air the tempest sweeps,
And bears me to the roaring surge again!
[She goes into the interior of the palace,
followed by DIEGO.
The Scene changes to the Garden.
Both Choruses, afterwards BEATRICE.
The Chorus of DON MANUEL enters in solemn procession,
adorned with garlands, and bearing the bridal ornaments
above mentioned. The Chorus of DON CAESAR opposes their
entrance.
First Chorus (CAJETAN).
Begone!
Second Chorus (BOHEMUND).
Not at thy bidding!
CAJETAN.
Seest thou not
Thy presence irks?
BOHEMUND.
Thou hast it, then, the longer!
CAJETAN.
My place is here! What arm repels me?
BOHEMUND,
Mine!
CAJETAN.
Don Manuel sent me hither.
BOHEMUND.
I obey
My Lord Don Caesar.
CAJETAN.
To the eldest born
Thy master reverence owes.
BOHEMUND.
The world belongs
To him that wins!
CAJETAN.
Unmannered knave, give place!
BOHEMUND.
Our swords be measured first!
CAJETAN.
I find thee ever
A serpent in my path.
BOHEMUND.
Where'er I list
Thus will I meet thee!
CAJETAN.
Say, why cam'st thou hither
To spy?----
BOHEMUND.
And thou to question and command?
CAJETAN.
To parley I disdain!
BOHEMUND.
Too much I grace thee
By words!
CAJETAN.
Thy hot, impetuous youth should bow
To reverend age.
BOHEMUND.
Older thou art--not braver.
BEATRICE (rushing from her place of concealment).
Alas! What mean these warlike men?
CAJETAN (to BOHEMUND).
I heed not
Thy threats and lofty mien.
BOHEMUND.
I serve a master
Better than thine.
BEATRICE.
Alas! Should he appear!
CAJETAN.
Thou liest! Don Manuel thousandfold excels.
BOHEMUND.
In every strife the wreath of victory decks
Don Caesar's brows!
BEATRICE.
Now he will come! Already
The hour is past!
CAJETAN.
'Tis peace, or thou shouldst know
My vengeance!
BOHEMUND.
Fear, not peace, thy arm refrains.
BEATRICE.
Oh! Were he thousand miles remote!
CAJETAN.
Thy looks
But move my scorn; the compact I obey.
BOHEMUND.
The coward's ready shield!
CAJETAN.
Come on! I follow.
BOHEMUND.
To arms!
BEATRICE (in the greatest agitation).
Their falchions gleam--the strife begins!
Ye heavenly powers, his steps refrain! Some snare
Throw round his feet, that in this hour of dread
He come not: all ye angels, late implored
To give him to my arms, reverse my prayers;
Far, far from hence convey the loved one!
[She runs into the alcove. At the moment when the two
Choruses are about to engage, DON MANUEL appears.
DON MANUEL, the Chorus.
DON MANUEL.
What do I see!
First Chorus to the Second (CAJETAN, BERENGAR, MANFRED).
Come on! Come on!
Second Chorus (BOHEMUND, ROGER, HIPPOLYTE).
Down with them!
DON MANUEL (stepping between them with drawn sword).
Hold!
CAJETAN.
'Tis the prince!
BOHEMUND.
Be still!
DON MANUEL.
I stretch him dead
Upon this verdant turf that with one glance
Of scorn prolongs the strife, or threats his foe!
Why rage ye thus? What maddening fiend impels
To blow the flames of ancient hate anew,
Forever reconciled? Say, who began
The conflict? Speak----
First Chorus (CAJETAN, BERENGAR).
My prince, we stood----
Second Chorus (ROGER, BOHEMUND) interrupting them.
They came
DON MANUEL (to the First Chorus).
Speak thou!
First Chorus (CAJETAN).
With wreaths adorned, in festal train,
We bore the bridal gifts; no thought of ill
Disturbed our peaceful way; composed forever
With holy pledge of love we deemed your strife,
And trusting came; when here in rude array
Of arms encamped they stood, and loud defied us!
DON MANUEL.
Slave! Is no refuge safe? Shall discord thus
Profane the bower of virgin innocence,
The home of sanctity and peace?
[To the Second Chorus.
Retire--
Your warlike presence ill beseems; away!
I would be private.
[They hesitate.
In your master's name
I give command; our souls are one, our lips
Declare each other's thoughts; begone!
[To the First Chorus.
Remain!
And guard the entrance.
BOHEMUND.
So! What next? Our masters
Are reconciled; that's plain; and less he wins
Of thanks than peril, that with busy zeal
In princely quarrel stirs; for when of strife
His mightiness aweary feels, of guilt
He throws the red-dyed mantle unconcerned
On his poor follower's luckless head, and stands
Arrayed in virtue's robes! So let them end
E'en as they will their brawls, I hold it best
That we obey.
[Exit Second Chorus. The first withdraws to the
back of the stage; at the same moment BEATRICE rushes
forward, and throws herself into DON MANUEL'S arms.
BEATRICE.
'Tis thou! Ah! cruel one,
Again I see thee--clasp thee--long appalled,
To thousand ills a prey, trembling I languish
For thy return: no more--in thy loved arms
I am at peace, nor think of dangers past,
Thy breast my shield from every threatening harm.
Quick! Let us fly! they see us not!--away!
Nor lose the moment.
Ha! Thy looks affright me!
Thy sullen, cold reserve! Thou tear'st thyself
Impatient from my circling arms, I know thee
No more! Is this Don Manuel? My beloved?
My husband?
DON MANUEL.
Beatrice!
BEATRICE.
No words! The moment
Is precious! Haste.
DON MANUEL.
Yet tell me----
BEATRICE.
Quick! Away!
Ere those fierce men return.
DON MANUEL.
Be calm, for naught
Shall trouble thee of ill.
BEATRICE.
Oh, fly! alas,
Thou know'st them not!
DON MANUEL.
Protected by this arm
Canst thou fear aught?
BEATRICE.
Oh, trust me; mighty men
Are here!
DON MANUEL.
Beloved! mightier none than I!
BEATRICE.
And wouldst thou brave this warlike host alone?
DON MANUEL.
Alone! the men thou fear'st----
BEATRICE.
Thou know'st them not,
Nor whom they serve.
DON MANUEL.
Myself! I am their lord!
BEATRICE.
Thou art--a shudder creeps through all my frame!
DON MANUEL.
Far other than I seemed; learn at last
To know me, Beatrice. Not the poor knight
Am I, the stranger and unknown, that loving
Taught thee to love; but what I am--my race--
My power----
BEATRICE.
And art thou not Don Manuel? Speak--
Who art thou?
DON MANUEL.
Chief of all that bear the name,
I am Don Manuel, Prince of Messina!
BEATRICE.
Art thou Don Manuel, Don Caesar's brother?
DON MANUEL.
Don Caesar is my brother.
BEATRICE.
Is thy brother!
DON MANUEL.
What means this terror? Know'st thou, then, Don Caesar?
None other of my race?
BEATRICE.
Art thou Don Manuel,
That with thy brother liv'st in bitter strife
Of long inveterate hate?
DON MANUEL.
This very sun
Smiled on our glad accord! Yes, we are brothers!
Brothers in heart!
BEATRICE.
And reconciled? This day?
DON MANUEL.
What stirs this wild disorder? Hast thou known
Aught but our name? Say, hast thou told me all?
Is there no secret? Hast thou naught concealed?
Nothing disguised?
BEATRICE.
Thy words are dark; explain,
What shall I tell thee?
DON MANUEL.
Of thy mother naught
Hast thou e'er told; who is she? If in words
I paint her, bring her to thy sight----
BEATRICE.
Thou know'st her!
And thou wert silent!
DON MANUEL.
If I know thy mother,
Horrors betide us both!
BEATRICE.
Oh, she is gracious
As the sun's orient beam! Yes! I behold her;
Fond memory wakes;--and from my bosom's depths
Her godlike presence rises to my view!
I see around her snowy neck descend
The tresses of her raven hair, that shade
The form of sculptured loveliness; I see
The pale, high-thoughted brow; the darkening glance
Of her large lustrous orbs; I hear the tones
Of soul-fraught sweetness!
DON MANUEL.
'Tis herself!
BEATRICE.
This day,
Perchance had give me to her arms, and knit
Our souls in everlasting love;--such bliss
I have renounced, yes! I have lost a mother
For thee!
DON MANUEL.
Console thyself, Messina's princess
Henceforth shall call thee daughter; to her feet
I lead thee; come--she waits. What hast thou said?
BEATRICE.
Thy mother and Don Caesar's? Never! never!
DON MANUEL.
Thou shudderest! Whence this horror? Hast thou known
My mother? Speak----
BEATRICE.
O grief! O dire misfortune!
Alas! that e'er I live to see this day!
DON MANUEL.
What troubles thee? Thou know'st me, thou hast found,
In the poor stranger knight, Messina's prince!
BEATRICE.
Give me the dear unknown again! With him
On earth's remotest wilds I could be blest!
DON CAESAR (behind the scene).
Away! What rabble throng is here?
BEATRICE.
That voice!
Oh heavens! Where shall I fly!
DON MANUEL.
Know'st thou that voice?
No! thou hast never heard it; to thine ear
'Tis strange----
BEATRICE.
Oh, come--delay not----
DON MANUEL.
Wherefore I fly?
It is my brother's voice! He seeks me--how
He tracked my steps----
BEATRICE.
By all the holy saints!
Brave not his wrath! oh quit this place--avoid him--
Meet not thy brother here!
DON MANUEL.
My soul! thy fears
Confound; thou hear'st me not; our strife is o'er.
Yes! we are reconciled.
BEATRICE.
Protect me, heaven,
In this dread hour!
DON MANUEL.
A sudden dire presage
Starts in my breast--I shudder at the thought:
If it be true! Oh, horror! Could she know
That voice! Wert thou--my tongue denies to utter
The words of fearful import--Beatrice!
Say, wert thou present at the funeral rites
Of my dead sire?
BEATRICE.
Alas!
DON MANUEL.
Thou wert!
BEATRICE.
Forgive me!
DON MANUEL.
Unhappy woman!
BEATRICE.
I was present!
DON MANUEL.
Horror!
BEATRICE.
Some mighty impulse urged me to the scene--
Oh, be not angry--to thyself I owned
The ardent fond desire; with darkening brow
Thou listened'st to my prayer, and I was silent,
But what misguiding inauspicious star
Allured, I know not; from my inmost soul
The wish, the dear emotion spoke; and vain
Aught else:--Diego gave consent--oh, pardon me!
I disobeyed thee.
[She advances towards him imploringly; at the same moment
DON CAESAR enters, accompanied by the whole Chorus.
BOTH BROTHERS, BOTH CHORUSES, BEATRICE.
Second Chorus (BOHEMUND) to DON CAESAR.
Thou heliev'st us not--
Believe thine eyes!
DON CAESAR (rushes forward furiously, and at the sight of his brother
starts back with horror).
Some hell-born magic cheats
My senses; in her arms! Envenomed snake!
Is this thy love? For this thy treacherous heart
Could lure with guise of friendship! Oh, from heaven
Breathed my immortal hate! Down, down to hell,
Thou soul of falsehood!
[He stabs him, DON MANUEL falls.
DON MANUEL.
Beatrice!--my brother!
I die!
[Dies. BEATRICE sinks lifeless at his side.
First Chorus (CAJETAN).
Help! Help! To arms! Avenge with blood
The bloody deed!
Second Chorus (BOHEMUND).
The fortune of the day
Is ours! The strife forever stilled:--Messina
Obeys one lord.
First Chorus (CAJETAN, BERENGAR, MANFRED).
Revenge! The murderer
Shall die! Quick, offer to your master's shade
Appeasing sacrifice!
Second Chorus (BOHEMUND, ROGER, HIPPOLYTE).
My prince! fear nothing,
Thy friends are true.
DON CAESAR (steps between them, looking around).
Be still! The foe is slain
That practised on my trusting, honest heart
With snares of brother's love. Oh, direful shows
The deed of death! But righteous heaven hath judged.
First Chorus (CAJETAN).
Alas to thee, Messina! Woe forever!
Sad city! From thy blood-stained walls this deed
Of nameless horror taints the skies; ill fare
Thy mothers and thy children, youth and age,
And offspring yet, unborn!
DON CAESAR.
Too late your grief--
Here give your help.
[Pointing to BEATRICE.
Call her to life, and quick
Depart this scene of terror and of death.
I must away and seek my sister:--Hence!
Conduct her to my mother--
And tell her that her son, Don Caesar, sends her!
[Exit.
[The senseless BEATRICE is placed on a litter and
carried away by the Second Chorus. The First Chorus
remains with the body, round which the boys who bear
the bridal presents range themselves in a semicircle.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
List, how with dreaded mystery
Was signed to my prophetic soul,
Of kindred blood the dire decree:--
Hither with noiseless, giant stride
I saw the hideous fiend of terror glide!
'Tis past! I strive not to control
My shuddering awe--so swift of ill
The Fates the warning sign fulfil.
Lo! to my sense dismayed,
Sudden the deed of death has shown
Whate'er my boding fears portrayed.
The visioned thought was pain;
The present horror curdles every vein
One of the Chorus (MANFRED).
Sound, sound the plaint of woe!
Beautiful youth!
Outstretched and pale he lies,
Untimely cropped in early bloom;
The heavy night of death has sealed his eyes;--
In this glad hour of nuptial joy,
Snatched by relentless doom,
He sleeps--while echoing to the sky,
Of sorrow bursts the loud, despairing cry!
A second (CAJETAN).
We come, we come, in festal pride,
To greet the beauteous bride;
Behold! the nuptial gifts, the rich attire
The banquet waits, the guests are there;
They bid thee to the solemn rite
Of hymen quick repair.
Thou hear'st them not--the sportive lyre,
The frolic dance, shall ne'er invite;
Nor wake thee from thy lowly bed,
For deep the slumber of the dead!
The whole Chorus.
No more the echoing horn shall cheer
Nor bride with tones of sweetness charm his ear.
On the cold earth he lies,
In death's eternal slumber closed his eyes.
A third (CAJETAN).
What are the hopes, and fond desires
Of mortals' transitory race?
This day, with harmony of voice and soul,
Ye woke the long-extinguished fires
Of brothers' love--yon flaming orb
Lit with his earliest beams your dear embrace
At eve, upon the gory sand
Thou liest--a reeking corpse!
Stretched by a brother's murderous hand.
Vain projects, treacherous hopes,
Child of the fleeting hour are thine;
Fond man! thou rear'st on dust each bold design,
Chorus (BERENGAR).
To thy mother I will bear
The burden of unutterable woe!
Quick shall yon cypress, blooming fair,
Bend to the axe's murderous blow
Then twine the mournful bier!
For ne'er with verdant life the tree shall smile
That grew on death's devoted soil;
Ne'er in the breeze the branches play,
Nor shade the wanderer in the noontide ray;
'Twas marked to bear the fruits of doom,
Cursed to the service of the tomb.
First (CAJETAN).
Woe to the murderer! Woe
That sped exulting in his pride,
Behold! the parched earth drinks the crimson tide.
Down, down it flows, unceasingly,
To the dim caverned halls below,
Where throned in kindred gloom the sister train,
Of Themis progeny severe,
Brood in their songless, silent reign!
Stern minister of wrath's decree,
They catch in swarthy cups thy streaming gore,
And pledge with horrid rites for vengeance evermore.
Second (BERENGAR).
Though swift of deed the traces fade
From earth, before the enlivening ray;
As o'er the brow the transient shade
Of thought, the hues of fancy flit away:--
Yet in the mystic womb unseen,
Of the dark ruling hours that sway
Our mortal lot, whate'er has been,
With new creative germ defies decay.
The blooming field is time
For nature's ever-teeming shoot,
And all is seed, and all is fruit.
[The Chorus goes away, bearing the corpse of DON MANUEL on a bier.
SCENE--The hall of pillars. It is night.
The stage is lighted from above by a single large lamp.
DONNA ISABELLA and DIEGO advance to the front.
ISABELLA.
As yet no joyful tidings, not a trace
Found of the lost one!
DIEGO.
Nothing have we heard,
My mistress; yet o'er every track, unwearied,
Thy sons pursue. Ere long the rescued maid
Shall smile at dangers past.
ISABELLA.
Alas! Diego,
My heart is sad; 'twas I that caused this woe!
DIEGO.
Vex not thy anxious bosom; naught escaped
Thy thoughtful care.
ISABELLA.
Oh! had I earlier shown
The hidden treasure!
DIEGO.
Prudent were thy counsels,
Wisely thou left'st her in retirement's shade;
So, trust in heaven.
ISABELLA.
Alas! no joy is perfect
Without this chance of ill my bliss were pure.
DIEGO.
Thy happiness is but delayed; enjoy
The concord of thy sons.
ISABELLA.
The sight was rapture
Supreme, when, locked in one another's arms,
They glowed with brothers' love.
DIEGO.
And in the heart
It burns; for ne'er their princely souls have stooped
To mean disguise.
ISABELLA.
Now, too, their bosoms wake
To gentler thoughts, and own their softening sway
Of love. No more their hot, impetuous youth
Revels in liberty untamed, and spurns
Restraint of law, attempered passion's self,
With modest, chaste reserve.
To thee, Diego,
I will unfold my secret heart; this hour
Of feeling's opening bloom, expected long,
Wakes boding fears: thou know'st to sudden rage
Love stirs tumultuous breasts; and if this flame
With jealousy should rouse the slumbering fires
Of ancient hate--I shudder at the thought!
If these discordant souls perchance have thrilled
In fatal unison! Enough; the clouds
That black with thundering menace o'er me hung
Are past; some angel sped them tranquil by,
And my enfranchised spirit breathes again.
DIEGO.
Rejoice, my mistress; for thy gentle sense
And soft, prevailing art more weal have wrought
Than all thy husband's power. Be praise to thee
And thy auspicious star!
ISABELLA.
Yes, fortune smiled;
Nor light the task, so long with apt disguise
To veil the cherished secret of my heart,
And cheat my ever-jealous lord: more hard
To stifle mighty nature's pleading voice,
That, like a prisoned fire, forever strove
To rend its confines.
DIEGO.
All shall yet be well;
Fortune, propitious to our hopes, gave pledge
Of bliss that time will show.
ISABELLA.
I praise not yet
My natal star, while darkening o'er my fate
This mystery hangs: too well the dire mischance
Tells of the fiend whose never-slumbering rage
Pursues our house. Now list what I have done,
And praise or blame me as thou wilt; from thee
My bosom guards no secret: ill I brook
This dull repose, while swift o'er land and sea
My sons unwearied, track their sister's flight,
Yes, I have sought; heaven counsels oft, when vain
All mortal aid.
DIEGO.
What I may know, my mistress,
Declare.
ISABELLA.
On Etna's solitary height
A reverend hermit dwells,--benamed of old
The mountain seer,--who to the realms of light
More near abiding than the toilsome race
Of mortals here below, with purer air
Has cleansed each earthly, grosser sense away;
And from the lofty peak of gathered years,
As from his mountain home, with downward glance
Surveys the crooked paths of worldly strife.
To him are known the fortunes of our house;
Oft has the holy sage besought response
From heaven, and many a curse with earnest prayer
Averted: thither at my bidding flew,
On wings of youthful haste, a messenger,
To ask some tidings of my child: each hour
I wait his homeward footsteps.
DIEGO.
If mine eyes
Deceive me not, he comes; and well his speed
Has earned thy praise.
MESSENGER, ISABELLA, DIEGO.
ISABELLA (to MESSENGER).
Now speak, and nothing hide
Of weal or woe; be truth upon thy lips!
What tidings bear'st thou from the mountain seer?
MESSENGER.
His answer: "Quick! retrace thy steps; the lost one
Is found."
ISABELLA.
Auspicious tongue! Celestial sounds
Of peace and joy! thus ever to my vows.
Thrice honored sage, thy kindly message spoke!
But say, which heaven-directed brother traced
My daughter?
MESSENGER.
'Twas thy eldest born that found
The deep-secluded maid.
ISABELLA.
Is it Don Manuel
That gives her to my arms? Oh, he was ever
The child of blessing! Tell me, hast thou borne
My offering to the aged man? the tapers
To burn before his saint? for gifts, the prize
Of worldly hearts, the man of God disdains.
MESSENGER.
He took the torches from my hands in silence
And stepping to the altar--where the lamp
Burned to his saint--illumed them at his fire,
And instant set in flames the hermit cell,
Where he has honored God these ninety years!
ISABELLA.
What hast thou said? What horrors fright my soul?
MESSENGER.
And three times shrieking "Woe!" with downward course,
He fled; but silent with uplifted arm
Beckoned me not to follow, nor regard him
So hither I have hastened, terror-sped.
ISABELLA.
Oh, I am tossed amid the surge again
Of doubt and anxious fears; thy tale appals
With ominous sounds of ill. My daughter found--
Thou sayest; and by my eldest born, Don Manuel?
The tidings ne'er shall bless, that heralded
This deed of woe!
MESSENGER.
My mistress! look around
Behold the hermit's message to thine eyes
Fulfilled. Some charm deludes my sense, or hither
Thy daughter comes, girt by the warlike train
Of thy two sons!
[BEATRICE is carried in by the Second Chorus on a litter,
and placed in the front of the stage. She is still without
perception, and motionless.
ISABELLA, DIEGO, MESSENGER, BEATRICE.
Chorus (BOHEMUND, ROGER, HIPPOLYTE, and the other nine followers
of DON CAESAR.)
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
Here at thy feet we lay
The maid, obedient to our lord's command:
'Twas thus he spoke--"Conduct her to my mother;
And tell her that her son, Don Caesar, sends her!"
ISABELLA (is advancing towards her with outstretched arms, and starts
back in horror).
Heavens! she is motionless and pale!
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
She lives,
She will awake, but give her time to rouse
From the dread shock that holds each sense enthralled.
ISABELLA.
My daughter! Child of all my cares and pains!
And is it thus I see thee once again?
Thus thou returnest to thy father's halls!
Oh, let my breath relume thy vital spark;
Yes! I will strain thee to a mother's arms
And hold thee fast--till from the frost of death
Released thy life-warm current throbs again.
[To the Chorus.
Where hast thou found her? Speak! What dire mischance
Has caused this sight of woe?
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
My lips are dumb!
Ask not of me: thy son will tell thee all--
Don Caesar--for 'tis he that sends her.
ISABELLA
'Tell me
Would'st thou not say Don Manuel?
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
'Tis Don Caesar
That sends her to thee.
ISABELLA (to the MESSENGER).
How declared the Seer?
Speak! Was it not Don Manuel?
MESSENGER.
'Twas he!
Thy elder born.
ISABELLA.
Be blessings on his head
Which e'er it be; to him I owe a daughter,
Alas! that in this blissful hour, so long
Expected, long implored, some envious fiend
Should mar my joy! Oh, I must stem the tide
Of nature's transport! In her childhood's home
I see my daughter; me she knows not--heeds not--
Nor answers to a mother's voice of love
Ope, ye dear eyelids--hands be warm--and heave
Thou lifeless bosom with responsive throbs
To mine! 'Tis she! Diego, look! 'tis Beatrice!
The long-concealed--the lost--the rescued one!
Before the world I claim her for my own!
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
New signs of terror to my boding soul
Are pictured;--in amazement lost I stand!
What light shall pierce this gloom of mystery?
ISABELLA (to the Chorus, who exhibit marks of confusion and
embarrassment).
Oh, ye hard hearts! Ye rude unpitying men!
A mother's transport from your breast of steel
Rebounds, as from the rocks the heaving surge!
I look around your train, nor mark one glance
Of soft regard. Where are my sons? Oh, tell me
Why come they not, and from their beaming eyes
Speak comfort to my soul? For here environed
I stand amid the desert's raging brood,
Or monsters of the deep!
DIEGO.
She opes her eyes!
She moves! She lives!
ISABELLA.
She lives! On me be thrown
Her earliest glance!
DIEGO.
See! They are closed again--
She shudders!
ISABELLA (to the Chorus).
Quick! Retire--your aspect frights her.
[Chorus steps back.
RORER.
Well pleased I shun her sight.
DIEGO.
With outstretched eyes,
And wonderstruck, she seems to measure thee.
BEATRICE.
Not strange those lineaments--where am I?
ISABELLA.
Slowly
Her sense returns.
DIEGO.
Behold! upon her knees
She sinks.
BEATRICE.
Oh, angel visage of my mother!
ISABELLA.
Child of my heart!
BEATRICE.
See! kneeling at thy feet
The guilty one!
ISABELLA.
I hold thee in my arms!
Enough--forgotten all!
DIEGO.
Look in my face,
Canst thou remember me?
BEATRICE.
The reverend brows
Of honest old Diego!
ISABELLA.
Faithful guardian
Of thy young years.
BEATRICE.
And am I once again
With kindred?
ISABELLA.
Naught but death shall part us more!
BEATRICE.
Will thou ne'er send me to the stranger?
ISABELLA.
Never!
Fate is appeased.
BEATRICE.
And am I next thy heart?
And was it all a dream--a hideous dream?
My mother! at my feet he fell! I know not
What brought me hither--yet 'tis well. Oh, bliss!
That I am safe in thy protecting arms;
They would have ta'en me to the princess, mother--
Sooner to death!
ISABELLA.
My daughter, calm thy fears;
Messina's princess----
BEATRICE.
Name her not again!
At that ill-omened sound the chill of death
Creeps through my trembling frame.
ISABELLA.
My child! but hear me----
BEATRICE.
She has two sons by mortal hate dissevered,
Don Manuel and Don Caesar----
ISABELLA.
'Tis myself!
Behold thy mother!
BEATRICE.
Have I heard thee? Speak!
ISABELLA.
I am thy mother, and Messina's princess!
BEATRICE.
Art thou Don Manuel's and Don Caesar's mother?
ISABELLA.
And thine! They are thy brethren whom thou namest.
BEATRICE.
Oh, gleam of horrid light!
ISABELLA.
What troubles thee?
Say, whence this strange emotion?
BEATRICE.
Yes! 'twas they!
Now I remember all; no dream deceived me,
They met--'tis fearful truth! Unhappy men!
Where have ye hid him?
[She rushes towards the Chorus; they turn away from her.
A funeral march is heard in the distance.
CHORUS.
Horror! Horror!
ISABELLA.
Hid!
Speak--who is hid? and what is true? Ye stand
In silent dull amaze--as though ye fathomed
Her words of mystery! In your faltering tones--
Your brows--I read of horrors yet unknown,
That would refrain my tongue! What is it? Tell me!
I will know all! Why fix ye on the door
That awe-struck gaze? What mournful music sounds?
[The march is heard nearer.
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
It comes! it comes! and all shall be declared
With terrible voice. My mistress! steel thy heart,
Be firm, and bear with courage what awaits thee--
For more than women's soul thy destined griefs
Demand.
ISABELLA.
What comes? and what awaits me? Hark
With fearful tones the death-wail smites mine ear--
It echoes through the house! Where are my sons?
[The first Semi-chorus brings in the body of DON MANUEL
on a bier, which is placed at the side of the stage.
A black pall is spread over it.
ISABELLA, BEATRICE, DIEGO.
Both Choruses.
First Chorus (CAJETAN).
With sorrow in his train,
From street to street the King of Terror glides;
With stealthy foot, and slow,
He creeps where'er the fleeting race
Of man abides
In turn at every gate
Is heard the dreaded knock of fate,
The message of unutterable woe!
BERENGAR.
When, in the sere
And autumn leaves decayed,
The mournful forest tells how quickly fade
The glories of the year!
When in the silent tomb oppressed,
Frail man, with weight of days,
Sinks to his tranquil rest;
Contented nature but obeys
Her everlasting law,--
The general doom awakes no shuddering awe!
But, mortals, oh! prepare
For mightier ills; with ruthless hand
Fell murder cuts the holy band--
The kindred tie: insatiate death,
With unrelenting rage,
Bears to his bark the flower of blooming age!
CAJETAN.
When clouds athwart the lowering sky
Are driven--when bursts with hollow moan
The thunder's peal--our trembling bosoms own
The might of awful destiny!
Yet oft the lightning's glare
Darts sudden through the cloudless air:--
Then in thy short delusive day
Of bliss, oh! dread the treacherous snare;
Nor prize the fleeting goods in vain,
The flowers that bloom but to decay!
Nor wealth, nor joy, nor aught but pain,
Was e'er to mortal's lot secure:--
Our first best lesson--to endure!
ISABELLA.
What shall I hear? What horrors lurk beneath
This funeral pall?
[She steps towards the bier, but suddenly pauses,
and stands irresolute.
Some strange, mysterious dread
Enthrals my sense. I would approach, and sudden
The ice-cold grasp of terror holds me back!
[To BEATRICE, who has thrown herself between her and the bier.
Whate'er it be, I will unveil----
[On raising the pall she discovers the body of DON MANUEL.
Eternal Powers! it is my son!
[She stands in mute horror. BEATRICE sinks to the ground
with a shriek of anguish near the bier.
CHORUS.
Unhappy mother! 'tis thy son. Thy lips
Have uttered what my faltering tongue denied.
ISABELLA.
My soul! My Manuel! Oh, eternal grief!
And is it thus I see thee? Thus thy life
Has bought thy sister from the spoiler's rage?
Where was thy brother? Could no arm be found
To shield thee? Oh, be cursed the hand that dug
These gory wounds! A curse on her that bore
The murderer of my son! Ten thousand curses
On all their race!
CHORUS.
Woe! Woe!
ISABELLA.
And is it thus
Ye keep your word, ye gods? Is this your truth?
Alas for him that trusts with honest heart
Your soothing wiles! Why have I hoped and trembled?
And this the issue of my prayers! Attend,
Ye terror-stricken witnesses, that feed
Your gaze upon my anguish; learn to know
How warning visions cheat, and boding seers
But mock our credulous hopes; let none believe
The voice of heaven!
When in my teeming womb
This daughter lay, her father, in a dream
Saw from his nuptial couch two laurels grow,
And in the midst a lily all in flames,
That, catching swift the boughs and knotted stems
Burst forth with crackling rage, and o'er the house
Spread in one mighty sea of fire. Perplexed
By this terrific dream my husband sought
The counsels of the mystic art, and thus
Pronounced the sage: "If I a daughter bore,
The murderess of his sons, the destined spring
Of ruin to our house, the baleful child
Should see the light."
Chorus (CAJETAN and BOHEMUND).
What hast thou said, my mistress?
Woe! Woe!
ISABELLA.
For this her ruthless father spoke
The dire behest of death. I rescued her,
The innocent, the doomed one; from my arms
The babe was torn; to stay the curse of heaven,
And save my sons, the mother gave her child;
And now by robber hands her brother falls;
My child is guiltless. Oh, she slew him not!
CHORUS.
Woe! Woe!
ISABELLA.
No trust the fabling readers of the stars
Have e'er deserved. Hear how another spoke
With comfort to my soul, and him I deemed
Inspired to voice the secrets of the skies!
"My daughter should unite in love the hearts
Of my dissevered sons;" and thus their tales
Of curse and blessing on her head proclaim
Each other's falsehood. No, she ne'er has brought
A curse, the innocent; nor time was given
The blessed promise to fulfil; their tongues
Were false alike; their boasted art is vain;
With trick of words they cheat our credulous ears,
Or are themselves deceived! Naught ye may know
Of dark futurity, the sable streams
Of hell the fountain of your hidden lore,
Or yon bright spring of everlasting light!
First Chorus (CAJETAN).
Woe! Woe! thy tongue refrain!
Oh, pause, nor thus with impious rage
The might of heaven profane;
The holy oracles are wise--
Expect with awe thy coming destinies!
ISABELLA.
My tongue shall speak as prompts my swelling heart;
My griefs shall cry to heaven. Why do we lift
Our suppliant hands, and at the sacred shrines
Kneel to adore? Good, easy dupes! What win we
From faith and pious awe? to touch with prayers
The tenants of yon azure realms on high,
Were hard as with an arrow's point to pierce
The silvery moon. Hid is the womb of time,
Impregnable to mortal glance, and deaf
The adamantine walls of heaven rebound
The voice of anguish:--Oh, 'tis one, whate'er
The flight of birds--the aspect of the stars!
The book of nature is a maze--a dream
The sage's art--and every sign a falsehood!
Second Chorus (BOHEMUND).
Woe! Woe! Ill-fated woman, stay
Thy maddening blasphemies;
Thou but disown'st, with purblind eyes,
The flaming orb of day!
Confess the gods,--they dwell on high--
They circle thee with awful majesty!
All the Knights.
Confess the gods--they dwell on high--
They circle thee with awful majesty!
BEATRICE.
Why hast thou saved thy daughter, and defied
The curse of heaven, that marked me in thy womb
The child of woe? Short-sighted mother!--vain
Thy little arts to cheat the doom declared
By the all-wise interpreters, that knit
The far and near; and, with prophetic ken,
See the late harvest spring in times unborn.
Oh, thou hast brought destruction on thy race,
Withholding from the avenging gods their prey;
Threefold, with new embittered rage, they ask
The direful penalty; no thanks thy boon
Of life deserves--the fatal gift was sorrow!
Second Chorus (BERENGAR) looking towards the door
with signs of agitation.
Hark to the sound of dread!
The rattling, brazen din I hear!
Of hell-born snakes the hissing tones are near!
Yes--'tis the furies' tread!
CAJETAN.
In crumbling ruin wide,
Fall, fall, thou roof, and sink, thou trembling floor
That bear'st the dread, unearthly stride!
Ye sable damps arise!
Mount from the abyss in smoky spray,
And pall the brightness of the day!
Vanish, ye guardian powers!
They come! The avenging deities
DON CAESAR, ISABELLA, BEATRICE. The Chorus.
[On the entrance of DON CAESAR the Chorus station themselves
before him imploringly. He remains standing alone in the
centre of the stage.
BEATRICE.
Alas! 'tis he----
ISABELLA (stepping to meet him).
My Caesar! Oh, my son!
And is it thus I meet the? Look! Behold!
The crime of hand accursed!
[She leads him to the corpse.
First Chorus (CAJETAN, BERENGAR).
Break forth once more
Ye wounds! Flow, flow, in swarthy flood,
Thou streaming gore!
ISABELLA.
Shuddering with earnest gaze, and motionless,
Thou stand'st.--yes! there my hopes repose, and all
That earth has of thy brother; in the bud
Nipped is your concord's tender flower, nor ever
With beauteous fruit shall glad a mother's eyes,
DON CAESAR.
Be comforted; thy sons, with honest heart,
To peace aspired, but heaven's decree was blood!
ISABELLA.
I know thou lovedst him well; I saw between ye,
With joy, the bands old Nature sweetly twined;
Thou wouldst have borne him in thy heart of hearts
With rich atonement of long wasted years!
But see--fell murder thwarts thy dear design,
And naught remains but vengeance!
DON CAESAR.
Come, my mother,
This is no place for thee. Oh, haste and leave
This sight of woe.
[He endeavors to drag her away.
ISABELLA (throwing herself into his arms).
Thou livest! I have a son!
BEATRICE.
Alas! my mother!
DON CAESAR.
On this faithful bosom
Weep out thy pains; nor lost thy son,--his love
Shall dwell immortal in thy Caesar's breast.
First Chorus (CAJETAN, BERENGAR, MANFRED).
Break forth, ye wounds!
Dumb witness! the truth proclaim;
Flow fast, thou gory stream!
ISABELLA (clasping the hands of DON CAESAR and BEATRICE).
My children!
DON CAESAR.
Oh, 'tis ecstasy! my mother,
To see her in thy arms! henceforth in love
A daughter--sister----
ISABELLA (interrupting him).
Thou hast kept thy word.
My son; to thee I owe the rescued one;
Yes, thou hast sent her----
DON CAESAR (in astonishment).
Whom, my mother, sayst thou,
That I have sent?
ISABELLA.
She stands before thine eyes--
Thy sister.
DON CAESAR.
She! My sister?
ISABELLA.
Ay, What other?
DON CAESAR.
My sister!
ISABELLA.
Thou hast sent her to me!
DON CAESAR.
Horror!
His sister, too!
CHORUS.
Woe! woe!
BEATRICE.
Alas! my mother!
ISABELLA.
Speak! I am all amaze!
DON CASAR.
Be cursed the day
When I was born!
ISABELLA.
Eternal powers!
DON CAESAR.
Accursed
The womb that bore me; cursed the secret arts,
The spring of all this woe; instant to crush thee,
Though the dread thunder swept--ne'er should this arm
Refrain the bolts of death: I slew my brother!
Hear it and tremble! in her arms I found him;
She was my love, my chosen bride; and he--
My brother--in her arms! Thou hast heard all!
If it be true--oh, if she be my sister--
And his! then I have done a deed that mocks
The power of sacrifice and prayers to ope
The gates of mercy to my soul!
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
The tidings on thy heart dismayed
Have burst, and naught remains; behold!
'Tis come, nor long delayed,
Whate'er the warning seers foretold:
They spoke the message from on high,
Their lips proclaimed resistless destiny!
The mortal shall the curse fulfil
Who seeks to turn predestined ill.
ISABELLA.
The gods have done their worst; if they be true
Or false, 'tis one--for nothing they can add
To this--the measure of their rage is full.
Why should I tremble that have naught to fear?
My darling son lies murdered, and the living
I call my son no more. Oh! I have borne
And nourished at my breast a basilisk
That stung my best-beloved child. My daughter, haste,
And leave this house of horrors--I devote it
To the avenging fiends! In an evil hour
'Twas crime that brought me hither, and of crime
The victim I depart. Unwillingly
I came--in sorrow I have lived--despairing
I quit these halls; on me, the innocent,
Descends this weight of woe! Enough--'tis shown
That Heaven is just, and oracles are true!
[Exit, followed by DIEGO.
BEATRICE, DON CAESAR, the Chorus.
DON CAESAR (detaining BEATRICE).
My sister, wouldst thou leave me? On this head
A mother's curse may fall--a brother's blood
Cry with accusing voice to heaven--all nature
Invoke eternal vengeance on my soul--
But thou--oh! curse me not--I cannot bear it!
[BEATRICE points with averted eyes to the body.
I have not slain thy lover! 'twas thy brother,
And mine that fell beneath my sword; and near
As the departed one, the living owns
The ties of blood: remember, too, 'tis I
That most a sister's pity need--for pure
His spirit winged its flight, and I am guilty!
[BEATRICE bursts into an agony of tears.
Weep! I will blend my tears with thine--nay, more,
I will avenge thy brother; but the lover--
Weep not for him--thy passionate, yearning tears
My inmost heart. Oh! from the boundless depths
Of our affliction, let me gather this,
The last and only comfort--but to know
That we are dear alike. One lot fulfilled
Has made our rights and wretchedness the same;
Entangled in one snare we fall together,
Three hapless victims of unpitying fate,
And share the mournful privilege of tears.
But when I think that for the lover more
Than for the brother bursts thy sorrow's tide,
Then rage and envy mingle with my pain,
And hope's last balm forsakes my withering soul?
Nor joyful, as beseems, can I requite
This inured shade:--yet after him content
To mercy's throne my contrite spirit shall fly,
Sped by this hand--if dying I may know
That in one urn our ashes shall repose,
With pious office of a sister's care.
[He throws his arms around her with passionate tenderness.
I loved thee, as I ne'er had loved before,
When thou wert strange; and that I bear the curse
Of brother's blood, 'tis but because I loved thee
With measureless transport: love was all my guilt,
But now thou art my sister, and I claim
Soft pity's tribute.
[He regards her with inquiring glances, and an air of
painful suspense--then turns away with vehemence.
No! in this dread presence
I cannot bear these tears--my courage flies
And doubt distracts my soul. Go, weep in secret--
Leave me in error's maze--but never, never,
Behold me more: I will not look again
On thee, nor on thy mother. Oh! how passion
Laid bare her secret heart! She never loved me!
She mourned her best-loved son--that was her cry
Of grief--and naught was mine but show of fondness!
And thou art false as she! make no disguise--
Recoil with horror from my sight--this form
Shall never shock thee more--begone forever!
[Exit.
[She stands irresolute in a tumult of conflicting
passions--then tears herself from the spot.
Chorus (CAJETAN).
Happy the man--his lot I prize
That far from pomps and turmoil vain,
Childlike on nature's bosom lies
Amid the stillness of the plain.
My heart is sad in the princely hall,
When from the towering pride of state,
I see with headlong ruin fall,
How swift! the good and great!
And he--from fortune's storm at rest
Smiles, in the quiet haven laid
Who, timely warned, has owned how blest
The refuge of the cloistered shade;
To honor's race has bade farewell,
Its idle joys and empty shows;
Insatiate wishes learned to quell,
And lulled in wisdom's calm repose:--
No more shall passion's maddening brood
Impel the busy scenes to try,
Nor on his peaceful cell intrude
The form of sad humanity!
'Mid crowds and strife each mortal ill
Abides'--the grisly train of woe
Shuns like the pest the breezy hill,
To haunt the smoky marts below.
BERENGAR, BOHEMUND, and MANFRED.
On the mountains is freedom! the breath of decay
Never sullies the fresh flowing air;
Oh, Nature is perfect wherever we stray;
'Tis man that deforms it with care.
The whole Chorus repeats.
On the mountains is freedom, etc., etc.
DON CAESAR, the Chorus.
DON CAESAR (more collected).
I use the princely rights--'tis the last time--
To give this body to the ground, and pay
Fit honors to the dead. So mark, my friends,
My bosom's firm resolve, and quick fulfil
Your lord's behest. Fresh in your memory lives
The mournful pomp, when to the tomb ye bore
So late my royal sire; scarce in these halls
Are stilled the echoes of the funeral wail;
Another corpse succeeds, and in the grave
Weighs down its fellow-dust--almost our torch
With borrowed lustre from the last, may pierce
The monumental gloom; and on the stair,
Blends in one throng confused two mourning trains.
Then in the sacred royal dome that guards
The ashes of my sire, prepare with speed
The funeral rites; unseen of mortal eye,
And noiseless be your task--let all be graced,
As then, with circumstances of kingly state.
BOHEMUND.
My prince, it shall be quickly done; for still
Upreared, the gorgeous catafalque recalls
The dread solemnity; no hand disturbed
The edifice of death.
DON CAESAR.
The yawning grave
Amid the haunts of life? No goodly sign
Was this: the rites fulfilled, why lingered yet
The trappings of the funeral show?
BOHEMUND.
Your strife
With fresh embittered hate o'er all Messina
Woke discord's maddening flames, and from the deed
Our cares withdrew--so resolute remained,
And closed the sanctuary.
DON CAESAR.
Make no delay;
This very night fulfil your task, for well
Beseems the midnight gloom! To-morrow's sun
Shall find this palace cleansed of every stain,
And light a happier race.
[Exit the Second Chorus, with the body of DON MANUEL.
CAJETAN.
Shall I invite
The brotherhood of monks, with rights ordained
By holy church of old, to celebrate
The office of departed souls, and hymn
The buried one to everlasting rest?
DON CAESAR.
Their strains above my tomb shall sound for ever
Amid the torches' blaze--no solemn rites
Beseem the day when gory murder scares
Heaven's pardoning grace.
CAJETAN.
Oh, let not wild despair
Tempt thee to impious, rash resolve. My prince
No mortal arm shall e'er avenge this deed;
And penance calms, with soft, atoning power,
The wrath on high.
DON CAESAR.
If for eternal justice
Earth has no minister, myself shall wield
The avenging sword; though heaven, with gracious ear,
Inclines to sinners' prayers, with blood alone
Atoned is murder's guilt.
CAJETAN.
To stem the tide
Of dire misfortune, that with maddening rage
Bursts o'er your house, were nobler than to pile
Accumulated woe.
DON CAESAR.
The curse of old
Shall die with me! Death self-imposed alone
Can break the chain of fate.
CAJETAN.
Thou owest thyself
A sovereign to this orphaned land, by thee
Robbed of its other lord!
DON CAESAR.
The avenging gods
Demand their prey--some other deity
May guard the living!
CAJETAN.
Wide as e'er the sun
In glory beams, the realm of hope extends;
But--oh remember! nothing may we gain
From Death!
DON CAESAR.
Remember thou thy vassal's duty;
Remember and be silent! Leave to me
To follow, as I list, the spirit of power
That leads me to the goal. No happy one
May look into my breast: but if thy prince
Owns not a subject's homage, dread at least
The murderer!--the accursed!--and to the head
Of the unhappy--sacred to the gods--
Give honors due. The pangs that rend my soul--
What I have suffered--what I feel--have left
No place for earthly thoughts!
DONNA ISABELLA, DON CAESAR, The Chorus.
ISABELLA (enters with hesitating steps, and looks irresolutely
towards DON CAESAR; at last she approaches, and addresses
him with collected tones).
I thought mine eyes should ne'er behold thee more;
Thus I had vowed despairing! Oh, my son!
How quickly all a mother's strong resolves
Melt into air! 'Twas but the cry of rage
That stifled nature's pleading voice; but now
What tidings of mysterious import call me
From the desolate chambers of my sorrow?
Shall I believe it? Is it true? one day
Robs me of both my sons?
Chorus.
Behold! with willing steps and free,
Thy son prepares to tread
The paths of dark eternity
The silent mansions of the dead.
My prayers are vain; but thou, with power confessed,
Of nature's holiest passion, storm his breast!
ISABELLA.
I call the curses back--that in the frenzy
Of blind despair on thy beloved head
I poured. A mother may not curse the child
That from her nourishing breast drew life, and gave
Sweet recompense for all her travail past;
Heaven would not hear the impious vows; they fell
With quick rebound, and heavy with my tears
Down from the flaming vault!
Live! live! my son!
For I may rather bear to look on thee--
The murderer of one child--than weep for both!
DON CAESAR.
Heedless and vain, my mother, are thy prayers
For me and for thyself; I have no place
Among the living: if thine eyes may brook
The murderer's sight abhorred--I could not bear
The mute reproach of thy eternal sorrow.
ISABELLA.
Silent or loud, my son, reproach shall never
Disturb thy breast--ne'er in these halls shall sound
The voice of wailing, gently on my tears
My griefs shall flow away: the sport alike
Of pitiless fate together we will mourn,
And veil the deed of blood.
DON CAESAR (with a faltering voice, and taking her hand).
Thus it shall be,
My mother--thus with silent, gentle woe
Thy grief shall fade: but when one common tomb
The murderer and his victim closes round--
When o'er our dust one monumental stone
Is rolled--the curse shall cease--thy love no more
Unequal bless thy sons: the precious tears
Thine eyes of beauty weep shall sanctify
Alike our memories. Yes! In death are quenched
The fires of rage; and hatred owns subdued,
The mighty reconciler. Pity bends
An angel form above the funeral urn,
With weeping, dear embrace. Then to the tomb
Stay not my passage:--Oh, forbid me not,
Thus with atoning sacrifice to quell
The curse of heaven.
ISABELLA.
All Christendom is rich
In shrines of mercy, where the troubled heart
May find repose. Oh! many a heavy burden
Have sinners in Loretto's mansion laid;
And Heaven's peculiar blessing breathes around
The grave that has redeemed the world! The prayers
Of the devout are precious--fraught with store
Of grace, they win forgiveness from the skies;--
And on the soil by gory murder stained
Shall rise the purifying fane.
DON CAESAR.
We pluck
The arrow from the wound--but the torn heart
Shall ne'er be healed. Let him who can, drag on
A weary life of penance and of pain,
To cleanse the spot of everlasting guilt;--
I would not live the victim of despair;
No! I must meet with beaming eye the smile
Of happy ones, and breathe erect the air
Of liberty and joy. While yet alike
We shared thy love, then o'er my days of youth
Pale envy cast his withering shade; and now,
Think'st thou my heart could brook the dearer ties
That bind thee in thy sorrow to the dead?
Death, in his undecaying palace throned,
To the pure diamond of perfect virtue
Sublimes the mortal, and with chastening fire
Each gathered stain of frail humanity
Purges and burns away: high as the stars
Tower o'er this earthly sphere, he soars above me;
And as by ancient hate dissevered long,
Brethren and equal denizens we lived,
So now my restless soul with envy pines,
That he has won from me the glorious prize
Of immortality, and like a god
In memory marches on to times unborn!
ISABELLA.
My Sons! Why have I called you to Messina
To find for each a grave? I brought ye hither
To calm your strife to peace. Lo! Fate has turned
My hopes to blank despair.
DON CAESAR.
Whate'er was spoke,
My mother, is fulfilled! Blame not the end
By Heaven ordained. We trode our father's halls
With hopes of peace; and reconciled forever,
Together we shall sleep in death.
ISABELLA.
My son,
Live for thy mother! In the stranger's land,
Say, wouldst thou leave me friendless and alone,
To cruel scorn a prey--no filial arm
To shield my helpless age?
DON CAESAR.
When all the world
With heartless taunts pursues thee, to our grave
For refuge fly, my mother, and invoke
Thy sons' divinity--we shall be gods!
And we will hear thy prayers:--and as the twins
Of heaven, a beaming star of comfort shine
To the tossed shipman--we will hover near thee
With present help, and soothe thy troubled soul!
ISABELLA.
Live--for thy mother, live, my son--
Must I lose all?
[She throws her arms about him with passionate emotion.
He gently disengages himself, and turning his face away
extends to her his hand.
DON CAESAR.
Farewell!
ISABELLA.
I can no more;
Too well my tortured bosom owns how weak
A mother's prayers: a mightier voice shall sound
Resistless on thy heart.
[She goes towards the entrance of the scene.
My daughter, come.
A brother calls him to the realms of night;
Perchance with golden hues of earthly joy
The sister, the beloved, may gently lure
The wanderer to life again.
[BEATRICE appears at the entrance of the scene.
DONNA ISABELLA, DON CAESAR, and the Chorus.
DON CAESAR (on seeing her, covers his face with his hands).
My mother!
What hast thou done?
ISABELLA (leading BEATRICE forwards).
A mother's prayers are vain!
Kneel at his feet--conjure him--melt his heart!
Oh, bid him live!
DON CAESAR.
Deceitful mother, thus
Thou triest thy son! And wouldst thou stir my soul
Again to passion's strife, and make the sun
Beloved once more, now when I tread the paths
Of everlasting night? See where he stands--
Angel of life!--and wondrous beautiful,
Shakes from his plenteous horn the fragrant store
Of golden fruits and flowers, that breathe around
Divinest airs of joy;--my heart awakes
In the warm sunbeam--hope returns, and life
Thrills in my breast anew.
ISABELLA (to BEATRICE).
Thou wilt prevail!
Or none! Implore him that he live, nor rob
The staff and comfort of our days.
BEATRICE.
The loved one
A sacrifice demands. Oh, let me die
To soothe a brother's shade! Yes, I will be
The victim! Ere I saw the light forewarned
To death, I live a wrong to heaven! The curse
Pursues me still: 'twas I that slew thy son--
I waked the slumbering furies of their strife--
Be mine the atoning blood!
CAJETAN.
Ill-fated mother!
Impatient all thy children haste to doom,
And leave thee on the desolate waste alone
Of joyous life.
BEATRICE.
Oh, spare thy precious days
For nature's band. Thy mother needs a son;
My brother, live for her! Light were the pang
To lose a daughter--but a moment shown,
Then snatched away!
DON CAESAR (with deep emotion).
'Tis one to live or die,
Blest with a sister's love!
BEATRICE.
Say, dost thou envy
Thy brother's ashes?
DON CAESAR.
In thy grief he lives
A hallowed life!--my doom is death forever!
BEATRICE.
My brother!
DON CAESAR.
Sister! are thy tears for me?
BEATRICE.
Live for our mother!
DON CAESAR (dropping her hand, and stepping back).
For our mother?
BEATRICE (hiding her head in his breast).
Live
For her and for thy sister!
Chorus (BOHEMUND).
She has won!
Resistless are her prayers. Despairing mother,
Awake to hope again--his choice is made!
Thy son shall live!
[At this moment an anthem is heard. The folding doors
are thrown open, and in the church is seen the catafalque
erected, and the coffin surrounded with candlesticks.
DON CAESAR (turning to the coffin).
I will not rob thee, brother!
The sacrifice is thine:--Hark! from the tomb,
Mightier than mother's tears, or sister's love,
Thy voice resistless cries:--my arms enfold
A treasure, potent with celestial joys,
To deck this earthly sphere, and make a lot
Worthy the gods! but shall I live in bliss,
While in the tomb thy sainted innocence
Sleeps unavenged? Thou, Ruler of our days,
All just--all wise--let not the world behold
Thy partial care! I saw her tears!--enough--
They flowed for me! I am content: my brother!
I come!
[He stabs himself with a dagger, and falls dead
at his sister's feet. She throws herself into her
mother's arms.
Chorus, CAJETAN (after a deep silence).
In dread amaze I stand, nor know
If I should mourn his fate. One truth revealed
Speaks in my breast;--no good supreme is life;
But all of earthly ills the chief is--Guilt!
THE END
ON THE USE OF THE CHORUS IN TRAGEDY.
A poetical work must vindicate itself: if the execution be defective,
little aid can be derived from commentaries.
On these grounds I might safely leave the chorus to be its own advocate,
if we had ever seen it presented in an appropriate manner. But it must
be remembered that a dramatic composition first assumes the character of
a whole by means of representation on the stage. The poet supplies only
the words, to which, in a lyrical tragedy, music and rhythmical motion
are essential accessories. It follows, then, that if the chorus is
deprived of accompaniments appealing so powerfully to the senses, it will
appear a superfluity in the economy of the drama--a mere hinderance to
the development of the plot--destructive to the illusion of the scene,
and wearisome to the spectators.
To do justice to the chorus, more especially if our aims in poetry be of
a grand and elevated character, we must transport ourselves from the
actual to a possible stage. It is the privilege of art to furnish for
itself whatever is requisite, and the accidental deficiency of
auxiliaries ought not to confine the plastic imagination of the poet. He
aspires to whatever is most dignified, he labors to realize the ideal in
his own mind--though in the execution of his purpose he must needs
accommodate himself to circumstances.
The assertion so commonly made that the public degrades art is not well
founded. It is the artist that brings the public to the level of his
own conceptions; and, in every age in which art has gone to decay, it has
fallen through its professors. The people need feeling alone, and
feeling they possess. They take their station before the curtain with
an unvoiced longing, with a multifarious capacity. They bring with them
an aptitude for what is highest--they derive the greatest pleasure from
what is judicious and true; and if, with these powers of appreciation,
they deign to be satisfied with inferior productions, still, if they have
once tasted what is excellent, they will in the end insist on having it
supplied to them.
It is sometimes objected that the poet may labor according to an ideal--
that the critic may judge from ideas, but that mere executive art is
subject to contingencies, and depends for effect on the occasion.
Managers will be obstinate; actors are bent on display--the audience is
inattentive and unruly. Their object is relaxation, and they are
disappointed if mental exertion be required, when they expected only
amusement. But if the theatre be made instrumental towards higher
objects, the diversion, of the spectator will not be increased, but
ennobled. It will be a diversion, but a poetical one. All art is
dedicated to pleasure, and there can be no higher and worthier end than
to make men happy. The true art is that which provides the highest
degree of pleasure; and this consists in the abandonment of the spirit to
the free play of all its faculties.
Every one expects from the imaginative arts a certain emancipation from
the bounds of reality: we are willing to give a scope to fancy, and
recreate ourselves with the possible. The man who expects it the least
will nevertheless forget his ordinary pursuits, his everyday existence
and individuality, and experience delight from uncommon incidents:--if he
be of a serious turn of mind he will acknowledge on the stage that moral
government of the world which he fails to discover in real life. But he
is, at the same time, perfectly aware that all is an empty show, and that
in a true sense he is feeding only on dreams. When he returns from the
theatre to the world of realities, he is again compressed within its
narrow bounds; he is its denizen as before--for it remains what it was,
and in him nothing has been changed. What, then, has he gained beyond a
momentary illusive pleasure which vanished with the occasion?
It is because a passing recreation is alone desired that a mere show of
truth is thought sufficient. I mean that probability or vraisemblance
which is so highly esteemed, but which the commonest workers are able to
substitute for the true.
Art has for its object not merely to afford a transient pleasure, to
excite to a momentary dream of liberty; its aim is to make us absolutely
free; and this it accomplishes by awakening, exercising, and perfecting
in us a power to remove to an objective distance the sensible world;
(which otherwise only burdens us as rugged matter, and presses us down
with a brute influence;) to transform it into the free working of our
spirit, and thus acquire a dominion over the material by means of ideas.
For the very reason also that true art requires somewhat of the objective
and real, it is not satisfied with a show of truth. It rears its ideal
edifice on truth itself--on the solid and deep foundations of nature.
But how art can be at once altogether ideal, yet in the strictest sense
real; how it can entirely leave the actual, and yet harmonize with
nature, is a problem to the multitude; and hence the distorted views
which prevail in regard to poetical and plastic works; for to ordinary
judgments these two requisites seem to counteract each other.
It is commonly supposed that one may be attained by the sacrifice of the
other;--the result is a failure to arrive at either. One to whom nature
has given a true sensibility, but denied the plastic imaginative power,
will be a faithful painter of the real; he will adapt casual appearances,
but never catch the spirit of nature. He will only reproduce to us the
matter of the world, which, not being our own work, the product of our
creative spirit, can never have the beneficent operation of art, of which
the essence is freedom. Serious indeed, but unpleasing, is the cast of
thought with which such an artist and poet dismisses us; we feel
ourselves painfully thrust back into the narrow sphere of reality by
means of the very art which ought to have emancipated us. On the other
hand, a writer endowed with a lively fancy, but destitute of warmth and
individuality of feeling, will not concern himself in the least about
truth; he will sport with the stuff of the world, and endeavor to
surprise by whimsical combinations; and as his whole performance is
nothing but foam and glitter, he will, it is true, engage the attention
for a time, but build up and confirm nothing in the understanding. His
playfulness is, like the gravity of the other, thoroughly unpoetical. To
string together at will fantastical images is not to travel into the
realm of the ideal; and the imitative reproduction of the actual cannot
be called the representation of nature. Both requisites stand so little
in contradiction to each other that they are rather one and the same
thing; that art is only true insomuch as it altogether forsakes the
actual, and becomes purely ideal. Nature herself is an idea of the mind,
and is never presented to the senses. She lies under the veil of
appearances, but is herself never apparent. To the art of the ideal
alone is lent, or rather absolutely given, the privilege to grasp the
spirit of the all and bind it in a corporeal form.
Yet, in truth, even art cannot present it to the senses, but by means of
her creative power to the imaginative faculty alone; and it is thus that
she becomes more true than all reality, and more real than all
experience. It follows from these premises that the artist can use no
single element taken from reality as he finds it--that his work must be
ideal in all its parts, if it be designed to have, as it were, an
intrinsic reality, and to harmonize with nature.
What is true of art and poetry, in the abstract, holds good as to their
various kinds; and we may apply what has been advanced to the subject of
tragedy. In this department it is still necessary to controvert the
ordinary notion of the natural, with which poetry is altogether
incompatible. A certain ideality has been allowed in painting, though, I
fear, on grounds rather conventional than intrinsic; but in dramatic
works what is desired is allusion, which, if it could be accomplished by
means of the actual, would be, at best, a paltry deception. All the
externals of a theatrical representation are opposed to this notion; all
is merely a symbol of the real. The day itself in a theatre is an
artificial one; the metrical dialogue is itself ideal; yet the conduct of
the play must forsooth be real, and the general effect sacrificed to a
part. Thus the French, who have utterly misconceived the spirit of the
ancients, adopted on their stage the unities of tine and place in the
most common and empirical sense; as though there were any place but the
bare ideal one, or any other time than the mere sequence of the
incidents.
By the introduction of a metrical dialogue an important progress has been
made towards the poetical tragedy. A few lyrical dramas have been
successful on the stage, and poetry, by its own living energy, has
triumphed over prevailing prejudices. But so long as these erroneous
views are entertained little has been done--for it is not enough barely
to tolerate as a poetical license that which is, in truth, the essence of
all poetry. The introduction of the chorus would be the last and
decisive step; and if it only served this end, namely, to declare open
and honorable warfare against naturalism in art, it would be for us a
living wall which tragedy had drawn around herself, to guard her from
contact with the world of reality, and maintain her own ideal soil, her
poetical freedom.
It is well-known that the Greek tragedy had its origin in the chorus; and
though in process of time it became independent, still it may be said
that poetically, and in spirit, the chorus was the source of its
existence, and that without these persevering supporters and witnesses of
the incident a totally different order of poetry would have grown out of
the drama. The abolition of the chorus, and the debasement of this
sensibly powerful organ into the characterless substitute of a confidant,
is by no means such an improvement in the tragedy as the French, and
their imitators, would have it supposed to be.
The old tragedy, which at first only concerned itself with gods, heroes
and kings introduced the chorus as an essential accompaniment. The poets
found it in nature, and for that reason employed it. It grew out of the
poetical aspect of real life. In the new tragedy it becomes an organ of
art, which aids in making the poetry prominent. The modern poet no
longer finds the chorus in nature; he must needs create and introduce it
poetically; that is, he must resolve on such an adaption of his story as
will admit of its retrocession to those primitive times and to that
simple form of life.
The chorus thus renders more substantial service to the modern dramatist
than to the old poet--and for this reason, that it transforms the
commonplace actual world into the old poetical one; that it enables him
to dispense with all that is repugnant to poetry, and conducts him back
to the most simple, original, and genuine motives of action. The palaces
of kings are in these days closed--courts of justice have been
transferred from the gates of cities to the interior of buildings;
writing has narrowed the province of speech; the people itself--the
sensibly living mass--when it does not operate as brute force, has become
a part of the civil polity, and thereby an abstract idea in our minds;
the deities have returned within the bosoms of mankind. The poet must
reopen the palaces--he must place courts of justice beneath the canopy of
heaven--restore the gods, reproduce every extreme which the artificial
frame of actual life has abolished--throw aside every factitious
influence on the mind or condition of man which impedes the manifestation
of his inward nature and primitive character, as the statuary rejects
modern costume:--and of all external circumstances adopts nothing but
what is palpable in the highest of forms--that of humanity.
But precisely as the painter throws around his figures draperies of ample
volume, to fill up the space of his picture richly and gracefully, to
arrange its several parts in harmonious masses, to give due play to
color, which charms and refreshes the eye--and at once to envelop human
forms in a spiritual veil, and make them visible--so the tragic poet
inlays and entwines his rigidly contracted plot and the strong outlines
of his characters with a tissue of lyrical magnificence, in which, as in
flowing robes of purple, they move freely and nobly, with a sustained
dignity and exalted repose.
In a higher organization, the material, or the elementary, need not be
visible; the chemical color vanishes in the finer tints of the
imaginative one. The material, however, has its peculiar effect, and may
be included in an artistical composition. But it must deserve its place
by animation, fulness and harmony, and give value to the ideal forms
which it surrounds instead of stifling them by its weight.
In respect of the pictorial art, this is obvious to ordinary
apprehension, yet in poetry likewise, and in the tragical kind, which is
our immediate subject, the same doctrine holds good. Whatever fascinates
the senses alone is mere matter, and the rude element of a work of art:--
if it takes the lead it will inevitably destroy the poetical--which lies
at the exact medium between the ideal and the sensible. But man is so
constituted that he is ever impatient to pass from what is fanciful to
what is common; and reflection must, therefore, have its place even in
tragedy. But to merit this place it must, by means of delivery, recover
what it wants in actual life; for if the two elements of poetry, the
ideal and the sensible, do not operate with an inward mutuality, they
must at least act as allies--or poetry is out of the question. If the
balance be not intrinsically perfect, the equipoise can only be
maintained by an agitation of both scales.
This is what the chorus effects in tragedy. It is in itself, not an
individual but a general conception; yet it is represented by a palpable
body which appeals to the senses with an imposing grandeur. It forsakes
the contracted sphere of the incidents to dilate itself over the past and
the future, over distant times and nations, and general humanity, to
deduce the grand results of life, and pronounce the lessons of wisdom.
But all this it does with the full power of fancy--with a bold lyrical
freedom which ascends, as with godlike step, to the topmost height of
worldly things; and it effects it in conjunction with the whole sensible
influence of melody and rhythm, in tones and movements.
The chorus thus exercises a purifying influence on tragic poetry,
insomuch as it keeps reflection apart from the incidents, and by this
separation arms it with a poetical vigor, as the painter, by means of a
rich drapery, changes the ordinary poverty of costume into a charm and
ornament.
But as the painter finds himself obliged to strengthen the tone of color
of the living subject, in order to counterbalance the material
influences--so the lyrical effusions of the chorus impose upon the poet
the necessity of a proportionate elevation of his general diction. It is
the chorus alone which entitles the poet to employ this fulness of tone,
which at once charms the senses, pervades the spirit, and expands the
mind. This one giant form on his canvas obliges him to mount all his
figures on the cothurnus, and thus impart a tragical grandeur to his
picture. If the chorus be taken away, the diction of the tragedy must
generally be lowered, or what is now great and majestic will appear
forced and overstrained. The old chorus introduced into the French
tragedy would present it in all its poverty, and reduce it to nothing;
yet, without doubt, the same accompaniment would impart to Shakspeare's
tragedy its true significance.
As the chorus gives life to the language--so also it gives repose to the
action; but it is that beautiful and lofty repose which is the
characteristic of a true work of art. For the mind of the spectator
ought to maintain its freedom through the most impassioned scenes; it
should not be the mere prey of impressions, but calmly and severely
detach itself from the emotions which it suffers. The commonplace
objection made to the chorus, that it disturbs the illusion, and blunts
the edge of the feelings, is what constitutes its highest recommendation;
for it is this blind force of the affections which the true artist
deprecates--this illusion is what he disdains to excite. If the strokes
which tragedy inflicts on our bosoms followed without respite, the
passion would overpower the action. We should mix ourselves with the
subject-matter, and no longer stand above it. It is by holding asunder
the different parts, and stepping between the passions with its composing
views, that the chorus restores to us our freedom, which would else be
lost in the tempest. The characters of the drama need this intermission
in order to collect themselves; for they are no real beings who obey the
impulse of the moment, and merely represent individuals--but ideal
persons and representatives of their species, who enunciate the deep
things of humanity.
Thus much on my attempt to revive the old chorus on the tragic stage. It
is true that choruses are not unknown to modern tragedy; but the chorus
of the Greek drama, as I have employed it--the chorus, as a single ideal
person, furthering and accompanying the whole plot--if of an entirely
distinct character; and when, in discussion on the Greek tragedy, I hear
mention made of choruses, I generally suspect the speaker's ignorance of
his subject. In my view the chorus has never been reproduced since the
decline of the old tragedy.
I have divided it into two parts, and represented it in contest with
itself; but this occurs where it acts as a real person, and as an
unthinking multitude. As chorus and an ideal person it is always one and
entire. I have also several times dispensed with its presence on the
stage. For this liberty I have the example of Aeschylus, the creator of
tragedy, and Sophocles, the greatest master of his art.
Another license it may be more difficult to excuse. I have blended
together the Christian religion and the pagan mythology, and introduced
recollections of the Moorish superstition. But the scene of the drama is
Messina--where these three religions either exercised a living influence,
or appealed to the senses in monumental remains. Besides, I consider it
a privilege of poetry to deal with different religions as a collective
whole. In which everything that bears an individual character, and
expresses a peculiar mode of feeling, has its place. Religion itself,
the idea of a Divine Power, lies under the veil of all religions; and it
must be permitted to the poet to represent it in the form which appears
the most appropriate to his subject.
SCHILLER'S POEMS
CONTENTS:
POEMS OF THE FIRST PERIOD
Hector and Andromache
Amalia
A Funeral Fantasie
Fantasie--To Laura
To Laura at the Harpsichord
Group from Tartarus
Rapture--To Laura
To Laura (The Mystery of Reminiscence)
Melancholy--To Laura
The Infanticide
The Greatness of the World
Fortune and Wisdom
Elegy on the Death of a Young Man
The Battle
Rousseau
Friendship
Elysium
The Fugitive
To Minna
The Flowers
The Triumph of Love (A Hymn)
To a Moralist
Count Eberhard, the Groaner of Wurtemburg
To the Spring
Semele
POEMS OF THE SECOND PERIOD
Hymn to Joy
The Invincible Armada
The Gods of Greece
Resignation
The Conflict
The Artists
The Celebrated Woman
Written in a Young Lady's Album
POEMS OF THE THIRD PERIOD
The Meeting
The Secret
The Assignation
Longing
Evening (After a Picture)
The Pilgrim
The Ideals
The Youth by the Brook
To Emma
The Favor of the Moment
The Lay of the Mountain
The Alpine Hunter
Dithyramb
The Four Ages of the World
The Maiden's Lament
To My Friends
Punch Song
Nadowessian Death Lament
The Feast of Victory
Punch Song
The Complaint of Ceres
The Eleusinian Festival
The Ring of Polycrates
The Cranes of Ibycus (A Ballad)
The Playing Infant
Hero and Leander (A Ballad)
Cassandra
The Hostage (A Ballad)
Greekism
The Diver (A Ballad)
The Fight with the Dragon
Female Judgment
Fridolin; or, the Walk to the Iron Foundry
The Genius with the Inverted Torch
The Count of Hapsburg (A Ballad)
The Forum of Women
The Glove (A Tale)
The Circle of Nature
The Veiled Statue at Sais
The Division of the Earth
The Fairest Apparition
The Ideal and the Actual Life
Germany and her Princes
Dangerous Consequences
The Maiden from Afar
The Honorable
Parables and Riddles
The Virtue of Woman
The Walk
The Lay of the Bell
The Power of Song
To Proselytizers
Honor to Woman
Hope
The German Art
Odysseus
Carthage
The Sower
The Knights of St. John
The Merchant
German Faith
The Sexes
Love and Desire
The Bards of Olden Time
Jove to Hercules
The Antiques of Paris
Thekla (A Spirit Voice)
The Antique to the Northern Wanderer
The Iliad
Pompeii and Herculaneum
Naenia
The Maid of Orleans
Archimedes
The Dance
The Fortune-Favored
Bookseller's Announcement
Genius
Honors
The Philosophical Egotist
The Best State Constitution
The Words of Belief
The Words of Error
The Power of Woman
The Two Paths of Virtue
The Proverbs of Confucius
Human Knowledge
Columbus
Light and Warmth
Breadth and Depth
The Two Guides of Life
The Immutable
VOTIVE TABLETS
Different Destinies
The Animating Principle
Two Descriptions of Action
Difference of Station
Worth and the Worthy
The Moral Force
Participation
To----
The Present Generation
To the Muse
The Learned Workman
The Duty of All
A Problem
The Peculiar Ideal
To Mystics
The Key
The Observer
Wisdom and Prudence
The Agreement
Political Precept
Majestas Populi
The Difficult Union
To a World-Reformer
My Antipathy
Astronomical Writings
The Best State
To Astronomers
My Faith
Inside and Outside
Friend and Foe
Light and Color
Genius
Beauteous Individuality
Variety
The imitator
Geniality
The Inquirers
Correctness
The Three Ages of Nature
The Law of Nature
Choice
Science of Music
To the Poet
Language
The Master
The Girdle
The Dilettante
The Babbler of Art
The Philosophies
The Favor of the Muses
Homer's Head as a Seal
Goodness and Greatness
The Impulses
Naturalists and Transcendental Philosophers
German Genius
Theophania
TRIFLES
The Epic Hexameter
The Distich
The Eight-line Stanza
The Obelisk
The Triumphal Arch
The Beautiful Bridge
The Gate
St. Peter's
The Philosophers
The Homerides
G. G.
The Moral Poet
The Danaides
The Sublime Subject
The Artifice
Immortality
Jeremiads
Shakespeare's Ghost
The Rivers
Zenith and Nadir
Kant and his Commentators
The Philosophers
The Metaphysician
Pegasus in harness
Knowledge
The Poetry of Life
To Goethe
The Present
Departure from Life
Verses written in the Album of a Learned Friend
Verses written in the Album of a Friend
The Sunday Children
The Highest
The Puppet-show of Life
To Lawgivers
False Impulse to Study
To the Prince of Weimar
The Ideal of Woman (To Amanda)
The Fountain of Second Youth
William Tell
To a Young Friend Devoting Himself to Philosophy
Expectation and Fulfilment
The Common Fate
Human Action
Nuptial Ode
The Commencement of the New Century
Grecian Genius
The Father
The Connecting Medium
The Moment
German Comedy
Farewell to the Reader
Dedications to Death
Preface
SUPPRESSED POEMS
The Journalists and Minos
Bacchus in the Pillory
Spinosa
To the Fates
The Parallel
Klopstock and Wieland
The Muses' Revenge
The Hypochondriacal Pluto (A Romance)
Book I
Book II
Book III
Reproach. To Laura
The Simple Peasant
Actaeon
Man's Dignity
The Messiah
Thoughts on the 1st October, 1781
Epitaph
Quirl
The Plague (A Phantasy)
Monument of Moor the Robber
The Bad Monarchs
The Satyr and My Muse
The Peasants
The Winter Night
The Wirtemberger
The Mole
Hymn to the Eternal
Dialogue
Epitaph on a Certain Physiognomist
Trust in Immortality
Appendix to Poems
POEMS OF SCHILLER.
POEMS OF THE FIRST PERIOD.
HECTOR AND ANDROMACHE.
[This and the following poem are, with some alterations, introduced
in the Play of "The Robbers."]
ANDROMACHE.
Will Hector leave me for the fatal plain,
Where, fierce with vengeance for Patroclus slain,
Stalks Peleus' ruthless son?
Who, when thou glid'st amid the dark abodes,
To hurl the spear and to revere the gods,
Shall teach thine orphan one?
HECTOR.
Woman and wife beloved--cease thy tears;
My soul is nerved--the war-clang in my ears!
Be mine in life to stand
Troy's bulwark!--fighting for our hearths, to go
In death, exulting to the streams below,
Slain for my fatherland!
ANDROMACHE.
No more I hear thy martial footsteps fall--
Thine arms shall hang, dull trophies, on the wall--
Fallen the stem of Troy!
Thou goest where slow Cocytus wanders--where
Love sinks in Lethe, and the sunless air
Is dark to light and joy!
HECTOR.
Longing and thought--yes, all I feel and think
May in the silent sloth of Lethe sink,
But my love not!
Hark, the wild swarm is at the walls!--I hear!
Gird on my sword--Beloved one, dry the tear--
Lethe for love is not!
AMALIA.
Angel-fair, Walhalla's charms displaying,
Fairer than all mortal youths was he;
Mild his look, as May-day sunbeams straying
Gently o'er the blue and glassy sea.
And his kisses!--what ecstatic feeling!
Like two flames that lovingly entwine,
Like the harp's soft tones together stealing
Into one sweet harmony divine,--
Soul and soul embraced, commingled, blended,
Lips and cheeks with trembling passion burned,
Heaven and earth, in pristine chaos ended,
Round the blissful lovers madly turn'd.
He is gone--and, ah! with bitter anguish
Vainly now I breathe my mournful sighs;
He is gone--in hopeless grief I languish
Earthly joys I ne'er again can prize!
A FUNERAL FANTASIE.
Pale, at its ghastly noon,
Pauses above the death-still wood--the moon;
The night-sprite, sighing, through the dim air stirs;
The clouds descend in rain;
Mourning, the wan stars wane,
Flickering like dying lamps in sepulchres!
Haggard as spectres--vision-like and dumb,
Dark with the pomp of death, and moving slow,
Towards that sad lair the pale procession come
Where the grave closes on the night below.
With dim, deep-sunken eye,
Crutched on his staff, who trembles tottering by?
As wrung from out the shattered heart, one groan
Breaks the deep hush alone!
Crushed by the iron fate, he seems to gather
All life's last strength to stagger to the bier,
And hearken--Do these cold lips murmur "Father?"
The sharp rain, drizzling through that place of fear,
Pierces the bones gnawed fleshless by despair,
And the heart's horror stirs the silver hair.
Fresh bleed the fiery wounds
Through all that agonizing heart undone--
Still on the voiceless lips "my Father" sounds,
And still the childless Father murmurs "Son!"
Ice-cold--ice-cold, in that white shroud he lies--
Thy sweet and golden dreams all vanished there--
The sweet and golden name of "Father" dies
Into thy curse,--ice-cold--ice-cold--he lies!
Dead, what thy life's delight and Eden were!
Mild, as when, fresh from the arms of Aurora,
While the air like Elysium is smiling above,
Steeped in rose-breathing odors, the darling of Flora
Wantons over the blooms on his winglets of love.
So gay, o'er the meads, went his footsteps in bliss,
The silver wave mirrored the smile of his face;
Delight, like a flame, kindled up at his kiss,
And the heart of the maid was the prey of his chase.
Boldly he sprang to the strife of the world,
As a deer to the mountain-top carelessly springs;
As an eagle whose plumes to the sun are unfurled,
Swept his hope round the heaven on its limitless wings.
Proud as a war-horse that chafes at the rein,
That, kingly, exults in the storm of the brave;
That throws to the wind the wild stream of its mane,
Strode he forth by the prince and the slave!
Life like a spring day, serene and divine,
In the star of the morning went by as a trance;
His murmurs he drowned in the gold of the wine,
And his sorrows were borne on the wave of the dance.
Worlds lay concealed in the hopes of his youth!--
When once he shall ripen to manhood and fame!
Fond father exult!--In the germs of his youth
What harvests are destined for manhood and fame!
Not to be was that manhood!--The death-bell is knelling,
The hinge of the death-vault creaks harsh on the ears--
How dismal, O Death, is the place of thy dwelling!
Not to be was that manhood!--Flow on, bitter tears!
Go, beloved, thy path to the sun,
Rise, world upon world, with the perfect to rest;
Go--quaff the delight which thy spirit has won,
And escape from our grief in the Halls of the Blest.
Again (in that thought what a healing is found!)
To meet in the Eden to which thou art fled!--
Hark, the coffin sinks down with a dull, sullen sound,
And the ropes rattle over the sleep of the dead.
And we cling to each other!--O Grave, he is thine!
The eye tells the woe that is mute to the ears--
And we dare to resent what we grudge to resign,
Till the heart's sinful murmur is choked in its tears.
Pale at its ghastly noon,
Pauses above the death-still wood--the moon!
The night-sprite, sighing, through the dim air stirs:
The clouds descend in rain;
Mourning, the wan stars wane,
Flickering like dying lamps in sepulchres.
The dull clods swell into the sullen mound;
Earth, one look yet upon the prey we gave!
The grave locks up the treasure it has found;
Higher and higher swells the sullen mound--
Never gives back the grave!
FANTASIE--TO LAURA.
Name, my Laura, name the whirl-compelling
Bodies to unite in one blest whole--
Name, my Laura, name the wondrous magic
By which soul rejoins its kindred soul!
See! it teaches yonder roving planets
Round the sun to fly in endless race;
And as children play around their mother,
Checkered circles round the orb to trace.
Every rolling star, by thirst tormented,
Drinks with joy its bright and golden rain--
Drinks refreshment from its fiery chalice,
As the limbs are nourished by the brain.
'Tis through Love that atom pairs with atom,
In a harmony eternal, sure;
And 'tis Love that links the spheres together--
Through her only, systems can endure.
Were she but effaced from Nature's clockwork,
Into dust would fly the mighty world;
O'er thy systems thou wouldst weep, great Newton,
When with giant force to chaos hurled!
Blot the goddess from the spirit order,
It would sink in death, and ne'er arise.
Were love absent, spring would glad us never;
Were love absent, none their God would prize!
What is that, which, when my Laura kisses,
Dyes my cheek with flames of purple hue,
Bids my bosom bound with swifter motion,
Like a fever wild my veins runs through?
Every nerve from out its barriers rises,
O'er its banks, the blood begins to flow;
Body seeks to join itself to body,
Spirits kindle in one blissful glow.
Powerful as in the dead creations
That eternal impulses obey,
O'er the web Arachne-like of Nature,--
Living Nature,--Love exerts her sway.
Laura, see how joyousness embraces
E'en the overflow of sorrows wild!
How e'en rigid desperation kindles
On the loving breast of Hope so mild.
Sisterly and blissful rapture softens
Gloomy Melancholy's fearful night,
And, deliver'd of its golden children,
Lo, the eye pours forth its radiance bright!
Does not awful Sympathy rule over
E'en the realms that Evil calls its own?
For 'tis Hell our crimes are ever wooing,
While they bear a grudge 'gainst Heaven alone!
Shame, Repentance, pair Eumenides-like,
Weave round sin their fearful serpent-coils:
While around the eagle-wings of Greatness
Treach'rous danger winds its dreaded toils.
Ruin oft with Pride is wont to trifle,
Envy upon Fortune loves to cling;
On her brother, Death, with arms extended,
Lust, his sister, oft is wont to spring.
On the wings of Love the future hastens
In the arms of ages past to lie;
And Saturnus, as he onward speeds him,
Long hath sought his bride--Eternity!
Soon Saturnus will his bride discover,--
So the mighty oracle hath said;
Blazing worlds will turn to marriage torches
When Eternity with Time shall wed!
Then a fairer, far more beauteous morning,
Laura, on our love shall also shine,
Long as their blest bridal-night enduring:--
So rejoice thee, Laura--Laura mine!
TO LAURA AT THE HARPSICHORD.
When o'er the chords thy fingers stray,
My spirit leaves its mortal clay,
A statue there I stand;
Thy spell controls e'en life and death,
As when the nerves a living breath
Receive by Love's command! [1]
More gently zephyr sighs along
To listen to thy magic song;
The systems formed by heavenly love
To sing forever as they move,
Pause in their endless-whirling round
To catch the rapture-teeming sound;
'Tis for thy strains they worship thee,--
Thy look, enchantress, fetters me!
From yonder chords fast-thronging come
Soul-breathing notes with rapturous speed,
As when from out their heavenly home
The new-born seraphim proceed;
The strains pour forth their magic might,
As glittering suns burst through the night,
When, by Creation's storm awoke,
From chaos' giant-arm they broke.
Now sweet, as when the silv'ry wave
Delights the pebbly beach to lave;
And now majestic as the sound
Of rolling thunder gathering round;
Now pealing more loudly, as when from yon height
Descends the mad mountain-stream, foaming and bright;
Now in a song of love
Dying away,
As through the aspen grove
Soft zephyrs play:
Now heavier and more mournful seems the strain,
As when across the desert, death-like plain,
Whence whispers dread and yells despairing rise,
Cocytus' sluggish, wailing current sighs.
Maiden fair, oh, answer me!
Are not spirits leagued with thee?
Speak they in the realms of bliss
Other language e'er than this?
GROUP FROM TARTARUS.
Hark! like the sea in wrath the heavens assailing,
Or like a brook through rocky basin wailing,
Comes from below, in groaning agony,
A heavy, vacant torment-breathing sigh!
Their faces marks of bitter torture wear,
While from their lips burst curses of despair;
Their eyes are hollow, and full of woe,
And their looks with heartfelt anguish
Seek Cocytus' stream that runs wailing below,
For the bridge o'er its waters they languish.
And they say to each other in accents of fear,
"Oh, when will the time of fulfilment appear?"
High over them boundless eternity quivers,
And the scythe of Saturnus all-ruthlessly, shivers!
RAPTURE--TO LAURA.
From earth I seem to wing my flight,
And sun myself in Heaven's pure light,
When thy sweet gaze meets mine
I dream I quaff ethereal dew,
When my own form I mirrored view
In those blue eyes divine!
Blest notes from Paradise afar,
Or strains from some benignant star
Enchant my ravished ear:
My Muse feels then the shepherd's hour
When silvery tones of magic power
Escape those lips so dear!
Young Loves around thee fan their wings--
Behind, the maddened fir-tree springs,
As when by Orpheus fired:
The poles whirl round with swifter motion,
When in the dance, like waves o'er Ocean,
Thy footsteps float untired!
Thy look, if it but beam with love,
Could make the lifeless marble move,
And hearts in rocks enshrine:
My visions to reality
Will turn, if, Laura, in thine eye
I read--that thou art mine!
TO LAURA. (THE MYSTERY OF REMINISCENCE.) [2]
Who and what gave to me the wish to woo thee--
Still, lip to lip, to cling for aye unto thee?
Who made thy glances to my soul the link--
Who bade me burn thy very breath to drink--
My life in thine to sink?
As from the conqueror's unresisted glaive,
Flies, without strife subdued, the ready slave--
So, when to life's unguarded fort, I see
Thy gaze draw near and near triumphantly--
Yields not my soul to thee?
Why from its lord doth thus my soul depart?--
Is it because its native home thou art?
Or were they brothers in the days of yore,
Twin-bound both souls, and in the link they bore
Sigh to be bound once more?
Were once our beings blent and intertwining,
And therefore still my heart for thine is pining?
Knew we the light of some extinguished sun--
The joys remote of some bright realm undone,
Where once our souls were ONE?
Yes, it is so!--And thou wert bound to me
In the long-vanish'd Eld eternally!
In the dark troubled tablets which enroll
The Past--my Muse beheld this blessed scroll--
"One with thy love my soul!"
Oh yes, I learned in awe, when gazing there,
How once one bright inseparate life we were,
How once, one glorious essence as a God,
Unmeasured space our chainless footsteps trod--
All Nature our abode!
Round us, in waters of delight, forever
Voluptuous flowed the heavenly Nectar river;
We were the master of the seal of things,
And where the sunshine bathed Truth's mountain-springs
Quivered our glancing wings.
Weep for the godlike life we lost afar--
Weep!--thou and I its scattered fragments are;
And still the unconquered yearning we retain--
Sigh to restore the rapture and the reign,
And grow divine again.
And therefore came to me the wish to woo thee--
Still, lip to lip, to cling for aye unto thee;
This made thy glances to my soul the link--
This made me burn thy very breath to drink--
My life in thine to sink;
And therefore, as before the conqueror's glaive,
Flies, without strife subdued, the ready slave,
So, when to life's unguarded fort, I see
Thy gaze draw near and near triumphantly--
Yieldeth my soul to thee!
Therefore my soul doth from its lord depart,
Because, beloved, its native home thou art;
Because the twins recall the links they bore,
And soul with soul, in the sweet kiss of yore,
Meets and unites once more!
Thou, too--Ah, there thy gaze upon me dwells,
And thy young blush the tender answer tells;
Yes! with the dear relation still we thrill,
Both lives--though exiles from the homeward hill--
One life--all glowing still!
MELANCHOLY--TO LAURA.
Laura! a sunrise seems to break
Where'er thy happy looks may glow.
Joy sheds its roses o'er thy cheek,
Thy tears themselves do but bespeak
The rapture whence they flow;
Blest youth to whom those tears are given--
The tears that change his earth to heaven;
His best reward those melting eyes--
For him new suns are in the skies!
Thy soul--a crystal river passing,
Silver-clear, and sunbeam-glassing,
Mays into bloom sad Autumn by thee;
Night and desert, if they spy thee,
To gardens laugh--with daylight shine,
Lit by those happy smiles of thine!
Dark with cloud the future far
Goldens itself beneath thy star.
Smilest thou to see the harmony
Of charm the laws of Nature keep?
Alas! to me the harmony
Brings only cause to weep!
Holds not Hades its domain
Underneath this earth of ours?
Under palace, under fame,
Underneath the cloud-capped towers?
Stately cities soar and spread
O'er your mouldering bones, ye dead!
From corruption, from decay,
Springs yon clove-pink's fragrant bloom;
Yon gay waters wind their way
From the hollows of a tomb.
From the planets thou mayest know
All the change that shifts below,
Fled--beneath that zone of rays,
Fled to night a thousand Mays;
Thrones a thousand--rising--sinking,
Earth from thousand slaughters drinking
Blood profusely poured as water;--
Of the sceptre--of the slaughter--
Wouldst thou know what trace remaineth?
Seek them where the dark king reigneth!
Scarce thine eye can ope and close
Ere life's dying sunset glows;
Sinking sudden from its pride
Into death--the Lethe tide.
Ask'st thou whence thy beauties rise?
Boastest thou those radiant eyes?--
Or that cheek in roses dyed?
All their beauty (thought of sorrow!)
From the brittle mould they borrow.
Heavy interest in the tomb
For the brief loan of the bloom,
For the beauty of the day,
Death the usurer, thou must pay,
In the long to-morrow!
Maiden!--Death's too strong for scorn;
In the cheek the fairest, He
But the fairest throne doth see
Though the roses of the morn
Weave the veil by beauty worn--
Aye, beneath that broidered curtain,
Stands the Archer stern and certain!
Maid--thy Visionary hear--
Trust the wild one as the sear,
When he tells thee that thine eye,
While it beckons to the wooer,
Only lureth yet more nigh
Death, the dark undoer!
Every ray shed from thy beauty
Wastes the life-lamp while it beams,
And the pulse's playful duty,
And the blue veins' merry streams,
Sport and run into the pall--
Creatures of the Tyrant, all!
As the wind the rainbow shatters,
Death thy bright smiles rends and scatters,
Smile and rainbow leave no traces;--
From the spring-time's laughing graces,
From all life, as from its germ,
Grows the revel of the worm!
Woe, I see the wild wind wreak
Its wrath upon thy rosy bloom,
Winter plough thy rounded cheek,
Cloud and darkness close in gloom;
Blackening over, and forever,
Youth's serene and silver river!
Love alike and beauty o'er,
Lovely and beloved no more!
Maiden, an oak that soars on high,
And scorns the whirlwind's breath
Behold thy Poet's youth defy
The blunted dart of Death!
His gaze as ardent as the light
That shoots athwart the heaven,
His soul yet fiercer than the light
In the eternal heaven,
Of Him, in whom as in an ocean-surge
Creation ebbs and flows--and worlds arise and merge!
Through Nature steers the poet's thought to find
No fear but this--one barrier to the mind?
And dost thou glory so to think?
And heaves thy bosom?--Woe!
This cup, which lures him to the brink,
As if divinity to drink--
Has poison in its flow!
Wretched, oh, wretched, they who trust
To strike the God-spark from the dust!
The mightiest tone the music knows,
But breaks the harp-string with the sound;
And genius, still the more it glows,
But wastes the lamp whose life bestows
The light it sheds around.
Soon from existence dragged away,
The watchful jailer grasps his prey:
Vowed on the altar of the abused fire,
The spirits I raised against myself conspire!
Let--yes, I feel it two short springs away
Pass on their rapid flight;
And life's faint spark shall, fleeting from the clay,
Merge in the Fount of Light!
And weep'st thou, Laura?--be thy tears forbid;
Would'st thou my lot, life's dreariest years amid,
Protract and doom?--No: sinner, dry thy tears:
Would'st thou, whose eyes beheld the eagle wing
Of my bold youth through air's dominion spring,
Mark my sad age (life's tale of glory done)--
Crawl on the sod and tremble in the sun?
Hear the dull frozen heart condemn the flame
That as from heaven to youth's blithe bosom came;
And see the blind eyes loathing turn from all
The lovely sins age curses to recall?
Let me die young!--sweet sinner, dry thy tears!
Yes, let the flower be gathered in its bloom!
And thou, young genius, with the brows of gloom,
Quench thou life's torch, while yet the flame is strong!
Even as the curtain falls; while still the scene
Most thrills the hearts which have its audience been;
As fleet the shadows from the stage--and long
When all is o'er, lingers the breathless throng!
THE INFANTICIDE.
Hark where the bells toll, chiming, dull and steady,
The clock's slow hand hath reached the appointed time.
Well, be it so--prepare, my soul is ready,
Companions of the grave--the rest for crime!
Now take, O world! my last farewell--receiving
My parting kisses--in these tears they dwell!
Sweet are thy poisons while we taste believing,
Now we are quits--heart-poisoner, fare-thee-well!
Farewell, ye suns that once to joy invited,
Changed for the mould beneath the funeral shade;
Farewell, farewell, thou rosy time delighted,
Luring to soft desire the careless maid,
Pale gossamers of gold, farewell, sweet dreaming
Fancies--the children that an Eden bore!
Blossoms that died while dawn itself was gleaming,
Opening in happy sunlight never more.
Swanlike the robe which innocence bestowing,
Decked with the virgin favors, rosy fair,
In the gay time when many a young rose glowing,
Blushed through the loose train of the amber hair.
Woe, woe! as white the robe that decks me now--
The shroud-like robe hell's destined victim wears;
Still shall the fillet bind this burning brow--
That sable braid the Doomsman's hand prepares!
Weep ye, who never fell-for whom, unerring,
The soul's white lilies keep their virgin hue,
Ye who when thoughts so danger-sweet are stirring,
Take the stern strength that Nature gives the few!
Woe, for too human was this fond heart's feeling--
Feeling!--my sin's avenger [3] doomed to be;
Woe--for the false man's arm around me stealing,
Stole the lulled virtue, charmed to sleep, from me.
Ah, he perhaps shall, round another sighing
(Forgot the serpents stinging at my breast),
Gayly, when I in the dumb grave am lying,
Pour the warm wish or speed the wanton jest,
Or play, perchance, with his new maiden's tresses,
Answer the kiss her lip enamored brings,
When the dread block the head he cradled presses,
And high the blood his kiss once fevered springs.
Thee, Francis, Francis [4], league on league, shall follow
The death-dirge of the Lucy once so dear;
From yonder steeple dismal, dull, and hollow,
Shall knell the warning horror on thy ear.
On thy fresh leman's lips when love is dawning,
And the lisped music glides from that sweet well--
Lo, in that breast a red wound shall be yawning,
And, in the midst of rapture, warn of hell!
Betrayer, what! thy soul relentless closing
To grief--the woman-shame no art can heal--
To that small life beneath my heart reposing!
Man, man, the wild beast for its young can feel!
Proud flew the sails--receding from the land,
I watched them waning from the wistful eye,
Round the gay maids on Seine's voluptuous strand,
Breathes the false incense of his fatal sigh.
And there the babe! there, on the mother's bosom,
Lulled in its sweet and golden rest it lay,
Fresh in life's morning as a rosy blossom,
It smiled, poor harmless one, my tears away.
Deathlike yet lovely, every feature speaking
In such dear calm and beauty to my sadness,
And cradled still the mother's heart, in breaking,
The softening love and the despairing madness.
"Woman, where is my father?" freezing through me,
Lisped the mute innocence with thunder-sound;
"Woman, where is thy husband?"--called unto me,
In every look, word, whisper, busying round!
Alas, for thee, there is no father's kiss;--
He fondleth other children on his knee.
How thou wilt curse our momentary bliss,
When bastard on thy name shall branded be!
Thy mother--oh, a hell her heart concealeth,
Lone-sitting, lone in social nature's all!
Thirsting for that glad fount thy love revealeth,
While still thy look the glad fount turns to gall.
In every infant cry my soul is hearkening,
The haunting happiness forever o'er,
And all the bitterness of death is darkening
The heavenly looks that smiled mine eyes before.
Hell, if my sight those looks a moment misses--
Hell, when my sight upon those looks is turned--
The avenging furies madden in thy kisses,
That slept in his what time my lips they burned.
Out from their graves his oaths spoke back in thunder!
The perjury stalked like murder in the sun--
Forever--God!--sense, reason, soul, sunk under--
The deed was done!
Francis, O Francis! league on league shall chase thee
The shadows hurrying grimly on thy flight--
Still with their icy arms they shall embrace thee,
And mutter thunder in thy dream's delight!
Down from the soft stars, in their tranquil glory,
Shall look thy dead child with a ghastly stare;
That shape shall haunt thee in its cerements gory,
And scourge thee back from heaven--its home is there!
Lifeless--how lifeless!--see, oh see, before me
It lies cold--stiff--O God!--and with that blood
I feel, as swoops the dizzy darkness o'er me
Mine own life mingled--ebbing in the flood--
Hark, at the door they knock--more loud within me--
More awful still--its sound the dread heart gave!
Gladly I welcome the cold arms that win me--
Fire, quench thy tortures in the icy grave!
Francis--a God that pardons dwells in heaven--
Francis, the sinner--yes--she pardons thee--
So let my wrongs unto the earth be given
Flame seize the wood!--it burns--it kindles--see!
There--there his letters cast--behold are ashes--
His vows--the conquering fire consumes them here
His kisses--see--see--all are only ashes--
All, all--the all that once on earth were dear!
Trust not the roses which your youth enjoyeth,
Sisters, to man's faith, changeful as the moon!
Beauty to me brought guilt--its bloom destroyeth
Lo, in the judgment court I curse the boon
Tears in the headsman's gaze--what tears?--'tis spoken!
Quick, bind mine eyes--all soon shall be forgot--
Doomsman--the lily hast thou never broken?
Pale Doomsman--tremble not!
THE GREATNESS OF THE WORLD.
Through the world which the Spirit creative and kind
First formed out of chaos, I fly like the wind,
Until on the strand
Of its billows I land,
My anchor cast forth where the breeze blows no more,
And Creation's last boundary stands on the shore.
I saw infant stars into being arise,
For thousands of years to roll on through the skies;
I saw them in play
Seek their goal far away,--
For a moment my fugitive gaze wandered on,--
I looked round me, and lo!--all those bright stars had flown!
Madly yearning to reach the dark kingdom of night.
I boldly steer on with the speed of the light;
All misty and drear
The dim heavens appear,
While embryo systems and seas at their source
Are whirling around the sun-wanderer's course.
When sudden a pilgrim I see drawing near
Along the lone path,--"Stay! What seekest thou here?"
"My bark, tempest-tossed,
I sail toward the land where the breeze blows no more,
And Creation's last boundary stands on the shore."
"Stay, thou sailest in vain! 'Tis INFINITY yonder!"--
"'Tis INFINITY, too, where thou, pilgrim, wouldst wander!
Eagle-thoughts that aspire,
Let your proud pinions tire!
For 'tis here that sweet phantasy, bold to the last,
Her anchor in hopeless dejection must cast!"
FORTUNE AND WISDOM.
Enraged against a quondam friend,
To Wisdom once proud Fortune said
"I'll give thee treasures without end,
If thou wilt be my friend instead."
"My choicest gifts to him I gave,
And ever blest him with my smile;
And yet he ceases not to crave,
And calls me niggard all the while."
"Come, sister, let us friendship vow!
So take the money, nothing loth;
Why always labor at the plough?
Here is enough I'm sure for both!"
Sage wisdom laughed,--the prudent elf!--
And wiped her brow, with moisture hot:
"There runs thy friend to hang himself,--
Be reconciled--I need thee not!"
ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG MAN. [5]
Mournful groans, as when a tempest lowers,
Echo from the dreary house of woe;
Death-notes rise from yonder minster's towers!
Bearing out a youth, they slowly go;
Yes! a youth--unripe yet for the bier,
Gathered in the spring-time of his days,
Thrilling yet with pulses strong and clear,
With the flame that in his bright eye plays--
Yes, a son--the idol of his mother,
(Oh, her mournful sigh shows that too well!)
Yes! my bosom-friend,--alas my brother!--
Up! each man the sad procession swell!
Do ye boast, ye pines, so gray and old,
Storms to brave, with thunderbolts to sport?
And, ye hills, that ye the heavens uphold?
And, ye heavens, that ye the suns support!
Boasts the graybeard, who on haughty deeds
As on billows, seeks perfection's height?
Boasts the hero, whom his prowess leads
Up to future glory's temple bright!
If the gnawing worms the floweret blast,
Who can madly think he'll ne'er decay?
Who above, below, can hope to last,
If the young man's life thus fleets away?
Joyously his days of youth so glad
Danced along, in rosy garb beclad,
And the world, the world was then so sweet!
And how kindly, how enchantingly
Smiled the future,--with what golden eye
Did life's paradise his moments greet!
While the tear his mother's eye escaped,
Under him the realm of shadows gaped
And the fates his thread began to sever,--
Earth and Heaven then vanished from his sight.
From the grave-thought shrank he in affright--
Sweet the world is to the dying ever!
Dumb and deaf 'tis in that narrow place,
Deep the slumbers of the buried one!
Brother! Ah, in ever-slackening race
All thy hopes their circuit cease to run!
Sunbeams oft thy native hill still lave,
But their glow thou never more canst feel;
O'er its flowers the zephyr's pinions wave,
O'er thine ear its murmur ne'er can steal;
Love will never tinge thine eye with gold,
Never wilt thou embrace thy blooming bride,
Not e'en though our tears in torrents rolled--
Death must now thine eye forever hide!
Yet 'tis well!--for precious is the rest,
In that narrow house the sleep is calm;
There, with rapture sorrow leaves the breast,--
Man's afflictions there no longer harm.
Slander now may wildly rave o'er thee,
And temptation vomit poison fell,
O'er the wrangle on the Pharisee,
Murderous bigots banish thee to hell!
Rogues beneath apostle-masks may leer,
And the bastard child of justice play,
As it were with dice, with mankind here,
And so on, until the judgment day!
O'er thee fortune still may juggle on,
For her minions blindly look around,--
Man now totter on his staggering throne,
And in dreary puddles now be found!
Blest art thou, within thy narrow cell!
To this stir of tragi-comedy,
To these fortune-waves that madly swell,
To this vain and childish lottery,
To this busy crowd effecting naught,
To this rest with labor teeming o'er,
Brother!--to this heaven with devils--fraught,
Now thine eyes have closed forevermore.
Fare thee well, oh, thou to memory dear,
By our blessings lulled to slumbers sweet!
Sleep on calmly in thy prison drear,--
Sleep on calmly till again we meet!
Till the loud Almighty trumpet sounds,
Echoing through these corpse-encumbered hills,
Till God's storm-wind, bursting through the bounds
Placed by death, with life those corpses fills--
Till, impregnate with Jehovah's blast,
Graves bring forth, and at His menace dread,
In the smoke of planets melting fast,
Once again the tombs give up their dead!
Not in worlds, as dreamed of by the wise,
Not in heavens, as sung in poet's song,
Not in e'en the people's paradise--
Yet we shall o'ertake thee, and ere long.
Is that true which cheered the pilgrim's gloom?
Is it true that thoughts can yonder be
True, that virtue guides us o'er the tomb?
That 'tis more than empty phantasy?
All these riddles are to thee unveiled!
Truth thy soul ecstatic now drinks up,
Truth in radiance thousandfold exhaled
From the mighty Father's blissful cup.
Dark and silent bearers draw, then, nigh!
To the slayer serve the feast the while!
Cease, ye mourners, cease your wailing cry!
Dust on dust upon the body pile!
Where's the man who God to tempt presumes?
Where the eye that through the gulf can see?
Holy, holy, holy art thou, God of tombs!
We, with awful trembling, worship Thee!
Dust may back to native dust be ground,
From its crumbling house the spirit fly,
And the storm its ashes strew around,--
But its love, its love shall never die!
THE BATTLE.
Heavy and solemn,
A cloudy column,
Through the green plain they marching came!
Measure less spread, like a table dread,
For the wild grim dice of the iron game.
The looks are bent on the shaking ground,
And the heart beats loud with a knelling sound;
Swift by the breasts that must bear the brunt,
Gallops the major along the front--
"Halt!"
And fettered they stand at the stark command,
And the warriors, silent, halt!
Proud in the blush of morning glowing,
What on the hill-top shines in flowing,
"See you the foeman's banners waving?"
"We see the foeman's banners waving!"
"God be with ye--children and wife!"
Hark to the music--the trump and the fife,
How they ring through the ranks which they rouse to the strife!
Thrilling they sound with their glorious tone,
Thrilling they go through the marrow and bone!
Brothers, God grant when this life is o'er,
In the life to come that we meet once more!
See the smoke how the lightning is cleaving asunder!
Hark the guns, peal on peal, how they boom in their thunder!
From host to host, with kindling sound,
The shouting signal circles round,
Ay, shout it forth to life or death--
Freer already breathes the breath!
The war is waging, slaughter raging,
And heavy through the reeking pall,
The iron death-dice fall!
Nearer they close--foes upon foes
"Ready!"--From square to square it goes,
Down on the knee they sank,
And fire comes sharp from the foremost rank.
Many a man to the earth it sent,
Many a gap by the balls is rent--
O'er the corpse before springs the hinder man,
That the line may not fail to the fearless van,
To the right, to the left, and around and around,
Death whirls in its dance on the bloody ground.
God's sunlight is quenched in the fiery fight,
Over the hosts falls a brooding night!
Brothers, God grant when this life is o'er
In the life to come that we meet once more!
The dead men lie bathed in the weltering blood
And the living are blent in the slippery flood,
And the feet, as they reeling and sliding go,
Stumble still on the corpses that sleep below.
"What, Francis!" "Give Charlotte my last farewell."
As the dying man murmurs, the thunders swell--
"I'll give--Oh God! are their guns so near?
Ho! comrades!--yon volley!--look sharp to the rear!--
I'll give thy Charlotte thy last farewell,
Sleep soft! where death thickest descendeth in rain,
The friend thou forsakest thy side shall regain!"
Hitherward--thitherward reels the fight,
Dark and more darkly day glooms into night--
Brothers, God grant when this life is o'er
In the life to come that we meet once more!
Hark to the hoofs that galloping go!
The adjutant flying,--
The horsemen press hard on the panting foe,
Their thunder booms in dying--
Victory!
The terror has seized on the dastards all,
And their colors fall!
Victory!
Closed is the brunt of the glorious fight
And the day, like a conqueror, bursts on the night,
Trumpet and fife swelling choral along,
The triumph already sweeps marching in song.
Farewell, fallen brothers, though this life be o'er,
There's another, in which we shall meet you once more!
ROUSSEAU.
Monument of our own age's shame,
On thy country casting endless blame,
Rousseau's grave, how dear thou art to me
Calm repose be to thy ashes blest!
In thy life thou vainly sought'st for rest,
But at length 'twas here obtained by thee!
When will ancient wounds be covered o'er?
Wise men died in heathen days of yore;
Now 'tis lighter--yet they die again.
Socrates was killed by sophists vile,
Rousseau meets his death through Christians' wile,--
Rousseau--who would fain make Christians men!
FRIENDSHIP.
[From "Letters of Julius to Raphael," an unpublished Novel.]
Friend!--the Great Ruler, easily content,
Needs not the laws it has laborious been
The task of small professors to invent;
A single wheel impels the whole machine
Matter and spirit;--yea, that simple law,
Pervading nature, which our Newton saw.
This taught the spheres, slaves to one golden rein,
Their radiant labyrinths to weave around
Creation's mighty hearts: this made the chain,
Which into interwoven systems bound
All spirits streaming to the spiritual sun
As brooks that ever into ocean run!
Did not the same strong mainspring urge and guide
Our hearts to meet in love's eternal bond?
Linked to thine arm, O Raphael, by thy side
Might I aspire to reach to souls beyond
Our earth, and bid the bright ambition go
To that perfection which the angels know!
Happy, O happy--I have found thee--I
Have out of millions found thee, and embraced;
Thou, out of millions, mine!--Let earth and sky
Return to darkness, and the antique waste--
To chaos shocked, let warring atoms be,
Still shall each heart unto the other flee!
Do I not find within thy radiant eyes
Fairer reflections of all joys most fair?
In thee I marvel at myself--the dyes
Of lovely earth seem lovelier painted there,
And in the bright looks of the friend is given
A heavenlier mirror even of the heaven!
Sadness casts off its load, and gayly goes
From the intolerant storm to rest awhile,
In love's true heart, sure haven of repose;
Does not pain's veriest transports learn to smile
From that bright eloquence affection gave
To friendly looks?--there, finds not pain a grave?
In all creation did I stand alone,
Still to the rocks my dreams a soul should find,
Mine arms should wreathe themselves around the stone,
My griefs should feel a listener in the wind;
My joy--its echo in the caves should be!
Fool, if ye will--Fool, for sweet sympathy!
We are dead groups of matter when we hate;
But when we love we are as gods!--Unto
The gentle fetters yearning, through each state
And shade of being multiform, and through
All countless spirits (save of all the sire)--
Moves, breathes, and blends, the one divine desire.
Lo! arm in arm, through every upward grade,
From the rude mongrel to the starry Greek,
Who the fine link between the mortal made,
And heaven's last seraph--everywhere we seek
Union and bond--till in one sea sublime
Of love be merged all measure and all time!
Friendless ruled God His solitary sky;
He felt the want, and therefore souls were made,
The blessed mirrors of his bliss!--His eye
No equal in His loftiest works surveyed;
And from the source whence souls are quickened, He
Called His companion forth--ETERNITY!
ELYSIUM.
Past the despairing wail--
And the bright banquets of the Elysian vale
Melt every care away!
Delight, that breathes and moves forever,
Glides through sweet fields like some sweet river!
Elysian life survey!
There, fresh with youth, o'er jocund meads,
His merry west-winds blithely leads
The ever-blooming May!
Through gold-woven dreams goes the dance of the hours,
In space without bounds swell the soul and its powers,
And truth, with no veil, gives her face to the day.
And joy to-day and joy to-morrow,
But wafts the airy soul aloft;
The very name is lost to sorrow,
And pain is rapture tuned more exquisitely soft.
Here the pilgrim reposes the world-weary limb,
And forgets in the shadow, cool-breathing and dim,
The load he shall bear never more;
Here the mower, his sickle at rest, by the streams,
Lulled with harp-strings, reviews, in the calm of his dreams,
The fields, when the harvest is o'er.
Here, he, whose ears drank in the battle roar,
Whose banners streamed upon the startled wind
A thunder-storm,--before whose thunder tread
The mountains trembled,--in soft sleep reclined,
By the sweet brook that o'er its pebbly bed
In silver plays, and murmurs to the shore,
Hears the stern clangor of wild spears no more!
Here the true spouse the lost-beloved regains,
And on the enamelled couch of summer-plains
Mingles sweet kisses with the zephyr's breath.
Here, crowned at last, love never knows decay,
Living through ages its one bridal day,
Safe from the stroke of death!
THE FUGITIVE.
The air is perfumed with the morning's fresh breeze,
From the bush peer the sunbeams all purple and bright,
While they gleam through the clefts of the dark-waving trees,
And the cloud-crested mountains are golden with light.
With joyful, melodious, ravishing, strain,
The lark, as he wakens, salutes the glad sun,
Who glows in the arms of Aurora again,
And blissfully smiling, his race 'gins to run.
All hail, light of day!
Thy sweet gushing ray
Pours down its soft warmth over pasture and field;
With hues silver-tinged
The meadows are fringed,
And numberless suns in the dewdrop revealed.
Young Nature invades
The whispering shades,
Displaying each ravishing charm;
The soft zephyr blows,
And kisses the rose,
The plain is sweet-scented with balm.
How high from yon city the smoke-clouds ascend!
Their neighing, and snorting, and bellowing blend
The horses and cattle;
The chariot-wheels rattle,
As down to the valley they take their mad way;
And even the forest where life seems to move,
The eagle, and falcon, and hawk soar above,
And flutter their pinions, in heaven's bright ray.
In search of repose
From my heart-rending woes,
Oh, where shall my sad spirit flee?
The earth's smiling face,
With its sweet youthful grace,
A tomb must, alas, be for me!
Arise, then, thou sunlight of morning, and fling
O'er plain and o'er forest thy purple-dyed beams!
Thou twilight of evening, all noiselessly sing
In melody soft to the world as it dreams!
Ah, sunlight of morning, to me thou but flingest
Thy purple-dyed beams o'er the grave of the past!
Ah, twilight of evening, thy strains thou but singest
To one whose deep slumbers forever must last!
TO MINNA.
Do I dream? can I trust to my eye?
My sight sure some vapor must cover?
Or, there, did my Minna pass by--
My Minna--and knew not her lover?
On the arm of the coxcomb she crossed,
Well the fan might its zephyr bestow;
Herself in her vanity lost,
That wanton my Minna?--Ah, no!
In the gifts of my love she was dressed,
My plumes o'er her summer hat quiver;
The ribbons that flaunt in her breast
Might bid her--remember the giver!
And still do they bloom on thy bosom,
The flowerets I gathered for thee!
Still as fresh is the leaf of each blossom,
'Tis the heart that has faded from me!
Go and take, then, the incense they tender;
Go, the one that adored thee forget!
Go, thy charms to the feigner surrender,
In my scorn is my comforter yet!
Go, for thee with what trust and belief
There beat not ignobly a heart
That has strength yet to strive with the grief
To have worshipped the trifler thou art!
Thy beauty thy heart hath betrayed--
Thy beauty--shame, Minna, to thee!
To-morrow its glory will fade,
And its roses all withered will be!
The swallows that swarm in the sun
Will fly when the north winds awaken,
The false ones thine autumn will shun,
For whom thou the true hast forsaken!
'Mid the wrecks of the charms in December,
I see thee alone in decay,
And each spring shall but bid thee remember
How brief for thyself was the May!
Then they who so wantonly flock
To the rapture thy kiss can impart,
Shall scoff at thy winter, and mock
Thy beauty as wrecked as thy heart!
Thy beauty thy heart hath betrayed--
Thy beauty--shame, Minna, to thee
To-morrow its glory will fade--
And its roses all withered will be!
O, what scorn for thy desolate years
Shall I feel!--God forbid it in me!
How bitter will then be the tears
Shed, Minna, O Minna, for thee!
THE FLOWERS.
Ye offspring of the morning sun,
Ye flowers that deck the smiling plain,
Your lives, in joy and bliss begun,
In Nature's love unchanged remain.
With hues of bright and godlike splendor
Sweet Flora graced your forms so tender,
And clothed ye in a garb of light;
Spring's lovely children weep forever,
For living souls she gave ye never,
And ye must dwell in endless night?
The nightingale and lark still sing
In your tranced ears the bliss of love;
The toying sylphs, on airy wing,
Around your fragrant bosoms rove,
Of yore, Dione's daughter [6] twining
In garlands sweet your cup-so shining,
A pillow formed where love might rest!
Spring's gentle children, mourn forever,
The joys of love she gave ye never,
Ne'er let ye know that feeling blest!
But when ye're gathered by my hand,
A token of my love to be,
Now that her mother's harsh command
From Nanny's [7] sight has banished me--
E'en from that passing touch ye borrow
Those heralds mute of pleasing sorrow,
Life, language, hearts and souls divine;
And to your silent leaves 'tis given,
By Him who mightiest is in heaven,
His glorious Godhead to enshrine.
THE TRIUMPH OF LOVE.
A HYMN.
By love are blest the gods on high,
Frail man becomes a deity
When love to him is given;
'Tis love that makes the heavens shine
With hues more radiant, more divine,
And turns dull earth to heaven!
In Pyrrha's rear (so poets sang
In ages past and gone),
The world from rocky fragments sprang--
Mankind from lifeless stone.
Their soul was but a thing of night,
Like stone and rock their heart;
The flaming torch of heaven so bright
Its glow could ne'er impart.
Young loves, all gently hovering round,
Their souls as yet had never bound
In soft and rosy chains;
No feeling muse had sought to raise
Their bosoms with ennobling lays,
Or sweet, harmonious strains.
Around each other lovingly
No garlands then entwined;
The sorrowing springs fled toward the sky,
And left the earth behind.
From out the sea Aurora rose
With none to hail her then;
The sun unhailed, at daylight's close,
In ocean sank again.
In forests wild, man went astray,
Misled by Luna's cloudy ray--
He bore an iron yoke;
He pined not for the stars on high,
With yearning for a deity
No tears in torrents broke.
. . . . .
But see! from out the deep-blue ocean
Fair Venus springs with gentle motion
The graceful Naiad's smiling band
Conveys her to the gladdened strand,
A May-like, youthful, magic power
Entwines, like morning's twilight hour,
Around that form of godlike birth,
The charms of air, sea, heaven, and earth.
The day's sweet eye begins to bloom
Across the forest's midnight gloom;
Narcissuses, their balm distilling,
The path her footstep treads are filling.
A song of love, sweet Philomel,
Soon carolled through the grove;
The streamlet, as it murmuring fell,
Discoursed of naught but love,
Pygmalion! Happy one! Behold!
Life's glow pervades thy marble cold!
Oh, LOVE, thou conqueror all-divine,
Embrace each happy child of thine!
. . . . .
By love are blest the gods on high,--
Frail man becomes a deity
When love to him is given;
'Tis love that makes the heavens shine
With hues more radiant, more divine,
And turns dull earth to heaven!
. . . . .
The gods their days forever spend
In banquets bright that have no end,
In one voluptuous morning-dream,
And quaff the nectar's golden stream.
Enthroned in awful majesty
Kronion wields the bolt on high:
In abject fear Olympus rocks
When wrathfully he shakes his locks.
To other gods he leaves his throne,
And fills, disguised as earth's frail son,
The grove with mournful numbers;
The thunders rest beneath his feet,
And lulled by Leda's kisses sweet,
The Giant-Slayer slumbers.
Through the boundless realms of light
Phoebus' golden reins, so bright,
Guide his horses white as snow,
While his darts lay nations low.
But when love and harmony
Fill his breast, how willingly
Ceases Phoebus then to heed
Rattling dart and snow-white steed!
See! Before Kronion's spouse
Every great immortal bows;
Proudly soar the peacock pair
As her chariot throne they bear,
While she decks with crown of might
Her ambrosial tresses bright,
Beauteous princess, ah! with fear
Quakes before thy splendor, love,
Seeking, as he ventures near,
With his power thy breast to move!
Soon from her immortal throne
Heaven's great queen must fain descend,
And in prayer for beauty's zone,
To the heart-enchainer bend!
. . . . .
By love are blest the gods on high,
Frail man becomes a deity
When love to him is given;
'Tis love that makes the heavens shine
With hues more radiant, more divine,
And turns dull earth to heaven!
. . . . .
'Tis love illumes the realms of night,
For Orcus dark obeys his might,
And bows before his magic spell
All-kindly looks the king of hell
At Ceres' daughter's smile so bright,--
Yes--love illumes the realms of night!
In hell were heard, with heavenly sound,
Holding in chains its warder bound,
Thy lays, O Thracian one!
A gentler doom dread Minos passed,
While down his cheeks the tears coursed fast
And e'en around Megaera's face
The serpents twined in fond embrace,
The lashes' work seemed done.
Driven by Orpheus' lyre away,
The vulture left his giant-prey [8];
With gentler motion rolled along
Dark Lethe and Cocytus' river,
Enraptured Thracian, by thy song,--
And love its burden was forever!
By love are blest the gods on high,
Frail man becomes a deity
When love to him is given;
'Tis love that makes the heavens shine
With hues more radiant, more divine,
And turns dull earth to heaven!
. . . . .
Wherever Nature's sway extends,
The fragrant balm of love descends,
His golden pinions quiver;
If 'twere not Venus' eye that gleams
Upon me in the moon's soft beams,
In sunlit hill or river,--
If 'twere not Venus smiles on me
From yonder bright and starry sea,
Not stars, not sun, not moonbeams sweet,
Could make my heart with rapture beat.
'Tis love alone that smilingly
Peers forth from Nature's blissful eye,
As from a mirror ever!
Love bids the silvery streamlet roll
More gently as it sighs along,
And breathes a living, feeling soul
In Philomel's sweet plaintive song;
'Tis love alone that fills the air
With streams from Nature's lute so fair.
Thou wisdom with the glance of fire,
Thou mighty goddess, now retire,
Love's power thou now must feel!
To victor proud, to monarch high,
Thou ne'er hast knelt in slavery,--
To love thou now must kneel!
Who taught thee boldly how to climb
The steep, but starry path sublime,
And reach the seats immortal?
Who rent the mystic veil in twain,
And showed thee the Elysian plain
Beyond death's gloomy portal?
If love had beckoned not from high,
Had we gained immortality?
If love had not inflamed each thought,
Had we the master spirit sought?
'Tis love that guides the soul along
To Nature's Father's heavenly throne
By love are blest the gods on high,
Frail man becomes a deity
When love to him is given;
'Tis love that makes the heavens shine
With hues more radiant, more divine,
And turns dull earth to heaven!
TO A MORALIST.
Are the sports of our youth so displeasing?
Is love but the folly you say?
Benumbed with the winter, and freezing,
You scold at the revels of May.
For you once a nymph had her charms,
And Oh! when the waltz you were wreathing,
All Olympus embraced in your arms--
All its nectar in Julia's breathing.
If Jove at that moment had hurled
The earth in some other rotation,
Along with your Julia whirled,
You had felt not the shock of creation.
Learn this--that philosophy beats
Sure time with the pulse,--quick or slow
As the blood from the heyday retreats,--
But it cannot make gods of us--No!
It is well icy reason should thaw
In the warm blood of mirth now and then,
The gods for themselves have a law
Which they never intended for men.
The spirit is bound by the ties
Of its gaoler, the flesh;--if I can
Not reach as an angel the skies,
Let me feel on the earth as a man!
COUNT EBERHARD, THE GROANER OF WURTEMBERG.
A WAR SONG.
Now hearken, ye who take delight
In boasting of your worth!
To many a man, to many a knight,
Beloved in peace and brave in fight,
The Swabian land gives birth.
Of Charles and Edward, Louis, Guy,
And Frederick, ye may boast;
Charles, Edward, Louis, Frederick, Guy--
None with Sir Eberhard can vie--
Himself a mighty host!
And then young Ulerick, his son,
Ha! how he loved the fray!
Young Ulerick, the Count's bold son,
When once the battle had begun,
No foot's-breadth e'er gave way.
The Reutlingers, with gnashing teeth,
Saw our bright ranks revealed
And, panting for the victor's wreath,
They drew the sword from out the sheath,
And sought the battle-field.
He charged the foe,--but fruitlessly,--
Then, mail-clad, homeward sped;
Stern anger filled his father's eye,
And made the youthful warrior fly,
And tears of anguish shed.
Now, rascals, quake!--This grieved him sore,
And rankled in his brain;
And by his father's beard he swore,
With many a craven townsman's gore
To wash out this foul stain.
Ere long the feud raged fierce and loud,--
Then hastened steed and man
To Doeffingen in thronging crowd,
While joy inspired the youngster proud,--
And soon the strife began.
Our army's signal-word that day
Was the disastrous fight;
It spurred us on like lightning's ray,
And plunged us deep in bloody fray,
And in the spears' black night.
The youthful Count his ponderous mace
With lion's rage swung round;
Destruction stalked before his face,
While groans and howlings filled the place
And hundreds bit the ground.
Woe! Woe! A heavy sabre-stroke
Upon his neck descended;
The sight each warrior's pity woke--
In vain! In vain! No word he spoke--
His course on earth was ended.
Loud wept both friend and foeman then,
Checked was the victor's glow;
The count cheered thus his knights again--
"My son is like all other men,--
March, children, 'gainst the foe!"
With greater fury whizzed each lance,
Revenge inflamed the blood;
O'er corpses moved the fearful dance
The townsmen fled in random chance
O'er mountain, vale, and flood.
Then back to camp, with trumpet's bray,
We hied in joyful haste;
And wife and child, with roundelay,
With clanging cup and waltzes gay,
Our glorious triumph graced.
And our old Count,--what now does he?
His son lies dead before him;
Within his tent all woefully
He sits alone in agony,
And drops one hot tear o'er him.
And so, with true affection warm,
The Count our lord we love;
Himself a mighty hero-swarm--
The thunders rest within his arm--
He shines like star above!
Farewell, then, ye who take delight
In boasting of your worth!
To many a man, to many a knight,
Beloved in peace, and brave in fight,
The Swabian land gives birth!
TO THE SPRING.
Welcome, gentle Stripling,
Nature's darling thou!
With thy basket full of blossoms,
A happy welcome now!
Aha!--and thou returnest,
Heartily we greet thee--
The loving and the fair one,
Merrily we meet thee!
Think'st thou of my maiden
In thy heart of glee?
I love her yet, the maiden--
And the maiden yet loves me!
For the maiden, many a blossom
I begged--and not in vain!
I came again a-begging,
And thou--thou givest again:
Welcome, gentle Stripling,
Nature's darling thou--
With thy basket full of blossoms,
A happy welcome now!
SEMELE:
IN TWO SCENES.
Dramatis Personae.
JUNO.
SEMELE, Princess of Thebes.
JUPITER.
MERCURY.
SCENE--The Palace of Cadmus at Thebes.
SCENE I.
JUNO. (Descending from her chariot, enveloped in a cloud.)
Away, ye peacocks, with my winged car!
Upon Cithaeron's cloud-capped summit wait!
[The chariot and cloud vanish.
Hail, hail, thou house of my undying anger!
A fearful hail to thee, thou hostile roof,
Ye hated walls!--This, this, then, is the place
Where Jupiter pollutes his marriage-bed
Even before the face of modest day!
'Tis here, then, that a woman, a frail mortal,
A dust-created being, dares to lure
The mighty Thunderer from out mine arms,
And hold him prisoner against her lips!
Juno! Juno! thought of madness!
Thou all lonely and in sadness,
Standest now on heaven's bright throne!
Though the votive smoke ascendeth,
Though each knee in homage bendeth,
What are they when love has flown?
To humble, alas, each too-haughty emotion
That swelled my proud breast, from the foam of the ocean
Fair Venus arose, to enchant gods and men!
And the Fates my still deeper abasement decreeing,
Her offspring Hermione brought into being,
And the bliss once mine own can ne'er glad me again!
Amongst the gods do I not reign the queen?
Am I not sister of the Thunderer?
Am I not wife of Zeus, the lord of all?
Groans not the mighty axis of the heavens
At my command? Gleams not Olympus' crown
Upon my head? Ha! now I feel myself!
In my immortal veins is Kronos' blood,
Right royally now swells my godlike heart.
Revenge! revenge!
Shall she unpunished ridicule my might?
Unpunished, discord roll amongst the gods,
Inviting Eris to invade the courts,
The joyous courts of heaven? Vain, thoughtless one!
Perish, and learn upon the Stygian stream
The difference 'twixt divine and earthly dust!
The giant-armor, may it weigh thee down--
Thy passion for a god to atoms crush thee!
Armed with revenge, as with a coat of mail,
I have descended from Olympus' heights,
Devising sweet, ensnaring, flattering words;
But in those words, death and destruction lurk.
Hark! 'tis her footstep! she approaches now--
Approaches ruin and a certain death!
Veil thyself, goddess, in a mortal form! [Exit.
SEMELE. (Calling behind the scenes.)
The sun is fast declining! Maidens, haste,
Scatter ambrosial fragrance through the hall,
Strew roses and narcissus flowers around,
Forgetting not the gold-embroidered pillow.
He comes not yet--the sun is fast declining--
JUNO. (hastily entering in the form of an old woman.)
Praised be the deities, my dearest daughter!
SEMELE.
Ha! Do I dream? Am I awake? Gods! Beroe!
JUNO.
Is't possible that Semele can e'er
Forget her nurse?
SEMELE. 'Tis Beroe! By Zeus!
Oh, let thy daughter clasp thee to her heart!
Thou livest still? What can have brought thee here
From Epidaurus? Tell me all thy tale!
Thou art my mother as of old?
JUNO. Thy mother!
Time was thou call'dst me so.
SEMELE. Thou art so still,
And wilt remain so, till I drink full deep
Of Lethe's maddening draught.
JUNO. Soon Beroe
Will drink oblivion from the waves of Lethe;
But Cadmus' daughter ne'er will taste that draught.
SEMELE.
How, my good nurse? Thy language ne'er was wont
To be mysterious or of hidden meaning;
The spirit of gray hairs 'tis speaks in thee;
Thou sayest I ne'er shall taste of Lethe's draught?
JUNO.
I said so, yes! But wherefore ridicule
Gray hairs? 'Tis true that they, unlike fair tresses,
Have ne'er been able to ensnare a god!
SEMELE.
Pardon poor thoughtless me! What cause have I
To ridicule gray hairs? Can I suppose
That mine forever fair will grace my neck?
But what was that I heard thee muttering
Between thy teeth? A god?
JUNO. Said I a god?
The deities in truth dwell everywhere!
'Tis good for earth's frail children to implore them.
The gods are found where thou art--Semele!
What wouldst thou ask?
SEMELE. Malicious heart! But say
What brings thee to this spot from Epidaurus?
'Tis not because the gods delight to dwell
near Semele?
JUNO. By Jupiter, naught else!--
What fire was that which mounted to thy cheeks
When I pronounced the name of Jupiter?
Naught else, my daughter! Fearfully the plague
At Epidaurus rages; every blast
Is deadly poison, every breath destroys;
The son his mother burns, his bride the bridegroom;
The funeral piles rear up their flaming heads,
Converting even midnight to bright day,
While howls of anguish ceaseless rend the air;
Full to overflowing is the cup of woe!--
In anger, Zeus looks down on our poor nation;
In vain the victim's blood is shed, in vain
Before the altar bows the priest his knee;
Deaf is his ear to all our supplications--
Therefore my sorrow-stricken country now
Has sent me here to Cadmus' regal daughter,
In hopes that I may move her to avert
His anger from us--"Beroe, the nurse,
Has influence," thus they said, "with Semele,
And Semele with Zeus"--I know no more,
And understand still less what means the saying,
That Semele such influence has with Zeus.
SEMELE. (Eagerly and thoughtlessly.)
The plague shall cease to-morrow! Tell them so
Zeus loves me! Say so! It shall cease to-day!
JUNO. (Starting up in astonishment.)
Ha! Is it true what fame with thousand tongues
Has spread abroad from Ida to Mount Haemus?
Zeus loves thee? Zeus salutes thee in the glory
Wherein the denizens of heaven regard him,
When in Saturnia's arms he sinks to rest?
Let, O ye gods, my gray hairs now descend
To Orcus' shades, for I have lived enough!
In godlike splendor Kronos' mighty son
Comes down to her,--to her, who on this breast
Once suckled--yes! to her--
SEMELE. Oh, Beroe!
In youthful form he came, in lovelier guise
Than they who from Aurora's lap arise;
Fairer than Hesper, breathing incense dim,--
In floods of ether steeped appeared each limb;
He moved with graceful and majestic motion,
Like silvery billows heaving o'er the ocean,
Or as Hyperion, whose bright shoulders ever
His bow and arrow bear, and clanging quiver;
His robe of light behind him gracefully
Danced in the breeze, his voice breathed melody,
Like crystal streams with silvery murmur falling,
More ravishing than Orpheus' strains enthralling.
JUNO.
My daughter! Inspiration spurs thee on,
Raising thy heart to flights of Helicon!
If thus in strains of Delphic ecstasy
Ascends the short-lived blissful memory
Of his bright charms,--Oh, how divine must be
His own sweet voice,--his look how heavenly!
But why of that great attribute
Kronion joys in most, be mute,--
The majesty that hurls the thunder,
And tears the fleeting clouds asunder?
Wilt thou say naught of that alone?
Prometheus and Deucalion
May lend the fairest charms of love,
But none can wield the bolt save Jove!
The thunderbolt it is alone
Which he before thy feet laid down
That proves thy right to beauty's crown.
SEMELE.
What sayest thou? What are thunder-bolts to me?
JUNO. (Smiling.)
Ah, Semele! A jest becomes thee well!
SEMELE.
Deucalion has no offspring so divine
As is my Zeus--of thunder naught I know.
JUNO.
Mere envy! Fie!
SEMELE. No, Beroe! By Zeus!
JUNO.
Thou swearest?
SEMELE. By Zeus! by mine own Zeus!
JUNO. (Shrieking.) Thou swearest?
Unhappy one!
SEMELE. (In alarm.) What meanest thou, Beroe?
JUNO.
Repeat the word that dooms thee to become
the wretchedest of all on earth's wide face!--
Alas, lost creature! 'Twas not Zeus!
SEMELE. Not Zeus?
Oh, fearful thought!
JUNO. A cunning traitor 'twas
From Attica, who 'neath a godlike form,
Robbed thee of honor, shame, and innocence!--
[SEMELE sinks to the ground.
Well mayest thou fall! Ne'er mayest thou rise again!
May endless night enshroud thine eyes in darkness,
May endless silence round thine ears encamp!
Remain forever here a lifeless mass!
Oh, infamy! Enough to hurl chaste day
Back into Hecate's gloomy arms once more!
Ye gods! And is it thus that Beroe
Finds Cadmus' daughter, after sixteen years
Of bitter separation! Full of joy
I came from Epidaurus; but with shame
To Epidaurus must retrace my steps.--
Despair I take with me. Alas, my people!
E'en to the second Deluge now the plague
May rage at will, may pile mount Oeta high
With corpses upon corpses, and may turn
All Greece into one mighty charnel-house,
Ere Semele can bend the angry gods.
I, thou, and Greece, and all, have been betrayed!
SEMELE. (Trembling as she rises, and extending an arm towards her.)
Oh, Beroe!
JUNO. Take courage, my dear heart!
Perchance 'tis Zeus! although it scarce can be!
Perchance 'tis really Zeus! This we must learn!
He must disclose himself to thee, or thou
Must fly his sight forever, and devote
The monster to the death-revenge of Thebes.
Look up, dear daughter--look upon the face
Of thine own Beroe, who looks on thee
With sympathizing eyes--my Semele,
Were it not well to try him?
SEMELE. No, by heaven!
I should not find him then--
JUNO. What! Wilt thou be
Perchance less wretched, if thou pinest on
In mournful doubt?--and if 'tis really he,--
SEMELE. (Hiding her face in Juno's lap.)
Ah! 'tis not he!
JUNO. And if he came to thee
Arrayed in all the majesty wherein
Olympus sees him? Semele! What then?
Wouldst thou repent thee then of having tried him?
SEMELE. (Springing up.)
Ha! be it so! He must unveil himself!
JUNO. (Hastily.)
Thou must not let him sink into thine arms.
Till he unveils himself--so hearken, child,
To what thy faithful nurse now counsels thee,--
To what affection whispers in mine ear,
And will accomplish!--Say! will he soon come?
SEMELE.
Before Hyperion sinks in Thetis' bed,
He promised to appear.
JUNO. (Forgetting herself hastily.) Is't so, indeed?
He promised? Ha! To-day? (Recovering herself.) Let him approach,
And when he would attempt, inflamed with love,
To clasp his arms around thee, then do thou,--
Observe me well,--as if by lightning struck,
Start back in haste. Ha! picture his surprise!
Leave him not long in wonderment, my child;
Continue to repulse him with a look
As cold as ice--more wildly, with more ardor
He'll press thee then--the coyness of the fair
Is but a dam, that for awhile keeps back
The torrent, only to increase the flood
With greater fury. Then begin to weep
'Gainst giants he might stand,--look calmly on
When Typheus, hundred-armed, in fury hurled
Mount Ossa and Olympus 'gainst his throne:
But Zeus is soon subdued by beauty's tears.
Thou smilest?--Be it so! Is, then, the scholar
Wiser, perchance, than she who teaches her?--
Then thou must pray the god one little, little
Most innocent request to grant to thee--
One that may seal his love and godhead too.
He'll swear by Styx. The Styx he must obey!
That oath he dares not break! Then speak these words:
"Thou shalt not touch this body, till thou comest
To Cadmus' daughter clothed in all the might
Wherein thou art embraced by Kronos' daughter!"
Be not thou terrified, my Semele,
If he, in order to escape thy wish,
As bugbears paints the horrors of his presence--
Describes the flames that round about him roar,
The thunder round him rolling when he comes:
These, Semele, are naught but empty fears--
The gods dislike to show to us frail mortals
These the most glorious of their attributes;
Be thou but obstinate in thy request,
And Juno's self will gaze on thee with envy.
SEMELE.
The frightful ox-eyed one! How often he
Complains, in the blest moments of our love,
Of her tormenting him with her black gall--
JUNO. (Aside, furiously, but with embarrassment.)
Ha! creature! Thou shalt die for this contempt!
SEMELE.
My Beroe! What art thou murmuring there?
JUNO. (In confusion.)
Nothing, my Semele! Black gall torments
Me also--Yes! a sharp, reproachful look
With lovers often passes as black gall--
Yet ox-eyes, after all, are not so ugly.
SEMELE.
Oh, Beroe, for shame! they're quite the worst
That any head can possibly contain!
And then her cheeks of green and yellow hues,
The obvious penalty of poisonous envy--
Zeus oft complains to me that that same shrew
Each night torments him with her nauseous love,
And with her jealous whims,--enough, I'm sure,
Into Ixion's wheel to turn all heaven.
JUNO. (Raving up and down in extreme confusion.)
No more of this!
SEMELE. What, Beroe! So angry?
Have I said more than what is true? Said more
Than what is wise?
JUNO. Thou hast said more, young woman,
Than what is true--said more than what is wise!
Deem thyself truly blest, if thy blue eyes
Smile thee not into Charon's bark too soon!
Saturnia has her altars and her temples,
And wanders amongst mortals--that great goddess
Avenges naught so bitterly as scorn
SEMELE.
Here let her wander, and give birth to scorn!
What is't to me?--My Jupiter protects
My every hair,--what harm can Juno do?
But now, enough of this, my Beroe!
Zeus must appear to-day in all his glory;
And if Saturnia should on that account
Find out the path to Orcus--
JUNO. (Aside.) That same path
Another probably will find before her,
If but Kronion's lightning hits the mark!--
(To Semele.)
Yes, Semele, she well may burst with envy
When Cadmus' daughter, in the sight of Greece,
Ascends in triumph to Olympus' heights!--
SEMELE. (Smiling gently.)
Thinkest thou they'll hear in Greece of Cadmus' daughter?
JUNO. From Sidon to Athens the trumpet of fame
Shall ring with no other but Semele's name!
The gods from the heavens shall even descend,
And before thee their knees in deep homage shall bend,
While mortals in silent submission abide
The will of the giant-destroyer's loved bride;
And when distant years shall see
Thy last hour--
SEMELE. (Springing up, and falling on her neck.)
Oh, Beroe!
JUNO. Then a tablet white shall bear
This inscription graven there:
Here is worshipped Semele!
Who on earth so fair as she?
She who from Olympus' throne
Lured the thunder-hurler down!
She who, with her kisses sweet,
Laid him prostrate at her feet!
And when fame on her thousand wings bears it around,
The echo from valley and hill shall resound.
SEMELE. (Beside herself.)
Pythia! Apollo! Hear!
When, oh when will he appear?
JUNO. And on smoking altars they
Rites divine to thee shall pay--
SEMELE. (Inspired.)
I will harken to their prayer,
And will drive away their care,--
Quench with my tears the lightning of great Jove,
His breast to pity with entreaty move!
JUNO. (Aside.)
Poor thing! that wilt thou ne'er have power to do. (Meditating.)
Ere long will melt . . . yet--yet--she called me ugly!--
No pity only when in Tartarus!
(To Semele.)
Fly now, my love! Make haste to leave this spot,
That Zeus may not observe thee--Let him wait
Long for thy coming, that he with more fire
May languish for thee--
SEMELE. Beroe! The heavens
Have chosen thee their mouthpiece! Happy I!
The gods from Olympus shall even descend,
And before me their knees in deep homage shall bend,
While mortals in silent submission abide--
But hold!--'tis time for me to haste away!
[Exit hurriedly.
JUNO. (Looking after her with exultation.)
Weak, proud, and easily-deluded woman!
His tender looks shall be consuming fire--
His kiss, annihilation--his embrace,
A raging tempest to thee! Human frames
Are powerless to endure the dreaded presence
Of him who wields the thunderbolt on high!
(With raving ecstasy.)
Ha! when her waxen mortal body melts
Within the arms of him, the fire-distilling,
As melts the fleecy snow before the heat
Of the bright sun--and when the perjured one
In place of his soft tender bride, embraces
A form of terror--with what ecstasy
Shall I gaze downwards from Cithaeron's height,
Exclaiming, so that in his hand the bolt
Shall quake: "For shame, Saturnius! Fie, for shame!
What need is there for thee to clasp so roughly?"
[Exit hastily.
(A, Symphony.)
SCENE II.
The Hall as before.--Sudden brightness.
ZEUS in the shape of a youth.--MERCURY in the distance.
ZEUS.
Thou son of Maia!
MERCURY. (Kneeling, with his head bowed reverentially.)
Zeus!
ZEUS. Up! Hasten! Turn
Thy pinions' flight toward far Scamander's bank!
A shepherd there is weeping o'er the grave
Of his loved shepherdess. No one shall weep
When Zeus is loving: Call the dead to life!
MERCURY. (Rising.)
Let but thy head a nod almighty give,
And in an instant I am there,--am back
In the same instant--
ZEUS. Stay! As I o'er Argos
Was flying, from my temples curling rose
The sacrificial smoke: it gave me joy
That thus the people worship me--so fly
To Ceres, to my sister,--thus speaks Zeus:
"Ten-thousandfold for fifty years to come
Let her reward the Argive husbandmen!"--
MERCURY.
With trembling haste I execute thy wrath,--
With joyous speed thy messages of grace,
Father of all! For to the deities
'Tis bliss to make man happy; to destroy him
Is anguish to the gods. Thy will be done!
Where shall I pour into thine ears their thanks,--
Below in dust, or at thy throne on high?
ZEUS.
Here at my throne on earth--within the palace,
Of Semele! Away! [Exit Mercury.
Does she not come,
As is her wont, Olympus' mighty king
To clasp against her rapture-swelling breast?
Why hastens not my Semele to meet me?
A vacant, deathlike, fearful silence reigns
On every side around the lonely palace,
So wont to ring with wild bacchantic shouts--
No breath is stirring--on Cithaeron's height
Exulting Juno stands. Will Semele
Never again make haste to meet her Zeus?
(A pause, after which he continues.)
Ha! Can yon impious one perchance have dared
To set her foot in my love's sanctuary?--
Saturnia--Mount Cithaeron--her rejoicings
Fearful foreboding!--Semele--yet peace!--
Take courage!--I'm thy Zeus! the scattered heavens
Shall learn, my Semele, that I'm thy Zeus!
Where is the breath of air that dares presume
Roughly to blow on her whom Zeus calls His?
I scoff at all her malice.--Where art thou,
O Semele? I long have pined to rest
My world-tormented head upon thy breast,--
To lull my wearied senses to repose
From the wild storm of earthly joys and woes,--
To dream away the emblems of my might,
My reins, my tiller, and my chariot bright,
And live for naught beyond the joys of love!
Oh heavenly inspiration, that can move
Even the Gods divine! What is the blood
Of mighty Uranus--what all the flood
Of nectar and ambrosia--what the throne
Of high Olympus--what the power I own,
The golden sceptre of the starry skies--
What the omnipotence that never dies,
What might eternal, immortality--
What e'en a god, oh love, if reft of thee?
The shepherd who, beside the murmuring brooks,
Leans on his true love's breast, nor cares to look
After his straying lambs, in that sweet hour
Envies me not my thunderbolt of power!
She comes--she hastens nigh! Pearl of my works,
Woman! the artist who created thee
Should be adored. 'Twas I--myself I worship
Zeus worships Zeus, for Zeus created thee.
Ha! Who will now, in all the being-realm,
Condemn me? How unseen, yes, how despised
Dwindle away my worlds, my constellations
So ray-diffusing, all my dancing systems,
What wise men call the music of my spheres!--
How dead are all when weighed against a soul!
(Semele approaches, without looking up.)
My pride! my throne on earth! Oh Semele!
(He rushes towards her; she seeks to fly.)
Thou flyest?--art mute?--Ha! Semele! thou flyest?
SEMELE. (Repulsing him.)
Away!
ZEUS. (After a pause of astonishment.)
Is Jupiter asleep? Will Nature
Rush to her fall?--Can Semele speak thus?
What, not an answer? Eagerly mine arms
Toward thee are stretched--my bosom never throbbed
Responsive to Agenor's daughter,--never
Throbbed against Leda's breast,--my lips ne'er burned
For the sweet kiss of prisoned Danae,
As now--
SEMELE. Peace, traitor! Peace!
ZEUS. (With displeasure, but tenderly.) My Semele!
SEMELE.
Out of my sight!
ZEUS. (Looking at her with majesty.)
Know, I am Zeus!
SEMELE. Thou Zeus?
Tremble, Salmoneus, for he fearfully
Will soon demand again the stolen charms
That thou hast robbed him of--thou art not Zeus!
ZEUS. (With dignity.)
The mighty universe around me whirls,
And calls me so--
SEMELE. Ha! Fearful blasphemy!
ZEUS. (More gently.)
How, my divine one? Wherefore such a tone?
What reptile dares to steal thine heart from me?
SEMELE.
My heart was vowed to him whose ape thou art!
Men ofttimes come beneath a godlike form
To snare a woman. Hence! thou art not Zeus!
ZEUS.
Thou doubtest? What! Can Semele still doubt
My godhead?
SEMELE. (Mournfully.)
Would that thou wert Zeus! No son
Of morrow-nothingness shall touch this mouth;
This heart is vowed to Zeus! Would thou wert he!
ZEUS. Thou weepest? Zeus is here,--weeps Semele?
(Falling down before her.)
Speak! But command! and then shall slavish nature
Lie trembling at the feet of Cadmus' daughter!
Command! and streams shall instantly make halt--
And Helicon, and Caucasus, and Cynthus,
And Athos, Mycale, and Rhodope, and Pindus,
Shall burst their bonds when I order it so,
And kiss the valleys and plains below,
And dance in the breeze like flakes of snow.
Command! and the winds from the east and the north,
And the fierce tornado shall sally forth,
While Poseidon's trident their power shall own,
When they shake to its base his watery throne;
The billows in angry fury shall rise,
And every sea-mark and dam despise;
The lightning shall gleam through the firmament black
While the poles of earth and of heaven shall crack,
The ocean the heights of Olympus explore,
From thousandfold jaws with wild deafening roar
The thunder shall howl, while with mad jubilee
The hurricane fierce sings in triumph to thee.
Command--
SEMELE, I'm but a woman, a frail woman
How can the potter bend before his pot?
How can the artist kneel before his statue?
ZEUS.
Pygmalion bowed before his masterpiece--
And Zeus now worships his own Semele!
SEMELE. (Weeping bitterly.)
Arise--arise! Alas for us poor maidens!
Zeus has my heart, gods only can I love,
The gods deride me, Zeus despises me!
ZEUS. Zeus who is now before thy feet--
SEMELE. Arise!
Zeus reigns on high, above the thunderbolts,
And, clasped in Juno's arms, a reptile scorns.
ZEUS. (Hastily.)
Ha! Semele and Juno!--which the reptile!
SEMELE.
How blessed beyond all utterance would be
Cadmus' daughter--wert thou Zeus! Alas!
Thou art not Zeus!
ZEUS. (Arises.) I am!
(He extends his hand, and a rainbow fills the hall; music
accompanies its appearance.)
Knowest thou me now?
SEMELE.
Strong is that mortal's arm whom gods protect,--
Saturnius loves thee--none can I e'er love
But deities--
ZEUS. What! art thou doubting still
Whether my might is lent me by the gods
And not god-born? The gods, my Semele,
In charity oft lend their strength to man;
Ne'er do the deities their terrors lend--
Death and destruction is the godhead's seal--
Bearer of death to thee were Zeus unveiled!
(He extends his hand. Thunder, fire, smoke, and earthquake.
Music accompanies the spell here and subsequently.)
SEMELE.
Withdraw, withdraw thy hand!--Oh, mercy, mercy,
For the poor nation! Yes, thou art the child
Of great Saturnius--
ZEUS. Ha! thou thoughtless one!
Shall Zeus, to please a woman's stubbornness,
Bid planets whirl, and bid the suns stand still?
Zeus will do so!--oft has a god's descendant
Ripped up the fire-impregnate womb of rocks,
And yet his might's confined to Tellus' bounds
Zeus only can do this!
(He extends his hand--the sun vanishes, and it becomes
suddenly night.)
SEMELE. (Falling down before him.)
Almighty one!
Couldst thou but love! [Day reappears.
ZEUS. Ha! Cadmus' daughter asks
Kronion if Kronion e'er can love!
One word and he throws off divinity--
Is flesh and blood, and dies, and is beloved!
SEMELE.
Would Zeus do that?
ZEUS. Speak, Semele! What more?
Apollo's self confesses that 'tis bliss
To be a man 'mongst men--a sign from thee,
And I'm a man!
SEMELE. (Falling on his neck.)
Oh Jupiter, the Epidaurus women
Thy Semele a foolish maiden call,
Because, though by the Thunderer beloved,
She can obtain naught from him--
ZEUS. (Eagerly.) They shall blush,
Those Epidaurus women! Ask!--but ask!
And by the dreaded Styx--whose boundless might
Binds e'en the gods like slaves--if Zeus deny thee,
Then shall the gods, e'en in that self-same moment,
Hurl me despairing to annihilation!
SEMELE. (Springing up joyfully.)
By this I know that thou'rt my Jupiter!
Thou swearest--and the Styx has heard thine oath!
Let me embrace thee, then, in the same guise
In which--
ZEUS. (Shrieking with alarm.)
Unhappy one! Oh stay! oh stay!
SEMELE. Saturnia--
ZEUS. (Attempting to stop her mouth.)
Be thou dumb!
SEMELE. Embraces thee.
ZEUS. (Pale, and turning away.)
Too late! The sound escaped!--The Styx!--'Tis death
Thou, Semele, hast gained!
SEMELE. Ha! Loves Zeus thus?
ZEUS.
All heaven I would have given, had I only
Loved thee but less! (Gazing at her with cold
horror.) Thou'rt lost--
SEMELE. Oh, Jupiter!
ZEUS. (Speaking furiously to himself,)
Ah! Now I mark thine exultation, Juno!
Accursed jealousy! This rose must die!
Too fair--alas! too sweet for Acheron!
SEMELE.
Methinks thou'rt niggard of thy majesty!
ZEUS.
Accursed be my majesty, that now
Has blinded thee! Accursed be my greatness,
That must destroy thee! Cursed be I myself
For having built my bliss on crumbling dust!
SEMELE.
These are but empty terrors, Zeus! In truth
I do not dread thy threats!
ZEUS. Deluded child!
Go! take a last farewell forever more
Of all thy friends beloved--naught, naught has power
To save thee, Semele! I am thy Zeus!
Yet that no more--Go--
SEMELE. Jealous one! the Styx!--
Think not that thou'lt be able to escape me. [Exit.
ZEUS.
No! Juno shall not triumph.--She shall tremble--
Aye, and by virtue of the deadly might
That makes the earth and makes the heavens my footstool,
Upon the sharpest rock in Thracia's land
With adamantine chains I'll bind her fast.
But, oh, this oath--
[Mercury appears in the distance.
What means thy hasty flight?
MERCURY.
I bring the fiery, winged, and weeping thanks
Of those whom thou hast blessed--
ZEUS. Again destroy them!
MERCURY. (In amazement.)
Zeus!
ZEUS. None shall now be blessed! She dies--
[The curtain falls.
POEMS OF THE SECOND PERIOD.
HYMN TO JOY.
Joy, thou goddess, fair, immortal,
Offspring of Elysium,
Mad with rapture, to the portal
Of thy holy fame we come!
Fashion's laws, indeed, may sever,
But thy magic joins again;
All mankind are brethren ever
'Neath thy mild and gentle reign.
CHORUS.
Welcome, all ye myriad creatures!
Brethren, take the kiss of love!
Yes, the starry realms above
Hide a Father's smiling features!
He, that noble prize possessing--
He that boasts a friend that's true,
He whom woman's love is blessing,
Let him join the chorus too!
Aye, and he who but one spirit
On this earth can call his own!
He who no such bliss can merit,
Let him mourn his fate alone!
CHORUS.
All who Nature's tribes are swelling
Homage pay to sympathy;
For she guides us up on high,
Where the unknown has his dwelling.
From the breasts of kindly Nature
All of joy imbibe the dew;
Good and bad alike, each creature
Would her roseate path pursue.
'Tis through her the wine-cup maddens,
Love and friends to man she gives!
Bliss the meanest reptile gladdens,--
Near God's throne the cherub lives!
CHORUS.
Bow before him, all creation!
Mortals, own the God of love!
Seek him high the stars above,--
Yonder is his habitation!
Joy, in Nature's wide dominion,
Mightiest cause of all is found;
And 'tis joy that moves the pinion,
When the wheel of time goes round;
From the bud she lures the flower--
Suns from out their orbs of light;
Distant spheres obey her power,
Far beyond all mortal sight.
CHORUS.
As through heaven's expanse so glorious
In their orbits suns roll on,
Brethren, thus your proud race run,
Glad as warriors all-victorious!
Joy from truth's own glass of fire
Sweetly on the searcher smiles;
Lest on virtue's steeps he tire,
Joy the tedious path beguiles.
High on faith's bright hill before us,
See her banner proudly wave!
Joy, too, swells the angels' chorus,--
Bursts the bondage of the grave!
CHORUS.
Mortals, meekly wait for heaven
Suffer on in patient love!
In the starry realms above,
Bright rewards by God are given.
To the Gods we ne'er can render
Praise for every good they grant;
Let us, with devotion tender,
Minister to grief and want.
Quenched be hate and wrath forever,
Pardoned be our mortal foe--
May our tears upbraid him never,
No repentance bring him low!
CHORUS.
Sense of wrongs forget to treasure--
Brethren, live in perfect love!
In the starry realms above,
God will mete as we may measure.
Joy within the goblet flushes,
For the golden nectar, wine,
Every fierce emotion hushes,--
Fills the breast with fire divine.
Brethren, thus in rapture meeting,
Send ye round the brimming cup,--
Yonder kindly spirit greeting,
While the foam to heaven mounts up!
CHORUS.
He whom seraphs worship ever;
Whom the stars praise as they roll,
Yes to him now drain the bowl
Mortal eye can see him never!
Courage, ne'er by sorrow broken!
Aid where tears of virtue flow;
Faith to keep each promise spoken!
Truth alike to friend and foe!
'Neath kings' frowns a manly spirit!--
Brethren, noble is the prize--
Honor due to every merit!
Death to all the brood of lies!
CHORUS.
Draw the sacred circle closer!
By this bright wine plight your troth
To be faithful to your oath!
Swear it by the Star-Disposer!
Safety from the tyrant's power! [9]
Mercy e'en to traitors base!
Hope in death's last solemn hour!
Pardon when before His face!
Lo, the dead shall rise to heaven!
Brethren hail the blest decree;
Every sin shall be forgiven,
Hell forever cease to be!
CHORUS.
When the golden bowl is broken,
Gentle sleep within the tomb!
Brethren, may a gracious doom
By the Judge of man be spoken!
THE INVINCIBLE ARMADA.
She comes, she comes--the burden of the deeps!
Beneath her wails the universal sea!
With clanking chains and a new god, she sweeps,
And with a thousand thunders, unto thee!
The ocean-castles and the floating hosts--
Ne'er on their like looked the wild water!--Well
May man the monster name "Invincible."
O'er shuddering waves she gathers to thy coasts!
The horror that she spreads can claim
Just title to her haughty name.
The trembling Neptune quails
Under the silent and majestic forms;
The doom of worlds in those dark sails;--
Near and more near they sweep! and slumber all the storms!
Before thee, the array,
Blest island, empress of the sea!
The sea-born squadrons threaten thee,
And thy great heart, Britannia!
Woe to thy people, of their freedom proud--
She rests, a thunder heavy in its cloud!
Who, to thy hand the orb and sceptre gave,
That thou should'st be the sovereign of the nations?
To tyrant kings thou wert thyself the slave,
Till freedom dug from law its deep foundations;
The mighty Chart the citizens made kings,
And kings to citizens sublimely bowed!
And thou thyself, upon thy realm of water,
Hast thou not rendered millions up to slaughter,
When thy ships brought upon their sailing wings
The sceptre--and the shroud?
What should'st thou thank?--Blush, earth, to hear and feel
What should'st thou thank?--Thy genius and thy steel!
Behold the hidden and the giant fires!
Behold thy glory trembling to its fall!
Thy coming doom the round earth shall appal,
And all the hearts of freemen beat for thee,
And all free souls their fate in thine foresee--
Theirs is thy glory's fall!
One look below the Almighty gave,
Where streamed the lion-flags of thy proud foe;
And near and wider yawned the horrent grave.
"And who," saith He, "shall lay mine England low--
The stem that blooms with hero-deeds--
The rock when man from wrong a refuge needs--
The stronghold where the tyrant comes in vain?
Who shall bid England vanish from the main?
Ne'er be this only Eden freedom knew,
Man's stout defence from power, to fate consigned."
God the Almighty blew,
And the Armada went to every wind!
THE GODS OF GREECE.
Ye in the age gone by,
Who ruled the world--a world how lovely then!--
And guided still the steps of happy men
In the light leading-strings of careless joy!
Ah, flourished then your service of delight!
How different, oh, how different, in the day
When thy sweet fanes with many a wreath were bright,
O Venus Amathusia!
