University of Virginia Library

Scene I.—Cyril's Room. After Supper.

Cyril and his Friends.
FIRST FRIEND
So, having crowned you for the second time,
We say good-night.

CYRIL
How for the second time?

FIRST FRIEND
You were crowned first, when these astonished airs
Took such a crowd of ‘Cyrils’ from our lips
Echo was crushed among them; when we heard
Your name in its own place, the top of honour;
Working its little miracle at once,
For Grey was pleased, and Essingdon surprised;
Two sights our Cambridge never saw before.

SECOND FRIEND
Surprised? You wrong my judgment and his fame.

FIRST FRIEND
Well, you reared up your eyelashes, and said
‘Cyril? Indeed!’ When made you such a speech
Foodless, till now? I know you had not lunched.

SECOND FRIEND
Tut! tut! I had some tea.

CYRIL
O! that explains it!
I thought the tea-light glistened in your eyes
And warmed you with unwonted eloquence.
But not the less I thank you—my success
Reveals a world of hidden love. Good-night.

[They take leave.
THIRD FRIEND
No satire after supper, by your leave!
'Twill spoil your dreams.

CYRIL
I have no need to dream.

THIRD FRIEND
Ay, Cyril, a proud word! He needs not dream
Who has achieved. I'm sorry for the world,
Because achievement ever means farewell,
And one may weep in parting from a dream.

CYRIL
‘Farewell’ is as a shield, whose other face
Bears the strong word ‘Advance.’

THIRD FRIEND
I lose my breath.
Where will this going spirit take you? First
A heap of unconsidered scholarships,
Last year the Craven—Senior Wrangler now—
Both sides of knowledge scaled! Vouchsafe to rest
On the clear summit, pass not while we gaze
From Alp to Andes!

CYRIL
Fie! You do but mock
My dumb ambitions with such hyperbole!

THIRD FRIEND
In your vocabulary, hyperbole
Is construed into fact.

CYRIL
No, no. Good-night.

[Exit Third Friend.
FOURTH FRIEND
That which you worked for, Cyril, you have won,
But I must spur you with reproachful praise
To labours half completed. You were once
The fairest promise in my crew—you paused
Just when by two short weeks of guided toil
You might have gained that hold upon the water!
(I flatter not) you paused, before you gained it.
'Tis not too late—you will have leisure now—
If once you get that grip upon the water
I'll say you are the foremost man alive.

CYRIL
Well, captain, you shall write my epitaph
And say ‘He might have been.’

FOURTH FRIEND
I should be loth
To give you such a ‘finis.’ Think of it!

[Exit Fourth Friend. A group advances to take leave.
ONE
Good-bye, old fellow.

ANOTHER
When you're chancellor
Make me your secretary!

ANOTHER
Not his line,
He speaks too well to wait.

ANOTHER
Aye, when St. Stephen's
Resounds with him, and in the streets men ask
‘Have you read Cyril's speech?’ ‘When, do you think,
He was most great—now? Or in that assault
Which hurled the Cabinet to earth last year?’
We shall behold each other, and recall
The first young roarings of his thunder-talk
In our debates!

ANOTHER
And some of us will laugh
To think how well we thought we answered him,
Our monarch in disguise, only not crowned
Because he had not stretched his hand out.

ANOTHER
Cyril,
You shall hear clarions in your sleep to-night.

[Exeunt all but one friend and Cyril.
FRIEND
You are sad, Cyril.

CYRIL
Only tired.

FRIEND
But I,
Who see your heart, can see how ill they read it;
Decyphering all the titles of your fame
Blind to its import.

CYRIL
Speak, interpreter;
Reveal the thought they missed.

FRIEND
[Cyril covers his face with his hands.

CYRIL
Aye, did it show you all?
That were a window worth the looking through!
Friend, you know more than I.

FRIEND
'Tis possible.
Ships have I seen that rode the tempest out
But stranded in the calm! I'll counsel you,
Being your friend—be wary in the calm!
That shallow stillness drifts you to a shoal
And tells you all the while you have not moved.
Let the dear home embrace and let you go,
But not entangle you. There lies your peril.

CYRIL
You think so?

FRIEND
Nay, I know it. Never think
I scorn that ease which I would sting you from;
The lovely danger and the tender sleep
Spread between you and greatness. For the heights
Your soul was born, therefore I bid you mount;
Let not the tranquil virtue of your love
Become temptation!

CYRIL
O, you speak blind words!
Blind as a poniard which perceives no wound
Though its point touch the heart. Yet will I thank you,
For words, aye and the winds that carry them,
Are full of seeds; we breathe them as we walk,
Nor see what forces of unconscious growth
We take into our souls. I'll talk to you
Another time. Good-night.

FRIEND
What, have I vexed you
With frank goodwill? Are you so soon a king
Who must be answered, but not questioned? Cyril,
Beware of pride!

CYRIL
Good night.

FRIEND
Why then, good night,
Since you dismiss me. I am sorry for it.

CYRIL
(taking him by the shoulders goodhumouredly)
Take your intolerable wisdom hence;
I'll beg your pardon when we meet again,
Now I want peace.

FRIEND
I knew you did. Good night.

[Exit.
[Cyril stands silent with clasped hands as if overpowered with thought—then speaks suddenly:
CYRIL
A little—helpless—soft—three-summered child
Working for bread! A man of fourscore years
Dying before he hears the name of Christ!
Of Christ, who died two thousand years ago
With prints of children's kisses on His hands
Beside the nails—and died for only this,
That men should love each other, and know Him.
O, in the darkness of our Christendom
To wander eighty years without a star
And die bewildered, as you hear of life
For the first time! It might have been myself,—
And I, who know it, am alive, awake,
Strong, full of victory—nay, what can I do,
What is there left for me to do, but go
And pour the medicine of my Master's Name
Into these gaping wounds which groan for Him,
This dreadful Christian land, which sets her babes
To toil, and thrusts away her wearied hearts,
Without their rest, and flaunts her hollow cross
Before the nations like a self-crowned saint,
And buys and sells and prospers and is cruel!
If I should say I heard Him in the night
Cry ‘Follow me’ men would believe me mad;
Aye, shake their heads and make allowance for me,
Because I hear when they are deaf. I think
It was not only by Gennesareth
That He cried ‘Follow me.’ O! in that land,
That milk-and-honey land, compassionate
Of all her children, by necessity,
Because God made her flowing for their need,
How wept He for the poor! Why, all His words
His tender wisdom, sorrowful rebuke,
Trumpet of hope or thunder of command,
Or whisper from the vast serene of Truth
Which no man sees and lives, were incomplete
Without that cadence ‘Care ye for the poor!
What would He say in England, where skies freeze
And cities starve the nakedness of want?
What of our souls that perish at church-doors,
Our harvests rotting while the reapers feast?
Receive me, few that labour! Not by choice,
By force I join you, having seen these things,
Henceforth unable to avert mine eyes,
But grateful for this mist and help of tears
Whereby the vision grows endurable! [A pause.

I do suppose this is the sacrifice
Required of me,—that I should slay their hopes
Gathered around my feet confidingly
Like children certain of their coming joy.
I grieve more than I should—so small a thing
To give—a cost not worth the counting—yet
All that we have. I quote the Widow's mite,
And wonder if she left a son at home
Who grudged it. That would make the giving hard. [A pause.

A man is happy, having two dear homes
Though he leave both. And this, the first, consoled
For my departure, yet not cold to me,
Wise, beautiful, benignant, and beloved,
Left, but not lost,—a root from which I grow,
Not a mere ground to leap from—Ah, farewell!
I feel not how the presence of this time,
The shadow of these shrines, this friendship-world,
Gladness of toil and glee of holyday,
Hope, difficulty, failure, fault, and glory,
Can pass into remembrance! But, from these,
I move and linger to the deeper home
Lying within my life, there still to lie
Though the life change. Now, while my triumph shines
On those soft faces in Northamptonshire,
I think about the cloud which I must bring.
If I had grieved them sooner, I could bear
Better to grieve them now; but I, who made
Their Paradise, must drive them out of it
Although they have not sinned. It must be done.
I would my heart were broken into words
That they might read it piece by piece, so learning
The thing that I must do and they must bear.
How beautiful were Life, if we could make
All our steps forward, tangled by no pause,
Whether it be but flowers about the feet,
Or serpents in the path. I think the martyrs
Felt not the death they feared not, but they felt
Only the pangs of all those pleading eyes
Which held them from it. What a child am I
To let my little burden seem so great!