University of Virginia Library

SCENE III.

The Hall of Justice. Mendizabel, seated under a canopy, at one side—De Zelos on a splendid seat near him—Judges, Attendants. Mendizabel, suddenly recollecting himself, and starting from his seat, draws De Zelos to the front of the stage.
Mend.
My noble lord,
A word with you:—A trifle, but a strange one,
Had well nigh made my memory a truant:
A trifle—yet to this day's claim it doth
An indistinct and strange relation bear:—
This morn, a muffled stranger, darkly wrapt,
With marvellous and ceaseless importunity,
O'erbore my train's resistance ere I rose,
And rush'd into my chamber.—
Like some dark phantom by my couch it stood,
And seem'd to wrestle with some horrible image.
I gazed upon him till, with heaving utterance,
As if a giant's hand grappled his throat,
He muttered forth—“De Zelos is a villain!”—

De Zel.
(Starting as from a trance)
You did not see his face?

Mend.
No, but strange chance
Disclosed he was a Moor; for, as he spoke,
He placed his sable hand on mine.

De Zel.
You saw no face?
(Recovering himself)
In sooth my lord, your witless train do merit
Most heavy chidings, near your couch to suffer
A stranger with his dagger.

Mend.
I did not say he bore a dagger.

De Zel.
Ha!
In truth, I marked you not.—'Tis a strange tale.
A dagger'd ruffian breaking on your rest,
And hollowing forth I was a murderer.

Mend.
Murderer?—He said a villain—

De Zel.
True, most true,—
A villain only—'twas not murderer;—
I had forgot myself.—Doubtless, my lord,
It was some maniac, on whose racking brain
Some dark and troubled image dimly press'd,
Of loss that held resemblance to Alonzo's—
For madness, in its wayward potency,
Doth oft transform us to the very agents
Of griefs, whose warp'd and blacken'd thread was wove
In the same web with—But, you saw no dagger!

Mend.
None, my good lord.—Doubtless, it was a maniac.

(Mendizabel returns to his seat, conversing with the Court. De Zelos remains alone, in front of the stage, quite abstracted, and evidently meditating on what he has heard. An Officer approaches him slowly.)
Off.
My lord, the court is full, and waits your leisure.—

De Zel.
(starting.)
What say'st thou?—that the Moor awaits my leisure?

Off.
No, my good lord, I spoke not of a Moor.

De Zel.
Thou didst not!
Then there are other voices in the hall
Than issue from the lips of those I speak with.

(He takes his seat with much stateliness. Manuel enters on the other side, supported by his daughter. No attendants. Both in deep mourning. One of the Officers comes forward to help him to his seat, which is opposite De Zelos. He declines it gently.)
Man.
I thank you, sir—I have a DAUGHTER still.

Mend.
Before on this strange cause we enter, lords,
'Tis meet I should, in generous sorrow, mourn
The noblest blood of Spain, which should have flow'd
In fair and peaceful channel, fiercely thus
Disparts, and, breaking into various streams,
Dashes its angry waves against itself.—
Would that we might unite their thwarting currents!
But, since this may not be, tell us, Don Manuel,
What cause of bloody and momentous title,
Against your noble kinsman and your heir,
Doth urge this doubtful charge?

Tor.
One
Who, 'mid the wrecks and tempests of the world,
Hath, level still with honour, held his course.

Vel.
One whom Cordova, yea, all Spain, rejoices
To see restored to his just dignities,
And hail'd as Manuel's heir.

[All the council bow to De Zelos.
De Zel.
Oh! you flatter me, you flatter me—

Man.
What! sit ye here to flatter or to judge?
Oh ye soiled furs! dishonor'd dignities!
Ye robed mockers of the state ye shame!
With glozing proem of well-sorted words
To make mine enemy shew like a god,
And turn his scaffold to his pedestal—
And bid the summoning trump of judgment flourish
His hollow eulogy in venal courts—
Call you this Justice?—To your trusted hands
She gave her scales, and you weigh falsehoods with them—
She gave her sword, and 'gainst herself you turn it—
Of all her awful ensigns ye retain
Her bandage only: marry, that ye have stolen,
To bind your eyes withal

Mend.
From the wild rage
Of impotent, but venerable grief,
We turn in pitying deafness; while our eyes
Are quick and sensitive to its juster calls,
Be they in temperance uttered—

Vic.
Temperance!
My dearest father, even from these bad men,
Who with corrupted souls in judgment sit,
Take the ill-meaning lesson of their wisdom.

Man.
Then here I charge you, grave and reverend men,
Robed in the sanctity of awful duty—
To whose high trust 'tis given the mortal door
To open or to shut—that ye sit there
As men who for their judgment shall be judged—
That ye entangle not the upright spirit
In your fine subtleties—in a web of words
Catch struggling Truth, and leave her there o'erthrown—
Watch verbal flaws, the lapses of the tongue,
And set them down for crimes—and, when Conviction
With conquering step comes rushing on the soul,
Lift in your 'fence a high-held, hollow shield,
Inscribed with quaint Formality's chill name,
And bid her come no further!—
I call upon the spirit of these walls,
But do disdain their forms—

Mend.
Do you instruct us in our duty, lord?

Man.
I do instruct you in your nature, man—
That, above all your quaint and letter'd forms,
Petty enactments, and the snares of courts,
There is a prior and unwritten law,
Viewless, but legible to the soul's clear eye,
That man eraseless in his bosom bears,
And judges, if they would, might read.

Mend.
Well, Sir,
What says your sapient and oracular law,
That, like the wanderer from Religion's light,
First mocks at forms, and next defies its Judge?

Man.
It tells me by that whisper of the soul,
Which to no ear but mine is audible—
By dark array of thronging circumstance,
Which to the inmost soul conviction brings,
But faulters in its passage to the tongue;
By that untold and thrilling evidence
That wants the witnessing oath, and, wanting, spurns,
Yet calls the bristling hair and quivering nerve
T'attest its stern instinctive potency—
By these, that, feeling, yet ye will not feel,
It tells me that De Zelos is a murderer!—

Mend.
Words, words,—what proof of such a horrible charge?

Man.
What proof?—he hated him—can he deny it?
Could any but his murderer hate Alonzo?
Nay, smile not at the old man's helpless ravings;
He hated him: for that he was mine heir,
Child of mine age—the bar to his bad hopes—
He hated him!—Why didst thou hate him?—tell me—
I know not the foul secret of his soul.
The frown that doomed him is upon thy brow—
The lightning of thine eye that struck him, and parted,
Yet sleeps within its cloud—But I can read it.

De Zel.
If I have hitherto refrained myself—
If, with check'd tongue and bursting heart, I've sat
To hear my stainless and unblenched name,
The sport of maniac rage—I pray you, lords,
Wrong not the grave respect I bear your court,
And to aught else ascribe it. Old man, I tell thee
The sheeted bones of our dead ancestry
Do rattle in their cearments at the charge;
Thy desperate breath sounds through our buried line—
Thy blood is in my veins—thou canst not taint them
But ev'ry drop in thine should tingle too!—
We were two branches of the self-same trunk:
The dew was on thy stem, and the fresh wave
Fed it with many waters; the green leaf
Was bright upon thy bough; the trav'ller paused,
And blest it for its beauty. Such wast thou.
I was a blighted branch—the storm was on me;
And in my rifted core the winds of heaven
Sung wintry welcome, and made stern abode.
The mildew'd moss upon my brown sere bark
Made verdure seem like blasting—such was I.
The sun is on me now—the storm on thee—
Bear it as I have borne it.
Must I be broke and gathered for the burning,
Because the bolt of heaven hath smote thy pride?

Mend.
My lord, you do with waste of costly language
Obscure the cause which simpler speech had cleared.

De Zel.
Well, then, I will be plain;
He says, I slew his son: how doth he prove it?
Lives there another on the earth to beard me
With the bold charge?— (looks round in much terror, then recovers himself.)

Or, if there were, 'tis false—
What proof? still to the proof I challenge him!
Witness or evidence semblative—there's none.
He says I hated him—plotted his death,
Even from his infancy.

Per.
He said not so.

De Zel.
Well, well, 'twas meant: look at his muffled head,
Look at the speechless motion of his hand,
And tell me what that means.

“Per.
(aside to Victoria.)
This is most excellent.”

De Zel.
Had I meant so, I had not lack'd the means;
I might have to his sleeping cradle crept,
And with these fingers griped his infant throat.

Man.
'T'is false! I watched his cradle. Alonzo,
Thou wast my child of age, or to the battle
I would have follow'd thee!

De Zel.
Away, thou dreamer!
I might have bribed the venal slaves around him
To mingle poison with his infant food.

Man.
False, false!—they loved him, aye, the meanest of them,
As his own soul.

De Zel.
I might have stolen upon his careless steps,
And led them to the stream that bathes his towers.

Man.
Oh, hear him, hear him! hear the man of blood,
Convicted by himself—Could such thoughts be,
And not their harbour be a murderer's breast?

Mend.
Oh shame, thou ancient lord, where is thy wisdom?
With rash and peevish malice dost thou wrest
The generous anguish of an innocent soul
To thine own shame, not his—Be wise!—be wise!

“Vic.
First be ye merciful, oh men of subtilty,
“Who know full well how on the jealous ear
“Of fond insanity allusion works—
“The very charge doth cause th'infirmity,
“And makes your hapless victim what you term him.”

Man.
I am not mad. I am but miserable.
Yet hear me, lords; hear proof. I had a dream—
[Much agitation and debility.
Ye mock me—Yes, I had a dream in the forest—
The voice—the dagger—Oh, that they were here—
Aye, my old brain is wreck'd—all mist and twilight.
[Increasing agitation; he springs across the stage, and seizes on De Zelos.
I have but one hope left—Confess, confess!
[Shaking him.
The eye of God is on thee, and the grasp
Death ne'er unlock'd presses thy throat; confess!—
[De Zelos remains trembling in his grasp. The Court rises in great agitation, but, not daring to interfere, Ximena faints.
Think of the hollow, valueless pelf thou sellest
A deathless soul for!—Hath it made me blest?—
Number against thy ducats shrieks of torment—
These must be thine.
[Changes his tone, and falls on his knees.
Confess, and I will bless thee:
Thy victim's father kneeling here will bless thee!
[The Court rises to interpose; Manuel waves them off.
Hush! move not, move not; on your souls I charge ye!—
[A long pause, Ximena is borne off.
His eye is speaking, though his writhed lip
Struggles for art's damn'd language—look not on him.
[A pause.
If we were in a desart, thou'dst speak true.

[The Court rises in great indignation.
Mend.
Officers of the Court, perform your duty—
Release the Lord De Zelos!—See, he trembles
Yet from the maniac's grasp—

Tor.
It is from rage—

(The Attendants separate Manuel and De Zelos: the former falls into the arms of Victoria, still gazing at de Zelos.)
Vic.
(vehemently)
It is from guilt.

De Zel.
(recovering himself)
What should it be but rage?

Mend.
Oh, sir, we have too far yielded to his phrensy—
And this wild outrage on all legal form—

De Zel.
Talk not of legal forms,
As he hath trampled on my name—Thou dotard!
If in thy pithless arm remain'd the nerve
To grasp the shield, or poise the couched lance,
Then shouldst thou feel the weapon truth can wield.

Vic.
(supporting her father.)
Oh that this woman's arm could but obey
My struggling will!—'twould meet and blast thee, boaster!

Man.
(raising himself from her arms with difficulty.)
Villain—I had a son!—I had a son!

De Zel.
'Tis meet
I should in this grave council hold debate
With women and with madmen—

Mend.
Stay this distemper'd brawling—lords, your judgment:
I need not ask your suffrage—yet the forms
Of law do bind me to administer
An oath to the accused, whereby he clears
Himself of crime, even in the lawless thought
Of the unadvised summoner.

Man.
(starting forward, and gazing on De Zelos.)
Will he swear?

(A long pause: De Zelos in great agitation.)
De Zel.
I swear—

Man.
(in an agony of rage, tearing his hair, &c.)
Perjury, perjury, by heaven and earth!—

De Zel.
To thee I answer not.—My lords, from you
I claim the combat in my honour's right:
'Gainst Manuel's champion let my champion stand
In mailed proof—and God defend the right!

Man.
I have no champion—on my desolate side
No mailed foot will stand—my shield is fallen;
But with it fell its country's!—Oh, that this call
Might wake Alonzo to—What sound is that?

(Music without.)
Mend.
Who wakes that blast of martial minstrelsy?

Enter Perez, who has gone out to inquire.
Per.
It is the warlike band that serv'd Alonzo:
In sad and solemn march they onward come:
His broken spear and helm are on a bier;
Round it Spain's noblest warriors, dark and sad,
With trailing lance and low-hung banner, tread
To the near fane upon whose holiest shrine
They've vow'd to place them.

Man.
Said I, I have no son?—I have a thousand!
In ev'ry Spanish soul the offspring lives
Of him whose son bled for his country.

“Mend.
My noble lord, (to De Zel.)

“It were not wise you did intrust your safety
“To the wild soldiery's enchafed mood;
“Let us retire until this storm be past.

“De Zel.
I will not move!

“Mend.
Oh, yet retire, I pray you!

“Man.
No, let him stay, and look upon his work.

“De Zel.
(Struggling with them.)
“Off, I will stay! no power shall move me hence!”

Man.
Grave Lords, your leave. Go, bid them enter here. I was his father!
My blessing never fell upon his corse—
Let it fall on his bier!
[Manuel starts up.
(Enter Soldiers in procession with the bier, &c.— Martial Music.)
(To De Zelos.)
Thou, who hast sworn—now swear thee by these reliques,
And I will half believe thee—Swear, I say!

(De Zelos in frightful agitation attempts to advance, but knows not where to place his hand—Manuel seizes it, and places it on the bier.)
Man.
Here—here— [De Zelos almost insensible.


(Torrismond rushing in.)
Torris.
He shall not swear— [Hurrying him off.


[Exeunt, Torrismond bearing out his father insensible.
Man.
Will he not swear?
Mine be the oath then—Warriors, kneel with me!—
And kneel thou too—
[To his daughter, they all kneel round the bier.
Vengeance! eternal vengeance!

[The curtain drops.