University of Virginia Library

SCENE V.

An Apartment in the Monastery of St. Ignazio.
Savelli and Gerardo.
GERARDO.
It was a blessed thing to hear them speak
Of Ludovico and the saint deceased,
Their learning, and their wisdom, and their zeal!
You should have been there too—I never heard
More wholesome doctrine.

SAVELLI.
May we live to profit!
But tell me, does the light and straw-built duke
Float toward this man of amber?

GERARDO.
I shall speak
What wiser men have taught me—for the duke,
And the duke's nurse, my mother's eldest son,
Who humbly calls me brother—though a god
He in this firmament, and I at most
A priest,—have uttered for the two last hours
These and nought else. The abbey—as they say,
Needs stricter rule: disorder like a flood,
Extends and widens in our house—mark that.
The late good abbot—be the truth itself
Whispered with reverence toward his place and soul—
In age grew negligent. Hence strife, they say,
Lax laws, frail discipline, perverted funds,
Accounts uneven.—

SAVELLI.
Knew they this?

GERARDO.
Throughout;
Nay more; for when I told them of yourself—
How grave you were, and wise you were, adorned
With holiest letters—meek, I said, yet bold,
Laborious, watchful, pious, chaste, sincere,
And framed in all to grace the choice they made—
One pished, the other bade me peace, and both
Transferred my many-coloured coat to clothe
Their idol's nakedness.

SAVELLI.
Yet, who told this?
Not Ludovico?

GERARDO.
Nay, no matter who—
'Tis told, believed, set down. The owl deceased
Must have his feathers stuffed too! he shall last
Embalmed for ages like the Ægyptian bird,
Worshipped and mourned by kings. 'Twere less to see
My neighbour's house on fire, though next mine own,
Than hear him praised or pitied.

SAVELLI.
He would not die
A month ago—a month had saved us both.

GERARDO.
And this was what you call a kind good man
Who loved his brethren truly! He has lived—
With all his charity—a month too long,
And so may hang us both.

SAVELLI.
They seemed resolved?

GERARDO.
Faith we shall find it so. I might persuade
As easily the slumbering brain and ear
Of him we mourned for yesterday. Well, next
I tried this tangled skein the other way,
Spoke for myself a little, touched in haste—
As men who doubt if coals be hot or no—
Mine ancient services, the treaties wrought
What time they sent me on the state's affairs
To Modena.

SAVELLI.
This was a hazardous cast.

GERARDO.
And so it proved, but all was lost before.

SAVELLI.
What did they say?

GERARDO.
Our pleasant duke laughed loud
At such an argument—waxed blithe and merry,
Recalled my least fair practices, and sneered—
With much philosophy to cool his mirth—
At good Savelli's advocate.

SAVELLI.
The child
Has learnt his lesson in his teacher's words,
And speaks it like a man.

GERARDO.
While Andria crams
This fluttering popinjay with bran for meat,
The moral fragments which from age to age
Wisdom lets fall, mere chips and crusts pecked up,
Then dropp'd as profitless—it eats and swells
And thinks it fattens!—Andria answered next—
“Go back, Gerardo, go. If we should seek
“One who can serve us wisely, and has hands
“To gather and distribute, drop his own,
“And filch his neighbour's—to apply a bribe
“Discreetly, and demurely take one back—
“His Grace will send and find thee—but till then,
“Remember, brother, it is sometimes wise
“In some things to forget.”

SAVELLI.
This was to thee?

GERARDO.
Ay, truth—to both—it served for both or either;
The sequel ended thus—“Savelli first
“Must call his equals round him, show his hoard,
“What sums he gathers for the public chest,
“And what and how disburses.”

SAVELLI.
So—the blight
Has gone abroad before me, and I reap
But stubble here—go on.

GERARDO.
The younger bird
Is but an innocent chick. Behold me thus—
With eyes awhile averted, diffident step
Retiring, and a long scarce audible groan
Half uttered half suppressed—“Unmerciful man
“Condemns his fellow, and a brother's tongue
“Wounds like the anointed sword! Is it too late
“To cast our frailties from us, and resign
“Earth with its toys—to strip the body bare,
“Despise its tenderness, afflict with stripes,
“And fret the extenuate flesh with chains! The cell
“Shades not its habitant; but Hate and Scorn
“Obdurate follow;—yea, the very lips
“For whose applause we stained us, and whose smiles
“First tempted to transgression”—

SAVELLI.
Light and darkness!
What didst thou hope from this?

GERARDO.
To make the duke
Suspect us both—my brother and myself—
The bulkiest lies swim best.

SAVELLI.
Bear witness now
These cheeks of mine can blush!

GERARDO.
Prince Andria's too
Were red, but less through modesty than wrath.
“Thy bribes,” he cried, “for us! that we should smile!
“I tempt thee to transgress!—Thou camest, O traitor!”—
He called me traitor to my beard, and I
Would risk my neck to make his words prove true;
There is a settling day for him and me,
But this some better time—“Thou camest, O traitor!
“Not penitent, not smitten in soul, not grieved
“And wearied with offences, not as one
“Who loaths and would renounce his lusts—but driven
“With hatred at thine heels, and like a wolf
“Fled'st hunted to the cloister, where that head,
“Hid in a cowl, its crimes.—Savelli too—
“We know you both, Gerardo.”

SAVELLI.
Indeed they do?
He knows us both—what did he say—us both?

GERARDO.
Both, man, he knows us both—well what of that?
And both of us know him.

SAVELLI.
Let him say what.
He shall be answered straight. The weak and base
See dangers round them, and their treacherous souls
Desert them in perplexity, and fail
There most where most they need them. We, Gerardo,
Will threat the threatener, rise as troubles rise,
And grow from what would lessen. It is thus
That great men prove them such. The storm blows loudly,
And we will meet it with our teeth shut hard,
Grinning defiance. In this world there stands
But thou alone beside me—a hundred foes
Hedge round, each watchful when to strike, and all
Loud for the falling carcase. There are things
Ill-hidden which revealed would tell sad tales!
Thy brother knows us both—who knows how well?
The mightiest are against me, and my props
Fall fast—suspicion undermines the rest
Which stay me yet—ill-credit presses hard,
The public coffers in my charge abused,
And worse than empty, for the notes are there
Which tell their obligations! Thou and I
Have borrowed largely of their wealth, and now
No crown to pay—but mark, Gerardo, still
I will be abbot ere the duke is king,
And we shall prosper.

GERARDO.
Some one comes this way.

[Exeunt.