 | Prince Lucifer |  |
ACT III
SCENE I
Sunday Morning[Groups of men and women outside the Village Church. The bells ringing merrily.]
CRONE.
Mercy on us! What a clang and a clatter they do make! Up and down, down and up, and never a taking of breath. They seem to think no one has anything to say but themselves.
1ST MATRON.
The Blessed Mother must be honoured, grannie, even if it does spoil talk a bit; and how better than by the tongues of all the belfry?
2D MATRON.
Santa Klaus! Look at Elspeth! Bib and tucker, kirtle and stockings, complete. One might think she was the Rosière.
1ST MATRON.
And why not? I lay she's as clean as any of them, as clean even as Eve herself, if not quite so winsome.
CRONE.
Aye, there it is! The world always veered that way, ever since I was in it. There's no such best as good looks. Your plain wench is never much, one way or t'other: too uncomely to be surmised crooked, too unheeded to have a wreath clapped on her head for perfection. Well, well, when one's old, one can go one's own way, and none heed.
1ST MATRON.
But Eve is very good.
2D MATRON.
Who's to tell? I suppose Father Gabriel knows; but the Confessional is as mum as the mountains, thank God.
CRONE.
Aye, aye; that dark box knows a thing or two the quickest don't guess. Saint Mary help us! Our feet are not always as prim as our faces. 'Twas a frisky world, when I was green; and maybe 'tis so still! Love and naughtiness are always in their teens.
1ST PEASANT.
Have the Englishmen gone?
GUIDE.
Yes, before the mist curled. Nothing stops those people. When they want to climb, they take the weather for a lackey, and fancy it will turn
2D PEASANT.
Will they return, think you?
GUIDE.
Likely enough, not; I don't like the look of the Weisshorn. Then, perhaps, they'll be content. I suppose life comes so easy to such folks, they covet death.
1ST PEASANT.
That's a stake soon won. And so you wouldn't go with them?
GUIDE.
I'd have gone, had it been any other day. But I don't want to miss seeing the crowning of the Rosière.
2D PEASANT.
It'll be a rare sight. They ought to be coming soon. She's to be all in white.
3D PEASANT.
Like a bride. Let's hope she'll really be one soon. But folks that are better than their neighbours are always tetchy difficult to please.
GUIDE.
I don't think she's proud.
4TH PEASANT.
Proud? After all, what's pride? The top of the Matterhorn 's not proud; but it's not easy to get at. And Eve's got a far-off way with her, that makes a man gaze, but doesn't help him to get any nearer.
GUIDE.
You've said it. Good's good, but fair is better; and then she's both. Though she's a sight cleverer than the other lasses, she minds her flocks, and says her prayers.
1ST PEASANT.
I think, of late, she's been oftener in church than ever.
2D PEASANT.
And when Father Gabriel takes such pains to teach her, he thinks her none the worse for her April face and her trim little gait.
3D PEASANT.
Neither will Saint Peter, I warrant, when she knocks him up. I suspect he lets all the pretty ones sneak in, somehow.
4TH PEASANT.
Much of a Heaven it would be, if he didn't. See! here they come.
[A Procession, formed of the young girls of the village, comes along the street, singing the Litany of Loreto. In their midst is Eve, dressed in white, and wearing a white veil.]1ST MATRON.
Come, we'd better be going in, or we shan't have good places.
CRONE.
Lord! Lord! how pretty she does look! She could not be more beautiful, if she were already in Paradise.
2D MATRON.
And so innocent; with her eyes
CRONE.
Aye, and how sweetly the children sing! all the more sweetly, like the birds, because they do not understand what they are saying.
1ST MATRON.
You, first.
[They push the heavy curtain aside and enter, and the rest follow. The Procession enters the Church, singing the close of the Litany.]SCENE II
[Father Gabriel reciting Mass; the Choir, accompanied by a harmonium, singing the parts allotted to it.]FATHER GABRIEL.
Kyrie, Eleison!
Christe, Eleison!
Kyrie, Eleison!
[The Choir sings.]
EVE.
(praying).
In the hour of my temptation,
Lord! have mercy on me!
Christ! have mercy on me!
In the hour of my repentance,
Lord! have mercy on me!
[Prince Lucifer, who has entered the Church along with Count Abdiel, leans against a pillar where Eve can see him.]
EVE.
(praying).
Lo! there He stands:
But with unfolded hands,
And knees not bent in prayer.
Why did I bid him come?
His lips are locked and dumb;
And yet—and yet—my heart is glad to know that he is there!
No more upon the mountain-side
With workday kirtle and unribboned crook,
His eyes upon me look,
But here in white apparel of a bride.
I close my eyes, but see him still.
Have mercy on me, Lord, have mercy!
Do what I will,
The incense and the flowers and the chants grow dim;
My heart, instead of Thee, with him!
LUCIFER.
(to himself).
Her thoughts from earth have got away so far,
That, like a lark whose soaring we pursue
Till in celestial vacancy the song
Dwindles to doubt, her soul is buried in Heaven.
If she can thus on fantasy unseen
Concentrate adoration, how would love,
Love of a living presence, bind her heart
To sweet idolatry! She nothing hears
Save the angelic canticles, nothing sees
But the imagination of her breast,
On which she broods. The rescued lamb should be
Still in her arms, as she lives still in mine,
Fondly remembered.
FATHER GABRIEL.
Agnus Dei qui tollis peccata mundi,
Miserere nobis.
Agnus Dei qui tollis peccata mundi,
Miserere nobis.
Agnus Dei qui tollis peccata mundi,
Dona nobis pacem.
(praying).
O Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world,
Give me peace, give me peace!
The mists are round me rolled and curled,
The dark and dangers of the way increase.
I cannot pray,
Pray as of old.
My thoughts are like a flock astray.
Wilt Thou not call them back,
Back to the heavenly track,
Unto the trodden pathway of thy fold?
Bid these strange tumults cease!
Thyself upon my heart enthrone!
Make me Thine own, Thine own!
Give me peace, give me peace!
LUCIFER.
(to himself).
What seeks she in the hollow of her palms,
Making her eyes a darkness, shutting out
The clear and wholesome presence of the day?
Either she hides from earthy visitant
Her heart should welcome, or to vaporous guest
Gives useless lodging. Tender little head,
And hands unmarred by shepherding, ye should
The treasure each contains. A bride elect,
Arrayed for barren nuptials, how she would
Adjust the part of love's own celebrant!
Now she but plays with marriage, and enfolds
A shadowy bridegroom. . . . O unnatural Nature!
Why is thy work so prodigal of waste?
Thou, like a wanton mother, dost refuse
To suckle our legitimate desires,
Thy very offspring. Thy delight alone
Is in the getting, selfish sensualist!
Content though half thy teeming progeny,
Beauty, and youth, and genial appetite,
Pine unfed foundlings!
FATHER GABRIEL.
[Reciting the beginning of the Gospel according to St. John.]
Et verbum caro factum est.
[They all kneel.]
LUCIFER.
(to himself).
“The Word, made flesh.” The Word, that is, the Spirit.
Why then oppose them? If the spirit endues
A carnal garment, should it not revere
Divorce the nuptials? Granted that the body
Is kindled by the spirit, spirit should own
The substance that it feeds on. Yet this man,
This simple soul, this lantern to the simple,
If he should speak, will glorify the flame,
Anathematise the fuel, making base
And bestial, by the act of banning it,
What complete fusing of the flesh and spirit
Can burn to ether. He is going to speak.
[Mass being over, Eve and her companions approach the altar-rails.]
FATHER GABRIEL.
And listen humbly to the sound
Of holy counsel through me poured,
As by a conduit, from the Lord.
The words I utter are not mine:
They come from unseen source divine,
Cleansing, where'er they freely flow,
The soul from sin, the heart from woe.
A world of turmoil and chagrin,
A conflict cruel, endless, vain.
How blest are we, my children dear,
Safe in our mountain haven here,
Far from the sea and storms of life,
Far from the struggle and the strife.
So safely, sin may not intrude?
You know the shameless bird of spring,
When innocent warblers pair and sing,
Drops its foul egg within their nest,
Where, fostered by a loving breast,
And warmed to life with their own brood,
Sharing their couch, their warmth, their food,
The half-fledged alien writhes about,
And from their own home thrusts them out.
ABDIEL.
(to himself).
Alas! poor cuckoo! Yet I ween it were
Scarcely the spring, without you!
FATHER GABRIEL.
So to your hearts, God meant to be
Close nests of loving purity,
Slow it matures from day to day,
Feeds on the warmth it findeth there,
Expels peace, purity, and prayer,
And, foully glorying in its guile,
Dwells in the breast it doth defile.
ABDIEL.
(to himself).
Thus Nature lends herself to any text,
Dispassionately various. If one owned
The ready fancy this wise preacher boasts,
One could malign the turtles.
FATHER GABRIEL.
Therefore, dear daughters, watch and pray;
And pure like her we crown to-day,
Alike in thought, and word, and deed,
With Mary Mother intercede
To tend you safely till you feel
Your earthly senses faint and reel,
And burst upon your soul's desire
The Hosannas of the heavenly choir.
[Father Gabriel, having placed a chaplet of white wild-flowers on Eve's head, retires to the Sacristy. Eve, followed by
LUCIFER.
My roses to your rose; not grown so fair,
Nor yet so faultless; frail, ephemeral,
But such as homage offers. When they fade,
Your sweetness and my memory will survive them.
[Prince Lucifer and Count Abdiel take their leave.]
CRONE.
What did he say?
1ST MATRON.
I didn't catch the words; did you?
2D MATRON.
Not the last ones. But what I did hear was beautiful.
1ST PEASANT.
Yes, that's the sort of talk they like. Flowers and fair words would people a nunnery.
2D PEASANT.
Aye, if one had such a tongue and such roses, Elspeth wouldn't flout a fellow long.
[The villagers disperse, and Eve, attended by some of her companions, walks homeward.]1ST MATRON.
Did you see how shy she was? She never answered him a word.
2ND MATRON.
What would you have her say? To
3D MATRON.
She looked mighty pleased, though.
1ST MATRON.
What girl wouldn't? He treated her as though she were the Princess, and he the peasant.
SCENE III
[Lucifer and Abdiel going up the mountain towards Castle Tourbillon.]LUCIFER.
Were I yon presbyter, I had conceived
Some variation from his ancient text.
Be pure. Agreed! But love is purity,
The rest abomination.
ABDIEL.
Which is which?
That hedge thrives best 'neath which there runs a ditch.
Consult the boar, the turbot, and the wren,
They will provide an answer. Men, though men,
Have their foundation deep down in the brutes,
And topmost boughs are suckled by the roots.
She is the purest maid who loves the most;
Who loves the least, the maiden most unclean.
For let ascetic skulls and wintry dames
Inculcate chaste stagnation as they may,
In her spring season Nature will ferment.
Bid May be March, go countermand the sap
Of trickling oaks, forbid the nightingale
To wail and warble to the vernal moon,
Stop the careering throstle in his song,
And tell the womb of seasonable June
Bear snow, not roses; then expect to find
Maidenhood chill as frosty infancy,
Nor thrill with outward longings. O these priests,
These footpads rather, who with thievish hands
Take Nature by the throat and bid her yield
Her wealth or her existence!
ABDIEL.
A fair thing;
Comely as autumn, winsome as the spring;
Half blossom and half fruit. Who would not cull
A rose so sweet, a hip so beautiful?
The sunshine-shadow of mid summer lies
And something in her footstep and her seeming
Allures like waking, yet illudes like dreaming.
Yet, sooth to please the sacristy, this flower
Must wilt from drouth, that pineth for a shower.
LUCIFER.
You rave as though you loved her.
ABDIEL.
If it be
That I love her, I love all such as she.
When once again the wilding briar blows,
Fix you your fancy on some single rose?
When nights wax long and pathways darkened are,
Will you be guided but by one bright star?
This draught, or that, will quench your thirst, my brother;
And one sweet maid's as sweet as any other.
LUCIFER.
There spoke the boar, the turbot, and the wren.
The universal base of brutal lust
Soars tapering to a fine particular love,
One comprehensive, one exclusive face,
Flower of all flowers, for every flower in one—
Fie on your similes! A love like this
Lights every path and quenches every thirst.
ABDIEL.
Will it quench yours? Then, sure, 'twill be the first.
The empty loves, from which you once quaffed deep,
Lie thick as potsherds on a midden-heap.
LUCIFER.
O, you evade distinction! Lusts, not love.
Who loves the costly clusters reared in heat,
The splendours of the hothouse, gorgeous blooms,
Lascivious tendrils, enervating scents,
The flowers of the seraglio? Who culls these
With hand of hesitating eagerness,
Presses their formal petals to his lips,
Or hides them 'neath his pillow, that his dreams
May by a secret theft be perfumëd?
No, 'tis the simple wilding of the hedge,
The blossom of the bramble, the musk-rose,
Startles the tear in gazing tenderness,
The tropic blooms of the abjurëd past,
That forced themselves upon the fancy, faugh!
Were savoured and forgotten. But this flower
Of shrinking loveliness enchains the sense,
And takes the memory captive.
[Lucifer passes into the Castle.]
ABDIEL.
(alone).
Thus—thus—thus—
Reasons my self-discrowned Idealist,
Enforcing satisfaction. Reason? Reason!
Thou bawd, thou pimp, thou pandar to the passions,
Thou servile drudge, thou doubling advocate,
Thou specious lackey, lithe apologist,
Mere sycophant and shadow of the Will!
Never was keen point sharpened by the heart,
But the head straightway fledged it to the mark.
Let Will but set its appetite on war,
And Reason promptly will invent offence,
And furnish blood with arguments. Let lust
Muster its threat of lurid thunder-clouds,
Lo! Reason, shimmering through the sultry wrack,
Will span it with a rainbow!
SCENE IV
[Night. Eve, undressed in her sleeping-chamber, and alone. Over the bed hangs the chaplet of flowers given her as the Rosière. In her hand she holds the roses given her by Prince Lucifer.]EVE.
He gave me these; those, Father Gabriel.
Which do I prize the most? O, these! these! these!
Why here dissemble which I love the best?
Those at my head, but these within my breast!
[She sleeps, with his roses in her hand.]
SCENE V
Midnight.THE MATTERHORN.
Is the storm coming on? Do you hear it?
THE WEISSHORN.
It is roaring up from the south,
With the thunders piled on its back and the lightning spears in its mouth.
As the wolf drives the kid and the roebuck.
THE MATTERHORN.
Tell it I stand and wait.
THE WEISSHORN.
The trunks of the forest are creaking, the pine-tops waver and sway,
And the rotten boughs on the air are tossed as the torrent tosses the spray.
The veil of the snow is lifted, the folds of the mist are torn;—
THE MATTERHORN.
Tell the thunder to hasten and hurry, lest my scorn should die of its scorn.
Bid the torrents darken and deepen, bid the avalanche madden down;
For tempest and time have done their worst, and I still stand crowned with my crown.
Let the frail light passions of pigmy man, like levin, and wind, and rain,
With ephemeral fury rage and pass. I am motionless and remain.
| Prince Lucifer | |