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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/2137-0.txt b/2137-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f393b39 --- /dev/null +++ b/2137-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2743 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Rosamund, by Algernon Charles Swinburne + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most +other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + + + + +Title: Rosamund + Queen of the Lombards: a Tragedy + + +Author: Algernon Charles Swinburne + + + +Release Date: September 10, 2014 [eBook #2137] +[This file was first posted on 23 July 1999] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROSAMUND*** + + +Transcribed 1899 Chatto & Windus edition by David Price, email +ccx074@pglaf.org + + + + + + ROSAMUND, + + + QUEEN OF THE LOMBARDS + + A TRAGEDY + + * * * * * + + BY + ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE + + * * * * * + + LONDON + CHATTO & WINDUS + 1899 + + * * * * * + + + + +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 THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROSAMUND*** + + +******* This file should be named 2137-0.txt or 2137-0.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/1/3/2137 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, +and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive +specific permission. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + + + + +Title: Rosamund + Queen of the Lombards: a Tragedy + + +Author: Algernon Charles Swinburne + + + +Release Date: September 10, 2014 [eBook #2137] +[This file was first posted on 23 July 1999] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROSAMUND*** +</pre> +<p>Transcribed 1899 Chatto & Windus edition by David Price, +email ccx074@pglaf.org</p> +<h1>ROSAMUND,</h1> +<p style="text-align: center">QUEEN OF THE LOMBARDS</p> +<p style="text-align: center">A TRAGEDY</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">BY</span><br +/> +ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">LONDON</span><br /> +CHATTO & WINDUS<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">1899</span></p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<h2>PERSONS REPRESENTED</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Albovine</span>, <i>King of the +Lombards</i>.</p> +<p><span class="smcap">almachildes</span>, <i>a young Lombard +warrior</i>.</p> +<p><span class="smcap">Narsetes</span>, <i>an old leader and +counsellor</i>.</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p><span class="smcap">Rosamund</span>, <i>Queen of the +Lombards</i>.</p> +<p><span class="smcap">Hildegard</span>, <i>a noble Lombard +maiden</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Scene</span>, +VERONA.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Time</i>, June 573</p> +<h2><a name="page1"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 1</span>ACT +I.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>A hall in the Palace</i>: <i>a +curtain drawn midway across it</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Narsetes</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">This is no matter of the wars: in war<br /> +Thy king, old friend, is less than king of thine,<br /> +And comrade less than follower. Hast thou loved<br /> +Ever—loved woman, not as chance may love,<br /> +But as thou hast loved thy sword or friend—or me?<br /> +Thou hast shewn me love more stout of heart than death.<br /> +Death quailed before thee when thou gav’st me life,<br /> +Borne down in battle.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Woman? As I love<br /> +Flowers in their season. A rose is but a rose.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Dost thou know rose from thistle or +bindweed? Man,<br /> +Speak as our north wind speaks, if harsh and hard—<br /> +Truth.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">White I know from red, and dark from bright, +<br /> +And milk from blood in hawthorn-flowers: but not<br /> +Woman from woman.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">How should God our Lord,<br /> +Except his eye see further than his world?<br /> +For women ever make themselves anew,<br /> +Meseems, to match and mock the maker. Friend,<br /> +If ever I were friend of thine in fight,<br /> +Speak, and I bid thee not speak truth: I know<br /> +Thy tongue knows nought but truth or silence.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Is it<br /> +A king’s or friend’s part, king, to bid his friend<br +/> +Speak what he knows not? Speak then thou, that I<br /> +May find thy will and answer it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I am fain<br /> +And loth to tell thee how it wrings my heart<br /> +That now this hard-eyed heavy southern sun<br /> +Hath wrought its will upon us all a year<br /> +And yet I know not if my wife be mine.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thy meanest man at arms had known ere dawn<br +/> +Blinked on his bridal birthday.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Did I bid thee<br /> +Mock, and forget me for thy friend—I say not,<br /> +King? Is thy heart so light and lean a thing,<br /> +So loose in faith and faint in love? I bade thee<br /> +Stand to me, help me, hold my hand in thine<br /> +And give my heart back answer. This it is,<br /> +Old friend and fool, that gnaws my life in twain—<br /> +The worm that writhes and feeds about my heart—<br /> +The devil and God are crying in either ear<br /> +One murderous word for ever, night and day,<br /> +Dark day and deadly night and deadly day,<br /> +Can she love thee who slewest her father? I<br /> +Love her.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thy wife should love thee as thy +sire’s<br /> +Loved him. Thou art worth a woman—heart for +heart.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">My sire’s wife loved him? Hers he +had not slain.<br /> +Would God I might but die and burn in hell<br /> +And know my love had loved me!</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Is thy name<br /> +Babe? Sweet are babes as flowers that wed the sun,<br /> +But man may be not born a babe again,<br /> +And less than man may woman. Rosamund<br /> +Stands radiant now in royal pride of place<br /> +As wife of thine and queen of Lombards—not<br /> +Cunimund’s daughter. Hadst thou slain her sire<br /> +Shamefully, shame were thine to have sought her hand<br /> +And shame were hers to love thee: but he died<br /> +Manfully, by thy mightier hand than his<br /> +Manfully mastered. War, born blind as fire,<br /> +Fed not as fire upon her: many a maid<br /> +As royal dies disrobed of all but shame<br /> +And even to death burnt up for shame’s sake: she<br /> +Lives, by thy grace, imperial.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">He or I,<br /> +Her lord or sire, which hath most part in her,<br /> +This hour shall try between us.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Rosamund</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Royal lord,<br /> +Thy wedded handmaid craves of thee a grace.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">My sovereign bids her bondman what she +will.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I bid thee mock me not: I may ask thee<br /> +Aught, and be heard of any save my lord.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Go, friend.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i> <span +class="smcap">Narsetes</span>.]</p> +<p class="poetry">Speak now. Say first what ails thee?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Me?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thy voice was honey-hearted music, sweet<br /> +As wine and glad as clarions: not in battle<br /> +Might man have more of joy than I to hear it<br /> +And feel delight dance in my heart and laugh<br /> +Too loud for hearing save its own. Thou rose,<br /> +Why did God give thee more than all thy kin<br /> +Whose pride is perfume only and colour, this?<br /> +Music? No rose but mine sings, and the birds<br /> +Hush all their hearts to hearken. Dost thou hear not<br /> +How heavy sounds her note now?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Sire, not I.<br /> +But sire I should not call thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Surely, no.<br /> +I bade thee speak: I did not bid thee sing:<br /> +Thou canst not speak and sing not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Albovine,<br /> +I had at heart a simple thing to crave<br /> +And thought not on thy flatteries—as I think not<br /> +Now. Knowest thou not my handmaid Hildegard<br /> +Free-born, a noble maiden?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">And a fair<br /> +As ever shone like sundawn on the snows.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I had at heart to plead for her with thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Plead? hast thou found her noble maidenhood<br +/> +Ignobly turned unmaidenlike? I may not<br /> +Lightly believe it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Believe it not at all.<br /> +Wouldst thou think shame of me—lightly? She loves<br +/> +As might a maid whose kin were northern gods<br /> +The fairest-faced of warriors Lombard born,<br /> +Thine Almachildes.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">If he loves not her,<br /> +More fool is he than warrior even, though war<br /> +Have wakened laughter in his eyes, and left<br /> +His golden hair fresh gilded, when his hand<br /> +Had won the crown that clasps a boy’s brows close<br /> +With first-born sign of battle.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No such fool<br /> +May live in such a warrior; if he love not<br /> +Some loveliness not hers. No face as bright<br /> +Crowned with so fair a Mayflower crown of praise<br /> +Lacked ever yet love, if its eyes were set<br /> +With all their soul to loveward.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I know not<br /> +A man so fair of face. I like him well.<br /> +And well he hath served and loves thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay? The boy<br /> +Seems winsome then with women.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Hildegard<br /> +Hath hearkened when he spake of love—it may be,<br /> +Lightly.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">To her shall no man lightly speak.<br /> +Thy maiden and our natural kin is she.<br /> +Wilt thou speak with him—lightly?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">If thou wilt,<br /> +Gladly.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">The boy shall wait upon thy will.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">My heart is heavier than this heat that +weighs<br /> +With all the weight of June on us. I know not<br /> +Why. And the feast is close on us. I would<br /> +This night were now to-morrow morn. I know not<br /> +Why.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Almachildes</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry">Ah! What would you?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen, our lord the king<br /> +Bade me before thee hither.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Truth: I know it.<br /> +Thou art loved and honoured of our lord the king.<br /> +Dost thou, whom honour loves before thy time,<br /> +Love?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay: thy noble handmaid, Hildegard.<br /> +I know not if she love me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou shalt know.<br /> +But this thou knowest: I may not give thee her.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I would not take her from the Lord God’s +hand<br /> +If hers were given against her will to mine.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">A man said that: a manfuller than men<br /> +Who grip the loveless hands of prisoners. Well<br /> +It must be with the bride whose happier hand<br /> +Lies fond and fast in thine. Our Hildegard,<br /> +Being free and noble as Albovine and we,<br /> +Born one with us in race and blood, and thence<br /> +Our equal in our sole nobility,<br /> +Must well be won by noble works, and love<br /> +Whose light is one with honour’s.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen, may I<br /> +Perchance not win it? I know not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nay, nor I.<br /> +Soon may we know; they are entering toward the feast.</p> +<p>[<i>The curtain drawn discovers a banquet</i>, <i>with guests +assembled</i>: <i>among them</i> <span +class="smcap">Narsetes</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Hildegard</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Re-enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thine hand: I hold the whitest in the world.<br +/> +Sit thou, boy, there, beside sweet Hildegard.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>They sit</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry">Bring me the cup. Queen, thou shalt +pledge with me<br /> +A health to all this kingdom and its weal<br /> +Even from the bowl that here to hold in hand<br /> +Assures me lord of Lombardy and thine<br /> +By right and might of battle and of God—<br /> +The skull that was thy father’s: so shalt thou<br /> +Drink to me with thy father.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Sire, my lord,<br /> +The life my sire, who gave thee up his life,<br /> +Gave me, and fostered till thou hadst given him death,<br /> +Is all now thine. Thy will be done. I drink<br /> +To thee, who art all this kingdom and its weal,<br /> +All health and honour that of right should be,<br /> +With all good things I wish thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Drinks</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Wish me well,<br /> +And God must give me what thou wilt. Good friends,<br /> +My warriors and my brethren, hath not he<br /> +Given me to wife the best one born of man<br /> +And loveliest, and most loving? Silent, sirs?<br /> +Wherefore?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou shouldst not ask it. Bid the cup<br +/> +Go blithely round.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">By Christ and Thor, it shall.<br /> +What ails the boy there? Almachildes!</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King,<br /> +Nought ails me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nor thy maiden?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King, nor her.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Fall then to feasting. Bear the cup +away.<br /> +Some savour of the dust of death comes from it.<br /> +Sweet, be not wroth nor sad.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I am blithe and fain,<br /> +Sire; and I loved thee never more than now.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nor ever I thee. Now I find thee mine,<br +/> +And now no daughter of mine enemy’s.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No.<br /> +Thou hast no enemy left on earth alive—<br /> +No soul unslain that hates thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">That were much.<br /> +What man may say it? and least of all may kings.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What hast thou done that man should hate +thee—man<br /> +Or woman?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Which of us may answer, Nought?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou might’st have made me—me, my +father’s child—<br /> +Harlot and slave: thou hast made me wife and queen.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thee have I loved; ay, and myself in thee,<br +/> +Who hast made me more than king and lord, being thine.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Courtesy sets on kings a goldener crown<br /> +That sits upon them seemlier.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Courtesy!<br /> +Truth. Hark thee, boy, and let thy Hildegard<br /> +Hearken. Is she, thy queen, a peer of mine?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">She wears no crown but heaven’s about her +head—<br /> +No gold that was not born upon her brows<br /> +Transfigures or disfigures them. She is not<br /> +A peer of thine.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">He answers well.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">He answers<br /> +Ill—as the spirit of shamelessness might speak.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Shameless are they that lie. I lie +not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Boy,<br /> +Tempt not the rod.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">The rod that man may wield<br /> +No man may fear: the slave who fears it is not<br /> +Man.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Art thou crazed with wine?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Am I thy king?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">My thrall thou knowest thou art not, or thy +tongue<br /> +Durst challenge not mine anger.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thrall and free,<br /> +Woman and man, yea, queen and king, are born<br /> +More wide apart than earth or hell and heaven.<br /> +Sirs, let no wrangling breath distune the peace<br /> +That shines and glows about us, and discerns<br /> +A banquet from a battle. Thou, my lord,<br /> +Hast bidden away the dust of death which fell<br /> +Between us at thy bidding, and is now<br /> +Nothing—a dream blown out at waking. Thou,<br /> +My lord’s young chosen of warriors, be not wroth,<br /> +Albeit thy wrath be noble, though my lord<br /> +See fit to try my love as gold is tried<br /> +By fire: it burns not thee. Strike hand in hand:<br /> +Ye have done so after battle.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Drink again.<br /> +I pledge thee, boy.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I pledge thee, king.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">My lord,<br /> +I am weary at heart, and fain would sleep. Forgive me<br /> +That I can sit no more.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What ails thee?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nought.<br /> +The hot and heavy time of year has bound<br /> +About my brows a band of iron. Sire,<br /> +Thou wouldst not see me sink aswoon, and mar<br /> +The raptures of thy revel.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Get thee hence.<br /> +Go. God be with thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">God abide with thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit with attendants</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">This is no feast: I will no more of it. +Boy,<br /> +Take note, and tempt not so thy bride, albeit<br /> +She tempt thee to the trial.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I shall not, king,</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">She will not. Sirs, good night—if +night may be<br /> +Good. Hardly may the day be, here. And yet<br /> +For you it may be—Hildegard and thee.<br /> +God give you joy.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">God give thee comfort, king.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exeunt</i>.</p> +<h2><a name="page22"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 22</span>ACT +II.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>A room in the Queen’s +apartments</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Rosamund</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I am yet alive to question if I live<br /> +And wonder what may ever bid me die.<br /> +But live I will, being yet not dead with thee,<br /> +Father. Thou knowest in Paradise my heart.<br /> +I feel thy kisses breathing on my lips,<br /> +Whereto the dead cold relic of thy face<br /> +Was pressed at bidding of thy slayer last night,<br /> +And yet they were not withered: nay, they are red<br /> +As blood is—blood but newly spilt—not thine.<br /> +How good thou wast and sweet of spirit—how dear,<br /> +Father! None lives that knew thee now save one,<br /> +And none loves me but thou nor thee but I,<br /> +That was till yesternight thy daughter: now<br /> +That very name is tainted, and my tongue<br /> +Tastes poison as I speak it. There is nought<br /> +Left in the range and record of the world<br /> +For me that is not poisoned: even my heart<br /> +Is all envenomed in me. Death is life,<br /> +Or priesthood lies that swears it: then I give<br /> +The man my husband and thy homicide<br /> +Life, if I slay him—the life he gave thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Hildegard</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry">Girl,<br /> +I sent for thee, I think: stand near me. Child,<br /> +Thou art fairer than thou knowest, I doubt: thou art fair<br /> +As the awless maidenhood of morning: truth<br /> +Should live upon thy lips, though truth were dead<br /> +On all men’s tongues and women’s born save thine.<br +/> +Dawn lies not when it laughs on us. Thy queen<br /> +I am not now: thy friend I would be. Tell<br /> +Thy friend if love sleep or awake in thee<br /> +Toward any man. Thou art silent. Tell me this,<br /> +Dost thou not think, where thought scarce knows itself—<br +/> +Think in the subtle sense too deep for thought—<br /> +That Almachildes loves thee?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">More than I<br /> +Love Almachildes.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thus a maid should speak.<br /> +Dost thou love me?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou knowest it, queen.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">It lies<br /> +Now in thy power to show me more of love<br /> +Than ever yet hath man or woman. Swear,<br /> +If thou dost love me, thou wilt show it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I swear.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">By all our fathers’ great forsaken +gods<br /> +Who smiled on all their battles, and by him<br /> +Who clomb or crept or leapt upon their throne<br /> +And signed us Christian, swear it, then.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I swear.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What if I bid thee give thyself to +shame—<br /> +Yield up thy soul and body—play such parts<br /> +As shameless fame records of women crowned<br /> +Imperial in the tale of lust and Rome?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou couldst not bid me do it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou hast sworn.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I have sworn.<br /> +Queen, I would do it, and die.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou shalt not. Yet<br /> +This must thou do, and live. Thou shalt not be<br /> +Shamed. Thou shalt bid thine Almachildes come<br /> +And speak with thee by nightfall. Say, the queen<br /> +Will give not up the maiden so beloved<br /> +—And truth it is, I love thee—willingly<br /> +To the arms of one her husband loves: but were it<br /> +Shame, utter shame, that he should wed not her,<br /> +The shamefast queen could choose not. Then shall he<br /> +Plead. Then shalt thou turn gentler than the snow<br /> +That softens at the strong sun’s kiss, and yield.<br /> +But needs must night be close about your love<br /> +And darkness whet your kisses. Light were death.<br /> +Hast thou no heart to guess now? Fear not then.<br /> +Not thou but I must put on shame. I lack<br /> +A hand for mine to grasp and strike with. His<br /> +I have chosen.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I see but as by lightning. Queen,<br /> +What should I do but warn the king—or him?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou hast sworn. I hold thee by thy +word.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">My Christ,<br /> +Help me!</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No God can break thine oath in twain<br /> +And leave thee less than perjured. Thou must bid him<br /> +Make thee to-night his bride.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I could not say it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou shalt, or God shall smite thee down to +hell.<br /> +What, art thou godless?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Art not thou?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Not I.<br /> +I find him just and gracious, girl: he gives me<br /> +My right by might set fast on thine and thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">For love of mercy, queen—for +honour’s sake,<br /> +Bid me not shame myself before a man—<br /> +The man I love—who gives me back at least<br /> +Honour, if love he gives not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay, my maid?<br /> +And yet he loves thee, or thy maiden thought<br /> +Errs with no gracious error, more than thou<br /> +Him?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Art thou woman born, to cast me back<br /> +My maiden shame for shame upon my face?<br /> +I would not say I loved him more than man<br /> +Loved ever woman since the light of love<br /> +Lit them alive together. Let us be.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I will not. Mine are both by God’s +own gift.<br /> +I will not cast it from me. Ye may live<br /> +Hereafter happy: never now shall I.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Have mercy. Nay, I cannot do it. +And thou,<br /> +Albeit thine heart be hot with hate as hell,<br /> +Couldst say not, nor fold round with fairer speech,<br /> +Those foul three words the Egyptian woman said<br /> +Who tempted and could tempt not Joseph.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No.<br /> +He would not hearken. Joseph loved not her<br /> +More than thine Almachildes me. But thou<br /> +Shalt. Now no more may I debate with thee.<br /> +Go.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">God requite thee!</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">That shall he and I,<br /> +Not thou, make proof of. If I plead with him,<br /> +I crave of God but wrong’s requital. Go.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i> <span +class="smcap">Hildegard</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry">And yet, God help me! Can I do it? +God’s will<br /> +May no man thwart, or leave his righteousness<br /> +Baffled. I would not say, ‘My will be done,’<br +/> +Were God’s will not for righteousness as mine,<br /> +If right be righteous, wrong be wrong, must be.<br /> +How else may God work wrong’s requital? I<br /> +Must be or none may be his minister.<br /> +And yet what righteousness is his to cast<br /> +Athwart my way toward right this wrong to me,<br /> +A sin against the soul and honour? Why<br /> +Must this vile word of <i>yet</i> cross all my thought<br /> +Always, a drifting doom or doubt that still<br /> +Strikes up and floats against my purpose? God,<br /> +Help me to know it! This weapon chosen of me,<br /> +This Almachildes, were his face not fair,<br /> +Were not his fame bright—were his aspect foul,<br /> +His name dishonourable, his line through life<br /> +A loathing and a spitting-stock for scorn,<br /> +Could I do this? Am I then even as they<br /> +Who queened it once in Rome’s abhorrent face<br /> +An empress each, and each by right of sin<br /> +Prostitute? All the life I have lived or loved<br /> +Hath been, if snows or seas or wellsprings be,<br /> +Pure as the spirit of love toward heaven is—chaste<br /> +As children’s eyes or mothers’. Though I +sinned<br /> +As yet my soul hath sinned not, Albovine<br /> +Must bear, if God abhor unrighteousness,<br /> +The weight of penance heaviest laid on sin,<br /> +Shame. Not on me may shame be set, though hell<br /> +Take hold upon me dying. I would the deed<br /> +Were done, the wreak of wrath were wroken, and I<br /> +Dead.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Art thou sick at heart to see me?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou art sweet and wise as ever God hath +made<br /> +Woman. I would not turn thine heart from me<br /> +Or set thy spirit against the sense of mine<br /> +For more than Rome’s old empire.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">That, albeit<br /> +Thou wouldst, be sure thou canst not. God nor man<br /> +Could wake within me toward my lord the king<br /> +A new strange love or loathing. Fear not this.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">From thee can I fear nothing. Now I +know<br /> +How high thy heart is, and how true to me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou knowest it now.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I know not if I should<br /> +Repent me, or repent not, that I tried<br /> +A heart so high so sorely—proved so true.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Do not repent. I would not have thee +now<br /> +Repent.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">By Christ, if God forbade it not,<br /> +I would have said within mine own fool’s heart,<br /> +Of all vile things that fool the soul of man<br /> +The vilest and the priestliest hath to name<br /> +Repentance. Could it blot one hour’s work out,<br /> +A wise thing and a manful thing it were,<br /> +And profit were it none for priests to preach.<br /> +This will I tell thee: what last night befell<br /> +Rejoices not but irks me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Let it not<br /> +Rejoice nor irk thee. Vex thou not thy soul<br /> +With any thought thereon, if none may bid thee<br /> +Rejoice: and that were harsh and hard of heart.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I will not. Queen and wife, hell durst +not say<br /> +I do not love thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Heaven has heard—and I.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Forget then all this foolishness, and pray<br +/> +God may forget it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">God forgets as I.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry">And had repentance helped him? Shall I +think<br /> +It might have molten in my burning heart<br /> +The thrice-retempered iron of resolve?<br /> +Yet well it is to know that penitence<br /> +Lies further from that frozen heart of his<br /> +Than mercy from the tiger’s. Ay, God knows,<br /> +I had scorned him too had penitence bowed him down<br /> +Before me: now I do but hate. I am not<br /> +Abased as wholly, so supremely shamed,<br /> +As though I had wedded one as hard as he<br /> +Who yet might think to soften down with words<br /> +What hardly might be cleansed with tears of blood,<br /> +The monumental memory graven on steel<br /> +That burns the naked spirit of sense within me<br /> +Like the ardent sting of keen-edged ice, which makes<br /> +The naked flesh feel fire upon it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Almachildes</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen,<br /> +I come to crave a word of thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I hear.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou knowest I love thy noble Hildegard:<br /> +And rather would I give my soul to burn<br /> +Than wrong in thought her flawless maidenhood.<br /> +And now she hath told me what I dare not think<br /> +Truth. And I dare not think her lips may lie.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I have heard. And what is this to +me? She hath not<br /> +Said—hath not told thee, nor wouldst thou believe—<br +/> +That I have breathed a lie upon her lips<br /> +Or taught them shamelessness by lesson?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No.<br /> +But she came forth from thee to me—from thee—<br /> +And spake with quivering mouth and quailing eyes<br /> +And face whose fire turned ashen, and again<br /> +Rekindling from that ashen agony<br /> +Flamed, what no heart could think to hear her speak,<br /> +Mine least of all, who love her.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Not she,<br /> +I know it as sure as night is known from day<br /> +And surelier than I know mine own soul’s truth,<br /> +Spake what she spake in broken bursts of breath<br /> +Out of her own heart and its love for me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Didst thou so answer her?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I might not well<br /> +Answer at all.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Poor maid, she hath loved amiss.<br /> +Belike she thought to find in thee a man’s<br /> +Love.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">That she hath found; nought meaner than a +man’s;<br /> +No wolfish lust of ravenous insolence<br /> +To soil and spoil her of her noblest name.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I do not ask thee what she said. I +know.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I knew thou didst.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">To make your bridal sure<br /> +She bade thee make thy bride of her to-night.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">She bade me as a slave might bid the scourge<br +/> +Fall.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Such a scourge no slave might shrink from; +nay,<br /> +No free-born woman, Almachildes.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen,<br /> +I crave thy queenly mercy though I say<br /> +My maid, my bride that will be, shrank, and showed<br /> +In all the rosebright anguish of her face<br /> +A shuddering shame that wrung my heart. And thou<br /> +Hast surely set thereon that seal of shame.<br /> +I know it as thou dost.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay, and more she said,<br /> +Surely: she said I would not yield her up<br /> +To the arms of one my husband loves and holds<br /> +Honoured at heart—I hate my husband so,<br /> +She told thee—were the need avoidable<br /> +Save by her sacrifice to shame.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou knowest<br /> +All, as I knew, and lacked not from thy lips<br /> +Confession.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Warrior though thou be, and boy<br /> +Though my lord call thee, brainless art thou not—<br /> +No sword with man’s face carven on the heft<br /> +For mockery more than truth or help in fight.<br /> +I do not and I durst not play with thee.<br /> +Thy bride spake truth: I knew not she might need<br /> +So much of truth to tempt thee toward her. Now<br /> +Thou knowest, and I know. If this imminent night<br /> +Make not thy darkling bride of her, by day<br /> +Thy bride she may be never. She hath sworn.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Why wouldst thou shame her?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Shamed she cannot be<br /> +If thou be found not shameless. Plead no more<br /> +Against thine own love’s surety. Doubt thou not<br /> +I wish thee well, and love her. Make not thou<br /> +Out of her shamefast maidenhood and fear<br /> +A sword to cleave your happiness in twain.<br /> +What if some oath constrain me, sworn in haste,<br /> +Infrangible for shame’s sake, sealed in heaven<br /> +Inevitable? Ask now no more of me.<br /> +Nightfall is here upon us. Nought on earth<br /> +May set the season of your bridal back<br /> +If thou be true as she must. Wait awhile<br /> +Here till a sign be sent thee—till a bell<br /> +Strike softly from this chamber here at hand.<br /> +I have sworn to her she shall not see thy face,<br /> +So sore she prayed she might not: and for thee<br /> +I swore that ere the darkling air grew grey<br /> +Thou shouldst arise and leave her, and behold<br /> +Thy midnight bride but when thou art bidden again<br /> +To meet her here to-morrow. Strange it were,<br /> +More strange than aught of all, that thou shouldst prove<br /> +Dishonourable: and except thou be, these things<br /> +Must all be wrought in this wise, lest her oath<br /> +And mine, at peril of her soul and life,<br /> +By passionate forgetfulness of thine<br /> +Disloyally be broken. Swear to us now<br /> +Thou wilt not break our oath and thine, or think<br /> +To look to-night upon thy bride.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I swear.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I take thine oath. I bid not thee take +heed<br /> +That I or thou or each of us at once,<br /> +Couldst thou play false, may die: I bid thee think<br /> +Thy bride will die, shamed. Swear me not again<br /> +She shall not: all our trust is set on thee.<br /> +What eyes and ears are keen about us here<br /> +Thou knowest not. Love, my love and thine for her,<br /> +Shall deafen and shall blind them. Be but thou<br /> +A bridegroom blind and dumb—speak soft as love,<br /> +And ask not answer louder than a sigh—<br /> +And when to-morrow sets thy bride and thee<br /> +Here face to face again, thy soul shall stand<br /> +Amazed: thy joy shall turn to wonder. This<br /> +Thy queen, whose power may seal her promise fast,<br /> +Swears for thine oath again to thee. Good night.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I cannot think I live. Our Sigurd loved +not<br /> +Brynhild as I love her, and even this hour<br /> +Shall make us great as they. No spell to break,<br /> +No fire to pass, divides us. Blind and dumb,<br /> +Love knows, would I be ever while I live<br /> +For love’s sake rather than forego the joy<br /> +That makes one godlike power of spirit and sense,<br /> +One godhead born of manhood. God requite<br /> +The queen who loves my love and cares for me<br /> +Thus! How may man or God requite her? Ah!</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Bell rings softly from +without</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry">There sounds the note that opens heaven on +me,<br /> +And how should man dare heaven? But love may dare.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<h2><a name="page44"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 44</span>ACT +III.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>An eastward room in the +Palace</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">This sun—no sun like ours—burns out +my soul.<br /> +I would, when June takes hold on us like fire,<br /> +The wind could waft and whirl us northward: here<br /> +The splendour and the sweetness of the world<br /> +Eat out all joy of life or manhood. Earth<br /> +Is here too hard on heaven—the Italian air<br /> +Too bright to breathe, as fire, its next of kin,<br /> +Too keen to handle. God, whoe’er God be,<br /> +Keep us from withering as the lords of Rome—<br /> +Slackening and sickening toward the imperious end<br /> +That wiped them out of empire! Yea, he shall.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Hildegard</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">The queen would wait upon your majesty.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Bid her come in. And tell her ere she +come<br /> +I wait upon her will.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i> <span +class="smcap">Hildegard</span>.]</p> +<p class="poetry">What would she now?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Rosamund</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry">By Christ, how fair thou art! I never saw +thee<br /> +So like the sun in heaven: no rose on earth<br /> +Might think to match thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">All I am is thine.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Mine? God might come from heaven to +worship thee.<br /> +Thine eyes outlighten all the stars: thy face<br /> +Leaves earth no flower to worship.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">How should earth<br /> +Worship her children? Nought it is in me,<br /> +My lord’s dear love it is, that makes me seem<br /> +Fair.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">How thou liest thou knowest not. +Rosamund,<br /> +What hast thou done to be so beautiful?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">The sun has left thine eyes half blind.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I dare not<br /> +Kiss thee, or stare straight-eyed against the sun.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Kiss me. Who knows how long the lord of +life<br /> +May spare us time for kissing? Life and love<br /> +Are less than change and death.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What ghosts are they?<br /> +So sweet thou never wast to me before.<br /> +The woman that is God—the God that is<br /> +Woman—the sovereign of the soul of man,<br /> +Our fathers’ Freia, Venus crowned in Rome,<br /> +Has lent my love her girdle; but her lips<br /> +Have robbed the red rose of its heart, and left<br /> +No glory for the flower beyond all flowers<br /> +To bid the spring be glad of.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Summer and spring<br /> +May cleanse and heal the heart of man no more<br /> +Than winter may, or withering autumn. Sire,<br /> +Husband and lord, I have a woful word<br /> +To speak against a man beloved of thee,<br /> +A man well worth all glory man may give—<br /> +Against thine Almachildes.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Has the boy<br /> +Transgressed again in awless heat of speech<br /> +And kindled wrath in thee against him—thee,<br /> +Who stood’st between my wrath and him?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I would<br /> +His were no more transgression than of speech.<br /> +He hath wronged—I bid thee ask of me no more—<br /> +A noble maiden. Till her shame be healed,<br /> +Her name is dead upon my lips and his,<br /> +Who is yet not all ignoble.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">He shall die<br /> +Except he wed her, and she will to wed.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">That surely will she.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Bid him hither.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">See,<br /> +There strides he through the sunshine toward the shade.<br /> +How light and high he steps! He sees thee. Bid +him—<br /> +Beckon him in.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">He knows mine eye. He comes.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Obedient as a hound is.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">As a man<br /> +That knows the law of loyal manhood.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay?<br /> +God send it be so.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Almachildes</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen and king, I am here.<br /> +What would you?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Truth. Hast thou not borne thyself<br /> +Toward any soul on earth disloyally<br /> +Ever?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Never.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I would not say thou liest.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Do not: the lie should burn thy lips up, +king.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou hast wrought no wrong toward man or +woman?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">None.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Speak thou: thou hast heard him answer me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I have heard.<br /> +No wrong it may be with the serfs of hell<br /> +To cast upon a woman for a curse<br /> +Shame: to defile the spirit and shrine of love,<br /> +Put out the sunlike eyes of maidenhood<br /> +And leave the soul dismantled. Has not he<br /> +So sinned?—Hast thou wrought no such work as this?<br /> +The king has heard thy silence.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen and king,<br /> +I have done no wrong, but right. I have chosen my bride,<br +/> +And made her mine by gentle grace of hers<br /> +Lest wrong should come between us. Now no man<br /> +May think to unwed us: king nor queen may cross<br /> +This wedded love of ours: no thwart or stay<br /> +May sunder us till heaven and earth turn hell.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I deemed not thee dishonourable: and thy +queen<br /> +Now knows thee true as I did. Rosamund,<br /> +Forgive and give him back his bride.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I will,<br /> +King.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Boy, thy queen hath shown thee grace; be +thou<br /> +Thankful. I leave thee here to yield her thanks.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen, I would die to serve and thank thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Die?<br /> +So young and glad and glorious? Thou shalt not<br /> +Die. Was thy bride’s face bright to look upon<br /> +When last night’s moon and stars illumined it?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou knowest I might not look upon it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No.<br /> +Thou hast never loved before?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I have loathed, not loved,<br /> +The loveless harlots clasped of all the camp:<br /> +I have followed wars and visions all my days<br /> +Even till my love’s eyes lit and stung to life<br /> +The soul within my body. Till I loved,<br /> +I knew not woman.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Now thou knowest. This love<br /> +Is no good lord—no gentle god—no soft<br /> +Saviour. Thou knowest perchance thy bride’s +name—hers<br /> +Whose body and soul were one but now with thine?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">How should not I? What darkling light is +this<br /> +That burns and broods and lightens in thine eyes,<br /> +Queen?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Hildegard it was not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Art not thou—<br /> +Or am not I—sun-smitten through the brain<br /> +By this mad might of midsummer? Who was it<br /> +That slept or slept not with me while the night<br /> +Was more than noon and more than heaven? What name<br /> +Was hers who made me godlike?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Rosamund.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thine? was it thou? It was not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">It was I.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Does the sun stand in heaven? Or stands +it fast<br /> +As when God bade it halt on high? My life<br /> +Is broken in me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nay, fair sir, not yet.<br /> +Thy life is now mine—as the ring I wear<br /> +That seals my hand a wife’s. Die thou shalt not,<br +/> +But slay, and live.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Slay whom?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thy lord and mine.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I had rather go down quick to hell.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I know it.<br /> +I leave thee not the choice. Keep thou thy hand<br /> +Bloodless, and Hildegard, whom yet I love,<br /> +Dies, and in fire, the harlot’s death of shame.<br /> +Last night she lured thee hither. Hate of me,<br /> +Because of late I smote her, being in wrath<br /> +Forgetful of her noble maidenhood,<br /> +Stung her for shame’s sake to take hands with shame.<br /> +This if I swear, may she unswear it? Thou<br /> +Canst not but say she bade thee seek her. She<br /> +Lives while I will, as Albovine and thou<br /> +Live by my grace and mercy. Live, or die.<br /> +But live thou shalt not longer than her death,<br /> +Her death by burning, if thou slay not him.<br /> +I see my death shine in thine eyes: I see<br /> +My present death inflame them. That were not<br /> +Her surety, Almachildes. Thou shouldst know me<br /> +Now. Though thou slay me, this may save not her.<br /> +My lines are laid about her life, and may not<br /> +By breach of mine be broken.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">God must be<br /> +Dead. Such a thing as thou could never else<br /> +Live.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">That concerns not thee nor me. Be thou<br +/> +Sure that my will and power to serve it live.<br /> +Lift now thine eyes to look upon thy lord.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Re-enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">By this time hath he thanked thee not +enough?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">More hath he given than thanks.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What more may be?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">His plighted faith to heal the wrong he +wrought<br /> +Faithfully.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Boy, strike then thy hand in mine.<br /> +Thou art loyal as I knew thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King, I may not<br /> +Touch hands with thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou art false, then, ha? Thou hast +lied?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King, till the wrong I have wrought be wreaked +or healed<br /> +I clasp not hands with honour. Nay, and then<br /> +Perchance I may not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Boy I called thee: child<br /> +I call thee now. But, boy, the child thou art<br /> +Is noble as our sires.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Would God it were!</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What ails him?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Love and shame.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No more than these?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Enough are they to darken death and life.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou art less than gentle towards his love and +him.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I would not speak ungently. Her I +love,<br /> +Poor child, and him I hate not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou shalt live<br /> +To love him too.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">This heaviness of heat<br /> +Kills love and hate and life in me. I know not<br /> +Aught lovesome save the sweet brief death of sleep.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I am weary as thou. Good night we may not +say—<br /> +Good noon I bid thee. Sleep shall heal us.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay;<br /> +No healing and no help for life on earth<br /> +Hath God or man found out save death and sleep.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exeunt</i>.</p> +<h2><a name="page61"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 61</span>ACT +IV.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>The same Scene</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Almachildes</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Hildegard</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Hast thou forgiven me?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I have not forgiven<br /> +God.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Wilt thou slay thy soul and mine?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Wilt thou<br /> +Madden me? God hath given us up to her<br /> +Who is deadlier than the fiery fang of death—<br /> +Us, innocent and loyal.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nay, if I<br /> +Forgive her love of thee—though this be hard,<br /> +Canst thou forgive not?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Sweet, for thee and me<br /> +Remains no rescue save by death or flight<br /> +From worse than flight or death is.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Worse is nought<br /> +But shame: and how may shame take hold on us,<br /> +On us who have sinned not? Me she bound to play thee<br /> +False, and betray thee to her arms: I might not<br /> +Choose, though my heart should rend itself in twain<br /> +And cleave with ravenous anguish: yet I live.<br /> +Vex not thy soul too sorely: me, not her,<br /> +Thy spirit embraced, thine arms and lips made thine<br /> +Me, not my darkling wraith, my changeling foe,<br /> +My thief of love, our traitress. This I bid thee,<br /> +Forget thy fear and shame to have wronged me: night<br /> +Breeds treacherous dreams that can but poison day<br /> +If thought be found so base a fool as dares<br /> +Fear. Did I doubt thy love of me, I durst not<br /> +Live or look back upon thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Wilt thou then<br /> +Fly?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Dost thou know what flight means—thou?<br +/> +It means<br /> +Fear. And is fear a new-born friend of thine?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">God help us! if he live, and hate not +man—<br /> +If Satan be not God. We will not fly.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Rosamund</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Fly? What should love at height of +happiness<br /> +Or youth at height of honour fear and fly?<br /> +Would ye take wing for heaven? take shame on earth<br /> +To wed in peace and honour?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No, my king.<br /> +No, surely.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Weep not, maiden. Dost not thou,<br /> +Man, that we thought her bridegroom sealed of love,<br /> +Love her?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No saint loved ever God as I<br /> +Her.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">And betray her to shame thou wouldst not?<br /> +See,<br /> +My lord, the silent answer flash aloud<br /> +From cheek and eye a goodly witness. Thou,<br /> +My maiden, dost thou love not him? Nay, speak.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I cannot say it—I cannot strive to +say.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou shalt. Are all we not fast bound in +love—<br /> +My lord and thine, my maiden and her queen,<br /> +A fourfold chain of faith twice linked of love?<br /> +Speak: let not shame find place where shame is none.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I will not. King and queen and God shall +hear.<br /> +I love him as our songs of old time say<br /> +Men have been loved of women akin to gods<br /> +By blood as they by spirit, albeit in me<br /> +Nought lives that woman or man or God could say<br /> +Were worth his love, if mine by grace of love<br /> +Be found not all unworthy. Mine am I<br /> +No more: mine own in no wise now, but his<br /> +To save or slay, to cherish or cast out,<br /> +Crown and discrown, abase and comfort. Shame<br /> +Were more to me than honour if his will<br /> +It were that shame should clothe me round, and life<br /> +Were the only death left fearful if he bade me<br /> +Die. Could his love be turned from me, and set<br /> +On one less loving but more fair than I,<br /> +A thrall more base than treason or a queen<br /> +Too high for shame to brand her shameful, even<br /> +Though sin had stamped and signed her foul as fraud<br /> +And loathsome as a masked adulterous lie,<br /> +Hers would I make him if I might, and yield<br /> +To her the hatefullest of hell-born things<br /> +The man found lovelier by my love than heaven.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Great love is this to brag of: great and +strange.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Love is no braggart: lust and fraud and hate<br +/> +Vaunt their vile strength when shame unveils them: love<br /> +Vaunts not itself. I spake not uncompelled,<br /> +And blushed not out the avowal.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Boy, I held<br /> +And hold thee noblest of my lords of war,<br /> +And worthier than thine elders born and tried<br /> +Ere battle found thee ripe and glad at heart<br /> +To stem and swim the tide of spears: but this<br /> +I know not if thou be or any man<br /> +Be worthy of.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Of all men born on earth<br /> +I am most unworthy of it. None might be<br /> +Worthy.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">He weeps: thy boy is humble.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen,<br /> +I weep not. Shamed with no ignoble shame<br /> +Thou seest me: but I weep not. Yea, God knows,<br /> +Humbled I am, and humble; not to thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Chafe not: and thou, queen though thou be, and +mine,<br /> +Tempt not a true man’s wrath with words that bear<br /> +Fangs keener than thou knowest of.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King, henceforth,<br /> +Being warned, I will not. Dangerous as the sea<br /> +A true man’s wrath is—and a true man’s love:<br +/> +A woman’s hath no peril in it: her tears<br /> +Wash wrath and peril away.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I have never seen thee<br /> +Weep.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">How should I weep—I, thy wife?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I have heard thee<br /> +Laugh; and thy smiles were always bright as fire.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Well were it with me—ay, and reason +found<br /> +For me to live and do the living world<br /> +Some service—could my husband warm thereat<br /> +His heart as winter-stricken hands in frost<br /> +Are warmed at winter fires.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No need, no need:<br /> +The sun thou art warms all our year with love,<br /> +And leaves no chill on winter.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Albovine,<br /> +Love now secludes us not from sight of man—<br /> +From sight of this my maiden and the man<br /> +Who shines but as the battle’s boy for thee<br /> +But lives for me my maiden’s lover—true<br /> +As truth is—Almachildes.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">How thy lips<br /> +Hang lingering on his name as though ’twere thou<br /> +That loved him! Thou shouldst love thy maiden well.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">As she loves me I love her. Hildegard,<br +/> +Leave us. Thou knowest I love thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Queen, I know.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What ails the boy? what rapturous agony<br /> +Torments and glorifies his glance at her<br /> +As with delight in torture? Cheer thee, man:<br /> +Thou art not thus all unworthy.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Spare him, king.<br /> +A king may guess not how a man’s heart yearns<br /> +With all unkingly sense of love and shame<br /> +Not all unmanly.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Shame is none to be<br /> +Loved, and to deem that love exceeds our due<br /> +Who may not well deserve it. Sick at heart<br /> +He seems, and should be gladder than the sea<br /> +When wind and sun strike life in it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I am not<br /> +So stricken, king. I thank thy care of me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Heart-stricken or shame-stricken art thou?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King,<br /> +Spare him. Thou knowest not love like his. It +burns<br /> +And rends and wrings the spirit.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No. And thou,<br /> +Dost thou then?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Eyes and heart and sense are mine<br /> +As weak and strong as woman’s can but be;<br /> +As weak in strength and strong in weakness. Men,<br /> +Being wise, and mightier than their mates on earth,<br /> +Need no such knowledge born of inborn pain<br /> +As quickens all the spirit of sense in us.<br /> +Worms know what eagles know not.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Like enough.<br /> +Rede me no redes and riddles. Never yet<br /> +I have loved thee more, and yet I have loved thee well,<br /> +Than now that loving-kindness borne toward love<br /> +Makes thee so gracious, pleading for it.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Love<br /> +Sees all things lovely: thine, if praise there be,<br /> +Not mine the praise is: thee, not me, these twain<br /> +Must love and worship as their lord of love.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Well, God be good to them and thee and me!<br +/> +I would this fierce Italian June were dead,<br /> +So hard it weighs upon me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Now not long<br /> +Shall we sustain or sink aswoon from it:<br /> +It has but left a day or two to die.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">And well were that, if summer died with +June.<br /> +Two red months more must set on sense and soul<br /> +The branding-iron stamped of summer: nay,<br /> +The sea is here no sea to cherish man:<br /> +It brings no choral comfort back with tides<br /> +That surge and sink and swell and chime and change<br /> +And lighten life with music where the breath<br /> +Dies and revives of night and day.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Be thou<br /> +Content: a God hath driven us hither.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Yea:<br /> +A God of death and fire and strife, whose hand<br /> +Is heavy on my spirit. Be not ye<br /> +Troubled, if peace be with you.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Peace to thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry">Now follow: smite him now: thou art strong, but +yet<br /> +Thy king is stronger—mightier thewed than thou.<br /> +Thou couldst not slay him in fight.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I cannot slay him<br /> +Thus.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Canst thou slay thy bride by fire? He +dies,<br /> +Or she dies, bound against the stake. His death<br /> +Were the easier. Follow him: save her: strike but once.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I cannot. God requite thee this! I +will.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">And I will see it. And, father, thou +shalt see.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<h2><a name="page76"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 76</span>ACT +V.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>The Banqueting-hall</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Rosamund</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">This June makes babes of men; last night I +deemed<br /> +When thou hadst wished me peace as I passed forth<br /> +A footfall pressed behind me soft and fast,<br /> +And turning toward it I beheld nought: thee<br /> +I saw, and Almachildes hard at hand<br /> +Turned back toward thee: nought stranger: yet my heart<br /> +Sprang, and sank back. I laughed against myself,<br /> +That manhood should be girlish, when the heat<br /> +Burns life half out within us. Even thine eyes,<br /> +Like stars before the wind that brings the cloud,<br /> +Look fainter. Ere they fill the banquet full<br /> +And bid the guests about us where we sit,<br /> +Tell me if aught be worse than well with thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nought.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Wilt thou swear it, sweet?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">By what thou wilt—<br /> +By God and man—by hell and earth and heaven.<br /> +I know what ails thy loyal heart of love<br /> +And binds thy tongue for fear to bid me know.<br /> +The cup we drank of when we feasted last<br /> +Tastes bitter on it yet. Thou wilt not bid me<br /> +Pledge thee therein again. If I bid thee,<br /> +Pledge me thou shalt—and seal thy pardon.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Be not<br /> +Too sweet for woman.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Cross me not in this.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Mine old fast friend Narsetes hath my word<br +/> +Plighted. All funeral reverence shall inter<br /> +The royal relic, and all thought therewith<br /> +Of strife between thy father’s child and me<br /> +Or less than love and honour.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nay, my lord,<br /> +Let the dead thing live as a lifelong sign<br /> +Of perfect plight in love and union. This<br /> +Were no dishonour done to fatherhood<br /> +But honour shown to wedlock. Here is spread<br /> +The feast, the bride-feast of my love and thine,<br /> +Whereat the cup of death shall serve our lips<br /> +To drink forgetfulness of all but love.<br /> +Herein thou shalt not thwart me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">God forbid.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">God hath forbidden: and God shall be obeyed.<br +/> +Bid thy Narsetes play the cup-bearer,<br /> +And I will pour the wine: my hand shall fill<br /> +The sacramental draught of love that seals<br /> +Our eucharist of wedlock.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Yea, I know<br /> +To drink with thee is even to drink with God.<br /> +Thou art good as any God was ever.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay?<br /> +We know not till we die.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou art wise and true<br /> +As ever maid was born of the oldworld north<br /> +In the oldworld years of legend. Bid Narsetes<br /> +Bring thee the chalice: thou shalt mix the draught<br /> +Whence we will drink life, if true love be life,<br /> +Even from the lipless mouth of bone that speaks<br /> +Death.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I will mix it well with honey and herb<br /> +Sweet as the mead our fathers drank, and dreamed<br /> +Their gods so drank in heaven—draughts deep and strong<br +/> +As life is strong and death is deep. I go<br /> +To bid Narsetes hither.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nay, by God,<br /> +Whoever God be, never Christ or Thor<br /> +Beheld or blessed a nobler wife, whose love<br /> +Was found through proof of purity by fire<br /> +More like our northern stars and snows and suns,<br /> +And sane in strong sufficiency of soul<br /> +As womanhood by godhead from the womb<br /> +Elected and exalted.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Narsetes</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King, thy wife<br /> +Hath given me back thy message given her.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Ay?<br /> +And thou hast given her back my cup, then?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King,<br /> +I have given it. Loth to give it if I were,<br /> +Ye know: she knows as thou: thou knowest as she.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What ails thee to distaste thy duty? +Man,<br /> +Thou shouldst be glad, being loyal. Knowest thou not<br /> +Her will it was that we should pledge therein<br /> +To-night, this hour, our lifelong love, and seal it<br /> +More surely so than priest or prayer can seal?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Her will it was, I know, not thine. I +would<br /> +Thou hadst not yielded up to hers thy will.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou liest: I have not yielded it: I have +given<br /> +Love, willing as the springtide sea gives up<br /> +Her will to the eastern sea-wind’s.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Love should give<br /> +No more than love should crave of love: and this<br /> +Is such a gift as hate might crave of death<br /> +Or priests of God when angered.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Hark thee, man.<br /> +Thou art old, and when I loved thee first and found thee<br /> +My lord and leader down the ways of war,<br /> +My master born by right of manfulness<br /> +And steersman through the surf of battle, time<br /> +Gaped as a gulf between us: sire and son<br /> +We might be: now I bid thee hold thy peace,<br /> +Lest all these memories perish, and their death<br /> +Give life more strong than theirs to wrath, and leave thee<br /> +Shelterless as a waif of the air when storm<br /> +Drives bird and beast to deathward. What I bade thee<br /> +I bid thee do, and leave me.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">King, I go.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Exit</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">What, have I played the Berserk with my +friend?<br /> +So should not kings. What meant he? Men wax old,<br +/> +And age eats out the natural sense of love<br /> +Which gives the soul sight of such nobler things<br /> +As trust may see by grace of truth more fair<br /> +Than doubt would fear to dream of. Rosamund<br /> +Knows more by might of faith and love than he.<br /> +And yet I would, and yet I would not, fool<br /> +As even in mine own eyes I am, she had not<br /> +Given me this proof, desired of me this sign,<br /> +How clear her soul is toward me save of love,<br /> +To attest her pardon of me. Would it were<br /> +Sunrise to-morrow!</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Almachildes</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Hildegard</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry">Whence come these, to bring<br /> +Sunrise about me? Nay, I bade you be<br /> +Here. Does thy memory too not fail thee, boy,<br /> +Burnt out by stress of summer</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">No.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Nor hers?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">How might it, king? Thou art good to +us.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">All things born<br /> +Seem good to lovers in their spring of love,<br /> +And all men should be. Maiden, God doth well<br /> +To give us foresight of the sight of heaven<br /> +By looking in such eyes as love like thine<br /> +Kindles and veils for love’s sake. Fain was I<br /> +To see my boy’s bride and her bridegroom here<br /> +Before the feast broke in on us, and bless<br /> +Their love with mine—if mine be blessing.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">HILDEGARD.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Sire,<br /> +As the earth gives thanks in spring for the April sun<br /> +I would and cannot yield you thanks for this.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I cannot thank at all. I cannot thank<br +/> +God.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Art thou mazed with love? For her thou +canst not<br /> +Thank God? What feverish doubt of love or life<br /> +Crazes or cramps thy spirit?</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I cannot say.<br /> +My heart, if any heart be left in me,<br /> +Is as it was not thankless: yet, my king,<br /> +I know not how to thank thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thank me not:<br /> +I did not bid thee thank me. Love thy love,<br /> +And God be with you: so may God be found<br /> +Thankworthier. Keep some heart in thee awhile<br /> +For God’s and her sake.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALMACHILDES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">All I may I will.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Re-enter</i> <span +class="smcap">Rosamund</span>, <i>followed by</i> <span +class="smcap">Narsetes</span> <i>and Guests</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Sit, friends and warriors: thou, my boy, next +me,<br /> +And by my wife thy bride. This night, that leaves<br /> +But two days more for June to burn and live,<br /> +Plights with my queen’s troth mine in life and death<br /> +This last one time for ever, in the cup<br /> +Whence none shall drink hereafter. Not in scorn,<br /> +Sirs, but in honour now the draught is pledged<br /> +Between us, ere this relic stand enshrined<br /> +And hallowed as a saint’s on the altar. Queen,<br /> +I drink to thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I thank thee. Good Narsetes,<br /> +Give him the chalice. Women slain by fire<br /> +Thirst not as I to pledge thee.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>As</i> <span +class="smcap">Albovine</span> <i>is about to take the cup</i>, +<span class="smcap">Almachildes</span> <i>rises and stabs +him</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Thou, my boy?</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Dies</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">ROSAMUND.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">I. But he hears not. Now, my +warrior guests,<br /> +I drink to the onward passage of his soul<br /> +Death. Had my hand turned coward or played me false,<br /> +This man that is my hand, and less than I<br /> +And less than he bloodguilty, this my death<br /> +Had been my husband’s: now he has left it me.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Drinks</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry">How innocent are all but he and I<br /> +No time is mine to tell you. Truth shall tell.<br /> +I pardon thee, my husband: pardon me.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">[<i>Dies</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">NARSETES.</span></p> +<p class="poetry">Let none make moan. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +This etext was prepared by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk +from the 1899 Chatto & Windus edition. + + + + + +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 + diff --git a/old/rsmnd10.zip b/old/rsmnd10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..610cedd --- /dev/null +++ b/old/rsmnd10.zip |