University of Virginia Library

Scene III.

—The Hall of Voragine.
Volupsa and Cœlis.

Is he not lone when none his cares partake,
And woman would his faith in nature shake?
Yet there was one he loved, and ever sought
When hope's excesses their own misery wrought.
Volupsa from the early day
Whereof the memory was childish play,
Had kept his heart as 'neath a vow:
But his meek love is humbled now;
To him it seems but as a summer rose
That bloomed, then dropped where the sweetbriar grows.

CŒLIS.
Volupsa! Life with us is lonely;
All day you speak to few but me,
And I, with hundreds near, can only
Yourself with eyes of pleasure see.

VOLUPSA.
But, Cœlis, soon we both shall welcome others:
Your darling sister Vivia and our brothers!
We shall be blithe for many a day
And laugh o'er all the absent voices say!
The more that length of waiting makes us weary,
The more will every heart be cheery:
Those whom we love are on their homeward way.
We need no other pleasure seek
Than to look on towards days so surely pending:
Time may creep slowly, yet has many a week
One happy morrow for its ending.

CŒLIS.
Your brother! Tell me his return is sure:
No other morrow shall my heart implore
Than that of peace. But time, I fear, effaces
In my young brother's breast the love of home:
New life in him wears out the early traces;
Here all is old; he will not come;
Not even when to his princess wed,—
Unless it hap we all are dead!

VOLUPSA.
His absence is but of a year:
Sooner than you surmise he will appear.

CŒLIS.
No, he must stay in foreign courts
And there enjoy the savage sports;
Hunt the scared fox, run down the boar,
Stalk the red deer, pursue the roe,
And chase the plunging buffalo,
With times of hawking kept in store.

VOLUPSA.
Not strange it is to see a comely youth
Pursue his pleasures with the lords,—
Though strong may be the contrast it affords
To your pursuits of hidden truth.
Dear Cœlis, better were it far
That you had followed in the raging war
With my brave brother Voragine,
Who has so many battles seen!
Better than to be lost in fruitless musing!
Eyes pierce not nature and the heart
In her high symphony has little part:
Thought there but gambles and is ever losing.

CŒLIS.
Had I his tastes I could be wise:
I go but as the arrow flies.
Who shapes the bow the arrow shapes,
And none for long his doom escapes.

VOLUPSA.
Whence come these sayings sad and wild?
You were so cheerful when a child!
Too short for us was then the day,
And only tired-out eyes put off our play.
Now with a startling earnestness you meet
The same light hours half-way.

CŒLIS.
Can we repeat
Our infancy? Did we not then rehearse
With upstart zest our youth, our later age,
Before they came, and, on our little stage,
In arbitrary games all things reverse?
There lay our life, and only there
Can we look back devoid of care.
The times at last are true: the latest cry
Is war and Voragine's sage strategy:
How he the unsuspecting foe decoys;
How he their crops at harvest season,—
Their very towns with greedy fire destroys.
He makes men's lives the penalty of treason!
It is a feverish tale.

VOLUPSA.
He but performs
His duty when their fortresses he storms.
Despite these deeds is he not kind?
There never was a truer mind.

CŒLIS.
Brave though he be, and fearing not to die,
Where is the pride of his humanity?
To him the higher life is lost
Who honour gains at honour's cost.
Look at our people, how their fields are teeming
With plenty for the year's supply!
The harvest-moon is nightly beaming
With gratulations of the Deity.

VOLUPSA.
Yes; it is sad; but how can we evade
The woes whereof this world is made!
Even you at last to this dark war assented.

CŒLIS.
And from that hour to this have I repented.
Even better had it been to share the fate
Of those who hope though they but death await:
Blessed are the souls who, early though they die,
Have striven to touch the highest destiny.