University of Virginia Library

Scene IV.

A street before the ducal palace.
Two Guards attending the body of Floribel; Lenora hanging over it.
1st Guard.
'Tis time to bear the body to the council:
The criminal is there already.

2nd Guard.
Stay;
'Twere sacrilege to shake yon mourner off,
And she will perish in the wintry night,
If unattended: yet this poor dumb witness
Is needful at the trial. While she sleeps
With careful hands convey her to the Duke's,
And bid the women tend her.

1st Guard.
Soft! She breaks
Her trance, and rises like a new-born thing
Fresh from the realm of spirits.

2nd Guard.
Hush! she speaks.

Len.
I dreamed, and in that visioned agony
'Twas whispered by strange voices, like the deads',
I was the mother of this Floribel,
And still a wanderer upon man's earth;
No, no, I am her ghost, shade of her essence,
Thrust into some strange shape of womanhood
Until the tomb is open. What are these?
Good sir, have you a tear to throw away,
A little sigh to spare unto the wind?
I've heard that there are hearts yet in the world,
Perhaps you have one.

1st Guard.
Lady, for your sorrow
It aches most deeply.

Len.
Prithee, look you here.
Cold, cold; 'tis all in vain: those lustrous eyes
Will never beam again beneath the stars;
Darkened for ever; and those wan, dead lips:
They'll put her in the earth and let the world,
The pitiless bad world, tread o'er her beauty,
While I—ye airs of heaven, why will ye feed me?
Why, ye officious ministers, bestow
The loathed blessing of a cursed existence?
There's many a one now leans upon the cheek
Of his dead spouse, a-listening for her pulse,
And hears no motion but his bursting heart;
Give him my life and bid him wipe his eyes.
Look here, look here,
I've heard them call her flower; oh! had she been
The frailest rose that whitens in the blast,
Thus bruised and rifled by a ruffian hand,
I might have kept her living in my tears
A very little while, until I die;
And then—now tell me this and I will bless thee,
Where thinkest our spirits go?

1st Guard.
Madam, I know not;
Some say they hang like music in the air,
Some that they sleep in flowers of Paradise,
Some that they lie ingirt by cloudy curtains,
Or 'mong the stars.

Len.
Oh! not among the stars,
For, if she's there, my sight's so dimmed with tears,
I ne'er shall find her out,
But wander through the sparkling labyrinth
Wearied, alone; oh! say not 'mong the stars.
Why do ye move her?

1st Guard.
We must bear her hence
Unto the Duke.

Len.
What! Is it not enough
That she is dead?

1st Guard.
No hand shall offer hurt,
And in short space we'll bring her back again,
Unto your cottage.

Len.
Thanks! They shall not harm her;
Soldier, I will repay this kindness nobly;
Hark you; I'm going far off, to Paradise,
And if your child, or wife, or brother's there,
I'll bring them to you in your dreams some night.
Farewell; I will go search about for Comfort,
Him, that, enrobed in mouldering cerements, sits
At the grey tombstone's head beneath the yew;
Men call him Death, but Comfort is his name.

[Exeunt.
Enter two Citizens.
1st Cit.
Well met sir, come you from the trial?

2nd Cit.
Ay;
In wonder that the stones do not come down
To crush that monster of all wickedness,
The wretched Hesperus; there he stands,
Biting his chains and writhing in his rage
Like a mad tiger.

1st Cit.
Is he yet condemned?

2nd Cit.
Death is the sentence.

1st Cit.
See, the criminal
And his old father; what a sight of pity.

Enter Hesperus guarded, Orlando, Hubert, Lord Ernest, and Mob.
Hesp.
Well, gaping idiots; have ye stared enough;
Have ye yet satisfied your pious minds,
By thanking your most bounteous stars ye're not
A prodigy like this? Get home and tell
Your wives, and put me in your tales and ballads;
Get home and live.

L. Ern.
Oh hush my son,
Get some good priest of Charity to draw
Tears of repentance from your soul, and wake
The sleeping virtue.

Hesp.
Who's this greybeard driveller?
Go, find your wits, old fellow, that bald skull
Is full of leaks; hence! look in last night's bowl;
Search all your money-bags: don't come abroad
Again without them; 'tis amiss.

L. Ern.
Oh heavens!
Is this the son, over whose sleeping smiles
Often I bent, and, mingling with my prayers
Thanksgivings, blessed the loan of so much virtue.

Hesp.
That's right; weep on, weep on; for thou art he,
Who slew his only child, his first-born child.

Orl.
Oh look upon his galling agony,
These desperate yearnings of paternal love,
And try to have an heart.

Hesp.
You're merry, friend;
Troth 'tis a goodly jest: what, dost thou think
These limbs, the strength of nature's armoury,
That but exist to dare, and dare the things
That make the blood of bravery turn pale
For very terror, such a minion's work,
The offspring of those dribbling veins? Go to,
Thou'rt a sad idiot.

L. Ern.
Oh! hear him not, thou ever-present Justice,
And close thy watchful eyelid, thou that weighest
Th' allotted scale of crime.

Hesp.
Come hither, age;
I have a whisper for your secrecy;
Consider; who am I?

L. Ern.
Thou wast my son,
The pulse of my dead heart, light of my eyes,
But now—

Hesp.
Thy son! I would I'd time to laugh.
No, no; attend. The night, that gave me being,
There was unearthly glee upon the winds,
There were strange gambols played beneath the moon,
The madman smiled uncouthly in his sleep,
And children shrunk aghast at goblin sights;
Then came a tap against the rattling casement,
Not the owl's wing, or struggle of the blast;
Thy dotardship snored loudly, and meanwhile
An incubus begot me.

L. Ern.
Lead me home,
My eyes are dim; I cannot see the way:
I fain would sleep.

[Exit with some of the Citizens.
Hesp.
Go, some one, tell his nurse
To get him swaddling clothes.

Orl.
Prodigious wretch!
Rebel to man and heaven! On thee shall fall
The cureless torture of the soul, the woe
Hell nurses for the deepest damned.

Hesp.
'Tis pity
So much good cursing should be thrown away;
Well spit, my reptile! Officers, lead on:
Shall I, in bondage, stand to glut the sight
Of these poor marvel-dealing things? Away,
I'll shut them out; the red death on you all! [Going.

Ah! my good fellow, are you of the train
That wait upon Olivia?

Attend.
I'm her servant.

Hesp.
How fares she?

Attend.
Very ill; she wastes,
Careless of living.

Hesp.
Tell her, on my love
I charge her live; oh heaven, she must not die,
There are enough accusers in the tomb.
Tell her—Shame, shame, they shall not see me weep.

[Exeunt.