University of Virginia Library

Scene II.

—Before the Porta San Lorenzo.—On three rude biers lie the bodies of the younger Stefano, Gianni, and Pietro Agabito Colonna, guarded.
Enter Cecco del Vecchio and Citizens.
1st Cit.

Rienzi has, indeed, most pitiably mauled
the Barons. Here lies young Gianni, next him his
father, Stefano, and beyond, the Provost of Marseilles.

There are slain besides, two bastards of their House,
with many other noblemen.

2nd Cit.

And Giordano di Marino is reported dead
of his wounds. This Stefano must be the last of
Stefanuccio's sons?

1st Cit.

Nay, the Cardinal lives. This is a dismal
spectacle.

Cecco.

Will the sparrow mourn for the hawk?

2nd Cit.

Give me the old free times and the Barons'
pilfering, rather than the rule of a monastery and
Rienzi's taxes.

Cecco.

Taxes, ay—there I am with you. He calls
us lords of the world: let him make the world pay
our taxes, or down he shall come. He has borne
himself haughtily of late to those who set him where
he is. I mistrust this knighthood.

2nd Cit.

His kith and kin begin to hold their heads
too high. The fat Barber, on his piebald horse, rides
over his betters in the streets.

1st Cit.

Ay, with his ragamuffins crying, “Way for
the Uncle of the Tribune!”

Cecco.

Ha! Does the old lion come to look upon
his dead whelps? The devil grace them all!

Enter Stefano Colonna and Cola Orsino.
Cola O.
Here lie the bodies, slain, as you have heard.

Stef. C.
God's will be done! Better be dead than be
The playthings of this bloated upstart's pride.

Cola O.
Their tares are reaped. Baron, I feel how sore
The tribulations of this iron time
Beat on your wintered head; how desolate,
With chambers blank against the tardy dawn,
Stares the dismantled fortress of your age.

Stef. C.
(striking his breast.)
Here is my fortress, sir, not yet dismantled.
Methinks I am an oak, whose greenest twigs
Are withered ere itself. (Aside.)
I cannot weep;
But every ruffian wound of you smarts here,
Branded in blood upon my tearless eyes.
I'll swear young Stefanello, on your tomb,
The Hannibal of this Rome—but happier fortuned!
(Aloud.)
I here identify, and claim these bodies,
To give them Christian burial.

Cola O.
Nay, my lord,
The Tribune, in his anger, hath forbid them
More than pertains to common criminals.

Stef. C.
My curse upon his head! God grant these eyes
May see his carrion ditched with common rogues!

Cola O.
This bootless rage is most unseemly here,
But pardoned to your grief. Let me entreat you
To sue his clemency—I'll second you.

Stef. C.
To sue to him? I will not sue to him.
For your safe conduct, thanks. (Aside.)
I'll to the Legate.
The Church, or none, must crush this Antichrist.
(Aloud.)
Farewell, my lord!

[Exit.
Cola O.
Now, with good steering, we may pass the reefs;
But rashness wrecks us—and I fear the Tribune
Will greet the breakers as miraculous waves
To float him over all.
Enter Rienzi and his young son, Lorenzo, attended.
Good-morrow, Tribune!
Of all our bloody reaping yesterday
Here lie the choicest sheaves.

Rien.
'Tis very well.
I have this day cut off an ear too tough
For even St. Peter's sword.

Cola O.
Methinks 'twere better
If, ere we take our ease for harvest-home,
We gather that still standing at Marino.
Let me march straight upon my cousins there,
Awed by Giordano's death.

Rien.
I'll think upon it.

Cola O.
And act, I hope.

Rien.
Here is enough of slaughter.

Cola O.
Too much; if still the fires of civil war
Be left to smoulder. Bid me quench them straight.

Rien.
Enough—I'll think upon it. All my mind
Is bent, just now, upon a solemn rite
Which I have here to do, God's hand upon me,
Who hath cast down this House, to raise up mine.
Kneel down, Lorenzo, by this bloody pool
Which pays my brother's blood.
[Boy kneels. Rienzi gives him the accolade.
Rise up a knight,
Messer Lorenzo, with the further style
Of Cavalier of Victory; and receive
This chrism of expiation on thy brow.
[He dips his fingers in the bloody pool, and touches the boy's forehead.
Salute him, trumpets! He shall give Rome peace.

[Flourish.
Cola O.
(aside).
This is sheer madness!

Rien.
I will beat the sword
Into the pruning-hook; and in the Church
Of Araceli hang my olive-crown.
Enter Vittoria Colonna, with twelve Nuns of San Silvestro. She kneels to Rienzi.
Madam, your suit to us?

Vitt. C.
I know not how to shape my tongue to speak
Words that may fit the changes of our hap
Since last we met in friendship. I am come,
Humbly enough, Heaven knows, to claim the boon
Your friendship promised then.

Rien.
Madam, what boon?

Vitt. C.
Alas! but mercy on our fallen House.
I ask, what's nought to you, too much to me:
My father's—brother's body—and my cousin's,
To give them loving burial.

Rien.
You ask mercy
On those who have stabbed mercy to the death,
And flung it forth for carrion—it smells foul.
Mercy? Will men pull rocks upon their heads,
Or thrust their hands in fire, and whine for mercy,
When they are crushed or burnt? Will criminals
Play with the law, as children at some game,
And hope for forfeits kisses?

Vitt. C.
To a man
I plead, not to the mindless elements.
A man whom, with most ample cause to hate,
I deem still noble. For the law, I know not
What law transcends heaven's justice; and from heaven
The blackest criminals may pardon find.

Rien.
Ay, after ransom paid, and penance done.
Who pays the ransom here?

Vitt. C.
What penance more
Can dead men do? Base insult after death
Is savage, and not just. And oh, for ransom,
If innocent pangs must pay, what have I done,
That Rome, or you, should wreak revenge upon me?
What has my mother done! What has the bride—
The three-weeks bride—of my dead brother done?
Ask you our blood? We weep away our blood
In slow-consuming tears—dead while we live,
Drinking the sorrows mixed for us by men,
Our womanhood's daily potion, silently.
Let the dead rest, who, standing at God's bar,
May smile at man's revenge: but pity us—
Add no more gall to our thrice-bitter cup.

Rien.
O for more enemies like you, to wring
From their clear souls such honey as outwells
In your reluctant praise! To add one pang
To your o'erflowing sorrows rends my heart;
But how can I show mercy, yet be just?

Vitt. C.
O speak not like some devilish instrument
Grinding out tortures that it cannot feel,
With blind relentlessness; but like a man,
With human organs and a human will,
And full in history's eye! For your own sake
Trample not on my prayer; for she will see
In this no law, but the great Tribune's act.
Be just to me—give me these poor, marred limbs,
In whose dishonour you dishonour me—
Ay, more than if you whipped me thro' the town,
Naked—I feel it more. O bid me take them!
Give me my father, Tribune—give me my brother!

Rien.
Take them, then; but at midnight, secretly,
You must inter them. I will have no clamour
Of women's tongues about them, no orations,
No show of public funeral, to stir up
The common people's pity. If there be,
They share the fate of common criminals.

Vitt. C.
I ask no more than this, and bless you for it.
O Gianni! O my father!

Rien.
Fare you well!
Keep Stefanello from the throat of Rome,
For his own sake—but that's impossible.

[Exeunt severally, the Nuns carrying off the biers.