University of Virginia Library

Scene III.

—A Room in the Palace. Admetus alone.
Admetus.
No, no—it cannot be! It cannot be,
That these transcendent spirits, whose pure flame
Informs our lives with splendour, whose great thoughts
Measure the spaces of infinity,
Should be blown out like bubbles! Yet the flower
Dies in the act of seeding, in the flame
And victory of its passion;—why not she?
Leaves she not seed behind which keeps her life?
Nay, this is true in figure, not in fact.
Creation is a stair of many steps,
Life feeding life, and life being piled on life,
In stones, weeds, reptiles, insects, beasts, and men,
Continuous, yet by leaps; for every change,
However small's, a leap. Change—what is change?
Or permanence? This life—this permanence
In change—what is it? What am I—this self—
This passionate orb, winging infinity
With its weak pinions, memory and desire?
Say I'm myself, I know not what I say.
I live by daily dying—hour by hour
The same, yet not the same. Shall I call the Past
My own; from which I'm driven, a shuddering thing,
By Time's stern hunting? Or the Present? What!
This naked moment, dead as soon as born?
That's nothing. Or the Future, whose bright hopes
Are but as milestones on the road to death?
Yet we live somehow; and the world's a place
Where we may dream great dreams. How shall we wake?
Yes, here's the question: Can we reach at last
A stage of life wherein it can put off
Its fleshly form and yet persist? Why not?
What frames the organs by which life is life
But our own soul, or a dark something else
Which yet is soul—or what? Yet we go out,
Like candles puffed, not willingly. We die,
And go—ah! where? Some say they have seen the dead,
And talked with them—tales, tales! We have no proof
That we live on, that we shall live again.
This mocks the reach of reason.

[Enter Œnanthus.
Œnanthus.

I crave thy pardon, King Admetus, in that I thus intrude on thee, as it were in the very dull and hush of the midnight; but in respect of the light in thy chamber, and that I am thy poor servant, and I would say thy honest servant, and I would further desire to present myself to thee in some measure of condolency as thy—what shall I say?—what shall I say?

Admetus.
I fear, my tipsy servant. Shame, man, shame!
Well, well, what now?

Œnanthus.

No indeed, my dread Lord, no indeed. I did but drink a drop with King Hercules, to drown grief withal; and I come to bring thee a cup of the same comfort—which may now very meekly and becomingly be done, when all's thus seemly set in order:

Admetus.
Set it down sirrah, and to bed with thee!
'Twould ask some cordial stronger than thy wine
To make my heart beat merrily again.
But what of Hercules? I had forgot
His presence here.

Œnanthus.

Mad, my Lord, King Admetus. He's in his fit— A very dangerous madman.

Admetus.
Mad, sirrah, how mad?

Œnanthus.

I cannot say how mad he is; but very mad he is, very mad. If he be not stark mad, he's at the least a homicidial lunatic—that I'll swear to.

Admetus.
O nonsense, fool! But how came this about?

Œnanthus.

Grief and drink, my Lord, grief and drink. They will turn the strongest brain. When in his cups, he heard tell of thy wife; for I was a little sudden with him—I fear I was a little sudden—he rose up in a fury, and would have strangled me in his gripe.

Admetus.
Strangled thee?

Œnanthus.

Ay, in good sooth. He roars at me to know where her tomb was, and ere I could answer him I was half-way on the road myself.

Admetus.
Her tomb, and why?

Œnanthus.

Ay, what I asked him, what I asked him. A very sober, aperient question. But my belief is, under thy favour, that he is now gone to bellow around her tomb. 'Tis very often the manner of these lunatics when the moon is at its full.

Admetus.
Pshaw! pshaw! Thou dreamest. Sleep thyself awake,
And trouble me no more. To bed, I say!

Œnanthus.

But, my good Lord—

Admetus.
Begone, thou angerest me. Is this a night
To plague me with such tales? To bed, to bed—

Œnanthus.

Ay, my dread Lord—but—

Admetus.
Be off with thee! To bed, to bed, to bed!

Œnanthus.

Well, my Lord—

[Exit Œnanthus.

Admetus.
What then, can she be dead? Alcestis dead!
That mind, which thought, which loved, which spoke but now,
No more than some frail quiverings of the flesh,
And ceasing with their ceasing; or at best
A weak, sad, cowering, joyless, growthless shade
On Charon's coast—an echo of the past,
A withered leaf of life? Nay, that's a tale
Too paltry. If we die, we wholly die,
Will, feeling—all that delicate knot of force,
Conscious of power, we call ourself. It may be:
The gods themselves know not their origin,
And fear their end. If so, this life of ours,
With all its longings, strivings, hopes, and fears,
Is a poor puppet-show for each of us;
Though for the race come some triumphant joy
Which our blind pangs prepare. But if we live,
O we shall live indeed! Ha! what is this,
This glow, this hope; this reaching out of faith,
Like babes to the breast they know not but through need;
This ardour of desire, which, Pallas-like,
Through the tough sutures of cold reason's head
Leaps armed in warmer wisdom—beckoning me
From the bare known to a surmised beyond?
Do I begin to hear thy echoes, dear?
[Enter Clymene.
What, Clymene? My little shivering child!
How comest thou here?

Clymene.
I come to comfort thee.

Admetus.
To comfort me, my darling!

Clymene.
Mother bade me
That I must love thee while she's gone away;
So I crept here to thee, because I know—

Admetus.
What dost thou know?

Clymene.
I know what mother did
When thou wast in the trance. She's gone away—
Away, away—in another bigger trance—
O, very far away!

Admetus.
Ay, very far!

Clymene.
No, no; thou must not sigh and sit like that—
Thou must walk up and down, and wring thy hands,
And pray the gods—O—pray them very much;
And send them things, and pray them very much;
And then—then mother will come home again,
And I may have a birthday!

Admetus.
There, don't cry
My little Clymene! My little girl
We must be patient, and be very good
Till mother comes again. We'll pray the gods
To send her soon.

Clymene.
But wilt thou wring thy hands
Enough of times?

Admetus.
Yes, yes; now, little girl,
Back to thy bed. Good night, my mouse, good night!
[Exit Clymene.
O life, life, life! Art thou a thing so dread
That we must dress thee in fantastic tales
To hide thy face from children, as in shame
We have brought them here? Nay, are not we ourselves
Children who play at phantasies? And yet
When we essay to bare the bones of life,
Dissect our dreams, anatomise our hopes,
And carve the living heart that vexes us
With unappeased desires, thoughts infinite,
And high imaginations—what is left?
Either we are the fools of that dim power
That sends us hither, and our holiest joys—
The spiritual bread by which we live—
But painted cheats, drugs, gauds; yea truth itself
The loathsome pit of death; or these our dreams
Are glimpses, half-revealments, hieroglyphs
Of mighty meaning. Choose: on this side truth;
On that all, all for which our spirits pant—
Dreadful dilemma! Truth? Nay there are truths
We dimly feel, not find. Life must be lived
With what small daily bread of truth we are sent,
And to live well, though anguish be our drink,
Unveils Love's face. Life somehow must be lived;
Then let us use all organs, wings as feet,
And in the light of our supremest visions
Live like immortals!

(Enter Hercules, leading in Alcestis veiled).
Hercules.
Admetus, thou and I, who have been friends,
Should meet, when we do meet, with open hearts:
Why hast thou met me like a stranger? Why,
Being thus in trouble, hast thou coined a tale
To shut me from thy sorrow's comradeship?
Dost thou doubt my love?

Admetus.
No, no! O Hercules, thou art a friend
For whom mere praise were injury; but—

Hercules.
But yet,
I'm a rough fellow, I'm a rough fellow—I know it.

Admetus.
Ay, as the fur that shakes the tempest off,
Yet keeps with tender warmth the tenderest warm.
Nay, that's not it. But there are sorrows, Hercules,
Into whose gloom, as into death's dark wave
We must go down—alone.

Hercules.
Looks death the darker
For the firm grip of a friend's honest fist,
To squeeze the chill off?

Admetus.
Nay, but I was loath,
In the faint apathy of selfish grief
To scare thee from my door.

Hercules.
And shut thy heart,
To open but thy door! What hast thou made of me—
That I should crown my head, and feast and sing,
When she lay—To my grief I knew her not;
But, by the gods! for love of thee and her,
As by her praise I knew her, I'd have fought
With Death himself for her possession, man;
Were't possible.

Admetus.
I know it, I know it—O speak
No more of her, no more! I cannot bear it—
I cannot bear it now; but take my thanks
For all thy love most heartily.

Hercules.
Well, we'll turn
To another business I am here upon.
Thou hast been the prince of hospitable souls,
I'll tax thy kindness further; to the bound
And circle of its utmost.

Admetus.
Tax it home.
What keep'st thou in the shade?

Hercules.
O, fair and soft!
What say'st thou to a woman?

Admetus.
A woman!

Hercules.
Ay;
Whom I won lately in a wrestling-match—
A tough one too, as any e'er I played:
I feel it in my loins, back, shoulders, sides,
I warrant thee, very shrewdly. I'd as lieve
Hold up the heavens again for father Atlas:
To crush Antæus was a joke to it.
Yet now, thou knowest, I'm on the road to Thrace,
To slay this Diomed. I'll crave thy kindness,
That, till I come again, thou keep'st her here,
In this thy hospitable house, for me.
If I come not again, why, keep her still—
Count her thine own.

Admetus.
A hard thing, Hercules,
Is this thou cravest of me. This is not seemly—
To leave thy virgin in a house of men,
Dwelling among the slaves; for what should be
The talk of me, the King, came she in here,
Like a hetaira, tended daintily,
With women at her beck?

Hercules.
Faith, mostly virgins
Are frail and perishable merchandise:
But her I'll trust with anyone but thee,
And thee with her. Come, take her at my hands;
For in sweet sooth I meant her for thyself—
To comfort thee. For what should medicine grief
For a dead woman better than the kiss
Of just another woman, warm and living?
What sayest thou?

Admetus.
Now, by Zeus, I did not think
The man was in the world could flout at me
With such a cruel jest! And Hercules—
The one man Hercules? But that my blood
Is waterish all with tears, and leaves me weak,
O aspen weak! such insult to my faith
Had waked as deep an anger. Now I can
But stare and shudder. Hercules? This wrong
The deed of Hercules?

Hercules.
Nay, nay, believe me,
There is no insult meant thee. Here stands one
As nobly born, as good, as beautiful,
As nobly dowered with all that gifts a wife,
As was thy dead Alcestis—worthier even
Thy most intensest love. Take her, and prove her,
And find how true my praise.

Admetus.
O never, never!
What, in her chamber, where the air is yet
Warm with her presence; where her needle sticks,
Just as she left it, in the unfinished flower;
Where her sweet words yet echo!
O blasphemy of nature! Let me die,
Ere such ill thought can touch me!

Hercules.
Time, man, time—
Time will do much.

Admetus.
Ay, that is true—too true.
I am no woman whose proud folly plays
The pander to her frailty. In my strength
I can see cracks. I dare not play with vows,
Oaths, promises; but if I know myself
I will dare think that, save that tender slip
Of dead Alcestis which was here just now,
My daughter Clymene, I'll have no wife
Other than her that's gone.

Hercules.
I give thee praise,
Right hearty praise, for thy firm constancy,
And know her worthy; but Alcestis' self,
Did she stand here, would echo me and say
That thou did'st wrong Alcestis, spurning thus
This woman I have brought thee.

Admetus.
How, how, how?
O vex me not with riddles! What means this
Strange iterance of an insult which doth seem
A thing far off and meaningless?

Hercules.
Suppose
Alcestis' self should rise from off her bier,
And claim her place—how would'st thou treat her then?

Admetus.
Alcestis' self? O dear and dreadful thought!
But that's impossible—Ah, Hercules,
Kill me not with these torturing thoughts; but rather
Stab me at once!

Hercules.
Admetus, look on me—
Are there no traces on me of a fight
More dire than common?

Admetus.
Thou look'st pale and shrunk—
And—well-nigh weak!

Hercules.
Well, to have fought with Death,
And held him, till a moment more had sent
A double monster, Hercules and Death,
To freeze in Hades—that might doubtless make
Even Hercules look weak.

Admetus.
What's this? What's this?

Hercules.
Muster thy heart up for the shock of joy,
When thou behold'st the prize I won of him—
This matchless woman, whose sweet warmth, as here
I bore her in my arms, has been to me
Death's antidote. Behold her! Dost thou know her?

[Unveils Alcestis.
Admetus.
O awful vision! Do I dream?

Hercules.
Hey, hey!
It seems when one's alive the other dies.
[Seeing the cup of wine left by Œnanthus.
What's here? Ay, wine. Come, come—off with it, man.
Drink it up quick—so—still alive it seems.
Look at her well.

Admetus.
So I do—so I do.
O this is terrible? What trick is this?
Fancy or fact? She seems to live, yet lives not.
She breathes but speaks not—stands with open eyes,
Yet sees not, smiles not—pale almost as when
She sank into my arms. This is not life.

Hercules.
Yes, yes, she lives. Go, clasp her in thy arms;
Kiss her upon the lips, and speak to her.
See will she kiss thee back.

Admetus.
Alcestis! Dearest!
If it be thou indeed?

[Kisses her; she starts as from a trance.
Alcestis.
Persephone,
August co-arbitress of Hades' realm,
I thank thee for this news.

Admetus.
What news? What news?

Alcestis.
That still Admetus loves me.

Admetus.
O, believe it!

Alcestis.
What should these be? They look too brave for shades.

Admetus.
'Tis I, 'tis I—O dream not thou art dead!
Thou livest, thou livest. 'Tis I, Admetus—I,
Thy husband.

Alcestis.
Ha! how comest thou here? Ah me!
Art thou dead too?

Admetus.
No, no, I live, I live,
And thou, thou livest. See where thou art, at home.
And here stands Hercules, who fought with Death,
And rescued thee, and brought thee back to me.
O Hercules, my best friend, what shall we do
To shew our love to thee?

Hercules.
Why, love each other.
I'll seek out yon old wine-skin, your good steward,
And crave a cup of wine from him—if yet
He have not drunk all up. Faith I'm but puny.

Admetus.
Do so, do so: call all the palace up,
And bid them tend on thee. We'll come anon.

[Exit Hercules.
Alcestis.
'Tis a sweet dream of home. And may we dream
So vividly in Hades?
And I can touch thee too!

Admetus.
Nay, this is home—
No dream of life, but very life itself.
Thy heart, like mine, beats strongly.

Alcestis.
Life?—this life?
How should I be alive?

Admetus.
By Death's defeat,
Whom Hercules won thee from, and brought thee back
To me,—and Clymene, Eumelus—all of us.

Alcestis.
Then, it is true—oh, let me think it true!
I'll pull my hair. Ha, pain! real pain! It must be—
That argues life indeed.

Admetus.
Nay, make not pain
The touchstone of true life; but bliss, but bliss,
Whereof 'tis but the shadow.
Alcestis (pulling off her wreath.)
What are these?
A garland—marigolds and daisies? Flowers
Of the dear old earth! No, 'tis no dream—Admetus!
My love!

Admetus.
O my Alcestis—tenfold mine
This blessed night!

Alcestis.
This agony of bliss
Outrivals that of death.

Admetus.
No more of death;
Let me begin to live. I am mad with joy,
And would do something mighty—when these limbs
Have done their trembling. Help me then to bear
This sudden flood of fearful rapture, which
Tugs my heart tigerishly. Tell me something
To piece our pang-rent lives. Where hast thou been
Since we two parted? Thou hast walked strangely far
Through the dark ways and dreadful glades of death:
What tiding or report of the Beyond
Bring'st thou?

Alcestis.
No more but what one newly waked
May tell of some bright dream. Methinks I come
Back from Love's very presence.

Admetus.
To find him here,
More than a dream. Thou art come back to me
Beautiful as a bride.

Alcestis.
And happier far
Than as a bride I crost thy threshold first.
O I will love thee! Thou shalt ne'er regret
That I myself succeed myself thy bride,
And oust my own successor.

Admetus.
In my thoughts
I ne'er saw but thy face. Wilt thou not see
The children?

Alcestis.
Let me kiss them in their beds.

Admetus.
Ay, better so. Clymene was here but now,
To comfort me.

Alcestis.
My little Clymene!
And poor Eumelus?

Admetus.
Wept himself to sleep.

Alcestis.
He speaks not much, but loves me.

Admetus.
Ay, in sooth.

Alcestis.
He'll waken glad.

Admetus.
All of us waken glad
From a bad dream. O death should teach us this:
To plant each patch and acre of our lives
With a rich seed of joy and love; in fear,
Yet in far-reaching-hope! I marvel now
How carelessly we crop our dearest joys,
Even in their tenderest budding; and henceforth
Each kiss of thy sweet lips shall seem a flower
Plucked for the shrine of a god, a drop of awe
Mingled with its delight. Love should know all,
Feel all—

Alcestis.
And dare all. I must kiss thee still
Though every kiss were death to me.

[Re-enter Hercules.
Hercules.
Good! both
Alive, I see, and likely to do well.

Alcestis.
O, Hercules! how shall we do thee good?

Hercules.
Get me a wife, the sister of thyself.

Alcestis.
That's not so hard. Win thou the maiden's heart,
She'll be what thou wouldst have her.

Hercules.
Nay, the heart
Needs a good head as well—both head and heart's
Too much to win in one sweet venture—eh?
Where grows thy compeer? Thy good Lord, dear Lady,
Has had rare fortune in thee.

Alcestis.
Every man
Must mould his fortune found. You shape us ill,
And blame the faults you have made.

Hercules.
How modestly
Ye rate yourselves! Fair lumps of passive clay,
How do you shape your shapers?

Admetus.
Pray you truce
To this light bickering. Your brisk-flashing tongues
Illumine but the ripples on the face
Of the deep sea of love. My vast content
Would take it at full tide, and plumb its depths
Where 'tis most fathomless; would dive therein,
Drowned and yet trusting. Such a sea is love,
That, Hercules, call for thy counterpart,
And she will hear and answer through the waves
That yearn from star to star.

Hercules.
Pooh! lover's dreams.
There's no such kindly and match-making sea
Pairs us like doves. Thou hast cast a lucky line
In wedlock's ocean. I might say to thee,
And just as truly: such a sea's the air,
That, dear Admetus, cry but for the moon,
And she will weep and flutter down to thee.

Admetus.
Maidens are gentle moons, one sweet, right word
Draws from their lonely orbits. Still I say,
If thou art worth a wife, touch but her hand
O'er the dark gulf that severs sex from sex;
Call her with pure desire and holy trust,
And she will come to thee. That gulf of gloom,
Full of dark fear and ugly controversy,
Shall grow a bay of peace, a lake of joy,
A bath of new-creation, full of light,
Where ye shall live like halcyons.

[Enter confusedly a troop of servants, &c.
Servants.
Where's the Queen?
Where is Alcestis? Wondrous!

Admetus.
Welcome friends!
Here stands, indeed, our Queen, come back to us.

Alcestis.
Yes, here I stand, alive and well, o'erjoyed
To see your joy.

Admetus.
And here stand I, your King,
Blest with such love of noble wife and friend
As none e'er found before. The gods I knew
Sat distant in Olympus in my need—
Ay, even Apollo was too weak to save.
But there's One holier, whose immortal throne's
The mortal heart—a God who died for me,
When she, my dearest, died; who conquered death,
When Hercules triumphed. There's no greater god
Than He whose pure and world-redeeming breath
Fills these great spirits. Light all the palace up;
We'll make a solemn sacrifice to Love,
Whom, as Apollo in the arts of life,
We'll worship in life's inward ways; and then
This happy night we'll turn to happy day,
And usher in the dawn with nuptial songs.
Come, my Alcestis.

(Exeunt.)