University of Virginia Library

SCENE I.

—Chamber in Lodoro's palace, the casement opening on to the grand canal. moonlight, music heard in the distance.
Bianca, Maria.
Bia.
—What most unseasonable mirth is this?
Is there no sanctity for grief? Alas!
Methinks, we should respect each other's woe
When misery is so common to us all!

Mar.
—Your melancholy makes you feel this mirth
Discordant. 'Tis a brilliant serenade
The courteous Barbarigo gives his love.

Bia.
—Poor man! If he must waste his love on one,
Whose soul reflects not his, as those bright waters
Mirror that moonlight, he had better die!
If I should love, 'twould be as suns look down
To feed the flowers up-gazing to their light.

Mar.
—I knew you'd love!

Bia.
Because you trusted nature,
Whose precepts told you that we all must love.
No matter what the object be, love is
As natural—as much a part of woman,
As is the light to heaven, the green to earth,
Or anything that is most natural.

Mar.
—I fear, my lady—

Bia.
What, Maria?

Mar.
How
Your father will receive this news.

Bia.
Maria!
Obedience, duty, country, kindred, all
Are only names, to those whose bosoms once
Have given birth to passions, that you may
Despise, but can no more control, than tear
The rooted mountains from the steadfast earth!
Enter Augustus.
Who enters?

Aug.
Fear not!

Bia.
O, my brother! how
You have alarm'd me!

Aug.
Pardon me! Ill news
Is seldom usher'd in with ceremony.

Bia.
—Speak out!

Aug.
Come, do not tremble! But tomorrow
Our father pledges you a noble's bride.

Mar.
—My lady!

Bia.
I am well! what would you with me?
Say on, Augustus.

Aug.
I am still your brother,
Although the unwelcome messenger of this.
You'll wed the Barbarigo?

Bia.
By heaven! I will not!

Aug.
—A convent then awaits you, and a life—

Bia.
—Of ignominious solitude!—I know it.
Augustus, I have loved you! Tell me, have you
Not read in antique Roman story, how
Lucretia gave her stainless Latin blood
An offering to the daughters of her land?

Aug.
—What mean you?

Bia.
That her spirit is not dead!
But lives in woman's heart as long as tyranny
Usurps the natural honor of mankind!

Aug.
—Your words are wild, Bianca.

Bia.
And the current
Of my o'erboiling blood—outraged and scorn'd
By savage selfishness—is ten times fiercer!

Aug.
—What answer do I bear your father?

Bia.
Go!
Bid him essay to curb the storm's career!
Bridle the tempestuous ocean! chain the winds!
And then reflect how easy 'tis to bow
And bend the passions of the bursting heart!

Aug.
—Bianca, these are idle words! ere long
You'll beg your freedom from a convent—

Bia.
Never!
Freedom unto the body, when the soul
Is fetter'd by its giant handed passions,
Is no more freedom than a larger cell,
A longer link, a wider, broader hell,
Unto the chain'd and damn'd are liberty!
O, my dear brother! I forget my sex!
Bear with me! I am but a woman! weak
By nature—weaker by designing man.
Have pity! Let me weep upon your bosom!

Aug.
—Companion of my earliest, best affections!
Look in my face! It smiles when yours is cheerful,
And weeps when you are sorrowful! I only
Essayed the virtue of your heart, and find
A woman's love dies but with woman's life.
What, never blush, girl! nature hath too many
Infirmities to drop the eyelash o'er—
We need not be asham'd of truth.—This Julian—
Enter Julian.
You tremble!

Bia.
O Augustus, I have given
My love too lightly! Swear to Julian, that
My heart is true to him, though false to me!

Jul.
—I do believe it! and I'd rather trust
To nature's undisguised simplicity,
Than all the worthless oaths in honor's code!
Exeunt, unperceived, Augustus and Maria.
I do offend you with my earnestness.
Forgive me, lady, that I have presum'd
To level you to hopes so poor as mine!

Bia.
—Julian, I will not contradict my heart,
Belie my nature, and disgrace my sex
By pandering to the custom—for I love you!
Perhaps you hate me for this bold confession;
But I would sooner hunt the faded light
Of yesterday, than hope to feel again
My maiden prudence! If hypocrisy
Be woman's virtue, I have sadly sinn'd.

Jul.
—Bianca, there are villains—so they say—
I fear 'tis true!—would pin a woman's virtue
Upon her words—I am not one of these!
I love you for yourself. I love you for
The spirit that can spurn duplicity—
Convention gives another designation
To such dishonesty, but I forget it.
My dictionary is my heart—and quarrelling
O'er words is wretched when we mean the same.

Bia.
—Augustus! Gone?

Jul.
You do not fear to trust
Your honor with your lover?

Bia.
No, I never
Fear what I love, or love what I should fear.

Jul.
—Come, then! I have a gondola at hand.
We will go forth upon the sleeping waters;
And, in the interchange of holy vows
And starry dreams of future happiness,
Forget the pain and sorrow of the past.
Why do you sigh, dear lady?

Bia.
I know not.
Sometimes I have presentiments of evil,
As if the soul foredream'd of danger, as
The ocean's depths are troubled long before
The tempest wakens in its cavern'd bosom.

Jul.
—O never fear!

Bia.
I cannot help it, Julian!
Fear seems as much a part of me as hope;
And, like a silly girl, at times I weep
That I am far too happy, when I think
How very short our happiness may be.

Jul.
—A lover's eyes should only see the rainbow,
And disbelieve the clouds and storms of life.
We know they shadow every sky; but, while
It can, imagination should create
A sunshine in the gloom, a glory in
The storm, and love and beauty all around!

Enter Augustus.
Aug.
—Julian!

Jul.
What now?

Aug.
You cannot linger here
With safety!

Jul.
Safety? where's the danger? speak!

Aug.
—Bianca!

Jul.
I submit then! Oh, the agony!
That those who meet to love should part to grieve!
What says my lady?

Bia.
I have tears to weep
Away the heavy hours, until thy smile,
Like sunshine, comes to dry the waters up.

Jul.
—Is this the end of every happiness?
I've heard, but never credited 'till now,
How short—how fearfully short is human joy!
Bianca, love! I leave my soul with you,
And drag my body to a sleepless couch.
O! think how very lonely I shall be!

Bia.
—Alas! you rob me of the power of thought,
Save to brood o'er the misery of your absence.

Aug.
—Come, sir, the moments hasten. Time respects
No more the lover in his mistress' arms,
Than sickness hurrying to the awful grave.
Come! kiss me girl! Good night, and pleasant slumbers!
Come, Julian! Heaven defend the man who drives
A love sick gentleman! come, Julian! come!

Jul.
—Farewell, Bianca! they, who never loved,
But little know the horror of that word.
We, who thus gaze our farewell from the eye,
Can feel how terrible it is to die!

Exeunt Julian and Augustus.
Bia.
—Maria! are you there?
Enter Maria.
Come here Maria!
Give me your arm, girl!

Mar.
How you tremble, lady.

Bia.
—Do I? What creatures are we of our passions!
Strong in design—in action imbecile.
Great to ourselves—ignoble unto others.
Assuming wisdom—laughed at for our folly.
O love! O melancholy, mournful love!
Source of all joy! All joy destroying passion!
Soul of our souls! without whose influence
The heavens, the earth, and all created things
Would fall to pieces like a broken billow!
O wherefore are thy joys so dash'd with sorrows—
Thy sorrows intermingled so with joys—
That with, or without thee, we're wretched still!
O Julian! Julian! I could die for joy
That I possess thee, as I could have died
For agony without thee! Fare thee well!

Exeunt.