University of Virginia Library

ACT I.

SCENE I.

The Great Hall in Calaynos' Castle. Enter Pedro and Baltasar, carrying bundles.
Pedro.
I like not this journey to Seville.

Baltasar.
O, you like nothing that savors of gentility.

Ped.

How can I like it? I tell you this genteel savor is deadly. I 'd as soon die by sprats as by turbot. I 've a rhyme in my head.

Balt.
And a rind over that: what is it?

Ped.
“When a Calaynos shall go to Seville,
Then sure that Calaynos shall go to ill.”

My grandam taught me that. She could read, and was a great diviner, with a beard that would make two of yours. She told fortunes by the way a cat jumped, or a sparrow flew; and as often hit the truth as the wisest of your scholars. If she hit it not, then was not the thing fore-ordered; and she left that for the schoolmen to wrangle about. Why does my lord go, Baltasar?

Balt.

To do homage for his lands, as all vassals must. The king granted his ancestors lands; and

my lord must acknowledge the king's right and sovereignty, as he holds the land from his forefathers.

Ped.

I know nothing of his aunt's sisters and his four fathers. If he had them, then was not his mother an honest woman. How many people go to the making of your one great lord! Now, I was turned out indifferent well; and, as I hope for grace, I had but one father, Haroun the Falconer, and no lands. Mayhap, some day, the king will take back his lands. Then what use are my lord's four fathers, more than my one?

Balt.
'T would pose him to do that.

Ped.

Here 's another wise thing! Is that a king's bounty? My lord says, “Sir king, I'll keep what 's my own most faithfully.” Says the king, “You may keep what 's not mine.” “Thank you most humbly, for nothing,” say my lord; and so they part. That's worth a journey to hear! Why, a fool can see through it.

Balt.
So I see.

Ped.

If you see, you are a fool, and fell in a fool's trap.

Balt.

So I see again, I fell in a fool's trap. Take up your traps, good fool, and be off; for here comes my lord.

[Exeunt with their bundles.]
(Enter Calaynos and Doña Alda.)
Doña Alda.
Nay, dear Calaynos, go not hence to-day.
Since morn, the clouds have hugged the hidden tops
Of the rude peaks that gird our mountain home;
Nor could the fiercest northern blasts shake off
Their close embrace. But now, in one huge mass,
The sluggish vapors down the mountains' sides
Roll like an inundation. Well thou know'st
That signs like these portend a coming storm:
Therefore, until the storm is past, delay;
For nothing urges this immediate haste.

Calaynos.
To please thee, Alda, I'll remain to-day.
But, for a mountain maiden, thou hast grown
Strangely afraid of gentle summer showers;
Perchance thy love exaggerates the fear.
Thou 'rt not thus chary to expose thyself
Even to the blasts which chilling winter blows.

Doña A.
If not to-day, why go to-morrow morn?
Or why next day? Or why go'st thou at all?
If thou wilt go, then let me go with thee.
An hour, and I'll be ready: I shall need
But scanty preparation to set forth.

Cal.
Thou hast forgotten. But a moment since,
Thy fear was brewing a fast-gathering storm;
Which thou, in fancy, on the mountains saw'st
Resting its threatening front. Alda, I see
That 't is thy fond intent to win my mind
From what I must perform. Long since in death
My father closed his eyes; yet ancient rites,
Which seigniors owe their liege, by me unmarked,
Their term of grace have passed. But now the king.
By stiff set phrase of law, allegiance claims,
And homage due demands.

Doña A.
Far be it from me
To counsel breach of law. Nay, go thou must;
But why not I with thee? Shall I thus pine,
Shut, like a cloistered nun, in these dark walls,
Whilst thou with retinue and pomp of power
Seville mak'st wonder?—Beautiful Seville!
Of which I 've dreamed, until I saw its towers
In every cloud that hid the setting sun;
Saw its long trains of youths and maidens fair
Sweep, like a sunlit stream, along the streets;
Saw its cathedrals vast, its palaces,
Its marts o'erladen with the Indies' spoils,
Its galleys rocking at the crowded quays;
Heard its loud hum by day, its airs by night
Struck from guitars, that guide the busy feet
Of rosy youth across the springing ground.
Methinks the moon shines brighter on Seville,
And every star looks larger for mere joy!
And then, Martina—

Cal.
Ah! Martina?—so.

Doña A.
But, dear Calaynos, thou 'lt not blame the girl:
She in Seville was born; her youthful days,
When the heart easiest takes impress of joy,
Were in Seville all past. Martina says
That 'mong the ladies there none could o'ertop
In state or retinue, or worship paid
By all the glittering throng that girds the throne,
The bride of great Calaynos.

Cal.
Alda, cease:
Thou 'rt pleading 'gainst thyself: nor dost thou know
How frail the fabric of the dream-wove vision,
When cunning Fancy plies her golden hand.

Doña A.
What meanest thou?

Cal.
Martina told but half:
Or did she tell how Sloth and Beggary,
Closely attended by their handmaid Vice,
Stare, with lack-lustre and ferocious eyes,
Into the porch of every palace-gate?
How Want creeps forth at night with tottering pace,
And 'gainst the windows of the revellers
Flattens its pinched and wasted features out,
Cursing the feasts for which one half the world
Labors unpaid? And, Alda, did she tell
Of marketable crime, of sin for sale?
Of multitudes neck-deep in ignorance,
Toiling with murmurs 'neath a servile yoke,
Checked and o'erawed by bayonet and axe?
How they who bend to power, and lap its milk,
Are fickler and more dangerous far than they
Who honestly defy it? How jealousy
Consumes their hearts who most caress and woo it?
Know'st thou the slippery falsehoods of the Court,
Where every step is on a quaking bog,
Where men spend lives on hopes and promises,
And pine on smiles, and starve on smooth-told lies?
Thou know'st not this; nor shall thy rustic mind,
Pure as the Guadalquiver, ere it flows
Past the foul sluices that Seville outpours,
Know aught of it.

Doña A.
If thou wilt have it so,
I needs must stay. But I shall count the hours,
And chide along the slow-paced summer days:
For thou art all with whom I dare to mate,—
A lonely queen, without a court or friend.
And, losing thee, thou leav'st me with these walls;
Whose forms I'll hate, because they rise between
Thee and myself. Ah! it is very sad
To be shut up, for days and days together,
With these old portraits of thy ancestors—
That look like Moors, though they be Christian men—
All mailed and helmed, whose knit and warlike brows
Beneath their casques send forth a settled scowl,
Darkening the hall; or see, like shadows, come
The old retainers, by my presence awed,
To beg some leave they need not have besought.
What gloomy state! Martina calls me Proserpine.

Cal.
Again Martina! Love, I fear thy maid
Has put these vagrant fancies in thy head.
I never liked her bold, pert, city modes:
With upturned nose she treads the castle floors,
As if she thought the very air might breed
Some loathsome plague. Then at our festivals—
Time-worn, though quaint and homely they may be—
A supercilious smile comes o'er her face;
As if she, fallen from paradise, perforce
Endured the antics of rude savages.
I like not that her busy tongue should stuff
Thy open ears, who 'rt ever ripe for change,
With all the worn-out tinsel of a town;
And breed in thee a discontent for state
Which many a queen might pine with envy for.

Doña A.
Calaynos, thou dost rate my girl too hard.
I wonder not that she, a city maid,
Should sometimes long for the more joyous scenes
With which her memory mocks our quiet life.

Cal.
Well, let her go—she is no slave of mine.

Doña A.
Her love for me has forged a stronger chain—

Cal.
Her love for thee! Nay, Alda, there are those
Who love to live where they may scold and frown,
And toss their heads at everything they see:
So, by affected knowledge, seem above
All the poor fools that round them wondering crowd.
Such is thy maid.

Doña A.
Calaynos, truce to this.
Martina loves me; shall I throw her off?

Cal.
I do not urge it. But thou 'rt lately grown
Strangely ill-humored with thy dwelling-place,
And vexed and discontented with thyself.
Come to the casement; look from these huge walls,
Whose massive strength has held a king at bay,
Down on the ripening fields of yellow grain;
Let thy eyes roam o'er swarming villages,
Busy with life and filled with happy hearts,
Far to the hills that, with their smoky heads,
Hem in the view and guard our favored vale.
Round this domain the proudest bird of air
Could scarcely circle with an untired wing;—
All this is thine. O, what a field for good
Lies here outspread before thee! Life employed
In ministration to this grateful land,
Would win for thee a place beside the saints.

Doña A.
Have I not ever given, at morn and eve,
To all the ragged band that throngs our gate?

Cal.
This is but half the task of charity.
Seek out the needy, cheer the wretched mind,
Urge on the slothful, pour thy spirit's balm
On wounds which time has fretted to the quick;
Counsel the weak, and make the strong more strong:
The soul has urgent need for faith and hope,
More pressing and immediate than the wants
The choking sailor feels upon the wreck.

Doña A.
Why, now, my lord, thou 'dst make a nun of me—
One of those maids of black-robed charity,
Who sometimes hither come, with solemn step,
To ask my bounty. Convents are there not,
By thee endowed, to feed these starving souls?

Cal.
Yes; but in works of good there cannot be
Too many hands; the task is ne'er o'erdone.
Alda, my grave discourse fatigues thy ear.—
Well, I must leave thee to prepare my train;
My home-bred knaves are slack at setting forth,
And I must urge them. Farewell, love!

Doña A.
Farewell!
[Exit Calaynos.]
Thus comes he ever with that thoughtful brow;
Thus goes he ever with that calm, cold mien;
Thus would he ever be, thus passionless,
If all the world were hissing in his face!
More like a father than a husband he—
O! how could love for me usurp abode
In such a heart! Martina, are you there?

(Enter Martina.)
Martina.
My lady, did you call?

Doña A.
Come hither, girl.
O, what a sermon has been preached to me!

Mar.
On what? by whom?

Doña A.
By whom but by my lord?
And what the subject, think you, of his speech?

Mar.
On the regeneration of the world;
Taking his text from Plato; quoting large,
In Greek and Hebrew, to make clear the fact
That two and two make four. Good Lord! they say
He talks the Cura out of countenance;
And so comes down upon the good man's head,
With hints of things above his scope of thought,
That he, both night and morning, prays kind Heaven
To keep your lord from utter heresy.

Doña A.
You have shot wide the mark; for charity
Was all he taught.

Mar.
Ho! ho! he 'd have you mount,
Like a mad nun, upon a sumpter mule,
And ride the country down, to vex the sick
With nauseous draughts; or have you thrust your face
In the affairs of every poor, proud man;
So would you gain wry mouths for recompense,
Or haughty curses.

Doña A.
Peace, you rattlepate!
My lord but thinks of benefits to man;
His every wish and act inclines to good.
And sometimes, in the dead and hush of night,
When evil thoughts dare scarcely walk abroad—
When loneliness and fear half play the part
Of humble holiness, and force the heart,
Despite its wicked bent, to virtuous plans—
Some random word, which he, in passing, dropped
On the light fallow of my wavering mind,
Springs up and blossoms, with a promise fair;
But with the morning dew dries up the fruit,
And I laugh down, as weak and childish fright,
What, 'chance, an angel whispered in my ear.

Mar.
Dear madam, you have grown as grave and sad
As your sage lord, by pondering o'er such things:
I prithee, drive them out with gayer thoughts;
Or all within the castle may become
A band of nuns and sourest anchorites.

Doña A.
Yet there is much of moment in these things,
Could we, of fickle purpose, deem them so.

Mar.
Lady, I heard an old physician say
That melancholy is the chiefest spring
Of raving madness. Dwell not on such thoughts.

Doña A.
And would you rob me of my very thoughts,
The only things I have to wile the time?
What can I do, but think, and think, and think,
In this unvarying castle?

Mar.
There it is!
Could you but see Seville in all its pomp,
As I have seen it, when the Court is there!
Could you but see our king ride through the gate,
Decked like the east when morn first opes her eye;
Hear the loud flourishes of trump and drum,
The glad huzzas, the rattling musketry,
The pealing bells, the thundering cannon-shots;
See the great ships, the ocean's swans, bedecked
With silken banners, of all shapes and dyes;
The courtiers see, the proudest stars of Spain,
In one grand constellation sweep along;
Then think that you, the brightest star of all,
Might blot them half with your superior light!—
Madam, my lord is wise to keep you here,
In total ignorance of your rank and power;
Once knowing these, and gaining but your due,
'T would stretch his arm to keep you from your rights.

Doña A.
But he has no desire for this gay court.

Mar.
He! why, to him the gay are butterflies,
Flitting around a light of which they die.
He looks on pleasure as a kind of sin;
Calls pastime waste-time. Each to his trade, say I.
I heard a man, who spent a mortal life
In hoarding up all kinds of stones and ores,
Call one, who spitted flies upon a pin,
A fool, to pass his precious lifetime thus!
What might delight you, lady, may not him;
And yet your pleasures argue you no fool,
Nor his grave brows prove a philosopher.

Doña A.
Stop, malpert girl! you 're trenching on my love;
Your glibly-flowing tongue must not presume
Too far upon the license I allow.
Thus every day, of late, I 've caught you up,
About to strike a side-blow at my lord.

Mar.
Pardon me, madam, if I went too far.
Of late my silly brain has been perplexed
With a great problem, which I cannot solve.
Thus runs the question: Who are wise, who fools?
The man with heavy brows and solemn thoughts
Looks on the gay as blanks in fortune's wheel;
But then the fool laughs in his sapient face.
At this the sage flies in a windy rage,
And calls hard names, and works his angry liver
To bilious fits, which end the good man's days;
When laughs the ribald jester more and more.
Now, which is wiser? He who frowns and scolds,
And views sweet nature in a sallow light;
Or he who takes what pleasure comes to hand,
Gleaning some honey from the bitterest flowers,
And, when death scowls, smiles in his hideous face?
Can you resolve?

Doña A.
Not I, philosopher.
Your gentle education has nigh spoiled
A most complete, well-mannered waiting-maid.
But there walks Oliver, in sober thought;
Call him; perchance he can resolve your doubts.

Mar.
Yes, there he goes—just see him, mistress dear!—
Backward and forward, like a weaver's shuttle,
Spinning some web of wisdom most divine,
I warrant you. Observe his solemn brows,
His monk-like gait, his cap without a plume,
His stiff and formal clothes, sans tag or braid.
There is a nursling of this house of learning!—
A man all head, without a heart or sense.
Once I made love to him, for lack of work,
And got a frown for all my tenderness;
Therefore I hate him! I can pardon one
Who felt affection, should he turn to hate;
But never one who slips my favors by.
Shall I address him?

Doña A.
If it pleases you.

Mar.
Ho, Oliver! ho, sage! a mortal calls—
A mortal wandering in dark error's path—
For light and succor!

(Enter Oliver.)
Oliver.
Did you call me, lady?

Doña A.
Martina called you.

Oli.
Yes, I know her voice.
I thought she called for you; her notes are pitched
Some octaves higher than your ladyship's,
And further heard.

Doña A.
Nay, you two jar at once,
When brought in contact. Well, you must e'en strike
Your angry blows without a witness near.

[Exit.]
Mar.
So, then, you think my voice is over shrill
For your soft ears, attuned to Plato's spheres!

Oli.
Why did you call so loud, I walking near?

Mar.
You near! I thought you half way up to heaven:
How can a man be where his mind is not?
Wherein consists this thing which you call I—
In your gross flesh, or in your heaven-born spirit?

Oli.
Strive not to vex me with such mockery.
All your pert smartness, and your sallies shrewd,
Are spent with loss on ears as dull as mine.

Mar.
Ugh! man, but I do hate you!

Oli.
Hate me, then.

Mar.
Our clay, the preachers say, was warmed to life;
But yours, your dull, cold mud, was frozen to being.
I would not be the oyster that you are,
For all the pearls of wisdom in your shell!

Oli.
A truce to this! I haul my colors down;
I have no means to fight your light-armed tongue.
But I must warn you—for I late o'erheard
The words which you with Lady Alda held—
That if you urge your sensual doctrines more,
To the pollution of my lady's thoughts,
My lord shall know it.

Mar.
Pshaw! I meant no harm.

Oli.
I know not what you mean, but harm you do

Mar.
Why talk you thus, you demi-atheist?
I 've heard you hold a creed against the church,
Which, spread abroad, might overturn the world,
And send us all unbaptized to the pit.
They say you have no faith in good men's prayers;
And talk not of salvation, but progression.—
Are these things so?

Oli.
Are you Inquisitor?

Mar.
Did you say aught against the Holy Office?

Oli.
No word, to you, O, pious Catholic!

Mar.
Ambassador from cloud-land, take your leave
I do not wish to vex an oracle;
And we have bandied words enough to-day.

Oli.
I go; but keep my warning in your mind.

[Exit.]
Mar.
That man of learning has a lynx's eye
I'll be more circumspect: it will not do
To have the great Calaynos at my ears;
To leave behind a home as warm as this,
Where I'm half mistress of whate'er it holds,
Again to struggle with the ruthless world:
Yet to Seville I'll go for wantonness.
Well, we shall see what woman's craft can do
Against the brains of two philosophers.

[Exit.]

SCENE II.

The Study of Calaynos. Enter Oliver.
Oliver.
I do not like this journey of my lord's—
And yet I know not why; the path is safe,
And we are guarded by a retinue.
'T is many a year since last I saw Seville;
'T is natural, therefore, I should wish to go:
Yet do I not. What can this feeling mean?
Is it that influence, o'ermastering will,
Presentiment, which pulls me from the wish,
And presses on my heart its leaden weight?
I 've heard that soundest sleepers will awake
When danger steals upon them. It may be
The first low knocking of death's pallid hand,
Ere he flings wide the gate which shelters life,
That so appalls my mind and shakes my purpose.
Pshaw! this is idle.—I must e'en end thus,
As I began, I do not wish to go.

(Enter Calaynos.)
Calaynos.
Are all things ready for our setting forth?

Oli.
They are, my lord.

Cal.
Then, at the break of day,
Mount all the train.

Oli.
You have delayed till then?

Cal.
Yes; 't was my lady's wish, not my intent.
But on the morrow we must sure begone;
We do but give our parting lengthened pangs
By keeping doubt alive.

(Enter a Servant.)
Servant.
My lord, old Friar Gil is in the hall,
And craves admittance.

Cal.
Friar Gil! how 's this?
'T was but a week ago we met, and then
He tottered so beneath his weight of years,
He scarce could ope the door that guards his cell.

Ser.
He seems to walk with pain, and well-nigh dropped
Ere we could bring him to the neighboring hall.

Cal.
Admit him, then. [Exit Servant.]
'T is near a miracle;
So feeble—

(Enter Friar Gil.)
Friar Gil.
Son, my blessing!

Cal.
Welcome, Father!
Thou art fatigued and weakened by thy walk.—
What cause has drawn thee from thy cell so far?
Such lengthened walks, to one of thy great age,
Are full of peril. Why not send for me?
Bring a chair, Oliver. [Oliver places a chair.]

So, sit thee down.

Friar G.
I feared to miss thee; as I lately heard
That thou design'st a journey to Seville:
I came to warn thee from that dangerous step.

Cal.
Dangerous! What danger do you know or fear?

Friar G.
None that is certain, every one I fear.

Oli.
Ha! here 's another seer. [Aside.]


Cal.
Father, thy path through life was long and hard,
And thou hast gathered wisdom by the way;
But this idea is baseless fantasy.

Friar G.
Hear me, Calaynos! As I lay last night
Sleepless, but why I know not, on my bed,
Telling my beads and thinking o'er my sins,
Thy grandsire, as I saw him ere he left
This castle for Seville, before me stood,
Pointing his hand, through which the moonbeams shone,
To a great gash beneath his lifted arm;
Then, solemnly and slow, he waved his hand,
As if in warning, towards the castle-gate.
I strove to speak; but, ere my tongue was loosed,
The melancholy shadow passed away.
So, with the dawn, I rose to seek thee here:
Once turned me back, to 'scape thy lordship's laugh;
But, ere three steps were taken, I prostrate fell,
Though the path 'neath me was without a stone.
It seemed the will of heaven that urged me on,
And gave my feeble frame unwonted strength:
So have I sought thee, though but half in hope,
To overrule thee in this enterprise.

Cal.
For thy kind zeal I thank thee. 'T was a dream,
Bred on a superstition of our house,
That to my race Seville brings fated death.

Friar G.
Has it not been? Did not the one I saw
Fall at Seville, struck by a coward's steel
Over the wine-cup? So thy father thought;
And he did homage by a deputy,
As oft I 've heard him say. Go further back;
All of thy race shunned, as a plague, Seville.
And thou, the last of all the mighty line,
The wisest, greatest, without heir or kin,
Wouldst tempt thy fate, though nothing urges thee!

Cal.
This is a thing at which my reason laughs,
And naught but actual trial can resolve.

Friar G.
Go, go, thou headstrong man! Nay, I'll not chide;
May God go with thee! I have done my part.

[Going.]
Cal.
Farewell! We'll meet again.

Friar G.
Perhaps—farewell!

[Exit.]
Oli.
I hope, my lord, you'll take the Friar's advice.

Cal.
Take what?—Take hellebore, good Oliver!
For you with Friar Gil have lost your wits.

Oli.
I am not superstitious, as you know;
But when I think what greatness hangs on you,
And with your fall how much would be o'erthrown,
I nigh believe that watchful heaven might send
This anxious phantom to avert your ill.

Cal.
I do not go through stiff-necked stubbornness;
I view these rights of homage to the crown
As a stale pageant better unperformed,
At least by me, who can depute the act.
But in Seville I have a most dear friend,
From whom, till late, I had not heard for years;
And now he writes me in the closest straits,
Saying his lands are forfeit for some debts,
By knavish means imposed upon his hands:
Should the law take its course, his wealth is gone,
And he turned forth in utter beggary.
Some days ago, I sent him present aid;
With promise to redeem his lands from pawn,
When at Seville I shall the court attend.

Oli.
Let me not balk you in this noble act,
Though instant peril stare us in the face.

Cal.
He loves not good who turns from it through fear.
O, what a joy is it to have the power
That lifts from want the worthy sufferer!
What double rapture when he calls us friend,
And with that name wipes obligation off!
Out, out!—my heart 's afire, till this be done!
Urge on the loiterers,—see them all prepared
To start at dawn,—our speed shall clip the way!

[Exeunt.]