University of Virginia Library

SCENE II.

A Wood. Rondinelli discovered waiting.
Rondinelli.
My bosom is so full, my heart wants air;
It fears even want of utterance; fears the man,
For very loathing; fears his horrible right,
His lawless claim of lawfulness; and feels
Shame at his poisonous want of shame and manhood.
Yet she endures him; she can smile to him,
Would have him better. Oh, heavenly Ginevra!
Name, which to breathe puts pity in the air,
I know that to deserve to be thy friend
Should be to show all proofs of gentlest right.
Oh be the spirit of thine hand on mine;—
Hang by me, like a light, a face, an angel,
To whom I turn for privilege of blest patience,
Letting me call thee my soul's wife!
He comes.

Enter Agolanti.
Agolanti.
I recognise the Signor Rondinelli;
And in him, if I err not, the inditer
Of a strange letter.—He would speak with me?

Rondinelli.
Pardon me. I am sensible that I trespass
On many delicacies, which at first confuse me.
Be pleased to look upon them all as summ'd
In this acknowledgment, and as permitted me
To hold acquitted in your coming hither.
I would fain speak all calmly and christianly.

Agolanti.
You spoke of my wife's life. 'Twas that that brought me.

Rondinelli.
Many speak of it.

Agolanti.
To what end?

Rondinelli.
They doubt
If you are aware on what a delicate thread
It hangs.

Agolanti.
Mean you of health?

Rondinelli.
I do.

Agolanti.
'Twere strange,
If I knew not the substance of the tenure,
Seeing it daily.

Rondinelli.
A daily sight—pardon me—
May, on that very account, be but a dull one.—
I pray you, do not think I use plain words
From wish to offend: I have but one object—such
As all must have, who know, or ever have known,
The lady,—you above all others.

Agolanti.
Truly, sir,
You, and these knowing friends of yours, or hers,
Whom I know not, might leave the proverb alone,
Which says that a fool knows better what occurs
In his own house, than a wise man does in another's.
Good Signor Antonio, I endure you
Out of a sort of pity: you understand me;
Perhaps not quite a just one. This same letter
Is not the first of yours, that has intruded
Into my walls.

Rondinelli.
We understand each other
In some things, Signor Agolanti, and well;
In some things one of us is much mistaken;
But one thing we know perfectly, both of us,—
The spotlessness of her, concerning whom
We speak, with conscious souls, thus face to face.—
Signor Agolanti, I humbly beg of you,
Well nigh with tears, which you may pity, and welcome,
So you deny them not, that it will please you
To recollect, that the best daily eyes,
The wisest and the kindest, made secure
By custom and gradation, may see not
In the fine dreadful fading of a face
What others see.

Agolanti.
Signor Antonio,—
When others allow others to rule their houses,
To dictate commonplaces, and to substitute
For long experience and uncanting love
Their meddling self-sufficiency, their envious
Wish to find fault, and most impertinent finding it,
When this is the custom and the fashion, then,
And not till then, will I throw open my doors
To all my kind good masters of fair Florence,
To come and know more in my house than I do;
To see more, hear more, have a more inward taste
Of whatsoever is sweet and sacred in it,
And then vouchsafe me their opinions: order me
About, like some new household animal
Call'd servant-husband, they being husband-gods,
Yet condescending to all collateral offices
Of gossip, eaves-dropper, consulting-doctor,
Beggarly paymaster of discarded page,
Themselves discarded suitor.

Rondinelli.
(Aside.)
Help me, angel,
Against a pride, that, seeing thee, is nothing.—
You know full well, Francesco Agolanti,
That though a suitor for the prize you won
(Oh! what a prize! and what a winning! enough
Surely to make you bear with him that lost),
Discarded I could not be, never, alas!
Having found acceptation. My acquaintance
Not long preceded yours; and was too brief
To let my love win on her filial eyes,
Before your own came beaming with that wealth,
Which, with all other shows of good and prosperous,
Her parents justly thought her due. For writing to her
Since, with whatever innocence (as you know)
And for any opinions of yourself
In which I may have wrong'd you, I am desirous
To hold my own will in a constant state
Of pardon-begging and self-sacrifice,
And will engage never to trouble more
Your blessed doors (for such I'll hope they will be)
One thing provided.—Sir, it is,—
That in consideration of your possessing
A treasure, which all men will think and speak of
(The more to the just pride of him that owns it),
You will be pleased to show, even ostentatiously,
What more than care, at this supposed sad juncture,
You take of it: will call in learned eyes
To judge of what your own too happy ones
May slide o'er too securely; will thus revenge
Your wrong on ill mouths, by refuting them;
And secure kindlier ones from the misfortune
Of being uncharitable towards yourself.

Agolanti.
I will not suffer, more than other men,
That wrong should be assumed of me, and bend me
To what it pleases. What I know, I know;
What in that knowledge have done, shall still do.
The more you speak, the greater is the insult
To one that asks not your advice, nor needs it;
Nor am I to be trick'd into submission
To a pedantic and o'erweening insolence,
Because it treats me like a child, with gross
Self-reconciling needs and sugary fulsomeness.
Go back to the world you speak of, you yourself,
True infant; and learn better from its own school.
You tire me.

Rondinelli.
Stay; my last words must be heard.—
In nothing then will there be any difference
From what the world now see?

Agolanti.
In nothing, fool!—
Why should there? Am I a painter's posture-figure?
A glove to be made to fit? a public humour?
To hear you is preposterous; not to trample you
A favour, which I know not why I show.

Rondinelli.
I'll tell you.
'Tis because you, with cowardly tyranny,
Presume on the bless'd shape that stands between us;
Ay, with an impudence of your own, immeasurable,
Skulk at an angel's skirts.

Agolanti.
I laugh at you.
And let me tell you at parting, that the way
To serve a lady best, and have her faults
Lightliest admonish'd by her lawful helper,
Is not to thrust a lawless vanity
'Twixt him and his vex'd love.

Rondinelli.
Utter that word
No second time. Blaspheme not its religion.
And mark me, once for all. I know you proud,
Rich, sanguine during passion, sullen after it,
Purchasing shows of mutual respect,
With bows as low, as their recoil is lofty;
And thinking that the world and you, being each
No better than each other, may thus ever,
In smooth accommodation of absurdity,
Move prosperous to your graves. But also I know you
Misgiving amidst all of it; more violent
Than bold, more superstitious ev'n than formal;
More propp'd up by the public breath, than vital
In very self-conceit. Now mark me—

Agolanti.
A beggar
Mad with detection, barking like his cur!

Rondinelli.
Mark me, impostor. Let that saint be worse
By one hair's-breadth of sickness, and you take
No step to show that you would have prevented it,
And every soul in Florence, from the beggar
Up to the princely sacredness now coming,
Shall be loud on you, and loathe you. Boys shall follow you,
Plucking your shuddering skirts; women forego,
For woman's sake, their bashfulness, and speak
Words at you, as you pass; old friends not know you;
Enemies meet you, friend-like; and when, for shame,
You shut yourself in-doors, and take to your bed,
And die of this world by day, and the next by night,
The nurse, that makes a penny of your pillow,
And would desire you gone, but your groans pay her,
Shall turn from the last agony in your throat,
And count her wages!

Agolanti
(drawing his sword).
Death in thine own throat.

Rondinelli.
Tempt me not.

Agolanti.
Coward!

Rondinelli
(drawing his sword).
All you saints bear witness!

[Cries of “Agolanti! Signor Agolanti!”
Enter Servants in disorder.
First Servant.
My lady, sir.

Agolanti.
What of her?

Servant.
Sir, she is dead.

Agolanti.
Thou say'st what cannot be. A hundred times
I've seen her worse than she is now.

Rondinelli.
Oh horror!
To hear such words, knowing the end!—Oh dreadful!
But is it true, good fellow? Thou art a man,
And hast moist eyes. Say that they served thee dimly.

Servant.
Hark, sir.

[The passing-bell is heard. They all take off their caps, except Agolanti.
Rondinelli.
She's gone; and I am alone. Earth's blank;
Misery certain.—The cause, alas! the cause!
[Passionately to Agolanti.
Uncover thee, irreverent infamy!

Agolanti
(uncovering).
Infamy thou, to treat thus ruffianly
A mute-struck sorrow.

Rondinelli.
Oh God! to hear him talk!
To hear him talk, and know that he has slain her!
Bear witness, you—you of his household—you,
That knew him best, and what a poison he was—
He has slain her.—What you all fear'd would be, has come,
And the mild thread that held her heart, is broken.

Agolanti
(going off with the Servants).
Pietro, I say, and
Giotto! away! away!

[Exit with Servants.
Rondinelli.
Ay, ay; to justice with him! Whither with me?

[Exeunt opposite.