University of Virginia Library

Scene I

Night. A great Hall in Castel-Roussillon, hung with armour and weapons of war and the chase. A huge stone fireplace, in which the fire has died out, centre, at back of Hall. On either side of it a lofty entrance, Gothic in character, supporting on their lintels of stone the carven arms of the Barons of Roussillon. To the left an embayed casement opening upon a small balcony of stone overlooking the mountain precipice which forms a portion of the foundation of the castle. Torches in sconces of iron light the Hall. A carven table of massy oak in the centre is spread as for a banquet. Raymond of Roussillon, Robert of Tarascon, Aubert, Malamort, and Giraud and Agnes, the wife of Robert of

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Tarascon, with the Ladies of Roussillon, Ermengard and Beatrix, are just seating themselves as the curtain rises. Pages and retainers attending. Enter Margherita.
Raymond:
Why are we thus kept waiting?

Margherita:
Grant me pardon.
The twilight and the full moon and the mountains,
The roses and the nightingales, the garden,
Set me to dreaming. I forgot the hour.
This is my poor excuse. Will it suffice?—
I did not dream it was so late.
[Seats herself beside Raymond. Attendants bring in and set upon the table various dishes. All are served. Margherita puts a pleading hand on Raymond's arm.
Am I forgiven?

Raymond
(unmollified; sullenly):
Here are arrived thy sister and her husband
Upon their way to Tarascon: they stay
The night with us. Thou wast not here to greet them.

Robert
(hastily, in fear of a marital outburst):
I shall forgive her if her sister will.

Agnes
(pleasantly smiling):
I know the garden; it is wrapped in spells.—
Witchcraft, whose name is Springtime, held my sister:
It wove old sorceries of the moon and flowers,
And the wild music of the rossignols.—
Raymond, thou must forgive her.—Say thou wilt.

Raymond
(sombrely):
Too much she muses mid the nightingales.

Malamort
(laughing lightly):
There is one nightingale that sings there whom
Our Ladies all have given their fancy to.
My Lord, he holds their fickle hearts in fee.

Raymond
(with grim humour):
A nightingale? I'll have his tongue. They say
Their tongues were much desired by the Cæsars.—
Their hearts, I think, were better eating, eh?
What say'st thou, Robert, to a dish of them?
A golden platter served with golden music?

Robert
(soberly):
I am for solid meat. No nightingales' hearts
Would stay my appetite. As for the music—
It would disturb digestion; hag-ride sleep.—
Only the horns of war or of the hunt
Can hold me with their charm.

Margherita
(to Raymond with a rebuking smile):
Oh, thou art cruel.
Speak not so brutally of things that sing.—
The nightingales and full moon kept me long,
'T is true, but here is our own rossignol
To sing thee into humour.

[As Cabestaing enters.
Agnes
(to Margherita, aside):
If he would,
I 'd have him write a song for my own lute;
One full of fire of youth, as is his face.

Margherita
(aside):
Many of such he has; I'll ask one for thee.

Malamort
(aside to Beatrix):
Here comes the only nightingale she loves.

Beatrix
(caustically):
Oh! dost thou envy him?

Raymond
(with rough enthusiasm):
Our Cabestaing?—
Ay, there 's a troubadour, by God and Mary!
[As Cabestaing comes into the line of his vision; Raymond not having raised his eyes or turned his head at the entrance of the troubadour or the remark of Margherita, being absorbed as it were with his own thoughts and the wine before him.
Robert, all Provence and the Courts of Love
Envy our dear possession. Hast thou heard
The chanson he composed in praise of Beauty?—
Bring wine. And when our Cabestaing hath drunken
Then let him sing.

[A goblet of wine is brought by a page.
Robert
(patronisingly):
Thou hast no equal, eh?
The Ladies, so I hear, make much of thee.

Cabestaing
(deliberately drinking and returning the goblet to the page):
Not of the man but of his song, my Lord

Robert
(unimpressed by the carelessness of the reply):
The singer only, eh?—I heard a song,—
'T was only yesterday,—that Agnes had
Of some mad jongleur. Eh?—He said t' was thine—
And written to some Lady—not so far—

Agnes
(with smiling but hurried interruption):
As we are from the moon!—The song 's a song,
And being a good song is to be commended.
I would I had inspired it myself.

Robert
(with stolid astonishment):
How canst thou say it?—'T is as full of fire
As Ætna is of flame. (Addressing himself to Cabestaing):
Now were it Agnes,
To whom thou sang'st in such consuming rhymes,
I'd bleed thee for a fever.

Raymond
(laughing loudly):
By God and Mary!
Blood-letting is not for my troubadour.—
His art 's his art. And only in a song,
Chanson or ballad or the high aubade,
Doth burn his passion. He is winter-cold
At heart, I hear. Why, I could tell thee tales
Of many slights he hath put on great dames,
And damsels, too, who would be in his fancy.
I never saw him look at any woman,
Significantly, save above his lute,
And only as accompaniment to his song.—
Is it not so, my troubadour?

Cabestaing:
My Lord,
I know not how to answer you. I love,
Whene'er I sing of love. Each maid I see
Hath some perfection, excellence of wit,
Or form, or face, that takes me by the heart
Compelling for the moment. Love, my Lord,
Is necessary to the poet's art:
And he, to sing so men will hark his song
And hold it true, must be in love alway:
It matters not with whom, or one or many:
Love is the first requirement of a poet.

Malamort
(with a courteous sneer):
Reason and thought are only secondary.

Robert
(unimpressed):
Thou plead'st thy cause quite badly—for the Ladies;—
Or the one Lady whom thy heart holds dear.
One must there be to hold thy singing true.
[Turning to Raymond.
Too many loves, like cooks—eh? eh? my Lord?

Raymond
(with humour):
There is an old saw that I heard somewhere
That says too many are better than none at all.

Robert:
But 't is against all reason. Look you now—

Agnes
(interrupting him):
Enough! Too much thou hast already said.
Thou hast confused him.—See, his face is pale.
Let him love whom he will. Thou dost not stint
Thyself in loving other women than me.
Let him love whom he will; and if he love
Well as he sings—his mistress hath my envy.

Raymond:
'T is rightly said. All men must have their loves,
And women too. 'T is only justice. So!
The battle 's ended. Turning to Cabestaing):
Let thy music now
Be balm to all our wounds. Sing us thy song,
The cause of this discussion.

Margherita
(anxiously):
Yea; is it new?

Cabestaing:
'T is nothing. You will smile at it, I fear.
It hath no height of passion and no depth.
'T is the mere froth of feeling from the sea
Of song beneath the surface of my love.
(He addresses a page):
Boy, fetch me here my lute.

Robert:
As Captains wear their swords
So shouldst thou wear thy lute. 'T is thy great weapon
To mow down hearts of women. (Laughing.)


Cabestaing
(coldly):
My lute 's my lute;
My sword, as thou canst see, is like to thine.
I am a chevalier, Sir, and a poet.

Raymond:
He speaks the truth, his sire was noble as mine.

Robert:
Then I 've no more to say. Here comes thy lute.
[The page returns with his lute which he hands to him. Cabestaing seats himself so as to face the Lady Margherita. As he sings he gazes steadily into her eyes.

Margherita
(rising in agitation):
Well hast thou sung. Thy song is worth a heart;
The heart of any woman.

Raymond:
'T is full of fire.
A song to win a woman.

Robert:
Ay; perhaps
Win two or three.

Margherita
(standing, uncertain what to say or do):
I am right weary.

Agnes:
Well;
We will retire: I am weary too.
We rode all day, Fatigue was of our train
From morning.

Robert
(significantly):
Raymond, I would speak with thee
On private matters. There is much to say.—
And, as thou knowest, we depart at dawn.

Raymond
(good-humouredly):
Business should wait till pleasure have an end,
And should, in brief, be brief, whatever it is.
But as our wives are fearful of offending,
And will not leave without us (he speaks with irony),
being weary,
There's nothing left us but to be excused.
[Rising, he proceeds to Cabestaing who rises as do all the others. Raymond lets

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his hand fall heavily upon Cabestaing's shoulder as he speaks.
By Mary! thou shalt sing for us again.
Such songs as thine are heard once in a lifetime.
Be careful of thy lute as of thy heart.

Cabestaing
(smiling softly, and gazing steadily before him):
Both heart and lute are sound, my Lord, and safe.

[Raymond and Robert leave with attendants by doorway left.
Margherita
(imperiously):
Come, Cabestaing, attend us to our rooms.

Cabestaing:
I am thy servant. (Aside)
Dost thou think me bold?

Margherita
(aside):
Come to the window with the balcony,
That looks upon the upper terrace: there
I will await thee. (Aloud)
Agnes, shall we go?

Agnes
(who has been conversing with the others):
The Ladies, Ermengard and Beatrix
Have talked my weariness away.

Beatrix
(laughing):
Not I.
'T was Malamort, with his civilities.

[Margherita, Agnes, and Cabestaing go out through doorway to the right.
Beatrix
(eagerly, as soon as the door has closed upon them):
Didst mark his eyes?

Ermengard:
Canst ask?—They were two stars
Shaping the destiny of two who love.

Malamort:
They were two tarns whereover tempest drives,
And in whose deeps enchantment sleeps for ever.

Aubert:
And hers were wild lights on the mountain heights,
Whose fires proclaim rebellion. They are lost.

Giraud:
His eyes looked into hers as no man's look
Into a woman's whom he doth not love.

Ermengard:
Sir Matter-of-Fact! thou putt'st it in blunt words.—
He looked at her, therefore she needs must look,
From courtesy, at him.

Beatrix
(scornfully):
She could not help it?—
No more could I.

Ermengard
(sharply):
His eyes were not for thee,
Nor any woman, except the one he loves.

Malamort
(provokingly):
Into her eyes he poured his soul in music.

Beatrix
(in a rage):
Her eyes! his eyes!—The Devil take their eyes!—
Why, I'll turn jongleur just to sing of eyes.—
His eyes! her eyes!—God send them both a squint!

Ermengard:
Now thou art angry:

Beatrix:
Nay. A little weary.

Aubert:
Wilt come into the garden with me?

Beatrix:
No!
I care not for the nightingale and moon.

Ermengard
(to Aubert):
I'll go with thee if our wise friend, Giraud,
Will make our company three.

Giraud
(hesitating):
I am not wanted;
That 's plain. But thou hast asked me, so, 't is plain,
I'll go where I am asked. Bid you goodnight.

[Ermengard, Aubert, and Giraud go out.
Malamort
(confidently):
The loveliest woman, worthiest of his song,
Is she into whose eyes I'm looking now.

Beatrix
(incredulously; laughing scornfully):
Rank flattery!—Thy speech is full of words
That poison women's souls. I am no fool.

Malamort:
I know what beauty is.

Beatrix
(sarcastically):
A connoisseur?

Malamort:
I'll prove my point by a comparison:
Now take thy mouth and Margherita's mouth:—
The Cupid-bow perfection of thy lips,
The rosebud redness—hath hers aught of these?
Her hand now: true, 't is long, and white and shapely;
But plumpness, smallness, take my heart by storm—
And thine is plump and small.—Come, let me hold it.—
[Takes her hand which she yields reluctantly.
Not cold like Margherita's. And thy cheek—
Thou hast a dimple there: a darling pit-fall
To catch men's hearts in. A sweet trap for kisses.

[Kisses her deliberately. She disengages herself swiftly, starting back with pretended fury.
Beatrix:
Why didst thou that?—Had I a dagger now
I'd mark upon thy evil face the beast
That is thy soul, so never woman more
Would look on thee and be beguiled.

Malamort
(coolly):
I love thee.
I love thee. Dost thou doubt it? Look at me.
I am no troubadour to sing thy praise,
Or curve my eyebrows at thee o'er a lute.
I am a man, a knight, a chevalier,
Who loves thee better than he loves his life.

Beatrix
(yieldingly):
Rhymers are not for me, but warriors are.—
When thou hast fought a battle for me, then
Come to me and demand—what I can give.

Malamort:
Bid me to battle now. I fain would fight.

Beatrix
(impetuously):
I hate this Cabestaing. I'd have him die.—
He had my love once—thou should'st know it.

Malamort
(slowly, gazing steadily at her):
Yea.
I knew of it. He cast thy love aside.

Beatrix
(fiercely):
Like a great gentleman.—The wretched pauper!
I was not good enough for him.—I hate him!
Hate him! Oh, God in Heaven, how I hate him now!—
[Lowering her voice and speaking with malignancy.
Look thou!—Go to the Baron: tell him all
Thou knowest; all, and more thou dost not know,
Of what is seen and said of Cabestaing
And Margherita.—Leave no thing unsaid.
Tell it with smiles and shrugs as something vile,
Notorious, in his castle. Look such things
As shall imply more than the words thou say'st.
Put poison in his heart's security.
Thou are a trusted servant; 't will be easy.
When thou hast done this, and thy words bear fruit,
Then come to me and ask—whatever thou wilt.

Malamort
(with conviction):
By God! thou lov'st this Cabestaing!

Beatrix
(with intensity):
I hate him.
And he must die, so that my soul have peace.

Malamort
(taking her by the arms and looking steadily into her eyes):
Thou 'lt keep thy word?

Beatrix
(unflinchingly):
I never break my word.

[Malamort goes out left, facing towards Beatrix, who stands a moment as if transfixed in thought and then goes out slowly through door to right.