University of Virginia Library

DRAMATIC POEMS

FRANCIS DRAKE A TRAGEDY OF THE SEA TIME, 1578

At sea, off the coast of Patagonia, on board the Pelican, the Elizabeth, and the Plymouth.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

• Francis Drake.
• Thomas Doughty, his friend.
• Francis Fletcher, Chaplain.
• John Winter, Captain.
• Leonard Vicary, Captain.
• William Chester, Captain.
• Gentlemen-Venturers.
• Seamen.

Deck of the Elizabeth. Fleet in the offing.
John Winter. Thomas Doughty.
Doughty
(coming aboard).
Good-morrow, Winter. Still the winds are foul.
I would they blew from merry England shores.

Winter.
I would they had not blown you to my ship.
None are more welcome elsewhere. Strict commands
Forbid this visiting from ship to ship.

Doughty.
These orders are most wise,—I doubt not that;
Yet must I learn that any here afloat
Is master of the gentlemen who venture
Their ducats and their lives. Let him make laws
To rule rough sailors; they are not for us.

Winter.
Yet one must be the master. Ill it were
If, drifting masterless, this little realm
Of tossing ships obeyed not one sure helm.
I shall but serve you if I bid you go.

Doughty.
The Pelican is twice a league away.
'T is time the several captains of the fleet
Should learn how little mind the seamen have,
Ay, and the gentlemen, to hold our course.
Now, were we all of us of one firm mind,
This cheating voyage should end, and that full soon.
This in your ear. Did I dare speak of Burleigh—

[Winter recoils.
Winter.
Have you a mind to lose us both our heads?
I would not ill report you, but your words
Sail near to treason, both to Queen and Friend.

Doughty.
I pray you but this once be patient with me.
My actions shall not lack support in England.
If I might dare say all, you best of any
Would know the admiral has no better friend.
The ships decay; the sailors mutiny;
Before us lies a waste of unknown seas;
Methinks authority doth beget in men
A certain madness. Think you if we chance
To ruin peaceful towns and scuttle ships,
And rouse these Spanish hornets on their coasts,
Think you the dearest counsellor of the Queen—
I may not name him—will be better pleased
With him that hurts or him that helps this voyage?

Winter.
I think your enterprise more perilous
Than half a hundred voyages, good friend—
I pray you risk not losing of the name,
For you are greatly changed from him I knew
This some time past of gentle disposition;
In danger tranquil; gay, and yet discreet;
Learned in the law, a scholar and a soldier.

Doughty.
An old-time nursery trick: comfits before,
And after comes the dose; then sweets again.

Winter.
Be not so hasty; hear me to the end,
And be my careful friendship early pardoned.
I have heard you say of late you lack advancement.
There is advancement no man need to lack
Who makes his Duty like a mother's knees,
Where all his prayers are said. This man you were.
What other man is this I hardly know:
One that of all his natural endowments
Makes but base use to stir the meaner sort,
To darken counsel with a mist of words,
To scatter falsehood, and to sow distrust;
And all as lightly as a housewife flings
The morning grain amidst her cackling crew.

Doughty.
You have done well to ask my pardon first.

Winter.
Nay. I do hold the bond of friendship strong;
And he who wills to keep his friends must know
To stomach that they lack. I would indeed
You had not spoken as you have to-day.

Doughty.
What matters it? My words are safe with you.

Winter.
Safe as my countenance will let them be;
Safe till the admiral asks, and, like a boy,
I stand a-twiddling of uneasy thumbs,
On this foot, now, or that, red in the face.
By Heaven! what fetched you on this hated voyage?

Doughty.
A trick. A fetch indeed!

Winter.
Nay, that's not so.
Trick or no trick, this is not English earth,
Nor Drake the man who on the Devon greens
Sat half the night a-talking poesy.
I have seen many men in angry moods,
But this man's wrath is as the wrath of God,
Instant and terrible. Pray you, be warned,
And if your soul be capable of fear—

Doughty.
Fear!

Winter.
Ay, a healthful virtue in its place.
Had I been but the half as rash as you,
My very sword would tremble in its sheath.

Doughty.
And yet I have no nearer friend than he.

Winter.
You judge men by their love, as maidens do.

Doughty.
And not an ill way, either, as earth goes.
The admiral in his less distracted times
Hath some rare flavor of the woman in him.

Winter.
Oh, that's the half of him: no lady wronged,
No pillaged church, no hurt of unarmed man,
Will stain his record at the great account.
Have then a care. The gentle, just, and brave
Are ill to anger.

Doughty.
What I say to you
I not less readily shall say to him,
Trusting the friendly equity of his love.

Winter.
A certain devil lurks in every angel,
Else had there never been a strife in heaven.
Now on my soul I wonder at the man.
Thrice has he warned you as a brother might,
And once removed you from a high command.
'T is very strange to me how men may differ.
No doubts have I; along these savage coasts
Magellan sailed. Are we not English born?

Doughty.
I neither have forgotten nor forget.
Thanks for your patience. There is more to say
That might be said.

Winter.
I would it had been less.
I think it well no other hears your words.

Doughty.
Oh, fear not I shall rashly squander speech.

Winter.
Spend not your thoughts at all. Be miserly.
These wooden walls have echoes; to and fro
Some wild word wanders, till, on each return,
We less and less our own mind's children know.
All gold they say is of the devil's mint;
But words are very devils of themselves.
I do commend you to a fast of speech.

Doughty.
It might be wise—but you'll not talk of this.

Winter.
Nay, that I will not. It is you will speak.
A restless tongue is ever no man's friend.
Come, let us shift the talk. 'T is perilous.
[Winter, as he speaks, walks to the rail.
How huge and bloody red the moon to-night!
This utter quiet of the brooding sea
I like not over well; nor yon red moon.
So, there's a breeze again, and now 't is still.
We shall have storms to-morrow.

Doughty.
Reason good,
Before our ships are scattered far and wide,
That I should speak what others dare not speak.

Winter.
Nor I dare hear. My mother used to say
That silence was a very Christian virtue.
When I talk folly, be the Moon my friend;
There are no eavesdroppers among the stars.

Doughty.
Her sex, they say, are leaky counsellors;
And, too, she shares your secrets with a man,
Red i' the visage now. Here's three to keep
Your pleasant indiscretions.

Winter.
Happy Moon!
That ere a day is dead shall England see.
Ah, gentle dame, shine on our island homes;
Kiss for my sake a face as fair as thine;
Go, tell our love to every maiden flower
That droops tear-laden in our Devon woods.

Doughty.
I dreamed last night that never more again
Should I see England.

Winter.
That's as God may will.
I dare not think on England. Why should you?
What ails you now that you should look behind
When honor cries come on?

Doughty.
To be a child!
Is that your largest wisdom?

Winter.
Yes, well said!
Child, woman, man—the nobler life hath need
That man be all of these.

Doughty
(is silent a moment).
I would that I
Were always near you, Winter. Drake has power
To tempt resistance as no other can.
With you, dear friend, my soul abides in peace.

Winter.
Seek you such peace as comes to those alone
Who have for friend the duty of the hour.

Doughty.
Enough of preaching.

Winter.
Well, so be it then;
But guard that restless tongue. When night is come,
And all these mighty spaces overhead
And all this vast of sea lie motionless,
God seems so near to me, ill deeds so far,
That all my soul in gentled wonder rests.

[They are silent a time.
Doughty.
Mark how the southward splendor of the cross
Shines peace upon us. When the nights are calm,
I joy to climb the topmast's utmost peak,
And, hanging breathless in the unpeopled void,
Note how the still deep answers star for star.

Winter.
See, the wind freshens. Get you to your ship.
Come not again. This seeming quiet sea
Is not more dangerous than a man we know.

Doughty.
'T is not the danger checks me; yet be sure
I shall not spare to think upon your words.
You have my thanks. Good-night, and merry dreams.
See that you keep my counsel.

Winter.
Said I not,
'T was safe with me?

Doughty
(goes over the rail to his boat).
Good-night, and better winds.

Winter.
Good-night to you.
The devil take the man.

Cabin of Pelican.
Drake. Vicary. Winter.
Winter.
It sorts not with my honor that I speak.

Drake.
Enough to know John Winter will not speak;
A cruel verdict is the just man's silence.
I have been patient, but the end has come.
What breeds these discontents? I know the man.
Were he twin brother of my mother's womb
He should not live to mar my Prince's venture.
(To Vicary.)
Are you struck silent, like my good John Winter?
What substance is there in this mutinous talk?

Vicary.
Too little substance, not enough to eat;
A prating parson, and some empty bellies.
A very mutinous thing's an empty paunch.

Drake.
Now here's a man has never a plain answer.
Out with it in good English.

Vicary.
As you will,
I pray you pardon me my way of speech;
I cannot help it. I was born a-grinning,
Or so my mother said. If death's a jest,
I doubt not I shall never die in earnest.

Drake.
Now on my soul this passes all endurance;
Grin, if it please you, but at least speak out.

Vicary.
I never had as little mind to speak.

Drake.
I have heard you jesting with a Spanish Don
When sore beset and well-nigh spent with wounds.
I think some counsel lies behind your mirth.

Vicary.
Were I the admiral I would preach a sermon.

Drake.
A sermon!

Vicary.
Ay! and that a yardarm long,
And to conclude, a parson and a rope.
Also good rum's a very Christian diet,
And vastly does console a shrunken belly.

Drake
(smiling).
Well, my gay jester, is there more to say?

Vicary.
I sometimes think we carry on our ships
Too large a freight of time.

Drake.
Talk plain again.
It takes three questions to beget an answer.

Vicary.
Now, as the world runs, that's unnatural many.

Drake.
I think you will not speak.

Vicary.
No, I'm run dry.
I am as barren as a widowed hen.

Drake
(laughing).
Out with you. Go!

Vicary
(aside).
And none more glad to go.
[Exit Vicary.

Drake.
One that must needs be taken in his humor.

Winter.
'Tis a strange disposition that has mirth
For what breeds tears in others.

Drake.
No, not strange.
But I've no jesting in my heart to-day.
The straits lie yonder, dark and perilous;
The Spaniards' villainies sit heavy here.
[Strikes his breast.
Their racks are red with honest English blood;
The dead call, “Come.” Ah, Winter, by my soul,
When Panama is ours, when their galleons lie
Distressful wrecks, and England's banner flies
Unquestioned on the far Pacific sea,
Then—

Winter.
Is it so? Runs your commission thus?

Drake.
Once past the straits, and all shall know my errand.
Here is the warrant of Her Majesty,
And here the sword she bade me call her own.

Winter.
Did Doughty know of this?

Drake.
Ay, from the first.

Winter.
A double treason.

Drake.
Counsel me, John Winter.
The sailors murmur, and the gentlemen
Sow quarrels and dissension through the fleet.
My dearest friend betrays my dearest trust.
What means this gay boy's chatter about time?

Winter.
A riddle easily read, if you but think
What use the devil has for idle hours.

Drake.
I have long meant to make an end of that.
Go tell these lazy gentles, Francis Drake
Bids them to haul and pull as sailors do;
Ay, let them reef and lay out on the yards.
I'll bid 'gainst Satan for their idleness.
Belike they may not care to go aloft;
Then, on my word, I've bilboes down alow.

Winter.
Thou wouldst not set a gentle i' the stocks?

Drake.
Gentle or parson, let them try me not.
'T is said a gibbet stands on yonder shore:
There brave Magellan hanged a mutinous Don.
Let them look to it. See I be obeyed.
None shall be favored. Fetch me now aboard
This traitor Doughty, and no words with him.

Winter.
Ay, ay, sir.

Drake.
Go. Let there be no delay.

[Winter in his boat beside the Plymouth.
Doughty
(descending).
What means this summons?

Winter.
Hush! I may not speak.
Give way there, men. (To Doughty.)
Have you your tablets with you?
[Takes them and writes:
“Take care. Be warned. The devil is broke loose.”

Doughty.
Why am I bidden?

Winter.
Way—give way there, men!

Doughty.
Will you not answer me?

Winter.
Not I, indeed.
Way there, enough! Ho, there, aboard!

[Doughty goes aboard the Pelican.
Doughty.
Good-day.

Deck of Pelican.
Doughty. Fletcher.
Fletcher.
I think there is some mischief in the air.
'T is said the admiral has sent for you.

Doughty.
I'm haled aboard with no more courtesy
Than any meanest ruffian of the crew.
Were I in England he should answer me.

Fletcher.
This is not England.

Doughty.
Oh, by heaven! no!
(Aside.)
Time must be won. I've been a loitering fool.
(Aloud.)
I would that I could clear my mind to you.

Fletcher.
Why not to me? What other is so fit?
Is not confession like an act of nature?

Doughty.
I am like a wine thick with confusing lees.
To-day they settle, and to-morrow morn
Another shakes me, and I'm thick again.
[Fletcher watches him. Both are silent for a moment.
You are both man and priest.

Fletcher.
Add friend to both.

Doughty.
We said, most reverend sir, both man and priest.
Had you been more of man, yet all of priest,
Confession had been easier.

Fletcher.
More of man!
Grant you I lack the courage of the sea,
Think you it takes none to be now your friend?
I have the will, ay, and the resolution,
To help you when I think you most need help.
I guess the half your lips delay to tell.

Doughty
(looking about him).
Enough. Time passes, and you should know all.
My Lord of Burleigh much mislikes this voyage.
Who helps to ruin it will no loser be.
Had I but known this ere my florins went
To help a foolish venture!

Fletcher.
But the Queen—

Doughty.
Hath ever had two minds, as is her way.
(Points north.)
Now there advancement lies. (Points south.)
And that way death.

Fletcher.
Art in the service of my Lord of Burleigh?
Not more than thou am I this admiral's man.

Doughty.
And I am no man's man; I am the Queen's.
I shall best serve my God in serving her.
Shall it be Prince or friend? I may not both.

Fletcher.
Is he thy friend?

Doughty.
Of late I doubt it much.
Now hath he closer counsellors than I.

Fletcher.
He loves thee not. This ill-advisèd voyage
Goes to disaster in these unknown seas
Where some foul devil led the sons of Rome.
'T is said that demons lit them down the coast.
This nine and fifty years no Christian sail
Has gone this deathful way. The admiral
Knows not the sullen temper of the fleet.
(Looks at Doughty steadily).
There should be one—a friend—to bid him turn
And set our prows toward England. Think on that.

Doughty.
But who shall bell the cat? What mouse among us?

Fletcher.
If but we English mice were of one mind!

Doughty.
Soon shall we be so. You have unawares
Made firm my purpose. 'T is not in your kind
To court such peril as our talk may bring.
The more for this have you my thanks. Enough.
The counsel given me—

Fletcher
(alarmed).
I gave you none.

Doughty.
Oh, rest you easy. It is safe with me.
As you are priest, so I am gentleman;
Now in the end it comes to much the same.

Enter Chester.
Chester
(to Doughty).
The admiral would see you instantly.

[Exit.
Cabin of Pelican.
Drake.
I would this man had been less dear to me;
Another I had long since crushed. The rat
Which gnaws the planks between our lives and death
I had as lightly dealt with. For love's sake
And all the honest past that has been ours
Once shall I speak. Once more:
[A knock.
Ho there! Come in.

Enter Chester and Doughty.
Chester.
The land lies low to westward, and the wind
Blows fair and steady.

[Drake looks at the chart.
Drake.
Ay, St. Julian's isle.
[Exit Chester.
(To Doughty).
Pray you be seated.

Doughty.
I am ordered hither.
'T were fit I stand.

Drake.
Yes, I am admiral;
But there are moments in the lives of all
When the stern conscience of a too great office
Appals the kindlier heart that fain would be
Where indecisions breed less consequence.
I said, be seated.
[Doughty obeys.
Are you not my friend?
Forget these rolling seas, the time, the place,
This mighty errand which my Prince has sped.
Think me to-day but simple Francis Drake,
And be yourself the brother of my heart.

Doughty.
There spoke the old Frank Drake I seemed to lose.

Drake.
Let us try back. We are like ill-broken dogs.
Our lives have lost the scent.

Doughty.
Nay, think not so.

Drake.
Ah, once I had a friend, a scholar wise,
A soldier, and a poet; dowered, I think,
With all the gentle gifts that win men's hearts.
Of late he seems another than himself;
Of late he is most changed, and him I knew
Is here no more. Ah, but I too am double,
And one of me is still your nearest friend,
And one, ah, one is admiral of the fleet.
Let him that loves you whisper to your soul
The thing he would not say. You understand.
Ah, now you smile. A pretty turn of phrase
Did ever capture you. 'T was always thus.
We have seen death so often, eye to eye,
That fear of death were idle argument;
Yet in such words of yours as men report
A deathful sentence lurks. Oh, cast away
These mad temptations, won I know not whence.
Last night I fell to thinking, ere I slept,
Of those proud histories of older days
You loved to tell amid the tents in Ireland.
Trust me, no one of these that shall not fade
Before the wonder of this English tale
Of what El Draco and his captains did.
And when, at twilight, by our Devon hearths
Some old man tells the story, shall he pause,
And say, But one there was, of England born,
That sowed the way with perils not of God,
Breeding dissension, casting on his name
Dishonor—

Doughty
(leaping up).
Now, by heaven! no man shall say—

Drake
(smiling and quiet, puts a hand on each shoulder of Doughty).
Hush! you will waken up that other man.
Read not my meaning wrong. I am sore beset.
Before me lie dark days. The timid shrink;
The gentlemen, who should have been my stay,
Fall from me useless. Yet, come what come may,
For England's glory and my lady's grace,
I go my way. Well did he speak who said,
“Heaven is as near by water as by land.”
And therefore, whether it be death or fame
That waits in yonder seas, I go my way.
Yet, if I lose you on this venturous road,
Half the proud joy of victory were gone.
I have been long; you, patient. Rest we here.

Doughty.
Yes, I am more than one man; more's the pity.
If I have sinned, forgive me, and good-night.

Drake.
Thou shalt stay with me on the Pelican.

Doughty
(aside).
So, so. A child in ward! (Aloud.)
Again, good-night.

[Exit.
[Enter Vicary.
Vicary.
The water shoals. A land lies west by south.
There seems good anchorage in the island's lee.

Drake.
We shall find water here, good fruit and fish.
Send in a boat for soundings. Signal all
To anchor where seems best; and Vicary,
Set thy gay humor to some thoughtful care
Of him that left just now. I hold him dear.

Vicary.
I would to heaven he were safe in England.

Drake.
And I, and I. He is more like a child
Than any man my life's experience knows.
Yet he is dangerous to himself and us;
Too fond of speech; too cunning with the tongue;
That tempts to mischief like a sharpened blade.

Vicary.
Ah, words! words! words! Ye children of the fiend,
On all your generated repetitions
Is visited your parents' wickedness.
He keeps boon company with each man's humor,
Is gay with me, is chivalrous with you,
At Winter's side a grave philosopher.
I shall set merry sentinels for his guards,
And there my wisdom ends.

Drake.
My Thanks. No more.

[Exit Vicary.
Deck of Pelican. Ships at anchor near the north end of the island of St. Julian.
Doughty. Winter. Seamen.
Winter.
These are my orders.

Doughty.
I may not to shore;
And for the reason? Drake shall give it me.
[Turns to the men.
I hear there is no water on these shores.

1st Sailor.

That in the casks is but mere mud of vileness; rot in the mouth, and stenches in the nose.

2d Sailor.

And for the biscuits, they are moldy green, and inhabited like an owl's nest with all manner of live things.

3d Sailor.

It will be worse in the lower seas. There the men are eleven cubits tall.

2d Sailor.

Nay, feet, and that's enough.

4th Sailor.

Where scurvy Dons have gone, good English may.

Doughty.
We gentles are no better off than you.
Here is an order, we shall pull and haul
And lay aloft. What! Lack ye meat to-day?
Here are grubs to spare. These caverned biscuits hold
Small beeves in plenty. Here's more life, I think,
Than we are like to find on yonder coast.

1st Sailor.

A Portugee did tell me once there was no day in the straits where we must sail, and all the sea be full of venomed snakes.

Doughty.

Nay. That's a foolish fable. True it is that in the straits are mighty isles of ice, with sail and mast. They beat about, men say, like luggers on a wind, and never man to handle rope or sail.

Fletcher.

The boats are come again, and no water, none! Alas, this miserable voyage!

Enter Vicary from boat.
Vicary.
Not so, good chaplain. Underneath a cliff
I found a spring as sweet as England's best.
Good store of shellfish, too, and these strange fruits.

(To Doughty).
You're but an old wife at these fireside tales. Lord, lads! there's wonders yonder. It is twice as good as a fair in May. There's only a merry-go-round that's called a swirlpool. Round you go, a hundred years, ship and all, not a farthing to pay, and then home to bed, with addled pates, as good as drunk, and no man the poorer.

[The men laugh.
1st Sailor
(aside).

He do lie to beat a rusty weather-cock.

2d Sailor.

But men do say there's hell-traps set along the rocks, and all the waters boil like witch's pots.

Vicary
(laughs).

The tale is gone awry. When last I sailed this way, no fire would burn, and all the little fiends were harvesting of mighty icicles to keep the daddy devils from frosted toes.

1st Sailor
(aside).

He be a lively liar. He be a very flea among liars.

[All laugh.
Vicary.
The seas be rum, and all the whales mad drunk.
[Laughter.
I thought my laughter trap was baited well.

4th Sailor
(aside).

He don't starve his lies. A very pretty liar. His lies be fat as ever a Christmas hog.

Vicary.
Tom Doughty, I'll match lies with you, my lad,
The longest day of June. A song, a song!

Sailors.
A song, a song! The captain for a song!

Vicary.
SONG.

Vicary.
Well tuned, my lads. Now who of you's for shore?

Doughty
(aside to a mate).
There'll be no songs down yonder.

Winter
(leaning over him).
What, again?
More mischief, ever more? Dark is the sea
Where you will sail. What fiend possesses you?
This in your ear. The priest is no man's friend.
If I do know the malady of baseness,
There's one that needs a doctor.

Doughty.
You are wrong.
I have better friend, none more assured.

Winter.
Indeed, I think you are too rich in friends.
Better you had a hundred eager foes
Than this man's friendly company. One step more,
One slight excess of speech, some word retold—
And you are lost to life.

Doughty.
He dare not do it!

Winter.
Dare not! I think it oft doth chance a man
Knows not his nearest friend as others do.
As for your priest—I greatly fear a coward.
The day will come when honest Francis Drake
Will shake all secrets from him as a dog
Shakes out a rat's mean life. Beware the day!
Well do I know the admiral's silent mood;
Then should men fear him, and none more than you,
Because he dreads the counsel of his heart.

[Exeunt both.
Deck of the Pelican. Evening, a week later. The fleet at anchor near the south end of the island of St. Julian. Sailors at the capstan.
Winter.
Now, then, to warp her in. Round with the capstan.
Sailors and gentlemen, bear all a hand!

Doughty.
Not I, by heaven! Not I! My father's son
Stains not his sword-hand with this peasant toil.

Gentlemen.
Nor I! nor I! nay, never one of us.

Winter.
Do as I bid you!

Doughty.
Not a hand of mine
Shall to this sailor work.

Winter.
[Walks to the cabin.
Boatswain whistles. Men man the capstan, singing:

Enter Vicary.
Vicary.
Well sung. Well hauled, my lads. (To Doughty).

A word with you.
You will attend the admiral in his cabin.
(Aside to Doughty.)
'Ware cat, good mouse! The claws are out to-night!

Doughty.
'T were better soon than later. After you.

[Exeunt.
Cabin of Pelican.
Drake. Winter.
Enter Vicary, followed by Doughty.
Drake.
Pray you be seated. (To Doughty.)
Nay, not you, not you.
(To Winter.)
Arrest this gentleman.

Winter.
Your sword, an't please you.

[Receives it.
Drake.
I charge you here with treason to the Queen.
You shall to trial with no long delay.

Doughty.
What court is this with which you threaten me?

Drake.
Now, by St. George, your lawyer tricks and quibbles
Shall help you little. I am Francis Drake,
The Queen's plain sailor, and the master here.

Doughty.
Master!

Drake.
Ay, master! Traitor to the Queen,
This long account is closed. All, all is known,
Since when, at Plymouth, on the eve we sailed,
My Lord of Burleigh bought you; what the price
The devil knows—and you.

Doughty.
My Lord of Burleigh!
I pray you speak of this with me alone.
What I would say is for a secret ear.

Drake.
No, by my sword, not I!

Doughty.
Then have your way.
No law can touch me here. This is not England.

Drake.
Where sails a plank in English forests hewn,
There England is. This deck is England now,
And I a sea-king of thus much of England.
Put me this man in irons! See to it!
Let him have speech of none except yourselves.
[Exeunt Winter and Doughty.
(To Vicary.)
I have too long delayed.

Vicary.
That may well be.

Drake.
I hear he hath great favor with the crews,
A maker of more mischief than I guessed.

Vicary.
Men love him well.

Drake.
He hath too many friends.
This is the very harlotry of friendship.
Go now, and pray that when command is yours
You have no friends. See that strict guard be kept.
[Exit Vicary.
(Alone.)
I would that God had spared me this one hour.

Pelican. Doughty in irons on the deck, seated upon a coil of ropes, leaning against a mast.
Winter
(to the guards).
Back there, my men!

Doughty.
You are most welcome, Winter.
I am very glad of company. My soul
Is sick to surfeit of its own dull thoughts.
I like not lonely hours. What land is that?

Winter.
St. Julian's cape.

Doughty.
Is that a cross I see?
It seems, I think, the handiwork of man.

Winter.
No cross is that; there stout Magellan hanged
Don Carthagene, vice-admiral of his fleet.

Doughty.
Wherefore?

Winter.
'T is said he did dislike the voyage,
And had no mind to pass the narrow straits.

Doughty.
The strait he chose was narrower; mayhap
He had no choice—as I may not to-morrow.
[Is silent a few moments.
A little while ago, the scent of flowers
Came from the land. Their nimble fragrance woke,
As by a charm, some sleeping memories.
I dreamed myself again a fair-haired boy,
A-gathering cowslips in my mother's fields.
[Pauses.
There is no order that I shall not sing;
I can no mighty treason set to song.

Winter.
Sing, if it please you. I'll be glad it doth.
What song shall't be?

Doughty.
[Sings.
SONG.
[The men come nearer.

1st Sailor.
'T is a sad shame so gay a gentleman
Should lie in irons.

2d Sailor.
Ay, the pity of it.

Winter
(to the men).
Off with you there! (To Doughty.)

The devil's in your tongue!
Why must you sing of England? Follow me.
I think you would breed mutiny in heaven.

[Exit.
Cabin of Pelican.
Drake. Enter Fletcher.
Fletcher.
I come as bidden. What may be your will?

Drake.
Think you a man may serve two masters?

Fletcher.
Nay,
'T is not so writ.

Drake.
Yet there are some I know
Would have me serve a dozen, and my Queen.
Shall I serve this man's doubt, and that man's fear?
Who bade these cowards follow me to sea?
And you, that are Christ's captain,—what of you?
Were I a man vowed wholly unto God,
I should have courage both of God and man;
And fear's a malady of swift infection.

Fletcher.
I think my captain has been ill informed.

Drake.
Ah, not so ill. Look at me, in the face;
A man's eyes may rest honest, though his soul
Be deeper damned than Judas. Thou art false!
False to thy faith, thy duty, and thy Prince!
Now, if thou hast no righteous fear of God—
By heaven! here stands a man you well may fear.

Fletcher.
Indeed I know not how I've angered you.

Drake.
You shall know soon. And—look not yet away—
You have hatched treason with her larger help
Of one that hath more courage. Spare him not
If you have hope to see another day.
What of your plans? I charge you, sir, be frank.
What has he told that you should fear to tell?

Fletcher.
We did but talk. Perchance I may have said
I do not love the sea, that some aboard
Would be well pleased to stand on English soil.

Drake.
If you have any wisdom of this world,
A coward heart may save a foolish head.
I asked you what this traitor Doughty said,
You answer me with babble of yourself.
Speak out, or, by my honor,—no light oath,—
I shall so score you with the boatswain's lash
That Joseph's coat shall be a mock to yours.

Fletcher.
You would not—dare—

Drake.
I think you know me not.
You have my orders. Is it yes, or no?

Fletcher.
I pray you, sir, consider what you ask.
No priest of God may, without deadly sin,
Tell what in penitence a troubled soul
Has in confession whispered. Ask me not.

Drake.
If I do understand your words aright,
Save for the idle talk of idle men,
He hath said nought to you except of sin
Such as the best may in an hour of shame
Tell for the soul's relief. If this be so,
Nor I, nor any man, may question you.

Fletcher.
I do assure you that I spoke the truth.

Drake
(perplexed, walks to and fro. Turns suddenly, offering the hilt of his sword).
Swear it upon the cross-hilt of my sword.
Swear! (Fletcher hesitates.)
As my God is dear, thou art more false
Than hell's worst devil. Ho! Without there! Ho!

Fletcher.
Nay, I will swear.

Drake.
Too late. Without there! Ho!
Send me the boatswain's mate. Without there! Ho!
If I confess thee not, thou lying priest,
May I die old—die quiet in my bed.
Ho there! And quick!

Fletcher.
I pray you—let me think.
It may be that I did not understand.
It might be that he talked to me, a man,
As man to man. I think 't was even so.

Drake.
Out with it—quickly! Speak! Out! Out with it!

Fletcher.
I think, he said, the purpose of this voyage
Was hid, and all of us are cheated men.
It seems, he said, that if the gentles here
Were of one mind, and stirred the crews to act,
We might see England and our homes again.

Drake.
What more?

Fletcher.
Asked whom we'd get to bell the cat.—
And that the Queen your errand did not guess.

Drake.
So! Said he that? Go on; your tale lacks wit.

Fletcher.
Also, that storms and ever-vexing winds
Did show God's will.

Drake.
I think you trifle, sir.
Did he talk ever of my Lord of Burleigh?

Fletcher.
I fear to speak.

Drake.
Fear rather to be silent.
Here lies the warrant of her Majesty:
'T is she, not I, commands.

Fletcher.
He seems to say
They would best serve my Lord of Burleigh's wish
Who marred this venture, ere the power of Spain
Was roused to open war. I can no more.

Drake.
See that your memory fail not on the morrow!
Go thank the devil in your prayers to-night
For that your skin is whole. Begone! Begone!
[Exit Fletcher.
Now know I what it costs a woman-prince
To keep her realm. The great should have no friends.

Enter Vicary, Winter, and Chester.
Drake.
Call all the captains and the officers.
The court shall meet to-morrow morn, at eight.
There shall be charges ready in due form;
You, all of you, shall hear the witnesses.
And, Winter,—we are far from England now,—
See that this trial be in all things fair,
As though each man of you, an ermined judge,
Sat in Westminster. Let no words of mine
Disturb the equities of patient judgment.
I would not that, when you and I are old,
Uneasy memories of too hasty action
Should haunt us with reproach. But have a care.
My duty knows no friend; be yours as ignorant.
Our fortunes and the honor of the Queen—
I should have said her honor and our fortunes—
Rest in your hands. See that my words be known.

Winter.
To all?

Drake.
To all, sailors and gentlemen.

[Exeunt the captains.
Winter, Vicary, and Chester without.
Chester.
I'm like a child that fain would run away
To 'scape a whipping.

Winter.
There are none of us
More sore at heart than Drake.

Vicary.
I know of one.
I would a friend were dead ere break of day,
And all to-morrow's story left untold.
I think that I shall never laugh again.

[They reach the deck.
Chester
(pointing to the gibbet on the shore).
It may be yon long-memoried counsellor
Made hard the admiral's heart.

Vicary.
That might be so.
I wandered thither, yesterday, at eve,
And found a skull. Didst ever notice, Winter,
How this least mortal relic of a man
Does seem to smile? Hast ever talked with skulls?
They are courteous ever, and good listeners.
And never one of them, or man or maid,
That is not secret. There's another virtue;
For what more honest and more chaste than death?
Now then, this skull that grins an hundred years—
Pray think how mighty must the jest have been;
And then, how transient are our living smiles.

Winter.
Ill-omened talk. A graver business waits.

Vicary.
Give me an hour. I am not well to-day.
I will be with you very presently.
[Exit Vicary.

Evening of the day of the trial and condemnation of Doughty. Time, sunset. Ashore on St. Julian's Island.
Winter. Vicary. Drake.
Drake walking to and fro under the trees.
Winter
(coming up and walking beside him).
What orders are there?

Drake.
See the prisoner,
And bid him choose the hour and the day.

Winter.
And for the manner of the execution?
The court said nothing; sir, it lies with you.
What is your pleasure?

Drake.
Say my will, John Winter.
The gallows and the rope!

Vicary
(returning).
Must that be so?
'T is a dog's death, and not a gentleman's.

Drake.
I have at home a very honest dog.

Vicary.
Wilt pardon me if once again I plead?

Drake.
Plead not with me. No plea the heart can bring
My own heart fails to urge.

Winter.
I made no plea.
The man I loved this morn for me is dead.
But there are those in England—far away—
Mother and sister—

Drake.
Sir, you have my orders!
Henceforth no friends for me! This traitor dies,
As traitors all should die, a traitor's death.
The man's life judges him, not you, nor I.

Vicary.
Indeed, the manner of a man's departure,
Whether upon a war-horse or an ass,
Doth little matter, as it seems to me,
If those he leaves feel not the fashion of it.
Now, many a year that rope will throttle me,
Who am no traitor, and who like not well
What treachery this man's nature moved him to.

Drake.
It seems to me that good men's lives are spent
In paying debts another makes for them.
I have my share. Take you your portion, too.
Be just, I pray you, both to him and me.
Now, here's a man that was my closest friend.
In Plymouth, ay, in London, ere we sailed,
Against the pledge myself had given the Queen,
He told the purpose of my voyage to Burleigh,
Pledging himself to wreck this enterprise,
Lest we should rouse these Spanish curs to bite.
That I do hold the warrant of the Queen
None but this traitor knew, and, knowing it,
Has set himself to brewing discontent,
Stirred mutiny amidst my crews, cast wide
The seed of discord, till obedience,
That is the feather on the shaft of duty,
Failed, and my very captains questioned me.
One man must die, or this great venture dies;
This man must die, or we go backward home,
Like mongrel dogs that fear a shaken stick.

Winter.
Yet none of us have asked his life of you.

Drake.
I ask it of myself; shall ask it, sir,
Knowing how vain and pitiful my plea.
I have said nothing of the darker charge,
The covert hints, the whispering here and there
Of how my death might please my Lord of Burleigh,
And settle all these mutinous debates.
I think 't was but an idle use of speech;
I think he meant not it should come to aught.

Winter.
Nor I.

Vicary.
Nor I. He hath confessed to all
Except this single charge. That he denied.

Drake.
And now no more! And hope not I shall change.
Yet will I well consider all your words.
Rest you assured if there be any way
That both secures the safety of this voyage
And leaves this man to future punishment,
I shall not miss to find it.

Winter.
That were well.
I somewhat fear the temper of the men.
And these grave statesmen, closeted at home,
Have slight indulgence for the sterner needs
That whip us into what seems rash or cruel.

Drake.
Ah, many a day 'twixt us and England lies,
And the peacemaker's blessing rests on time.
If death await me in the distant seas,
I shall not fear to meet a higher Judge.
If fortune smile upon our happy voyage,
No man in England that will dare to say
I served not well my country and my God;
The Queen will guard my honor as her own.
But, come what may, sirs, I shall act unmoved
By any dread of what the great may do,
Though we should prick this sullen Spain to war.

Vicary.
Now, by St. George, could we but stir the Dons
To open fight! The Queen has many minds,
But when the blades are out, and Philip strikes,
As strike he will, these wary counsellors
Will lose her ear amid the clash of swords.

Drake.
Pray God that I do live to see the day
When all the might of England takes the sea,
And we, that are the falcons of the deep,
Shall tear these cruel vultures, till our beaks
Drip red with Spanish blood!

Vicary.
May I be there!

Drake
(gravely).
Trust me, we all shall live to see that hour.
God gives us moments when the years to come
Lie easily open like a much-read book.
Oppressed with weight of care, in these last days
I seem to see beyond this bitter time.
We shall so carry us in yon Rome-locked seas
That all the heart of England shall be glad,
And the brown mothers of these priest-led Dons
Shall scare unruly children with my name.
And then, and then, I see a nobler hour.
A day of mightier battle, when their fleets
Shall fly in terror from our English guns,
And through the long hereafter we shall sail
Unquestioned lords of all the watery waste.
Oh, 't was a noble dream!

Vicary.
But what were life
Without the splendid prophecy of dreams?

Drake.
At least, a moment they have given release
From sadder thought of that which has to be.
The night is falling. Get we now aboard.
To-morrow you shall have my final judgment.

A cabin in the Pelican. Early morning. The day after the trial and condemnation of Doughty.
Doughty. Enter Winter.
Doughty.
Is there an hour set? When shall it be?

Winter.
That rests with you. Alas, too well you know
That, being charged with certain grave offences,
Of which, to our great grief, you are not cleared,
The court decreed your death. Now, I am come
To offer you thus much of grace—

Doughty.
As what?

Winter.
Either to be at morning left ashore,
Or to be held till, at convenient time,
A ship may carry you to England, there
To answer for your deeds the Lords in Council;
Or will you take to be here done to death
As runs our sentence?

Doughty.
Would I had no choice.
That's a strange riddle! Here be caskets three.
'T is like the story in the Venice tale.
Thank Francis Drake for me. I'll think upon it.
And send me Leonard Vicary with good speed.

Winter.
Is there aught else a man may do for you?

Doughty.
Yes, come no more until I send for you.

Winter.
Have I in anything offended you?

Doughty.
No, you have too much loved me; that is all.
The sting lies there.

Winter.
I do not understand.

Doughty.
And I too well. Wilt send me Vicary?

Winter
(aside).
As strange a monitor for a mortal hour
As e'er a sick life's fancy hit upon.

[Exit.
Doughty
(alone).
[Walks to and fro.
Enter Vicary.

Vicary.
I understand.

Doughty.
How ever apt you are;
That took my fancy always. Now, it saves
The turning of a dagger in a wound.
I have chosen death.

Vicary.
And chosen well, I think.
There was not one of us that said not so;
Not one but wishes life were possible.

Doughty.
Set that aside. It is not possible.
And put no strain upon your natural self
To be another than the man you are.
Do you remember once a thing you said,—
How for the wise the soul has chapels four?
One, that I name not. One, a home of tears.
One, the grave shrine of high philosophy.
And one, where all the saints are jesters gay.
Smile on me when I die. In that dim world
I am assured men laugh, as well they may,
To see this ant-heap stirred. Oh, I shall look
To see you smile.

Vicary.
I pray you talk not thus.

Doughty.
And wherefore not? A moment, only one,
The thought of England troubled my decision;
But that is over. Yet, a word of home.
There is a maid in Devon— (hesitates.)
Pardon me.
When, by God's grace, you see her, as you must,
Tell her I loved her well—and what beside
I leave to you. I shall not hear the tale.
Be gentle in the way of your report.
Ah me! by every cross a woman kneels;
I doubt not, Leonard, that some Syrian girl
Sobbed where the thief hung dying. Now, good-by!
Go! and remember—I shall hold you to it.
[Exit Vicary.
Oft when the tides of life were at their full,
I have sat wondering what the ebb would be,
And what that tideless moment men call death.
I think it strange as nears the coming hour,
I willingly would fetch it yet more near.

Vicary
(without, as he goes on deck).
He asks a smile where nature proffers tears.
I have laughed tears before, and may again.
Here dies a man who, like that heir of Lynne,
Has madly squandered honor, friendship, love,
And hath no refuge save the dismal rope.
Shall that bring other fortunes than he spent?
Ah me! I loved him well,—and I must smile—
That will seem strange to men. I sometimes wish
I could feel sure that Christ did ever smile.

Enter Drake.
Drake.
I come to hear thy choice.

Doughty.
My choice is made.
Death, and no long delay. And be not grieved;
You will—ah, well I know you—feel the hurt.
Were you to say, “Take life, take hope again,
Take back command,” and bid me mend my ways,
The mercy were but vanity of kindness.
Never could I be other than I am;
Yet think of me as but the minute's traitor.
You have been merciful. 'T is I am stern.
Not you, but I, decree that I shall die.
A sudden weariness of life is mine;
Let me depart in peace—

Drake.
Must it be so?
Another court may clear you.

Doughty.
Urge me not.
Another court! There is but one high court
May clear my soul of guilt. I go to God.
There shall be witnesses you cannot call.
Let this suffice. No man can move me now;
And rest assured I never loved you more.

Drake.
I thank you. Now, what else?

Doughty.
I choose to die.
Go we ashore at noon, and eat at table,
Like gentlemen who speed a parting friend
Upon a pleasant and a certain voyage:
And I would share with you the bread of God.
[Pauses.
There is but one thing more—

Drake.
Speak! Oh, my God!
Except—except mere life, there is no thing
I would not give you; yea, to my own life.

Doughty.
You cannot think that I would ask my life?

Drake.
Pardon, sweet gentleman, and sweeter friend.

Doughty.
There is a maid in Devon—oh, Frank Drake!
It must not be the gibbet and the rope!
The axe and block, men say, cure all disgrace.

Drake.
So shall it be.

Doughty.
I knew you not unkind.
I pray you leave me now. God prosper you.
You cannot know how kind a thing is death.

Island of St. Julian. Table spread at noon, under the trees. Drake seated with Doughty and other officers. In the background, a block, with the headsman, sailors, and others.
Vicary and Winter approach the table.
Vicary.
Didst hear, John Winter, what he said to him?

Winter.
I had but come ashore. What said he, Leonard?

Vicary.
First, he would have the admiral take the bread;
Then, when in turn the priest did come to him,
He said, “I would another man than you
Were here to give me of this bread of God.
Yet, as for this dear body of my Lord,
A pearl that's carried in a robber's pouch
Doth lose no lustre;” and with no more words
Took of the sacrament; and so to table.

[They approach sadly and in silence.
Doughty
(looking up).
Come, come, I'll none of this! Here are bent brows;
You go not thus to battle. Shall one death
Disturb our appetites and spoil our mirth?
Am I not host? They'll not be bid again
Who come not merry. (Aside to Vicary.)
See you fail me not.
Some men ask prayers. I only ask a smile.
(Aloud.)
Come, gentlemen, I put this hardship on you.
There might be many questions, much to say.

Drake.
I shall sit here forever, if you will,
But talk I cannot.

Doughty.
Nay, but that is strange.
'T is the glad privilege of the gentle-born
To see in death an honest creditor,
That any day may ask the debt of life.
What! must I make the talk? That's naughty manners.
I never was a happier man than now.
There's few among you shall have choice of deaths.
And you, Frank Drake,—if God should bid elect—
What way to death wouldst choose?

Drake.
I do not know—
Not in my bed, please God.

Doughty.
Speak for him, Leonard.
I think my friend has shed his wits to-day.
Once he was readier—

Vicary.
Were I Francis Drake,
When waves are wild and fly the bolts of war,
And timbers crash, and decks are bloody red,
Then would I pass, slain by my loving sea,
As died the hurt Greek by a friendly sword.

Doughty.
Full bravely answered. Winter, what of you?

Winter.
As God may will. I have no other thought.

Doughty
(to Vicary).
And what, dear jester, Leonard, what of you?

Vicary.
Oh, between kisses, of a morn of May,
Or in the merriest moment of a fight,
When blades are out, and the brave Dons stand fast—
Upon my soul, I can no more of this,
You ask too much of man. I can no more!

[Leaves the table.
Doughty.
Now, here's a dull companion. Go not yet—
Or go not far, and let not sorrow cheat me.

Vicary.
Oh, I shall smile. Rest you assured of that.

[Moves away.
Doughty.
I thought he had been made of sterner stuff.
There's a too gentle jester. (To Drake.)
Think you, Frank,
That we shall meet in heaven?

Drake.
Such is my trust.

[They talk in whispers.
Doughty
(aloud).
The wind lies fair to south. Friends, gentles, all,
It were not well to lose a prospering hour.
God send you kindly gales and gallant ventures!
Strike hard for me, John Winter! When the Dons
Are thick about you and the fight goes ill,
Cry, This is for remembrance! This, and this!
And you, dear Leonard, when the feast is gay
Drink double for your friend. Be sure my lips
Shall share with yours the laughter and the cup.
[Rises, as do all.
Now, then: The Queen and England! (Drinks.)
(To Drake.)

Take my love.
Still let me live a friendly memory—
Come with me.

Drake.
No, I cannot, cannot come!

[Moves away.
Doughty
(To Vicary, as they walk to the block.)
What, not a smile? Not one? That's better, Leonard,
Albeit of a rather sickly sort.
Come hither, Francis Drake. (Drake approaches.)
Good-by, dear friend.

[Kisses him on both cheeks. Kneels, and the axe falls.
Vicary.
God rest this soul!

Winter.
Amen!

Drake.
Christ comfort me!

PHILIP VERNON

THE INN

When Bess was queen, and the Bishop of Rome and the King of Spain were troubling our England, the cowls were many in the land, and knew how to pull the lamb-skins well around them.

One of these wolves, of a summer morning, walked, halting a little, to and fro under the great oaks between the Vernon Arms and the road. His sheep's clothing was a burgher's gray hose and doublet; but he was not right, red English, having of late come out of Spain, yellow-cheeked and lean. He looked down the highway to the bridge, and then with his eyes followed the river curves to the sea, whence, he smiled to think, the great Armada would come, in time to help certain wicked schemes, and set the cowls again in high places. Then, less pleased, he cast looks at a gallant in blue with yellow points, who sat at a table a little way from the inn. This gentle had a good leg and was high-colored and young. At times

he drummed on the table, or uneasily cast down his cap, and once half drew his sword, then presently, as if impatient, drove it back into its sheath. But whether he yawned or sat quiet in thought, Hugh Langmayde, the priest in gray, lost naught of what he did; and at last, still watching the gallant, he fell to open talk with himself after this fashion:

Herewith the young gallant, Philip Vernon by name, calls out to a servant of the inn:

Hearing his call, the priest, smiling, sits down beside the young man he had been gravely watching; and taking of the ale,—but with a wry face, for in Spain he had learned dislike of such honest English drink,— he lays a hand on the lad's knee, and says to him:

Philip Vernon.
We have strayed
Now here, now there, in England, while you played
A game, good Father, somewhat like the chess
Our prior loved. You smile on me,—my guess
Has hit the butt? Here moves a pawn, and there,
Haply, a bishop. Then the queen—

Hugh Langmayde.
Beware!
You chatter lightly, call me “Father”—try
To lose the habit; that way dangers lie.
One careless word, and rack and axe or rope
Await us; and so dies the saintliest hope
This misruled kingdom knows. To die were gain
For me; and yet God's work, the Church, our Spain,
The king, our master, own me till this strife
With evil ends. Be patient!

Philip Vernon.
Oh, this life
Of masquerade, and lies, and daily fear
Of what I know not, wearies me!

Hugh Langmayde.
Not here
The time or place for truant tongues. Speak low,
Or, better, change the talk.

Philip Vernon.

The priest, emptying his tankard and pushing it from him, looks askance at his companion, and therewith says, as if to quiet his mind with other thought:

And now is heard a quick rattle of horse-hoofs, and a score of gentles come down the road at speed. Some

are armed, and more are clad in gay doublets, with plumes unmeet for riding—sign of haste, perchance. Red, blue, and purple, with glint of steel, flash through the yellow dust, aglow with the sun of noon, as the riders go by the inn. But three draw rein beneath the oaks; whereon this Philip Vernon leaps up, oversetting a flagon of good ale, and crying:

As he speaks the servants and landlord come hastily forth from the inn.

Hugh Langmayde.
Hush! Out comes all the hive.
You shall know shortly.

Red Doublet.
Ho! are none alive?
The Armada's off the Lizard. Look aright
That all your headland beacons blaze to-night!
These be Lord Howard's orders. Ho, there, quick!
Ale, ale—three flagons!

Gray Plume.
Wine, wine! I am sick
With dusty thirst.

Red Doublet.
And I could drink a tun.

As they sit in the saddle, the fair maid of the inn brings to each his flagon of ale.
One Armed in a Cuirass.
Keep me some kisses.

Red Doublet.
I shall ask but one.

Maid.
Oh, my good lords, there shall not lack a prayer
From one poor wench that God your lives will spare.
Alas! alas! I'm mightily afraid
Scarce will be left a man to kiss a maid!
This dreadful war!—

Gray Plume.

Red Doublet.

Then he who wore a cuirass, as they ride away, sings lustily:

Landlord.
God keep our England merry!

Philip Vernon.
Who be they
Who ride so hotly at full noon of day?

Landlord.
Howard of Effingham, Lord High Admiral,
A lover of the Pope, and yet withal
A sturdy gentle, English to the core,
And hates a Spaniard. What can one say more?

Hugh Langmayde.
Where rides he now?

Landlord.
To Plymouth Port. The coast
Is all astir. The great Armada's host
Is come at last. God help our little fleet!

Hugh Langmayde.
God help the right and England!

Landlord.
Aye.

Philip Vernon.

Hereon Hugh Langmayde and Philip together leave the inn and highroad, and as they slowly climb a little hill, and begin to enter into a wood of oak, the priest makes this answer to the lad's vexation of spirit:

THE CHASE

As they move through the wood the priest pauses at last where from a hillside the more open forest commands a broad view of green fields, the river with hills beyond, and to left the distant sea.

Philip Vernon.
How still it is, how full of peace, how far
From the rude hurry and alarm of war!
See what an airy build the mountains show
When over them the broad-winged shadows go.
A land to love!

Hugh Langmayde.
Ay, and a land to serve
With noble deeds that may indeed deserve
This splendid recompense. A land to win
Back from its damnèd covenant with sin.
Sit here, my son. Once this great fallen tree
Looked o'er the land, and could no equal see.
Lord of the forest, underneath its shade
The wanderer rested. Here both man and maid
Found shelter. High among its eaves
The birds sang hymns which God alone had taught,
Or nested peaceful in its spreading leaves,
Where sun and rain His mystic wonders wrought.

Philip Vernon.
I see not clearly, Father—

Hugh Langmayde.
No, my son,
A nation wandered from the fold, undone,
Sunk in delusion, waits full many a year—
Waits for God's hour to read that riddle clear.
Once, in this land, the Church spread broad and high
The mighty leafage of her destiny—
Why mince my meaning? Lo! a brutal king
Struck, and the splendid trunk lies moldering.

Philip Vernon.
And still I see not wherefore—

Hugh Langmayde.
Ah! The rest
Attends your hearing. Soon this land oppressed
Shall know deliverance. O'er yon waiting sea
Great Philip's viceroy comes. To you, to me,
God grants on land as sure a victory.
And now, my Philip, hear me to an end.
In happier times I shall be glad to mend
My broken story of your life. To-day
Accept a briefer tale. I have grown gray
Now many years, since through these woods I fled,
A hunted priest, this land where God seemed dead.
Pursuit was hot; my boat lay off the shore;
A bullet caught me as I plunged; a score
Flew over. Still this crippled leg, my lad,
Keeps me a memory not wholly sad;
For, as I bleeding strove, a boy's white face
Rose in a black wave's hollow. By God's grace
I clutched your hand, my son. The boat's crew caught
The pair of us, half-drowned; and so God wrought
This great deliverance. I think the tide
Trapped you at play on yonder sands. I tried
To set you safe upon the coast. 'T was vain;
I could not do the thing I would. In Spain
The fevered life I scarce had hope to save
Came back as if new-born, as if the grave
That was so near had taken half away
Your boyhood's recollections. Need I say
Love to my heart came easily? I yearned
To win the love my double help had earned.

Philip Vernon.
You have it in full measure. Now at last
I shall know all. Is this to end that past
Of doubts, and dreams, and fears? Before my eyes,
Lo! as you speak, faint memories arise.

Hugh Langmayde.
Trust them not wholly.

Philip Vernon.
I've a vision wild
Of ravening seas; and them beyond, a child,
I live again glad days. I seem indeed
Like one who, waking from a dream, has need
To piece it out with thinking. Who is he—
A stately gentleman, I strive to see,
And cannot clearly, though he smiles? Stay, stay!
Was that my father? As you love me, say!
Was it my father? Ah! so much is dim;
But that has substance. Let me go to him—
Yes, you and me together. I can hear
How he will thank you.

Hugh Langmayde.
Wherefore should I fear
To know at last if I have truly read
The soul I trained?

Philip Vernon.
Why hesitate? You dread
To speak some truth!

Hugh Langmayde.
You do not ask to know
Your name and station?

Philip Vernon.
Let that matter go.
Where is my father?

Hugh Langmayde.
Can I give the dead?

Philip Vernon.
Dead! And how long ago?

Hugh Langmayde.
Two years, 't is said.

Philip Vernon.
Dead! Two years dead! Know you the hour, the day?

Hugh Langmayde.
I know them not.

Philip Vernon.

As he ceases, the priest, who has watched him moodily, touches his arm as if in appeal, whereupon the young man exclaims:

Hugh Langmayde.

As if not hearing the priest, and with yet more of anger, the younger man continues:

Hugh Langmayde.
You wrong me, Philip.

Philip Vernon.
No, I should have fled—
Oh, long ago—had I known all, but now
'T is past the cure of word or deed. Ah, how—
How could you hurt me thus?

Hugh Langmayde.
I did God's will—
His, and the king's.

Philip Vernon.
The king's! Could he fulfil
What home and father would have given?

Hugh Langmayde.
My son,
Pray you consider. Could I aught have done
Against the king's command? I did not dare.
What lack you else the gentle-born should bear?
Head, hand, and eye have had such anxious care
As only Spain can give. What English peer
Has court or camp trained better? Do you fear
To cross a sword with any? Who, I ask,
Can match you mounted? Mine the graver task
To see you lack not learning. Pause, reflect;
Not without prayer I acted. You suspect
Some treason?—Philip, where you stand to-day
The soil is yours. That castle old and gray,
The river's sweep, hill, forest, town, and lake,
In God's good time are yours, my son, to take.
See where yon eagle o'er the mountain soars!
Scarce can he look beyond what land is yours.
Set foot in stirrup, draw your father's sword:
A thousand men will follow you, my lord!
Low at your word will bow that tavern churl,
And I shall bid you welcome, my Lord Earl!

Philip Vernon.
Earl! Lord! These manors mine?
You could not jest?

Hugh Langmayde.
Not I, my lord; you match with England's best.
The proofs that give you these the Church will guard
Till one proud day of triumph and reward.

Philip Vernon.
'T is a strange tale, and sad as it is strange.
I would a braver love had bid you change
Those home-reft years I have forever lost.
You should have counted well the cruel cost,
And saved my life this pain. Oh, bitter day!
Vexed with a convent life, made next to play
A page's part, or squire's, left to say
I knew not who I was, or high or base,
Until, worn out, I smote a snarling face
That mocked my birth as knowing some disgrace;
For text of thought he got a rapier thrust.
Alas! I gave you all my boyhood's trust,
And thus you used it!

Hugh Langmayde.
Philip, that same breath
With which you question me, I gave; the death
From which I saved you set a silent grave
Between the lost life and the life I gave.
You have a father. Have I seemed to be
Less than a father?

Philip Vernon.
None were that to me.
I have been hurt enough: 't were well to spare
These convent subtleties. In England fair
I tread where men are free, breathe lighter air.
Much have I learned no Spanish cloister taught,
More have I heard that Spain had never thought.

Hugh Langmayde.
Ill have you heard. Not all my tale is told.
Let but the Church her lifting hand withhold,
And you are lost! Be her true son, be bold,
And these broad lands are yours to win when she
Who rules this kingdom dies. For you, for me,
The path lies straight. But yestermorn in prayer
I asked of God a sign, and found it where
At close of eve I sat and saw the sun
Set in a sea of blood ere day was done—
A cloud-born cross above. Oh, dark shall be
The Church's reckoning when yon loathing sea
Its unrepentant dead spits on the shore,
And the long torment of the galley's oar
Shall chain the souls that live! What seek you more?

Philip Vernon.
What more indeed! I went your way, not mine,
Knew but one prince, sought never to divine
Your reasons, nor the policy of State
That without explanation ruled my fate.
Answer my manhood outright! Be more true
To one who loves you! Give me all love's due.
What keeps us here? I will not be denied.
An English noble! Wherefore should I bide
Upon your will my father's lands to claim
While pope and king play out a doubtful game?

Hugh Langmayde.
You ask untimely. Shall the arrow know
The stern commission of the bended bow?
In God's good time—

Philip Vernon.
The hour that is, is good;
No other answers. Ah, I think you should
Have known me better. Speak! By good St. James,
I'm very weary of these priestly games!
I take it that, as well as one can see
Through this dim, wordy haze of mystery,
I rest mere Philip Vernon until death
Strikes with your hand, or mine, Elizabeth.
Is that your meaning, Father? if 't is so,
We part to-day. Oh, I must clearly know
What the cowl's caution hid from me. Be frank,
As you were wont. Give me new cause to thank
The man within the priest.

Hugh Langmayde.
Go, if you will.
If God and king, my danger, and these years
Of love lack force to teach you duty still,
Go! Leave me here to peril and to tears.

Philip Vernon.
Love is not bondage; and, for that harsh king,
I owe him hate alone.—Oh, do not wring
My heart with more of grief! Tell me the tale
Of who and what I am. There cannot fail
To be some light, some guidance, some poor path
Out of this mystery!

Hugh Langmayde.
The Lord's just wrath
Will punish this revolt.

Philip Vernon.
I do not change
As shifts the weather-vane! Hold you it strange
I should learn English ways?—but yesterday
I fell to talking with a gallant gay—
Upon my soul, a rare, a sweet gentle he,
Hidalgo born, a flower of chivalry,
Simple and courteous, melancholic now,
And now as merry as a May-day queen,
With chat of court and camp and State, a brow
Just helmet-dinted, o'er an eye serene
That made swift capture of my inward thought
Before a word my tardy tongue had wrought.
Sir Philip Sidney he! We talked full long
Of Spain and England, of what cruel wrong
My jailor Philip did, and soon we passed
To speak of Spain's Armada. “Now,” at last,
“Thank God for war!” he cried. “The die is cast!
And you, a gentleman, young sir,”—to me,—
“Sit in a tavern sad, while history
Is in the mighty making.” Then he quaffed
A cup of wine. “Is it a woman?”—laughed
Because, shame-flushed, I, angry, answered not.
“Pardon,” he added. “Cast the iron lot
Of war, and take with us the splendid chance.
God and the Queen, a sword, a horse, a lance!
Your name, fair sir?” I could but hang my head.
What could I answer? “I have none,” I said.
—You bade me hide it, you were well obeyed.
He touched my shoulder kindly: “Many a man
Has found a proud name where the red blood ran.
Aimless and nameless? Get you aim and name
Where two great nations play war's royal game.
Come with me on the morrow.”

Hugh Langmayde.
And you cried,
Vade Sathanas!

Philip Vernon.
Nay, I naught replied,
Or scarce a word. By Heaven, I had been right
To follow loyally that gallant knight
Where England calls her sons!

Hugh Langmayde.
What, must I fail
For this boy-folly?—You shall hear the tale—
Ay, all of it a tender heart withheld
To give more gently in the happier hour
God's victory will bring. Ah, then dispelled
Were half its anguish!

Philip Vernon.
Speak! I have the power
To bear life's very worst.

Hugh Langmayde.
Is this the lad
I saved from death? Defiant, reckless, mad,
You ask you know not what.

Philip Vernon.
But I will know,
And on the minute, or by Heaven! I go
To claim what rights are mine.

Hugh Langmayde.
Take then the fate
That bides for him who does not know to wait
On God's maturing hour. Alas, poor fool!
Art nameless? Yes! This, on my oath to rule
A froward nature, by the rood I swear!
Didst hear?—the rood! Thou art a bastard born!
Art fitly answered? Didst thou think to dare
To cross my purpose,—thou, a child of scorn!

Philip Vernon.
What fool's device is this? A little while
I was my lord, am now a bastard vile.
Another man this pleasant tale should rue
All the brief life I'd leave him.

Hugh Langmayde.
Still, 't is true.

Philip Vernon.
By Heaven, thou liest!

Hugh Langmayde.
Have I ever lied?

Philip Vernon.
God knows, not I.

Hugh Langmayde.
I should have naught replied.
A priest, and lie! It seems a challenge cheap.
Tears!—that is wiser. Oh, I did but keep
My better tidings back. Alas, no friend
Could hide this ill news long, or know to mend
A wrong of birth; but when, in God's good time,
Your arm has freed a land, and yonder chime
Rings in our king, rings out this fated Queen,
Then she who owns this broad domain has seen
Her last of greatness.

Philip Vernon.
Who?

Hugh Langmayde.
Your cousin,—she,
Your father's heir, your steward now till we
Win Philip's battle, and his potent hand
Strikes from your shield the bastard's shameful band,
Gives all I promised, honor, wealth, and place,—
All that men covet in this earthly race.
Go! I have done. Think on it for the week
We linger here. Be prudent, slow to speak,
Watchful and wise. God's hand is on the helm,
And I, the Church, the King, this woeful realm,
Will need your help.

Philip Vernon.
I would that I could doubt
One who has never lied. I stand without
The pale of honor and the hopes of men,
A nameless creature, bred to turn again
And rend the race that gave me, with this stain,
Intrepid honor, proud desires,—in fine,
The manly virtues of a noble line.
Poor useless jewels! all in vain their worth.
I had been happier made of meaner earth.

Hugh Langmayde.
Nay, nay; but that's not so. Land, title, place,
Are yours to gain when, by God's helping grace,
That Spanish dagger at your side strikes quick.
Oh, I can see—can see this heretic
Roll bloody in the dust, and hear the land
Ring joy from spire to spire!

Philip Vernon.
I understand
At last too well. No more for me the prayer
To be delivered from temptation's snare.

Hugh Langmayde.
Sad words, my son!

Philip Vernon.
Yet heed them well: they say
The malice of dishonor. If I prey
Like maggots on the carcass whose decay
Begot my baseness, who shall blame the banned?
What would'st thou of me? Is it head or hand?

Hugh Langmayde.
How beautiful the evening is! Behold
The dim, green meadows take the dewy gold,
While in the hollows little pools of mist
Are gathering slowly where the cattle list
The milky summons of the twilight horn.
Look! 'T is your heritage! Some men are born
Ignobly great; some in one matchless hour
Scale at a bound the heights of human power.

Philip Vernon.
A bastard lord! Not I! Awhile ago
You took from life its beauty and its glow.
How could you mock my fancies with a tale
Such as my boyhood dreamed, and let it fail
In such a slough of shame? Love, honor, hope—
You took them all, and offer now a rope!
'T is kind! I was a man, and you have made
A fiend of whom you well might be afraid
If you had lied.—You could not.—Take me! Use
My strength, my will, my hate, as you may choose.

Hugh Langmayde.
There's time to think.

Philip Vernon.
Not I! What next?

Hugh Langmayde.
Wilt swear?

Philip Vernon.

As Philip speaks he makes a move as if to go, but, of a sudden returning, looks the priest steadily in the face, and with a troubled countenance says to him:

Hugh Langmayde.
Long, long ago
Your mother died.

Philip Vernon.
'T is all I care to know.
Loved, sinned, and died! May God's sweet pity rest
Upon the shameless woman from whose breast
I drew the milk of sorrows!

Hugh Langmayde.

As the priest moves away Philip Vernon replies tardily:

THE GARDEN

Walking slowly away, Philip Vernon takes his sadness deeper into the woods, and wandering far, comes at last to a great garden wall. There he stays awhile, until sweet odors, rising, seem to call him; and with no more thought of what may lie beyond, he leaps the wall, and stands amid the flowers, waist-deep in hollyhock and golden plume.

Hither into the garden at this moment comes Lord Francis Grey, in red velvet, with a face aflame to match.

Seeing this gallant across a hedge of sweet-peas, he slips the collar of his humor and sets it on to bite in this wise:

Philip Vernon.
Yes. Your words, I think, exceed
The owner's power to back his tongue at need.

Lord Grey.
My cousin is the chancellor's ward; none dare
Avenge an insult here.

Philip Vernon.
Then wiser 't were
To keep the tongue in ward. You question one
That hath lost touch of fear beneath the sun.
The chancellor? What care I? Your cousin? Mine?
Now, why not mine? Suppose, to cap the jest,
We fight for cousinship: who wins is best.
And is she fair, this woman? Doth her talk,
Like thine, lack breeding? This smooth garden walk
Is broad enough to serve us. Draw, on guard!
And let my rapier teach your tongue such ward
As hasty manners lack.

Lord Grey.
Have then your will!
Or mad or foolish, you 're a man to kill!
Yet to cross blades with one unknown or base—

Philip Vernon.

Lord Grey, having already drawn his sword, advances and lunges smartly at Philip, at the same time crying out:

“By Heaven, you are dead!”

Philip Vernon.
A thing, observe, less easily done than said.
A step more near, a trifle yet more quick,
And you had boasted shrewdly. Oh, the trick
Is stale. In Spain we lunge this wise, and then
A thrust in tierce—Well parried!—good, again!
I take it firmly close to hilt; the wrist
Well up; then deftly, with this cunning twist,
Give point. Your sword-arm? By the Cid, 't is sad!
That stops the sport.

Lord Grey.

At this he sees men break through the shrubbery and come running toward them, whereon he says to Philip:

Philip Vernon.
And wherefore?

Lord Grey.

As Philip stands with no mind to escape, the steward and many servants gather around them.

Steward.
What means this brawl? My lady asks, not I.

Lord Grey.
'T is but a trifle. Come with me. The blame
I shall stand father to. This way. The dame?—

Steward.
Is in the eastern gallery.

Lord Grey.

With these words Lord Grey leaves Philip Vernon at the entrance of the castle, where, with sudden interest in his face, he looks about him, and at last says:

A Servant.

Philip Vernon enters the picture-gallery, and sees at the far end Elizabeth Vernon speaking with Lord Grey.

Lord Grey.
The errant knight waits yonder.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Let him wait;
'T is a man's business. Now, I pray you, state
What means this quarrel?

Lord Grey.
Ask of yonder man.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Man! Why not gentle, cousin? Never ran
Mean blood in one like him, who there, at ease,
In courteous silence stands. Now, an you please,
What more, my lord?

Lord Grey.
I found the man you see
A-picking roses 'neath your balcony.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Why, this should hang him on the nearest tree!
And my blunt cousin picked, for company,
A quarrel. That is easier than a rose.
He found a thorn, as rather plainly shows
That crimsoned sleeve.

Lord Grey.
Now look you, Cousin Bess,
Your jest is but ill-timed. Let me confess
I made this quarrel when, my heart aflame,
You left me stinging with your words. The blame
Is yours, fair cousin. Shafts in anger sent
May find mad errands ere their force be spent.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Now, by our Lady!

Lord Grey.
Nay, but hear me still;
And let your servants know at least your will
That yonder venturer go on his way,
And no such words escape as haply may
Breed risks for me.

Elizabeth Vernon.

At this Lord Grey, turning to one side, mutters to himself as he glances down the hall at Philip:

Elizabeth Vernon.
You are silent, sir?

Lord Grey.
I school my hurt heart to soft words, for her
Whose lightest word my very blood can stir;
And if in aught I have exceeded, rest
Assured I meant it not. Were it not best
I set this errant knight without your gate?

Elizabeth Vernon.

Lord Grey, sullenly walking down the hall, pauses beside Philip Vernon:

Philip Vernon.

As he moves up the hall toward Elizabeth Vernon, she watches him, speaking to herself the while:

Philip Vernon.
I thank you, madam.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Am I, sir, a book,
That you would read me with that eager look?

Philip Vernon.
Oft have I read you. I am wont to share
My idle hours with you.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Indeed, sir?

Philip Vernon.
Where
The chase o'erhangs your garden, oft I sit
And read you page by page, nor want I wit
To comment on your sweetness.

Elizabeth Vernon.
You are bold
Past nurtured manners.

Philip Vernon.
Pardon me, I told
But half my heart says.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Sir, an hour ago
We were but strangers.

Philip Vernon.
Ere the sand shall flow
Another hour, we shall be strange once more,
And ever strange.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Is this some Quixote, mad,
That loved and lost, and cannot live it o'er?
—By all the saints, I think it very sad
To see good wits astray.

Philip Vernon.
Are mine astray?
It seems they wandered wisely. Let them say
What saner wits would shun. The shyest maid
That ever loved, and, loving, grew afraid,
Would braver be to set her love in words.
Mine hath uncertain wings, like new-born birds,
And may not think on heaven. Forgive, forget!
Think me a lover wild of brain, once met
In some freaked tale of eld—a prince of fay
That came, and loved, and lost, and rode away.

Elizabeth Vernon.
That's a wilde riddle.

Philip Vernon.
Time owns not the hour
Shall give some buds the answer of a flower.
You have been very gentle with a man
Who dare not name himself, who never can
Do more than thank your kindness. I am one
Accursed and nameless till my days be done.
How you have helped me you may never know,
Nor what you saved us both. I came your foe;
More than your friend I leave. Just Heaven knows
How sad my life has been. Let this one rose
I took for—well, no matter—let me guard
This rose for memory. It will make less hard
The strife of days to come.

Elizabeth Vernon.
You speak like one
By some strange cruelty of fate undone.
Be plain.

Philip Vernon.
I may not further.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Then take hence
A woman's prayer for peace. There's no offence.
In honest words, and none did ever speak
Words that more sadly touched me. I am weak
Where women should be. There's no need to say
'T is but mere weakness. Must you, then, away?

Philip Vernon.

As he walks away, Elizabeth Vernon whispers to herself:

Philip, walking down the gallery and seeing the portraits on the walls, stops abruptly; whereupon Elizabeth Vernon adds:

Philip Vernon.

For a moment he stands before the portrait, and then goes slowly down the gallery, and leaves the castle.

THE CHASE

Two days later, in the afternoon of the summer day, Philip Vernon walks here and there in the great forest, and at last, leaning against a tree, speaks thus to himself:

Seeing him of a sudden, Elizabeth Vernon comes timidly through the thickets.

Elizabeth Vernon.
I thought, Sir Knight,
You had been far from this. I would quick flight
Had set you miles away. I more than fear
My cousin's treachery. What keeps you here
Is much in question, and in days of war
The questioned man is lost. You should be far
From this to-morrow.

Philip Vernon.
Not while dangers grow
So thick about one frail old man.

Elizabeth Vernon.
I know
Of you, of him, no more than what I hear
From one who hates you, yet enough to fear
For you such peril as may cost too dear
Some woman-heart at home.

Philip Vernon.
Ah, there are none
Will weep for me. Of all that live not one.
As alien ships that only meet to part,
Thy life and mine have crossed on stormy seas.
Learn to forget. 'T is a most wholesome art.

Elizabeth Vernon.
An art that women practise with less ease
Than men.

Philip Vernon.
There 's time to learn it, for no more
Shall we two meet.

Elizabeth Vernon.
No more!

Philip Vernon.
Dear heart, no more.
I said forget. How could I say forget?
No, rather let some shadow of regret
Still haunt thy better fortunes in glad hours
When Spring is come again, and with her flowers
Arise frail memories and thoughts long dumb,
That are the wildings of the mind, and come
With Nature's yearning season.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Hush! I heard
Steps in the wood.

Philip Vernon.
No, not a leaf has stirred.

Elizabeth Vernon.
I am grown fearful. If you would but go
While the near hour is gracious—

Philip Vernon.
No; ah, no!
Not for the bribe of love.

Elizabeth Vernon.
If, sir, you loved,
My prayer were quickly answered. You'd be moved,
And fly.

Philip Vernon.
You will not ask it. Those proud eyes
Would turn with scorn from him whose honor dies.
Men call me traitor: but, my lady fair,
That died in me when all of my despair
I cast before your feet. What mercy lies
In the sweet equity of honest eyes
I gladly trust.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Thank Heaven, I know not, sir,
What sad temptation may have bid you err.
I would not—will not—know. Do you forget
I suffer while you linger here?

Philip Vernon.
And yet
I cannot go. I would we had not met,
Or God had given to me a kinder fate,
A less uncertain birth, a nobler state.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Uncertain, said you?

Philip Vernon.

Elizabeth Vernon looks at Philip, and of a sudden seating herself upon a fallen tree, covers her face with her hands, and is silent for a moment.

Philip Vernon.
You will not speak?

Elizabeth Vernon.
Wait, wait!
—My God, I love him!—Sir, as sad a fate
As yours will make my life and land the prize
Of some debt-burdened noble.—It were wise
We part at once.

Philip Vernon.
At once!

Elizabeth Vernon.
Be merciful!
Go while my blinded sight with tears is dull.
You have been cruel. Ah, I cannot see
For tears of pity both for you and me.

Philip Vernon.
And have I wounded you, my gentle dove?
That were most sad of all, to hurt with love.
I have done wrong—

Elizabeth Vernon.

As she ceases, Lord Grey comes abruptly into the open space, and cries out:

Philip Vernon.

They draw their swords as Hugh Langmayde, in haste coming through the wood, steps between them.

Philip Vernon.
Out of my path!

Hugh Langmayde.

Lord Grey falls back, sheathes his sword, and says:

Elizabeth Vernon.
Oh, for one hour to be a man!

Lord Grey.
True, true!
That had been better. There were less to rue.

Philip Vernon.

Lord Grey stands smiling, while Hugh Langmayde seizes Philip by the arm, and, drawing him away, says to him:

Philip cries to Elizabeth Vernon as he follows the priest:

Then, turning to Lord Grey, says haughtily, and with a bow:

Lord Grey.

With these words he walks swiftly away, while the priest and Philip hurry through the wood in the opposite direction, leaving Elizabeth Vernon, who for a time stands still in the deepening shadows, and looks along the path where her lover has gone.

THE FORD

After dusk Philip Vernon, having waited long at the appointed ford, begins to walk to and fro uneasily, and says:

Hugh Langmayde.

As they leave the shore, the sound of men-at-arms comes from above and below, and always nearing them.

The priest, fainting and in haste, gives to Philip a packet.

Philip Vernon.

The old man, helped, hurries through the chase. As they cross an open space near the garden, the moon comes out, and from a thicket the flash of steel is seen, and the red blaze of half a dozen musquetoons. The

priest stumbles, and groans; men run forth, and, falling on Philip and his companion, stab the priest, who falls within the arched and open gateway of the garden of the castle, crying:

Philip Vernon.

And, standing within the gateway, he cries fiercely as he fights:

As with cries and shouts the men fall back, there is a brief pause, while Lord Grey comes forward, sword in hand.

Philip Vernon.

As Lord Grey staggers and falls, he cries to those about him:

Philip again attacks the men who are nearest, and as they give way, retreating, he shuts the gate. Then, kneeling, he lifts the priest's head, and exclaims:

As Philip bends over the priest, he hears him groan and mutter:

Philip Vernon.
Alas!

Hugh Langmayde.

But even as the words are on his lips the priest's head drops, and he dies.

Philip Vernon.

As he rises he hears voices and shots, and, instantly turning, flies through the shrubbery until, bewildered, he comes upon a doorway in the side wall of the castle, and, in the darkness stumbling in haste upon a narrow stairway, opens a door cautiously, and enters the chapel of the castle.

Breathing fast and hard, he sinks exhausted on the chancel step.

Of a sudden he leaps up at sight of one coming through the darkness.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Mother of mercy! It is I! 't is I!
I thought you slain.

Philip Vernon.
I have one friend the less.
They've killed my only father; none may guess
My utter loneliness.

Elizabeth Vernon.
I hear men's feet.
Get you behind the altar.

Philip Vernon.
Kiss me, sweet;
That will make death seem easy.

Elizabeth Vernon.

He obeys, and Elizabeth Vernon falls on her knees before the crucifix.

Elizabeth Vernon.

Here comes in hot haste the steward, with men-at-arms and the Queen's officers.

Steward.

The Lady Elizabeth rising, he says, as he comes forward:

Elizabeth Vernon.

Upon this the steward and men leave the chapel, and as the noise fades away Philip Vernon comes forward.

Philip Vernon.
Right bravely done!

Elizabeth Vernon.

At this Philip Vernon gives her that packet the priest had given him, and, much troubled, says:

Elizabeth Vernon.

As she opens the packet and reads therein a great surprise possesses her.

Philip Vernon.
Answer I have none.
The good priest gave me these ere life was done.
I thought them dangerous.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Letters out of Spain!
The King's grave attestation. Still in vain
I tax my cunning. Who are you that brought
This tale of wonder?

Philip Vernon.
Madam, I was taught
To call myself plain Philip Vernon. I
Was that in Spain.

Elizabeth Vernon.
You Philip Vernon! Try
To tell me more. Is it indeed of you
What I find written here? Is—is it true?

Philip Vernon.
How can I know? The Jesuit, flying, found
A tired boy-swimmer floating as if drowned,
And kept him all these years in Spain.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Think. Strive
Some memory of childhood to revive.

Philip Vernon.
Ah, but what matters it to me? They bring
No happy fortune. What am I? A thing
The sea refused to bury, which that priest
Caught for mere pity ere it died—the least,
Ay, least of men am I. A waif forlorn.
Only in name a Vernon. I have borne
That old man's silence long, till he of late
Cursed me with knowledge of my bastard fate,
To use my anguish in a desperate game—
For what cared I, the unreckoned child of shame?

Elizabeth Vernon.

Philip staggers back against a marble effigy of a boy on a tomb just behind him, and cries out:

Elizabeth Vernon.
It is. If less the gloom,
You might have seen, my lord, your very tomb
Behind you there. And fully on the scroll
How, Philip Vernon drowned, “his precious soul
Is with the saints.” Oh, I could laugh, were death
Less neighbored to my mirth. Also it saith,
“A youth of parts; well loved,” that's very truth;
“Witty and virtuous, also learned”—forsooth,
I think I must have loved you in your youth,
And ever since, my Philip.—What to do
I know not. Yes! let your sword counsel you.
Seek my Lord Howard, the High Admiral;
Tell him this story boldly. Ay, tell all—
All this strange story. Let what may befall,
You cannot lose my love. Go, go, my lord;
Only to England could my soul afford
This new-born hope. Go now; the Spanish fleet
Is on the seas. Go, Philip. When you meet
Your boyhood's jailers, strike for brave Queen Bess,
And for this Bess, that is thy queen no less.
Go! I shall love you as no mortal man
Was ever loved of maid since love began.

Philip Vernon.

As he speaks he kneels, and sets her hand to his lips, and then looking up, says:

Elizabeth Vernon.

They go out of the chapel, and descend to the bank of the river.

Philip Vernon.
Good-night! Sweet night, that marries hope to love.

Elizabeth Vernon.

She stands and watches him as his boat goes down the river.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Oh, I could cry, could laugh; and if I knew
A saint of laughter, I would pray that you
Do keep me merry for good cause. Alack,
Being but a maid, I would I had you back.

THE GARDEN

Vernon Castle of a Morning in August 1588

Elizabeth Vernon
walks amidst the flowers, an open letter in her hand.

Thus speaking, Elizabeth Vernon walks to and fro among the flowers, and sometimes pauses to shadow her eyes with her hand, that she may look across the river all a-glitter with the sun. But at last she kneels on the sod, and, laughing, cries:

Philip Vernon, coming of a sudden through the hedge:

Elizabeth Vernon.
My love! my lord!

Philip Vernon.
One kiss from thee outweighs
A hundred given. Not all love's usury,
Not all the interest of unnumbered days,
Can keep us even.

Elizabeth Vernon.
There's for ransom, see!
Oh, I'll be honest. Tell me of the fight.
Indeed, I prayed for you both morn and night.
Now, tell me of it. Did we hear aright?
Hast seen the Queen?

Philip Vernon.
Aye, and she mocked me, too,
Because these lands are cumbered, love, with you.
I had her pardon also. My Lord Grey
Takes more to kill him than most traitors may.

Elizabeth Vernon.
The packet reached the chancellor?

Philip Vernon.
You did well
To send it. I have no long tale to tell.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Sit near me, Philip. Now, the battle, pray!

Philip Vernon.
Oh, I'll be brief; I've other things to say.
We caught them in the Channel. Day by day
We hung about them, like bold dogs that tease
Great lumbering bullocks; left them at our ease,
Then bit again, until each bloody deck,
Mast, sail, and timber, shorn to shattered wreck,
Their cannon silent, helpless, overpowered,
Northward they drifted, and a storm that lowered
Broke on their ruin, pitiless and swift.
The gray fog closed about them like a pall;
The great seas, leaping, smote them, and the lift
Grew dark above them. One bleak funeral,
They passed from sight of man. For us, we fled
To 'scape the storm's worst peril.
All is said
That may not till the morrow be delayed.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Ah, never day like this has England seen!
Come, drink a cup to England and the Queen:
I'll cast my love within the bowl.

Philip Vernon.
That pearl
Shall jewel every cup of life.

Elizabeth Vernon.
Sweet Earl,
Thy people grow impatient. Hark! the chimes
Ring in their new lord, and these gladder times.

RESPONSIBILITY

Thus, lying among roses in the garden of the Great Inn after certain cups of wine, I, Attar El Din, sang of things to come, when, I being dead a day, the Angels of Affirmation and Denial should struggle for my soul.

WIND AND SEA

Scene I

A June Afternoon.—Meadows.—A Farm, with distant Woods; New Jersey Coast; Cape May.
An idle group within the willow's shade
We lay and chatted, holding lazy tilts,
And many a lance of mocking laughter broke,
Or calmly settled creeds and governments
High on the pleasant uplands of content,
Till soon the westering sun peeped underneath
The fringes of our green tent-skirts, and fell,
Where on the paling-fence the milk-cans gleamed,
Red in the level gold, whilst suddenly,
Swift from the sea, the gay salt breezes came,
And, dipping like the swallows here and there,
With quick cool kisses touched the startled grain,
And fled ashamed, to seek new loves afar,
Where in the dark damp marsh the lilies float,
And lustrous-leaved the white magnolia lifts
Its silvery censers, and the frogs, like friars,
Intone their even-song along the marge.

Hester
(rising).

Alfred.
That's music for a poet's soul, his words
Soft slipping from a woman's lips, the while
Caressed by lingering sunshine wrapt she stands,
A shining aureole round her fallen hair.

Henry.
A bid for equal flattery. Let us go
Across the sand dunes o'er the mazy creeks.
Hear how old ocean calls us. Come away.

Frank.
Dost thou remember that October day
We three together stood and saw at eve
The wanton wind yon sleeping waves arouse,
Till at the touch of that coy courtesan
Strange yearning seized them, and with shout and cry
They followed fleetly, while she, laughing, fled
Across the golden-rods above the beach?

Henry.
Ay, then it was you, perched beneath an oak,
To us, the long expectant heirs, set forth
King Autumn's testament and royal will.

Hester.
I pray you tell again his dying thoughts,
And we shall lie upon the meadow grass
And be as heirs should be, stern visaged, grave,
Whilst you within yon bower of wild grapes stand:
So shall your words steal o'er the listening ear,
Breeze-broken, while the melancholy sea
Moans his sad chorus on the distant shore.

Frank.
Brown-visaged Autumn sat within the wood,
And counted miserly his ripened wealth:
I, Autumn, heritor of Summer's wealth,—
I, Autumn, who am old and near to death,—
Do thus make clear my will; I dowered earth
With fruit and flowers. I fed her hungry tribes,
The bee, the bird, the worm, the lazy flocks,
And like a king who unto certain death
Goes proudly clad, in royal state I go,
Through the long sunset of October woods,
Where like a trembling maid the smooth-limbed beech
Lets fall her ruddy robes, or where afield
Red vine leaves fleck the cedar's sombre cone,
Or where the maple and the hickory tall
Shed the long summer's store of garnered gold.
Mine, too, the orchard's raining fruit, and mine
Round-shouldered melons fattening in the sun;
Mine the brown pennons of the rustling maize,
The squirrel's nutty wealth, the wrinkled gourd.
For I am Autumn, lord of fruits and flowers,—
God's almoner to all the tribes of man.
Here, then, to earth and all her habitants,
I, dying, leave wheat Summer's bounty gave:
Great store of grain, ripe fruit, and tasselled corn;
Yea, last of all, and best, I here bequeath,
With loving thought, a special legacy
To all good fellows everywhere on earth:
To them I give the sun-kissed grapes of Spain,
The Rhine's autumnal treasure, and the fruit
Of knightly Burgundy and winding Rhone;
Nor less the grape of Capri's lifted cliff,
The purple globes that jewel Ischia's isle,
And that sad vintage weeping holy tears
On black Vesuvian slopes. To them I give
The soothing sweetness of the Cuban leaf
Wherewith to hold good counsel, when life palls,
Wherewith to charm away some weary hour.
And when from thoughtful lips the pale blue wreaths
Curl upward, and, the wanderer's only hearth,
His pipe-bowl, glows with hospitable fires,
I charge them drink a single cup, and say:
He was a good old fellow—peace to him.
So died great Autumn, passing like a mist,
Where in the woodland verge the maples rain
Reluctant gold in hesitating fall.

Alfred.
What ho! good minstrel. Let us seaward roam,
'T is but a half-hour's stroll past yonder hill.

Frank.
I well recall the way. It lies within
A wood of stunted cedars and of firs,
Which heard in infancy the great sea moan,
And so took on the wilted forms of fright.

Hester.
Well, too, I know it: when the tide is up
'T is barred and traversed by an hundred creeks,
So populous with lilies, you might dream
King Oberon's navy rode at anchor there.

Frank.
Let us away to it. Our sculptor here
Knows not the sea as we do. He shall feast
His eager eyes on it, and own to us
That earth has glories other than the curves
Of lithe Apollo and the queen of love.

Scene II

Seashore.—Sand Dunes dotted with distorted Trees.
Henry.
Why never can the painter tell to us
This awful story of a lonely sea,
This terrible soliloquy of nature?
Why must he slip us in the bit of red,
The group of fishers or the tossing ship?
Who asks for life or human action here?

Frank.
Nay, man is nature's complement. The sea,
The sky, the flowers suggest him. Best I love
The smiling landscape of a woman's face.

Alfred.
But he who worships nature, ought to be
The ready lover of her thousand gods.

Hester.
Lo! what a thought is yon triumphant sea,
A thought so perfect in its competence,
That I would leave it to its loneliness.

Alfred.
Think what it was when unto God there came
This great sea-thought.

Frank.
Here, friend, your chisel fails.
'T is powerless here. Thank heaven, I at least
Can some way capture it with feeble brush.

Alfred.
Alas, 't is no man's prize. It mocks us all.
Leave me but only man, and you may paint,
And you may chisel. I would sail alone
The great Atlantic of the human heart.

Henry.
Do you remember how, last summer, here
We played with fancies, and in idle mood
Struck to and fro the shuttlecocks of thought?

Frank.
Ah, well I do. 'T was such an hour as comes
Once in the life of joy. Just here we lay.
As oft before, you led the playful race.

Henry.
Watch now the waves; each has its little life,
High-couraged triumph in yon crest of pride,
Some proud decision in its onward sweep,—
Destruction, failure,—'t is a history!

Frank.
I like it best when of a winter day
The cold dry norther rolls athwart the beach
The gleaming foam-balls into serpents white,
And all the sand is starred with rainbow lights.

Hester.
It knoweth all the secrets of my moods:
To-day is gay with me, to-morrow grave.

Frank.
For me its voice is ever sorrowful
As some God's grief beyond all earthly speech.

Hester.
How wave on wave turns lapsing on the beach,
Like the great leaves of some eternal book.

Alfred.
Unread forever since creation's dawn.
I pray you notice how the seaside trees
Seem flying headlong, all their withering limbs
Stretched landward, craving refuge from the sea.

Frank.
As they might be remorseful murderers,
That heard the hoarse deep, like an angry foe,
Storm up the sand slopes—nearer, nearer still,
Crying, Vengeance, vengeance! all the summer night.

THE SHRIVING OF GUINEVERE

THE SWAN-WOMAN

A LEGEND OF THE TYROL

A MEDAL

PANDOLPHUS MALATESTA, ISOTTA.
Malatesta.
Why does it pleasure me, Isotta, why?
Canst guess,—I cannot,—wherefore such as I
Should crave to see myself in bronze or gold?
Matteo hath art's courage. He is bold!
God-made or devil-fashioned, out I go
For comment of the world, or friend or foe.
What saith this face, Isotta?—what to you,
As to a gazer chance hath brought to view?
You smile,—dost dare? The soul beyond your eyes
Will bid you risk all other things save lies.

Isotta.
A jewel set in brass,—yet why, God knows,
If God knows anything of such as those,
Like me, who fear you not as men know fear,
Being, see you, so little and so dear.
Then lying is the luxury of the great,
The marge of perils sweet. You dare me—wait;
Give me the wax. This side face doth relate
More truth than most, my lord, may care to state.
And yet, not all; nay, with strange cunning, hides
What little good or noble haply bides
For rare occasion. Oh! you bade me try
At truth as of men dead beyond reply.
Be sure, my lord, I could not lie to you.
Why did Delilah love her great brute Jew,
Hated and loved him? Riddle that, my lord.

Malatesta.
Rare old Genosthos Platon, whom I stored
In yon stone tomb, might guess in vain for you
Betwixt his dreams of Plato, but for me,
Too brief is life to riddle love or hate.
The face, the face,—what secrets shall it prate
When I am dead, and babbling students claim
In feebler days to know who set his name,
Ensigns, and heraldry on yonder wall,
With yours, my dame? Dost fear to tell me all?

Isotta.
Narrow the forehead; bushy eyebrows set
O'er lizard lids, cross-burrowed; hair as jet;
The nose rapacious, falcon-curved, morose;
Cheeks wan, high-boned, o'er hollows; lips set close,
Like each to each, large, pouting, to men's eyes
Twin slaves of passion, apt for love or lies.
They who shall read in gentler days that face
Shall call you mad, and wonder at your race.

Malatesta.
Dost think they tell my story? Lo, how sweet!
The swallows flashing down the sunlit street;
A thrush upon the window,—he at least
Must hold me guileless as yon pale boy-priest.
What more, fair mistress? How he seeks your eye!

Isotta.
'Neath this stern brow forgotten murders lie;
The red lip-lines confess lust, scorn, and hate;
Dark treacheries 'neath those sombre eye-caves wait.
Ah, where, my lord, the scholar's studious pain,
The zest for art, the Plato-puzzled brain,
The high ambition for diviner thought,
That joyed to see how well Alberti wrought?

Malatesta.
The earthquake scars the mildly tended soil,
And leaves behind no trace of man's slow toil;
Lo, then, at last you find some alms of praise.
Who sees a man full-faced must meet his gaze;
This side face, mark you, lacks the quick eye's change.
Unwatched, men see it. Ever is it strange
To him who carries it. 'T is like, you say.

Isotta.
My good lord, so Matteo said to-day.

Malatesta.
Now what a thing is custom! You can scan
This face and call me good. See how a man
May scourge through centuries with the whips of shame,
And curse you with the thing that wins him fame.

Isotta.
Minutes are courtiers. The inflexible years
To no man palter, know not loves nor fears.

Malatesta.
Ah! none but you would dare in bitter speech
To front the Malatesta. Doth naught teach
Your careless tongue to fear loose talk of me?

Isotta.
Yet so the meanest churl shall prate of you,
When axe or spear sets free your soaring soul,
And its wild flight hath won an earthly goal.

Malatesta.
Small care have I what man or gossip say,
When axe or spear-thrust come to close my day.
And yet, and yet, Isotta, when my face
Pales on some stricken field, and in my place
Another wooes you,—what wilt say, my maid?

Isotta.
Much as the rest. The dead are oft betrayed.

Malatesta
(aside).
Not by the dead. No other lips shall lay
Love's bribe upon your cheek.
(Aloud).
Another day
Fades in the West, behind yon crumbling tower!
Give me my Plato. Pray, how stands the hour?

THE HUGUENOT

HOW LANCELOT CAME TO THE NUNNERY IN SEARCH OF THE QUEEN

Three days on Gawain's tomb Sir Lancelot wept,
Then drew about him baron, knight, and earl,
And cried, “Alack, fair lords, too late we came,
For now heaven hath its own, and woe is mine:
But 'gainst the black knight Death may none avail.
I will that ye no longer stay for me.
In Arthur's realm I go to seek the Queen,
Nor ever more in earthly lists shall ride.”
So, heeding none, seven days he westward rode,
And at the sainted mid-hour of the night
Was 'ware of voices, and above them all
One that he knew, and trembled now to hear.
Rose-hedged before him stood a nunnery's walls,
With gates wide open unto foe or friend.
Unquestioned to the cloister court he came,
And in the moonlight, on the balcony, saw
Beneath the arches nuns and ladies stand,
And in their midst a cowled white face he loved,
Whereat he cried aloud, “Lo, I am here!
Lo, I am here!—I, Lancelot, am here!
Would ye I came? I could not help but come.”
Spake then the Queen, low-voiced as one in pain:
“Oh, call him here, I pray you call him here.”
Then lit Sir Lancelot down, and climbed the stair,
And doffed his helm, and stood before the Queen.
But she that had great fear to see his face:
“Oh, sinless sisters, ye that are so dear,
Lo, this is he through whom great ills were wrought;
For by our love, which we have loved too well,
Is slain my lord and many noble knights.
And therefore, wit ye well, Sir Lancelot,
My soul's health waneth; yet through God's good grace
I trust, when death is come, to sit with Christ,
Because in heaven more sinful souls than I
Are saints in heaven; and therefore, Lancelot,
For all the love that ever bound our souls
I do beseech thee hide again thy face.
On God's behalf I bid thee straitly go,
Because my life is as a summer spent;
Yea, go, and keep thy realm from wrack and war,
For, well as I have loved thee, Lancelot,
My heart will no more serve to see thy face;
Nay, not if thou shouldst know love in mine eyes.
In good haste get thee to thy realm again,
And heartily do I beseech thee pray
That I may make amend of time mislived.
And take to thee a wife, for age is long.”
“Ah no, sweet madam,” said Sir Lancelot,
“That know ye well I may not while I breathe;
But as thou livest, I will live in prayer.”
“If thou wilt do so,” said the Queen,“so be.
Hold fast thy promise; yet full well I know
The world will bid thee back.”—“And yet,” he cried,
“When didst thou know me to a promise false?
Wherefore, my lady dame, sweet Guinevere,
For all my earthly bliss hath been in thee,
If thou wilt no more take of this world's joy,
I too shall cease to know the bliss of life.
I pray thee kiss me once, and nevermore.”
“Nay,” said the Queen, “that shall I never do.
No more of earthly lips shall I be kissed.”
Then like to one stung through with hurt of spears,
Who stares, death-blinded, round the reeling lists,
At gaze he stood, but saw no more the Queen;
And as a man who gropes a foot in dreams,
Deaf, dumb, and sightless, down the gallery stairs
Stumbling he went, with hands outstretched for aid,
And found his horse, and rode, till in a vale
At evening, 'twixt two cliffs, came Bedevere,
And with his woesome story stayed the knight.
At this, Sir Lancelot's heart did almost break
For sorrow, and aboard his arms he cast,
And cried, “Alas! ah, who may trust this world!”

THE HILL OF STONES:

A LEGEND OF FONTAINEBLEAU.

THE CUP OF YOUTH

SCENE, A SEA BEACH NEAR RAVENNA. MOONLIGHT.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

• GASPAR.
• UBERTO.
• GALILEO.
• GELOSA, his wife.
• EMILIA, his wife.

Time, circa 1632.

Scene I.

Gaspar and Gelosa. Gelosa playing with the sand.
Gelosa
(letting the sand fall slowly through her fingers).
See, Gaspar, how I hold the hours of love,
Or bid the merry minutes flit away.

Gaspar.
Time should be captive in those pretty hands,
With none to ransom him, had I my way.
Yet must I break the spell and hustle in
The rough world's business. Wherefore, little one,
This long delay? You lacked not courage once.

Gelosa.
Still am I in the bondage of my youth;
All my life long I feared that silent man
Who came across the garden from the tower,
Ate, slept, or to and fro athwart the grass
Trod one same path with bended head and back,
And shunned all company with this lower world.
She whose proud love and gold alike he spent,
She who did love him as the worst are loved
By those sad hearts who best know how to love,
Got but few words and bitter; but for her
I had not cared to see his face again.

Gaspar.
Men say his silence guards such fateful power
As makes yon stars the vassals of his will,
Turns baser metals into golden coin,
And wrings all secrets from the miser Time.

Gelosa.
And yet he knew not that one summer night
A little maid—Gelosa was her name—
Had stolen out beneath his starry slaves
To learn the subtle alchemy of love
That turns all fates to gold, nor lacks the power
To prophesy the sweetness of to-morrow.
Methinks he knew but little, knowing not
What love will dare; or haply knew too much
For all the gentler uses of the world
When, like a landlord with too full an inn,
He thrust out Love, that ever might have been
The fairest guest his learning entertained.

Gaspar.
Nor I more welcome. I could laugh to think
How patiently I took the beggar's “Nay”
He cast in scorn. “What! wed a landless squire,
Who spends in folly what he won in blood!—
None but a scholar wins my niece's lands.”

Gelosa.
My lands indeed; if certain tales be true,
He married them these many years ago.

Gaspar.
Ay, and may keep them if he be but wise.
Fair over Arno tower my castle walls,
With vine-clad hillsides rolling to the plain.
Nothing I owe you save your own sweet self.
A scholar, I! Not troubled will you be
By reason of my studies. I shall learn
Love from your eyes; your lips shall be my law,
And if their ripe decisions please me not,
The fount of justice at its very source
I shall know how to bribe. I brought you here
Because you willed it,—ay, and save for that
I care but little how this errand thrives.

Gelosa.
Kiss, kiss away the thoughts that trouble me;
The lapsing days will bring some pleasant chance.

Gaspar.
Who trusts that multitude of counsellors
Wins sad unrest.

Gelosa.
Oh, let my errand wait.
How very silent is the sea to-night!
The little waves climb up the shore and lay
Cool cheeks upon the ever-moving sands
That follow swift their whispering retreat.
I would I knew what things their busy tongues
Confess to earth.

Gaspar.
Let me confess you, sweet!
Tell me again you love me.

Gelosa.
Small my need.
'T is in my eyes; 't is on my lips; my heart
Beats to this music all the long day through.
A bird am I that have one single note
For song, for prayer, for thanks, for everything.

Gaspar.
You cannot know how passing sweet it is
To change the camp, the field, the storms of war,
For this and you; to watch the gray moon wane
And see the slumbrous sea leap here and there
To silver dreams.

Gelosa.
The hand of time seems stayed,
And joy to own the ever constant hours,
So full of still assurance is the night.
Love hath the quiet certainty of heaven,
Rich with the promise of unchanging years.

[Voices are heard near by.
Gaspar.
Hush, my Gelosa! Who be these that come?

[Enter Galileo and Uberto, who sit down among the dunes close by.
Gelosa.
My uncle and his friend, the Florentine.

Gaspar.
Hark you, he speaks your name. He said, “Gelosa.”
He called you—was it Gelosetta, love?
Why, I shall call you Gelosetta too.

Gelosa.
Distance and absence leave him this one friend,
A scholar grave, and gentle as the gentlest.

Gaspar.
And that is Galileo! I recall
One day in Florence walking with the Duke,
A man most studious of his fellow-men,
We saw this scholar wandering to and fro
Intent of gaze where Giotto's campanile
Athwart the plaza casts its length of shade.
The Duke had speech with him. A serious face,
With eyes that seemed to search beyond the earth,
Large, open, steady, like Luini's saints.

Gelosa.
More sweet than mine?

Gaspar.
I'll tell you when 't is day.
A mighty student of bright eyes am I;
Now there I'll match my science with the best.
Those Florentines, who never want for wit
To label love or hate, say he's moon-mad,
And hath for mistresses the starry host
That wink at him by night.

Gelosa.
Not Solomon
Had half so many. Yet for earthly love
He lacks not time nor honest appetite;
He never starved his heart to feed his head.
Hush! now he speaks again. The time may serve
To learn my uncle's mood.

Galileo.
This niece of yours—

Uberto.
Not ever greatly mine. The wayward child
Grew to the wilful woman, ignorant,
Untrained, and wild, a dreamer by the sea,—
Nor hers the housewife's knowledge. I have lived
Companionless of nobler intercourse,—
As to a friend I speak,—my wife wrapped up
In household cares and tendance of the poor,
Death busy with my manhood's friends. I tread
An ever lonelier road.

Galileo.
So seem all ways
To him who, yearning for too distant good,
Sees not the sweetness of the common path.
Life hath two hands for those who fitly live:
With one it gives, with one it takes away;
The willing palm still finds the touch of love,
And he alone has lost the art to live
Who cannot win new friends. Unwise are they
Who scorn the large relationship of life.
Yon restless sea, the sky, the bird, the flower,
The laugh of folly, and the ways of men,
The woman's smile, the hours of idleness,
The court, the street, the busy market-place,—
All that the skies can teach, the earth reveal,—
Are wisdom's bread. Alas! the common world
Hath lessons no philosophy can spare;
The tree that ever spreads its leaves to heaven
Casts equal anchors 'neath the soil below.
With man it is as with the world he treads:
No little stone of yonder pebbled beach
Could cease to be, and this great rolling orb
Feel not its loss. Enough of this to-night.
Count me your gains a little. Years have gone
Since last we met: what good things have they brought?

Uberto.
To-morrow I will tell you all. To-night
My mind is ill at ease; come, let us go,
But, as my love is valued by your own,
Speak not again of that unthankful child.

Galileo.
And yet I loved her. Have it as you will.

[Exeunt Galileo and Uberto.
Gelosa.
O Gaspar, said I not that age was hard?
Be but your youth as kind.

Gaspar.
Almost I thank
The misery that doubly sweetens love.
Strange seemed my life to him. To me, as strange
This corner-pickled shrivel of a man,
That all things dreaming never waked enough
To win the sanity of open eyes.
One day in Rimini, before a mirror,
So near I stood, my breath the image blurred.
Duke Francis, laughing, o'er my shoulder gazed;
Said I was like some men he knew, and went,
And would not read the riddle. Now 't is clear.
The man that hath no mirror save himself
Blurs the clear image conscience shows us all.
Now for a schoolless, helmet-dinted head,
The guess is not so bad.—What, tears again?
Tears for this man who in your childhood scorned
Its glad prerogatives of love and trust?
A thoughtless falcon, bold and wild of wing,
Like to my lover-self, had better kept
God's pledge to childhood.

Gelosa.
Nay, no tears have I
For him who cost me many. But for her,
The simple, kindly dame who had no will
That was not his,—I am more sad for her,
Because she never learned the woman's art
To traffic with her sadness. Yet had she
A childless youth; the children of old age,
Love, solace, cheerful days of quietness,
Dead as the little ones she never knew.
Though sad at best the husbandry of years,
Time in the happy face no furrow cuts
That is not wholesome; but the loveless hours
Of uncompanioned sorrow and neglect
Make records sore with shame as are the scars
A master's whip leaves on the beaten slave.
Has life no answering scourge for them that sin?

Gaspar.
For less than this, ay, for a moment's wrong,
I have seen men die young.

Gelosa.
Come, let us go.
The night has lost its grace. These memories
Serve but to stir dead hates. To bed,—to bed.
Like his, my mind is very ill at ease;
I would his hurt were equal to my own.

Scene II.

Garden of a villa near the sea and bordering on a road. Enter Uberto, who walks to and fro. Night of the day after the last act.
Uberto.
For gold, for lands, for any bribe of power
The soldier wastes the substance of the poor,
Sets ravage free and spills the innocent blood,
Yet sleeps as soundly. Shall I hesitate,
Checked by the memory of an outworn love,
A thoughtless woman and a foolish girl?
My friend—but he has won the laurel crown.
Dim continents of thought before me lie;
Their harvests wait the vigor of the scythe,
While in my heart the tardy blood of age
Unequal throbs. The mind, as tremulous
As these thin hands, has lost its certain grasp;
Pass, ye weak phantasies that bar my way,—
Children of habit,—I will do this thing!

Enter Emilia.
Emilia
(aside).
Now help me, Mary Mother, in my need.
Perhaps some memory of our joyous youth—

Uberto.
What, not abed?

Emilia.
I cannot sleep of late.
As if life were not long enough, the days
Live through the night, and mock with time's excess.

Uberto.
Why vex my soul with that of which each hour
Tells the sad tale?

Emilia.
Let us forget, Uberto!
Just half a century gone, when you and I,
Just fifty years ago this very night,
Walked 'neath the flowering locust, how I blessed
The kindly shade that hid my blushing cheek.
Not redder was the moon that night of May.

Uberto.
Still shall it mock the cheek of other loves
When you and I are dead. Oh, cruel time!
You lost the plaything of a pretty face;—
What was your loss to mine? What comfort lies
In useless babble o'er a squandered past?
Lo, when the eager spirit, worn with toil,
Has gathered knowledge, won its lordliest growth,
This robber comes to plunder memory
And lash with needless anguish to the grave.
We scorn the miser who in death laments
The gold he cannot carry; let us jest
At him whose usury of knowledge stops.

Emilia.
How know you that it doth? To me it seems
As if no office of our mortal frame
Has more the signet of immortal use
Than just this common gift of memory.
Forgive the thoughts that come I know not whence,—
I think our Galileo said it once,—
The ghosts that haunt the peaceful hours of night
Are not more unaccountable of man
Than the dead thoughts of life that, at a touch,
A taste, an odor, rise, we know not whence,
To scare us with the unforgotten past.
Your knowledge is not like the miser's gold,
For this world's usage only. Yet, perchance,
'T is like in this, that what it was on earth,
Self-ful, or helpful of another's pain,
May set what interest on that gathered hoard
The soul falls heir to in a world to come.

Uberto.
Alas, were I but sure that after death
I still should carry all life's nobler seed
To ripen largely under other skies,
I should not mourn at death.

Emilia.
Why is it, friend,
That I, for whom this life so little holds,
Should in its cup of emptied sweetness find
The pearl content, and with calm vision see
The stir of angel wings 'neath death's black cloak?
And life, ah, life might still be sweet to me!
O husband, had you been as some have been,
We might have lived a length of tranquil days,
With love slow moving through its autumn-time
To merge in loving friendship, and at last
To find the cloistered peace of patient age,
Tranquil and passionless, and so have walked
Like little children through life's wintry ways
To meet what fate the kindly years decreed.

Uberto.
Alas, the best is ever to be won!
There is no rose but might have been more red,
There is no fruit might not have been more sweet,
There is no sight so clear but sadly serves
To set the far horizon farther still.

[Voices are heard on the road back of them.
Emilia
(aside).
Heart of my hearts! It is the little one!
My Gelosetta! Will he know the voice?

Gelosa
(on the road as she goes by with Gaspar).
Can the rosebud ever know
Half how red the rose will grow?
Can the May-day ever guess
Half the summer's loveliness?

Uberto.
What voice is that?

Emilia.
Some wandering village girl.

Uberto.
No, 't was Gelosa's.

Emilia.
Would indeed it were!
Ah, that were joy! Alas, 't is but the girl
I helped last winter, one the plague cast out
With other Florentines. (Aside.)
Would I could see!

Uberto.
Come back again to drain our meagre purse
Ay, there's the man,—a woman and a man.

A man's voice sings.
'T is better to guess than to see,
'T is better to dream than to be.
The best of life's loving
Is lost in the proving,
'T is better to dream than to be.
The joy of love's sweetness
Is lost with completeness,
'T is better to dream than to be.

Emilia.
A pair of lovers! She has found her mate.

Uberto.
Already doth your cynic lover sing
The death and funeral of love and trust.
Thrice happy these with wingless instincts born.
Perhaps is best the woman's ordered life,
Market and house, the husband and the child.

Emilia.
Mother of God! and I that have no child!

Uberto.
St. Margaret! but you women-folk are tender.
Behind a hedge Gaspar and Gelosa, while Uberto continues.
Forget my haste, Emilia; all my mind
Dwells on the nearness of one fateful hour.

Emilia.
Again the dream that through these weary years
Has turned your life from God, and home, and me,—
To win for you that doubtful cup of youth.
Think yet, Uberto, on the thing you do;
It cannot be that I, grown drear and old,
The very death-tide oozing round my feet,
Shall see you glad and young. It cannot be
Earth holds for me that agonizing hour.

[Uberto remains silent.
Gaspar
(to Gelosa apart).
No answer hath he. Now speak you to him.
It seems the wise man hath no wiser dreams
Than fools are heir to.

Gelosa.
Heard you all he said?

Gaspar.
Ay, all I cared to hear. Come, let us go.
Seek you his wife alone. Forget this fool.

Gelosa.
Didst hear, my Gaspar? Can it be he owns
A cup which, drained, shall fetch his youth again?
Men say the thing has been in other days.
To leave her old and withered were to add
A crime, unthought of yet, to sin's dark list.

Gaspar.
Less base it were to stab her where she stands.

[Exit Emilia silently.
Gelosa.
Hush! she has left him,—left him. Were I she,
I would crawl out at midnight to his tower.
Deep would I drain the damnèd cup of life,
And wander back a maiden fair and young,
To curse his age with jealous misery.
Or I would kill him as he lay asleep,
And keep him old forever,—that would I.

Gaspar.
Now here's a wicked lady. Should I chance
To fall in love with larger length of days,
I shall be very careful of my diet.
Comes now the Florentine. The play were good,
Were you not in the plot. They say in Florence
The Pope will have it that this man of stars
Shall spread no gossip as to worlds that roll,
Nor play at Joshua with the Emperor Sun.
To be so wise that all the world's a fool
Might breed uneasy life.

Gelosa.
Perhaps; and yet,—
You know we little women will have thoughts,—
I was but thinking that for one to own
A soul for actions great beyond compare,
A mind for thoughts that have the native flight
Of eaglets rising from the parent nest,
To soar so high they cast no earthward shade,
Might bring a very childhood of content.

Gaspar.
There's ever music in your Umbrian heart
That lived where Dante died. Yet vain the thought;
For me the world may skip, or stop, or turn
Back-somersaults as likes the blessed Pope.
Where got you, love, these riddles of the brain,
These comments on a world you never knew?

Gelosa.
A certain soldier taught me. Ah, you smile!
To greatly love is to be greatly wise.
God were less wise were He not also love.
Ah, there's a riddle only love can read!

Enter Galileo. To Uberto, still seated.
Galileo.
Far have I sought you through the ilex grove,
Among Emilia's roses, in your tower.

Uberto.
My tower—you saw—

Galileo.
Saw nothing. (Aside.)
He distrusts me.

Uberto.
Forgive me. You shall see, shall hear, tonight.

Galileo.
Those many years that I, a jocund lad,
To you, my elder, turned for counsel, help,
Came back to me to-day. You were more kind
Than brothers are. Ah, happy, studious hours!
What was the Pope to me, or I to him?
A cardinal was as the farthest star,
Outside the orbit of my hopes and fears.
I came to you to share some idle days,
To get again within your life of thought,
To question and be questioned.

Uberto.
Wherefore not?

Galileo.
A messenger who followed me with haste
Bids me to Rome to answer as I may.
My sin you know.

Uberto.
What answer can you make?

Galileo.
Alas, it moves! This ever-patient globe
Moves, with the Pope and me; would move without.
Could I but summon God to answer them!
If He has whispered in my listening ear
This secret, guarded since the morn of time,
How shall I say I know not it nor Him?
A man may love or not, rejoice or not,
May hate or not, but what he thinks is sped
In word-winged arrows of eternal flight.

Uberto.
And you, the archer, you who loosed the string,
What harm if you should say this was not yours?—
This troubling doctrine long ago was born;
Sages in Egypt knew it. Or, at need,
Say that the world is stiller than a snail.
Say what you will, but live to draw anew
That bow of thought which you alone can draw.

Galileo.
Death is more wise than any wisest thought
The living man can think; death is more great
Than any life; and as for that stern hour
I meet in Rome next week, I know not now
How I shall judge my judge.

Uberto.
The fate I fear,
I fear for you, but would not for myself.
Ay, at this hour would I change lives with you;
For come what may, chains, prison, rack, or axe,
You will have lived so largely that no fate
Can pain your age with sense of unfulfilment.
But I have all things willed, yet nothing done.

Galileo.
I cannot think your solitary years
Have won us nothing, as you seem to say.
My hours are few and I go hence to-morrow
Perhaps no more to hear a friendly voice,
Or guess the starry secrets of the night.

Uberto.
Be patient with me. Many a year ago,
At twilight walking by the darkened sea,
The sudden glory of a broadening thought
Smote me with light as if through doors cast wide
To one in darkness prisoned. Then I saw
Dimly, as if at dusk, vast open space
Of things long guessed, but waiting fuller light.
What could I but despair? The hand and brain
No longer did my errands. There was set
A task for youth and vigor. Steadily
I gave my age to win the gift of youth,
That youth might help my quest.
That charm I sought
Which vexed the soul of old philosophy.
I won it, friend! To-night I drain this cup.
Like autumn leaves the withered years shall fall,
And sudden spring be mine. With wisdom clad,
With knowledge, not of youth, assured of time,
I shall speed swiftly to my certain goal.
The midnight calls my steps to yonder tower,
Where youth, the bride, awaits my joy's delay.
You have my secret. Oh, my God, if youth,
This second youth, should mock me like the first,
And bring no larger gain!

Galileo.
In this wild search
Great minds have perished. Where you think to win,—
In this the masters failed. Their wasted thoughts
Are in huge volumes scattered. It may be.
The strange is only what has never been,
And every century gives the last the lie.
But if 't is so, there's that within your cup
Might stay the wiser hand. Ay, if 't is so!

Uberto.
If? if 't is so? It is! Not vain the work
That filled these longing years. For no base end
These wasting vigils and these anxious days.
The gains I win shall lessen human pain.
One re-created life to man shall bring
Uncounted centuries in the gathering sum.

Galileo.
I too am of that sacred guild whose creed,
Before Christ died or Luke the healer lived,
Taught temperance, honor, chastity, and love.
I neither doubt the harvest nor the power
To reap its glorious fruit. And yet—and yet—
If the strong river of your flowing life
You shall turn back to be again the brook,
Is 't natural to think 't will float great ships,
Or with its lessened vigor turn the wheel?
Enough of me. I go to meet my fate.
Would I could stay!

Uberto.
Ah! when in Pisa's dome
You watched the lamp swing constant in its arc,
You gave to man another punctual slave,
And bade it time for us the throbbing pulse;
Joyful I guessed the gain for art and life.
Not that frail English boy Fabricius taught,
Not sad Servetus, nor that daring soul,
Our brave Vesalius, e're had matched your power
To read the riddles of this mortal frame.
And then you left us. Would our strange machine
Had kept your toil, and cheated yon fair stars!

Galileo.
We do but what we must. Some instinct guides.
To-night, when all the morrow world seems dim
And life itself a thing of numbered hours,
With clearing vision still for you I doubt.
Life hath its despot laws. You more than I
Know all their tyrant rigor. Tempt it not,
Lest failure, anguish, lurk within the cup.
Think sanely of this venture; let it pass.
Fill full, God helping, all the time He leaves.
Set 'gainst the darkness of death's nearing hour
In wholesome light all human action shines.
This dream is childlike; you will wake to tears.
Ask of your life if you have life deserved.
What did you with the gift? You had of it
All that another hath, or long or short.
Not time, but action, is the clock of man.
I should go happier hence if I could set
Your fatal cup aside. Nay, sorrow not;
Thank God for me. I have not vainly lived.
Truth have I served, and God, in serving her:
That heritage is deathless as Himself.
Something the thinker of the poet hath;
Our Dante was no mean philosopher:
With prophet eyes I see a freer day,
When thought shall mock at Kaiser and at Pope.
How can they think to chain the viewless mind,
Which is the very life within the life,
And in the irresponsible hours of sleep
Brings thought unto fruition? Yea, ethereal!
Of all God's mysteries most near to Him;
Instinctively creative, like the woman,
Pledged by conception's joy to labor's toil.
Grieve not for me. All that is best shall live.
There is no rack for thought; no axe, no block,
Can silence that.

Uberto.
But what, dear friend, if I
Should bid you laugh at pope or cardinal?
Take you this cup of mine. Take this and live.
In youth's disguise lie safely, freedom, life.

Galileo
(aside).
Not stranger in its orbit moves my world
Than man, its habitant. Why, here is one
Could squander years and cheat a woman's love,
Yet turn to offer this. Not I, indeed!
(Aloud.)
Life has been very dear to me, Uberto,
For that it has and that it has not been.
How many in their tender multitude
The cobweb ties of friendship, labor, love,
I knew not till this cruel storm of fate
Did thread them thick with jewels numberless.
And yet life owns no bribe would bid me back
To live it o'er anew. I can but thank you.

Uberto.
Is it only they who have no life of worth
Would live it o'er again?

Galileo.
That is not all.
Vainly and long would we have talked of it
In other days. No life is what it seems.
If thought were man's whole company in life,
Who would not live it o'er? But from our side
Friends, comrades, fall and torture us with loss.
Who is there born would will to live again
Such anguish as the happiest have known?
This is the heart's half only; more there is.
But the night wastes.

[Rises.
Uberto.
To-morrow you go hence?
Write me from Rome. Before the day is spent
I shall have won or lost. Good-night, good friend.

[Exeunt both.
Gaspar.
These learned folks are not more gay to hear
Than Lenten priests. I gave their riddles up
This half-hour since. And you?

Gelosa.
I heard it all.
Love, friendship, reason, all alike are vain.

Gaspar.
Had I a moment in his secret den,
That draught of his should give eternal life
To weeds that rot around the moat below.
[Gelosa whispers.
The jest were good. Is there no peril in it?

Gelosa.
None, Gaspar. Wait for me beside the gate.
Quick, ere the chance be lost! 'T is past eleven.
Oh, he will like my jest. Come, this way, come!

Scene III.

Stairway of the tower, where Emilia sits. weeping at the door of the astrologer's laboratory, a small lamp beside her.
Emilia.
Though he should kill me, I will wait for him.
To die were easy, if to die would stay
His hand from wrong. Alas! too sure it is,
Alive or dead, I nothing am to him.
Who is it comes? Say, is it you, Uberto?

Gelosa comes up the stairs.
Gelosa.
Oh, mother, it is I, your little one!
Friends, husband, wealth, all that life hath to give,
Are mine to-day. Come to my Tuscan home.
The flowers you love watch for you on the hills.
My children shall be yours. My good lord waits
Our coming at the gate. Leave, leave this man.

Emilia.
I cannot, child.

Gelosa.
Then will I talk with him.
For this we came from Florence. Once again,
I would be sure his will is as of old.
Beside the tower my good lord waits for me.

Emilia.
Vain is your errand, child.

Gelosa.
Yet must I try;
(Aside.)
The equal years give me at last my turn.
(Aloud.)
Is the door barred?

Emilia.
Nay, but I dare not enter.

Gelosa.
Not long the thing you fear shall vex your soul.
Come with me. Spill the cursèd cup, or wreck
With wholesome fire this chamber of your fear.

Emilia.
Who has betrayed his secrets?

Gelosa.
He himself.
Hid by the ilex hedge I heard it all.
Wept with you, for you; heard your tender plea.
Of other make am I. Give me your ring.
You used to say I had your sister's voice,
Twin to your own.

Emilia.
What would you say to him?
What do to him? You cannot mean him ill.

Gelosa.
Not I, indeed. Hark! there's a voice without.
Trust me a little. Quick! the ring, the ring!
No other hope is left. Give me the ring!

Emilia.
You will not harm him? I shall have it back?
He gave it me the day we were betrothed.

Gelosa.
A goodly half of this world's misery
Is born of woman's patience. Could you live
From that to this?

Emilia.
What can a woman else?

Gelosa.
What else? Naught now. The ring, and have no fear!
[Takes her hand and removes the emerald ring, which is yielded reluctantly.
Alas, poor withered hand! how dear thou art,
And sweet with use of bounty!
Quick, the lamp:
And wait for me upon the upper stair.

[Urges her hastily.
Emilia.
Nay, tell me more. I am afraid, Gelosa.

Gelosa.
Of me who love you? There, a kiss; goodby.
And stir not, if you love or him or me.
[Gelosa opens the door, and with the lamp in her hand enters the room. Emilia ascends the upper staircase.
There may be too much sweetness in a woman.
A little soured on the shadowed side
My Tuscan peaches are.
Now what a den!
A winter wealth of kindling in old books.
Bones, and a skull—gay vipers, slimy things,
A crocodile that hath an evil eye.
[Crosses herself.
And dust, ye Saints! but here's a long day's work.
[Lifts a bell glass from a small Venice goblet containing a transparent fluid.
Around the rim twin serpents writhe in coils.
[Reads the inscription below them.
Ex morte vitam. Life is child of death.
Is this in truth the draught shall make man young?
Now should I drink, it were a merry jest
To find myself a baby tumbling round,
Athirst for mother's milk. Not I, indeed.
[Empties cup on the floor, and refills it with water. Blows out the light and veils herself.
The moon is quite enough. Will he be long?
Now, kindly uncle, for this pretty play.

[She conceals herself in a corner. Enter Uberto.
Uberto.
At last, 't is near. The stairs my constant feet
Have worn with many steps more toilsome grow.
The hounds of time are on their panting prey;
I wait no longer. No man owns to-morrow.
To-morrow is the fool's to-day. Ah, soon
I shall go gaily tripping down the hill,
Glad as a springtide swallow on the wing,
A man new born.—Nay, this is like to death.
Why should I falter here? We both are old.
Soon in the common way our steps would part.
And to be young; to feel the sinews strong,
Eye, ear, and motion quick, the brain all life,—
The visions of my manhood round me whirl,
White limbs, red lips, and love's delirious dream,
The passion kiss of wine, the idle hours
Unmissed from youth's abounding heritage.
Off, off, ye brutal years that gnaw our age!
Come, joy! come, life!—life at the full of flood!
[Pauses.
Birth is not ours. We are, and that is all.
Death is not ours. We die, and that is all.
This stranger birth that waits upon my will,
Ay, this is mine alone. The herd of men
Are born and die. One sole ignoble lot
Awaits them all. This none can share with me.
Auspicious planets shine upon the hour.
[Takes the hour-glass.
Swift waste the sands. So much of age is left.
Uncounted memories of things long lost
Leap to my view, as if to one who stands
Beside the waif-thronged surges of the deep,
And sees its dead roll passive to his feet,
Its pearls, its weeds, its wrecks.
So let it end.
[Fills up the glass with wine.
Nor fear, nor friend, nor love shall hinder me.
[Drinks.
Will it be swift? or will the change be like
The wonder work of spring?
[Lights a small lamp, and examines his face in a mirror.
A ghastly face!
Is this the earthquake agony of change?

[Gelosa, still veiled, advances.
Gelosa.
Change that will never come. You that would cheat
A life-worn love of company to death,
Take the stern answer of a tortured soul.
You drained my cup of life, and cast aside
The poor mean vessel. I, Emilia, stole
Your cup of life. Mine is the youth you craved,
Mine the gay dream of girlhood's rosy joy,
Mine once again the wooing lips you kissed
When you and I were young. Ah, sweet is youth!
Go, thieving dotard, to a loveless grave!

[Uberto staggers forward, with the lamp in his hand.
Uberto.
My wife, Emilia? No, not my Emilia.

Gelosa.
Nay, touch me not! And is your memory dead?
Why, even I some dim remembrance keep.
Take back this ring, this pledge of endless love.

[Uberto receives it.
Uberto.
Her ring—your ring—Emilia!—Lost, lost, lost!
Life, honor, fame, and youth. Emilia, wife,
Speak kindlier to me. Speak, oh, speak again!
Your voice is like an echo from the past.—
What devil taught you this?

[Advances.
Gelosa.
Off, off, old man!
What has a girl to do with palsied age?
I'll be a daughter to your feebleness,
And fetch your crutch, and set you in the sun,
And get me lovers kin to me in years.

Uberto.
Black Satan take your kindness! Yet have I
The strength to kill you! You shall die for this!

[Seizes her.
Gelosa.
What?—feeble fool!

[Pushes him away; he falls and remains on the floor.
Uberto.
This is not my Emilia.
Help, help, without there! Help!

Gelosa.
Come in,—come in!
Well have I paid a fool with folly's coin.

Emilia enters and runs to lift her husband.
Emilia.
Ill have you done, and cruel I have been.
Oh, you have slain my love!

Gelosa.
Not I, in truth.

Uberto.
Out, lying baggage! Now I know you well.

Gelosa.
Come you with me, dear mother of my love.
Leave we this base old man. My husband waits.

Emilia.
Get hence! I never loved you. He knew best.
Pray God I see no more the wicked face
That cheated him and me. Begone, I say!

[Exit Gelosa.

MY LADY OF THE ROSES

HOW THE POET FOR AN HOUR WAS KING

THE VIOLIN

The belief that it is sinful to touch that which the shadow of the across falls upon is a medieval fancy, but I cannot now recall where I have seen it mentioned.

I am indebted to Professor T. F. Crane, of Cornell University, for the strange legendary story of the thirty pieces of silver. I have, of course, taken great liberties with the old Latin version, as to which Professor Crane says:

“The legend of the thirty pieces of silver is found only in Gottfried of Viterbo's ‘Pantheon,’ a rare work reprinted in Scriptores Rerum Germanicorum, Ratisbon, 1726 (ed. Pistorius and Stoure). I have copied it from M. du Meril, Poésies Populaires Latines du Moyen Age, Paris, 1847, p. 321, also a scarce work. I do not know of any other accessible version, although the legend was copied from Gottfried by various legend-writers of the time. Where Gottfried got it I cannot tell.”

Time, 1750

THE TYROL
Scene, A hilltop with a wayside cross.
Johan.

Elsa.
My Johan, have you waited long?
I heard your viol's happy song;
I heard it call, “Come quick, come fast!”
As o'er the stepping-stones I passed.
I heard it calling, “Sweet, come fleet!”
As up I came among the wheat.
The birds o'erhead called, “Soon,—come soon!”
I think they know its pretty tune.
What, sad again, and ever sad?
Play, Johan, play! 'T is eventide;
The bells ring out the story glad
How came her joy to Mary's side.

Johan.
I cannot. Better had I stayed
In yonder convent's tranquil shade,
At hopeless peace. They meant it well
Who bade me be a priest. The cell,
The fast, dead prayers, a palsied life,
I fought or bent to, till the strife
O'ermastered patience. None too late
I fled beyond their cursèd gate;
And free was I as birds are free
To fly, and yet at liberty,
Like them, to quench no single note
That trembles in the eager throat.
What slavery sweet to feel within
The song which not to sing is sin!
If He at whose divine decree
These hands interpret Him can be
So careless of the gift He gave,
What has He left me but the grave?
I plough, I dig; far through the years
I see myself the slave of tears,—
I, that have dreamed of love and fame,
A village boor, without a name.
Last week the young duke opened wide,
To please the poor, his garden's pride.
There, wandering, I saw withal
The nectarines rotting on the wall,
The tumbling grapes caught up with thread,
The dead-ripe figs hung overhead,
The fattening peaches swung in nets.
What woman's starving baby gets
One half the care that saves these pets?
Sharp, sharp the lesson. Break, sad heart,
Or learn to know the poor man's art,—
The art to bear with patience meek
The blow upon the other cheek.
How shall I bear it? I could steal,
Cheat, for this chance. You only feel,
And you alone, how hard the toil
That bends me o'er the silent soil,
And you alone what wild desires
Await a larger life; what fires
Of wordless anguish burn unguessed,
To think,—be sure,—that unexpressed,—
A serf, a boor,—my soul has here
A gift the waiting world holds dear.
Old violin, comrade of the hours
That labor spares, what music-flowers,
What whispers wild, what visions bright,
Thy friendship brings the tired night!
And yet, like one who, sick with sin,
Would murder love he cannot win,
Twice on the bridge, at night, I stood,
To cast thee in the wrecking flood.
But when a last farewell I sung
Too stern a pang my bosom wrung;
I could not drown the dreams that crave
Expression's life. Best were the grave.

Elsa.
Yet that were sin! Could I but give
My life to help your art to live!
The Alp-horn calls; I cannot stay.
One kiss. Ah, Johan, wait and pray.
[She sees a purse in the road.
A purse!

Johan.
I pray it be not thin.

Elsa.
Nay, touch it not. It lies within
The shadow of the cross. 'T is sin.
Who taketh but a flower or stone
Where that holy shade is thrown
Is cursed to death. His dearest prayer,
Fluttering like a prisoned bird,
Never wins the happy air,
Beats against the painted saints,
At the altar hopeless faints,
Never, never to be heard.

Johan.
The ban is off,—the sun is on.
St. George! 't is full; my luck has won.
Good thirty ducats, gold beside!
Ho for my love, my art, my bride!

Elsa.
What, take at will another's gold,
For love, for greed? Stay, Johan,—hold!
The duke has guests! You cannot soil
Your soul with this.

Johan.
And did they toil
To win this money? Out of earth
Some swarthy bondsman wrought its birth.
His sweat, his pain, to be at last
A wanton's wage, a gambler's cast!
Mine is it now to better end.

Elsa.

Johan.
The purse is mine! No old monk's tale
Shall stay my hand. If this should fail—
All men own death. How shall it be?

Elsa.
Give me the purse! The purse or me?
Am I so little worth? worth!

Johan.
Take care;
I hear a horse.

Enter Horseman.
Horseman.
Ho, fellow, there!
Hast seen a purse? Just here it lay.

Elsa.
My Johan found it.

Horseman
(takes it).
Thanks. Good-day.

[Rides away as a gentleman comes behind them, hidden by the hedge.
Johan.
Now is life over.

Elsa.
Never less.
Your soul is saved. Now, Johan, guess
A secret. No? Well, at the fair
Last week I sold, I pledged, my hair.
To-morrow I shall fetch the gold
To win your way. Ah, love is bold.
My father? Think you I shall care?
A little hurt; less ill to bear
Than that worse hurt you bade me share.

Johan.
Forgive, forget! Ah, not again
Your trust shall fail.

Elsa.
Just one more kiss;
And ere your sinless face I miss,
Take up the viol. Say not nay.
The twilight song. Play, Johan, play
The song that in the stillness brings
My troubled soul from earthly things,
When the blown horns the cattle call
Back to the shelter of the stall.

Johan.

Enter Gentleman.
Gentleman.
A poet-lover! Did you find my purse?

Johan.
Ay; and had kept it, too,—or worse,—
Except for her.

Gentleman.
Would Eve had stayed
As honest as your blushing maid!
I always thought the story queer,
Would like that poor snake's tale to hear.
Sometimes I fancy Madam Eve
Tempted the Tempter to deceive.
I heard you tell a pretty tale
About some yellow hair for sale.
Wilt sell it now? Say, gold for gold!
Let's see the goods.
[Pulls out the comb.
'T is worth, when sold,
A hundred ducats.

Johan.
No, my lord,
'T is not for sale. No miser's hoard
Could buy it.

Gentleman.
Say two hundred, then;
A kiss to boot. I know of men
Would ask for six.

Elsa.
'T is yours,—'t was mine!

Gentleman.
The gold is thine. Too proudly shine
Those locks above a heart of gold
For me to part them. When you're old,
And you have babes and he has fame,
Teach in their prayers the wild duke's name.
And you who thought a purse to keep,
Within that battered violin sleep—
Ah, but I heard—all wealth and power
Man craves on earth. In some full hour,
When heaven is nearest, make for me
One golden fugue, to live and be
Remembered when the morrow's light
Is gone for us. Good-night, Good-night.

FRANÇOIS VILLON

François Villon, born 1431, poet, thief, vagabond, led a life of excesses in which were sharp experiences of the prison and the torture-chamber. His ballad “Des Pendus” was written in 1461, whilst he was under sentence of death. Soon after he is lost to history, and becomes fair subject for the imagination. There is not the least foundation in any known facts for the story I have labelled with his name.

THE COUNT DE LILLE, AND THE SEIGNEUR DE LUCE, A FREE-LANCE.

Time, circa 1463
Scene, The Garden of an Inn.
De Luce.
Our good Duke Charles, you tell me, fain would know
Where bides this other rhymer. Be it so.
I might have said, I know not: for to lie
Is easy, natural, and hath brevity
To win its hearing favor, whilst the truth
Spins out forever like a woman's youth,
And lacks the world for ally. But mere pride
Would make me honest. Let the duke decide
'Twixt boor and noble. Ah! 't was gay, I think,
When we were lads together. What! not drink?
Then, by St. Bacchus, here's to you, my lord!
Men say that luck, a liberal jade, has poured
Her favors on you: lordships half a score,
Castles and lands, that vineyard on the Loire;
Something too much for one who lightly leaves
Such wine as this. Alas! who has, receives.

De Lille.
Come when you will and share it. I have served
God and the King. What fortune I've deserved
The good saints know; through many a year I've played
The games of war and peace. My father's blade
Has no stain on it. That, it seemeth me,
Were pleasant to the conscience, when, set free
From war and council and grown old and gray,
Fades in monastic peace one's life away.
These war-filled years gone by since last we met
Have had their griefs. What of yourself? Forget
My fates and me. I think the latter wars
Have missed your helping. As for me, my scars
Count half these years.

De Luce.
Well, as chance willed, I fought
In Spain, or Italy, or France, and brought
Some pretty plunder back; have killed my share,
Dutch, Don, or Switzer, any—everywhere
That bones were to be broken and the fare
And game were good; have taken soldier pay
On this side and on that. In wine or play
Spent gaily; found life but a merry friend
That lent, and then forgot the debt. To end,
Came home. And now my tale. On Easter-day
It lost its hero.
Silence, once 't is broke,
Can no man mend. 'T was thus this fellow spoke
Of whom I talk. I never owned the thing
Folks like to label conscience, which the king
Packs wisely on his chancellor. My device,
“Suivez le Roi,” suits well with life. Not nice
Need one to be who Louis, or the rest,
Loyally follows,—taking what is best
Each good day offers; yet, sometimes, De Lille,
Woman or wine, or one's too ready steel,
Lures one a trifle past the line of sport,
And then,—you see my point,—a friend at court
Perchance is needed. Gossip, hereabout,
Which spreads like oil on water, leaves no doubt
That I should speak. That wastrel had a way,
A trick of speech, as when he said, one day,
“The pot of Silence cracked, 't were best to break.”
Strange how his words stay with me! Half awake
Last night, I saw him, laughing too, and gay,
A grinning ghost, De Lille. What priest could lay
A rhyming, jesting fiend? I have killed men,
Ay, and some pretty fellows too, but then
None troubled sleep. This dead man, like an owl,
Roosts, wide-eyed, on my breast,—a feeble fowl—
Mere barnyard fowl at morn,—a carrion ghost.
The devil has bad locks to keep his host
Of poets, thieves, and tipplers.

De Lille.
Think you so?
No man can tell, De Luce, when some chance blow
Shall give him memories none may care to know.
Once, when we charged nigh Burgos, sorely pressed,
I drove my rapier through a youngster's breast
In wild fierce mellay when none think,—and yet
I see him,—see him reeling; never can forget
His large eyes' sudden change, that one long cry!
'T was but a moment, and the charge went by.
Some unknown woman curses me in sleep,
Mother or mistress; why does memory keep
These nettles, let the roses fall? Well! well!
What more, De Luce? The tale you have to tell
Is told a friend!

De Luce.
Three bitter years ago
A woman, every year more fair, one Isabeau,
A Demoiselle De Meilleraye, began
To twist this coil which later cost a man
A pleasant reckless life, and you my tale.
Maids I have loved a many, widows frail
Loved par amour, but this one gaily spun
A pretty net about me. It was done
Before I fully knew, and once begun,
No fly more surely netted. Ever still
The web is on me. At her merry will
What pranks she played!—and I, a fettered slave,
Was black or white, was all things, blithe or grave,
As met her humor. Many a suitor came
Because her lands were broad, and, too, the game
Worth any candle. She but laughed. Some flared,
Or sputtered, and went out. My lady shared
Their woe but little. As for me, I fought
A good half dozen lordlings, also caught
A hurt or two. But then, ah! that was worse,
A fellow came who wooed my dame in verse,
And did it neatly,—made her triolets
Rhyming her great blue eyes to violets;
Wrote chansons, villanelles, and rondelettes,
Sonnets and other stuff, and chansonnettes,
And jesting, rhymed the color of my nose
With something,—possibly an o'erblown rose.
No need to say we fought, but luck went hard:
I thrust in tierce; he parried, broke my guard,
And then, I slipped,—St. Denis; but I lay
A good six weeks to ponder on the way
The rascal did the thing. And he the while
Had to himself my lady's gracious smile;
Whereon we played the game again, and time
Was that to which my rhymer ceased to rhyme.
A pretty trick there is, De Lille, you see
I learned in Padua; this way, on one knee
To drop a sudden; then a thrust in quarte
Settles the business. You shall learn the art.
'T is very simple. Ah! before he died
He fumbled at his neck, and vainly tried
To snatch at something, till at last I took
A locket from him, for his own hand shook,
As well might be. He had but only breath
To mutter feebly “Isabeau”, then death
Had him, and I the locket—have it still,
And some day she shall have it—in my will,
For scourge of memory. This same Isabeau
Wept as a woman does, whilst to and fro
I wandered, waiting till the mood should go,
Then came again and found my lady fair
Reading my dead man's chansons. Little care
Had she for others. I, a love-fool, spent
The summer days like any boy, intent
To fit my will to hers. I laugh again
To think I vexed my battle-wildered brain
In search of rhymes.—You smile, my lord? 'T is so,
To find me gallant rhymes to Isabeau.
Pardie, De Lille, she rhymed it thrice to—No!
Swore none could love who lacked the joyous art
To love in song.
Now, really, when the heart
Gives out, and knows no more, one asks the head
To help that idiot ass. Someone has said,—
Ah! that man said it,—said, “'T is heads that win
In love's chuck-penny game.” And I had been
The heart's fool quite too long.—
At last, one day,
Hunting by St. Rileaux, I lost my way,
And wandering, lit upon a man who lay
Drowsing, or drunk, or dreaming mid the fern.
Quite motionless he stayed, as in I turn,
And say, “Get up there, villein! Ho! in there,—
Get up, and pilot me the way to Claire!”
On this rose lazily a lean, long man;
Yawned, stretched himself,—with eyes as brown as tan,
And somewhat insolent, regarded me; a nose
Fine as my lady's; red, too, I suppose,
With sun, or just so much of sun as glows
Shut up in wine: and thus far not a word.
Till I, not over gay, or somewhat stirred
By this brute's careless fashions, wrathful said,
“Art dumb, thou dog?” But he untroubled laid
His elbow 'gainst a tree-trunk, set his hand
To prop his head, and then,—
“I understand.
You lost the way to Claire, whilst I have lost
The gladdest thought that haply ever crossed
A poet's brain. Think what it is, fair sir,
To feel within your soul a gentle stir,
To see a vision forming as from mist,
And just then as your lips have almost kissed
This thing of heaven, to have a man insist
You show the way to Claire. A man may die
And still the world go on, but songs that fly
From laughing lip to lip, and make folk glad,
Have more than mortal life. 'T is passing sad.
You've killed a thing had outlived you and me,
Bishops and kings, and danced, a voice of glee,
On lovers' tongues.” Loudly I laughed and long.
“Mad! mad!” I cried; “the whole world's mad in song.
Out-memory kings? What noble trade have you
That rate a king so lo? Speak out, or rue
The hour we met. Your name, your name, man, too,
Unless you like sore bones.” At this he stayed,
No more disturbed than I, and undismayed
Said, “François Villon de Montcorbier
Men call me; but I really cannot say
I have not other names to suit at need,
As certain great folks have; and sir, indeed
As to my trade, I am a spinner, and I spin,
As please my moods, gay songs of love or sin,
Sonnets or psalms—could make a verse on you.
Hast ever heard my ‘Ballade des Pendus’?
I gave the verse a certain swing, you see,
That humors well the subject; you'll agree,
To read it really shakes one; many a thief
That verse has set a-praying. To be brief—
Ah, you'll not hear it?—then, sir, by my sword,—
But that's in pawn,—or better, by my word,—
I can't pawn that,—ye saints! if I but could!
Now just to pay your patience,—leave the wood
At yonder turning; then the road to Claire
Lies to the left; but you must be aware
The day is somewhat warm, and pray you try
To think how very, how unnatural dry
I am inside of me; for outwardly,
Thanks to the dews, I'm damp; but could I put
My outside inside,—Ah! your little ‘but’
Is really quite a philosophic thing
For lords who lose their way, and men who sing.
The simple fact is, I am deadly dry—
And that mere text once out, the sole reply,
The sermon, lies within your purse.” I said,
“Had you not put a notion in my head,
I long ago had broken yours. Instead,
Sell me its use awhile.” “If talk be dull,”
Cried he, “'twixt one who fasts and one who's full,
St. George! 't is duller than the dullest worst
When one of them is just corpse-dry with thirst.
Once, by great Noah! a certain bishop-beast
Kept me for three long summer months at least
On bread and water,—water! Were wine rain,
I never, never could catch up again.”
Well, to be brief, De Lille, just there and then
We drove an honest bargain. He, his pen
Sold for so long as need was,—I, to get
Three times a week some joyful rondelette,
Sirventes satiric, competent to fit
The case of any wooing, versing wit,
Dizains, rondeaux, and haply pastourelles,
With any other rhyming devil-spells
A well-soaked brain might hatch, whilst I agreed
To house, clothe, wine the man, and feed.
That day we settled it at Claire. A tun
Of Burgundy it took before 't was done.
And then, to ease him at his task, you know,
Smiling he queried of this Isabeau:
Her eyes, her lips, her hair; because, forsooth,
“The trap of lies were baited best with truth.”
Quoth I, half vexed, “Brown-red, her hair.” “I know,”
My poet says; “gold—darkened, like the glow
The sunset casts, to crown a brow of snow.”
Then I, a love-sick fool!—“She has a way—
Of”—“Yes, I understand; as lilies sway
When south winds flatter, and the month is May,
And love words has the maiden rose to say.”
Here pausing, suddenly he let his head
Rest on his hands, and, half in whisper, said,
“Alack! Full many a year the daisies grow
Where rests at peace another Isabeau.”
“The devil take thy memories! Guard thy tongue!”
Said I. What chanced was droll, for quick tears, wrung
From some low love-past, tumbled in his wine:
Cried he, “The saints weep through us. Can these tears be mine?
The dead are kings and rule us”—drank the liquor up,
Laughed outright like a girl, and turned the cup,
With “Never yet before, since life was young,
Did I put water in my wine,” then flung
The glass behind him, shouted, “Quick, a bottle!—
Another; grief is but a thief to throttle.
Ho! let the ancient hangman Time appear
And tuck it a neat tie beneath the ear.
Many a trade has master Time.
He sits in corners, and spinneth rhyme.
He is a partner of master Death,
Puffs man's candle out with a breath,
Leaves the wick to sputter and tell
In a sort of odorous epitaph
How foul the thought of a man may smell
For the world that lives, and has its laugh.
Ha! but Time has many trades!
Something in me now persuades
Master Time, grown debonair,
Hath turned for me a potter rare,
And made him a vase beyond compare:
Here below, a rounded waist,
Fit with roses to be laced;
Rising, ripely curved above
Into flowing lines of love.
Thinking, too, how sweet 't would grow,
Time called the proud vase Isabeau.”
“By every saint of rhyme,” laughed I, “good fellow,
If this a man can do when rather mellow”—
“What shall he do ripe-drunk?” he cried; “erelong
The vine shall live again a flower of song.”
How much he drank that six months who may know?
He kept his word. There came a noble flow,—
Rondels and sonnets, songs, gay fabliaux,
Tencils, and virelais, and chants royaux,
That turned at last the head of Isabeau.
For, by and by, he spun a languid lay
Set her a weeping for an April day.
And then a reverdie, I scarcely knew
Just what it meant; by times the damsel grew
Pensive and tender, till at last she said,—
You see the bait was very nicely spread,—
“How chances it, fair sir, this gift of song
Lay thus unused? You did yourself a wrong:
But now I love you,—love as one well may
A heart that hides its treasures, yet can say
At last their sweetness out. This simple lay!—
How could you know my thoughts?”
On this in haste
I cast an arm around her little waist,
And kissed her lips, and murmured tenderly
Some pretty lines my poet made for me
And this occasion's chance.
So there, the dame
Well wooed and married, ends this pleasant game.

De Lille.
I knew your poet once,—of knaves the chief,
A gallows-mocking brawler, guzzler, thief,—
This orphan of the devil won with song
Our good Duke Charles, who thinks of no man wrong,
And least of all a poet. Once or twice
Duke Charles has saved his neck. One can't be nice
With poet friends, nor leave them in the lurch
Because they stab a man, or rob a church.
Also, that hog-priest-doctor, Rabelais, you know,
Kept him a while, then bade the vagrant go
For half a nightingale and half a crow.
So there he slips from sight. Then comes a tale
That stirs our rhyming Duke. I must not fail
To know the sequel.

De Luce.

De Lille.
None I could well afford
To speak. The Duke must judge, not I.

De Luce.
My lord,
Your fashions like me not, and plainly, mine
Are somewhat franker.

De Lille.
I must ride. The wine?

De Luce.
I pay for that. The man who drinks must pay.
“The wine of friendship lasteth but a day,”
So said that pot-house Solomon. I suppose
'T is easily thinned with time. As this world goes,
A sorry vintage.

THE MISER

A MASQUE

Time: The Fifteenth Century. Midnight.
Iron boxes. A table strewn with jewels, trinkets, and coin. An hour-glass. An old man walks to and fro. (A knock is heard.)
Miser.
Come in.
[Covers the jewels with a cloth.
Enter a Woman, who unmasks.
What wouldst thou, wench? Hast aught to sell?

Woman.
I've that to sell for which men give their souls.

Miser.
Alack! their souls. Go seek yon market-place,
And learn what usury a soul will fetch.
The body of a man may sweat you gold,
Plow, sow, and reap, yet at the end be apt
As other carrion to fatten grapes.
How came you in? They keep slack guard below.

Woman.
[Sings

Miser.
Ay. The fool's world, not mine. The hour-glass wastes.

Woman.
Forget to turn it, and the hour is thine.
That minds me what the priest said Easter-eve:
The devil owns the minutes, God the years.
What think you that he meant?

Miser.
Nay, ask of him.
Age hath its secrets. Time shall sow for thee
Betwixt thy grand-dame wrinkles answers meet.
Thy errand, girl!

Woman.
Look in my face, and learn.

Miser.
By Venus! I have read that scroll too oft.
Eyes that say, Yes! and lips that murmur, No!
The red cheeks' mock-surrender. All the cheats
That make to-morrow lie to yesterday.

Woman.
Like a philosopher lies yesterday,
To-morrow like a poet; but to-day
Is true until to-morrow makes it lie.
What if the minute's coin that buys thee joy
Ring false the morrow morn! How old you look!
Kiss me, and live. A ducat for a kiss!
A ducat each for these two eyes of mine!

Miser.
A ducat! By St. Mercury! not I,—
A thing unchanging for a thing that dies.
I've been the fool of women, wit, and wine;
Have argued much with doctors; had my fill,
Ay that was best, of battle's stormy fate;
Have fooled and have been fooled, been loved and loved.

Woman.
Were any like to me?

Miser.
The lips I love
Betray me not at each new gallant's suit.
What are thy charms to these?
[Walks across the room, and returns with a casket of gold coins, while the Woman hastily looks under the table-cover and replaces it.
See, this and this!
[Shows her gold medals.
Hast thou the eyes of Egypt's haughty queen?
These eager lips that kissed a world away?
Lo, here Zenobia,—wisdom, beauty, grace.
Match me this warrior maid—this huntress lithe
Set in the changeless chastity of gold.

Woman.
Their lips are cold. A ducat for a kiss!

Miser.
Nay, get thee gone. Here's something sweeter far
Than wanton vouches of a woman's lips.

Woman.
I would not kiss thee for a world of ducats.

[Exit Woman, who whispers, as she goes, to a gentleman who enters, clad in a red cloak, hat, and cock's feather.
Miser.
Who let thee in?

Gentleman.
A girl, fair sir,—a girl.
Quite often 't is a girl that lets me in!

Miser.
Who art thou?

Gentleman.
Many people. Part of all,
For well-bred gentlemen “my Lord Duke Satan,” thus
Here somewhat late to thank you. Truly, sir,
To sum the seed of sin you've sown for me
Would puzzle the arithmetic of—Well,
One speaks not lightly of his home. My thanks.
Give me your hand, good friend.

Miser.
Art drunk! Begone!

Gentleman.
Alas! How sad, not know me. Gratitude
Is rare in either world. Yet men, I note,
Know not themselves, and therefore know not me.

Miser.
The jest is good.

Gentleman.
What, I—I, Satan, jest!
How hard to satisfy! Unhelped by me,
What hadst thou been? Lo, under this frail cloth
[Touches the table-cover.
There lie the pledges of a hundred souls:
That zone of pearls! That ruby coronal!

Miser.
Thou liest, fool!

Gentleman.
The ring,—the sapphire ring.

Miser.
The thing is strange.

Gentleman
Nay, gentle partner, nay.
Behold, I come to thee in sore distress,
A bankrupt devil. Why? It matters not.
Perhaps I gambled for the morning star,
Gambled with Lucifer; in want, perchance,
For reason good, of some less sin-worn world.
Brothers are we. No need for us to pray
Deliverance from temptation—to do good.
Not equals quite. A trifle thou dost lack
Thy master's joy in evil for itself.
Only the crack-brained sin for love of sin,
And crime is wretchedly alloyed with good.
Ho! for one honest sinner!

Miser.
Out, foul fiend!

Gentleman.
To waste your hours were but to squander mine.
Ha! Shall I take my own?

[Pulls off the table-cover.
Miser.
Without there! Help!
Help—help—a thief!

Gentleman.
Nay. Let me choose my coins,
Let me confess them. They have tales to tell.
I am a devil-poet, and can see
Beneath the skin of things.
[Takes coins in turn.]
On this is writ
A maiden's honor gone. And here is one
Helped the black barter of a traitor's soul.
This 'gainst a priestly conscience turned the scale.
And this is red with murder. See, gray hairs
Stick to it yet. Alas for charity!
Not one,—not one. The devil has no friend
[A knock is heard.
Save him that enters.
[Opens the door to the cowled figure, DEATH.
Pray thee, sir, come in.
Lo, my best friend! the scavenger of time,
Who picks from off this dust-heap called a world
The scared and hurried ants that come and go
Without a whence or whither worth a thought.
Be easy with this partner of my cares.
This greedy dotard drunk with guzzling gold
Spare me a little. Take thou hence the good,
The fair, the young, the chaste, the innocent.
[To the Miser.
Good-night, my friend. I leave you one who owns
The only truth this stupid planet holds.

[Exit Gentleman.
Miser.
What feast of folly hath broke loose to-night?
Who art thou?

Death.
Death!

Miser.
The devil and then Death!
Thou hast the play the wrong end first, my friend.

[Laughs.
Death.
Then laugh again. Full many a year has fled
Since sound of laughter crackled in mine ears.
There are who face me smiling. Men like thee,
Who gather ducats as I reap the years,
To add them to the gathered hoard of time;
Yea, men like thee, who poison souls for gain,
And love life for its baseness, mock not me.
Only the noble and the wretched smile
When these lean fingers summon to the grave.
Thy day is near; even now the clogging blood
Chills stagnant at my touch, and soon for thee
Shall come the yellow hags to stretch thy limbs,
And put the coins upon thy staring eyes.

[Miser falls into a chair.
Miser.
What cruel jest is this? I pray thee go.
My heart beats riotous, my legs grow weak.

Death.
Give me a hundred ducats.

Miser.
I! Not one.

Death.
A hundred ducats for a year of greed.

Miser.
Not one, I say.

Death.
Then, to that nether world.
Two days I grant thee, till upon the stair
Thy coffined weight shall creak, and other hands
Shall count thy ducats.

Miser.
Take thou ten, and go.

Death.
Ten ducats for a journey round the world!

Miser.
Nay, nay, not one. Thou surely art not Death.

Death.
Already on thy sallow cheek I see
The set grim smile which hardens on the face
When death unriddles life; thy jaw hangs slack;
The sweat wherewith man labors unto death
Drops from thy brow.

Miser.
Take what thou wilt, and go.
Hast said a hundred ducats. Take but that.
Take them and leave me. Not a ducat more.

[Death takes a bag.
Death.
For this I give thee many a lingering year.
Without there, gentlemen! Come in, come in!

[Enter Prince masked, the Court Fool as Mephistopheles, women and courtiers in fancy dress. The Miser leaps up.
Miser.
What robber-band is this?

Prince.
A jest, my friend.

Gentleman.
The Prince has lost his wager. Death has won.

Death.
To supper, gentlemen. Here's that shall pay.

Miser.
My gold! Alas, my gold!

Death.
But yet you live.

[Exeunt maskers singing.

THE WAGER

Time, 1650. Twilight The Duke's garden near Tours.

• Claire de Chastel Blanc, a lady of the Duchess.
• René La Tour.
• The Vicomte de Lancival.

La Tour walks moodily to and fro.
La Tour.
[Pauses.
[He sings as he walks.
[A servant enters with a letter. La Tour takes it and stands in thought, smiling. He opens it in an absent way, not yet reading it.
[Glances at the letter.
[He walks to and fro, in thought, and then slowly tears up the letter, retaining the fragments.
[Pauses.
I will not do it.
[As he speaks he casts away the torn paper and wanders aimlessly to and fro in the Duke's garden. Of a sudden he sees Claire seated and busy with the roses lying in her lap.
(Aside.)

[Coming up behind Claire, he bends over and kisses her. She starts to her feet.
Claire.
Now, by dear Marie and all saints above,
You—René—kissed me!

La Tour.
Yes, and, on my soul,
I'm glad and sorry: that sums up the whole,
The sin and penance; larger joy and pain
Than ever I shall know in life again.
[She is silent.
For God's sake, speak to me; say something, Claire.

Claire.
Your shame lacks courage, sir; how could you dare?

La Tour.
Fate, fortune, luck, have never known to spare
Head, heart, or purse of mine. 'T is very rare
My follies pay as well. How could I dare?
The question 's childlike, madam. What! in tears!
These were not counted in my list of fears.

Claire.
An idle gossip warned me yestereve
Of this, and you; yet how could I believe
Of one who once—no matter. What I said
Did cost one shameless cheek its share of red.
He little liked my comment; nor would you
Who tossed about amid a gambling crew
What estimate to put upon a kiss,
And set its worth at haply that or this.
He, laughing, swore the chivalry of wine
Did make you set a double price on mine.
You gaily urged, they say, that stolen fruit
Is ever sweeter. May I ask, to suit
The pretty poetry of tavern hours,
If that be also true of stolen flowers?
What need to talk? You have the prize you sought,
A courteous wager!

La Tour.
Madame, he who brought
This garnished story lied.

Claire.
It matters naught;
A man shall question you.

La Tour.
That were but just;
In point of fact, I really think he must;
And 'twixt a tongue-stab and a rapier-thrust
I gladly choose the latter; but why both
To punish one who never yet was loath
To face a man? Before a mistress' tongue
I cry for pity as I did when young.
Down goes my flag; I counted not the cost,
Else had this silly bet been gladly lost.

Claire.
Jest if it please you. Better men have died
For lighter cause than this.

La Tour.
So, I am tried,
Condemned past hope. Ah, Claire, thou ever art
The same cold woman. Could I call my heart
To witness for me—

Claire.
'T is a feebler jest.

La Tour.
Perhaps! perhaps! But let me be confessed.
Give one decree to die his little hour.
The gay temptation of a minute's power
Set in my way the honey of a flower;
And, by your leave, we'll say it was a rose
The bee-god Cupid robbed; and, I suppose,
A dainty diet, to be held more sweet
Than common clover honey.

Claire.
You may treat
This insult lightly—

La Tour.
Madam, I believe
Men have kissed women since the days of Eve;
'T is very frequent. Such fair goods, you know,
Are bartered, stolen, sold or high or low;
The market varies. One may cost a life,
A curse, a kingdom, win or lose a wife.
[La Tour pauses, while Claire stands in silence.
Have you no answer, madam? I have tried
Love, logic, penitence, have not denied
The muse her pretty privilege to defend
This naughty brigand here without a friend.
Now, what 's a kiss that naught can it atone?

Claire.
The trembling scales of loyal love alone
May know to weigh this coin of nature's own.
You cast the shadow of a nameless fear,
You left the memory of an angry tear.
Go! I could wish that you were lying dead,
Ay, here, to-night, ere this had need been said.

La Tour.
Am I so surely hated?

Claire.
Call it hate,
Contempt—a woman's sorrow.

[She moves away.
La Tour.
Pray you wait.
What if I swear this wager, wildly made,
Was lost? Wilt say—?

Claire.
That you were more afraid
Than fits a man.

La Tour.
Yes, that may well be said.
'T is you I fear.

Claire.
Me! There was once an hour,
Oh, very long ago, should still have power
To hurt you now. What is there more to say?

La Tour.
Yes, there are ghosts no priest has power to lay;
One is to-morrow, one is yesterday;
Both have your words called up to-night for me.
But ghosts like these at least do set one free
From such poor scare-souls as an honest blade.
That lays all spectres! Madam, undismayed
I bow before my judge and glad accept
The fate this wretched hour for me has kept.
And for De Lancival, I promise he
Shall in the quickest blade of Picardy
Find naught to hinder what your lips decree.
Say,—when you think upon this hour and me,—
“He loved me once.” Be that slight epitaph
Deep graven where the miserable half
Of life's most worthless memories serves to keep
Some fading thought of such as, thankful, sleep,
And wake no more on earth.

Claire.
You loved me?

La Tour.
Ay.

Claire.
How can it be? If once you loved me, why,
Why did your folly choose of all who live,
Of all fair women, me alone to give
This tavern feast a flavor? Pray you go.
The modest gentleman I seemed to know
In memory, kindly, tender, brave, and true,
Died very long ago. He is not you.
As willingly would I forget this night
And think it also dead. You won the right
To claim your wager.

La Tour.
Madam, it is I
Shall tell the Viscount, and with me shall die,
I promise you, this story. I shall pay
With what this wrecked life owns of life. I pray,
As God is good, your pardon. Fare you well.

Claire.
Wait—wait a moment. No, you shall not tell.

La Tour.
And why not, madam?

Claire.
Hush!

[De Lancival approaches, singing.
De Lancival.
He kissed her twice,
Or was it thrice?
Oh, what will kisses fetch?
You may buy a score
For a louis d'or.
Now, that 's a pretty catch.
Out with it, Claire.
What fortune had he? Did he really dare?
No need to go, La Tour. We all have heard.
Oh, there were bets on it. Right well it stirred
The inn's good fellows. I, too, had my bet
La Tour would lose.

Claire.
Indeed!

La Tour.
At what was set
My beggared chance of fortune?

De Lancival.
I forget.

Claire.
I, too, am curious.

De Lancival.
I am not clear
How much it was; a very trifle, dear:
Some dozen louis—hardly worth one's while.

Claire.
Yet it might set the value of—

La Tour.
A smile—

De Lancival.
Who said a smile? 'T was nothing but a kiss.

Claire.
They make fair company. Perchance to miss
The gracious comment of a smile might take
Some value from the lips' resort, and make
Their rosy honors less.

De Lancival.
What did I bet?
[Searches his tablets.
I had it yesternight. Just here 't was set,
Upon my honor!

La Tour.
That 's a pious oath
That no commandment breaks.

De Lancival.
St. Denis! Both
Are set to read me riddles. I for one—

La Tour.
An easy riddle. Nowhere 'neath the sun
On land or sea the thing is found. Pardie!
Swear by a thing less mortal.

De Lancival.
I make free
To think you mock me. But who was it won?

La Tour.
I won, my lord. The trick was neatly done.

De Lancival.
You won? Claire! Claire!

La Tour.
Indeed, it so befell,
I won my ducats and some thoughts as well
A man could do without.

Claire.
It is not true.
The beau sire jests—no courteous thing to do.

La Tour.
By Venus, I have but my word to give.
Here as she sat I kissed her, as I live!

De Lancival.
Ye saints! The man has luck. Now, when I bring
This news to-night, the tavern roof will ring.
I never dared as much. To kiss her hand
Was my slim ration. I may understand
You really kissed her?

La Tour.
Yes.

De Lancival.
Well—as one may
Kiss any woman for a wager's play;
Had she kissed you I should have more to say.

Claire.
Then take the truth: I kissed him as he lay
A-sleeping in the garden. Now, sir, pray,
What is it more your lordship has to say?

De Lancival.
You kissed La Tour?

Claire.
I did.

De Lancival.
Now, by my sword—

La Tour.
That's near kin to cursing. Well, my lord—

De Lancival.
Is this a jest?

Claire.
That may somewhat depend
On how a maudlin tragedy shall end.

La Tour.
I wait your orders, Viscount.

De Lancival.
Nonsense! Why
Should you or I for such a trifle die?
Yet, as a friend, La Tour, I take fair leave
To doubt her story.

La Tour.
Then, my lord,—I grieve
To put it coarsely,—does this lady lie?
I wait your answer. Is it she or I?
She doth depose to kissing one La Tour.
He swears in turn and is devoutly sure
He kissed the lady. Neither doth exclude
Belief in either. You, my lord, are shrewd.
Which is the sinner?

Claire.
Stay, sir.

De Lancival.
You shall hear
From me to-morrow.

La Tour.
And why not next year?
Had I once loved this gentle lady's face
His shrift were short, and small his chance of grace,
That dared to think those haughty lips could kiss
A man whom, dead, no man on earth would miss
Save some poor tapster. Sir, you seem to show
Small skill at riddles. Follow me.

Claire.
No, no.
Here must it end. A most unseemly brawl!
I'll have no more of it. It does not call
For such grave consequences. Let it end.

De Lancival.
With all my heart; and now, to surely mend
A needless quarrel, I, for one, agree
A kiss, my mischief-brewing maid, shall be
My own reward, his ransom.

Claire.
Here must stop
This tragedy, which seems inclined to drop
To something comic. I have long endured
A bond not of my making. Rest assured
This day forever breaks it.

La Tour.
And beware,
Be very careful that you do not share
This tale with tap-room friends. Remember, too,
I lost this wager and will pay my due.

De Lancival.
When once the wine is out comes folly in.
So said the Duke, and bet that you would win
And vow you did not. For my lady there,
She'll change her mind to-morrow. I can bear
My tenth dismissal gaily.

[He goes away singing.
“I would I were a priest,”
Quoth the devil;
“I would shrive me twice a day
And then revel.”
“I would I were a girl,”
Quoth the devil,
“With a lie in every curl.”
La Tour.
He shall rue
This insolence.

Claire.
No, René. What of you?

La Tour.
No more of me. I rid you of a fool
Who went his way as unconcerned and cool
As though love's perfect roses knew to grow
On every hedge. Now have I also earned
The tardy wages of a fool, and learned
Too late the lesson of a vain regret
For what life might have been.

Claire.
And yet—and yet—

La Tour.
By heaven, do not trifle with me now! Take care!
Think ere you speak. Be very certain, Claire.
Hope was so dead. I count it no light thing
To give love's winter rose a day of spring.
You tremble, hesitate—
[Voices from a distance call, “Claire, Claire!” La Tour seizes her hand as she turns to go.
Ah, let me share
Your heart's wise counsel, Claire. I pray you spare
A man twice hurt. Give me a minute, one—
[Voices call her. She moves away in haste.
You cannot leave me thus.

Claire.
Sir, I have done.
You won your bet. But what, sir, gave the right
To think you won a heart?
[The voices approach.
Enough. Good-night.

[La Tour looks after her until she is lost behind a hedge in the twilight.
La Tour.
The man is gone to heal his petty smart
With wine, sure balsam for a broken heart.
A comedy? Perhaps! And, by the rood,
The plot unlooked for and the acting shrewd:
A stately woman, resolute and sweet,
A bragging coward; and, to be complete,
This tavern hero, with, one ought to state,
King of the stage, Life's greatest actor, Fate!
I served her purpose well, and so once more—
I ever the sad loser as before—
We part. The usual ending, exeunt all.
And for the moral: It doth oft befall
One woman pays with usury the debts
Of that half-dozen maids a man forgets.
[A glove cast over the hedge falls at La Tour's feet; he picks it up.
I would it were my lord's. A woman's glove!

Claire.
What rhymes to that?

La Tour.
By every saint above,
How should I know?

Claire.
Why not a woman's love?

BARABBAS

Tents in the hills north of Bethlehem. Evening, near to dusk. An aged Hebrew standing before a tent chants.

Dramatis Personae:

• Amplias.
• Yacob.
• Barabbas.
• David.

Yacob.
When He opens the gates of the morning,
Bow lowly to pray.
When He closes the gates of the evening,
Thank Him for thy day.
Enter His courts with thanksgiving,
Enter with praise;
The gates of His Mercy are open
All gracious His ways.
[He ceases and watches a lad, who comes quickly.
Why are you here? I trust the flocks are safe.

David.
The shepherd guards them and they cannot stray.
I saw two strangers coming; one seemed blind.
I thought them lost, but he who could not see
Said to the other, “Come, some tents are near,
We shall find friends.” But then the other said,
“Or quite as likely Arab plunderers.”
Then I thought fit to say, “A welcome waits;
My father's tents lie yonder. Follow me.”
The young man answered, “We must trust your words.
This blind man found me wandering and starved;
He gave me food and water, saying, ‘Come!’
I followed him in wonder and in doubt.”
The blind man, father, did not wait or speak,
And I ran by in haste to tell of them.

Yacob.
It may be, son, he is not really blind;
A beggar's fraud, perhaps. What matters it!
Go quickly, son, and fetch the bread and salt.

[He greets the two men as they draw near. The blind man touches head, heart, and lips, as he bends, remaining silent. His companion touches his forehead and bows. The host returns the Oriental salutation of the blind man.
Yacob.
Take of my bread and salt; my tents are yours.
[They accept.
The peace of God which passeth other peace
Be with you ever.

Barabbas.
May your days be long,
Long in the land that once was ours alone.

[Meanwhile Amplias, the younger man, who has been uneasily watchful, murmurs to himself.
Amplias.
(Aloud)
Ah! Hebrews both, and surely to be trusted,
May the great God of Chance be good to you,
And, fortune-favored, may you live as long
As you are happy and all gods are kind—
Your gods and mine. What better can I wish?

Yacob.
Enter and share with us our evening meal.
(To David)
Fetch me cool water from the jar; their feet
May well be heat-sore from the desert sands.
(To Amplias)
Our people hereabout say David's spring
More than another has refreshing power.

Amplias
(At ease).
I passed the spring at sunset days ago,
And paused to watch the tall, lithe maidens come
With balanced water-jars upon their heads
And hand on hip, a merry company.
More black than midnight was their wind-blown hair;
I lingered, jealous of the golden light
That turned to bronze its darkness. I could spin
Gay verses on them to make envious
The fair-haired beauties of Athenian homes.

[The blind man sits silent.
Yacob
(Pleased and laughing).
Oft have I watched when in my younger days.
Their mothers came as now the daughters come;
I used to hear their gladsome chorus swell,
“Give us such lovers as came to the well,
Benaiah, Abishai, and Asahel.”

Amplias.
I caught gay fragments of some broken song,
My servants said was of the man you name,
This David, once a poet and a king.

Yacob.
Enter my tent. When you have cooled your feet,
Eaten and rested, you may hear the tale
Told as a brave man told it of himself.

Barabbas.
An ancient story of the poet-king
When we were not the cringing slaves of Rome.

[They lie at rest on the tent rugs while the lad bathes their feet and their hunger is satisfied.
Amplias.
My thanks, good lad. What is it you are called?

David.
David.

Amplias.
Indeed, a namesake of the king!
[He lies at ease, with hands clasped behind his head.
(To Yacob)
You should know more of us—of me, at least.
Hunger and thirst are foes to courtesy!

Yacob.
We ask no name but guest of those to whom
We gladly give what God to us has given,
Who are His guests.

Amplias.
A gracious comment, yet
I claim the pleasant liberty to learn
Who is this gentle almoner of the gods.

Yacob.
My name is Yacob, and the lad, my son.
We, as you see, are merely shepherd folk,
Well pleased when some one from the busy world
Brings news a six-months old, or haply takes
A sheep or two for taxes, and we hear
Which Cæsar rules.

Amplias.
Your name will live with me.
A welcome guest of oft-reminding hours.
My name is Amplias, a Greek by birth,
Rich when at home, but now a stranded man
With what of life disastrous fortune left
When robber Arabs fell on me and took
My slaves, my beasts, and left me little else.
This blind man's kindness led me safely here.
What instinct guides me? When I questioned him,
Grateful and curious, he made brief replies
And said no needless word from morn to eve,
When talk or jest had eased a weary way.

Yacob
(Laughing).
Talk if you will. We are not quite unlearned,
And talk with one who knows the outer world
Is always welcome to a lonely man.

Amplias.
I have seen men and cities, wrangled too
With mad philosophers or played with verse,
And won with wit the rose-crown of the feast;
Have wandered far, and now that I am fed
Am what I was not these three talk-starved days.
I doubt if empty nightingales could sing!
First for the song, and then, perhaps, the friend
Who led me hither will confess the charm
Shared with the swallow on his airy flight.

[Barabbas has meanwhile been a silent listener. The lad sitting near him feels now the touch of the blind man as he speaks.
Barabbas.
You have lived half your life the weathercock
Of every wind that blows—of every breeze.

Amplias.
Now there, at last, our friend has something said,
A weathercock's a rather useful thing—
A tireless sentinel, and much in use
To point sage morals for the young, when age
Has set sad limits to men's naughtiness
And left one luxury, the power to scold.

Yacob
(Pleasantly).
A restless symbol of the joy of change
You Greeks so dearly love. Now then, blind friend,
Your answer to our merry weathercock.

Barabbas
(To Yacob).
He shall be answered when my hour has come.
I am called Barabbas;—once you knew me well.

Yacob
(Smiles).
The storms of life, I fear, have wrecked for me
Too many memories of younger days,
And after all the name is not the man.

Barabbas.
You were the Rabbi Yacob. Once we met—
Not since that day have I seen face of man.

Amplias.
That seems to hint a story. May I ask—

Barabbas.
Ask—you may ask in vain; what matters it!

Amplias.
I pray you, pardon me; but really now
The talk goes back to something worth one's while,
Grows eloquent of opportunity,
And we may talk until the cool of night
Leaves silver moons upon the dewy grass.
That 's worth remembrance for a fertile hour.

[Writes on his tablets.
Yacob.
Thanks for a pleasant thought. Sing now, my son,
And keep some memory of those silver moons
We used to call the Arab spider-tents.
Forget us all, and be the poet-king.

[The boy rises proudly and chants.
David.
This is a psalm of remembrance,
A song to be sung
Of three friends who loved me
When I was still young.
Dry-lipped from the desert
I slumbered, accurst
With dreams of far waters
That mocked at my thirst.
I stood, a boy shepherd,
Where guarding the brink
The maidens asked coyly
A song for a drink;
Or naked and heated
I lay where below
The sun-gift from Lebanon
Crumbled to snow,
Till gaily, dream-happy,
I raced through the shade
Where far-braided silver
Of rivulets strayed.
What joy for the kiss of
The virginal pool,
Whose chaste water clasped me
Delicious and cool,
Where the white lilies rocked
In the sun-cradled light.
When waking, and thirsting,
I moaned in the night,
And cried, with lost manhood,
“Who is there will bring
Where Philistines guard it,
A draft from the spring?”
At morning I saw them—
Men bleeding, and dumb,
Till Asahel murmured,
“My lord, we are come.
We smote in the mid-watch
The Philistine band;
We smote till the sword hilt
Was locked to the hand.
The vultures are stooping
To find at the spring
The dead who once guarded
The water we bring—
The water you asked for.”
They gave to my fear
The skin bag men carry
When battle is near.
Ah, me, the mad longing!
“Far be it, oh Lord!”
On the sand of the desert
The water I poured:
“To the God of our fathers
I give what you gave;
I drink not, my brothers,
The blood of the brave!”

Amplias.
That voice in Rome, my lad, would bring you gold.

Barabbas.
Does it bring nothing but a thought of gold?

Amplias
(Gaily).
Nothing? Indeed! It opens golden mines
Of thought, conjecture, questions numberless.
The water wasted on the desert sand
Was such libation as at feasts we pour
To Bacchus, master of the festal hour.

Barrabas.
He gave from need, and you of base excess.

Amplias
(Pleasantly).
No single motive ever rules a man.
The custom may be old, and vanity
Has many forms, as thus—

David
(Aside to Yacob).
I hate the man.

Amplias.
What says the lad?

Yacob.
Now answer him, my son,
Say what you will. Speak out your honest thought.

David.
I'm very sorry that I sang for you;
You would have drunk the water. You, our guest,
Insult the memory of our hero-king.

Amplias.
No man can say what such an hour may bring;
Decisions vary with the weather's change.

Barabbas.
Bird-witted ever, these light-minded Greeks!

Amplias.
Another hour of thirst might—I suppose
Those men drank deeply at the conquered spring?

David
(Angrily).
They did not drink.

Amplias.
And wherefore not, my lad?

David.
I do not know; they went and came athirst.

Yacob.
The lad would say that had he been of them
To kill and quench his thirst had lost their gift
The nobleness of sacrificial honor.

David.
I should have done as they did, now I know.

[For a time no one speaks. Yacob rises and throws wide the tent-flaps. Amplias also rises, takes water from the water-jar, and leaning against the tent-pole speaks.
Amplias.
When one goes wandering in that lesser world—
Why not the greater—which men call the mind,
He has adventures, like all travelers.—

Barabbas
(Abruptly).
What find you now to mock a noble deed?

Amplias.
While I flew carelessly the kites of thought,
A naughty thief of manners stole away
The gentlehood of courtesy. It was
A noble deed, my lad, and fitting well
The honor of a poet and a man.

Yacob.
Take you our thanks. I, too, was wandering,
What is this gift, which lacking, man is dead?

Barabbas.
One of our rabbis said, “The wine of God.”

Amplias.
That 's worth remembrance; just the thought-winged phrase
A poet finds in some unequaled hour.

[Uses his tablets.
Yacob.
Of all the gifts of God most wonderful,
Ocean or dewdrop, terrible or sweet.

Amplias
(Gently, after a pause).
Again a thought, for but a moment lost.
If your one God has power infinite,
It follows surely that He may at will
Give to Himself infinity of joy,
And in some isolated wonderment
Supremacy of happiness acquire,
The artist gladness in created things.

Yacob.
He saw, and said the world He made was good.

Amplias.
I could suggest exceptions.

Yacob.
There are none.
For one who sees things with the eyes of Christ.

Barabbas.
The eyes of Christ!—Ah, me, the eyes of Christ!

[Amplias regarding him is silent a moment, and then says to Yacob:
Amplias.
That which your God called good I do not know.
A rose is beautiful, but is it good?
What has your Christ to do with it? For me
The world is but a very little place
Through which one carries this thing called himself.
One travels to escape monotony,
Or memories, or such absurd demands
On purse or heart as vex a man, and sow
With sleepy poppies every garden space
Where bloom the flowers of joy and idleness.
I am to love my neighbor as myself—
Or so my mother taught me. She, I saw,
Is trapped by this philosophy of Christ.
My neighbor! Well, but what becomes of me?

Yacob.
I trust, you listened.

Amplias.
No, in came a girl,
And then we fled. But now I find again
In one strange phrase my sightless friend let fall
This Christ, of whom in Cæsar's palaces
Noble and knight in cautious whispers speak;
Gentile and Jew bend down in prayer to him,
Inheritors of some new hopefulness.

Yacob.
And you that love the old and mock the new,
Would you know more of Him who died for man?

Amplias.
I said the world was small. Once long ago
When feasting gaily by the Ægean sea,
And we were glad with music, love, and wine,
One sober fool cast mid our idle talk
Words of this new revolt against the gods.
A Roman gentleman, a man in years,
Who sought the charm Falernian vineyards bring
To make the minute young, said quietly,
“I have some dim remembrance of the man.
An arrogant, rebellious priesthood asked,
As was the custom at their annual feast,
That I set free one criminal. They chose
A leader of revolt, and so to please
Unruly Jews I sent this Christ to death.
To-day men talk of this Judean serf;
I had quite forgotten it; but now, of late,
I sometimes wonder if—'twas but a chance,
The other man had been the crucified.—
Ho there, my girl, you of the golden hair!
Fill, fill my goblet.”
There was Christ again!
A sudden silence fell upon the feast,
Till one beside me said, “That other man
Had on his side the cheerful God of Luck.”

Barabbas
(Rising)
I was that other man.

Yacob.
What, you! Not you!

Amplias.
So cross men's fates. I said the world was small!

Yacob
(To Barabbas).
You were the hero of the priestled mob!
We both are old. I, too, am one of those
Who saw that day of wonder and of fear.

Amplias.
I would hear more.

Yacob.
Ask of Barabbas then.

Barabbas.
And if my heart I open wide to him,
Will he but use for subtleties of talk
The strangest hour the world has ever known?

Amplias.
I shall but use it as my reason bids.

Barabbas.
I do not know. You took the gift of life
As takes a child some new and fragile toy,
And had no word of thankfulness to God.

Amplias.
You had my thanks. What other god save Chance
Had I to thank for that large gift of life?
There is no God. The gods of Greece are dead;
The joy, the beauty and the grace of life
Are gone with them. What now is left to me?
Once as a boy I walked alert to see
Some prick-eared fawn go gaily prancing by,
Or sure I heard Diana's crescent bow
Release wild music from the parting string,
Whence silver arrows hurtled through the wood,
Where tramped with laughter all her buskined maids.
And white-limbed Venus, mistress of delight!
Ah, there 's a goddess will outlive all gods!
I found her smiling through a dozen girls.

Barabbas.
Fantastic mockeries of love or power,
The puppet fancies of men's poet-dreams.

Amplias.
If the gods gave us poets, or they, gods,
Poet and god immortal dreamers were,
And from the faded pages of old books
In days unborn the ghosts of gods will rise
To preach a creed of beauty, love, and joy,
And be the comrades of a poet's hour.
One God! you say. No sooner is there one
Than our poor pagan nature finds a need
To personate anew His attributes,
Or so I gather from my mother's talk.

Yacob.
The night is with us. I would have my say
In sober morning hours before you leave.

Amplias.
I find the midnight hour a wiser friend.
I mock at no man's creed, and least of all
At what beliefs my gentle mother holds.
But since are gone my beautiful dear gods,
I 've lost the chastity of virgin faith;
Religion must be beautiful for me
My mother's faith is sorrowful and sad
And has no wings of joy. What else is left?

Yacob.
Ah, me, alas! When I was young as you,
Question and answer, all the strife of tongues,
Were more to me than honest search for truth.
It may be so with you, I judge you not;
But take with you to that strange world of sleep
From which we bring so very little back,
An old man's words of Him you seem to meet
Or here or there wherever you may stray.
In yonder little town upon the hill
Long years ago a child of God was born.
He taught, as none have taught, the creed of love;
He had but little life. In those few years
He wrought strange wonders, healed men's mortal ills,
To win the crude belief of simple souls;
Bade others follow him for what he was
And what his wisdom taught to win to him
The more reluctant mind of thoughtful men.
He put aside the Hebrew's dream of power
And, a mute king of truth, accepted death;
But ask Barabbas now how this man died.

Barabbas.
I keep no count how many years have gone
Since I have told to any man this tale;
Though I am old, I do not seem to age
More than the sea that is forever young.
When, as Pilatus told, he set me free
To calm the priesthood, they were doubly pleased,
For I had led a weak and vain revolt
Which broke against the Roman's rock of power;
And thus my freedom doomed the silent man
To what I looked for, scourge and crucifix.
Set free! I shudder that it seemed so sweet.
Like to one drowning who sets foot on land,
I drew long breaths of open air and glad
Basked in the sun unseen for many a month,
I was the hero of an hour, and shared
The priesthood's hatred and their scorn of Him
Whose silence was the ransom of my life.
I followed them with thoughts at last set free
From night-long dreams of anguish on the cross
Till clanking fetters woke me to despair.
The man I watched upon his way to death
Bent stumbling 'neath his cross; and then and there
Some pity for this strange, insulting death
Held me to thought of what I might have been
Had he but made one eloquent appeal.
Why was he silent? He deserved to die.
False to our fathers' creed, he had the power
To lead a host to freedom, and for God
To call to battle all those crouching slaves,
Sweep clean the land from Moab to the sea
And hurl the Roman from his seat of pride!
A king of men! In some uplifting hour
The prophet hand that gave the Maccabee
Victorious visions and a sword of gold
Had won this wasted life to strike and slay.

[Barabbas, who had been standing, sinks down exhausted, and all are silent until Amplias speaks.
Amplias.
You cannot leave me with this half-told tale.
How died this man of whom while yet he lived
Only Judea knew,—but now, though dead,
Lives like the risen sun with growing power?

Yacob.
I too would hear—I did not stay to see
The fading sunset of a noble life.

Barabbas.
It is not easily told—

Amplias.
Nor lightly heard.

[Barabbas rises again feebly and leaning against the tent-pole is silent, and at last speaks.
Barabbas.
The mocking rabble slowly moved away,
While I in silence lingered, wondering
What secret held this suicidal death.
So rich a life with such calm courage spent,
While I who for my nation boldly dared
Had feared for months the scourging and the cross.
That I might be where now this brave man hung
Thrilled me at last with strange companionship
In His long torture's awful loneliness.
The guard lay idly round a waning fire,
The stern centurion stood indifferent;
Only the sob of women far away
Came and was lost. A soldier stirred the fire.
Some power of capture in the pleading eyes
Drew me yet nearer till all will was lost;
When that long wail of agonized appeal
Broke on the friendless silence of the night,
My eyes were His to hold—His eyes were mine.
The blood-stained cross shook with the throes of death;
The black hair heavy with the sweat of death,
Dropped o'er the fallen head, while suddenly
The earth rocked under me. I heard afar
The screams of women and the cries of men,
Uprooted trees, the crash of wall and tower;
And through it ever those beseeching eyes
I saw and fell, and reeling rose again
Blind, blind forever, as my soul had been,
With one last memory of those seeking eyes.

Amplias
(Gravely).
As strange a story as was ever told!
Why you it plainly cost so much to tell
Chose for the hearing one you pleased to call
A mere light-minded trifler, you may know;
At least you have the gratitude of thanks
From one too apt to hide his graver thought
Beneath a mask, but now would ask of you
What sequel has the tale no man could hear
Without distress for that man and for you.

Barabbas.
No, it is not the end. For many a year
Through perils numberless my steps have gone,
The alms of death denied my beggared life.
From land to land a gentle child-like hand,
Or some low voice of warning guided me.
This, this at least, whatever else you doubt,
You cannot dare to question. Everywhere
This tender touch has led me unto men
Who are the servants of this Christ who died.
That hand, unfelt, still leads you near to Him.
My tale is told, and I must wander on.

Yacob.
Why not abide with us?

Barabbas.
No, I must go.
When that still guiding hand is lost to me,
Then I shall know that I have led to Christ
A soul that brings me to my journey's end;
Ah! then perhaps those eyes of agony
Will smile on me. I have so often tried,
And tried in vain.

Amplias.
Take then to sleep my thanks
For something more than merely food and life.

Barabbas.
The peace of God be with you all to-night.

Yacob
(To Barabbas).
David, my son, will share with you his tent.
(To Amplias)
You will rest here with me, I trust, so long
As you find pleasure in our peaceful life.

[The lad returns in haste
David.
Barabbas asks for water—

[The boy hesitates.
Yacob.
Now, my son,
Why are you waiting? Take with you what else
Our guest may need for comfort and for rest.

David.
The man who came this evening to our tents,
As comes my dog to find me at the fold,
And for two days led here the man who sees—

[Pauses.
Amplias.
What else, my lad?

David
(Hesitating)
He did not seem to know
Which way to go; I led him like a child.
He only said, “Thank God, the eyes are gone!
The eyes are gone!” The man seemed very strange.

Yacob.
And was not troubled?

David.
No, he bade me say
The hand had left him, and the voice was still!

[Yacob stands in thought.
Yacob.
Perchance to-morrow he may be again
The man he was this morning. Go, my son.

[David leaves him.
Amplias.
Yes, I slept soundly, but those eyes he saw
Haunted my dreams. I go away to-day.
Now if your son will set me on the road,
Jerusalem will find me needed gold,
Friends of my people, and some days of rest.
I go just now to say my latest thanks
To this strange messenger with words as strange.

[He leaves, and returns in haste much disturbed.
Amplias.
Your son is sleeping and I did not wake him.
The man is dead.

Yacob.
Dead! Are you sure, my friend?

Amplias.
Yes, he is dead. I have seen many die,
But never one who like this stranger seemed
To smile upon me through the face of death.

Yacob.
Then he is happy. He has found perhaps
The man his life has sought.

Amplias.
Perhaps, perhaps!