University of Virginia Library

SCENE I.

The Same. An Apartment in the Castle. Enter Lanciotto.
Lanciotto.
It cannot be that I have duped myself,
That my desire has played into the hand
Of my belief; yet such a thing might be.
We palm more frauds upon our simple selves
Than knavery puts upon us. Could I trust
The open candor of an angel's brow,
I must believe Francesca's. But the tongue
Should consummate the proof upon the brow,
And give the truth its word. The fault lies there.
I 've tried her. Press her as I may to it,
She will not utter those three little words—
“I love thee.” She will say, “I'll marry you;—
I'll be your duteous wife;—I'll cheer your days;—
I'll do whate'er I can.” But at the point
Of present love, she ever shifts the ground,
Winds round the word, laughs, calls me “Infidel!—
How can I doubt?” So, on and on. But yet,
For all her dainty ways, she never says,
Frankly, I love thee. I am jealous—true!
Suspicious—true! distrustful of myself;—
She knows all that. Ay, and she likewise knows,
A single waking of her morning breath
Would blow these vapors off. I would not take
The barren offer of a heartless hand,
If all the Indies cowered under it.
Perhaps she loves another? No; she said,
“I love you, Count, as well as any man;”
And laughed, as if she thought that precious wit.
I turn her nonsense into argument,
And think I reason. Shall I give her up?
Rail at her heartlessness, and bid her go
Back to Ravenna? But she clings to me,
At the least hint of parting. Ah! 't is sweet,
Sweeter than slumber to the lids of pain,
To fancy that a shadow of true love
May fall on this God-stricken mould of woe,
From so serene a nature. Beautiful
Is the first vision of a desert brook,
Shining beneath its palmy garniture,
To one who travels on his easy way;
What is it to the blood-shot, aching eye
Of some poor wight who crawls with gory feet,
In famished madness, to its very brink;
And throws his sun-scorched limbs upon the cool
And humid margin of its shady strand,
To suck up life at every eager gasp?
Such seems Francesca to my thirsting soul;
Shall I turn off and die?

(Enter Pepe.)
Pepe.
Good-morning, cousin!

Lan.
Good-morning to your foolish majesty!

Pepe.
The same to your majestic foolery!

Lan.
You compliment!

Pepe.
I am a troubadour,
A ballad-monger of fine mongrel ballads,
And therefore running o'er with elegance.
Wilt hear my verse?

Lan.
With patience?

Pepe.
No, with rapture.
You must go mad—weep, rend your clothes, and roll
Over and over, like the ancient Greeks,
When listening to Iliad.

Lan.
Sing, then, sing!
And if you equal Homer in your song,
Why, roll I must, by sheer compulsion.

Pepe.
[Sings.]

Lan.
Most marvellous!
You struggle with a legend worth your art.

Pepe.
Now to the second stanza. Note the hint
I drop about the baby's parentage:
So delicately too! A maid might sing,
And never blush at it. Girls love these songs
Of sugared wickedness. They'll go miles about,
To say a foul thing in a cleanly way.
A decent immorality, my lord,
Is art's specific. Get the passions up,
But never wring the stomach.

Lan.
Triumphant art!

Pepe.
(Sings.)
My father combed his blue-black head,
My uncle combed his red head—maybe,
My mother combed my head, and said,
Sing high ho! my red-haired baby!

Lan.
Fie, fie! go comb your hair in private.

Pepe.
[Sings.]

Lan.
Why, what a hair-rending!

Pepe.

Lan.
Peace, fool!
So all this cunning thing was wound about,
To cast a jibe at my deformity?
[Tears off Pepe's cap.]
There lies your cap, the emblem that protects
Your head from chastisement. Now, Pepe, hark!
Of late you 've taken to reviling me;
Under your motley, you have dared to jest
At God's inflictions. Let me tell you, fool,
No man e'er lived, to make a second jest
At me, before your time!

Pepe.
Boo! bloody-bones!
If you 're a coward—which I hardly think—
You'll have me flogged, or put into a cell,
Or fed to wolves. If you are bold of heart,
You'll let me run. Do not; I'll work you harm!
I, Beppo Pepe, standing as a man,
Without my motley, tell you, in plain terms,
I'll work you harm—I'll do you mischief, man!

Lan.
I, Lanciotto, Count of Rimini,
Will hang you, then. Put on your jingling cap;
You please my father. But remember, fool,
No jests at me!

Pepe.
I will try earnest next.

Lan.
And I the gallows.

Pepe.
Well, cry quits, cry quits!
I'll stretch your heart, and you my neck—quits, quits!

Lan.
Go, fool! Your weakness bounds your malice.

Pepe.
Yes:
So you all think, you savage gentlemen,
Until you feel my sting. Hang, hang away!
It is an airy, wholesome sort of death,
Much to my liking. When I hang, my friend,
You'll be chief mourner, I can promise you.
Hang me! I 've quite a notion to be hung:
I'll do my utmost to deserve it.—Hang!

[Exit.]
Lan.
I am bemocked on all sides. My sad state
Has given the licensed and unlicensed fool
Charter to challenge me at every turn.
The jester's laughing bauble blunts my sword,
His gibes cut deeper than its fearful edge;
And I, a man, a soldier, and a prince,
Before this motley patchwork of a man,
Stand all appalled, as if he were a glass
Wherein I saw my own deformity.
O Heaven! a tear—one little tear—to wash
This aching dryness of the heart away!

(Enter Paolo.)
Paolo.
What ails the fool? He passed me, muttering
The strangest garbage in the fiercest tone.
“Ha! ha!” cried he, “they made a fool of me—
A motley man, a slave; as if I felt
No stir in me of manly dignity!
Ha! ha! a fool—a painted plaything, toy—
For men to kick about this dirty world!—
My world as well as theirs.—God's world, I trow!
I will get even with them yet—ha! ha!
In the democracy of death we'll square.
I'll crawl and lie beside a king's own son;
Kiss a young princess, dead lip to dead lip;
Pull the Pope's nose; and kick down Charlemagne,
Throne, crown, and all, where the old idiot sprawls,
Safe as he thinks, rotting in royal state!”
And then he laughed and gibbered, as if drunk
With some infernal ecstasy.

Lan.
Poor fool!
That is the groundwork of his malice, then,—
His conscious difference from the rest of men?
I, of all men, should pity him the most.
Poor Pepe! I'll be kinder. I have wronged
A feeling heart. Poor Pepe!

Paolo.
Sad again!
Where has the rapture gone of yesterday?

Lan.
Where are the leaves of Summer? Where the snows
Of last year's Winter? Where the joys and griefs
That shut our eyes to yesternight's repose,
And woke not on the morrow? Joys and griefs,
Huntsmen and hounds, ye follow us as game,
Poor panting outcasts of your forest-law!
Each cheers the others,—one with wild halloos,
And one with whines and howls.—A dreadful chase,
That only closes when horns sound amort!

Paolo.
Thus ever up and down! Arouse yourself,
Balance your mind more evenly, and hunt
For honey in the wormwood.

Lan.
Or find gall
Hid in the hanging chalice of the rose:
Which think you better? If my mood offend,
We'll turn to business,—to the empty cares
That make such pother in our feverish life.
When at Ravenna, did you ever hear
Of any romance in Francesca's life?
A love-tilt, gallantry, or anything
That might have touched her heart?

Paolo.
Not lightly even.
I think her heart as virgin as her hand.

Lan.
Then there is hope.

Paolo.
Of what?

Lan.
Of winning her.

Paolo.
Grammercy! Lanciotto, are you sane?
You boasted yesterday—

Lan.
And changed to-day.
Is that so strange? I always mend the fault
Of yesterday with wisdom of to-day.
She does not love me.

Paolo.
Pshaw! she marries you:
'T were proof enough for me.

Lan.
Perhaps, she loves you.

Paolo.
Me, Lanciotto, me! For mercy's sake,
Blot out such thoughts—they madden me! What, love—
She love—yet marry you!

Lan.
It moves you much.
'T was but a fleeting fancy, nothing more.

Paolo.
You have such wild conjectures!

Lan.
Well, to me
They seem quite tame; they are my bed-fellows.
Think, to a modest woman, what must be
The loathsome kisses of an unloved man—
A gross, coarse ruffian!

Paolo.
O! good heavens, forbear!

Lan.
What shocks you so?

Paolo.
The picture which you draw,
Wronging yourself by horrid images.

Lan.
Until she love me, till I know, beyond
The cavil of a doubt, that she is mine—
Wholly, past question—do you think that I
Could so afflict the woman whom I love?

Paolo.
You love her, Lanciotto!

Lan.
Next to you,
Dearer than anything in nature's scope.

Paolo.
(Aside.)
O! Heaven, that I must bear this! Yes, and more,—
More torture than I dare to think upon,
Spreads out before me with the coming years,
And holds a record blotted with my tears,
As that which I must suffer!

Lan.
Come, Paolo,
Come help me woo. I need your guiding eye,
To signal me, if I should sail astray.

Paolo.
O! torture, torture! [Aside.]


Lan.
You and I, perchance,
Joining our forces, may prevail at last.
They call love like a battle. As for me,
I'm not a soldier equal to such wars,
Despite my arduous schooling. Tutor me
In the best arts of amorous strategy.
I am quite raw, Paolo. Glances, sighs,
Sweets of the lip, and arrows of the eye,
Shrugs, cringes, compliments, are new to me;
And I shall handle them with little art.
Will you instruct me?

Paolo.
Conquer for yourself.
Two captains share one honor: keep it all.
What if I ask to share the spoils?

Lan.
(Laughing.)
Ha! ha!
I'll trust you, brother. Let us go to her:
Francesca is neglected while we jest.
I know not how it is, but your fair face,
And noble figure, always cheer me up,
More than your words; there 's healing in them, too,
For my worst griefs. Dear brother, let us in.

[Exeunt.]