University of Virginia Library

Scene I

By a burial-mound in Parmenie
Tristan and the Sons of Rual
A Son of Rual.
Lord Tristan, it is yonder. There they lie,
Thy foster-father and thy foster-mother;
One for ten years alone, before he bedded
His dust in peace with hers he so had loved
That every night he prayed to lay him down
By her spent earth.

Tristan.
She was a silent light,
Gay in the shadow, that we men discovered
As strangely to our need.

A Son of Rual.
Dear liege, you loved her:
And as she died and lay in amplitude
Of passing with all unction to her God,
Her eyes went round our group dissatisfied,
And a babe's voice cried at her husky lips
For Tristan.

Tristan.
God allow she sees me weeping
Beside this solemn grass! The good are mighty;
They are the power of God within the world.
I kiss this mound . . . the ash-leaves drifting over
Fall rightlier than my kisses. Foster-brothers,
By Rual's grave I could cry out for bread,
I stand so beggared in my emptiness
Beside the rich, informing solitude
Where saints are buried.
Let us go! . . . Yet linger
One moment while the arc of sunset sinks
Down the great arc of the turfed sepulchre.
It is my chastisement to feel the blessing,
I cannot take, relentless in its passion
To find me what I was when young and loyal
I left the land.

[A cry from the Sons of Rual.
Sons of Rual.
Remain!
Father and mother, we have laid to rest,
But God hath sent thee back, and with one voice,
One heart, we pray thee bide in thy own land,
With thy own men.

Tristan.
Forgive! I still must wander;
My feet must hasten from this grassy turf
And little crackling grass-shells that I crush.
I cannot stay . . .
Forgive me!

A Son of Rual.
Wherefore seek
Continual, sad adventure?

Enter Kahedin
Tristan.
Who is this?
He has an English face, a cheerful health
Of beauty, the brave lad! . . . Much of my build
Before I reached Tintagel.

A Son of Rual.
Kindly greeting!

Kahedin.
Is not that man, long-limbed and tall and wasted,
The great Sir Tristan?

A Son of Rual.
Our liege lord, Sir Tristan.

Kahedin.
May I have speech with him?

Tristan.
He listens, boy.
As to himself, for he was scarce your age
When last he stood where you are standing now,
Your great lord Tristan.

Kahedin.
I am Kahedin,
The only son of the Duke Jovelin
Of Arundel, that lies on English sea-coast
With southern crouch. My father's enemies
Have power beyond his compass of defence:
His land is waste, his villages in ruin,
Or smoking from their wild-fires to the wind;
His thralls and beasts are driven in multitude
To alien fields. And I am come to pray thee,
The mightiest lord of war in all the islands,
To aid my father.

Tristan.
I will aid him, boy.

Kahedin.
I am a Knight.

Tristan.
Sir Kahedin, your hand.
Will you be mine in friendship?

Kahedin.
To my death.

Tristan
(turning to the Sons of Rual).
I need your aid—five hundred men at least
With store of food and forage. Muster swiftly—
We ride to-night.

Kahedin.
O miracle! My father
Will welcome us in five short days; Iseult
My sister come to meet you.

Tristan.
Has the duke
Your father but one daughter? And her name?
You said her name . . .

Kahedin.
Iseult.

Tristan.
And is she fair,
Iseult, your sister?

Kahedin.
Yea, my lord, a maiden
Of beauty very still, as for itself.
She has white hands. Iseult of the White Hands
We call her for their loveliness of white.

Tristan.
A winning grace, white hands! Come, you and I
Banquet together, ere they harness us.
(Turning back.)
Farewell, dear grave. We leave thee in thy dusk:
The stars will come—the evening star is come,
Farewell!