University of Virginia Library

Scene II.

—The Senate-house.
Count Gonsalvi, Count Arrezi, Nobles, Attendants, &c.
GONSALVI
(taking a seat).
Henceforward Florence claims your fealty;
She will secure you in all ancient rights,
Immunity, and privilege: her sword
Will stand between ye and your enemies.
For this a yearly tribute must be paid
Of twenty thousand florins.

2ND NOBLE.
Our treasury's low, my lord.

GONSALVI.
And so is ours,
Exhausted by the late vexatious war.

2ND NOBLE.
Urged by the Count Castruccio, not ourselves.

GONSALVI.
It must be paid.

2ND NOBLE.
Well, well,
The goldsmiths round our market-place are rich.
The citizens, too, better being poor,
As more obedient, right that they should pay
The penalty of their rebellious spirit.

GONSALVI
(rising).
I leave you till to-morrow, when I bring
The treaty ready for your signatures,
And will receive your homage and your oaths.

—[Exit.
1ST NOBLE.
Homage and tribute—these are bitter words!

2ND NOBLE.
Less bitter than the Castrucani's sway.

1ST NOBLE.
To-day must fix his fate. What is his doom?

SEVERAL NOBLES.
Death!

ARREZI.
Rather say exile.

2ND NOBLE.
Yes, and one week sees him again our chief!

ARREZI.
He may be kept strict prisoner.

2ND NOBLE.
And keep perpetual terror o'er our heads.

SEVERAL NOBLES.
His scaffold is our safety.

ARREZI.
We dare not raise that scaffold.

SEVERAL NOBLES.
Dare not!

ARREZI.
The citizens would rise in his defence.

1ST NOBLE.
Not with our swords to teach them what they are.

2ND NOBLE.
Why risk a tumult that we well may spare,
While Lucca has a dagger?

1ST NOBLE.
He shall not perish by the assassin's hand.

2ND NOBLE.
So that he perish, little matters how.

ARREZI.
The tumult would be fearful.

1ST NOBLE.
Even now
The people gather fiercely in the streets.

2ND NOBLE.
Let them not see him, they will soon forget.

ARREZI.
Hark to the shouts!

1ST NOBLE.
I have a useful knave, who, give him gold,
Stabs and forgets; I'll send him to the prison.

2ND NOBLE.
The noise approaches, look ye to your swords.

1ST NOBLE.
Delay is fatal—let Castruccio die!

(While he is speaking the doors are burst open, and Castruccio enters, armed and attended.
CASTRUCCIO.
Not yet, nor by your hand! Thanks, gentlemen,
For an indifferent lodging. I have learnt
That prisons, tenanted with thoughts of death,
Is not a punishment to order lightly;
Therefore, ye shall not fill my vacant place.

2ND NOBLE.
The game is yours—I, for one, ask not mercy!

CASTRUCCIO.
And, therefore, worthier to have unask'd.
Ye do mistake me, signors: all my thoughts
To ye are grateful ones. But for your rash
And ill-advised attempt, I had not known
How true the love on which my power is built—
How strong the cause the people trust with me!

Re-enter Count Gonsalvi.
GONSALVI.
I must demand some escort: for the streets
Are fill'd with people, and unwillingly
Would I shed blood. What! Castrucani here?

CASTRUCCIO.
Ready to give the Count Gonsalvi audience,
And ask, what are the terms he brings from Florence?

GONSALVI.
With these, the representatives of Lucca,
I have arranged our treaty.

CASTRUCCIO.
On what terms?

GONSALVI.
That ye submit yourselves, and pledge your faith
True vassals unto Florence: and each year
Remit your tribute—twenty thousand florins!

CASTRUCCIO.
Tribute and homage! can they sink so low,
Men who have met ye bravely in the field?
Now hear me, Count Gonsalvi: Lucca rather
Would see her walls dismantled, than consent
To yield such base submission!

GONSALVI.
These are her chiefs—in their consent she yields.

CASTRUCCIO
You see that they are silent. By my voice
Does Lucca speak: she would be glad of peace,
An equal, sure, and honourable peace—
To terms like these she has but one reply—defiance.

GONSALVI.
Florence will teach you better in the field!

CASTRUCCIO.
This to your conqueror: not three weeks have pass'd
Since, in the field, we met. I think you found
More service from your spurs than from your swords.

GONSALVI.
'Twas an unlucky chance of war.

CASTRUCCIO.
Not so, my lord; there was a higher cause—
The right against the wrong. Your army came,
A mercenary and a selfish band,
Some urged by false ambition, some for spoil.
No noble motive noble impulse gave:
Ye were aggressors, and ye fought like such.
I tell you, count, with not a third your numbers
I chased your flying hosts within your gates.

GONSALVI.
I came not for a boast but for an answer—
War or submission.

CASTRUCCIO.
War or submission! sad such choice and stern:
Vast is the suffering—great the wrong of war!
But—and all Lucca speaketh in these words—
Rather we take the suffering; and the wrong
Rests on the oppressor's head, than we submit.
Not while one hand can strike on Lucca's side,
Not while one stone is left of Lucca's walls,
Not while one heart beats in our country's cause,
Will Lucca stoop beneath a foreign yoke.
Ye only fight for conquest or for spoil:
We for our homes, our rights, our ancient walls!
The sword is drawn—God be the judge between us!

GONSALVI.
Have ye no other answer?

CASTRUCCIO.
None! Cesario is your escort to the gates.

GONSALVI.
I take your answer—war, then, to the death.

—[Exit.
2ND NOBLE.
Are ye not rash in this? how weak our state,
Compared with Florence.

CASTRUCCIO.
Twice have we met them in the open field,
Each time they fled before us. Oh! my friends,
If I may call ye such, we are not weak
Who have our own good swords, and urge a war
Just in the sight of heaven. Our weakness lies
In our dissension, in the small base aims
That disunite us from the common cause.
Lucca were strong, had Lucca but one heart!
Why should ye be mine enemies? I seek
Yours in the general good. I stand between
Ye and a people whom ye would oppress.
Know ye not, love has stronger rule than fear?
A country, fill'd with tyrants and with slaves,
What waits upon her history?—crime and shame!
But the free state, where every rank is knit
By general blessings, freedom shared by all,
There is prosperity—there those great names
Whose glory lingers though themselves be gone.
It is not I ye serve, it is your country!

—(Applause.)
2ND NOBLE.
(Aside).
I see that we must yield, or seem to yield;
He's master now.

CASTRUCCIO.
And for this base submission
To your hereditary enemies,
There is no yoke so galling as the yoke
Foreign invaders place upon your neck!
The heavy and the arbitrary sway
That ye would fix upon your countrymen,
Would soon be on yourselves. Lucca is free;
To keep her so is trusted to your swords!
I march to meet the Florentines to-morrow;
Will ye not follow me for Lucca's sake?

NOBLES.
We will.

CASTRUCCIO.
Now must I forth to thank the citizens.
(Sees Arrezi.)
The Count Arrezi here!

ARREZI.
I came here as your friend.

CASTRUCCIO.
Then bear but hence my greetings to your daughter.

ARREZI.
My lord, she is much honour'd!

(Shouts without.)
CASTRUCCIO.
The people are impatient, let us forth:
I am impatient, too, to thank their love.
We will go forth together, and with them
Make common cause.

[Exeunt.