University of Virginia Library

ACT THE THIRD.

SCENE THE FIRST.

Raymond, Salviati.
Sal.
Behold me here: this is the appointed day:
I come; and bring with me whate'er I promised.
Already to the borders of Etruria
Warriors advance in arms: King Ferdinand
Pays them; the Roman Sixtus blesses them;
Ere they proceed, they wait to hear from us
The signal of attack. Now say, hast thou
All promised ammunition in these walls?

Ray.
My arm has long been ready for the blow;
And I have store of others also ready;
But whom to strike, or where, or how, or when,
They know not; nor befits it that they know.
But to the great achievement yet is wanting
Its chiefest ornament: my aged father,
He who alone could authorize the attempt,
Is ignorant of it: to revengeful words
His ears are closed; and thou wilt hear him speak
Of sufferance yet. My thoughts are known to him;
For ill I hide them; further he knows nothing:
I deem'd it wisest to conceal from him
This our confederacy till thou cam'st hither.

Sal.
What say'st thou? Nothing Guglielmo knows?
And thinkest thou that, at the close of day,
He should be ignorant of what he's doom'd
To-morrow to accomplish?

Ray.
Thinkest thou
That it were wise to risk so great a secret?
That to a man, (though enterprizing once,)
Infirm from years, 'twere wise to grant one night
To after-thoughts? Beyond a few brief hours
Audacity dwells not in empty veins;
Prudence comes soon; irresolution thence,
Procrastination and inconstancy,
And the infecting others with alarm;
And 'midst these doubts and fears the enterprize,
The time for its completion, and the rage
Ensuring its success, dissolve away,
And guilty shame at last o'erwhelms the whole.

Sal.
But how, detests he not the dreadful yoke?
And shares he not the general indignation? ...

Ray.
He hates it, but he fears more than he hates;
And thence he vacillates eternally
'Twixt anger and dismay. Now he controuls
His wholesome indignation, and he prays
And waits for, and half hopes for, better times;
And now, as by a fatal flash reveal'd,
The truth at once on his bewilder'd mind
Bursts forth; and all the heaviness he feels
Of his unworthy chains, yet dares not burst them.
He was indeed incensed beyond all bounds
At the last outrage, which I would incur
At all events. The useless gonfalon
Let others gain, taken from me to-day.
I have, with many and repeated insults,
Myself compell'd the tyrants to resume
The honour they bestow'd. Yet not the less
For this have I indulged in loud complaints,
Affecting an immeasurable grief
For the invited injury.—Oh see
What times we live in, what abode is ours,
When with hypocrisy we're forced to clothe
E'en patriotic views!—By schemes like these
I have, at least in part, to my designs
Silently moulded Guglielmo's heart.
At length thou comest: thou shalt now divulge
The king's assistance, the pontific wrath,
The means concerted. Let us wait him here;
For here we are accustomed to confer.

Sal.
Do not the tyrants oftentimes repair
To these apartments?

Ray.
We are now secure
From their approach: already has this place
Witness'd their public and obnoxious toils.
The remnant of the day, which we consume,
We, the scorn'd multitude, in useless tears,
They spend in revels and in sensual joys.
Hence I invited thee to meet me here;
And hence my father also summon'd. He,
At first, will be amazed at seeing thee:
In a short time I will reveal to him
The indignation and the hardihood,
And the immutable and stern resolve
Of giving death, or dying, which we feel.
Mine be the task to inflame him. But, meanwhile,
Let him at once learn this confederacy
Both can be form'd, and is already form'd.

Sal.
Thou dost admonish wisely: more and more
I deem thee, as I listen to thy words,
A worthy instrument of liberty.
As these are born oppressors, so art thou
Defender of thy country. To induce
Thy father to concur in our designs,
The sanction of the pope will much avail.
Those early principles on aged hearts
Have mighty influence, which e'en with our milk
We once imbibed. Rome, evermore believed
Implicitly by our forefathers, named
Each enterprize, injurious to herself,
Impious; and those, whatever they might be,
Holy, that aided her ambitious views.
If we are wise, this ancient prejudice
May now avail us much: since at this time,
Not as he's wont to be, the successor
Of Peter is the enemy of tyrants,
At this time, more than all allies beside,
That successor of Peter may befriend us.

Ray.
It grieves me, I to thee alone confess it,
It grieves me not a little, thus to make
Vile means subservient to a generous end.
To raise as watchword in the cause of freedom,
The name of Rome, the abode of guilty slaves:
Here are the times, and not myself, in fault!
And further am I grieved, that I'm constrain'd
To make pretext of individual wrongs
In this most righteous cause. The multitude
Will think that I'm inflamed by low revenge
And selfish passions; and perchance believe
That I am envious of the tyrant's power.—
Oh heaven, thou knowest ...

Sal.
Let not thoughts like these
Divert thee from thy purpose: speedily
The foolish vulgar will be undeceived
By our performances.

Ray.
The time to come
Fills me with mournful and foreboding thoughts.
Their necks they have accustomed to the yoke;
Their natural rights forgotten; they know not
That they're in chains, much less desire to burst them.
Slavery, the natures who resist it not,
Transforms, embrutes; and rather needs their force
To give them freedom than to clench their fetters.

Sal.
Hence will the enterprize be more exalted,
And worthier of thyself. In Greece or Rome
'Twas meritorious, though not difficult,
To endow free souls with freedom. But to rouse
Dead and degraded slaves to life at once
And liberty, ah this indeed requires
Sterner devotion.

Ray.
It is true: yet fame
Awaits the mere attempt. Ah, were I sure
As of my own arm, and of my own heart,
Of those of my compatriots! But by slaves
The tyrant, not the tyranny, is hated.

SCENE THE SECOND.

Guglielmo, Salviati, Raymond.
Gu.
Thou, Salviati, here? I thought thou wert
Pursuing honours on the Tyber's banks.

Sal.
A mightier object to my natal soil
Restores me.

Gu.
Lucklessly dost thou review
A soil which it were better to forget.
To us what foolish purpose guides thee safe,
Far from the tyrants didst thou dwell, and thou
Returnest to thy prison. To the man
Doom'd to behold his native land enslaved
By cruel and by arbitrary power,
What unfrequented and what distant spot
(However savage and inhospitable,)
Can be unwelcome? Let my son to thee
Be an example, if we ought to look
From these our Medicæan lords for aught
But outrages and scorn. In vain, in vain
Rome with the sacred ministry invests thee;
Their supreme will alone is here held sacred.

Ray.
Father, and know'st thou whether he comes here
Arm'd with endurance or a shield less vile?

Sal.
Of bitter and retributory wrath
I come the austere minister: I come
Of plenary, inflexible revenge,
Though late, the certain messenger. I hope
To arouse ye all from the vile lethargy
In which ye all lie buried, abject slaves,
Now that with me and with my rage I bring
The holy rage of Sixtus, sovereign pontiff.

Gu.
Arms wholly useless: rage we do not want;
We want support; endurance or support
Must be our choice or chance.

Sal.
Support we bring,
And more effectual than was ever proffer'd.
I bring not words alone. Hear; for to me,
In brief yet powerful language, it belongs
The business to divulge. There are, by whom
I am commission'd to recall to thee,
Provided thou canst yet remember them,
The ancient times, and thy original pride.
If not, the painful duty then is mine
The degradation of thyself and others
To bring before thine eyes. If in thy veins
There yet is blood left to revolt at this,
Assistance is not far from us. Already
The Roman banners in the Etrurian ports
Wave to the wind; and far more firm support
The standard of King Ferdinand affords,
Follow'd by thousand swords in firm array,
Impatient for the fight, at one slight nod
Of thine for any enterprize prepared.
In thy arbitrement is placed the life
Of the oppressors; thine and thy son's honour;
The freedom of us all. That which thy sword
May yet obtain, that which thou yet may'st lose
From cowardice, thy doubts, thy hopes, thy fears,
Our loss and our disgrace maturely weigh,
And finally resolve.

Gu.
What do I hear?
To thee can I yield credence? Who obtain'd
So much for our advantage? Hitherto
Profuse alone in empty promises
Sixtus and Ferdinand were tardy friends.
Who now impels them, who? ...

Ray.
Dost thou ask that?
Hast thou so soon forgotten then that I
Repair'd to Naples and the Tyber's banks?
That there twelve months I tarried? To what clime
Can I transport myself, and not inspire,
Where'er I go, resentment and abhorrence?
Among what people can I drag my days,
Into whose bosoms I shall not transfuse
All, all my indignation, and at once
Excite in them compassion for myself
And for my friends? Who now remains
Deaf to my lamentations?—For our shame
Thou art alone so, father; where thou oughtest,
More than all others, to abhor the yoke,
And feel its weight: thou, whom I call my father,
Art equally with me the tyrants' foe;
And art by them, e'en more than I am, scorn'd.
Thou, once the best among good citizens,
For thy too facile criminal endurance
Art now among the guilty ones the worst.
Ah, make, with thy infirm refusal, make
Our fetters and thy infamy eternal!
All now perceive that we are fit to serve,
But not to live: yes, wait, wait on for time,
Till time is ours no more: those hoary locks
For fresh disgraces keep; and palliate
With false compassion for thy son, which he
With all his heart abhors and disavows,
Thy ignominious cowardice.

Gu.
My son,
For such indeed thou art, no less than thou,
Fervid with youth and generous vehemence,
I once thus thunder'd; but that time is past;
E'en now I am not vile, nor deem'st thou so
Who thus aspersest me; but I have ceased
To act by chance.

Ray.
Thou art resign'd to live
Each day by chance, and wilt not act by chance?
What art thou? What are we? Would not the hope,
The most precarious, of revenge, now be
A state more certain than the doubtful one,
The apprehensive one, in which we're doom'd,
Trembling, to live?

Gu.
Thou know'st that for myself
I tremble not.

Ray.
Then would'st thou say for me,
I absolve thee from all paternal care
On my account. We both are citizens,
And nothing else to-day; and there remains
Far more for me than for thyself to lose.
To the meridian of my days have I
Scarcely attain'd; and thou towards night declinest.
Children thou hast; like thee I am a father;
I have an offspring but too numerous,
And of that helpless age that they are fit
Only to wake compassion in my heart.—
Different, far different, are my ties from thine.
I see a lovely consort, of myself
The better part, eternally in tears
Beside me pining: when they see her weep,
My children flock around, and ask her why;
And they too weep with her. Their sorrows rend
My heart; and I'm constrain'd to weep by stealth.
But soon the sad remembrance disenchants
Each soft affection of my wither'd heart,
That 'tis not fitting for a slave to love
Objects not his. My consort is not mine,
My children are not mine, while I permit
Him, whosoe'er he be, that is a tyrant,
In this place to inhale the vital air.
I have no tie now left in all the world
Except the stern inexorable oath,
Tyrants and tyranny to extirpate.

Gu.
Would'st thou slay two of them: to willing slaves
Will tyrants e'er be wanting?

Ray.
To the free
Will swords be wanting? Let them rise by thousands,
By thousands they shall fall, or I will fall.

Gu.
I am subdued by thy decisive will.
I, not unworthy of a son like thee,
Would to thy noble rage commit myself,
If of our arms, and not of foreign powers,
Thou would'st avail thyself. I see not, no,
For our sakes, Rome and Ferdinand in arms;
But for the injury of the Medici.
We place them in these walls ourselves, but who
At will can chace them afterwards from thence?
The mercenary soldiers of a king
Seem not to me the harbingers of freedom.

Sal.
I thus reply to thee. The faith of Rome,
The faith of Ferdinand I warrant not:
It is the accustomed plan of those who reign
Alternately to give it or resume it.
In the suspicion common to them both,
Their mutual envy, and in what is call'd
State policy, do thou to-day confide.
Both fain would domineer o'er us; but one
Prevents the other. Pity for our state
Their heart conceives not; nor have I alleged it:
But long experience, to our shame, persuades them
That popular and fluctuating rule,
The turbulence of faction, render us
Slow to resolve, irresolute in act.
Each of them fears that, on the Tuscan ruins,
A single Tuscan chieftain should arise,
Who may suffice to annihilate the one,
If with the other leagued. Behold at once
The royal knot untwisted: private ends
Prompt both alliances. If otherwise,
Think'st thou that I should ever dare to urge
Reliance on the friendship of a king?

Ray.
And were it otherwise, dost thou believe
That I should inconsiderately relax
The reins, that I, with persevering hand,
O'er the reboundings of my struggling will,
Have held so many years? I utter'd not
By accident inflammatory words
To thee; by accident thou didst not hear me
Exasperate with pungent virulence
The tyrant's rage against me. Long I spake not,
While silence might assist me; but the proud,
Imprudent tauntings that have madden'd them
To injure me, by prudence were inspired.
To my vile fellow-slaves I had in vain
Our general wrongs adduced; for private ones
Alone establish in corrupted minds
Right to retaliation. I could find
Abettors of my vengeance, if alone
I of myself discoursed; but not one man
Could I e'er find discoursing of my country.
Hence (ah opprobrious and cruel silence,
But indispensable!) I never dared
To name my country, never. But to thee,
Who art not of the common herd of men,
Can I refrain from naming her? Ah no!—
The object of our enterprize consists
In slaying the two tyrants: but 'twill be
Of far more difficult accomplishment
To fashion after consequences well;
To give to inanition life once more;
To re-create our prostrate commonwealth,
To make it once more strong, and capable
Of liberty; to make its pulses beat,
Now languishing, with vigorous, virtuous health.
Now, say'st thou not that we're confederate
To a most holy purpose? I alone
Am leader of this lofty brotherhood;
He is but one, as thou may'st also be,
Of its component parts. We have, thou seest,
Great instruments; and courage greater still:
Sublime the end, and worthy of ourselves.
Thou, father, from a project great as this,
Wilt thou shrink back dishearten'd? Thy consent
Grant me, oh grant me; nothing else is wanting.
The swords unscabbarded are raised already:
Give, give the signal only, and thou seest them
In their devoted bosoms plunged at once,
And make an ample space for liberty.

Gu.
Thou hast a hero's mind.—A noble shame,
Astonishment, resentment, hope, and rage,
All hast thou raised in me. Sense of old age,
Courage of manhood, and the fire of youth,
What hast thou not? My guide and my commander,
My deity art thou.—It shall be thine
Alone, the honour of this enterprize;
With thee its dangers I will only share!
Thou say'st, that nought is wanting but my name
To accomplish it. Henceforward to thy will
That name, and all its influence, I yield:
Dispose, elect, and whomsoe'er thou wilt
Rescind from our confederates. Keep alone
A weapon for thy father: thou shalt teach me
What post I should fill up, what blow inflict,
The whole shall teach me, when the whole is ready:
In thee and thy judicious rage I trust.

Ray.
But ... more than thou may'st think ... that time draws near.
Thou wilt not be inconstant?

Gu.
I am thy father:
Dost thou expect to change?

Ray.
Then whet thy blade,
For at the dawn of day ... But who approaches?
Bianca! ... Oh my friend, let us avoid her.
The last directions to this mighty work
Haste we to give. To thee I shall return,
Father, ere long, and then thou shalt know all.

SCENE THE THIRD.

Guglielmo, Bianca.
Bi.
I seek for Raymond, and he flies from me.
Oh tell me wherefore, and with whom he flies!—
What do I see? Thou seem'st bereft of reason!
What troublous thoughts estrange thee from thyself?
Ah, speak: does any danger threaten us? ...
O'er whom does it impend? ...

Gu.
If agony
Heavily sits upon my pallid face,
Why should'st thou be surprised at this? I fear,
And cannot hide my fears; and who fears not?
If thou look round, a pallidness like mine
On every face is painted.

Bi.
But for fear
What fresh occasion? ...

Gu.
'Tis not fresh, oh daughter.

Bi.
But I have always seen thee hitherto
Immoveable: thou fearest now, and say'st it.
And Raymond, who like an impetuous storm
Of violent discordant impulses
Seem'd hitherto to me, I now behold
Assume the semblance of a tranquil man.
Not long ago, words breathing nought but peace
He spake to me: and he, of all suspense
The instinctive enemy, professes now
To expect alleviation from delay:
With one unknown he flies from me; and thou
Stay'st agitated here. ... Ah yes, there is
Too certainly a secret; ... and thou hid'st it,
From me thou hidest it? My sire, my spouse,
Vie in deluding me. May heaven permit ...

Gu.
Check these suspicions, check these tears: in vain
Should I, alarm'd, exhort thee not to fear.
Fear thou, but fear not us.—Well said my son,
That time alone can bring us palliatives.
Go to thy children: thou canst not perform
A task more grateful to us than to guard them,
To love them well, and nourish them to virtue—
Useful advice, if thou from me regard it,
'Twill be to thee, that thou should'st persevere,
Where words avail not, in profoundest silence ...
Thus, oh Bianca, thou wilt surely win
All our affections; and at once escape
The persecution of thy cruel brothers.