University of Virginia Library

Scene II

Tintagel: the sea-shore in front of a steep cavern, a boat moored under a rock
Tristan, in guise of a pilgrim, is pacing a narrow beach with stupendous cliffs above. He grasps a letter in his hands, and turns and reads and looks to sea.
Tristan.
She shall not bear the fire, God's shame on her!
But I would rather bury her alive.
What means this call to me, this strict command
That I should stain my face, change my apparel,
Become a pilgrim, habited like those
Strange, holy men that met me on these coasts
When first I landed—holy, holy faces,
And carrying the sweets of sanctity
About them in their persons, as the bees
The sugar of the flowers? She bade me chaunt
In prayers and psalms. I cannot pray for her,
She does defy the heavens too wantonly:
She is profane. But, oh, the Miserere
For Tristan—I can sing it with no feint.
[He chaunts.
How my voice sounds up!
No wonder; I am very far away,
Cut off, cut off, as if the sea
Closed on me, and I sat within a vault,
Remembering the birds. No avenue!
Cut off, cut off!

[Iseult has entered the cavern by a secret passage, and for some time has been standing at the cavern's mouth.
Iseult.
Ah me! How woe-begone!
But I forget the part I bade you play,
A pilgrim.

Tristan.
I will play no more false parts.
You must confess—the king will pardon you;
I will abjure your magic.

Iseult
(looking down into a deep tide-pool).
Will you drown
Like the void flagon?
Gaily blows the wind;
I cannot drop a tear. ‘Iseult, ma mort.’
Pilgrim, you have forgot your scallop-shell;
But I will bind it on.
[She picks up a scallop from the beach and slips it into the ribbon of his hat, looking into his face.
‘Iseult, ma vie.’

Tristan.
What would you have me do? You put a hollowness
In all I am. But promise me, before—
Before we part, you will not face the fire.

Iseult.
Before we part?

Tristan.
You go to the Ordeal,
And I, a pilgrim, whither?

Iseult.
Say, my Tristan,
Where of yourself you wend. Conceive yourself
Washed up as on my lovely Irish coast,
A stranger—

Tristan.
Ah, I had not then drunk magic!
I saw thy beauty, and in loyal passion
Besought it for the king: then came the error,
The deadly draught. It is incredible
To Mark his friend should be to him a liar,
Amazing, curious as a miracle
I should betray. He does not hear the trumpets
That blow their triumph through me in his presence,
Blast of victorious trumpets, the wild curse
With which they catch my heart. . . .

Iseult.
Break, break from this!
God help me! Such fierce hate is in my heart
To keep thee and to torture thee—a moan
To be avenged. Thou dreamest we are parting;
But I shall pass from branding iron to fire
Of branding fagots, for I choose the iron.

Tristan.
Choose to be branded! All our love will be
Henceforth as it is written of the brand,
For men to read.
It was a crystal sphere
That swung round to itself. I was within,
And all the music of the harmony
That swept it through the heavens was Iseult.
Oh, it is broken up!

[He buries his face in his hands. Iseult looks forth, bites her lips, and then speaks very low over Tristan.
Iseult.
There is a service
I beg of thee, to bear me from the ship,
Such as thou shalt behold me, vilely clad
In beggar's weeds, a penitent, to carry
And lay me on the sands of Caerleon:
No knight will touch me,
For every knight feels toward me in his heart
Even as thou. But with thy scallop-shell,
Untaintable, a pilgrim, thou shalt bear me
Fast in thy arms to Caerleon. I entreat.

Tristan.
For this thou calledst me?

Iseult.
Yea, holy man.

Tristan.
For this?

[He lifts her and bears her a few paces along.
Iseult
(as he sets her down).
Thou wilt slip footing on the shore,
I know thou wilt. Meek pilgrims do but rarely
Strive with such awful burthen in their arms.
Thou wilt slip footing, fall, we shall be thrown
Together, side by side, and I shall swear,
By all the relics and the Holy Rood,
Iseult has never borne embrace of man
Save of her lord and this same clumsy pilgrim.

Tristan
(embracing and re-embracing Iseult).
O fine, O venerable ruse! Ha, ha!
What triumph for your lover! Is it thus
That I must hold thee? I shall grip thee tight
Against the plashing waves. Neptune forbid
That I should kiss thee, though if he contend . . .
Give me full measure now, rain kisses on me!
How brief thy tenderness!

Iseult.
Poor, poor soiled pilgrim!
What dost thou know but Cupid and his arrows,
His vivid little pains, his petulance.
Venus has none of these: her votaries
She aids from secret caverns in the sea,
And wraps them to herself. O Tristan, not
By any guileful speech or crafty lie,
I pass forth to my judges unafraid,
But being upheld by the strong charms of Love,
Of Venus, if you will—these mysteries
Are of the many gods.
Awhile ago
I thought you were too solemn for the hour,
And trifled with you: now in very earnest,
Mingling your hands with mine, I can make prayer
To God to shield us: Holy Trinity,
Ever to thee, thou threefold light, we turn—
Love, Love, ere we can falter, once more Love!

Tristan.
Iseult, O queen—oh, silence!

Iseult.
To thine oars!
Thy task is simple. Mine!—oh, recollect
The crown before mine eyes, the vast cathedral,
The sickness and the shiver in the head.
If I should fail, or if the jugglery
Of swearing I have never lain in arms,
Save of the pilgrim and my lord, were ill
Approved of heaven—

Tristan.
Heaven loves thy innocence,
The king's great faith. And I shall see thy feet
Bare on the stone, shall see thee in thy smock,
Trembling for cold, yea, and for modesty,
I should behold thee thus; for I shall see thee.
It is all carven clear before my eyes
How thou art only mine.

Iseult.
So vast a crowd!