University of Virginia Library

SCENE IV.

Leonatus
enters.
Bright being!—
How may the native of an upper sphere
Appear partaker of the general woe,
That makes the lot of man?

Leon.
O sire revered!
You see a man, of miserable men
The lowest, and most lost.

Bell.
Son of my age,
Son of my sorrows also—if sage counsel,
Or kind companionship in grief, may serve
To sooth calamity; then art thou come
Into the land of balms.

Leon.
No balm for wounds,
Deep as existence!

Bell.
That's a depth, beyond
What death himself can strike! The cause was, sure,
Most capital.

Leon.
It was, it was—the same
That sack'd the seven-fold walls of aged Priam,
Butcher'd his race, and laid his Asia waste—
A woman's want of truth!

Bell.
O, I could pour
Into a friendly hearing, such a tale
Of a lost woman, as should soon exile
All woe, save that alone, which is comprized
In her sad story!

Leon.
Once, I had a tear
For griefs that were not mine—Proceed, good father!

Bell.
The present King of Britain had a sister.
Who saw her not, could form no semblance of her
From aught that he had seen—I woo'd, and won,
And wedded her in secret.—
But, O, the richness of the bright possession!
The world wants wealth to rate it. Three blest moons,
Three moons, the brightest that had ever changed
Upon the changeful bliss of man, scarce wain'd,
When I was sent ambassador, by Cymbeline,
To Julius, Rome's dictator—Woe the while!
My love, my bride, my Adelaide proved pregnant—
She was impleaded of incontinence,
Even by her cruel brother was impleaded,
And urged to name the sire—but, kindly fearing
What, haply, might befall the hapless man,
Whom more than life she loved, she, to the death,
Persisted in her silence; and was offer'd,
On the curs'd altar of the dire Andate,
The richest incense of the truest love
That ever breathed to Heaven!

Leon.
Thrice happy husband!
Death may soon draw the veil that, from your arms,
Shuts your expecting Adelaide—but mine
No kind hereafter can restore!—Your pardon—
Forward, I pray.

Bell.
Thine eyes, my son, grow heavy—
Come to my friendly cave, and I will try,
With the sad tale of my remaining woes,
To charm thy griefs to slumber.

Leon.
O, for ever!—
That were to be most happy.

[Exeunt.