University of Virginia Library

SCENE III.

The great Square of the City. Adrastus seated on a throne; Agenor, Timocles, Cleon, and others, seated as Councillors—Soldiers line the stage at a distance.
ADRASTUS.
Upon your summons, Sages, I am here;
Your king attends to know your pleasure—speak it!

AGENOR.
And canst thou ask? If the heart dead within thee
Receives no impress of this awful time,
Art thou of sense forsaken? Are thine ears
So charm'd by strains of slavish minstrelsy
That the dull groan and frenzy-pointed shriek
Pass them unheard to Heaven? Or are thine eyes
So conversant with prodigies of grief
They cease to dazzle at them? Art thou arm'd
'Gainst wonder, while, in all things, nature turns
To dreadful contraries;—while Youth's full cheek
Is shrivell'd into furrows of sad years,
And 'neath its glossy curls untinged by care
Looks out a keen anatomy;—while Age
Is stung by feverish torture for an hour
Into youth's strength;—while manly Sorrow steals
From fragile girlishness hysteric tears;—
While Womanhood, made hardy by despair,
Starts into frightful courage, all unlike
The gentle strength its gentle weakness feeds
To make affliction beautiful, and stalks
Abroad, a tearless, an unshuddering thing;—
While Childhood, roaming parentless and free,
Finds, in the shapes of wretchedness which seem
Grotesque to its unsadden'd vision, cause
For dreadful mirth that shortly shall be hush'd
In never-broken silence; and while Love,
Immortal through all change, makes ghastly Death
Its idol of desire, and restless seeks,
'Mid images sepulchral, for the gauds
To cheat its fancy with?—Do sights like these
Glare through the realm thou shouldst be parent to,
And canst thou find the voice to ask “our pleasure?”

ADRASTUS.
Cease, babbler;—wherefore would ye stun my ears
With vain recital of the griefs I know,
And cannot heal?—will treason turn aside
The shafts of fate, or cure the ills of nature?
I have no skill in medicine, and no power
To sway the elements.

AGENOR.
Thou hast the power
To cast away thy flatterers; to put on
Some show of pity for thy people's sorrows;
To throw thyself upon the ground with them
In lowly penitence; or, if this power
Hath left a heart made weak by luxury
And hard by pride, thou had at least the power
To cease the mockery of thy frantic revels.

ADRASTUS.
I have yet power to punish insult—look,
I use it not, Agenor!—Fate may dash
My sceptre from me, but shall not command
My will to hold it with a feebler grasp;
Nay, if few hours of empire yet are mine,
They shall be colored with a sterner pride,
And peopled with more lustrous joys than flush'd
In the serene procession of its greatness,
Which look'd perpetual, as the flowing course
Of human things. Have ye beheld a pine
That clasp'd the mountain summit with a root
As firm as its rough marble, and apart
From the huge shade of undistinguish'd trees,
Lifted its head as in delight to share
The evening glories of the sky, and taste
The wanton dalliance of the heavenly breeze
That no ignoble vapour from the vale
Could climb to mingle with,—in wild caprice
Of frolic, Jove, smit by the thunder's marl
And lighted for destruction? How it stood
One glorious moment, fringed and wreathed with flame
Which show'd the inward graces of its shape,
Uncumber'd now, and midst its topmost boughs
That young Ambition's airy fancies made
Their giddy nest, leap'd sportive;—never clad
By liberal summer in a pomp so rich
As waited on its downfall, while it took
The storm-cloud roll'd behind it for a curtain
To gird its splendors round, and made the blast
Its minister to whirl its flashing shreds
Aloft towards heaven, or to the startled depths
Of forests that afar might share its doom!
So shall the royalty of Argos pass
In festal blaze to darkness. Have ye spoken?

AGENOR.
I speak no more to thee!—Great Jove look down!

[Shouting without.]
ADRASTUS.
What factious brawl is this?—disperse it, soldiers.
[Shouting renewed—As some of the soldiers are about to march, Phocion rushes in, followed by Ctesiphon, Ion, and Medon.]
Whence is this insolent intrusion?

PHOCION.
King!
I bear Apollo's answer to thy prayer.

ADRASTUS.
Has not thy travel taught thy knee its duty?
Here we had school'd thee better.

PHOCION.
Kneel to thee!

MEDON.
Patience, my son! Do homage to the king.

PHOCION.
Never!—thou talk'st of schooling—know, Adrastus,
That I have studied in a nobler school
Than the dull haunt of venal sophistry
Or the lewd guard-room;—where the sky extends
Its arch for all, and mocks the petty span
Of earth-built palaces and dungeons; where
The heart, beneath the meanest vestment, claims
Alliance with diviner things than state
Of monarchs or their minions, I have found
My teachers—and their lessons make me blush
To see a thousand of my fellows cringe
Before a creature moulded like themselves
In all things save in pity and in love.

ADRASTUS.
Peace! speak thy message.

PHOCION.
Shall I tell it here?
Or shall I seek thy couch at dead of night
And breathe it in low whispers?—As thou wilt.

ADRASTUS.
Here—and this instant!

PHOCION.
Harken then, Adrastus,
And harken, Argives—thus Apollo speaks!
[Reads a scroll.]
“Argos ne'er shall find release
“Till her monarch's race shall cease.”

ADRASTUS.
'Tis not the god, but man's sedition speaks:—
Guards! tear that lying parchment from his hands,
And bear him to the palace.

MEDON.
Touch him not,—
He is Apollo's messenger, whose lips
Were never stain'd with falsehood.

PHOCION.
Come on all!

AGENOR.
Surround him, friends! Die with him!

ADRASTUS.
Soldiers, charge
Upon these rebels; hew them down. On, on!

The Soldiers advance and surround the people; they seize Phocion. Ion rushes from the back of the stage, and throws himself between Adrastus and Phocion.
Phocion
to Adrastus.
Yet I defy thee.

ION.
[To Phocion.]
O my friend, forbear;
For thy dear father's sake—for sake of all—
Enrage him not—one moment while I plead—
[To Adrastus.]
My sovereign, pause in thy rash course: thou art
Here upon my entreaty, do not stain
This sacred place with blood; in Heaven's great name
I do conjure thee—and in hers, whose spirit
Perchance is mourning for thee now!

ADRASTUS.
Release him—
Let him go spread his treason where he will,
He is not worth my anger. To the palace!

ION.
Nay, yet an instant!—let my speech have power
From Heaven to move thee further: thou hast heard
The sentence of the god, and thy heart owns it;
If thou wilt cast aside this cumbrous pomp,
And in seclusion purify thy soul
Long fever'd and sophisticate, the gods
May give thee space for penitential thoughts;
If not—as surely as thou standest here,
Wilt thou lie stiff and weltering in thy blood.—
The vision presses on my soul.

ADRASTUS.
Art mad?
Resign my state! Sue to the gods for life,
The common life which every slave endures,
And meanly clings to? No; within yon walls
I shall resume the banquet, never more
Broken by man's intrusion. Councillors,
Farewell!—go mutter treason till ye perish!

[Exeunt Adrastus, Crythes, and Soldiers.
Ion,
who stands apart leaning on a pedestal.
'Tis seal'd!

MEDON.
Let us withdraw, and strive
By sacrifice to pacify the gods!

Medon, Agenor, and Councillors retire: they leave Ctesiphon, Phocion, and Ion. Ion still stands apart, as rapt in meditation.
CTESIPHON.
'Tis well; the measure of his guilt is fill'd.
Where shall we meet at sunset?

PHOCION.
In the grove
Which with its matted shade imbrowns the vale,
Between those buttresses of rock that guard
The sacred mountain on its western side,
Stands a rude altar—overgrown with moss,
And stain'd with drippings of a million showers,
So old, that no tradition names the power
That hallow'd it,—which we will consecrate
Anew to freedom and to justice.

CTESIPHON.
Thither
Will I bring friends to meet thee. Shall we speak
To yon rapt youth?

[pointing to Ion.
PHOCION.
His nature is too gentle.
At sunset we will meet.—With arms?

CTESIPHON.
A knife—
One sacrificial knife will serve.

PHOCION.
At sunset!

[Exeunt Ctesiphon and Phocion severally.
Ion comes forward.
ION.
O wretched man, thy words have seal'd thy doom!
Why should I shiver at it, when no way,
Save this, remains to break the ponderous cloud
That hangs above my wretched country?—death—
A single death, the common lot of all,
Which it will not be mine to look upon,—
And yet its ghastly shape dilates before me;
I cannot shut it out; my thoughts grow rigid,
And as that grim and prostrate figure haunts them,
My sinews stiffen like it. Courage, Ion!
No spectral form is here; all outward things
Wear their own old familiar looks; no dye
Pollutes them. Yet the air has scent of blood,
And now it eddies with a hurtling sound,
As if some weapon swiftly clove it. No—
The falchion's course is silent as the grave
That yawns before its victim. Gracious powers!
If the great duty of my life be near,
Grant it may be to suffer, not to strike!

[Exit.