University of Virginia Library

Scene II.

—The Wood.
Enter Daria from the chase with bow and arrows.
Daria.
O stag that swiftly flying
Before my feathered shafts the winds outvieing,
Impelled by wings, not feet,
If in this green retreat
Here panting thou wouldst die,
And stain with blood the fountain murmuring by,
Await another wound, another friend,
That so with quicker speed thy life may end;
For to a wretch that stroke a friend must be
That eases death and sooner sets life free.
[She stumbles and falls near the mouth of a cave.]
But, bless me, heaven! I feel
My brain grow hot, my curdling blood congeal:
A form of fire and snow
I seem at once to turn: this sudden blow,
This stumbling, how I know not, by this stone,
This horrid mouth in which my grave is shown,
This cave of many shapes,
Through which the melancholy mountain gapes,
This mountain's self, a vast
Abysmal shadow cast
Suddenly on my heart, as if 'twere meant
To be my rustic pyre, my strange new monument,
All fill my heart with wonder and with fear,
What buried mysteries are hidden here
That terrify me so,
And make me tremble 'neath impending woe.
[A solemn strain of music is heard from within.]
Nay more, illusion now doth bear to me
The sweetest sounds of dulcet harmony,
Music and voice combine:—
O solitude! what phantasms are thine!
But let me listen to the voice that blent
Sounds with the music of the instrument.

Music from within the cave.

Song.
Oh! be the day for ever blest,
And blest be pitying heaven's decree,
That makes the darksome cave to be
Daria's tomb, her place of rest!

Daria.
Blest! can such evil auguries bless?
And happy can that strange fate be
That gives this darksome cave to me
As monument of my sad life?


Music.
Yes.

Daria.
Oh! who before in actual woe
The happier signs of bliss could read?
Will not a fate so rigorous lead
To misery, not to rapture?—


Music.
No.

Daria.
O fantasy! unwelcome guest!
How can this cave bring good to me?


Music.
Itself will tell, when it shall be
Daria's tomb, her place of rest.

Daria.
But then, who gave the stern decree,
That this dark cave my bones should hide?


Music.
Daria, it was he who died,
Who gave his life for love of thee.

Daria.
“Who gave his life for love of me!”
Ah! me, and can it be in sooth
That gentle noble Roman youth
I answered with such cruelty
In this same wood the other day,
Saying that I his love would be
If he would only die for me!
Can he have cast himself away
Down this dark cave, and there lies dead,
Buried within the dread abyss,
Waiting my love, his promised bliss?—
My soul, not now mine own, has fled!

Cynthia
(within).
Forward! forward! through the gloom
Every cave and cavern enter,
Search the dark wood to its centre,
Lest it prove Daria's tomb.

Daria.
Ah! me, the sense confounding,
Both here and there are opposite voices sounding.
Here is my name in measured cadence greeted,
And there in hollow echoes oft repeated.
Would that the latter cries that reach my ear
Came from my mates in this wild forest sphere,
In the dread solitude that doth surround me
Their presence would be welcome.

[Enter Cynthia with bow and arrows.]
Cynthia.
Till I found me,
Beauteous Daria, by thy side once more,
Each mountain nook my search had well gone o'er.

Daria
(aside).
Let me dissemble
The terror and surprise that make me tremble,
If I have power to feign
Amid the wild confusion of my brain:—
Following the chase to-day,
Wishing Diana's part in full to play,
So fair the horizon smiled,
I left the wood and entered on the wild,
Led by a wounded deer still on and on.
And further in pursuit I would have gone,
Nor had my swift career
Even ended here,
But for this mouth that opening in the rock,
With horrid gape my vain attempt doth mock,
And stops my further way.

Cynthia.
Until I found thee I was all dismay,
Lest thou some savage beast, some monstrous foe,
Hadst met.

Daria
(aside).
Ah! would to Jove 'twere so!
And that my death in his wild hands had paid
For future chastisement by fate delayed!
But ah! the wish is vain,
Foreboding horror fills my heart and brain,
This mystic music borne upon the air
Must surely augur ill.

(Enter Nisida.)
Nisida.
Daria fair,
And Cynthia wise, I come to seek ye two.

Cynthia.
Has any thing occurred or strange or new?

Nisida.
I scarce can tell it. As I came along,
I heard a man, in a clear voice and strong,
Proclaiming as he went
Through all the mountain a most strange event:
Rome hath decreed
Priceless rewards to her whose charms may lead
Through lawful love and in an open way
By public wedlock in the light of day,
The son of proud Polemius from the state
Of gloom in which his mind is sunk of late.

Cynthia.
And what can be the cause that he is so?

Nisida.
Ah! that I do not know,
But yonder, leaving the Salarian Way,
A Roman soldier hitherward doth stray:
He may enlighten us and tell us all.

Cynthia.
Yes, let us know the truth, the stranger call.

Daria
(aside).
Ah! how distinct the pain
That presses on my heart, and dulls my wildered brain!

(Enter Escarpin.)
Nisida.
Thou, O thou, whose wandering footsteps
These secluded groves have entered ...

Escarpin.
Thou four hundred times repeated—
Thou and all the thous, your servant.

Nisida.
Tell us of the proclamation
Publicly to-day presented
To the gaze of Rome.

Escarpin.
I'll do so;
For there's nothing I love better
Than a story ( aside,
if to tell it
In divine Daria's presence
Does not put me out, for no one,
When the loved one listens, ever
Speaks his best): Polemius,
Rome's great senator, whose bended
Shoulders, like an Atlas, bear
All the burden of the empire,
By Numerian's self entrusted,
He, this chief of Rome's great senate,
Has a son, by name Chrysanthus,
Who, as rumour goes, at present
Is afflicted by a sadness
So extreme and so excessive,
That 't is thought to be occasioned
By the magic those detested
Christians (who abhor his house,
And his father, who hath pressed them
Heavily as judge and ruler)
Have against his life effected,
All through hatred of our gods.
And so great is the dejection
That he feels, there's nothing yet
Found to rouse him or divert him.
Thus it is Numerianus,
Who is ever well-affected
To his father, hath proclaimed
All through Rome, that whosoever
Is so happy by her beauty,
Or so fortunately clever
By her wit, or by her graces
Is so powerful, as to temper
His affliction, since love conquers
All things by his magic presence,
He will give her (if a noble)
As his wife, and will present her
With a portion far surpassing
All Polemius' self possesses,
Not to speak of what is promised
Him whose skill may else effect it.
Thus it is that Rome to-day
Laurel wreaths and crowns presenteth
To its most renowned physicians,
To its sages and its elders,
And to wit and grace and beauty
Joyous feasts and courtly revels;
So that there is not a lady
In all Rome, but thinks it certain
That the prize is hers already,
Since by all 'twill be contested,
Some through vanity, and some
Through a view more interested:
Even the ugly ones, I warrant,
Will be there well represented.
So with this, adieu. ( Aside,
Oh! fairest
Nymph Daria, since I ventured
Here to see thee, having seen thee
Now, alas! I must absent me!)

[Exit.
Cynthia.
What strange news!

Nisida.
There's not a beauty
But for victory will endeavour
When among Rome's fairest daughters
Such a prize shall be contested.

Cynthia.
Thus by showing us the value
Thou upon the victory settest,
We may understand that thou
Meanest in the lists to enter.

Nisida.
Yes, so far as heaven through music
Its most magic cures effecteth,
Since no witchcraft is so potent
But sweet music may dispel it.
It doth tame the raging wild beast,
Lulls to sleep the poisonous serpent,
And makes evil genii, who
Are revolted spirits—rebels—
Fly in fear, and in this art
I have always been most perfect:
Wrongly would I act to-day,
In not striving for the splendid
Prize which will be mine, when I
See myself the loved and wedded
Wife of the great senator's son,
And the mistress of such treasures.

Cynthia.
Although music is an art
Which so many arts excelleth,
Still in truth 't is but a sound
Which the wanton air disperses.
It the sweet child of the air
In the air itself must perish.
I, who in my studious reading
Have such learnéd lore collected,
Who in poetry, that art
Which both teacheth and diverteth,
May precedence claim o'er many
Geniuses so prized at present,
Can a surer victory hope for
In the great fight that impendeth,
Since the music of the soul
Is what keeps the mind suspended.
In one item, Nisida,
We two differ: thy incentive
Thy chief motive, is but interest:
Mine is vanity, a determined
Will no other woman shall
Triumph o'er me in this effort,
Since I wish that Rome should see
That the glory, the perfection
Of a woman is her mind,
All her other charms excelling.

Daria.
Interest and vanity
Are the two things, as you tell me,
That, O Cynthia! can oblige thee,
That, O Nisida, can compel thee
To attempt this undertaking
By so many risks attended.
But I think you both are wrong,
Since in this case, having heard that
The affliction this man suffers
Christian sorcery hath effected
Through abhorrence of our gods,
By that atheist sect detested,
Neither of these feelings should
Be your motive to attempt it.
I then, who, for this time only
Will believe these waves that tell me—
These bright fountains—that the beauty
Which so oft they have reflected
Is unequalled, mean to lay it
As an offering in the temple
Of the gods, to show what little
Strength in Christian sorcery dwelleth.

Nisida.
Then 't is openly admitted
That we three the list will enter
For the prize.

Cynthia.
And from this moment
That the rivalry commences.

Nisida.
Voice of song, thy sweet enchantment
On this great occasion lend me,
That through thy soft influence
Rank and riches I may merit.

[Exit.
Cynthia.
Genius, offspring of the soul,
Prove this time thou'rt so descended,
That thy proud ambitious hopes
May the laurel crown be tendered.

[Exit.
Daria.
Beauty, daughter of the gods,
Now thy glorious birth remember:
Make me victress in the fight,
That the gods may live for ever.

[Exit.