 | The Orphan of China |  |
17
SCENE III.
Zamti, Idamè.Idamè.
What have I seen? Barbarian! is it possible?
Did you command this horrid sacrifice?
Ah! no, I can't believe it; angry heav'n
Ne'er fill'd your bosom with such cruelty;
You cannot be more hard and barbarous
Than the rough Tartar. Canst thou weep then, Zamti?
Zamti.
Ah! weep with me, my Idamè; but try
To save your King.
Idamè.
How! sacrifice my son?
Zamti.
Such is our hapless lot: but think, dear wife,
That Citizen's a holier tie than Mother.
Idamè.
Rules nature then so feebly in your breast?
Zamti.
Alas! too strong; but weaker than my duty:
I would preserve our child; but more, much more,
To my unhappy master's blood I owe.
Idamè.
No, I disclaim this savage strength of soul.
I've seen these walls in ashes, this high throne
O'erturn'd, and wept our monarch's hapless fate:
But by what madness, still more horrible,
Will you bring on a poor wife's death, and shed
The blood of your own child, they not demand?
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Are they your gods, and do you dread their thunder?
And have you sworn to these weak gods intomb'd
To sacrifice your son? Alas! my Zamti,
The great and small, the subject and the monarch,
Distinguish'd for a time by idle marks,
Equal by nature, equal by misfortune,
Each bears enough, that bears his own distress.
It is our part, amid this gen'ral wreck
To gather up our sad remains.—Good heav'n!
Where had I been, if my credulity
Had fall'n into the net was spread before me!
If by the Orphan's side I had remained,
My infant-victim would to butcher hands
Have been deliver'd; I no more a mother
Had fall'n beneath the knife that kill'd my child.
Thanks to my love, that troubled and unquiet
Call'd me, like instinct, to the fatal cradle!
I found them carrying off my lovely babe,
And with a mother's fury tore him from them.
Barbarian! ev'n the cruel ravishers
Wanted thy savage firmness. To a slave,
Whose breast with nursing care has long sustain'd
His little life, the precious charge I gave.
Thus have I sav'd from death the child and mother,
Nay more, my Zamti, sav'd th'unhappy sire.
Zamti.
How! is my son then living?
Idamè.
Yes, thank heav'n!
Kind, in thine own despight, to bless thee still.
Repent you of your rashness.
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God of heaven!
Forgive this joy that will not be repress'd,
And for a moment mixes with my grief.
O my dear Idamè, his days are few:
In vain you would prolong his life, in vain
Conceal this fatal off'ring. On demand,
If we not render up his forfeit life,
The jealous tyrants soon will be reveng'd;
And all the citizens with us destroy'd
Too sadly shall repay thy cruel care.
Enclos'd by soldiers, there's no refuge left;
And my poor boy, thou fondly striv'st to save,
Cannot be rescued from the hand of slaughter.
He must die.
Idamè.
Stay! dear Zamti, stay, I charge thee!
Zamti.
Ah!—he must die.
Idamè.
Must die! hold, on thy life!
Fear my despair and fury, fear a mother.
Zamti.
I know no fear but to betray my duty.
Abandon yours; me and my life abandon
To the detested conqu'ror's impious rage.
Go, ask my death of Gengis; go, he'll grant it.
Bathe in a husband's blood your hands, and fill
With monstrous deaths this day of parricide.
Horror on horror's head still heap, at once
Betray your God, your Country, and your King.
Idamè.
My king! what claim have monarchs in the grave?
Owe I my blood a tribute to their ashes?
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Than the strong ties of father and of husband?
Nature and marriage are the first of laws,
The duties, and chief bonds of all mankind:
These laws descend from heav'n, the rest are human.
O make me not abhor the blood of kings!—
Yes, save the Orphan from the victor's sword,
But save him not by parricide. O let
His days be bought at any other price,
Far from abandoning, I fly to aid him.
I pity him. O pity thou thyself,
Pity thy guiltless infant, and O pity
His poor distracted mother, who doats on thee!
No more I threaten; at thy knees I fall.—
O hapless father, dear though cruel husband.
For whom I scorn'd, which haply you remember,
The man whom fortune now has made our master;
Grant me the offspring of our purest love;
Nor O! oppose the strong and tender cries
Of love, that even now shake all your frame!
Zamti.
Ah! do not thus abuse thy power o'er me,
Nor join with nature to oppose my duty.
O thou too weak of soul! if you but knew!—
Idamè.
Yes I am weak; a mother should be so.
Yet thou should'st not upbraid my soul of weakness,
Were I to follow thee to death or torture:
And if, to glut the bloody victor's rage,
The mother's murder may redeem the child,
I'm ready: Idamè shall ne'er complain;
And her heart beats as nobly as thy own.
Zamti.
Alas! I know thy virtues.
| The Orphan of China | |