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+Project Gutenberg Etext Rosamund, by Algernon Charles Swinburne
+#2 in our series by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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+Rosamund, Queen of the Lombards
+
+by Algernon Charles Swinburne
+
+April, 2000 [Etext #2137]
+
+
+Project Gutenberg Etext Rosamund, by Algernon Charles Swinburne
+*****This file should be named rsmnd10.txt or rsmnd10.zip******
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+This etext was prepared by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk
+from the 1899 Chatto & Windus edition.
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+
+
+ROSAMUND, QUEEN OF THE LOMBARDS
+A TRAGEDY
+
+by Algernon Charles Swinburne
+
+
+
+
+PERSONS REPRESENTED
+
+
+ALBOVINE, King of the Lombards.
+ALMACHILDES, a young Lombard warrior.
+NARSETES, an old leader and counsellor.
+
+ROSAMUND, Queen of the Lombards
+HILDEGARD, a noble Lombard maiden.
+SCENE, VERONA
+Time, June 573
+
+
+
+ACT I
+
+
+
+A hall in the Palace:  a curtain drawn midway across it.
+
+Enter ALBOVINE and NARSETES.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+This is no matter of the wars:  in war
+Thy king, old friend, is less than king of thine,
+And comrade less than follower.  Hast thou loved
+Ever--loved woman, not as chance may love,
+But as thou hast loved thy sword or friend--or me?
+Thou hast shewn me love more stout of heart than death.
+Death quailed before thee when thou gav'st me life,
+Borne down in battle.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+Woman?  As I love
+Flowers in their season.  A rose is but a rose.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Dost thou know rose from thistle or bindweed?  Man,
+Speak as our north wind speaks, if harsh and hard -
+Truth.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+White I know from red, and dark from bright,
+And milk from blood in hawthorn-flowers:  but not
+Woman from woman.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+How should God our Lord,
+Except his eye see further than his world?
+For women ever make themselves anew,
+Meseems, to match and mock the maker.  Friend,
+If ever I were friend of thine in fight,
+Speak, and I bid thee not speak truth:  I know
+Thy tongue knows nought but truth or silence.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+Is it
+A king's or friend's part, king, to bid his friend
+Speak what he knows not?  Speak then thou, that I
+May find thy will and answer it.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I am fain
+And loth to tell thee how it wrings my heart
+That now this hard-eyed heavy southern sun
+Hath wrought its will upon us all a year
+And yet I know not if my wife be mine.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+Thy meanest man at arms had known ere dawn
+Blinked on his bridal birthday.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Did I bid thee
+Mock, and forget me for thy friend--I say not,
+King?  Is thy heart so light and lean a thing,
+So loose in faith and faint in love?  I bade thee
+Stand to me, help me, hold my hand in thine
+And give my heart back answer.  This it is,
+Old friend and fool, that gnaws my life in twain -
+The worm that writhes and feeds about my heart -
+The devil and God are crying in either ear
+One murderous word for ever, night and day,
+Dark day and deadly night and deadly day,
+Can she love thee who slewest her father?  I
+Love her.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+Thy wife should love thee as thy sire's
+Loved him.  Thou art worth a woman--heart for heart.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+My sire's wife loved him?  Hers he had not slain.
+Would God I might but die and burn in hell
+And know my love had loved me!
+
+NARSETES.
+
+Is thy name
+Babe?  Sweet are babes as flowers that wed the sun,
+But man may be not born a babe again,
+And less than man may woman.  Rosamund
+Stands radiant now in royal pride of place
+As wife of thine and queen of Lombards--not
+Cunimund's daughter.  Hadst thou slain her sire
+Shamefully, shame were thine to have sought her hand
+And shame were hers to love thee:  but he died
+Manfully, by thy mightier hand than his
+Manfully mastered.  War, born blind as fire,
+Fed not as fire upon her:  many a maid
+As royal dies disrobed of all but shame
+And even to death burnt up for shame's sake:  she
+Lives, by thy grace, imperial.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+He or I,
+Her lord or sire, which hath most part in her,
+This hour shall try between us.
+
+Enter ROSAMUND.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Royal lord,
+Thy wedded handmaid craves of thee a grace.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+My sovereign bids her bondman what she will.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I bid thee mock me not:  I may ask thee
+Aught, and be heard of any save my lord.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Go, friend.  [Exit NARSETES.]
+Speak now.  Say first what ails thee?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Me?
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thy voice was honey-hearted music, sweet
+As wine and glad as clarions:  not in battle
+Might man have more of joy than I to hear it
+And feel delight dance in my heart and laugh
+Too loud for hearing save its own.  Thou rose,
+Why did God give thee more than all thy kin
+Whose pride is perfume only and colour, this?
+Music?  No rose but mine sings, and the birds
+Hush all their hearts to hearken.  Dost thou hear not
+How heavy sounds her note now?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Sire, not I.
+But sire I should not call thee.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Surely, no.
+I bade thee speak:  I did not bid thee sing:
+Thou canst not speak and sing not.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Albovine,
+I had at heart a simple thing to crave
+And thought not on thy flatteries--as I think not
+Now.  Knowest thou not my handmaid Hildegard
+Free-born, a noble maiden?
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+And a fair
+As ever shone like sundawn on the snows.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I had at heart to plead for her with thee.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Plead? hast thou found her noble maidenhood
+Ignobly turned unmaidenlike?  I may not
+Lightly believe it.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Believe it not at all.
+Wouldst thou think shame of me--lightly?  She loves
+As might a maid whose kin were northern gods
+The fairest-faced of warriors Lombard born,
+Thine Almachildes.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+If he loves not her,
+More fool is he than warrior even, though war
+Have wakened laughter in his eyes, and left
+His golden hair fresh gilded, when his hand
+Had won the crown that clasps a boy's brows close
+With first-born sign of battle.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+No such fool
+May live in such a warrior; if he love not
+Some loveliness not hers.  No face as bright
+Crowned with so fair a Mayflower crown of praise
+Lacked ever yet love, if its eyes were set
+With all their soul to loveward.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Ay?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I know not
+A man so fair of face.  I like him well.
+And well he hath served and loves thee.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Ay?  The boy
+Seems winsome then with women.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Hildegard
+Hath hearkened when he spake of love--it may be,
+Lightly.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+To her shall no man lightly speak.
+Thy maiden and our natural kin is she.
+Wilt thou speak with him--lightly?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+If thou wilt,
+Gladly.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+The boy shall wait upon thy will.  [Exit.]
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+My heart is heavier than this heat that weighs
+With all the weight of June on us.  I know not
+Why.  And the feast is close on us.  I would
+This night were now to-morrow morn.  I know not
+Why.
+
+Enter ALMACHILDES.
+
+Ah!  What would you?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Queen, our lord the king
+Bade me before thee hither.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Truth:  I know it.
+Thou art loved and honoured of our lord the king.
+Dost thou, whom honour loves before thy time,
+Love?
+
+ALMACHILDES
+
+Ay:  thy noble handmaid, Hildegard.
+I know not if she love me.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou shalt know.
+But this thou knowest:  I may not give thee her.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I would not take her from the Lord God's hand
+If hers were given against her will to mine.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+A man said that:  a manfuller than men
+Who grip the loveless hands of prisoners.  Well
+It must be with the bride whose happier hand
+Lies fond and fast in thine.  Our Hildegard,
+Being free and noble as Albovine and we,
+Born one with us in race and blood, and thence
+Our equal in our sole nobility,
+Must well be won by noble works, and love
+Whose light is one with honour's.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Queen, may I
+Perchance not win it?  I know not.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Nay, nor I.
+Soon may we know; they are entering toward the feast.
+[The curtain drawn discovers a banquet, with guests assembled:
+among them NARSETES and HILDEGARD.
+
+Re-enter ALBOVINE.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thine hand:  I hold the whitest in the world.
+Sit thou, boy, there, beside sweet Hildegard.
+
+[They sit.
+
+Bring me the cup.  Queen, thou shalt pledge with me
+A health to all this kingdom and its weal
+Even from the bowl that here to hold in hand
+Assures me lord of Lombardy and thine
+By right and might of battle and of God -
+The skull that was thy father's:  so shalt thou
+Drink to me with thy father.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Sire, my lord,
+The life my sire, who gave thee up his life,
+Gave me, and fostered till thou hadst given him death,
+Is all now thine.  Thy will be done.  I drink
+To thee, who art all this kingdom and its weal,
+All health and honour that of right should be,
+With all good things I wish thee.  [Drinks.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Wish me well,
+And God must give me what thou wilt.  Good friends,
+My warriors and my brethren, hath not he
+Given me to wife the best one born of man
+And loveliest, and most loving?  Silent, sirs?
+Wherefore?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou shouldst not ask it.  Bid the cup
+Go blithely round.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+By Christ and Thor, it shall.
+What ails the boy there?  Almachildes!
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+King,
+Nought ails me.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Nor thy maiden?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+King, nor her.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Fall then to feasting.  Bear the cup away.
+Some savour of the dust of death comes from it.
+Sweet, be not wroth nor sad.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I am blithe and fain,
+Sire; and I loved thee never more than now.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Nor ever I thee.  Now I find thee mine,
+And now no daughter of mine enemy's.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+No.
+Thou hast no enemy left on earth alive -
+No soul unslain that hates thee.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+That were much.
+What man may say it? and least of all may kings.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+What hast thou done that man should hate thee--man
+Or woman?
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Which of us may answer, Nought?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou might'st have made me--me, my father's child -
+Harlot and slave:  thou hast made me wife and queen.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thee have I loved; ay, and myself in thee,
+Who hast made me more than king and lord, being thine.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Courtesy sets on kings a goldener crown
+That sits upon them seemlier.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Courtesy!
+Truth.  Hark thee, boy, and let thy Hildegard
+Hearken.  Is she, thy queen, a peer of mine?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+She wears no crown but heaven's about her head -
+No gold that was not born upon her brows
+Transfigures or disfigures them.  She is not
+A peer of thine.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+He answers well.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+He answers
+Ill--as the spirit of shamelessness might speak.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Shameless are they that lie.  I lie not.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Boy,
+Tempt not the rod.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+The rod that man may wield
+No man may fear:  the slave who fears it is not
+Man.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Art thou crazed with wine?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Am I thy king?
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+My thrall thou knowest thou art not, or thy tongue
+Durst challenge not mine anger.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thrall and free,
+Woman and man, yea, queen and king, are born
+More wide apart than earth or hell and heaven.
+Sirs, let no wrangling breath distune the peace
+That shines and glows about us, and discerns
+A banquet from a battle.  Thou, my lord,
+Hast bidden away the dust of death which fell
+Between us at thy bidding, and is now
+Nothing--a dream blown out at waking.  Thou,
+My lord's young chosen of warriors, be not wroth,
+Albeit thy wrath be noble, though my lord
+See fit to try my love as gold is tried
+By fire:  it burns not thee.  Strike hand in hand:
+Ye have done so after battle.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Drink again.
+I pledge thee, boy.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I pledge thee, king.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+My lord,
+I am weary at heart, and fain would sleep.  Forgive me
+That I can sit no more.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+What ails thee?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Nought.
+The hot and heavy time of year has bound
+About my brows a band of iron.  Sire,
+Thou wouldst not see me sink aswoon, and mar
+The raptures of thy revel.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Get thee hence.
+Go.  God be with thee.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+God abide with thee.
+[Exit with attendants.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+This is no feast:  I will no more of it.  Boy,
+Take note, and tempt not so thy bride, albeit
+She tempt thee to the trial.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I shall not, king,
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+She will not.  Sirs, good night--if night may be
+Good.  Hardly may the day be, here.  And yet
+For you it may be--Hildegard and thee.
+God give you joy.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+God give thee comfort, king.
+[Exeunt.
+
+
+
+ACT II
+
+
+
+A room in the Queen's apartments.
+
+Enter ROSAMUND.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I am yet alive to question if I live
+And wonder what may ever bid me die.
+But live I will, being yet not dead with thee,
+Father.  Thou knowest in Paradise my heart.
+I feel thy kisses breathing on my lips,
+Whereto the dead cold relic of thy face
+Was pressed at bidding of thy slayer last night,
+And yet they were not withered:  nay, they are red
+As blood is--blood but newly spilt--not thine.
+How good thou wast and sweet of spirit--how dear,
+Father!  None lives that knew thee now save one,
+And none loves me but thou nor thee but I,
+That was till yesternight thy daughter:  now
+That very name is tainted, and my tongue
+Tastes poison as I speak it.  There is nought
+Left in the range and record of the world
+For me that is not poisoned:  even my heart
+Is all envenomed in me.  Death is life,
+Or priesthood lies that swears it:  then I give
+The man my husband and thy homicide
+Life, if I slay him--the life he gave thee.
+
+Enter HILDEGARD.
+
+Girl,
+I sent for thee, I think:  stand near me.  Child,
+Thou art fairer than thou knowest, I doubt:  thou art fair
+As the awless maidenhood of morning:  truth
+Should live upon thy lips, though truth were dead
+On all men's tongues and women's born save thine.
+Dawn lies not when it laughs on us.  Thy queen
+I am not now:  thy friend I would be.  Tell
+Thy friend if love sleep or awake in thee
+Toward any man.  Thou art silent.  Tell me this,
+Dost thou not think, where thought scarce knows itself -
+Think in the subtle sense too deep for thought -
+That Almachildes loves thee?
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+More than I
+Love Almachildes.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thus a maid should speak.
+Dost thou love me?
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Thou knowest it, queen.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+It lies
+Now in thy power to show me more of love
+Than ever yet hath man or woman.  Swear,
+If thou dost love me, thou wilt show it.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+I swear.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+By all our fathers' great forsaken gods
+Who smiled on all their battles, and by him
+Who clomb or crept or leapt upon their throne
+And signed us Christian, swear it, then.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+I swear.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+What if I bid thee give thyself to shame -
+Yield up thy soul and body--play such parts
+As shameless fame records of women crowned
+Imperial in the tale of lust and Rome?
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Thou couldst not bid me do it.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou hast sworn.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+I have sworn.
+Queen, I would do it, and die.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou shalt not.  Yet
+This must thou do, and live.  Thou shalt not be
+Shamed.  Thou shalt bid thine Almachildes come
+And speak with thee by nightfall.  Say, the queen
+Will give not up the maiden so beloved
+- And truth it is, I love thee--willingly
+To the arms of one her husband loves:  but were it
+Shame, utter shame, that he should wed not her,
+The shamefast queen could choose not.  Then shall he
+Plead.  Then shalt thou turn gentler than the snow
+That softens at the strong sun's kiss, and yield.
+But needs must night be close about your love
+And darkness whet your kisses.  Light were death.
+Hast thou no heart to guess now?  Fear not then.
+Not thou but I must put on shame.  I lack
+A hand for mine to grasp and strike with.  His
+I have chosen.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+I see but as by lightning.  Queen,
+What should I do but warn the king--or him?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou hast sworn.  I hold thee by thy word.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+My Christ,
+Help me!
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+No God can break thine oath in twain
+And leave thee less than perjured.  Thou must bid him
+Make thee to-night his bride.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+I could not say it.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou shalt, or God shall smite thee down to hell.
+What, art thou godless?
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Art not thou?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Not I.
+I find him just and gracious, girl:  he gives me
+My right by might set fast on thine and thee.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+For love of mercy, queen--for honour's sake,
+Bid me not shame myself before a man -
+The man I love--who gives me back at least
+Honour, if love he gives not.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Ay, my maid?
+And yet he loves thee, or thy maiden thought
+Errs with no gracious error, more than thou
+Him?
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Art thou woman born, to cast me back
+My maiden shame for shame upon my face?
+I would not say I loved him more than man
+Loved ever woman since the light of love
+Lit them alive together.  Let us be.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I will not.  Mine are both by God's own gift.
+I will not cast it from me.  Ye may live
+Hereafter happy:  never now shall I.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Have mercy.  Nay, I cannot do it.  And thou,
+Albeit thine heart be hot with hate as hell,
+Couldst say not, nor fold round with fairer speech,
+Those foul three words the Egyptian woman said
+Who tempted and could tempt not Joseph.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+No.
+He would not hearken.  Joseph loved not her
+More than thine Almachildes me.  But thou
+Shalt.  Now no more may I debate with thee.
+Go.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+God requite thee!
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+That shall he and I,
+Not thou, make proof of.  If I plead with him,
+I crave of God but wrong's requital.  Go.
+
+[Exit HILDEGARD.
+
+And yet, God help me!  Can I do it?  God's will
+May no man thwart, or leave his righteousness
+Baffled.  I would not say, 'My will be done,'
+Were God's will not for righteousness as mine,
+If right be righteous, wrong be wrong, must be.
+How else may God work wrong's requital?  I
+Must be or none may be his minister.
+And yet what righteousness is his to cast
+Athwart my way toward right this wrong to me,
+A sin against the soul and honour?  Why
+Must this vile word of YET cross all my thought
+Always, a drifting doom or doubt that still
+Strikes up and floats against my purpose?  God,
+Help me to know it!  This weapon chosen of me,
+This Almachildes, were his face not fair,
+Were not his fame bright--were his aspect foul,
+His name dishonourable, his line through life
+A loathing and a spitting-stock for scorn,
+Could I do this?  Am I then even as they
+Who queened it once in Rome's abhorrent face
+An empress each, and each by right of sin
+Prostitute?  All the life I have lived or loved
+Hath been, if snows or seas or wellsprings be,
+Pure as the spirit of love toward heaven is--chaste
+As children's eyes or mothers'.  Though I sinned
+As yet my soul hath sinned not, Albovine
+Must bear, if God abhor unrighteousness,
+The weight of penance heaviest laid on sin,
+Shame.  Not on me may shame be set, though hell
+Take hold upon me dying.  I would the deed
+Were done, the wreak of wrath were wroken, and I
+Dead.
+
+Enter ALBOVINE.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Art thou sick at heart to see me?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+No.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thou art sweet and wise as ever God hath made
+Woman.  I would not turn thine heart from me
+Or set thy spirit against the sense of mine
+For more than Rome's old empire.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+That, albeit
+Thou wouldst, be sure thou canst not.  God nor man
+Could wake within me toward my lord the king
+A new strange love or loathing.  Fear not this.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+From thee can I fear nothing.  Now I know
+How high thy heart is, and how true to me.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou knowest it now.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I know not if I should
+Repent me, or repent not, that I tried
+A heart so high so sorely--proved so true.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Do not repent.  I would not have thee now
+Repent.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+By Christ, if God forbade it not,
+I would have said within mine own fool's heart,
+Of all vile things that fool the soul of man
+The vilest and the priestliest hath to name
+Repentance.  Could it blot one hour's work out,
+A wise thing and a manful thing it were,
+And profit were it none for priests to preach.
+This will I tell thee:  what last night befell
+Rejoices not but irks me.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Let it not
+Rejoice nor irk thee.  Vex thou not thy soul
+With any thought thereon, if none may bid thee
+Rejoice:  and that were harsh and hard of heart.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I will not.  Queen and wife, hell durst not say
+I do not love thee.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Heaven has heard--and I.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Forget then all this foolishness, and pray
+God may forget it.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+God forgets as I.  [Exit ALBOVINE.
+And had repentance helped him?  Shall I think
+It might have molten in my burning heart
+The thrice-retempered iron of resolve?
+Yet well it is to know that penitence
+Lies further from that frozen heart of his
+Than mercy from the tiger's.  Ay, God knows,
+I had scorned him too had penitence bowed him down
+Before me:  now I do but hate.  I am not
+Abased as wholly, so supremely shamed,
+As though I had wedded one as hard as he
+Who yet might think to soften down with words
+What hardly might be cleansed with tears of blood,
+The monumental memory graven on steel
+That burns the naked spirit of sense within me
+Like the ardent sting of keen-edged ice, which makes
+The naked flesh feel fire upon it.
+
+Enter ALMACHILDES.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Queen,
+I come to crave a word of thee.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I hear.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Thou knowest I love thy noble Hildegard:
+And rather would I give my soul to burn
+Than wrong in thought her flawless maidenhood.
+And now she hath told me what I dare not think
+Truth.  And I dare not think her lips may lie.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I have heard.  And what is this to me?  She hath not
+Said--hath not told thee, nor wouldst thou believe -
+That I have breathed a lie upon her lips
+Or taught them shamelessness by lesson?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+No.
+But she came forth from thee to me--from thee -
+And spake with quivering mouth and quailing eyes
+And face whose fire turned ashen, and again
+Rekindling from that ashen agony
+Flamed, what no heart could think to hear her speak,
+Mine least of all, who love her.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Ay?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Not she,
+I know it as sure as night is known from day
+And surelier than I know mine own soul's truth,
+Spake what she spake in broken bursts of breath
+Out of her own heart and its love for me.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Didst thou so answer her?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I might not well
+Answer at all.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Poor maid, she hath loved amiss.
+Belike she thought to find in thee a man's
+Love.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+That she hath found; nought meaner than a man's;
+No wolfish lust of ravenous insolence
+To soil and spoil her of her noblest name.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I do not ask thee what she said.  I know.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I knew thou didst.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+To make your bridal sure
+She bade thee make thy bride of her to-night.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+She bade me as a slave might bid the scourge
+Fall.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Such a scourge no slave might shrink from; nay,
+No free-born woman, Almachildes.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Queen,
+I crave thy queenly mercy though I say
+My maid, my bride that will be, shrank, and showed
+In all the rosebright anguish of her face
+A shuddering shame that wrung my heart.  And thou
+Hast surely set thereon that seal of shame.
+I know it as thou dost.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Ay, and more she said,
+Surely:  she said I would not yield her up
+To the arms of one my husband loves and holds
+Honoured at heart--I hate my husband so,
+She told thee--were the need avoidable
+Save by her sacrifice to shame.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Thou knowest
+All, as I knew, and lacked not from thy lips
+Confession.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Warrior though thou be, and boy
+Though my lord call thee, brainless art thou not -
+No sword with man's face carven on the heft
+For mockery more than truth or help in fight.
+I do not and I durst not play with thee.
+Thy bride spake truth:  I knew not she might need
+So much of truth to tempt thee toward her.  Now
+Thou knowest, and I know.  If this imminent night
+Make not thy darkling bride of her, by day
+Thy bride she may be never.  She hath sworn.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Why wouldst thou shame her?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Shamed she cannot be
+If thou be found not shameless.  Plead no more
+Against thine own love's surety.  Doubt thou not
+I wish thee well, and love her.  Make not thou
+Out of her shamefast maidenhood and fear
+A sword to cleave your happiness in twain.
+What if some oath constrain me, sworn in haste,
+Infrangible for shame's sake, sealed in heaven
+Inevitable?  Ask now no more of me.
+Nightfall is here upon us.  Nought on earth
+May set the season of your bridal back
+If thou be true as she must.  Wait awhile
+Here till a sign be sent thee--till a bell
+Strike softly from this chamber here at hand.
+I have sworn to her she shall not see thy face,
+So sore she prayed she might not:  and for thee
+I swore that ere the darkling air grew grey
+Thou shouldst arise and leave her, and behold
+Thy midnight bride but when thou art bidden again
+To meet her here to-morrow.  Strange it were,
+More strange than aught of all, that thou shouldst prove
+Dishonourable:  and except thou be, these things
+Must all be wrought in this wise, lest her oath
+And mine, at peril of her soul and life,
+By passionate forgetfulness of thine
+Disloyally be broken.  Swear to us now
+Thou wilt not break our oath and thine, or think
+To look to-night upon thy bride.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I swear.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I take thine oath.  I bid not thee take heed
+That I or thou or each of us at once,
+Couldst thou play false, may die:  I bid thee think
+Thy bride will die, shamed.  Swear me not again
+She shall not:  all our trust is set on thee.
+What eyes and ears are keen about us here
+Thou knowest not.  Love, my love and thine for her,
+Shall deafen and shall blind them.  Be but thou
+A bridegroom blind and dumb--speak soft as love,
+And ask not answer louder than a sigh -
+And when to-morrow sets thy bride and thee
+Here face to face again, thy soul shall stand
+Amazed:  thy joy shall turn to wonder.  This
+Thy queen, whose power may seal her promise fast,
+Swears for thine oath again to thee.  Good night.
+[Exit.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I cannot think I live.  Our Sigurd loved not
+Brynhild as I love her, and even this hour
+Shall make us great as they.  No spell to break,
+No fire to pass, divides us.  Blind and dumb,
+Love knows, would I be ever while I live
+For love's sake rather than forego the joy
+That makes one godlike power of spirit and sense,
+One godhead born of manhood.  God requite
+The queen who loves my love and cares for me
+Thus!  How may man or God requite her?  Ah!
+
+[Bell rings softly from without.
+
+There sounds the note that opens heaven on me,
+And how should man dare heaven?  But love may dare.  [Exit.
+
+
+
+ACT III
+
+
+
+An eastward room in the Palace.
+
+Enter ALBOVINE.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+This sun--no sun like ours--burns out my soul.
+I would, when June takes hold on us like fire,
+The wind could waft and whirl us northward:  here
+The splendour and the sweetness of the world
+Eat out all joy of life or manhood.  Earth
+Is here too hard on heaven--the Italian air
+Too bright to breathe, as fire, its next of kin,
+Too keen to handle.  God, whoe'er God be,
+Keep us from withering as the lords of Rome -
+Slackening and sickening toward the imperious end
+That wiped them out of empire!  Yea, he shall.
+
+Enter HILDEGARD.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+The queen would wait upon your majesty.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Bid her come in.  And tell her ere she come
+I wait upon her will.  [Exit HILDEGARD.]
+What would she now?
+
+Enter ROSAMUND.
+
+By Christ, how fair thou art!  I never saw thee
+So like the sun in heaven:  no rose on earth
+Might think to match thee.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+All I am is thine.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Mine?  God might come from heaven to worship thee.
+Thine eyes outlighten all the stars:  thy face
+Leaves earth no flower to worship.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+How should earth
+Worship her children?  Nought it is in me,
+My lord's dear love it is, that makes me seem
+Fair.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+How thou liest thou knowest not.  Rosamund,
+What hast thou done to be so beautiful?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+The sun has left thine eyes half blind.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I dare not
+Kiss thee, or stare straight-eyed against the sun.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Kiss me.  Who knows how long the lord of life
+May spare us time for kissing?  Life and love
+Are less than change and death.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+What ghosts are they?
+So sweet thou never wast to me before.
+The woman that is God--the God that is
+Woman--the sovereign of the soul of man,
+Our fathers' Freia, Venus crowned in Rome,
+Has lent my love her girdle; but her lips
+Have robbed the red rose of its heart, and left
+No glory for the flower beyond all flowers
+To bid the spring be glad of.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Summer and spring
+May cleanse and heal the heart of man no more
+Than winter may, or withering autumn.  Sire,
+Husband and lord, I have a woful word
+To speak against a man beloved of thee,
+A man well worth all glory man may give -
+Against thine Almachildes.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Has the boy
+Transgressed again in awless heat of speech
+And kindled wrath in thee against him--thee,
+Who stood'st between my wrath and him?
+
+ROSAMUND
+
+I would
+His were no more transgression than of speech.
+He hath wronged--I bid thee ask of me no more -
+A noble maiden.  Till her shame be healed,
+Her name is dead upon my lips and his,
+Who is yet not all ignoble.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+He shall die
+Except he wed her, and she will to wed.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+That surely will she.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Bid him hither.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+See,
+There strides he through the sunshine toward the shade.
+How light and high he steps!  He sees thee.  Bid him -
+Beckon him in.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+He knows mine eye.  He comes.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Obedient as a hound is.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+As a man
+That knows the law of loyal manhood.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Ay?
+God send it be so.
+
+Enter ALMACHILDES.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Queen and king, I am here.
+What would you?
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Truth.  Hast thou not borne thyself
+Toward any soul on earth disloyally
+Ever?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Never.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I would not say thou liest.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Do not:  the lie should burn thy lips up, king.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thou hast wrought no wrong toward man or woman?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+None.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Speak thou:  thou hast heard him answer me.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I have heard.
+No wrong it may be with the serfs of hell
+To cast upon a woman for a curse
+Shame:  to defile the spirit and shrine of love,
+Put out the sunlike eyes of maidenhood
+And leave the soul dismantled.  Has not he
+So sinned?--Hast thou wrought no such work as this?
+The king has heard thy silence.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Queen and king,
+I have done no wrong, but right.  I have chosen my bride,
+And made her mine by gentle grace of hers
+Lest wrong should come between us.  Now no man
+May think to unwed us:  king nor queen may cross
+This wedded love of ours:  no thwart or stay
+May sunder us till heaven and earth turn hell.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I deemed not thee dishonourable:  and thy queen
+Now knows thee true as I did.  Rosamund,
+Forgive and give him back his bride.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I will,
+King.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Boy, thy queen hath shown thee grace; be thou
+Thankful.  I leave thee here to yield her thanks.
+[Exit.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Queen, I would die to serve and thank thee.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Die?
+So young and glad and glorious?  Thou shalt not
+Die.  Was thy bride's face bright to look upon
+When last night's moon and stars illumined it?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Thou knowest I might not look upon it.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+No.
+Thou hast never loved before?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I have loathed, not loved,
+The loveless harlots clasped of all the camp:
+I have followed wars and visions all my days
+Even till my love's eyes lit and stung to life
+The soul within my body.  Till I loved,
+I knew not woman.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Now thou knowest.  This love
+Is no good lord--no gentle god--no soft
+Saviour.  Thou knowest perchance thy bride's name--hers
+Whose body and soul were one but now with thine?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+How should not I?  What darkling light is this
+That burns and broods and lightens in thine eyes,
+Queen?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Hildegard it was not.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Art not thou -
+Or am not I--sun-smitten through the brain
+By this mad might of midsummer?  Who was it
+That slept or slept not with me while the night
+Was more than noon and more than heaven?  What name
+Was hers who made me godlike?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Rosamund.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Thine? was it thou?  It was not.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+It was I.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Does the sun stand in heaven?  Or stands it fast
+As when God bade it halt on high?  My life
+Is broken in me.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Nay, fair sir, not yet.
+Thy life is now mine--as the ring I wear
+That seals my hand a wife's.  Die thou shalt not,
+But slay, and live.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Slay whom?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thy lord and mine.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I had rather go down quick to hell.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I know it.
+I leave thee not the choice.  Keep thou thy hand
+Bloodless, and Hildegard, whom yet I love,
+Dies, and in fire, the harlot's death of shame.
+Last night she lured thee hither.  Hate of me,
+Because of late I smote her, being in wrath
+Forgetful of her noble maidenhood,
+Stung her for shame's sake to take hands with shame.
+This if I swear, may she unswear it?  Thou
+Canst not but say she bade thee seek her.  She
+Lives while I will, as Albovine and thou
+Live by my grace and mercy.  Live, or die.
+But live thou shalt not longer than her death,
+Her death by burning, if thou slay not him.
+I see my death shine in thine eyes:  I see
+My present death inflame them.  That were not
+Her surety, Almachildes.  Thou shouldst know me
+Now.  Though thou slay me, this may save not her.
+My lines are laid about her life, and may not
+By breach of mine be broken.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+God must be
+Dead.  Such a thing as thou could never else
+Live.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+That concerns not thee nor me.  Be thou
+Sure that my will and power to serve it live.
+Lift now thine eyes to look upon thy lord.
+
+Re-enter ALBOVINE.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+By this time hath he thanked thee not enough?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+More hath he given than thanks.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+What more may be?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+His plighted faith to heal the wrong he wrought
+Faithfully.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Boy, strike then thy hand in mine.
+Thou art loyal as I knew thee.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+King, I may not
+Touch hands with thee.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thou art false, then, ha?  Thou hast lied?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+King, till the wrong I have wrought be wreaked or healed
+I clasp not hands with honour.  Nay, and then
+Perchance I may not.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Boy I called thee:  child
+I call thee now.  But, boy, the child thou art
+Is noble as our sires.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Would God it were!
+[Exit.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+What ails him?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Love and shame.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+No more than these?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Enough are they to darken death and life.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thou art less than gentle towards his love and him.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I would not speak ungently.  Her I love,
+Poor child, and him I hate not.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thou shalt live
+To love him too.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+This heaviness of heat
+Kills love and hate and life in me.  I know not
+Aught lovesome save the sweet brief death of sleep.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I am weary as thou.  Good night we may not say -
+Good noon I bid thee.  Sleep shall heal us.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Ay;
+No healing and no help for life on earth
+Hath God or man found out save death and sleep.
+[Exeunt.
+
+
+
+ACT IV
+
+
+
+The same Scene.
+
+Enter ALMACHILDES and HILDEGARD.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Hast thou forgiven me?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I have not forgiven
+God.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Wilt thou slay thy soul and mine?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Wilt thou
+Madden me?  God hath given us up to her
+Who is deadlier than the fiery fang of death -
+Us, innocent and loyal.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Nay, if I
+Forgive her love of thee--though this be hard,
+Canst thou forgive not?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Sweet, for thee and me
+Remains no rescue save by death or flight
+From worse than flight or death is.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Worse is nought
+But shame:  and how may shame take hold on us,
+On us who have sinned not?  Me she bound to play thee
+False, and betray thee to her arms:  I might not
+Choose, though my heart should rend itself in twain
+And cleave with ravenous anguish:  yet I live.
+Vex not thy soul too sorely:  me, not her,
+Thy spirit embraced, thine arms and lips made thine
+Me, not my darkling wraith, my changeling foe,
+My thief of love, our traitress.  This I bid thee,
+Forget thy fear and shame to have wronged me:  night
+Breeds treacherous dreams that can but poison day
+If thought be found so base a fool as dares
+Fear.  Did I doubt thy love of me, I durst not
+Live or look back upon thee.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Wilt thou then
+Fly?
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Dost thou know what flight means--thou?
+It means
+Fear.  And is fear a new-born friend of thine?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+God help us! if he live, and hate not man -
+If Satan be not God.  We will not fly.
+
+Enter ALBOVINE and ROSAMUND.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Fly?  What should love at height of happiness
+Or youth at height of honour fear and fly?
+Would ye take wing for heaven? take shame on earth
+To wed in peace and honour?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+No, my king.
+No, surely.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Weep not, maiden.  Dost not thou,
+Man, that we thought her bridegroom sealed of love,
+Love her?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+No saint loved ever God as I
+Her.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+And betray her to shame thou wouldst not?
+See,
+My lord, the silent answer flash aloud
+From cheek and eye a goodly witness.  Thou,
+My maiden, dost thou love not him?  Nay, speak.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+I cannot say it--I cannot strive to say.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Thou shalt.  Are all we not fast bound in love -
+My lord and thine, my maiden and her queen,
+A fourfold chain of faith twice linked of love?
+Speak:  let not shame find place where shame is none.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+I will not.  King and queen and God shall hear.
+I love him as our songs of old time say
+Men have been loved of women akin to gods
+By blood as they by spirit, albeit in me
+Nought lives that woman or man or God could say
+Were worth his love, if mine by grace of love
+Be found not all unworthy.  Mine am I
+No more:  mine own in no wise now, but his
+To save or slay, to cherish or cast out,
+Crown and discrown, abase and comfort.  Shame
+Were more to me than honour if his will
+It were that shame should clothe me round, and life
+Were the only death left fearful if he bade me
+Die.  Could his love be turned from me, and set
+On one less loving but more fair than I,
+A thrall more base than treason or a queen
+Too high for shame to brand her shameful, even
+Though sin had stamped and signed her foul as fraud
+And loathsome as a masked adulterous lie,
+Hers would I make him if I might, and yield
+To her the hatefullest of hell-born things
+The man found lovelier by my love than heaven.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Great love is this to brag of:  great and strange.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Love is no braggart:  lust and fraud and hate
+Vaunt their vile strength when shame unveils them:  love
+Vaunts not itself.  I spake not uncompelled,
+And blushed not out the avowal.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Boy, I held
+And hold thee noblest of my lords of war,
+And worthier than thine elders born and tried
+Ere battle found thee ripe and glad at heart
+To stem and swim the tide of spears:  but this
+I know not if thou be or any man
+Be worthy of.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Of all men born on earth
+I am most unworthy of it.  None might be
+Worthy.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+He weeps:  thy boy is humble.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+Queen,
+I weep not.  Shamed with no ignoble shame
+Thou seest me:  but I weep not.  Yea, God knows,
+Humbled I am, and humble; not to thee.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Chafe not:  and thou, queen though thou be, and mine,
+Tempt not a true man's wrath with words that bear
+Fangs keener than thou knowest of.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+King, henceforth,
+Being warned, I will not.  Dangerous as the sea
+A true man's wrath is--and a true man's love:
+A woman's hath no peril in it:  her tears
+Wash wrath and peril away.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I have never seen thee
+Weep.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+How should I weep--I, thy wife?
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+I have heard thee
+Laugh; and thy smiles were always bright as fire.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Well were it with me--ay, and reason found
+For me to live and do the living world
+Some service--could my husband warm thereat
+His heart as winter-stricken hands in frost
+Are warmed at winter fires.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+No need, no need:
+The sun thou art warms all our year with love,
+And leaves no chill on winter.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Albovine,
+Love now secludes us not from sight of man -
+From sight of this my maiden and the man
+Who shines but as the battle's boy for thee
+But lives for me my maiden's lover--true
+As truth is--Almachildes.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+How thy lips
+Hang lingering on his name as though 'twere thou
+That loved him!  Thou shouldst love thy maiden well.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+As she loves me I love her.  Hildegard,
+Leave us.  Thou knowest I love thee.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Queen, I know.  [Exit.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+What ails the boy? what rapturous agony
+Torments and glorifies his glance at her
+As with delight in torture?  Cheer thee, man:
+Thou art not thus all unworthy.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Spare him, king.
+A king may guess not how a man's heart yearns
+With all unkingly sense of love and shame
+Not all unmanly.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Shame is none to be
+Loved, and to deem that love exceeds our due
+Who may not well deserve it.  Sick at heart
+He seems, and should be gladder than the sea
+When wind and sun strike life in it.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I am not
+So stricken, king.  I thank thy care of me.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Heart-stricken or shame-stricken art thou?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+King,
+Spare him.  Thou knowest not love like his.  It burns
+And rends and wrings the spirit.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+No.  And thou,
+Dost thou then?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Eyes and heart and sense are mine
+As weak and strong as woman's can but be;
+As weak in strength and strong in weakness.  Men,
+Being wise, and mightier than their mates on earth,
+Need no such knowledge born of inborn pain
+As quickens all the spirit of sense in us.
+Worms know what eagles know not.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Like enough.
+Rede me no redes and riddles.  Never yet
+I have loved thee more, and yet I have loved thee well,
+Than now that loving-kindness borne toward love
+Makes thee so gracious, pleading for it.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Love
+Sees all things lovely:  thine, if praise there be,
+Not mine the praise is:  thee, not me, these twain
+Must love and worship as their lord of love.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Well, God be good to them and thee and me!
+I would this fierce Italian June were dead,
+So hard it weighs upon me.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Now not long
+Shall we sustain or sink aswoon from it:
+It has but left a day or two to die.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+And well were that, if summer died with June.
+Two red months more must set on sense and soul
+The branding-iron stamped of summer:  nay,
+The sea is here no sea to cherish man:
+It brings no choral comfort back with tides
+That surge and sink and swell and chime and change
+And lighten life with music where the breath
+Dies and revives of night and day.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Be thou
+Content:  a God hath driven us hither.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Yea:
+A God of death and fire and strife, whose hand
+Is heavy on my spirit.  Be not ye
+Troubled, if peace be with you.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Peace to thee.
+
+[Exit ALBOVINE.
+
+Now follow:  smite him now:  thou art strong, but yet
+Thy king is stronger--mightier thewed than thou.
+Thou couldst not slay him in fight.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I cannot slay him
+Thus.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Canst thou slay thy bride by fire?  He dies,
+Or she dies, bound against the stake.  His death
+Were the easier.  Follow him:  save her:  strike but once.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I cannot.  God requite thee this!  I will.  [Exit.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+And I will see it.  And, father, thou shalt see.
+[Exit.
+
+
+
+ACT V
+
+
+
+The Banqueting-hall.
+
+Enter ALBOVINE and ROSAMUND.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+This June makes babes of men; last night I deemed
+When thou hadst wished me peace as I passed forth
+A footfall pressed behind me soft and fast,
+And turning toward it I beheld nought:  thee
+I saw, and Almachildes hard at hand
+Turned back toward thee:  nought stranger:  yet my heart
+Sprang, and sank back.  I laughed against myself,
+That manhood should be girlish, when the heat
+Burns life half out within us.  Even thine eyes,
+Like stars before the wind that brings the cloud,
+Look fainter.  Ere they fill the banquet full
+And bid the guests about us where we sit,
+Tell me if aught be worse than well with thee.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Nought.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Wilt thou swear it, sweet?
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+By what thou wilt -
+By God and man--by hell and earth and heaven.
+I know what ails thy loyal heart of love
+And binds thy tongue for fear to bid me know.
+The cup we drank of when we feasted last
+Tastes bitter on it yet.  Thou wilt not bid me
+Pledge thee therein again.  If I bid thee,
+Pledge me thou shalt--and seal thy pardon.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Be not
+Too sweet for woman.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Cross me not in this.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Mine old fast friend Narsetes hath my word
+Plighted.  All funeral reverence shall inter
+The royal relic, and all thought therewith
+Of strife between thy father's child and me
+Or less than love and honour.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Nay, my lord,
+Let the dead thing live as a lifelong sign
+Of perfect plight in love and union.  This
+Were no dishonour done to fatherhood
+But honour shown to wedlock.  Here is spread
+The feast, the bride-feast of my love and thine,
+Whereat the cup of death shall serve our lips
+To drink forgetfulness of all but love.
+Herein thou shalt not thwart me.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+God forbid.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+God hath forbidden:  and God shall be obeyed.
+Bid thy Narsetes play the cup-bearer,
+And I will pour the wine:  my hand shall fill
+The sacramental draught of love that seals
+Our eucharist of wedlock.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Yea, I know
+To drink with thee is even to drink with God.
+Thou art good as any God was ever.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+Ay?
+We know not till we die.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thou art wise and true
+As ever maid was born of the oldworld north
+In the oldworld years of legend.  Bid Narsetes
+Bring thee the chalice:  thou shalt mix the draught
+Whence we will drink life, if true love be life,
+Even from the lipless mouth of bone that speaks
+Death.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I will mix it well with honey and herb
+Sweet as the mead our fathers drank, and dreamed
+Their gods so drank in heaven--draughts deep and strong
+As life is strong and death is deep.  I go
+To bid Narsetes hither.  [Exit.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Nay, by God,
+Whoever God be, never Christ or Thor
+Beheld or blessed a nobler wife, whose love
+Was found through proof of purity by fire
+More like our northern stars and snows and suns,
+And sane in strong sufficiency of soul
+As womanhood by godhead from the womb
+Elected and exalted.
+
+Enter NARSETES.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+King, thy wife
+Hath given me back thy message given her.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Ay?
+And thou hast given her back my cup, then?
+
+NARSETES.
+
+King,
+I have given it.  Loth to give it if I were,
+Ye know:  she knows as thou:  thou knowest as she.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+What ails thee to distaste thy duty?  Man,
+Thou shouldst be glad, being loyal.  Knowest thou not
+Her will it was that we should pledge therein
+To-night, this hour, our lifelong love, and seal it
+More surely so than priest or prayer can seal?
+
+NARSETES.
+
+Her will it was, I know, not thine.  I would
+Thou hadst not yielded up to hers thy will.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thou liest:  I have not yielded it:  I have given
+Love, willing as the springtide sea gives up
+Her will to the eastern sea-wind's.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+Love should give
+No more than love should crave of love:  and this
+Is such a gift as hate might crave of death
+Or priests of God when angered.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Hark thee, man.
+Thou art old, and when I loved thee first and found thee
+My lord and leader down the ways of war,
+My master born by right of manfulness
+And steersman through the surf of battle, time
+Gaped as a gulf between us:  sire and son
+We might be:  now I bid thee hold thy peace,
+Lest all these memories perish, and their death
+Give life more strong than theirs to wrath, and leave thee
+Shelterless as a waif of the air when storm
+Drives bird and beast to deathward.  What I bade thee
+I bid thee do, and leave me.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+King, I go.  [Exit.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+What, have I played the Berserk with my friend?
+So should not kings.  What meant he?  Men wax old,
+And age eats out the natural sense of love
+Which gives the soul sight of such nobler things
+As trust may see by grace of truth more fair
+Than doubt would fear to dream of.  Rosamund
+Knows more by might of faith and love than he.
+And yet I would, and yet I would not, fool
+As even in mine own eyes I am, she had not
+Given me this proof, desired of me this sign,
+How clear her soul is toward me save of love,
+To attest her pardon of me.  Would it were
+Sunrise to-morrow!
+
+Enter ALMACHILDES and HILDEGARD.
+
+Whence come these, to bring
+Sunrise about me?  Nay, I bade you be
+Here.  Does thy memory too not fail thee, boy,
+Burnt out by stress of summer
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+No.
+
+ALBOVINE,
+
+Nor hers?
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+How might it, king?  Thou art good to us.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+All things born
+Seem good to lovers in their spring of love,
+And all men should be.  Maiden, God doth well
+To give us foresight of the sight of heaven
+By looking in such eyes as love like thine
+Kindles and veils for love's sake.  Fain was I
+To see my boy's bride and her bridegroom here
+Before the feast broke in on us, and bless
+Their love with mine--if mine be blessing.
+
+HILDEGARD.
+
+Sire,
+As the earth gives thanks in spring for the April sun
+I would and cannot yield you thanks for this.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I cannot thank at all.  I cannot thank
+God.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Art thou mazed with love?  For her thou canst not
+Thank God?  What feverish doubt of love or life
+Crazes or cramps thy spirit?
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+I cannot say.
+My heart, if any heart be left in me,
+Is as it was not thankless:  yet, my king,
+I know not how to thank thee.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thank me not:
+I did not bid thee thank me.  Love thy love,
+And God be with you:  so may God be found
+Thankworthier.  Keep some heart in thee awhile
+For God's and her sake.
+
+ALMACHILDES.
+
+All I may I will.
+
+Re-enter ROSAMUND, followed by NARSETES and Guests.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Sit, friends and warriors:  thou, my boy, next me,
+And by my wife thy bride.  This night, that leaves
+But two days more for June to burn and live,
+Plights with my queen's troth mine in life and death
+This last one time for ever, in the cup
+Whence none shall drink hereafter.  Not in scorn,
+Sirs, but in honour now the draught is pledged
+Between us, ere this relic stand enshrined
+And hallowed as a saint's on the altar.  Queen,
+I drink to thee.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I thank thee.  Good Narsetes,
+Give him the chalice.  Women slain by fire
+Thirst not as I to pledge thee.
+[As ALBOVINE is about to take the cup,
+ALMACHILDES rises and stabs him.
+
+ALBOVINE.
+
+Thou, my boy?  [Dies.
+
+ROSAMUND.
+
+I.  But he hears not.  Now, my warrior guests,
+I drink to the onward passage of his soul
+Death.  Had my hand turned coward or played me false,
+This man that is my hand, and less than I
+And less than he bloodguilty, this my death
+Had been my husband's:  now he has left it me.
+[Drinks.
+How innocent are all but he and I
+No time is mine to tell you.  Truth shall tell.
+I pardon thee, my husband:  pardon me.  [Dies.
+
+NARSETES.
+
+Let none make moan.  This doom is none of man's.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg Etext Rosamund, by Algernon Charles Swinburne
+
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