No start, no jealousy of stirring conscience!
And she referr'd to me-fondly, methought!
Could she walk here if she had been a traitress?
Here, where we play'd together in our childhood?
Here, where we plighted vows? where her cold
cheek
I stay'd as though the hour of death were pass'd,
And I were sitting in the world of spirits-
For all things seem'd unreal! There I sate-
The dews fell clammy, and the night descended,
Black, sultry, close! and ere the midnight hour,
A storm came on, mingling all sounds of fear,
That woods, and sky, and mountains, seem'd one Received my last kiss, when with suppress'd feelings
The second flash of lightning show'd a tree
Hard by me, newly scathed. I rose tumultuous:
My soul work'd high, I bared my head to the storm,
And, with loud voice and clamorous agony,
Kneeling I pray'd to the great Spirit that made me,
Pray'd that REMORSE might fasten on their hearts,
And cling with poisonous tooth, inextricable
As the gored lion's bite!
TERESA (shuddering).
A fearful curse!
ALHADRA (fiercely).
But dreamt you not that you return'd and kill'd them?
Dreamt you of no revenge?
ALVAR (his voice trembling, and in tones of deep distress).
She would have died,
Died in her guilt-perchance by her own hands!
And bending o'er her self-inflicted wounds,
I might have met the evil glance of frenzy,
And leapt myself into an unblest grave!
I pray'd for the punishment that cleanses hearts:
For still I loved her!
My soul is full of visions all as wild!
There is no room in this heart for puling love-tales.
TERESA (lifts up her veil, and advances to ALVAR).
Stranger, farewell! I guess not who you are,
Nor why you so address'd your tale to me.
Your mien is noble, and, I own, perplex'd me
With obscure memory of something past,
Which still escaped my efforts, or presented
Tricks of a fancy pamper'd with long wishing.
If, as it sometimes happens, our rude startling
Whilst your full heart was shaping out its dream,
Drove you to this, your not ungentle wildness-
You have my sympathy, and so farewell'
But if some undiscover'd wrongs oppress you,
And you need strength to drag them into light,
The generous Valdez, and my Lord Ordonio,
Have arm and will to aid a noble sufferer;
Nor shall you want my favorable pleading.
[Exeunt TERESA and ALHADRA.
ALVAR (alone).
"Tis strange! It cannot be! my Lord Ordonio!
Her Lord Ordonio! Nay, I will not do it!
I cursed him once-and one curse is enough!
She had fainted in my arms? It cannot be!
"Tis not in Nature! I will die, believing
That I shall meet her where no evil is,
No treachery, no cup dash'd from the lips.
I'll haunt this scene no more! live she in peace!
Her husband-ay, her husband! May this angel
New mould his canker'd heart! Assist me, Heaven,
That I may pray for my poor guilty brother! [Exit
A wild and mountainous Country. ORDONIO and Iss. DORE are discovered, supposed at a little distance from ISIDORE's house.
Here we may stop: your house distinct in view,
Yet we secured from listeners.
Now indeed
My house! and it looks cheerful as the clusters
Basking in sunshine on yon vine-clad rock,
That over-brows it! Patron! Friend! Preserver!
Thrice have you saved my life. Once in the battle
You gave it me: next rescued me from suicide,
When for my follies I was made to wander,
With mouths to feed, and not a morsel for them
Now, but for you, a dungeon's slimy stones
Had been my bed and pillow.
Good Isidore!
Why this to me? It is enough, you know it.
A common trick of Gratitude, my Lord,
Seeking to ease her own full heart-
A debt repaid ceases to be a debt.
You have it in your power to serve me greatly.
And how, my Lord? I pray you to name the thing.
I would climb up an ice-glaz'd precipice
To pluck a weed you fancied!
ORDONIO (with embarrassment and hesitation).
Why-that-Lady-
"Tis now three years, my Lord, since last I saw you
How bad she look'd, and pale! but not like guilt-Have you a son, my Lord?
And her calm tones-sweet as a song of mercy!
If the bad spirit retain'd his angel's voice,
Hell scarce were Hell. And why not innocent?
Who meant to murder me, might well cheat her?
But ere she married him, he had stain'd her honor;
Ah! there i am hamper'd. What if this were a lie
Framed by the assassin? Who should tell it him,
If it were truth? Ordonio would not tell him.
Yet why one lie? all else, I know, was truth.
I can bear this, and any thing more grievous
I can bear much-yes, very much from you!
But there's a point where sufferance is meanness :
I am no villain-never kill'd for hire-
My gratitude
From you, my Lord-but how can I serve you here? "T was a well-sounding word-what have you done
Why, you can utter with a solemn gesture
Oracular sentences of deep no-meaning,
Wear a quaint garment, make mysterious antics-
I am dull, my Lord! I do not comprehend you.
In blunt terms, you can play the sorcerer.
She hath no faith in Holy Church, 't is true :
Her lover school'd her in some newer nonsense!
Yet still a tale of spirits works upon her.
She is a lone enthusiast, sensitive,
Shivers, and cannot keep the tears in her eye:
And such do love the marvellous too well
Not to believe it. We will wind up her fancy
With a strange music, that she knows not of
With fumes of frankincense, and mummery,
Then leave, as one sure token of his death,
That portrait, which from off the dead man's neck
I bade thee take, the trophy of thy conquest.
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ISIDORE (with stammering). Why-why, my Lord! You know you told me that the lady loved you, Had loved you with incautious tenderness; That if the young man, her betrothed husband, Returned, yourself, and she, and the honor of both Must perish. Now, though with no tenderer scruples Than those which being native to the heart, Than those, my Lord, which merely being a manORDONIO (aloud, though to express his contempt he speaks in the third person).
This fellow is a Man-he kill'd for hire One whom he knew not, yet has tender scruples! [Then turning to ISIDORE. These doubts, these fears, thy whine, thy stammering
Pish, fool! thou blunder'st through the book of guilt, Spelling thy villany.
Yes, my Lord, I could not tell you!
I thrust away the thought-it drove me wild.
But listen to me now-I pray you listen
Villain! no more! I'll hear no more of it.
My Lord, it much imports your future safety That you should hear it.
ORDONIO (turning off from ISIDORE.) Am not I a Man! "Tis as it should be! tut-the deed itself Was idle, and these after-pangs still idler!
We met him in the very place you mention'd. Hard by a grove of firs
He fought us valiantly, and wounded all;
In fine, compell'd a parley.
ORDONIO (sighing, as if lost in thought).
Alvar! brother'
COLERIDGE'S POETICAL WORKS.
'Twas my intention
Having first traced him homeward to his haunt.
But lo! the stern Dominican, whose spies
Lurk everywhere, already (as it seem'd)
Had given commission to his apt familiar
To seek and sound the Moor; who now returning
Was by this trusty agent stopp'd midway.
I, dreading fresh suspicion if found near him
In that lone place, again conceal'd myself,
Yet within hearing. So the Moor was question'd,
And in your name, as lord of this domain.
Proudly he answer'd, "Say to the Lord Ordonio,
He that can bring the dead to life again!"
[A pause. A strange reply!
It seizes me-
-by Hell, I will go on!
What wouldst thou stop, man? thy pale looks won't 1
save thee!
Oh cold-cold-cold! shot through with icy cold!
[A pause.
ISIDORE (aside).
Were he alive, he had return'd ere now-
The consequence the same-dead through his plot-
O this unutterable dying away-here-
This sickness of the heart!
[A pause.
What if I went
And lived in a hollow tomb, and fed on weeds?
Ay! that's the road to heaven! O fool! fool! fool!
A pause.
What have I done but that which nature destined,
Or the blind elements stirr'd up within me?
Ay, all of him is strange.
He call'd himself a Christian, yet he wears
The Moorish robes, as if he courted death.
ORDONIO.
Where does this wizard live?
ISIDORE (pointing to the distance).
You see that brooklet
Trace its course backward: through a narrow opening
It leads you to the place.
How shall I know it?
ISIDORE.
You cannot err. It is a small green dell
Built all around with high off-sloping hills,
And from its shape our peasants aptly call it
If good were meant, why were we made these Be- The Giant's Cradle. There's a lake in the midst,
What dost thou mutter of?
Some of your servants know me, I am certain.
And round its banks tall wood that branches over,
And makes a kind of faery forest grow
Down in the water. At the further end
A puny cataract falls on the lake;
And there, a curious sight! you see its shadow
For ever curling like a wreath of smoke,
Up through the foliage of those faery trees.
His cot stands opposite. You cannot miss it.
ORDONIO (in retiring stops suddenly at the edge of the
scene, and then turning round to ISIDORE).
Ha!-Who lurks there? Have we been overheard?
There, where the smooth high wall of slate-rock glit-
'Neath those tall stones, which, propping each the
other,
Form a mock portal with their pointed arch!
Pardon my smiles! "T is a poor Idiot Boy,
Who sits in the sun, and twirls a bough about,
His weak eyes seethed in most unmeaning tears.
And so he sits, swaying his cone-like head;
And, staring at his bough from morn to sun-set,
Who as it seem'd was gathering herbs and wild flow-See-saws his voice in inarticulate noises!
Noble-minded woman!
Long time against oppression have I fought,
And for the native liberty of faith
Have bled, and suffer'd bonds. Of this be certain:
Time, as he courses onwards, still unrolls
The volume of Concealment. In the Future,
As in the optician's glassy cylinder,
The indistinguishable blots and colors
Of the dim Past collect and shape themselves,
Upstarting in their own completed image
To scare or to reward.
I sought the guilty,
And what I sought I found: but ere the spear
"lew from my hand, there rose an angel form
Betwixt me and my aim. With baffled purpose
To the Avenger I leave Vengeance, and depart!
Whate'er betide, if aught my arm may aid,
Or power protect, my word is pledged to thee:
For many are thy wrongs, and thy soul noble.
Once more, farewell.
[Exit ALHADRA. Yes, to the Belgic states
We will return. These robes, this stain'd complexion,
Akin to falsehood, weigh upon my spirit
Whate'er befall us, the heroic Maurice
Will grant us an asylum, in remembrance
ORDONIO (to himself, as he enters). If I distinguish'd right her gait and stature, It was the Moorish woman, Isidore's wife. That pass'd me as I enter'd. A lit taper, In the night air, doth not more naturally Attract the night-flies round it, than a conjuror Draws round him the whole female neighborhood. [Addressing ALVAR. You know my name, I guess, if not my person.
I am Ordonio, son of the Lord Valdez.
ALVAR (with deep emotion).
With you, then, I am to speak: [Haughtily waving his hand to ZULIMEZ. And, mark you, alone. [Exit ZULIMEZ.
And all the wealth, power, influence which is yours," He that can bring the dead to life again!"You let a murderer hold?
Such was your message, Sir! You are no dullard, But one that strips the outward rind of things!
"Tis fabled there are fruits with tempting rinds, That are all dust and rottenness within. Wouldst thou I should strip such?
Thou quibbling fool, What dost thou mean? Think'st thou I journey'd hither, To sport with thee?
O no, my Lord! to sport
Best suits the gaiety of innocence.
ORDONIO (aside).
O what a thing is man! the wisest heart
A Fool! a Fool that laughs at its own folly,
Yet still a fool!
[Looks round the Cottage.
You are poor!
Hark! heard you not some footsteps? What follows thence?
That you would fain be richer. 91
Did Alvar perish-he, I mean-the lover-
The fellow,-
Nay, speak out! 'twill ease your heart To call him villain!-Why stand'st thou aghast! Men think it natural to hate their rivals.
Now that he gave it me
This lady knows not. You are a mighty wizard-
Can call the dead man up-he wil
He is in heaven then-there you ha
Still there are tokens-and your imps i..
Something he wore about him when he die
And when the smoke of the incense on the altar
Is pass'd, your spirits will have left this picture.
What say you now?
ALVAR (after a pause).
Ordonio, I will do it.
We'll hazard no delay.
In the early evening.
I will prepare him.
Be it to-night,
Ask for the Lord Valdez.
Music too, and incense
(For I have arranged it-Music, Altar, Incense),
All shall be ready. Here is this same picture,
And here, what you will value more, a purse.
Come early for your magic ceremonies.
I will not fail to meet you.
ORDONIO.
Till next we meet, farewell!
ALVAR (alone, indignantly flings the purse away, and
gazes passionately at the portrait).
And I did curse thee?
At midnight? on my knees? and I believed
Thee perjured, thee a traitress! The dishonor'd
O blind and credulous fool! O guilt of folly!
Now, till she knows him dead, she will not wed me. Should not thy inarticulate Fondnesses,
ALVAR (with eager vehemence).
Are you not wedded then? Merciful Heaven!
Not wedded to Teresa?
Thy Infant Loves-should not thy Maiden Vows
Have come upon my heart? And this sweet Image,
Tied round my neck with many a chaste endearment.
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