University of Virginia Library

SCENE II.

(The Virgin Forest near the Spanish Camp.)
Juan.
O love, look up! What wondrous depths of green,
Bough above bough, and yet more boughs above them.
See how the mossy columns of the trees
Soar and divide and over-curve the gloom
With ever lighter arches, tier on tier.
See how the yellow sunlight, filtering through,
Grows ever greener till it finds the moss
On which we lie. Might not this beryl dome
Which shrines our love be some rare ocean cave,
In whose green lights and shadows during noon
The scaly nereïds and enamoured Tritons
Seek refuge when the arrows of the sun
Strike ocean's heart! Or is it all a dream?
O tell me, love, that all these leaves are real,
And not a vision born of raging thirst
In the delirium of that open boat
Upon the leafless horror of the sea,
Among the dead and dying; and that thou,
Who seemest to be leaning over me,
Art not a phantom of that final hour
Before Fernandez' vessel picked us up,
When I was calling on thy name in vain,
But thy own sweet reality.

Rosita.
Dear love,
Dismiss thy fears. Beneath the soft green light,
Thou art no longer in the open boat,
Dying of thirst; nor yet art thou on earth.
These are the green and silent depths of ocean,
Far down below the surface of the storms,
And I a mermaid, bending over thee.
When some young comely sailor drowns at sea,
We catch his body as it slowly sinks
Through the green fathoms, and we wake him back
With spells and kisses to a deep-sea life.

Juan.
Wert thou a mermaid, as thou say'st thou art,
Thou wouldst be so much fairer than the others,
That the green ocean cave and sea-weed forests
Would grow yet greener with their jealousy;
Thou couldst be but their victim or their queen.

Rosita.
No, here we all are equal, and no discord
Nor spite nor envy mars the placid depths.
Sweet sailor, I will take thee by-and-by
And show thee through the treasuries of ocean,
The caves in which we keep the sunken gold,
And all the shipwrecked jewels of the world.

Juan.
I have a richer treasury, thy heart.

Rosita.
Here will we live together and for ever,
And see no more of earth, save some rare glimpse
When we swim up and sit upon some rock,
Where, while I sing unto my golden harp,
Or watch some lazy vessel in the sunset,
Thou wilt repeat thy vows of merman love.

Juan.
O love, O love! Would that thy words were true!
Oh, I would tell thee that the pale green light,
Which shines so softly in the happy depths,
Is less to me than thou; that the light stems,
Which wave for ever in the briny caves,
Are less divinely supple than thy form;
That the pale rose which lines the ocean shell
Is conquered by the freshness of thy cheek,
The coral by the crimson of thy lips.
Oh, I would tell thee that thy voice outrings
The ocean's summer breeze; and that thy kiss
Is softer than the kiss the seagull's wing
Gives to the panting wave.

Rosita.
Love, hark my song!
I would not be a child of earth,
Which is so full of care;
I would not leave my mermaid life
To be an empress there.

Juan.
But if I were a child of clay,
Wouldst thou not leave the sea,
To share the pain and care and woe,
And live on earth with me?

Rosita.
The ocean's caves are green and sweet,
They know nor sigh nor tear;
The sea-weed forests shed no leaves,
As ends each passing year.

Juan.
Oh, wouldst thou stay where sea-bells bloom,
And let me pine alone;
And give me, as the days go by,
No answer to my moan?

Rosita.
The streets of earth are paved with cares,
Its roofs are tiled with woes;
The bread it eats is made by grief,
From grain that sorrow sows.

Juan.
Oh, wouldst thou sit upon thy rock,
And watch the fading ships;
And never give a kiss to him
Who lives but by thy lips?

Rosita.
Love, I would leave a thousand seas—
A thousand caves that glow—
To share with thee the paths of earth,
And all the tears they know.

Juan.
And so we are together upon earth.
We are on earth—oh, cruelly on earth!
O sweetest, it is time for us to wake
Out of the day-dream that has wrapped us round;
Here, where the dreamy magic of thy voice,
Mixed with the whisper of the leaves above,
Had lulled my soul till I had half forgot
What brought me here. Awake, awake, Rosita!
Emergency is clamouring for an answer,
And peril girds us like a fiery belt!

Rosita.
O love, I was so happy in my dream.
Wilt thou not let us be a little longer
Merman and mermaid, in a cave of pearl—
Here, in the pale green sunlight, where the world,
With all its doubts and hates, and pangs and perils,
Has no existence for us?

Juan.
Would I could!
But danger presses; we must think and act.

Rosita.
Thou deemest the danger greater than it is.

Juan.
I am no craven soul, for whom each mole-hill
Projects the shadow of a toppling mountain.
A hideous danger threatens thee. Agrippa——

Rosita.
I fear him not.

Juan.
Thou little knowest him.
The most destructive and abhorred wild beast
That crouches in the tangles of these forests,
Compared with his ferocity, is kind,
And, measured with his treachery, is loyal.
He is thy father's favourite and tyrant;
His daily evil genius; and thy father,
For some mysterious service past or future,
Has given him the promise of thy hand,
And every day, with more intense insistence,
He presses for fulfilment of the bond.

Rosita.
He will find out that he but wastes his pains.

Juan.
And when he finds it out, and drops the mask
Of love and courtship which conceals his rage,
Woe to thyself and me. His dark soul writhes
Beneath thy scorn; and when fair means have failed
He will use foul.

Rosita.
I can defend myself.
I do not fear his violence.

Juan.
Oh, my love,
Thou knowest not the danger thou art in.
If he were not the mean and cruel coward,
The unrestricted tyrant that he is—
If I could cross his blade in open fight—
Oh, I would rid thee of him soon enough!
But if I gave him challenge, dost thou think
That he would take it? Ere the day was out
I should have got but throttled for my pains.
Oh love, now list. Agrippa's insolence
Has fostered discontent among the soldiers,
Whose lives are being wasted month by month
In a vain, empty enterprise. Fernandez
With Garcia, Morasquez, and some others,
Have formed a plan to suddenly desert,
Seize on a ship, and sail away to Spain.
Love, we must fly.

Rosita.
I cannot leave my father.

Juan.
Thy life depends upon it. As for me,
I owe thy father nothing. Did he not
Place me and others in an open boat,
To die of thirst upon an unsailed ocean?

Rosita.
But I—I owe him all—my very breath,
And many a kiss between the eyes of childhood,
When he would hold me long upon his knee,
And when the Fount of Youth was not as now—
The only thing he loved.

Juan.
For his mad thirst
For that enchanted water which he never
Will reach on earth, he plunges all in woe,
And drags thee into ruin with himself.

Rosita.
The greater need that I, who am the only
True friend he has to warn him of his fate,
Should not desert him. Love, it cannot be.

Juan.
It must, it must! There is no time to lose.
This single opportunity, once wasted,
Will ne'er recur.

Rosita.
I cannot leave my father!
I cannot leave him—even, love, for thee.
But, hark, I hear a faint and distant clarion
Come from the tents. Haste, haste, or thou'lt be missed!
We must return to camp by different ways.
Each kiss is but a danger. Oh, begone!

Juan.
I still shall break thy purposes—think it o'er.
Oh, love, another kiss!

Rosita.
Away! Away!

[Exit Juan.
Rosita
(alone).
Now love is putting duty to the torture,
But it must stand the test. Oh, it were sweet
To fly with him to Spain, and see no more
This wild and cruel Indian world of peril,
And with my hand in his once more to cross
The rippling cornfields, where we used to meet.
It cannot be; no, no, it cannot be;
I cannot leave my father to his fate,
And I must stay beside him to the end.
What figure is approaching through the trees?

(Enter Agrippa.)
Agrippa.
What, here alone—without thy Indian guard?
Not even thy Indian handmaid; in this forest
Which has no paths, and out of sight of camp!
Oh, this is rash!

Rosita.
Thou hast been dogging me!
I care not to be dogged.

Agrippa.
I saw thee leave
The camp alone, and, spurred by love and fear
For thy sweet safety, followed in thy steps
For thy protection.

Rosita.
Does the roe require
To be protected by the skulking wolf?

Agrippa.
The forest is unsafe, however near
The bugle sound. There are wild beasts about.

Rosita.
Thyself, for instance?

Agrippa.
Call me what thou wilt,
Thou art the fairest when thou call'st me names;
Love is the sweetest when he looks most fierce
And wears a mantle made of lion's hide.

Rosita.
And Hate most hideous when his wolfish bristles
Are seen through lambskins.

Agrippa.
Call me wolf again.
It is so sweet to hear thee call me wolf;
Thou hast accustomed me to taunts and insults;
They do no harm, I take them as pet names.

Rosita.
Oh, then I'll call thee courteously Agrippa,
Which is for me the most ill-omened name
Between the earth's two poles.

Agrippa.
I have already
Outstretched the usual patience of a courtship,
In wooing thee so long, and do not thou
Outstretch it further, till it snap in two.
I have thy father's promise; thou art mine.
To-day I woo, to-morrow I shall order.
Fight not too long with fate, and, most of all,
Call not the wolf too often by his name,
Or, if thou dost, wait till he cares to rip.

Rosita.
Ho, ho! the fleece is off; and better so,
It suited thee but little, and thy growl
Is sweeter in my ears than was thy bleat.

Agrippa.
What, did I growl? and yet I am no wolf,
At most a lamb, who happens to have fangs,
And who, in other woods and other seasons,
On one or two occasions in his life,
Has eaten up a woman for less cause
Than thou, young lady, givest him to-day.

Rosita.
I thank thee for the warning, though in truth
I did not need it. Now be pleased to take
Some other path than mine to reach the camp.

Agrippa.
I owe it as a duty to thy father
To see thee safely back.

Rosita.
What, dost thou force
Thy company upon me? Answer plainly.

Agrippa.
Force is an ugly word; it is my duty
To see thee through these brambles, and, besides,
I have a little tale I wish to tell,
About a woman, as we go along.
The story is instructive and pathetic,
And shows the latent goodness of my heart;
I wish to prove how kind a soul I have.

Rosita.
I shall not listen.

Agrippa.
The story is pathetic, is it not?

Rosita.
I have not been attending.

Agrippa.
Were't not wise
To make no more resistance, but accept
So tender-souled a suitor?

Rosita.
Never, never!
Until God's lightning falls upon thy head!
O Thou Omniscient and Omnipotent God,
Give me the strength to fight Thy battle out
Against this man! Oh, never, never!

Agrippa.
Thou wilt think better of it at thy leisure.

Rosita.
If all thy soldiers drag me to the altar,
They shall not force me to become thy wife.
For I will stab thee at the altar's foot,
And be the executioner for God.
The day that thou shalt have recourse to force
Shall be thy last, and mine.

Agrippa.
What, threat of dagger!
I love to see a beauty in her fury,
And know the value of a woman's threat.
It is a pretty bubble.

Rosita.
Look at this.
(She takes a small dagger from her bosom, bares her left arm, and passes the dagger slowly through it.)
Dost thou believe me now? It is for thee,
And not for me, to meditate at leisure,
And weigh the peril of thy scheme to-day.

[Exit.
Agrippa.
By all the fiends who crowd the devil's stair
I thought her not so strong; and for this once
I own that I have reckoned sans my host.
Yes, she is right; it is for me to ponder
And weigh the items of my scheme at leisure.
She is too dangerous, and I must change
My plan from top to bottom, and build up
On other ground the edifice of fortune.
And better so, perhaps. The wind has changed
Since last I viewed the compass, and it brings me
Strange tempting whispers from the Indian king.
She shall not be my wife, but she shall be
A something better than a wife—a victim!
Revenge is sweeter in the cup than love
For one like me; and now that I am free
To give a hearing to Atalpa's offer
And found my altered schemes upon his help.
I can prepare a network of destruction
To wrap around her father and herself.