University of Virginia Library

ACT V.

Scene I.

Andrea.

'Tis with me, only out of the fryingpan into the fire: I live the life of a flying-fish: no sooner do I 'scape this shark than that cormorant pounces upon me; when I dive for safety from the

beak of the air-devil, I find the jaws of the water-devil most hospitably open to receive me.—Saint Bridget be my protector! here come my old friends, the Moorish ambassadors!—just in the nick of time to give my speech a new proof and illustration!— Again, I say, miserable! thrice-miserable Ribobolo! It is not two skips of the sun since thou wert on the point of being cut down like a flower of the field, in all the pride of thy beauty, and now, to crown thy ill-fortune, here are two devils come to possess thee.—Save ye, gentlemen!

Enter Grumiel and Momiel with Roselle.
Momiel.
Ha! ha! thou scape-goat!—art thou caught again?
Stir not a pace, but tremble where thou stand'st.

Andrea.

With all my might, sir!—I shake where I grow, as if I were about to turn into an aspen.

Momiel.
See! we have done thy duty, thou forsworn,
Contemptible wretch! This is the maiden-prize
Thou should'st have brought us, and been man again.

Andrea.

Lud-amercy! here is one of my mountain landladies!—Mistress Roselle, as I'm a person, the miller's daughter!

Momiel.

This?

Andrea.

This! Ay this! I'll stake my ears on't!—Odso! Now that I call the matter to mind, Satan was guilty of her abduction: he gathered her and her sister as they were growing, posy-fashion, beside the mill-pond, to sweeten the air of his roaring kitchen. Where is t' other pullet? has he spitted her already?

Grumiel.

Ha! ha! ha! ha! here was a stratagem!

Momiel.
Curse thee, vile oaf! dost laugh at me?
I'll tear thee!

Grumiel.
Come on! I'll writhe about thee as a snake,
And twist thy bones like gristle—

Momiel.
Help! help, king!

Andrea.

Well done, my chickens! To't, boys! Excellent! Five to one upon Spitfire!—At him, Snap-dragon!—To't!—Bravo!—Now if they would only eat each other up, after the precedent of the two cats in the sawpit, 'twould be a desideratum much to be desired.—Hilloah! are heaven, earth, and purgatory coming together?

Ararach descends amid thunder and lightning. Attendant Fiends.
Ararach.
Bunglers again?—Hurry them to the flames,
As I commanded: Sweep them from my sight,
Rebels! that serve their passions and not mine!
[Exeunt Fiends with Grumiel and Momiel.
Myself, I find, though sore against my will,
Both chief and actor must be in their business.
Come hither, clown!—Take thy man-shape again;
See what thou ow'st my pity. Get thee gone!
There is thy road; 'twill lead thee to thy friends,
Whom thou may'st hither fetch, if they will come,
To bear this maiden grave-ward. We'll depart:
See that yon corse burden not long our realm,
Or thou, and all thy rout, shall lie as cold!

[Ascends.
Andrea.

My stars! what a—phew! he has left after him: like the last sighs of ten thousand expiring candles. It is enough to smother all the hives in Sicily. Now if he would be only satisfied to live like a man of reputation, he might earn an honest livelihood by travelling as a sulphur-merchant to the North (where, I am told, there is a great demand for that article), or by selling matches through the streets,—two bundles for a halfpenny. But ods bobs! why do I stand here lecturing on commercial affairs, when I don't know but his pestiferous majesty may descend in another cloud of such frankincense, and I shall be smoked to the flavour of Westphalia bacon? Well, if it were only

from one feature in my face, videlicet, my tongue, I would even swear that I was the identical son of my mother!—Fly, Andrea, as fast as thy legs can carry thee!

[Exit.
Ararach descends again.
Ararach.
Now let me use my skill. Thou sleeping earth,
Take thou the form of Sylvia, the May-Queen!
And lie there in that thicket, till one comes
Whom I would lime for a decoy, to bring
The bird I love about her. So!—'tis done!—

[Ascends again.
The Scene closes.

Scene II.

Stephania.

O sister! sister! what has become of you?—I will never go home without you, if I were to seek a thousand years!—What should I say to my mother when she asked for her pretty Rose?

Geronymo.

Nay, weep not so heartily, I pray you: be not in such woful contrition. The case is not so bad, by a hundred miles, as you think it: for, look you now, it stands thus, or in other words, here 'tis: You have lost your sister beyond recovery; good—

Stephania.

Begone, fickle-hearted turncoat!— If I could even forget your treachery, I am not in the mood now to hear such a prig discoursing.

Geronymo.

Why very well, there 'tis: I am a prig. Bear witness to that: she calls me-prig, and refuses to hear condolement.

1st Peasant.

Go to! you are ejected, and may wear the willow.

Geronymo.

No matter! 'tis all very well! very well indeed!—I will hang myself some of these fine mornings, and then, mayhap, she will see what it is to wound the heart of a sensible-plant like me, by calling him prig and turncoat. Cruel Mrs. Stephania! I thought your soul was as tender as a chicken, but now I find it is harder than Adam's aunt or marble!

Stephania.

If you wish to soften it again, you will find out my sister. I can think of nothing else till she be discovered.

Geronymo.

Say no more, but put your trust in my zigacity. Above ground and beneath sky, I'll

ferret her out, though she were hid in a blind nutshell.

2d Peasant.

So, friend! whither are you going?

Enter Andrea.
Andrea.

Indeed I cannot particularly say: but going I am!—I have taken up the trade of a water-wheel lately, and am always going! moreover betoken that, like it, I cannot get out of the pickle in which the malice of my enemies has placed me, but am continually soused over head and ears by a flood of misfortune. However, time cures all sorrows, and philosophy the remainder—Saw you any peasants about here? clowns, clodpates, popolaccio, dregs, that is to say, honest, foolish kind of persons?

Peasants.

Why I hope we be such: what else do you take us for?

Andrea.

By this light, now that I observe it, so ye are. Ye answer the description exactly: no hue-and-cry ever gave the dimensions of a banditti more precisely. Well; and wherefore in the dumps, my honest, foolish kind of neighbours?

Geronymo.

Why if it so please you, here 'tis now—

Andrea.

This is a logicizer: you may always know a logicizer, by his laying down the law with his forefinger. Save thy invisible bellows, thou

oracular fellow; I know all thou wouldst say, better than if there was a glass window in thy stomach. Ye are seeking for one of your lost lambs, my pastors?

Peasants.

By the mass, so we are! He must be a witch, neighbours, to tell us this without knowing it.

Andrea.

Follow your noses, and I will undertake to lead you by them to where she is: I owe her as much gratitude as would fill a wine-flagon, pie-dish, brandy-flask, et cetera, nappercyhand, nappercyhand. She and her sister made a cramm'd fowl of me, I thank them. Indeed, if a stone could melt, I had poured out my heart at her feet, in expressions of love and affliction. But this is irreverent! Come along: 'tis not five-score yards beyond the bowsprits I have promised to tow ye by.

Peasants.

Willingly, and thank you.

[Exeunt.

Scene changes to another part of the Glen.
Enter Andrea and the Peasants.
Andrea.

There! in that thicket, that bramblebush; if your eyes be not scratched out by leaping into it, you will see her there.

Peasants.

Well, come with us, and show it more catacullycully.

Andrea.

Ay, to be sure I will!—Go on; I'll be

whipper-in of your whole pack. Proceed, I tell ye! it is all before you, as a pedlar carries his knapsack.

Peasants.

Lead away, then!

Andrea.

Right; you are in the very track of it: I shall cry out “roast beef!” when you are about to tumble upon her.

Peasants.

Good! Proceed, Geronymo. Our guide will come after us.

Andrea.

O doleful! woful! racks! torments! thumbscrews!—O my great toe! my great toe!

Peasants.

What is the matter?

Andrea.

My great toe, I say!—O now are the sins of my ancestors coming against me!—The gout! the gout!—I cannot stir an inch farther, if I got the bribe of a secretary!—Go on, go on; if you stay here making mouths at my foot it will only grow the more angry.

Peasants.

Well, remain here for us, while we search the bushes.

Andrea.

Speed ye, neighbours!—Hark 'ee!

Peasants.

What?

Andrea.

Ye will be here when ye come back, eh?

Peasants.

Ay, certainly.

Andrea.

Why then, mean time, I will put my foot in a sling, and prepare to hop off with ye.

Good bye!—Oo! such a twinge! as if the fiend's claw and my foot struck a bargain for ever! Oo!

Peasants.

On, folks! on!—He must be sorely afflicted to make such a piteous howling, and such heinously ill-favoured grimaces. How he lolls his tongue out at us, like a mad dog! we are well rid of him.

[Exeunt.
Andrea.

'Slife! why was I not a politician? a Machiavelian?—I would overreach his Spanish majesty himself, who, they tell me, is the very flower of dissimulation, the pink of hypocrisy.— Those empty-pates! those human ostriches! that run their heads into a bush and think themselves hidden from danger, because it is hidden from them!—I know more of jurisprudence than to play at blindman's buff with Mephistopheles and his convent of Black Friers. Well, he may enlist them all under his pitchy ensign, but he shall not have me for a fugue-man. I will rather be fugitive!

[Exit.

Scene III.

Romanzo and Sylvia.
Romanzo.
After the Night how lovely springs the Morn!
After the shower how freshly blooms the green!
After the clouds and tempest of our fate,
How sweetly breaks the beauty of the sky,
And hangs its rainbow ev'n amid our tears!—
Now Mercy joins us in her circling arms,
And, like a beauteous mother, wishes us
All joy that can betide!—Is not her blessing
Already come upon us? Is not this
Perfect beatitude?

Sylvia.
O, but I fear
It will not last for ever!—'Tis too sweet.

Romanzo.
What should Heaven find in either of us two
That should provoke its shaft?—No! we will live,
Bosom to bosom thus, like harmless doves,
And so be spared for our great innocence!—
Look up, and smile!

Sylvia.
Nay, I am of thy mind—
Ecstasy is too deeply-soul'd to smile.
I am more near to weep; but such fond tears
As flow'rets, ill-intreated of the night,
Shed, when the morn-winds sing i' the Eastern gate
That father Sun doth rise.

Romanzo.
Is not this love
A happy thing? a fountain of new life,
Another urn of blood within the heart
That floods the ebbing veins; and teems new life
Through all those ruby channels?—O it is
Warmest of bosom-friends!—Joy'st not to feel
This downy bird rustle within thy arms,
Choosing his fragrant bed; as fond as he,
The nectar-bibbing fly, who doth disturb,
With most uxorious care, yon rose, the while
He settles in her breast?

Sylvia.
Is Love a bird?

Romanzo.
A boy!—with curls of crisped gold, like thine:
Lips like the fresh sea-coral: in his cheek
The sleepless Laughter cradles; and above
Perpetual Sport rides in his humorous eye.
This guest of man hath to his use beside
A quiver, and light arrows, and a bow;
With which he stings his votaries' willing hearts,
Aiming from beauty's hills, or vantage-ground,
Where he can light: then flies (for pinions he
Fleeces the wand'ring gossamer) to tend
The wounds his bolt hath made; and often there,
Like a good surgeon, pillows till they heal,
Or sweetly cruel makes them bleed again.
This is Love's picture; and his page of life
Writ in Time's chronicle.

Sylvia.
Sure it must be
A marvellous child!

Romanzo.
O, 'tis a winsome boy!
And tells such pleasant tales, and sings such songs,
With harp gay-tinkling like a Troubadour,
That icy nuns through charitable grates
Thrust forth their lovely arms to pamper him;
And so he often wounds them, while they leave
Their bosoms undefended.

Sylvia.
I would hear
Some of his minstrelsy.

Romanzo.
Why so thou hast:
He speaks through various lips; even now through mine.

Sylvia.
Ah! thou deceiv'st me: thou art he! but clothed
In shape more godlike.

Romanzo.
[Kisses her.

Sylvia.
Would it were sweeter,
For thy sake, than it is!—We are betroth'd,
And so I hold my petty treasures thine,
My lord and husband.

Romanzo.
Therefore in their use
I will be frugal, since thou 'rt generous.—

Sylvia.
Hark! hark! a cry!—

Romanzo.
Fear not!—thou 'rt in my arms.

Andrea without.

Alas! alas!—Help! help!—Do I live amongst Saracens or Turkies?—No pity? no assistance?— The good dame! the excellent old lady! Kidnapt! transposed! elevated!—She who saved me from that mad-pated fellow, my master!

Sylvia.

My mother!

Romanzo.

What 's this ruffian hurly? speak!

Enter Andrea.

Help, I say!—Rescue! rescue!—If ye have hearts the size of queen-cakes, let your swords leap from your scabbards, and cut down these sans-culottes! these Carbonari! sons of the Black Prince! whelps of Belzebub!—O Master! Master! turn away the eyes of your wrath from me upon those dingy freebooters!—Lamentable! O lamentable! lamentable!

Romanzo.

Speak! Who?—who?—

Sylvia.

If thou hast pity, speak!

Andrea.

Pity!—Am I not weeping my eyes out?—What can I do more?—Are either of ye half as pitiful a fellow?—Do I stand nonchancically here like a statue, as if I were gaping for bobcherries, or had set my mouth for a fly-trap?— Pity, indeed!—Am I not shouting, ranting, and calling down vengeance upon the heads of these nefarious woman-stealers as fast as tiles in a storm? —What call you this but pity,—active, stirring, practical,—I say, practical pity?—Oons! I should have been president of some humane society, or an overseer of the poor, at the least, had I remained turnspit to the Sardinian ambassador in England.

Sylvia.

Agony choaks me!—O I shall go mad!

Romanzo.

Dastardly hound! I'll shake thy story out of thee!

Andrea.

Pray do not; it would discompose me much in the telling of it, I assure you. Mark me now—“Here 'tis!” as neighbour Geronymo says; or thus it stands, or this is the tot of the matter. We proceeded on our excursion, or incursion (to speak critically, for we were about to enter the preserve of a Nabob, though, indeed, we had a special licence from his diabolical lordship)—Well! —Take your knuckless off my throat, I beseech you, sir; my words come out pip! pip! like bullets from a potgun. Well—as I was saying,—the

peasants and I, or, in other words, I and the peasants, which you will,—proceeded on our progress to seek for young Mrs. Roselle, the miller's daughter, in the wood, just there, over your worship's nose, where the grass is so parched and thin, it would hardly fodder a goose. Well! so far, so good —A little more vent, if you please, sir! I shall never run out else. Well—When we had come thither, lo and behold ye! no Mrs. Roselle; not the print of her shoe upon the moss, though she wore beechen ones an inch thick, and clouted from heel to toe with sixpenny hobnails. Well!—no maid o' the mill, as I told ye, was to be found there, but in her stead the shapes and figures of one Mrs. Sylvia, as the peasants entitled her: some country-hoyden, I surmise, that purls a little through an oaten pipe, and infests these parts in a sheep-keeping character,—a “dear Pastora,” as one might say, a Mrs. Simplicity—O! your worship! do not tuck that thumb so inexorably under my gizzard as if you were nailing up wall-fruit—You'll spoil my story!

Romanzo.

Would I could strangle thee, and hear thee after!

Andrea.

Why, indeed, hanging is almost too good a death for an informer; but it is considered more politic to reward him. However, to proceed

as we went on: I being foremost, that is, foremost in the rear, I debouche towards dame Agatha, who, indeed, was coming by hasty marches to warn us of some danger, and I communicate to her my intelligence—

Romanzo.

Well?—What did she?—what?—what?—speak it!

Andrea.

Fell all of a heap like a haycock, your worship; and thereupon darted immediately into the wood as if her heels were loaded with quicksilver; from thence bolted into the arms of a couple of Black Hussars, who carried her off to perdition: And so, if they don't live happy, I hope—

Sylvia.

Fly! fly, and save her!—O your mercy, Heavens!

[Swoons.
Romanzo.
Hear me, thou villain!—On thy hopes of life,
Here and hereafter, guard this lovely one,
Sustain, restore, and tend her, while hard fate
Keeps me from that dear office,—or as sure
As lightning blasts, thy doom is fixt—

[Exit.
Andrea.

Indeed so it appears: to be ever surrounded and o'erwhelmed by innumerable and indescribable miseries and mischances, accidents and offences, dreadful calamities and singular occurrences!—They come as thick upon me as if they were showered from a dredging-box! I am

powdered with sorrows and afflictions! Salted, peopered, pickled! roasted, basted, stewed, fried, crimped, scarified, tossed like a pancake, and beaten like a batter, upon all occasions! Finally, I have been cooked up into a devil, and may perhaps be buried alive in a minced-pie to be served up at a Christmas-feast among the Cannibals. Nevertheless, I will endeavour to revive this lovely maiden according to the prescriptions of Galen and Hippocrypha—

Raises Sylvia in his arms.

Truly, my adventures follow one another with marvellous dexterity: if they were only printed I might string them together like ballads, and sell them by the yard as they do popular songs, or Bologna sausages: I should have every mob-cap in the neighbourhood peeping out of the attics, and have copper jingling about me as if I were playing the triangle,—could I only bring myself to chant my own deeds for remuneration.—Here now am I, without ever having studied more of the Healing Art than a farrier's dog,—here am Iinstalled as physician-general of this uninhabited district, and condemned under the penalty of bastinado and carbonization, to raise this mortal from the dead, as if I had invented an universal restorative!—'Sbodikins! it is too much! were my shoulders as broad as Mount

Hatless, I could not long bear this world of negotiations that is laid upon them!—If I were any thing less than the most tender-hearted Samaritan in all Christendom, I would leave this pretty faint-away here to get well as she could, by the study of “Every man his own physician,” and take to my heels like a dancing bear when I am threatened with such a flagellation. But no matter!—the heart of man was made for misfortune as an ass's back for a packsaddle. We must be all stocks and philosophers!—I'll run for a capfull of the limpid, to baptize her.

[Exit.

Scene closes.

Scene IV.

Enter Ararach and Fiends with Romanzo prisoner.
Ararach.
Enter before us!—
I will not have him torn with thongs, nor pierced
With barbed instruments; nor pincht, nor crampt;
These are but laughing pains to such wild tortures
As I'll afflict him with: he shall not bellow
His furnace pains shut in an ox of brass,
Like him whose craft was proved upon himself;
Nor shall his lopt or lengthen'd form be stretch'd
On iron bed, accommodately fill'd
By every guest, pygmy, or stout, or tall.
Trite code of agonies! that writhe the frame
But hardly wring the mind. Peasants who have
Their feelings in their flesh, and none more inward,
Shrink at the bloody pincers: but high natures
Who feel not in their clay, despise all pangs
That reach no deeper.—I will plague him there!
In a refined, imaginative way;
And work upon his sensibility,
Not on his senses, which he'd reck as much
As the wild Indian at the stake, or he
Who burnt his hand for bravery.—What ho!
Is the stage rear'd?

Fiend.
Dismiel, the machinist,
Is hard about it, lord: you hear the clang,
And music of his anvil, which doth sing
At every stroke, like a cathedral bell,
And every iron tingles in the hand
Of his accomplices.

Ararach.
Go! quicken him
With a few stings i' the elbow.—And thou, too,
See if my quaint device go smoothly off,
Ere the Phantasma pass before his eyes,
Whom we would entertain with feats and shows
As such a guest deserves. If one particular
Fail in the presentation, even by chance,
I'll hold thee punishable: Mark it well!

[Exit. The Fiends vanish.

Scene V.

Enter Sylvia, Stephania, Roselle, Jacintha, and Peasant-girls following.
Stephania.

Alas! alas! she is distract—

Jacintha.

Ay, truly: you may know it by her hands locked so; and her streaming hair; and her eye fixt upon the ground as if she were choosing her steps over a bridge not a hair's breadth. O it is a piteous condition!

Roselle.

Sweet Sylvia! Gentle maid!—Go not, we pr'ythee, towards that haunted wood: do not, we beseech thee!—She looks at me, but speaks not —O her eyes! her eyes!

Girls.

Go not, our queen! our beauteous sovereign!—We will kneel to thee, if thou wilt stay.

Stephania.

'Tis vain!—she heeds us not.

3d Girl.

She seemed to love Jacintha, because she could talk more gentlefolk than we: let Jacintha pray her not to go.

Jacintha.
[Embracing Sylvia.]

O gentle friend! by this entreating and affectionate kiss—

Sylvia.

No comfort! no!—they are ta'en! they are ta'en!

Jacintha.

I but offend her.

Sylvia.

Is he not dead, answer me that?—Is not my mother ta'en?—Why trouble ye me thus— Forgive, but leave me!

Jacintha.

Sweetness, even in her moods and wilfulness.

Girls.

Let us fall down about her on her knees.

Sylvia.

Prevent me not, I say!—I will proceed!

[Exit.
Peasants.

'Twill make her fractious: she will go. Let us follow her to the extent we dare, and persuade her back if possible.

[Exeunt after Sylvia.

Scene VI.

Romanzo.
Endure! O heart! endure!—
O strings of passion, break not!—Hold but firm
Till I have scaled this iron tomb: burst then,
Fountain of life, and let me choak with blood!—
Thou fair iniquity! I'll reach thy locks,
And strangle thee in their twisted goldenness!—
Might, double-thew my limbs! Knot the great sinews,
That my tough, boughy arms, curl with their strength,
Like the prodigious elm: I would pull down
To dust these riotous lovers!—Foul abortion!—
I will—O words!—For thee, young treachery!
Beautiful sin! fair hypocrite! I'll paint
Thy cheek a bloodier hue!—O is this earth
Limed to retain me?—Though my feet do move,
Weights, huge as millstones, seem to clog their steps,
Locking me to this goal—Torture of sight!
What! wilt thou wind thy passionate arms about him?—
Kiss him not, wanton!

Phantom of Ararach.
Fairer than fair!

Phantom of Sylvia.
Sweet king!

Romanzo.
O scorpion words!—Vile pair!—Must I yet storm
Like the fixt oak with idly-threatening arms,
Uttering loud tempest-talk, swung with blind rage,
But spur-bound to a spot?

Phantom of Sylvia.
Look! here's a wreath:
[To the Phantom-king.
I'll twist it round thy brow.

Romanzo.
Cruel! oh cruel!
That was my crown! my garland!

Phantom of Ararach.
Come and claim it.
Knock off his miry fetters there!

Phantom of Sylvia.
Poor fool!

Romanzo.
Vengeance!—I'm free!—Now, you luxurious pair,
Have at your hot alcove!—In war, in war
I've leap'd a battlement Alp-high to this.

Phantom of Ararach.
Work up! work up!—Dismiel, thou art too slow!

Romanzo.
Ha! what is this?—O grief!—the dungeon sides
Arise like murky clouds at thunder-call,
Hanging a rocky ciel above my head,
Ready to crush me if I breathe!—

Phantom of Ararach.
Let down,
Let down our shafted stairs!—Mount, worshipper!
Thine eyes must ache with lowly adoration.
Courage, and knee our throne!

A golden staircase is let down.
Romanzo.
Where lead these steps?—
Or how do they come here?—Ah! Pity stoops
Half out of Heaven, and to her bracelet links
This stair, that I on earth may groan no more,
But creep along her arm into her bosom,
And, like a hurt babe in its mother's breast,
Lament myself to peace!

Phantom of Sylvia.
Sir brideman, come!
We cannot tarry longer for thy torch
To light us bedward.

Phantom of Ararach.
Raise the nuptial song!
Music may draw him, though our love do not.

Romanzo.
Am I spell-stricken, now?—Now are my feet
Riveted! bolted! chained! that I forbear
To mount to my revenge?—Hold fast! hold fast,
Ye silver-clouted stars!—Afford me still
This pendulous step-inviter to your sphere,
I'll up as swift as soaring Victory
To clap at Heaven-gate her triumphant wings!—
I come! I come!
As he approaches, the steps fade away.
'Sdeath! do mine eyes melt at the flaming gold?
Phantoms of Ararach and Sylvia.
Ha! ha!—the rainbow-grasper weeps to see
His vision—air!

Romanzo.
Justice! Justice, ye gods!
Is this your equity?—
[The stair vanishes entirely.
I'll pray no more
The absent Powers. Justice long since, now Hope,
Ev'n Hope, hath left this planet!—Blank Despair,
Thou only dost abide!—Lend me a sword;
'Tis all I crave, and what thou lov'st to proffer:
A sword, kind deity of the miserable!
Let fall a sword, and I will swear thy name
Sweeter than Mercy's to the wretch in dread
Of everlasting pain!
A sword falls upon the ground.
Thanks!—Now farewell,
Earth, and its woes for ever!

Phantoms of Ararach and Sylvia.
Ha! ha! ha!

[Laughter above.
Romanzo.
Nay, let me pause!
There's something dread and horrid in that joy!—
'Tis said the fiends laugh where the angels weep:—
I will not do 't!—O all-disposing Heaven,
Pour down thy sorrows as thou wilt, I'll drink them
In patience, though in tears!

Phantoms of Ararach and Sylvia.
Ill done! O rage!

[Murmurs above.
Romanzo.
Now may I know Heaven smiles upon my deed,
For Hell is most unhappy.

Phantoms of Ararach and Sylvia.
Let's provoke him!

The Canopy, with the Phantom-lovers, descends.
Phantom of Ararach.
Behold!

Phantom of Sylvia.
Thy rival!—O behold!

Phantom of Ararach.
Thy love!

Romanzo.
To death and darkness, with one lightning-sweep
Of this blue thunderbolt!

His sword divides the Canopy, which vanishes with the Phantoms, displaying the Enchanted Vale, and Sylvia beside her lover.
Sylvia.
[Leaping to his bosom.]
My life! my lord!—
Take me into thine arms! take me!—

Romanzo.
Avaunt!
By what reed nature dost thou only bow
Beneath my stormy hand?—Dares thy slight insolence
Brave me again?

Sylvia.
Nay, I will kneel for death,
So my lord wills it!

[Kneels.
Romanzo.
Good! O art o' the sex!
How well she does it!

Sylvia.
Come! I'll bind mine eyes,
Or cast them on the ground, lest their fond looks
Persuade thee into pity. I would die!
In sooth, I would! now I have lost thy love.

Romanzo.
Perfidiousness!—

Sylvia.
Kill me! O kill me first,
And name me after!—Let me die believing
I am thy dear-one still—the simple thought
Would make me kiss the weapon. Gentle love!
One agony—one agony! Kill me not twice,
With sorrow, and the sword!

Romanzo.
Were I not staunch
As Murder, I would melt at this!—Wilt strive?
Wilt talk? wilt question with me?

Sylvia.
I will be dumb—
I'll cross my patient hands upon my breast,
And wait my death as meek as the poor lily
Whose head falls smiling at her slayer's feet.
Or I will clasp thy knees,—thus—thus!—And if
Tears through my blinding hair will come at all,
'Tis for thy misery when I am slain.
Now!—while I kiss thy gentler hand—

Romanzo.
Thus then,
[Raising his sword.
Die! die, thou traitress—Now, by heavens, she clings,
Clings to me like a babe!—Whate'er she be,
O God! how pitiful are woman's tears!

Sylvia.
No!—no!—they are not for myself!—

Romanzo.
Go, wretch!
That seem'st so innocent, but art not,—go!
I cannot murder thee: 'tis like infanticide!

Sylvia.
Where shall I go?—wretch as I am!

Romanzo.
I care not!—
Any where—any where!—so it be from me!
Go to thy paramour; thy sceptred love;
Thy demon wooer; whom my sword dispersed,
But slew not: him thou didst caress but now—

Sylvia.
Him? him? the Sorcerer?

Romanzo.
Ay, thou false one! ay!
With cheeks as flagrant as the sun's in June,
Smiles broad and liberal as she bestows
Whose blush is wine-engender'd; with such hands
As smoothe the unshorn Satyr when he loves,
Or weave his drunken crowns!—Follow him, go!
He'll perk thee by his side, I dare be sworn,
On his mock throne; call thee his florid queen;
While roars that bring down all the vaulted clouds
To quench the clamor, shall proclaim your title
As wide as Shame can hollo!—After him, go!

Sylvia.
'Tis a most hideous dream!—Would I had waken'd!

Romanzo.
For me,—O that some violent bolt would fall,
And make me ashes!—some oak-bending storm
Lap me in its wild skirt, and swirl me down
Precipices footed in the raging waves
Where thunder learns to bellow; where leviathan
Tosses his foam abroad, and to the sands
Sucks down the shrieking mariner!—plunged there,
Ten thousand fathoms deep amid the billows,
I would find out an ever-stunning grave
Where voice of man could never hail me more!—
O my brain seethes with fire!—Death! death! O death!

[Exit.
Sylvia retires, and sits down beside a rock with her head leaning against it.
Sylvia.

“Wretch”!—“False-one”!—“Precipices”!—“Grave”!—“Death! death”!— What is all this?—O, I am crazed! I'm crazed!— Mother!—Romanzo!—help me!—Fool! fool! silence!— Ha! ha! ha! ha!—No; I'll not laugh; I'll sing.

Why, the key to her happiness, that he may rob her of it, and begone; leaving her to live on her scholarship. Ah, deceiver!

O yes, indeed!

“Violets”!—what next?—Pah! I forget—“violets”!—

I have no better words: but they go pat enough; and would be sweet, sweet indeed, could the flower sigh them over my grave!—O that it were bedtime! I am aweary of this sun; and long to sleep beneath the fresh-green turf, with a sweet-briar at my head to entice the nightingale, and a streamlet at my foot to join in the lullaby.

At least if all maidens be like me!—and pray Heaven, I die ere night of this thorn in my bosom!

So she wept till the very shroud was moist with her tears! O what a kind shepherd! Would I had such another!—But no! Who thinks of Sylvia?— Not even Sylvia, though she is beside herself! ha! ha! ha!—the first jest I ever made in my life, and, without another, it is a most miserable one!—Indeed, indeed, I am not very happy, though I do sing. Where did I end?

Enter Floretta behind.
Floretta.
O happy sight! O happy hour!
I've found my beauteous lady-flower!
Arise, arise, and come with me,
Thou'rt in the realm of perfidy.

Sylvia.

Ay, that's true; it rhymed to me—

There was a swain for you!—ha! ha! ha! ha!

Floretta.
O see my tears! O hear my cries!
My love! my beauty! rise! arise!
Sit not, I pray thee, chanting there
Wild ditties to the ruthless air,
Like the lost Genius of Despair!
Two fiends are hither winging fast
To seize my lovely-one at last.
Sylvia!—Dost hear me?—

Sylvia.
Bird!

Floretta.
O come!
Return to thy forgotten home!
Hear ye not how the valleys mourn—
“When will our Shepherdess return?”
Return! return! the rocks of gray
And murmuring streams and hollows say!

Sylvia.

Ay, when I have sung my song, indeed!—when I have sung my song!

What does your fairyhood say to that?—Do your little goodies spin thread fine and strong enough to bind up a broken heart?—If so I will buy it of them for a silver penny cut out of the moon. Bear them my offer; I will sing here till you come back.

Floretta.
Enter Grumiel and Momiel.

Grumiel.

Ha! ha! have we caught thee at last?

Momiel.

Napping, i' faith! like a wild cat, with her eyes open. Come! bring her along.

Floretta.
O my lost flower! my flower!

Momiel,

Ay, Trip-Madam is her name: see how kindly she comes to it!

Grumiel.
What is that hizzing thing there?

Momiel.

Why nothing less than three barleycorns' length of woman-kind, in a huge petticoat made of a white thumbstall, and having wings as long as a brown hornet's or a caterpillar's after conversion. A pocket-piece!—She too has a name— Busybody. Wilt come with us, Gad-about?

Grumiel.

No! we have more of the sex by one than is welcome.

Momiel.

Nay, thou may'st flutter and squeal and ricket about, like an old wren (as thou art!) when the schoolboy filches thy young one. Adieu, mistress! and bear my respects to Monsieur Saint Vitus, thy dancing-master.

Grumiel.

Come on, thou gibbering ape!

Momiel.

Then, I may say, like one of my kindred in the fable, putting my hand upon this wig-block of thine,—“Bless me! what a fine head were this, if it only had brains!”

Grumiel.
I'll—

Momiel.

Go! go on!—Take a graybeard's advice: never open thy mouth but to eat thy porridge. Though thou didst live upon garbage, nothing would ever go into thy throat that was not better than aught that came out of it. Go on, pray thee!— despise not the use of thy trotters.—Good-bye,

little Mistress Hop-o'my thumb!—Warm work for an afternoon, Mistress! Thou look'st for all the world like a humming-top on the wing; and indeed would'st make a most lively representation of the proverb—a reel in a bottle.—Go on, buzzard!

[Exeunt Fiends with Sylvia.
Floretta.
Now may I to some covert creep,
And like the secret bird of sorrow
In darkling tears for ever weep,
Nor bid again the sun good morrow!
And wo! wo! wo!
Shall be my note where'er I go.

[Vanishes.

Scene VII.

Morgana.
Look out! look out!—Floretta should be here;
Or Osmé whom we sent—
[Exeunt scouts.
Nephon, droop not,
Thou didst perform thy careful duty well!
Rash and presumptuous Youth! he merits all
The punishment he suffers: To neglect
The warning that thou gav'st him ere he past
Insolent o'er the bounds, where his perdition
Gaped for him, like the monster of the Nile,
In every brake and jungle!

Nephon.
Madam, indeed,
I told him 'twas a fiendish stratagem,
To lure him over, but he would not hear;
Stampt when I plucked his skirt, and swung his sword
Round by the wrist, so that I'd lost my hold
And hand together, but I let him go.

Morgana.
I know, I saw it; thou art not to blame.
Proud of his azure weapon, he would cope
With those who scorn it, as they do the edge
Of bladed feather, or those grassy swords
Which our soft tourneyers wield—
(Cry without.)
A messenger!

Enter Osme.
Morgana.
Where is thy sister? hast thou seen her, say?

Osme.
Here comes the elve, weeping her silent way:
Some dreadful news I wot she brings
So lost in grief the wretch appears,
Her head she hides between her wings,
And cannot tell her tale for tears!

Morgana.
The Maid is lost!—Arm! arm, ye warlike elves!
With potent virtues now endue yourselves;
Lay by your puppet words and spears and shields,
We must prepare for other fights and fields.
Mount! mount with me in clouds the blackening sky!
War be the word, and Battle be the cry!

Scene VIII.

[Chorus of Spirits within.]
Enter the Fairy Host in triumph.
[Exeunt rejoicing.

Scene IX.

Stephania, Roselle, Jacintha, Andrea, Geronymo, and Peasants, assembled. They perform a dance; Andrea, between Stephania and Roselle as partners.
Stephania.

Nay, I can foot it no longer.

Roselle.

Nor I, in faith! I cannot feel my legs under me. Signior Andrea, you must dance to that oaken stump, if you will not sit down with the rest of us. O! my heart bounces so, it will break my girdle!

Jacintha.

Well, all is happy now. Our beautiful Queen and her partner are restored.

2d Peasant.

Ay, and here is an entertainment the hospitable dame has provided to welcome us all.

Would the hostess were now at the head of her table!

3d Peasant.

Ay, would she were!—Jollity has set in for the evening.

Roselle.

If it would only last till doomsday, we might be satisfied!

Geronymo.

We are, we are satisfied! We are all blessed ones, that is the tot of the matter!

Stephania.

And our unlucky friend there is the happiest of us all. He has not yet finished his setting-step to his stumpy partner.

1st Girl.

Lawk! what a skip-jack! what a bounce-about!—How he cuts!

2d Girl.

How he capers! He must have been a rope-dancer, as sure as sure—

4th Peasant.

Was he ever on the stage, think ye?

Geronymo.

Absolutely he was, absolutely: I saw him myself there; namelessly, or, that is to say, on the top of a barrel.

3d Girl.

Is this he I have heard of under the name of Merry Andrew?

Roselle.

No wonder if it was, for he is the merriest rogue—Oh! I do love that impudent smock-face of his!

Jacintha.

I think he looks as if he were about to jump out of his skin with joy.

Stephania.

All his afflictions are at an end. He has not even a bone in his foot to complain of.

Andrea.
[Stopping short]

O misery of miseries! O unspeakable misfortune!

Roselle.

Mercy upon us! what new calamity?

Andrea.

O that a man cannot have two wives at a time!—I could find it in my heart to turn Turk for the privilege.

Roselle.

Ho! ho! signior Doleful!—is it this that afflicts you?

Stephania.

I thought there was another face under that hood.

Andrea.

What say you, Cherrybud? would you have me?—And you, Sweetlips?

Stephania.

By your leave, signior: either or neither.

Roselle.

Come, tell us honestly now: What kind of a husband should you make? How should you behave were you married to either of us simple maidens?

Andrea.

Hang myself incontinently.

Stephania.

O pretty!—hang yourself if married to either!

Andrea.

Ay; in despair for the other. But if I were only married to both—ye Graces! what a trio we should make! what a picture for a painter!

—Would there be any thing, do you think, on this side of the sky to compare with us?

Roselle.

No, certainly; unless it were a white goose between a couple of gray ones.

Andrea.

Holla?

Stephania.

Or an ass between two thistles.

Andrea.

O gemini!

Roselle.

Or the likeness would be more like if we said, a crab-apple between two cherries.

Stephania.

Or, as it is in the church, a figure of Death between two angels.

Andrea.

Astonishment!—I profess the women have tongues!—Tongues apiece, as I live, to do evil!

Stephania.

Ay, and more than that—

Andrea.

What! more than one tongue apiece? —O monstrous!

Stephania.

No, signior; but we have the use of that we possess, as you shall find if you please to set it a-going.

Andrea.

By that bunch of keys at your girdle I know you to be a housekeeper, and therefore a person worthy of credit; I will take your word in this matter.—[To Geronymo]
Well, friend!— What a bowing dost thou keep there? as if thou wast upper man of a sawpit!—Is this what you call scraping an acquaintance?

Geronymo.
[To Stephania]

O imperious mistress of my heart!—Suffering-queen of my affections!—I cannot say what I could say, nor will I speak what I would speak!

Andrea.

Write it then, write it! If your tongue is bound to keep the peace on this ground, take her on some other. Inscribe her a billet-doux, and let it be as full of compliments as if it were her epitaph; let it breathe professions like the air of a minister's levee-room; stick it all over with sweet words, as a pastrycook does a tart with comfits; and, in the end, let me advise you, as one that knows the fashion, to subscribe it—“yours faithfully;” yours faithfully, which is as much as to say —Put your whole trust in me, and fear not!

Geronymo.

I will! I will do so! And I will take care as you say, not to admit—“yours faith-fully!” it has a most porpoise-like air with it!

Stephania.

O Geronymo! you need not be porpoise-like to gain me: you are already a melting creature!

Andrea.

Pooh! here have we been conjuring up a whirlwind to blow gossamer! This is a quail, indeed! that comes, fat and foolish, at the first pipe of the sportsman. Well! the vanities of this life are enough to make any man a crying philosopher. —Hark ye, ladies! [To Jacintha and Roselle]

What say you to a glee, or catch, or chorus?—Li! ti! lirra! tirra!—Eh, temptresses? eh, you pair of wild pigeons?

Jacintha.

Roselle chants like a green linnet; but I—

Andrea.

No, you cannot sing at all: I'd swear it, from the shape of your neck. It is made like an ivory pipe, only to be played upon with the fingers; and a man must put his lips to your mouth if he would produce sweet music. Come, I'll charm it out of you.

Jacintha.

Not so free, brother.

Roselle.

Not quite so free, Signior Rolypolillo!

Andrea.

Bless me! have I got into a mountain-nunnery?—Well; it is all one to me; I have my kisses, and you have your lips. If you will not embrace your good fortune when it offers, 'tis your own loss. I know there will be biting of nails for it in private: but never come with your tilly-vally to me! never presume even to blow me a favour! I had rather kiss, ay, a thousand times, the brim of this delicious goblet, than the lips of the Empress of Morocco herself, though they say her mouth might be taken for a bee-hive.

[Drinks.
2d Peasant.

He should have gills like a fish, to let all he gulps pass out behind his ears.

Andrea.

Come, lasses, a glee! a glee! My pipe

is as mellow as a French horn. Come; you have nothing to do but say hem! hem!—put your right hand under your left breast to show that your heart is beating—and then, with an interesting droop of the head, thus, as if you offered your neck to a scimitar, and, indeed, la! had much rather die than exhibit your faculty,—begin espressivo e amabile, raising your voice by degrees till it bullies the echo, and almost breaks your sweet heartstrings as short as maccaroni. Allons! “Tirra lee!”

Andrea.
Looking sad while they were laughing,
What, the silly clown! does he?—
Takes, in mere despair, to quaffing,
Sweeter far than tirra lee!

[Drinks.
Roselle.

A good excuse!

Jacintha.

His modesty had some need of it.

Andrea.
O how happy, happy he
Pouring out his tirra lee!

Enter Agatha, Sylvia, and Romanzo.
ROMANZO

As I live, madam, your wine-merchant is an honest fellow: this is as excellent Champagne as ever I drank at five-and-sixpence a bottle!—though, indeed, a little too potent of the gooseberry.

Peasants.

All joy attend our Queen! our Queen! —the lady of our hearts!—our sovereign-princess! —the star of our worships!—the idol of our perfections!—Huzza! our May Queen! our May Queen!

Sylvia.

Thanks, kind friends and neighbours! Would I were, indeed, a queen for some few hours, that I might reward, by other means than these acknowledgments, your love and loyalty! But though my coffers are empty, my heart is full, and you shall partake largely of its affections. Welcome to you all!

Agatha.

Welcome! welcome, friends and neighbours!

Peasants.

Does she not speak very queen-like? —so courtsying, and gracious, and withal so highspoken and indignified!—O if our duke had only seen her before he married the proud French princess, with her nose turned up like the toe of a China-man's slipper!—Well! to see the luck of foreigners in this country! we make hothouse plants of them, and leave our own pretty flowers to the will of the weather!

Romanzo
[to Andrea.]

I may freely pardon you for what you did unwittingly: but let me beseech you for the future to keep a stricter guard upon your tongue; whose volubility is ever laying you open to your enemies.

Andrea.

Here she is, sir, in petticoat regimentals (Pointing at Roselle):
this is she who will stand sentinel over my volatility; this is my body-guard, my life-guard, my beef-eater, who will never let me travel the length of her apron-string without keeping, I dare swear for her, watch and ward upon my actions. What other guard would you have me set over my tongue, unless I were to go muzzled like a terrier in the dog-days?

Roselle.

Never doubt me! I will stop your mouth—

Andrea.

With kisses: O you are a sad wanton! —She will always hang upon me thus, sir, as if I wore her for a Spanish cloak, and our lips are always touching like a double-cherry. In a word, sir, she is, poor girl! so incorrigibly fond of me, that I believe I must, perforce—take her to wife, lest there might be, as they say in England, a suspension of her habeas corpus, or some other dreadful calamity, too tedious to mention.

Roselle.

I will promise to hang myself for love, when you drown yourself for melancholy.

Romanzo.

There is surely something very catching in this place. I should as soon think of your taking a lock-jaw as a love-fever.

Andrea.

Reform, sir! reform!—it is the order of the day, and shall be radical in my constitution. I have determined to remedy all abuses, redress all grievances, root out all old prejudices, customs, and inveterate habits, which have so long made a borough of my body; and to regulate myself in future by a new code, which in a short time I hope and trust will render me—the envy of all my surrounding neighbours, and the admiration of the world!

Romanzo.

Marriage is the serious end of all our follies.

Andrea.

Alas! ay, sir! It is what we must all

come to! Death and matrimony are both grave words; and the chief distinction between them is that the halter very often brings us to death, while matrimony very often brings us the halter.

Roselle.

No fear of that with you: if you are to be choked, it will be with a flagon of Rhenish.

Andrea.

But the upshot of the whole is, there is nothing left me now but—conjugal felicity. I have been, it is true, while in your worship's company, little better than a reprobate; now that I have kept this lady's, I am little better than one of the converted. In a word, sir, this nymph has made a prototype of me, and I only await your benediction. From having been, as you know, sir, a perfect she-Timon, or in other words, a manhater of all woman-kind, I am now, in all love-matters, become as faithful and fond as a green turtle!—Come, sir, pray give away the bridegroom: I shall never have courage to throw myself into her arms without your paternal countenance.

Stephania.

O the Virgin! how he blushes!

Roselle.

In good troth, sweetheart, if bashfulness had been the only stumbling-block in the way of your promotion, you would never have broken your shins over it. However, I like you better than if you were ever so modest.

Romanzo.

Well then, come, I will bestow your innocence upon this maiden—

Geronymo.

So please your reverence, and mine too upon Mistress Stephania; she will be much beholden to your reverence for the donation.

Andrea.

Ha! ha! ha! ha! your worship is like to have all the modesty of the country at your disposal, if you will take it under your protection.

Romanzo.

Truly I have no desire to meddle with it: you and honest Geronymo must endeavour to get rid of the troublesome commodity without my assistance. I dare say you will experience no impediment from your partners.

Andrea.

'Pon my feracity! I apprehend there will be no let in that quarter: eh, brother Sheepface?

Geronymo.

You have said it, you have said it: there 'tis, and that is the tot of the matter!

Romanzo.

Our hostesses are seated.

Agatha.

You are so full of joy, that you seem to want no other nourishment.

Peasants.

Should not our Queen sit under the Maybush at the head of the table?

Romanzo.

True, neighbours, it should be so. Come, fairest! you shall take your state, and I will be your cupbearer.

Sylvia.

No, you must sit beside me, else I shall be like many a real queen, unhappy in my splendour. If I be indeed queen, you must obey me in this. Come, sit, sit. Sit, fair companions, and let each shepherd choose his place next the lass who

will make room for him. But hearken!—Ere we touch what is set before us, it is meet that we return a solemn thanks for our happy deliverance from peril and sorrow to that Power which has befriended us in our extremity.

FINAL CHORUS.