University of Virginia Library

ACT III.

SCENE I.

A Room in Roberto's House.
Cecilia and Leonora.
Cec.
To dare my father's will;—'t is to disjoin
Myself in hostile halves, each spearing each.
To wed Fernando, that were worse than death.
Rather than that I'll weep away my days
In convent cell.

Leon.
Talk not of convents, sister;
It makes my heart stop beating. There's a way—

Cec.
What way?

Leon.
To wed thee with another.

Cec.
Ha!
What other?

Leon.
Him to whom thou wast betrothed.

Cec.
Oh! speak not of another. Thou but addst
A wrench unto the wheel whereon I'm racked.—
We have not eyes, that they be seared; nor ears,
That they be stopped. These finer inward senses—
To which all others are but servitors—
Wherefore should they—whose prime, like landscape seized
By the fresh giant, Morning, is aglow
With quivering light—wherefore should they be darkened,
Their sudden sweetness soured? This is not right.

Leon.
It is not right that thy dear heart be wounded,
That weeps such healing tears for others' woes.
Who could do violence to such as thou?
Thy father surely not: he loves thee, Cecil.
Ambitious is he, not unkind; and when
Of thy averseness to the duke he learns,
Warm love will melt ambition's icy plots.

Cec.
I will believe thee! 'Tis my meddling fancy—
Bribed by a coward heart—that coins these fears.

Leon.
Forget the duke: let's talk of something else.
Filippo—once betrothed to thee—is here;
And he has seen thee, and thou him.

Cec.
What meanst thou?

Leon.
Alonzo's friend Valeric, that is he;
Ah, he, methinks, it were not hard to love.

Cec.
Prove this; I give thee all my share in him.

Enter Berto.
Berto.
Ladies, the Signor comes; with him the duke.

Cec.
Leave me not, sister; Berto, stay thou, too.
My one poor heart, unpropped, will not have pulse
To feed my willing tongue with all its needs.

Enter Roberto and the Duke.
Duke.
Lady Cecilia, the rich happiness,
Wherewith your honored father would enrobe me,
I dare not vest me with, nor call my own,
Till you have stamped upon its folds your signet.

Cec.
More even than my father, this great contract
Concerns, my lord, you and myself. The bond,
You honor me by wishing me to sign,
Is holy; but 'tis from the heart that comes
Its holiness. Not consecrated thus,
It is a malediction on the life.
You take me for myself; but if myself
I give without my affections, I then give
Not even a portion of me, but a thing
Defiled and worthless.

Rob.
What strange words are these?
They smack of disobedience.

Cec.
Oh! my father,
Break not the gentle cords that hitherto
Have linked me to thee, and have kept me ever
As pendant on thy wish as on the oak
The shadow is that softly lies beneath it.
I will forego my woman's destiny,
And minister but to thee, so thou'll not bid me
Attaint my virgin purity and honor,
Giving a husband's sacred rights to one
Who is a stranger to my heart.

Rob.
My daughter,
This new self-confidence beseems thee not;
And thy distrust of me is a rank weed,
Choking with sudden growth thy better parts.
When was my rule untoward to thy good?
My judgment now is what it ever was,
The guardian of thy simpleness.

Duke.
Signor,
Modesty is the casket that inlocks
A maiden's virtues. This sweet coyness whets
My love with warranty of excellence,
Adding a quenchless lustre to your gift.
Dear lady, you so perfectly have taught me
Love's task, the pupil now feels strong to teach
His teacher. I will trust thy heart to learn,
And through this rosy shyness do espy
Its aptitude.

Cec.
You read me wrong, my lord.
As to the lesson which you prize so much,
If I have taught it you, the teaching was
Without my will or knowledge. Love's a lesson
Which only then is well taught when 'tis self-taught.
When comes my time to learn, I'll teach myself.

Duke.
Begin then now: thy time is come to-day.
For by thy father's will thou'rt mine. This hand—

Cec.
[Who, as he would seize her hand, draws it back.]
If so my father shall enjoin, this hand
I'll give thee—but, first severed from my wrist;
That so, no longer warmed by my heart's currents,
No part of me, bloodless and dead, I care not
Whether it be given to thee, or thrown to the dogs.

Duke.
Know you me, madam? I am Duke Fernando.

Cec.
And I, sir, am myself. Within a circle,
Drawn round me by my womanhood, I stand;
And who, with forceful grasp would drag me thence,
He is an ingrate to his mother's breast,
Disfranchised of a sister's duty, and,
Whatever name he bear, false to true manhood,
To whose right sense naught is more precious—nay,
Not morning light or nurturing bread—than is
A maiden's purity.

[Exit Cecilia followed by Leonora.
Duke.
Here in your presence, sir, am I insulted
With a spoilt girl's unchecked capriciousness.

Rob.
My lord, my lord, to-morrow this will pass—

Duke.
To-morrow, to-morrow;—I'll no to-morrows.
Nay, sir, you are not master of your own.

[Exit.
Rob.
My lord, my lord— [follows the Duke out.]


Berto
alone.

There's a woman for you. If Florence had a score such, it were too good for me to snore in. I should migrate to Rome. To think, that I live under the same roof with such a perfection. Why, she would sweeten a whole province; she would convert a monastery to innocence. Her one fault was, that she was all angel. But she isn't; so she's faultless. A woman that has not in her a spice of the devil, is not worth that. [Snapping his fingers.]

Re-enter Roberto.
Rob.

Berto, Berto, this is a sad business.

Berto.

So sad, it almost makes me laugh.

Rob.

But the duke will not be pacified. In the election he'll turn against me.

Berto.

No matter which way he turns, signor; he'll be like the pig in his wallow; nothing will turn with him but his own skin.

Rob.

He has great influence, Berto; he can carry with him hundreds of votes.

Berto.

Not five. That grinning abbé would make you believe, that a wave of the duke's hand will knock a man down quicker than my fist. If I could but make trial on his reverend skull.

Enter Ernesto.
Rob.
Ha! my dear friend, how overjoyed I am
To greet you. Give me counsel. Wilt thou think it—
Cecilia, who did never yet rebel,
Is of a sudden mutinous; refusing
To marry Duke Fernando, and in's face
Throwing such words, so hot with angry scorn,
That I stood mazed, as if I'd heard a lamb
Howl like a wolf.

Ern.
Cecilia—did she this?

Rob.
She who was ever so serene, her heart,
Methought, held no blood red enough for anger,
Startled the duke, us all, with speech defiant.

Ern.
The pure never revolt but 'gainst what's foul:
The anger of the good is truth in arms.
Thy meek child's wrath deplumes thy soaring thoughts.
Open thy heart to let her wisdom in.
My friend, the guiltless young are heavenly teachers;
And blest is he, whose years leave him so humble
And clean, he still can learn from their deep schooling.
Let us go in and talk this trouble through.

[Exeunt.
Berto
alone.

From a man with his heart in the right place, good counsel comes as easily as butter from thick cream. These two are bent now on getting Cecilia married. She is too good to be married, men are such knaves; but then, she is too good not to be married, for thereby her husband's son will be less of a knave than his father. Marriage is the way of this wicked man-peopled world. I wonder what sort of a Berto a married Berto would have been. I laugh to think how I should have plagued my wife; but I laugh louder to think, what a plaguing I have missed. Well, let who will get married; all comfort shall not be banished from the world, for I'll keep single.

[Exit.

SCENE II.

Alonzo's Studio.
Alonzo
alone, seated gazing at Cecilia's portrait; then starting up.
Shame on my fevered heart; 't is almost jealous.
A blessing to my life she still may be,
If I keep worthy. Out, base jealousy:
There's no glass here to catch thy demon glare.
Oh! how the sordid meddling self will thrust
An opake pettiness betwixt our manhood
And its broad ends impersonal, keeping us
In dead eclipse toward beauty's cloudless sun.
But what is beauty, if not in the life?
Can I, who have made vows to beauty, keep then
By cunning practices of eye and hand?
The eye but guides, the hand but holds, the brush:
It is the soul that paints: and never can
The base in soul reach high in spotless Art.
To know great beauty, we must live it, be it.
[Seats himself again before the portrait.]
This face divine has baffled me, because
I've been too selfish, too unlike the soul
That makes its splendor.
[Enter Filippo behind him, unperceived.]
Now, I'll paint it, now
That my large self hath triumphed o'er the small.
I'll love her as another's with a love
More holy still. But this Fernando—were she
Filippo's, then the two I'd love as one.

[Filippo advances and touches him on the shoulder He starts up.
Fil.
Ay, start up, like the guilty thing thou art.

Alon.
My dear Filippo;—

Fil.
Call me friend and force me
Peer in thy heart from 'hind thy back, to learn—
What makes me, too, the happiest of men—
Thy secret noble love for sweet Cecilia.
But now, I was a rag of wretchedness.
To thee I'd come for counsel; for Ernesto—
Whose single thought was, foiling of the duke—
Thinking Cecilia's heart and mine mere wax,
For his warm will to melt into one lump,
Had made me swear to be her suitor, me
Whose wax was melting by another fire.
Thou lov'st Cecilia—I love Leonora:
Fernando, I've just learned, has been dismissed.

Alon.
Filippo, dear Filippo, can I dare
To grasp at so much blessedness, an orphan—
Less than an orphan—a lone foundling—

Fil.
Ha!
Signor Bordoni, was he not thy father!

Alon.
He called me son, and made me be as son.
I loved him like a father; but he knew
No more than I myself who were my parents.
On a cold day, in Mantua's streets he found me,
A boy of twelve years old.

Fil.
How cam'st thou there!

Alon.
As briefly as I can I'll tell thee all
A child's green memory can bring so far.
One summer evening, playing at the door,
I was upsnatched, and, with my face quick muffled,
Thrown in a boat upon a woman's lap,
Who idly strove to hush my frantic cries.
Terror kept me awake, it seemed for hours.
At last, soft Sleep—vexed childhood's pillowing mother—
Hugged me to her kind breast and stilled my sobs.
I woke within a hut, lying on straw.
Oh! the sick anguish of that frightful morning.
I had been stolen by gypsies, vagrant singers.
How life held out against the hourly siege
Of the long battering grief, I can not tell.
That time's hot agony still wrings my heart.
From town to town we journeyed, sleeping out,
Or in lone barns. Oh! how I longed to rush
Into the gaping crowds and tell my story.
But over on me were the cruel eyes
Of the dark husband. By degrees life's strength,
Fast swelling, sloughed my pinching sorrow off.
And then, the woman loved me; and at last
I loved her too. She had a mother's heart,
And laid me in it. Years rolled on. We wandered
To distant lands. One day Teresa sickened;
From day to day was worse; and as she sank,
Closer and closer pressed me to her side:
Poured aching tears upon my head; and as
I knelt, and mixed my prayers with hers, grew calm,
And died then on my breast. I'd lost my mother:
The only one I ever knew. Three days
Thereafter, in the night, I left the man,
And fled toward Italy; and there, weeping
In Mantua's streets, my second father found me.

Fil.
Alonzo, Alonzo, wast thou not from home,
On a far journey with thy father?

Alon.
Ay—
I think it was—I think it was:—

Fil.
And thou
Wast five years old?

Alon.
About, about: why ask'st thou?

Fil.
Wast not in Venice thou wast stolen?

Alon.
Venice—
Venice—Filippo, hast thou any clue?

Fil.
I have, I have: but keep thou calm.—Alonzo,
The night I came to Florence, as I rode
By Fiesole, half-dreaming on my horse,
There seemed to float before my path a wreath
Of faces, smiling and swaying with joy.
And as I shook myself awake, they vanished—
To come again; and so they came and vanished,
Until I reached the gate. And now I read
This happy vision. Oh! if through my coming
Thou shalt embrace thy father, and he thee,
Rather than not have come, I would forego
Embracing Leonora. Now to Roberto's.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.

A Room in Roberto's House.
Enter Roberto and Ernesto.
Rob.
Till now, I had not prized thy thoughtful friendship
At its great value, dear Ernesto. Would,
That of the balm thou'st poured on my fresh wounds,
Some drops I could distil for thy long pain.

Ern.
Oh! had I seen my boy cold in his shroud,
Then could my thoughts have followed him to Heaven;
And there my agony at last had rested.
But now—Oh! monstrous state—my anguish lives
Because he lives; and dire imaginations
My sorrow feed with ghastly food, and keep it
Bleeding as fresh as on the day I lost him.
There's not a tyranny that brutish man
Upon his brother wreaks, but I have wept
As his sad portion. Now, a slave I see him,
Spit on by Moslem master; now, a menial;
And now, a task-worn serf in frozen Moscow;
Now, buffeted by storms and despot skippers;
Now, naked, wrecked upon a savage shore;
Now, racked in cell of hellish inquisition.
In vain I cry—he's dead, he rests in peace—
My heart will not believe it; but for ever
Out from the night of cold uncertainty
His image glares, a living, weeping spectre.
Pardon me, friend; grief can not but be selfish,
'Tis twenty years to-day since mine first seized
My wiseless heart, and left me less than childless.
No more, no more: I'll drive my sorrow out
With thoughts of others' joy. Here come your daughters.

Rob.
Be you embassador for this new treaty.

Enter Cecilia and Leonora.
Ern.
My dear Cecilia, I am here as spokesman
For my young friend Filippo—

Cec.
Pardon me,
Signor Ernesto; art thou sure thy words
Know how to speak Filippo's mind to th' full?

Ern.
Thy doubt himself shall answer: here he is.
Enter Filippo and Alonzo.
Filippo, with my tongue I was about
To throw you at Cecilia's feet.

Fil.
Signor,
I'm proud you think me worthy such a place.
First let me say what I have come to say.
Signor Ernesto, 'tis now twenty years
Since you in Venice lost your child.

Ern.
Ay—ay:—

Alon.
Signor Ernesto!

Ern.
Oh! on every day
Of all those years, my boy has died to me.

Fil.
I have a friend, worthy to be thy son,
Who, twenty years ago, was stolen by gypsies
In Venice, on a summer evening.

Ern.
Ha!
Where—where?—His name—his name.

Fil.
So deep his name
Is buried 'neath the doubling folds of years,
His memory, unassisted, can not reach it.

Ern.
Oh! heaven—what yearnings seize my heart.

Alon.
The name—
The name—

Ern.
Signor Alonzo:—Ubaldo.

Alon.
Father, father—I am thy Baldino.

Ern.
O God! 'twas so I called him. Round his neck—

Alon.
A chain; here 'tis.

[Snatches the chain from his neck
Ern.
My boy, my boy—my lost one:
Is't so? I do not sleep—thy mother's brow—
On thy left arm thou hadst a mother's mark—

Alon.
'Tis here—a heart. [Unbaring his arm.]


Ern.
Oh! day of joy. Filippo,
To thee we owe this unmatched happiness.

Fil.
You owe it to a virtue there is in me;
Namely, that I, unworthy in myself,
Have the good gift to value worth in others.
This drew me to Alonzo; and my life's
Most fruitful work has been my love for him.
Nay, but I take what not belongs to me;
For 'tis a love—which I by chance discovered—
Deeper than mine for him, that has unlocked
This mortal treasury of joy. This love 'twas
That made him, in despair, relate his story.
The puissant one who, all unconsciously,
Winning a heart as noble as her own,
Has loosed this long-pent flood of happiness—
Making one love reveal another—and thus,
Is the dear causer of a general bliss;
This ministering mistress of Love's purest fonts,
Is, the Lady Cecilia.

Alon.
My bold secret
Which one hour since, I had locked within my breast,
As the sweet nourishment of solitude,
My friend hath truly told, Lady Cecilia;
Speaking for me the venturous words, which I,
Now new-baptized in joy, myself had spoken.

Cec.
Signor Alonzo, one hour since, these words
Had been as grateful to my ear as now;
And if this sudden sunshine makes them flow,
Its rays are hardly to your father's heart
More gladsome than to mine.

Ern.
Peerless Cecilia!

Cec.
Dear father, wilt thou give thy daughter to
Thy old friend's son?

Rob.
Had I a hundred daughters,
I'd give them all to dear Ernesto's sons.

Cec.
Alonzo, thou hast not thy father's leave.

Alon.
Oh! blessed day, that brings me such a duty,
Lapping me in a sweet dependence. Father—

Ern.
If aught could make thee dearer to my soul,
It were to have thee mated thus.

Alon.
Filippo,
My bliss is incomplete, unyoked to thine.
Lady Leonora, thou canst complete it. Let
My tongue woo for my friend, as his for me.
He loves thee; and of all the men I've known
He is the easiest to love.

Fil.
Have pity on me,
Lady. From far-off Padua I have come,
Battling my way 'gainst stout adversities.
Once I 'scaped drowning by the maddened Po:
Twice was I hand to hand with wolf-eyed bandits.
All this, to fetch a wife from lettered Florence.
Let me not thence depart with empty arms.

Leon.
Signor Filippo, there's my hand. And if
To-morrow I like you and you like me
As well as now—we'll talk this matter over.

Fil.
Without listeners.

Alon.
So gilded is this hour
By heaven's smile, our spirits are aglow
With strangest bliss. Through paths, wayward and ignorant
Have we been driven blindfold on our good
By highest Will; whose open secret guidance
Above our daily walk doth ceaseless flash
Benignant light, which we see not; and shall
Then only see, when our unwholesome wills,—
By thought and knowledge purged—shall hourly be
To the orbit of the will divine upswung;
A consummation whereof joys like this
Are golden tokens and sure prophecies.