University of Virginia Library

SCENE I.

—A Room.
Jeronymo. His Mother.
MOTHER.
What have I said that you affect this humour?
Come, look less strangely. Is your anger dumb?
Speak out. Jeronymo?

JERONYMO.
You have done this?

MOTHER.
I did: 'Twas for your good.

JERONYMO
Oh, mother, mother!
You have broke the fondest heart in Italy.
My good, what's that? Is't good that I shall die?
Is't good that I shall pine and fade away,
And take no comfort? None? O yes! Through all
My melancholy days I'll haunt the nest
Where my white dove lies guarded—

MOTHER.
Patience, boy.

JERONYMO.
Until I die, stern mother. I shall die,
Like people smit by lightning, suddenly.

MOTHER.
Live and be crowned with Love.

JERONYMO.
Why so I will,
And wear white roses on my ghastly brow,
And laugh at fate, like that forced bride who fell
Dead on her marriage morning. I'll be gone.
If she be false—Come with me, madam! False?
Sylvestra false? Sylvestra?

MOTHER.
Name her not,
The bitter cause whence all our sorrow springs.
You must not think of her.

JERONYMO.
Not think of her?

MOTHER.
No; she is married.

JERONYMO.
Ha, ha, ha! good mother.
Shame on your cruel jest: be grave—and gentle.

MOTHER.
I told you this before: she's married—married!
Do I speak plain?

JERONYMO.
Too plain, if you speak true.
That you may know I heed your tale, look at me!
Am I not—broken-hearted?

MOTHER.
Oh! sweet heavens.
I have done too much. (Aside)
How pinched and pale he looks!
Jeronymo, my child!

JERONYMO.
Your only child.

MOTHER.
Why do you talk thus? Prythee think on me;
On me, your mother.

JERONYMO.
Surely; for you thought
Of me in absence. I've a grateful soul:
I'll make you heir of all my father's lands,
His gems, and gold, and floating argosies:
All shall be yours; I will not live to leave
Widow or child to rob so kind a mother.

MOTHER.
Peace, peace, you hurt my heart.

JERONYMO.
I swear to do't.
By those dark Three who cut the threads of life!
By Plutus, God of gold! By Minos, judge,
And cruel Cupid! By my own lost life,
And murdered hopes, I swear!

MOTHER.
Oh! Do not talk thus.
If not for me, yet for your father's sake,
Spare me, my son!

JERONYMO.
My father? he is dead.

MOTHER.
But when he lived he was most merciful;
Tempering the angry feelings which will rise
In every mind (and lead in some to ruin)
By draughts of that divine philosophy—

JERONYMO.
O, the brave drink! Abroad, abroad, we had
Huge flasks which all went flaming to the brain.
Dark, sweet, and full of sin; and so I drank,
And drank and drank the livelong day and night,
And chewed the bitter laurel for my food,
Whose roots are watered, as wild poets tell,
By the immortal wells of Castaly.

MOTHER.
Alas, alas!

JERONYMO.
Why that looks well. I love it.

MOTHER.
What do you love, my son?

JERONYMO.
To see you weep,
Although your husband died so long ago.

MOTHER.
I do not weep for him.

JERONYMO.
Not weep for him?
Then shame seal up your mouth. Was he not kind?
Was he not good? he was; and yet you weep not;
Weep you the lazy lonely widow's life?
Tush! you may buy another husband yet.

MOTHER.
I do not wish't. I cannot match the last.

JERONYMO.
You cannot, madam; (That was true at least.)
No, though you gaze from evening dusk, till Morn
Comes climbing up the bright steps of the East;
Nay, tho' you watch for hearts from dawn till dark.
Unmatchable 'mongst men, so kind, so true,
Abhorring falsehood with a natural hate,
And full of pity was he,—but he died;
Good father! how he loved his poor pale son,
And how he feared (do you remember that?)
His race should end with me. He wished—vain wishes!
No child of mine shall ever bear our name,
And make't more noble. Lo, I am the last!
The last, last scion of a gracious tree;
For you, my mother, now have struck me down,
And withered all my branches. So, farewell.

[Going.
MOTHER.
Farewell! Yet stay! Leave pardon with me. Stay!

JERONYMO.
Farewell, and pardon! Blessings (if the son
May bless the mother) rest upon your heart.
Be calm, be happy: think of me no more.