University of Virginia Library

SCENE I.

Bertrand. Immediately afterwards, Sir Almerik. Then Martha.
Bert.
(entering from the house).
It was the bell!
Some message from the king!
(Crosses the stage to the rock, and opens the concealed door. Returns immediately with Sir Almerik, but keeps him standing at the entrance.)
Sir Almerik! You here! Stand back! Nay, not a step!
No stranger enters here.

Al.
I must and will.

Bert.
No, not a foot, by heavens! You have deceived me.
Hearing the bell, and with it, too, the sign,
I felt assured that it must be Raoul.

Al.
The king has sent me hither in his stead.
See here this letter, and his royal ring.

Bert.
His ring? 'Tis so. A letter! By your leave?
(Reads.)
“Frankly confide in Almerik, and give him
Whatever information he desires.”
—This changes matters quite. Frown not, my lord,
For if you know the secret of this place,
Then you must know that prudence is my duty.

Al.
(advancing with Bertrand to the front of the stage).
I know the place's secret? Save the mark!
I find myself here to my own surprise,
And all I see augments my wonderment.
A very paradise amid the waste!
Read me this mystery.

Bert.
How! from the king
Did you not learn it?

Al.
Nay, not I!

Bert.
So, so!
If he was silent, I must needs be dumb.

Al.
Nay, friend, you jest!

Bert.
I never jested less.

Mar.
(appearing at the door of the house).
Sir Almerik?

Bert.
He brings King René's ring,
And knows the sign to gain admittance here.
But nothing more. He must at once begone.

Al.
Begone, when the king sends me?

Bert.
Ay, although he did.

Mar.
Stay, Bertrand, stay! (To Almerik.)
What is your message, sir?

Al.
I was to say, that in an hour the king
Would come with his physician, Ebn Jahia.

Mar.
The very famous Moor, I know him well—

Al.
Comes with the king, and you were to make sure—
These were his words—that all things were prepared
As the leech ordered you.

Bert.
'Tis well, 'tis well!
The king may trust to us. Some hours ago
Was Ebn Jahia here.

Mar.
And yet, Sir Knight,
His Majesty imparted nothing more?

Al.
He was in haste, and full, meseemed, of thought.
The Moor, this Ebn Jahia, had arrived,
Raoul was ill, and secretly the king
Called me aside. “I can depend on you,”
He said, “and in your secrecy confide!
Follow the messenger, who will conduct you,
And then fulfil your charge.”

Mar.
And this was all
Was told you by the king?

Al.
Not all, and yet
What more he spake was wrapped in mystery.
He mused awhile, then, hesitating, said,
“Look you; I count on your fidelity;
You'll find my daughter, where you are to go.”
Then all at once he suddenly broke off,
Penned in keen haste the letter which I brought,
And bade me go.

Mar.
The letter?

Bert.
Ah, yes! The letter!

Mar.
(takes and reads the letter).
'Tis the king's hand. How can you doubt his tale?

Bert.
No, you are right, I had forgot the letter.

Al.
Then by the letter you may gather, how
The king desires, that from your lips I learn
What things soe'er 'tis needful I should know.
Who is this daughter that he told me of?
Margaret is now in Britain, and Iolanthe—

Mar.
Is here.

Al.
Here? Iolanthe is in Spain,
Reared in a convent since her infancy.

Mar.
Not so, Sir Knight; she's here, and has been ever.

Al.
How! Here? I prithee, Bertrand, tell me all!

Bert.
You oft, no doubt, have heard of the dispute
About Lorraine, that raged so long between
Our king and Vaudemont.

Al.
I know it well.
Yet is that ancient quarrel now forgot.
The terms of peace, by Burgundy arranged,
Secure—as rumour gives the story out—
King René's daughter's hand in marriage to
The son of Count Antonio Vaudemont.
This daughter, Iolanthe, was a child
When this alliance was determined on.

Bert.
'Twas even as you say; but, good Sir Knight,
The compact scarce was settled, when by fire
The palace was consumed at dead of night,
And Iolanthe—then a one year's babe—
Had all but perished in the flames. To save
Her life one course, and one alone, was left;
We from the chamber window let her down,
And caught her safe on cushions as she fell.
Yet, or through fear or injury from the fall,
Suffice to say, the child had lost her sight.

Al.
Had lost her sight?

Mar.
Ay, even so, my lord.
Imagine our distress—her sire's despair.
Alas! a child so gentle and so sweet,
And of her sight bereft—how sad, how hard!
The hope, that with her life was intertwined,
Extinguished, and the old and bitter feud
About Lorraine renewed—ay, and renewed
Too sure, alas! more fiercely than of old.
For the Count Vaudemont will never brook,
His son should have a blind girl for his mate.
He will believe, and this will fire his wrath,
A cheat was practised on him, and that she
Was blind before the truce was ratified.

Al.
Surmise to him most probable. But the king,
What did he in this strait?

Bert.
At first he veiled
In studious silence, that the child was blind,
Which none had e'er discovered from her looks;
But soon from Cordova he summoned hither
The very famed physician, Ebn Jahia,
Whose skill is counted nigh miraculous.
He came and tried all sorts of remedies.
With sagest counsel, too, he showed us how
To rear her up in tender fosterage;
And, last of all, he in the stars perused
Her horoscope.

Al.
And there?

Bert.
Found hope for us,
That Iolanthe should regain her sight,
When in her sixteenth year. That time is come,
And Ebn Jahia now is with the king.
He orders remedies which we apply,
Yet what their purpose I have never known;
The hour, he says, hath even now arrived.
Heaven grant it may be so!

Al.
But Iolanthe!
How heavily her fate must weigh her down!

Mar.
She has no thought herself that she is blind.

Al.
No thought that she is blind! You surely jest!

Mar.
Ah no, Sir Knight! you very soon may learn,
That all which I have told you now is true.
But let me earnestly beseech you, sir,
When you converse with Iolanthe, still
To guard your lips with most religious care,
That so no syllable shall cross their bounds,
Which to the eye bears slightest reference.
This is the strict injunction laid on all
Who come within these precincts. Nothing name
Which through the power of vision must be known;
Speak not before her of the light of day,
Nor of the moonbeams in the placid night,
Nor of its thousand stars. Alas! no stars
Illume the lasting night wherein she dwells!

Al.
And have you kept this rule implicitly?

Bert.
We schooled ourselves from her most tender years,
When there was little danger had we failed.

Al.
With what intent has it been hid from her,
That she is blind? Who willed it should be so?

Mar.
We know not whether 'twas the king's resolve,
Or whether Ebn Jahia so advised;
Yet I can easily explain the cause.
A coronet shall one day deck her brows,
As you are 'ware; so does her future hold
A brilliant promise forth, should all go well.
But it is feared, the consciousness of blindness
Might settle deep into her tender soul,
Untune her spirit, and from her senses take
Their equipoise, and that clear cheerfulness,
Which are a throne's most beauteous ornaments.
This consciousness 'tis purposed to avert.

Al.
This is the reason, then, why she lives here,
Secluded from the world and all who might
Betray to her the secret of her loss?

Bert.
'Tis even so. This valley, locked within
The heart of yonder mountains of Vaucluse,
Is from the eye of all intruders safe.
You know, it is King René's chief delight
To tend and cultivate his plants and flowers.
Thus all you see was by himself arranged,
And with the trees and shrubs his daughter grew.
Here knows she every spot,—unerringly
Can find her way about without a guide.
Nor has her education been o'erlooked.
She weaves, spins, tends her garden-plots, and is
For ever occupied, and ever cheerful.
She makes songs too, and sings at leisure hours.

Al.
Makes songs!

Bert.
Ay, she makes songs. The king himself
Taught her the cunning of the troubadours;
And ne'er a master of them all need blush
To own the verses which her fancy weaves.

Al.
All this I can explain and understand;
Yet how she ne'er suspects her blindness, I
Can scarce conceive. No! this must be delusion.

Mar.
Such it appears to you, whose eyesight serves
As a sure guide to every step you take.
Involuntarily you turn your gaze
Towards every sound that stirs. Even in the dark,
The accustomed light with fancied gleam deceives you;
But he, who from his earliest infancy,
From birth, mayhap, hath lacked the power of sight,
How shall he deem his fellow-creatures see?
What's sight to him? What can he comprehend,
Of all that wondrous power that's in the eye?
Yet, as with ease we master by its aid
All that surrounds us, so the blind do hold
Hearing, touch, feeling, the air's soft impress,
And other means innumerable, at command,
Which are to us incomprehensible.
—This shall yourself observe, as I have said,
Before you have been long with Iolanthe.

Al.
Now, by the mass, I long to see this wonder.
—Yet one thing more, that puzzles me, explain.
She lives alone with you, apart from all;
Is this secluded valley all her world?

Bert.
You err to think that Iolanthe is
So lonely, so forlorn. Behind these mountains
Lies, as you know, the convent of St Clara;
And oftentimes the abbess and the nuns
Come here to visit her; her father, too,
Brings with him stranger guests from time to time.

Al.
And so she lacks for nought, and is content,
If but some stranger on occasion come?
Of all the wealth the world to us presents,
Of all its glories, she surmiseth nought?
Does she not question you?

Mar.
That is a point,
On which 'tis not so easy to reply.
It may be, she suppresses many a thought.
She knows there is an entrance to this vale,
Hears the bell sound when any one arrives,
Brightens to hear it, and in silence waits,
With ear intent. Yet doth she never ask,
Where is the entrance, whitherward it leads;
For she has heard that there are many things
She must not ask, but leave to years to teach.
So 'tis with children. Speak to them of God,
Of power omnipotent, of another life,
And mark how they will listen, opening wide
Their little eyes in wonder, as some doubt—
A passing shade—is painted on their looks;
And then, at last, with touching faith, accept
For truth the things they may not comprehend.
So now for Iolanthe the whole world
Is one vast mystery, which she oft would pierce.
Then will her father or the abbess say,
“Rest thee content, my child: thou art too young,
Some future time thou'lt comprehend it all.”
In this she piously confides; nor dreams
She wants the eyes' clear sight, to compass all
The splendours of this goodly universe.
—May it not be, sir, while we darkly muse
Upon our life's mysterious destinies,
That we in blindness walk, like Iolanthe,
Unconscious that true vision is not ours?
Yet is that faith our hope's abiding star.

Al.
In this, good Martha, hast thou truly spoken.
But tell me, where is Iolanthe now?

Bert.
She sleeps.

Al.
How! Sleeps? And now?

Bert.
For just one hour,
By the physician's order every day.
Yet 'tis no soft and natural sleep; indeed
I'm puzzled sorely what to think of it.
By strange and uncouth words, and singular signs,
Does Ebn Jahia charm her to repose;
Then doth he place upon her breast a stone,
A talisman or amulet, belike,
And only when he has removed the gem,
Does she awake again. I will confess,
This troubles me.

Al.
Yet may we strongly trust
In Ebn Jahia's skill.

Bert.
There lies my hope.

(The bell rings.)
Mar.
Bertrand, the bell!

Bert.
Nay, then, it is the king.

(Exit through the concealed door.)
Al.
Comes the king often hither?

Mar.
Yes, when he
Has fixed his quarters at the neighbouring palace,
We see him frequently. At times, however,
Whole months will pass without his coming here.

Al.
Knows Iolanthe, then, it is the king?

Mar.
No, she doth not, and that is well remembered.
She has no thought of that. She calls him father,
We others call him Raymbaud,—such the name
Of one that was a famous troubadour.

Al.
Break off! The king!