University of Virginia Library

ACT I.

SCENE I.

A Room in Roberto's House.
Enter Roberto.
Rob.
A dukedom for my daughter, and myself
Gonfalonier of Florence:—this bedwarfs
The very giants of ambition's dream.
Enter Berto.
Ha! Berto, comes my friend?

Berto.
On the instant, signor.

Rob.
Now will I make Ernesto's critic frown
Unwrinkle to a smooth applausive smile.
Berto!—Berto, with all thy wilful ways,
Thou'rt true as apt, and lov'st my house and me.
Now tell me;—for thy greedy eyes devour
What 't is not meant that stranger looks should feed on—
Tell me, if 'mong the burnished cavaliers,
Who make my old walls laugh with their young talk,
There's one whose absence Cecil quickest marks,
Whose voice to her is singly musical,
Whose brow her eye becrowns with lingering looks.
Thou understandst;—

Berto.
Signor, not one, not one.
Florence, rich as she is in men, is yet
Too poor, too poor.

Rob.
And Leonora. Seldom
Doth now grief's shadow rest upon her cheek;
And then so briefly, that 'tis scarcely seen.
My poor son is more dead to her than me.

Berto.
Grief feeds on want: its crib is emptiness.
A child's loss leaves a void, wherein for ever
Grief thrusts his pallid fingers for his food.
A husband gone, there too's a void; but that,
Hope to the young soon fills with bearded visions,
Looking at which the blushing mourner's eyes
Forget, or with a new warmth dry, their tears.
Young widows, signor—

Rob.
'Tis well. Here comes Ernesto.
Enter Ernesto.
[Exit Berto.
I know, Ernesto, that a friend's success
Can pour no selfish wormwood in your cup.
Be glad then with me at my pregnant prospects.

Ern.
A false friend or an enemy might be that.
Prospects are sirens, heard through knavish mists,
Singing us ofttimes from a founded safety
To shoreless wastes;—a disembodied voice,
Grudging the bodied sounds of present joy.

Rob.
Art thou already past the age of hope?

Ern.
Ay; and now starve upon its promises.
But, tell me, what new feather tickles you?

Rob.
The Duke Fernando asks me for my daughter.

Ern.
Ha! Cecilia, Cecilia! Fernando!
Cold, proud, self-loving. He a husband for—
Oh! can you, can you, but in fleetest thought,
In twinkling fancy, hold such too conjoined?
Roberto, pardon me; your child you love,
Love as a parent only loves: the woman,
Who is your child, you see not on her height.

Rob.
Nay, I would lift her to the jewelled height,
Endowed for her pre-excellence. Than she
Who will sit easier on a ducal seat?

Ern.
No seat is easy when the heart doth ache.
But, dear Roberto, your old friend of Padua;
The bond with him has been a two-fold joy,
A memory and a hope;—

Rob.
By him dissolved.
His boy, he says, shall mate himself. He'll send him
To Florence; and no tidings thence, more ripe
To gladden him, than that my child and his
By mutual preference have resealed our contract.

Ern.
Blest in his father is that son, and back
Rebounds the blessing from his heart; for I,
Knowing this pledge, by deputy have watched
His unsoiled growth. His parts are firmed by truth;
And so far as the unwrit book of manhood
Can in the preface of frank youth be read,
His life is dedicate to worthiness.
When comes he?

Rob.
I know not, and when he comes
Shall welcome him as my friend's son; no more.

Ern.
But should he ratify his father's pledge.

Rob.
His father has revoked that ancient pledge.
I'm free to bind my child in other ties.

Ern.
You will not force or thwart her dispositions.

Rob.
So passive and obedient is her nature,
Her duties forge her will. Her joys run fullest
In channels scooped by other's predilections.

Ern.
The affections live on self-selected food:
Free choice is parcel of their very life;
That balked, they fester.

Rob.
In this town, Ernesto,
There are how many thousands married pairs.
Is there in every pair some special fitness,
Whereby, from each distinct duality,
Is born a happiness not else potential?
Or, can we not believe, that most or all
Of the components of these many pairs,
Coupled to others, had still reaped a good
Equal to what they now have compassed?
Outward conditions oftenest rule in matching.
The laborer mates him with his like; the trader
A trader's daughter weds; wealth marries wealth;
The courtier seeks his bride among the great.
Interest, ambition, accident, caprice,
Control or guide affection's bent; and thus,
Chance more than choice picks out the wedded mate.

Ern.
Thus is deep Nature's order contravened,
And th' inward true thralled to the outward false.

Enter Berto with a Letter.
Berto.
Signor, a letter from the Duke Fernando.

Rob.
[After hastily reading the letter.]
Ernesto, pardon me, but I must leave you.

[Exit.
Ern.
Berto, I know you may be trusted; know you
As much of me?

Berto.
Signor, you honor me.

Ern.
Nay, nay.
Berto, you love your mistress.

Berto.
Her own father
Loves her not more.

Ern.
Perhaps he loves her less.

Berto.
What mean you, signor?

Ern.
Duke Fernando, love you him?

Berto.
As I love wolves.

Ern.
This wolf would rob your roost.
He seeks to wed Cecilia.

Berto.
He! Cecilia!

Ern.
Fernando and Cecilia.

Berto.
Know you this?

Ern.
To make it known Roberto summoned me.

Berto.
For counsel?

Ern.
Nay, I fear he is past counsel;
With mien so confident did he impart it;
As 'twere an act his thought and will had signed.

Berto.

Signor Ernesto, you know me for a cheery frank buffoon, bred in this house, and borne with for my faithfulness. Signor, but for the Lady Cecilia, I had been a sour villain. Believe me, sir, by the power of goodness am I transformed into an honest happy knave.

Ern.
Good Berto, thou deserv'dst thy precious fortune.
Thou feel'st this sunshine. For herself, she's one,
Who, from her eye, tongue, hand, drops goodness; and,
Like May, breathing on frosted violets,
Melts where she comes cold evil in her path.
But this Fernando, this examinate duke,
He will not be transmutable by goodness.
Rather he'll quench warm Cecil's generous life,
Killing with coldness her pure heats; like winds
That angry strike the trembling blossoms down,
And then whip out of them their sweetened breath.
Hard is't to say, good Berto, but 'tis true;
This daughter needs protection 'gainst her father.

Berto.
Signor, my master's thoughts and hopes and dreams
Are now but titles, rank and eminence.

Ern.
And he, forgetful of his own hot youth,
Would deal with this dear child's unblown affections,
As though, instead of being life's sacred marrow,
They were counters to score ambition's game.
Berto, we'll countermine ambition's craft.
Let us about it. We have both some means.
Art we will dash with boldness. Such a marriage
Were sacrilege. Our cause is holy.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Alonzo's Studio.
Alonzo,
alone.
With every breath the fertile air is sweeter,
Each fragrant hour with sunnier beauty flushed.
If at its base life is so glad and great,
What will it be upon its boundless top?
Like wildered traveller on white Alpine crest,
I shall lack faculty: I lack it now.
My senses reel under their perfumed load;
And glittering visions throng, faster and grander
Than my slow hand can seize. Too weak am I
For my strong inwardness. A very God
In plastic swiftness I should be, to body
The blazing forms that sprout upon my brain,
Peopling the silent temples of the mind
With gorgeousness. But I shape only shadows.
Courage and Faith: these be my arms and armor.
Imagined beauty breeds upon the soul;
What though the offspring wear no present feature,
Warm Time shall ripen into sinewy life
The boldest thoughts' most choice imaginations,
Therewith to build the great hereafter. Glorious,
Divine 'twill be, one tiniest stone to bring
To the majestic pile. [Knocking at the door.]

Who's there? come in.
Enter Filippo.
Filippo!

Fil.
Dear Alonzo!—Oh! I see
Thou art thyself; thou art but changed, to be
Still more thyself.

Alon.
And thou: these four short years
Have only sported with thy youth.

Fil.
And I
With them. I shame to tell thee, dear Alonzo,
I am as light as aye, and learn no wisdom.

Alon.
Nay; to the true, Wisdom comes of herself,
And takes delight in coming; while the false,
With all their might, can't win her confidence.
Ere thou art gray, graybeards shall be thy pupils.
But what, save my good angel, brings thee hither?

Fil.
Florence brings me to Florence. I am one
Of the great flock that hither bleating runs,
To be, here in this beauteous pen of learning,
Fleeced of our ignorance. Then thou art here;
And thy good angel ever has been mine.
Lastly—I've come to seek a wife.

Alon.
A wife!

Fil.
About a score of years ago, my father—
With that farsightedness that fathers have—
From Padua spied one in a cradle here.

Alon.
Infant betrothment signed by parents.

Fil.
Ay;
On one condition, that on either part
The contract might at will be abrogated.
And so it is; unless myself rebind it,
The lady and her father both consenting.
Now hear my scheme. That I be not prejudged
For good or ill, and be more free to judge,
I will be seen unknown, and see unpledged.
Therefore, in Florence I am not Filippo
Of Padua, but Valerio a Venetian.
Knowest thou the rich Roberto?

Alon.
Roberto!

Fil.
'Tis he who was to be my father-in-law.

Alon.
What thou hast partly forfeited! the flower
Of Tuscany.

Fil.
So fair?

Alon.
In drawing her
My hopeless pencil seizes grace ideal;
And shall my image near her perfectness,
I shall be bold to cope unseen Madonnas.

Fil.
Show me this painted image.

Alon.
'Tis not here,
And barely touched. Twice only have I seen her.
At noon she sits again. This suits thy plot.
First thou shalt see Da Vinci's great cartoon,
And then the masterpiece of Nature. Come.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.

A Room in Roberto's House.
Enter Ernesto and Berto.
Ern.

My suspicion, Berto, has been quickly translated into knowledge. A villanous plot. Cecilia is the price Roberto pays Fernando for making him gonfalonier.

Berto.

Roberto gonfalonier!

Ern.

Ay; the plotters are at work; Fernando's minions and Roberto's ducats already trot hand in hand through the by-ways of Florence.

Berto.

Signor, think you the Signor Roberto fit for this high office?

Ern.

Thou rogue; thou shouldst have been an abbé, thou art so seeming innocent.

Berto.

I prophesy an eclipse. We shall have the Medici back.

Ern.

And deserve them. When a people persists in choosing wrongly, it jeopards the right to choose. But Roberto is not yet chosen. Fernando, 'tis true has power, noble though he be; for rank that has long been rooted, will, when cut down, throw up suckers. Yet by none is he beloved, and by all honest men, hated. Florentines, as strong as he, would

like to thwart him. If we can baffle Fernando's influence on the election, we defeat the marriage; and if we can defeat the marriage, we prevent the election. Our twofold aims double our chance of success.—I have, moreover, good tidings from my sentinel in Padua. Filippo, of whom I have told you, is on his way hither in disguise. He is a friend of the painter Alonzo, and is to pass for a Venetian. Alonzo comes for another sitting presently. I will return to sift from him what I can.

[Exeunt.
Enter Cecilia and Leonora.
Cec.
Dear Leonora, canst thou not to day
Lend me a heartful of thy cheerfulness?

Leon.
Lend thee or give my heart's whole joy I will,
And yawn a week in empty mirthlessness,
So thou wilt smile as thou didst yesterday.
Thou art unwonted sad: what hast thou, sister?

Cec.
Words from my father, they have made me sad;
Which should not be, and never was before.

Leon.
Sweet sis, fathers were made to balk their daughters,
And better them by balking. 'Tis their duty:
Thine is, to let thyself be balked and bettered,
Learning with pretty proneness thy first lesson
In virtue. Would there were some other way.

Cec.
My father has no thought but for my good.

[Sighing.
Leon.
A most rare good, that makes thee sigh to speak of.
A good, methinks, one might be selfish with,
Giving a friend the larger lump thereof.
Come, I'll be prodigal, halving it with thee.
Oh! Cecil, is't a husband?

Cec.
Thy fast tongue
Has overta'en the truth.

Leon.
Thou dost not jest?

Cec.
Would that I did.

Leon.
Wouldst be a child for ever?
For what hast thou been suckled, schooled, arrayed?
Since first thy lashes parted to the sun,
No beam has spurred thy growth, but daily graved
More deeply on thy pulse the one word, wife.
Therein is locked thy destiny, thyself.

Cec.
Good Leonora, are husbands all alike?

Leon.
Ah, there's the knot that ravels up the skein.

Cec.
Thinkst thou life could wind smoothly with Fernando?

Leon.
The duke? Is he thy suitor? thou a duchess?
Tall, handsome, noble, and thy father's choice—

Cec.
Dear sister, be not bribed by rank and looks,
The man, Fernando, what of him?

Leon.
His height
And title are the best of him. And yet,
In the dry dearth of men, these go for much.

Cec.
Oh! can I wed and love a proud cold man?

Leon,
To-day thou couldst not; but a week or month
Works headlong transformations. Love delights
In contraries; and were the cold to wed
Only the cold, frost would usurp the world,
And men soon turn to icicles.

Enter Berto.
Berto.
Signor Ernesto

Enter Ernesto.
Ern.
I've come, Cecilia, to befriend your picture,
Abetting with my tongue Alonzo's pencil.
To wordy war I challenge Leonora;
That we, by wisdom, and by wit of speech,
May so your fancy ravish, that your soul,
Charmed to your face, the painter, thence enkindled,
Shall fire the frigid canvass.

Berto.
Signor Alonzo.

Enter Alonzo and Filippo.
Alon.
Signora, I have used the privilege,
So hospitably given, and bring my friend,
Signor Valerio, who, fresh come from Venice,
Will, if so please you, rend the sitting's tedium
With latest martial news, or recent feats
Of great Giorgione and the greater Titian,
Champions of Art so nobly confident,
They throw the gauntlet down to Tuscany.

Cec.
Signor, welcome to Florence, and our house.
Of gorgeous Venice we shall gladly hear.

Fil.
Lady, I shall be grateful if you'll listen
To partial speech of Venice; yet to-day,
So lively is my mind with Florence self,
All distant images seem colorless.

Ern.
A Florentine bids you be welcome, sir,
To his fair city and to all it holds
That may or profit or divert you.

Fil.
Signor,
The high renown of Florence, I perceive,
Finds echo in its townsmen's courtesy.

Alon.
Noble Ernesto, there's no other man
I more delight to thank than you. Believe me,
My friend is worthy, sir, of your best will.

Ern.
His face, Alonzo, is your warrant's seal.
[Aside to Berto.]
The rogue tho' comes with fib upon his lips.

Alon.
[To Cecilia.]
Signora, will you sit.

[Cecilia takes her seat; Alonzo adjusts his easel; the others sit; and then the curtain drops.]