University of Virginia Library

SCENE III.

—A street. Slinely and Darkledge.
Sline.
I've heard from him within the last half hour—
An ashy paleness in his features grows,
And his hands shake when he would lift them
To his brow.—Signs unquestionable these,
Of what draws near: The great blight has struck him;
His wife is dead.

Dark.
She might have lived, and yet the world gone
Fairly on. A sudden malady?

Sline.
No suddener than the overthrow that comes
On Calmstorm. It broke her woman's foolish heart,
To look on him and see the strong thought
Of his doom shake all his powers.

Dark.
She goes before him to account some hour
Or two. A pity—confess Slinely—
That he's o'ermastered by too fierce a zeal
To tamper with high station, and the ordered rule
Of the world.

[Enter a messenger, whispers Slinely, Exit.
Sline.
Calmstorm has come forth and walks in the Square,
A pace or two from this, an old-used haunt of his—
There is a friend's house hard by there, in which
A window I have borrowed.
[Another messenger as before.
The crowd swells swiftly through all this fervent
Neighborhood. The window looks upon
The very point where they must gather,
And thence, we may, unseen, gaze on the end.
[Another messenger, &c.
Hearken! Heard you not that, a wide, deep hiss,
As if all the wildernesses of the world
Had emptied into a street, near by,
Their serpents in a rage.—A moment more,
And you will hear a shout to rock you
From your feet. The Popular Tongue clamours,
[A shout.
As if it were the bell of doom. Again!
Again! The bravest shouters of the world!
The sea when mad, the sky most merciless
Has not a speech one half so deep or rough.
There is a silence, now—let's hasten on—
For in their faces, still with deepest scorn,
In fingers pointed at his treacherous heart,
We shall behold the power 'gainst which no man,
Of adamant or iron or the pure diamond built,
Can stand.

[Exeunt Darkledge, Slinely.