University of Virginia Library

ACT THE FIRST.

SCENE I.

Portico of Vivius' mansion.
A crowd of citizens in waiting. A group enters.
VOICES.
Make up!

FIRST CITIZEN.
For what? The hour fast running out—
A crowded vestibule—all clients;—say,
What chance is there for you?

SECOND CITIZEN.
And with a wind
That comes to cut each one of us in two,
And double us all.

THIRD CITIZEN.
Ay, you may jest; 'tis none:
First dangling caps for justice in the Forum,
Then coming here to find it all bespoke.

FOURTH CITIZEN.
Rare life Hilarianus makes of it;
Jove, what a thing it is to be a præfect!
Pay,—play,—no toil.

THIRD CITIZEN.
Oh! 'tis a way they have.

FIRST CITIZEN.
And a way we have is to wake and work
On empty stomachs, while they sleep on full ones.

FIFTH CITIZEN.
Give us good sport, say I, in the arena,
I would not mind the work. Why, 'tis a shame,
The festival at hand, and ne'er a victim,
The while the city swarms alive with Christians.

SECOND CITIZEN.
Ah! here's the man would smoke their nests for them.

FIRST CITIZEN.
What, Vivius? Ay!

FIFTH CITIZEN.
Is Rome the only place
Where they can breed proconsuls? We are waiting
For one—why not of our own hatching?

THIRD CITIZEN.
Good:
The noble Vivius, say I, and end it!

FIRST CITIZEN.
End what?—our grievances?—'tis not so sure.
A man's a man, proconsul a proconsul;
But when a man is made into proconsul,
'Tis like he'll never be the man he was.
Now, our man here—you think 'tis us he serves.

SECOND CITIZEN.
And so he does.

FIRST CITIZEN.
But for his proper ends:
He has a mouth for greatness, uses us
To feed its craving.

THIRD CITIZEN.
Yet he's always ready
To give us counsel.

FOURTH CITIZEN.
Ay, and coin.

FIRST CITIZEN.
And coin—
But, tell me, did you ever come at his eye?

SECOND CITIZEN.
Oh, never mind his eye—take you the others,
And think yourself well off.

FOURTH CITIZEN.
To-day 'twill be
Nor one nor t'other.

SECOND CITIZEN.
Whoo!—he'll come sweeping through us
Like a breeze.

FIRST CITIZEN.
Who is that brown man yonder?
There, close against the pillar—he's in luck,
To catch a word, if any.

FIFTH CITIZEN.
The Jew it is:
Jostle him out of's place.

THIRD CITIZEN.
Why are you here?
The noble Vivius hates both Jew and Christian.

BARAC.
Both Jew and Christian—Christian more than Jew.

SECOND CITIZEN.
Keep close
[aside].
Eh, rusty screw?—spoil is the word.

BARAC.
Ay, spoil for spoil of those whose cursed craft
The glory of our nation undermin'd;
Come all the plagues of Moses hot upon them!
Think you that Titus would have plough'd our city,
But that the Nazarene had sapp'd its strength,
And craven'd with his bitter prophecy
The heart of Judah's Lion? Spoil for spoil,
While the world lasts!

SECOND CITIZEN.
His tongue's as long as his reck'ning.

FIFTH CITIZEN.
At him!

THIRD CITIZEN.
Caps up! here comes the noble Vivius!

[The doors of the vestibule open.
Enter Vivius, Statius, and Attilius, a crowd following. A shout.
VIVIUS.
Good citizens— [Hubbub, cries of “Silence!”
[Aside.]

Statius, sometimes I give
The “good” to thee—wilt take it e'er again?

STATIUS.
I know the value of fair words too well
With such as these: I pray thee scant them not;
They are useful, go for much at little cost.

VIVIUS.
Citizens, know ye not the hour is past?
I am call'd abroad—the city's wants are great,
And like to be, the while the idle air
Usurps your place of justice in the Forum.
Hand your petitions, ye who have them writ,
And on the morrow morn, like hour shall twin
Your grievance with its cure. Now all depart.
[Citizens murmur.
What muttering is this? Quick, clear the steps!

ATTILIUS.
The wind comes sharply through the portico,
The very sun looks shrunken in the heavens.
Poor rogues! they have been drawing in chill breath
So long, they are fain to heave it out again.

VIVIUS.
I will not have the breath, or hot or cold,
Of insubordination in the air
That circles round me. 'Tis the beggar's lot
To wait. What more may these be? Pass we on!

BARAC.
'Twere well to-day that thou thyself didst wait.

VIVIUS.
Who speaks?

STATIUS.
The voice came from the right; the wind
Hath borne the matter off; the tone was strange.
Heard you the words?

ATTILIUS.
Out, man, and shew thyself!

[Barac comes forward.
VIVIUS.
Thy need,—if thou canst tell it in a breath.

BARAC.
Thy need of me.

VIVIUS.
My need of thee!

STATIUS.
A word:
Were it not better thou didst bid again
The citizens depart?

VIVIUS.
Wherefore? True—true—
This fellow seems no very wise example.
Within there—clear the steps! Attilius, go
Summon my people to it. [Exit Attilius.

[The Citizens draw off slowly; a few remain in the distance.
Now this need.

BARAC.
It is of silence. Need that I conceal,
(The where, the when, the who, all clearly known,)
That certain Christians meet at certain times.

VIVIUS.
Now you see, Statius, how Hilarianus
Sports with the city's welfare—he a præfect!
Here at a time when faction peeps about,
Muttering beneath our very porticos,
He sees a brood of those sly innovators,
Those wily Christians, build within our walls;
Nor will unroost them, save there be some bird
Of note, whose golden plumage pays his toil.
The spirit of their creed (he looks not to it)
Would hoist yon malcontents to shoulder us,
Nay, lift the slave unto the master's level!
And thus uncheck'd they ooze their stealthy way,
Like crawling streams thorough each empty cranny,
To swell into a flood, will sweep to ruin
The old foundations of our state and worship.
Gods! and that man doth hold the power—to sleep,
Or, shame!—to drown in loathsome drunkenness
Man's eyesight out of him; while I, awake,
With sense alive, have not one step to stir.

BARAC.
And know you not—

VIVIUS.
These Christians? Well as thou;
Long since did urge Minucius the proconsul
To advise with Rome touching their growing strength;
He dies as comes the edict; and this sloth,
That some call præfect, meanwhile takes his place;
Plebeian! without e'en the common shame
Would bid him spurn his dunghill! he will back
These followers of a baser born than he.

STATIUS.
Wherefore that word “conceal?” The noble Vivius
Would have thee noise thy tale, not hold thy peace.

BARAC.
Wherefore? Hearken!

VIVIUS.
O that I had but power,
Strong as my will, to bring these vipers down,
These Christians, grovelling down into the dust,
Before the altar of almighty Jove,
Or to the sand of th' amphitheatre!

BARAC.
Hear you—

VIVIUS.
No more! This traffic take elsewhere.
Go to that prodigal, the procurator;
He'll thank thee for thy news, though he holds not
The lawful hate I bear these subtle mischiefs;
He'll thank thee, if some one of them be rich—
Some one, who out of craven fear will bid
The ready coin leap out,—a fear begot
Upon the torture of some howling slave;
Gladly he'll fill his coffers with thy tale,
And thou—and he—as gladly empty them.
Come not to me. Freely I give my gold
Where seems me good; but not to such as thee.

BARAC.
Even to me. I would not ope my lips
To have the buffet of thy breath, proud man,
Beat back my words, but that I seek from thee
A speedier and a wealthier reward.
Business goes quickly here—it lags i' the Forum:
Listen—ay, lift your head away in scorn;
'Twill bow down low enough ere time wear out.
Those vipers that you hate—those Christian vipers—
Have crawl'd over the threshold of your house;
Those creeping waters sap your mansion-walls;
Those wily birds do roost within your gardens.
Glare on; the proof I have—the proof I use;
Or give your gold even to such as I.

STATIUS.
What may he mean?

VIVIUS.
That knows he not himself:
My meaning he shall feel, and not mistake it!
Here, loiterers, citizens, lend your good hands;
Thrust out this wretch, would threat my gold from me.

BARAC.
Your time will come!

VIVIUS.
Not that I have lost with thee.

[Exeunt Citizens, driving out Barac.
Re-enter Attilius.
ATTILIUS.
What's the matter?

VIVIUS.
Matter?—a tricking Jew.
Not much—yet much, in proof there is no force
In the administration of our laws;
They might as well be rotten records all,
When slaves so beard us.

ATTILIUS.
Ay, and such a beard!

VIVIUS.
The jest's ill-timed; pray you, no more of this:
Let us pass on; or choose a wholesome theme
The while the street is ridding of this rabble.

STATIUS.
Thy daughter be it, then.

VIVIUS.
You bring her name
Too near pollution.

STATIUS.
Nay, thou'rt difficult.

VIVIUS.
Go, go to her, Attilius; say I come
Soon as this audience with the merchant-men,
That takes me now abroad, has stilled their wants—
How the whole city clamours for fit rule!—
One moment of the calm that dwells with her
Will smooth these chafing currents into peace.

ATTILIUS.
A goodly hest: warmth, smiles, and sweet good morrow,
Come like a song after such winds and voices.

STATIUS.
Make you good speed; my daughter, thither bent,
Will win the race of you.

ATTILIUS.
Farewell!

[Exit.
STATIUS.
And yours,
She still companions with her widowhood?

VIVIUS.
And with her child.

STATIUS.
She is a child herself.
I mean so young she looks, though twenty-two:
She never can conceal her age from me,
I had a girl was born her very day.
So late a widow, and so fair a cheek,
Meseemeth hers was scarce a loss.

VIVIUS.
I chose
A man of noble blood to husband her;
As noble in obedience. Call her wise,
Who lives not with the dead. Is't not reward
For all her patience—true, she had some trial—
The rosy promise of that rarest boy?
Tell me, good Statius, hast thou ever seen
A finer fellow?—one more fit to be
A treasury of the gold of future hopes?
I make him mine.

STATIUS.
Why slip you o'er your son?

VIVIUS.
Not so; 'tis he who slips from under me.
For years I tried to build my trust upon him—
As soon upon the restless water yonder:
He hath no grapple for the steep ascent;
Or if he hath—at times there is a power
Looks out of him—he is most like to use it
To help another up—to pass him by;
And when he found himself outstripped i' the race,
Would stay to cool, cutting a jest meanwhile
Upon, perchance, the straining limbs of him
Who rose above him! No, he lacks within
The earnestness to win. For Vivia, mark!
Beneath the gentleness that you call child
There is a depth nor you nor I can sound.
Thus much can I; to know there haunts the power
Shall aid the hopes stretch o'er yon heaving sea,
E'en to the Tiber's mouth: those dazzling waves,
That the increasing sun doth now light up,
Are not more bright than they.

STATIUS.
Wouldst thou to Rome?

VIVIUS.
A Rome for me in Carthage! Let us on.
How the blood stirs for action! Come, all's clear.

STATIUS.
My way is to the left; I have to wait
On Claudius the tribune.

VIVIUS.
Wait! the word
For Carthage. You will come again to me
At supper; there is much that I would say.

STATIUS.
I always gladly listen.

VIVIUS.
Fare thee well!

[Exit.
STATIUS.
Farewell!—These upward strivers often find
But downward fortunes. Ever are his eyes
Turned tow'rds some dazzling greatness, till made blind,
E'en by the sun that lures, he vaguely grasps
At things beyond his reach—to find but air.
Yet with so much of substance, there's no harm
To play with him at shadows. Yon bold man,
He seem'd to know much that I did not hear,
And strange surmises floated while he spoke.
A father who has children on his hands
Behoves him take a careful heed for them.
Vivius is wealthy; but these guesses true,
What were it, at the mercy of the Jew!

[Exit.

SCENE II.

Atrium in the house of Vivia Perpetua.
Vivia
alone.
It cannot be, that I, whose heart was wont
To live upon my lips like any child's,
Should now begin a life externe, untrue,
Now that this great Reality hath come
To wake renewing life within, that gives
A fuller impulse to my every thought—
A growth so sensible that days seem years
To pass me onward. Yesterday, scarce woman,
Weak, poor, unknowing God, save in my fear—
To-day, a soul adoring him with love.
Yet what to do? This silence grows too great;
Hath it not even now press'd on the sense
To find a speech in phantoms? Fearful, too,
My father's face between me and my child!
The never-failing sweetest peace, that once
Would sit and watch in fellowship with me
Beside his rosy sleep, hath vanish'd all
Before that pallid shadow! Whence?—O Heaven!
Is it thy mute reproach unto my silence?
To break it—how? To say unto my father,
I am a Christian! Oh, 'twere easier far
To speak those words unto assembled Carthage
Than one should even raise a doubt in him!
I cannot, while he stands full in the sun,
A child for hopefulness, a man for strength,
I cannot play the tempest to his joy,
And smite him to the earth. Who comes? Forbid!
Not thou to say 'tis he.

Enter Felicitas.
FELICITAS.
Madam, be wary;
The daughter and the ward of Statius. Nay,
I would have staid them, but they were impatient—
I dar'd not rouse suspicion; they are here.

Enter Nola and Cæcilius.
VIVIA.
Stir not, Felicitas; remain by me.

NOLA.
Vivia, what have I done? why barr'd the entrance,
Was ever open to me on the wish?
Why parley'd by yon slave, and bade to wait?

CÆCILIUS.
How pale you are! Nola, I pray thee peace!

NOLA.
No peace until she answers me in this.
There is a change—the very house is changed—
'Tis like a prison, you lock'd up within it,
Your thoughts in you from me. It is not just
Unto the many days that we have shared
Our bosomsful of counsel with each other.

CÆCILIUS.
More just unto those days to trust, not doubt.

NOLA.
'Tis Vivia I would hear.

VIVIA.
Sit thee, dear Nola—
Thou, Cæcilius:—for a while wilt leave me
Questionless?

NOLA.
Why press thy brow?—is't aching?
Well, to thy wish; I will not question thee;
But something one must do. Where is thy frame?
'Tis long, I dare to say, since it has seen
Those taper fingers; though so much extoll'd,
They're sadly idle ones!—where?

VIVIA.
Where?

NOLA.
“Where?”—Echo!

VIVIA.
There, good Felicitas, by yonder pillar.

NOLA.
Ah! well do I remember that same time
This was begun, though long enough ago
To earn one's memory riddance. Here they are,
Or should be, those same flowers you fain would fix,
Because I liked them not and cast them off.
You look'd as though they had been living things,
And lifted them, and kiss'd them—how I laughed!
And something like a lecture gave to me,
That things, how mean soe'er we reckon'd them,
Had each a beauty of their own. I now
Shall lecture you, that you are idle, Vivia;
You mope too much at home—'tis time you rous'd—
All Carthage wants to see you once again.
And now the festival, that trims us all
In welcome, with our gayest, loveliest looks,
Why let it pass as though it were a time
Like any other?—Watch her now, Cæcilius;
What thought is't holds her thus? look! she shall tell!

CÆCILIUS.
Oh, speak not!—how you have the heart, I wonder,
To rob her of her choice of such rare stillness.

NOLA.
Strange that she hears us not, and we so near.

CÆCILIUS.
And yet how far!

NOLA.
Vivia! say, what is it?
Have all our Carthage matrons given their cares
Into your hands?—why else so fix your eyes,
And sit for hours like a thing of stone?
There's the Antigone that stands behind you,
You're liker her than any living woman!

VIVIA.
I would I were.

CÆCILIUS.
Often you look like her,—
She like to you, I mean,—her brow, her lip,
Could marble smile.

VIVIA.
Her fine courageous breath,—
Oh, where is that? And yet to Œdipus,
Her poor, blind father—could she?—blind indeed!

NOLA.
So, leave Antigone, and come to you.
What was your thought?—silent to me?—Cæcilius,
You will speak truth, though it may vex e'en her;
Didst ever see a change like this?—to me!

CÆCILIUS.
Where is true faith all change comes graciously.
When the sun shines on me I am well pleas'd;
When the cloud comes, I do not blame the sun,
But feel the while that there he is behind it.

VIVIA.
Nola, 'tis true. New thoughts, urgent and strange,
Have so beset me round, they wilder me.
Let me but think them through, 'twill be my joy
Some day to tell them all. Art thou content?

NOLA.
No, not a whit! Why should thoughts come to you,
And not to me? Plague! there's another knot;
All things go cross to-day. Oh, what a mesh!

VIVIA.
Felicitas hath ready fingers.

NOLA.
Ah!
She was your father's slave; he has given her to you?

VIVIA.
O that slave!

NOLA.
What slave?—who is't you mean?

VIVIA.
I would not take her, save her freedom with her!

NOLA.
He will not give you that; he says so oft,
Slaves should be slaves, and keep their proper place.

VIVIA.
Cæcilius, sing!

NOLA.
Ay, do; a warming war-song.

VIVIA.
Call you a war-song warm? 'Tis deathly cold,
And makes one shiver at the thought of blood.

NOLA.
Vivia, how tam'd you are! Do you forget,
How once we watch'd the legions as they pass'd,
And plann'd the different garlands we would weave
To grace their conquest?

VIVIA.
Years on years ago,
That ages seem, now I look back on them.

NOLA.
May be; but 'tis not years ago that we
Did sit together on the shore, and you—
I see you now—look'd dreamily o'er the water,
Speaking the while of Dido;—you were fain
To invoke a god to bid her galley float
Again upon that sea, as once it did,
To bear her to your sight and to your love;
And then you said your heart was big as hers,
And could, like hers, pour out its dearest blood,
Give you a cause: and when I minded you,
That deeds like hers beseemed men, or matrons,
And not us maidens, straight you look'd away,
As you would rather have, instead of me,
The long blue line of ocean for a friend:—
And you to shrink from listening to a war-song!
But so you always were—so inconsistent!
That very time, although the sun had set
His great gold seal upon your valorous boast,
At dark I dared you cross unto the fountain,
The spouting dragon, near the steep ascent
In your father's garden, and you would not do it.

VIVIA.
Queen of my childhood! how, through all the gloom
Of ages rising up 'twixt then and now,
How pure and white she stands! as one might see
Down a long cypress-grove a marble statue.
'Twas not the letting out of Dido's life;—
I ne'er did see the might of such an act,
Although my father oft hath vaunted it
In some great name, whose history might end,
“He knew not what to do with life, and died!”
Why, Nola, it was Peace—this very Peace
She would secure her people—kiss'd the steel
Ere Dido struck it home; while truest love,
That sav'd its own from wrong, look'd on and smiled.
That perfect deed of death it was that seal'd
Her people's safety and her soul's dear honour.
Oh, fond and faithful blood!—might not that stream
Be chronicled in heaven for baptism?

NOLA.
I have made you speak; and now to make you listen.—
Cæcilius, war! The Battle of the Pass!

CÆCILIUS
(sings.)
The olive-boughs are sighing—

NOLA.
Ah, traitor!—that the song? I'll sleep; good night.

CÆCILIUS
(sings).

VIVIA.
Are sighing yet!—O, whence that song, Cæcilius?

CÆCILIUS.
My mother taught it me; and since you came
So tenderly to raise me from her ashes,
Looking upon me like her eyes again,
I sit and think she listens as I sing.
Sooth, but not I, 'tis music sings itself,
As easily as did the wind i' the tree
Over the dying warrior.

VIVIA.
Would you be
A soldier?

CÆCILIUS.
Would you have me? No; you sigh,
As she did ever when the song was done;
A sigh was always followed by a prayer
Unto the gods to keep me from the wars.

NOLA.
Vivia, you make a coward of the boy,
And so you will of Thascius;—as for me,
I would have fifty sons to make a front
Should grace a legion.

VIVIA.
And, 'tis like, my one
May be a soldier yet.

NOLA.
Yours!

VIVIA.
For a fight
Harder than any you would put him to.

Enter Attilius.
NOLA.
Good welcome! I enlist you on my side.

ATTILIUS.
How! warfare here?

NOLA.
Aught for a little life;
We are as dull as mourners at a feast.

ATTILIUS.
I come for life, not bring it. Standing chill'd
Under a portico, 'mongst muttering clients,
Is not the way to quicken up the blood.
Ah, this is well!—there is no home like this
In all our Carthage. Vivia, wert thou not
My sister, I could praise thee for a goddess.
But why so grave? You must wear brighter looks,—
Our father comes to you to smooth his plumes.

VIVIA.
What, then, has happen'd?

ATTILIUS.
Nothing that should bring
Such terror in thy face. The wretched breath
Of those poor miserables fann'd him;—'tis
Blow cold, blow hot; for, oh! that præfect-hate
Burns like a fever in his veins. Would he
But take one lesson from Hilarianus,
Who loves his ease too well to have a hate
For him, or any! That he would love thee—
And who would not?—my father should account
Fame to his blood.

NOLA.
What! from a fat plebeian?

ATTILIUS.
For the plebeian—Was he so? Perhaps!
I like the fat—it makes him more complete:
To see him at a feast! His eyes brimm'd o'er
With mirth—or wine, that, mounting to his head,
Look'd out again—his kindly face ashine
With all the unctuous treasure he hath stored;
The flesh of stalled beeves—their butcher (rogue!)
Did promise them they ne'er should see their deaths—
For why? their eyes were buried ere they died;
Of Trojan boars, who, for their loss i' the chase,
Came stuff'd with other meats in full revenge;
Fat fish, that toil'd with ineffectual fin;
The honey borne of bees, so heavy laden
That they broke down, and had to be unpack'd;
The oil of olive-gardens, where the sun
Did seem himself to melt, and yet the while
Did melt most dexterously each luscious drop
From the crude green into the mellow gold;
Rich fruits, so ripe upon the bending boughs,
That, scarcely touch'd, they dropp'd into the hand.
You would not have a man ungrateful? No;
He doth repay in kind the bounteous gifts;
No ingrate he! His very laugh is fat.
“Ha, ha!”—it almost smothers whom 'twould cheer.

Enter Vivius.
VIVIUS.
Brave picture for a butcher in the shambles!
For a proconsul—likeness of a beast!
Proconsul, said I? no, nor like to be.
Take his name hence, nor ever bring it more
Within these walls. We do not suffer swine
To come in gardens 'mongst our flowers and fountains.
How does my girl? See how fond custom still
Doth give a license to the saucy tongue;
We must keep compact with our dignities;
Or these impostors of the Roman name,
And offices—aye jealous of the birth
They lack—will drive a wedge into the tree,
The old patrician oak. Long shall it stand,
And stretch its arms in grand protection o'er us;
Ages shall come to find us still enthron'd
Beneath the shadow of the might we grew.
Truce to this voice—'tis for my portico,
And not thy atrium. I have been vex'd—
No more—no more—I come to thee for peace;
And all the thoughts that seek to part us, lo!
I put them off, as now I do this robe.
Greeting to thee, fair Nola; thee, Cæcilius:
Vivia, why, what's amiss—the boy is well?

VIVIA.
Well, and asleep; you would not have me wake him?

VIVIUS.
Wake him! Not I; Sleep is so good a nurse,
Right welcome is she to him. She ne'er stints,
But feedeth liberally the hidden fount
Whence leaps the torrent of our energies.
He should be strong, well nourished, and thou for him:
To-day thou lookest pale, and ill adapt.
There is a playmate for him waits without,
A bold one, and a strong one!—nay, no fear—
The infant Hercules, when first the god
Did stir within him, and he played a match
Against the necks of Juno's angry serpents.
'Tis finely done; the cunning chisel wrought
Like life upon the marble it hath fashioned.

ATTILIUS.
'Tis something worth to see; wilt come and look?

[Exit Nola with Attilius.
VIVIUS.
Thou, too, Cæcilius; for thou hast an eye,
For which thank Nature and the bounteous gods,
Hath an integrity doth guide aright
In matters of proportion; let it deal
With our fine playfellow, and bring the sum.
[Exit Cæcilius.
Take Thascius to it oft, teach him to clench
His hands like it, and so to knit his brows;
'Twill lesson him to strangle snakes betimes.

VIVIA.
I would that thou hadst seen him yesterday;
He stood upon my knees, and grasp'd in his hands
Yon shell—his little hands!—'twas no light burden;
And when I asked for sport what he would with it,
He stretch'd his arms towards Felicitas,
Who stood where now she stands, his eager face
All radiant with the light of giving love.
Of all the myriad kisses he hath had,
Of all the claspings that have held him here,
As though he grew to me, and ne'er could part,
Never was one for joy like yesterday's:
A new-born rapture sprung into our love,
Unknown before: we were in heaven together.

VIVIUS.
Seek, slave, for help to bear the marble hither.

VIVIA.
Wilt go, Felicitas, and see it done,
And if the boy still sleeps? And stay,—note well
The course of the sun.

[Exit Felicitas.
VIVIUS.
Vivia! say, why is this?
I lend thee slaves, to have them fawn'd upon,
As thou wert they, and they were empresses!
She must return.

VIVIA.
Nay, nay; she doth require
More gentle treatment than your custom warrants:
Death hath bereft her of a husband's care.
You would not have me lesser than my heart;—
And there are other reasons.

VIVIUS.
I would have
The mistress of the mansion seen in thee;
Thou wert the wife of one of noble blood;
Thou art the daughter of a noble house;
And shalt be mother to the noblest man
In Carthage! Ay, and a shall beyond. Be proud!
Thy bearing is too lax, too suppliant.
A slave should have the treatment of a slave.

VIVIA.
Give me her freedom.

VIVIUS.
No; hers least of all.
Beneath that skin, although it tell no tales,
There's blood needs curbing. I have mark'd of late
A dangerous sturdiness within her eyes;
Though not defiance quite, 'tis near upon it.

Re-enter Felicitas.
FELICITAS.
Lady, the shadow long hath left the dial,
The sun looks low aslant upon the sea.

VIVIUS.
So, is it? I must give the boy a kiss.

VIVIA.
Is he awake?

FELICITAS.
Wide-open eyes, and smiling.

VIVIA.
Ah, let us go.

VIVIUS.
Now you look like yourself—
More like. What cloud is this doth lour to-day?
I must have brightness—brightness, like my hopes,
My hopes in thee, the very sun of them!
Thou and the boy, who is a part of thee,
So part of them. Come, let us quickly to him.

[Exeunt.