University of Virginia Library

SCENE II.

A Room.
Gia.
You think it strange that I should visit you?

Fred.
No, Madam, no.

Gia.
You must: ev'n I myself
(Yet I've a cause) must own the visit strange.

Fred.
I am most grateful for it.

Gia.
Hear me, first.
What think you brought me hither? I've a suit
That presses, and I look to you to grant it.

Fred.
'Tis but to name it, for you may command
My fullest service. Oh! but you know this:
You injure when you doubt me.

Gia.
That I think:
So, to my errand. Gentle Signior, listen.
I have a child: no mother ever lov'd
A son so much: but that you know him, I
Would say how fair he was, how delicate;
But oh! I need not tell his sweet ways to you:
You know him, Signior, and your heart would grieve,
I feel't, if you should see the poor child die,
And now he's very ill. If you could hear
How he asks after you and says he loves you
Next to his mother, Signior—

Fred.
Stay your tears.
Can I do ought to soothe your pretty boy?
I love him as my own.

Gia.
Sir?

Fred.
I forget.
And yet I love him, lady: does that ask
Forgiveness? Is my love—

Gia.
Now you mistake me,
I thank you for your love.

Fred.
Giana! How!

Gia.
To my poor child: he pines and wastes away.
There is but one thing in the world he sighs for,
And that—I cannot name it.

Fred.
Is it mine?

Gia.
It is, it is: I shame to ask it, but
What can a mother do?

Fred.
'Tis yours, Giana:
Aye, tho' it be my head.

Gia.
It is—the falcon.
Ah: pardon me: I see how dear the bird
Is to you, and I know how little I
Have right to ask it. Pardon me.

Fred.
Alas!
I do, from—from my soul.

Gia.
I feel my folly.
You shall not part with your poor faithful friend.
No more of it: I was cruel to request it.
Signior, I will not take it, for the world.
I will not rob you, Sir.

Fred.
Oh! that you could:
Poor Mars! Your child, Madam, will grieve to hear
His poor old friend is dead.

Gia.
Impossible.
I saw it as I entered.

Fred.
It is dead.
Be satisfied, dear madam, that I say it:
The bird is dead.

Gia.
Nay, this is not like you.
I do not need excuses.

Fred.
Gracious lady,
Believe me not so poor: the bird is dead.
Nay then, you doubt me still, I see. Then listen.
Madam, you came to visit me—to feast:
It was my barest hour of poverty.
I had not one poor coin to purchase food.
Could I for shame confess this unto you?
I saw the descending beauty whom I loved
Honouring my threshold with her step, and deign
To smile on one whom all the world abandoned.
Once I had been her lover, how sincere
Let me not say: my name was high and princely:
My nature had not quite forgot its habits:
I lov'd you still: I felt it—Could I stoop
And say how low and abject was my fortune,
And send you fasting home? Your servant would
Have scorn'd me. Lady, even then I swore
That I would feast you daintily: I did.
My noble Mars, thou wast a glorious dish
Which Juno might have tasted.

Gia.
What is this?

Fred.
We feasted on that matchless bird, to which
The fabulous Phœnix would have bow'd. Brave bird!
He has redeem'd my credit.

Gia.
(after a pause)
—You have done
A princely thing, Frederigo. If I e'er
Forget it may I not know happiness.
Signior, you have a noble delicate mind,
And such as in an hour of pain or peril
Methinks I could repose on.

Fred.
Oh! Giana!

Gia.
I have a child who loves you: for his mother
You've work'd a way into her inmost heart.
Can she requite you?

Fred.
How! what mean you? Oh!
Giana, sweet Giana, do not raise
My wretched heart so high, too high, lest it
Break on its falling.

Gia.
But it shall not fall,
If I can prop it, or my hand requite
Your long and often-tried fidelity.
I come, Frederigo, not as young girls do,
To blush and prettily affect to doubt
The heart I know to be my own. I feel
That you have loved me well. Forgive me now,
That circumstance, which some day I'll make known,
Kept me aloof so long. My nature is
Not hard, altho' it might seem thus to you.

Fred.
What can I say?

Gia.
Nothing. I read your heart.

Fred.
It bursts, my love: but 'tis with joy, with joy.
Giana! my Giana! we will have
Nothing but halcyon days: Oh! we will live
As happily as the bees that hive their sweets,
And gaily as the summer fly, but wiser:
I'll be thy servant ever; yet not so.
Oh! my own love, divinest, best, I'll be
Thy Sun of life, faithful through every season,
And thou shalt be my flower perennial,
My bud of beauty, my imperial rose,
My passion flower, and I will wear thee on
My heart, and thou shalt never, never fade.
I'll love thee mightily my queen, and in
The sultry hours I'll sing thee to thy rest
With music sweeter than the wild birds' song:
And I will swear thine eyes are like the stars,
(They are they are, but softer,) and thy shape
Fine as the vaunted nymphs' who, poets feign'd,
Dwelt long ago in woods of Arcady.
My gentle deity! I'll crown thee with
The whitest lilies and then bow me down
Love's own idolater, and worship thee.
And thou wilt then be mine? My love, my love!
How fondly will we pass our lives together;
And wander, heart-link'd, thro' the busy world
Like birds in eastern story.

Gia.
Oh! you rave.

Fred.
I'll be a miser of thee; watch thee ever;
At morn, at noon, at eve, and all the night.
We will have clocks that with their silver chime
Shall measure out the moments: and I'll mark
The time and keep love's pleasant calendar.
To day I'll note a smile: to morrow how
Your bright eyes spoke—how saucily, and then
Record a kiss pluck'd from your currant lip,
And say how long 'twas taking: then, thy voice
As rich as stringed harp swept by the winds
In Autumn, gentle as the touch that falls
On serenader's moonlit instrument—
Nothing shall pass unheeded. Thou shalt be
My household goddess—nay smile not, nor shake
Backwards thy clustering curls, incredulous:
I swear it shall be so: it shall, my love.

Gia.
Why, now thou'rt mad indeed: mad.

Fred.
Oh! not so.
There was a statuary once who lov'd
And worshipped the white marble that he shaped;
Till, as the story goes, the Cyprus' queen,
Or some such fine kind-hearted deity,
Touch'd the pale stone with life, and it became
At last, Pygmalion's bride: but thee—on whom
Nature had lavish'd all her wealth before,
Now Love has touch'd with beauty: doubly fit
For human worship thou, thou—let me pause,
My breath is gone.

Gia.
With talking.

Fred.
With delight.
But I may worship thee in silence, still.

Gia.
The evening's dark; Now I must go: farewell
Until to-morrow.

Fred.
Oh! not yet, not yet.
Behold! the moon is up, the bright ey'd moon,
And seems to shed her soft delicious light
On lovers reunited. Why she smiles,
And bids you tarry: will you disobey
The Lady of the sky? beware.

Gia.
Farewell.
Nay, nay, I must go.

Fred
We will go together.

Gia.
It must not be to-night: my servants wait
My coming at the fisher's cottage.

Fred.
Yet,
A few more words, and then I'll part with thee,
For one long night: to-morrow bid me come
(Thou hast already with thine eyes) and bring
My load of love and lay it at thy feet.
—Oh! ever while those floating orbs look bright
Shalt thou to me be a sweet guiding light.
Once, the Chaldean from his topmost tower
Did watch the stars, and then assert their power
Throughout the world: so, dear Giana, I
Will vindicate my own idolatry.
And in the beauty and the spell that lies
In the dark azure of thy love-lit eyes;
In the clear veins that wind thy neck beside,
'Till in the white depths of thy breast they hide,
And in thy polish'd forehead, and thy hair
Heap'd in thick tresses on thy shoulders fair;
In thy calm dignity; thy modest sense;
In thy most soft and winning eloquence;
In woman's gentleness and love (now bent
On me, so poor,) shall lie my argument.