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| 2. | Scene II |
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 | The unpublished plays of Thomas Holley Chivers |  |
Scene II
(The interior of Macdonald's Park at Ormaclade. His residence in the distance. Enter Lochiel to Boisdale.)79
Lochiel, I tell thee, Lochiel, I have seen
A sight!
Lochiel
A sight, my lord?
Boisdale
A sight, my lord!
A cursed, damned, loathesome sight!
Lochiel
A ghost,
My lord?
Boisdale
No ghost, my lord! No ghost, or if
It be a ghost, a ghost in princely robes,
On whose Medean folds a villan's heart
To desolation burns!
Lochiel
What can he mean?
Boisdale
You are a hypocrite?
Lochiel
(Drawing)
A hypocrite? By heavens!
Boisdale
Put up your sword. I will not fight with thee.
80
Lochiel
You called my hypocrite?
Boisdale
I did, you are.
Lochiel
I say you lie.
Boisdale
I care not what you say;
You could not make me fight you, did you call
Me traitor, liar, thief, or what you please.
Lochiel
You called me hypocrite.
Boisdale
I did, you are.
I thought so once, but now I know you are.
Lochiel
By heavens! you shall not taunt me thus. Defend
Thyself!
Boisdale
Put up your sword. I will not fight
With thee.
Lochiel
Then take that for your insolence.
81
Boisdale
The day will come when you shall howl for this,
Howl like a beaten hound! Put up your sword.
Lochiel
A coward, by my soul!
Boisdale
You know that, else
You had not acted so.
Lochiel
Recall your words,
Or, by heavens, you shall not live for them!
Boisdale
I shall not die by you.
Lochiel
You could not die
By better hands.
Boisdale
When I do die, it shall
Be by what you consider better hands.
Lochiel
(Putting up his sword)
Come home, my sword, he is no work for thee.
Boisdale
There are two things on earth I love to hate.
82
What things are these?
Boisdale
A serpent and a goose.
Lochiel
What does he mean? The man has lost his wits.
Boisdale
Why should I keep my wits when all that made
My wits is gone?
Lochiel
What have you lost?
Boisdale
The world,
The riches of Peru, Golconda's mines.
Not all the bankrupt jewels of the earth
Could buy me back that precious gem again.
Lochiel
What have you lost? I pray you tell me now.
Boisdale
A gem more costly than the stars, from whose
Bright beams the abject world drank living light!
Should he not die?
Lochiel
What frantic mood is this?
83
It is no frantic mood, 'tis truth most true—
And, being truth, what frantic mood so sane?
Lochiel
You are abused, or maddened; which to guess,
I do not know.
Boisdale
I am abused, which heaven
Doth truly know, and madness follows next.
Lochiel
Who has abused you thus?
Boisdale
Were you my friend,
You would not ask. I have no tongue to tell.
A thousand tongues were dumb to give it better!
Lochiel
I shall despair to know your grief.
Boisdale
You would
Despair to know such grief.
Locheil
What? is there no
Relief?
84
Give medicine to a dying man;
A straw to one fast drowning in the sea;
A sound to him who has no ear to hear;
A taste to him who has no tongue to eat;
A sight to him who has no eyes to see;
And each will sooner live, hear, taste and see,
Than Boisdale will find relief!
Lochiel
Alas!
Are you not angry with the king?
Boisdale
Why ask?
To be the herald of my hate?
Lochiel
Thy hatred,
What cares he for thy hate?
Boisdale
It is a man's!
Lochiel
He has been hated by brave men before
Today.
Boisdale
I do not wonder that he has,
85
Lochiel
He lives,
And likely long to live.
Boisdale
Art sure of that?
Lochiel
I know it by my knowledge of the man.
Boisdale
Say rather that you wish it in your love.
Lochiel
You would not like the king?
Boisdale
Oh no, I would
Not kill him—give him to the dogs, the wolves,
The hounds of hell! 'Twere merciful to kill
The king!
Lochiel
Your power is great if measured by
Your words
Boisdale
They are the symbols of that power!
The measure of that soul-subduing power
Which never sleeps! 'Tis on the vigil now,
86
Who robbed me of the sweetest lamb on earth,
Took from my Paradise the sweetest flower
That ever bloomed!
Lochiel
Poor Boisdale, you are
In love.
Boisdale
In love with one who loves me not.
Who was the spring-tide of my life, my soul-love,
Whose smiles were beacons to the Land of Joy,
Whose blue-eyed beauty beckoned me to come,
And drink contentment from the cup of Bliss.
Lochiel
Forget her, man; forget her, let her go.
Boisdale
A base, abandoned profligate, to steal
The only joy I had on earth. Oh, God!
And does that villan live who robbed me thus?
Ay! revels in the joys that once were mine.
Oh, could his life-blood quench my agony,
It were oblivion to my soul indeed!
But I was lowly born, a cottage is
My home. But there is in my heart a pride
87
Not on the throne that Nature owns her sway.
The straw-thatched cottage, where dwells poverty
In mean attire, may hold a heart as great
As that within a Monarch's heart. Then why,
Before th' illusive shadows of rich pomp,
Should simple dignity bow down? It shall
Not be! no, by yon Heavens, it shall not be!
Lochiel
Come, Boisdale, be calm again.
Boisdale
Alas,
A crushed affection has no balm on earth.
My soul is plundered of its richest wealth,
And all the merchandise of earth is naught!
Lochiel
I know no remedy for ills like thine.
Boisdale
An aspirant for Heaven, when on
The threshold of the spies, was not more pure.
A holier vision never met the eyes!
But now, compared with what she was, as Hell
To Heaven! Where is that heavenly beauty now?
The benedictions of whose love fell on
88
Making my heart a paradise of joys.
Her brook-like voice ran through my thirsting soul,
Like silver waters over golden sands.
Lochiel
Become the subject of the king, and you
Shall hear that voice again.
Boisdale
No, Lochiel, no!
For misery's climax will delight to that.
I could not bear to gaze upon those eyes,
Two liquid heavens reflecting love, that face,
From whose sweet smile my soul drank living light—
And she another's! No, it cannot be.
Lochiel
I pity thee! But we must part. Farewell!
Boisdale
Farewell! (Exit Lochiel.)
Now for the king again! Tonight!
An ague-like revenge chills through my soul,
And makes distraction in my heart. Tonight!
(Exit.)
| The unpublished plays of Thomas Holley Chivers | |