 | The Apostate |  |
SCENE I.
A Moorish Apartment in Grenada.Enter Hemeya, Hamet, and Haly.
Hem.
It is in vain—you talk to me in vain.
Ham.
Have you forgot that you are last of all
The race of famous kings who ruled Grenada
Before the Spaniard conquer'd? In their slavery,
The Moors still hold you for their righteous prince;
And, in return for kingly reverence,
You owe them kingly care.
Haly.
Once, I remember,
The wrongs our Christian tyrants heap upon us
Could fire your soul with rage.—Aloud you cried
Against the treach'rous breach of ev'ry right
That Ferdinand secured; but now, when fame
Has told abroad, that Philip will blot out
The very name of Moor, and has decreed
To rob us of our faith, our nation's rites,
Our sacred usages, and all that men
2
Has bound you like a spell.
Ham.
This Spanish woman
Has banish'd from your soul each nobler care.—
The daughter of Alvarez—she alone
Possesses all your being! You can think
And speak but of Florinda—When the Moors
Weep o'er their cruel wrongs, Aben Hemeya,
Amid the assembled council sits enrapt,
And, in a lengthen'd sigh, breathes out “Florinda!”
Hem.
Oh! blame me not, it is my cruel fate!
I feel this passion, like necessity,
Rule my o'ermaster'd soul. What can you say?
Is there a pow'r in eloquence or reason
To cure the heart's deep malady?—Ha! tell me,
Have you e'er seen her face? have you beheld
That rare assemblage of all nature's beauties?
Ah! have you ever seen her? Where is the remedy
For passion like to mine?
Hal.
You should have found it,
If not in duty, in despair.—You know
Our Spanish tyrants spurn as well as hate us—
Would not Alvarez deem it infamy
That e'en a Moorish prince should wed Florinda?
When you approach his palace, ev'ry slave,
The menials of his threshold, cry, in scorn,
“Behold the Moor!”
And e'en the fair Florinda
Has ne'er confessed she smiles upon your passion.
And yet you love—
3
And must love on for ever.
Love is a fire self-fed, and does not need
Hope to preserve its flame. Full well I know
I must despair—and yet, when I behold her,
And her blue eyes are lifted—
Ham.
What avails it?
Even if she loved, she never could be yours—
Is she not promised to Grenada's governor?
Hem.
Kind heaven, let not that fell Pescara clasp
Those beauties to his bosom, and profane
An angel's form in his accurs'd embrace!
Oh no! it will not be—for she abhors him!
She shudders when she sees that man of blood,
Whom Philip sends to crush us. Well she feels
That he was once the Inquisition's satellite,
Till Philip pluck'd the cowl from off his front,
To raise him to his councils. Oh! Florinda,
Before I see thee his, may Heav'n's swift fire
Fall on my head!
Hal.
Weak and degenerate passion!
How it unmans your nature! I perceive
Malec alone can break this fatal charm.
Would that the aged Moor, to whom your father
Upon his death-bed gave you, had return'd!
Too long amid the Moorish mountaineers
He lingers from Grenada. Would he were here,
To wake your slumb'ring virtue!
Hem.
(Going)
Fare you well!
Hal.
Where wouldst thou go? 'Tis midnight's silent hour.
4
Repose and sleep for you; nor, till the morn,
Pale and aghast you come.
Hem.
This is my hour,
My only hour of joy. Haly, I go
To stand beside her lattice—there, sometimes,
I hear her distant voice, when up to heav'n
It goes in midnight melody. The moon
Throws, sometimes, on her face, its tender beams;
And e'en when I no longer can behold her,
I see the light that from the casement shines,
And gaze upon it, as it were the star
Of lovers, till the morning. Hark!
Hal.
A sound
Of far-off tumult murmurs on mine ear,
Like ocean's chafing surge—
Ham.
Behold, the sky
Doth redden in the black horizon's verge;
A strong unnatural light streams o'er the dark,
And mocks the dawn of morn.
(Fire-Bell heard.)
Enter a Moor.
Moor.
My lord, the palace
Of Count Alvarez stands enwrapped in fire!
Hem.
Florinda? Speak!
Moor.
She has not yet been seen.
Hem.
Oh heavens, Florinda!
[Exeunt.
| The Apostate | |