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BY MAURICE MAETERLINCK

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Crown 8vo, cloth, designed cover, gilt top, 5s. net each

Translated by ALFRED SUTRO

The Life of the Bee [Ninth Edition

The Treasure of the Humble
With an Introduction by A. B. Walkley[Sixth Edition

Wisdom and Destiny [Fourth Edition

The Buried Temple

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Translated by
ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS

The Double Garden [Second Edition

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Translated by ALFRED SUTRO

Foolscap 8vo, cloth, gilt top, 3s. 6d. net

Thoughts from Maeterlinck

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Small crown 8vo, half cloth, 3s. 6d. net each

Aglavaine and Selysette: A Drama in Five Acts
With an Introduction by J. W. Mackail[Third Edition

Monna Vanna: A Drama in Three Acts

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Translated by BERNARD MIALL

Sister Beatrice; and Ardiane & Barbe Bleue: Two Plays

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Translated by
ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS

Small 4to, half cloth, gilt top, 3s. 6d. net each

My Dog. With 6 Illustrations in Colour by G. Vernon Stokes

Old-fashioned Flowers and other Open-air Essays. With 6 Illustrations in Colour by G. S. Elgood

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JOYZELLE

BY

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

TRANSLATED BY

ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS

LONDON
GEORGE ALLEN, 156 CHARING CROSS ROAD
1907

[All rights reserved]

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Copyright in the United States of America, 1903,
by Eugène Fasquelle

Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson & Co.
At the Ballantyne Press

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CHARACTERS

• Merlin
• Lancéor, Merlin's Son
• Joyzelle
• Arielle, Merlin's genius, invisible to the others

[Scene: Merlin's Island

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JOYZELLE

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ACT I

A Gallery in Merlin's Palace

[Merlin is seated near Arielle, who is sleeping on the steps of a marble staircase. It is night.

Merlin.

You sleep, my Arielle, you my inner force, the neglected power which slumbers in every soul and which I alone, till now, awaken at will.... You sleep, my docile and familiar little fairy, and your hair, straying like a blue mist, invisible to men, mingles with the moon, the perfumes of the night, the rays of the stars, the roses that shed their petals, the spreading sky, to remind us thus that nothing separates us from any existing thing and that our thought does not know where the light begins for which it hopes, nor where the shadow ends which it escapes.... You are sleeping soundly and, while you sleep, I lose all my knowledge and become like my blind brethren, who do not yet know that on this earth there are as many hidden gods as there are hearts that throb.... Alas, I am to them the genius to be avoided, the wicked sorcerer in league with their enemies!... They have no enemies, but only subjects who know not where to find their king.... They are persuaded that my secret virtue, which is obeyed by the plants and the stars, by water, stone and fire and to which the future at times reveals some of its features: they are persuaded that this new and yet so human virtue is hidden in philtres, in horrible charms, in hellish herbs and awful signs.... No, it is in myself, even as it resides in them; it is in you, my frail Arielle, in you who were once in me.... I have taken two or three bolder steps in the dark.... I have done a little earlier what they will do later.... All things will be subject to them when they have learnt at last to revive your goodwill, even as I have revived it.... But it were vain for me to tell them that you are sleeping here and to point to your dazzling grace: they would not see you.... Each one of them must find you within himself; each one of them must open as I do the tomb of his life and come to awake you as I awake you now....

[He bends over Arielle and kisses her.

Arielle.

(Waking.) Master!...

Merlin.

This is the hour, Arielle, when love must watch.... I shall often trouble your sleep in these coming days....

Arielle.

My sleep was so long that I am always relapsing into it; but I feel stronger and become happier at each new awakening that your thought imposes on me....

Merlin.

Whither are you taking my son and when shall I see him again?...

Arielle.

I was following him with my eyes in my attentive dream.... He is approaching us.... He thinks that he is lost; and his destiny leads him where happiness awaits him....

Merlin.

Will he know me?... It is many years since the prescribed proof exacted that we should live as strangers to each other; and I am eager to be able to embrace him as I did long ago, when he was a child....

Arielle.

No, fate must be allowed to decide freely; nor may the proof be falsified by the love of a father of whose existence he must not know....

Merlin.

But now that Joyzelle is here, close to us; now that he is coming towards her, does the future become more clear, can you read further into it?...

Arielle.

(Gazing upon the sea and the night, in a sort of trance.) I read in it what I read from the first moment.... Your son's fate is wholly inscribed within a circle of love. If he love, if he be loved with a wondrous love, which should be that of all men, but which is becoming so rare that at present it seems to them a dazzling folly; if he love, if he be loved with an ingenuous and yet clear-seeing love, with a love simple and pure and all-powerful as the mountain stream, with an heroic love, yet one that shall be gentler than a flower, with a love which takes all and gives back more than it takes, which never hesitates, which is not deceived; a love which nothing disconcerts and nothing repels, a love which hears and sees naught save a mysterious happiness invisible to all beside, which perceives it everywhere, in every form and every trial, and which, with a smile, will even commit crime to claim it.... If he obtain that love, which exists somewhere and is waiting for him in a heart that I seem to have recognized, his life will be longer, fairer and happier than that of other men. But, if he do not find it before the month is past, for the circle is closing; if Joyzelle's love be not that which the future holds out to him from the high skies; if the flame do not burn its full span, if a regret veil or a doubt obscure it, then death triumphs and your son is lost....

Merlin.

Ay, for all men the hour of love is an important hour!...

Arielle.

For Lancéor, alas, it is the inexorable hour!... Within these next few days he will reach the summit of his life. With groping hands, he touches happiness and the tomb.... He is dependent entirely on the last steps which he is taking and on the act of the virgin who is coming to meet him....

Merlin.

And if Joyzelle be not she whom fate selects?...

Arielle.

Indeed, I fear that the proof which we are about to attempt is the only one which it offers; but man must never lose courage in face of the future....

Merlin.

Why attempt the proof if it be uncertain?...

Arielle.

If we do not offer it, fate will offer it; it is inevitable, but it is left to chance; and that is why I try to direct its course....

Merlin.

And if he love Joyzelle and she do not love him with the love which fate demands?...

Arielle.

Then we shall have to intervene more openly.

Merlin.

How?

Arielle.

I will try to learn.

Merlin.

Arielle, I conjure you, as this concerns the dearest being, much dearer than myself; as I have only one son and he can become what we well know that I could never be: is it not possible to make an unexampled, an almost desperate effort with regard to the future; to violate time; to snatch from the years, even were they to revenge themselves upon us two, the secret which they conceal so strictly and which contains much more than our own life and our own happiness?...

Arielle.

No, strive as I may, I can reach no further.... The future is a world limited by ourselves, in which we discover only that which concerns us and sometimes, by chance, that which interests those whom we love the most.... I see very clearly all that unfolds itself round Lancéor, until his road meets Joyzelle's road. But around Joyzelle the years are veiled. It is an effulgent veil, a veil of light, but it hides the days as profoundly as a veil of darkness.... It interrupts life. Then, beyond the veil, I again find happiness and death awaiting him, like two equal, indifferent, inscrutable hosts; and I cannot tell which is the nearer, the more imperious.... It is not possible for me to know if Joyzelle is the predestined one.... Everything promises that it is she, but nothing confirms it.... Her face is stretched towards the coming years ... and, call to her as I may, with all my might, she does not answer, does not turn her head. Nothing can distract her; and I have never seen her features, which I can only imagine.... One sign alone is certain: it is that of the very sharp and cruel proofs which she will have to overcome.... By these proofs alone we shall know her....

Merlin.

And, therefore, starting from this point which I can surmount, we must submit to unknown powers, question facts like other men, await their reply and try to conquer them if they threaten harm to those whom we love....

Arielle.

But here they come, in the breaking dawn.... Let us hasten away, they are coming near.... Let us leave to their destiny, which is beginning its work, the solitude and the silence which it demands.

[Exeunt Merlin and Arielle. A few moments after, while the daylight swiftly increases, Joyzelle and Lancéor enter from opposite sides and meet.

Joyzelle.

(Stopping, astonished, before Lancéor.) What are you seeking?

Lancéor.

I do not know where I am.... I was seeking a shelter.... Who are you?

Joyzelle.

My name is Joyzelle.

Lancéor.

Joyzelle.... I am saying the name.... It is as caressing as a wing, the breath of a flower, a whisper of gladness, a ray of light.... It describes you completely, it sings in the heart, it lights the lips....

Joyzelle.

And you, who are you?

Lancéor.

I no longer myself know who I am.... A few days ago, my name was Lancéor; I knew where I was and I knew myself.... To-day, I seek myself, I grope within myself and all around me and I wander in the mist, amid mirages....

Joyzelle.

What mist? What mirages?... How long have you been on this island?

Lancéor.

Since yesterday....

Joyzelle.

Strange, they did not tell me....

Lancéor.

No one saw me.... I was wandering on the shore, I was in despair....

Joyzelle.

Oh! Why?...

Lancéor.

I was very far from here, I was very far from him, when a letter told me that my old father was dying.... I took ship at once. We were long at sea; then, in the first port at which the ship put in, I learnt that it was too late, that my father was no more.... I continued my voyage, at least to be on the scene of his last thoughts and carry out his last wishes....

Joyzelle.

Why are you here?

Lancéor.

Why? I do not know, nor do I know how.... The sea was very still and the sky was clear.... We saw only the water slumbering in the azure.... Suddenly, without warning, the waves were invaded by thick blue mists.... They rose like a veil, which clung to our hands, to the rigging, to our faces.... Then the wind blew, our anchor broke loose and the blind ship, driven by a current that made her timbers creak, arrived towards evening in the unknown harbour of this unexpected island.... Sad and disheartened, I landed on the beach; I fell asleep in a cave overlooking the sea; and, when I awoke, the fog had lifted and I saw the ship disappear like a radiant wing on the horizon of the waves.

Joyzelle.

What had happened?

Lancéor.

I do not know.... I would have tried to follow her, but I could find no boat in the harbour.... I must wait, therefore, until another vessel passes....

Joyzelle.

That is curious.... It is like myself....

Lancéor.

Like you?...

Joyzelle.

Yes, I too came to the island through a thick fog.... But I was shipwrecked....

Lancéor.

When was that? And how?... Where do you come from, Joyzelle?...

Joyzelle.

I was coming from another island....

Lancéor.

Where were you going?

Joyzelle.

Where some one was awaiting me....

Lancéor.

Who?

Joyzelle.

One whom they had thought right to choose for me....

Lancéor.

Were you betrothed?...

Joyzelle.

Yes.

Lancéor.

Do you love him?...

Joyzelle.

No.

Lancéor.

But then?...

Joyzelle.

My mother wished it....

Lancéor.

Do you intend to obey her?

Joyzelle.

No.

Lancéor.

Ah, that is well!... I like that!... And my father, at the moment of his death, wished that I also should choose her whom he had chosen for me.... He had his reasons, very deep and serious reasons, it appears.... And, as he wished it and as he is no longer alive, I must obey him....

Joyzelle.

Why?

Lancéor.

We cannot evade the wishes of the dead.

Joyzelle.

Why?

Lancéor.

They can no longer be altered.... We must have pity, we must respect them....

Joyzelle.

No....

Lancéor.

You would not obey?...

Joyzelle.

No.

Lancéor.

Joyzelle!... This is horrible!...

Joyzelle.

No, the dead are horrible, if they want us to love those whom we do not love....

Lancéor.

Joyzelle!... I am afraid of you....

Joyzelle.

I said.... What did I say?... Perhaps I was too quick....

Lancéor.

Joyzelle, your eyes are moist at the thought of the dead and belie your words....

Joyzelle.

No, it is not for them.... Perhaps I was harsh.... And yet, they are wrong.

Lancéor.

Let us speak no more of the dead.... You have not told me how your shipwreck....

Joyzelle.

We lost our way in a thick fog.... A fog so thick that it filled our hands like white feathers.... The pilot mistook the course.... He thought he saw a beacon.... The ship struck upon a hidden reef.... But no one perished.... The waves bore me away; and then I saw the blue water glide before my eyes as though I were sinking in a stifling sky.... I went down and down.... Then some one caught hold of me and I lost consciousness....

Lancéor.

Who caught hold of you?...

Joyzelle.

The lord of this island.

Lancéor.

And who is this lord?...

Joyzelle.

He is an old man who wanders like a restless shade about this marble palace....

Lancéor.

If I had been there!...

Joyzelle.

What would you have done?...

Lancéor.

I should have saved you!...

Joyzelle.

Was I not saved?...

Lancéor.

It is not the same thing!... You would not have suffered, nothing would have come to you.... I should have carried you on the crest of the waves.... Ah, I do not know how.... Like a cup full of precious pearls, of which not one must be touched by a shadow; like a flower of the dawn, from which we fear to shake a single dewdrop.... When I think of the dangers which you, so fair, so fragile, ran among the cruel rocks, in that old man's arms!... What he did was fine; he did the impossible.... But it was not enough.... How did you reach the shore at last?...

Joyzelle.

I awoke lying on the sands.... The old man was there. Then he had me carried to this palace....

Lancéor.

Is he king of this island?...

Joyzelle.

The island is almost desert, one sees none but a few servants who move about in silence.... He can have for his subjects only the trees, the flowers and the happy birds with which the island seems filled....

Lancéor.

What he did was well done....

Joyzelle.

He is good and kind; and he received me as my father himself could not have received me.... Yet I do not like him....

Lancéor.

Why?

Joyzelle.

I believe he loves me....

Lancéor.

What!... He dares!... No, it is not possible, or else the years no longer have the weight they should have and reason escapes us when death draws near....

Joyzelle.

And yet I fear it.... He gave me to understand.... He is strange and sad.... They say he has a son who is very far from here, who is lost, perhaps.... He is always thinking of him.... When he thinks that he will see him again, his face lights up, he.... Here he is!...

[Enter Merlin.

Merlin.

I was looking for you, Joyzelle.... (Turning to Lancéor, with a threatening glance.) As for you, I know who you are and I know the reasons that have brought you to this island, the trick of this pretended shipwreck and the name of the enemy who sent you....

Lancéor.

Me?... But it was a mere accident that flung me on this coast....

Merlin.

Let us waste no phrases.

Joyzelle.

What has he done?

Merlin.

He intended, alas, to do the basest thing that man can do: to betray kindness, deceive friendship and sell to the enemy the too generous host who was going to welcome him....

Joyzelle.

No!

Merlin.

Why? Do you know him?

Joyzelle.

Yes.

Merlin.

Since when?

Joyzelle.

Since I first saw him.

Merlin.

And when did you see him?

Joyzelle.

When he entered this room....

Merlin.

That is hardly....

Joyzelle.

It is enough.

Merlin.

No, Joyzelle, and soon proofs and facts will show you that it is not enough and that an honest look, an innocent smile and ingenuous words often conceal more dangerous snares than those of thankless old age or of love that has but little hope....

Joyzelle.

What do you mean to do?

Merlin.

I am waiting for the final certainty; and then I shall do what it is lawful and necessary to do to remove all fear of an enemy who would stop at nothing. The pitiless measures which I shall take concern your safety as much as my own; for the same plots surround us both and we are united by fate.... I can tell you no more to-day; have confidence in me; perhaps you already know that your happiness is mine....

Joyzelle.

You saved my life, I remember that....

Merlin.

You remember it without any kindliness: but I hope that one day you will do me justice.... (To Lancéor.) As for you, go. The information which I have received is not open to doubt. When the facts which I fear have confirmed it, I shall act. Meanwhile, you are my prisoner. You will be shown the part of the palace reserved for you. If you go beyond the limits laid down, you become your own judge and pronounce your own sentence. There will be no appeal. Go, my orders are given....

Lancéor.

I obey, but only until you recognize your error. We shall meet soon, Joyzelle....

Merlin.

No, bid her farewell; for it is doubtful if you will ever see her again.... Nevertheless, Joyzelle, chance may bring you again in this man's presence. In that case, fly from him; your life and his depend most strictly on your prompt flight. If I learn that you have seen each other, you are irrevocably lost.... (To Lancéor.) Do you promise to fly from her?

Lancéor.

If her life is at stake, yes.

Merlin.

And you, Joyzelle?

Joyzelle.

No.

---

ACT II

A wild, neglected garden, full of weeds and brambles. On the right, a very high and gloomy wall, pierced by a railed gate.

[Joyzelle is discovered in the garden, alone.

Joyzelle.

This is the garden which no one visits. The sun does not enter here; the poor wild flowers upon which men wage war because they are not beautiful here await death; and the birds are silent. Here are the violet, which has lost its perfume, the trembling, shrinking buttercup and the scarlet poppy, which sheds its petals without ceasing.... Here are the scabious begging for a little water, the deadly spurge hiding its green blossoms, the blue campanula silently shaking its useless bells.... I know you all, you humble and despised flowers, so good and so ugly!... You could be beautiful; it needs scarce anything: a ray of happiness, a minute's grace, a bolder smile to attract the bee.... But no eye sees you, no hand sows you, no hand gathers you; and I have come among you to be also alone.... How gloomy everything looks!... The grass is neglected and parched, the leaves are sick, the old trees dying; and spring itself and the dew of dawn are afraid lest they should grow sorrowful in this solitude....

[Lancéor appears behind the railed gate.

Lancéor.

Joyzelle!...

Joyzelle.

Lancéor!...

Lancéor.

Joyzelle!...

Joyzelle.

Go away!... Go away!... Take care!... It is death if he sees you!...

Lancéor.

He will not see us; he is very far from here.

Joyzelle.

Where is he?...

Lancéor.

I saw him go away. I watched his departure from the top of that tower in which I am a prisoner.... He is at the other end of the island, near the blue forest that shuts in the horizon....

Joyzelle.

But he may return; or some one will tell him.... Go away, go away, I say!... Your life is at stake!...

Lancéor.

The palace is deserted; I have gone through the rooms, the gardens and the courts, the long box hedges, the marble staircases....

Joyzelle.

Go away, it is only a trap.... He has a design upon your life; I know it, he said so.... He suspects that I love you.... He is only seeking an excuse for what he would like to do.... Go away!... As it is, you have done too much....

Lancéor.

No.

Joyzelle.

If you do not go away, then I shall go.

Lancéor.

If you go, Joyzelle, I shall remain at this gate until night brings him back to the palace.... He will find me on this forbidden threshold.... I have passed the limits assigned to me; I have therefore disobeyed him and I wish him to see it and I wish him to know it!...

Joyzelle.

Lancéor, have pity! I entreat you, Lancéor!... You are risking all our happiness!... Do not think only of yourself!... I will go where you please, if you will leave this gate!... We shall see each other elsewhere, later, another day.... We must choose the time, we must take care, we must make our preparations.... See, I am stretching out my arms to you ... what would you have me do?... What must I promise you?...

Lancéor.

Open the gate.

Joyzelle.

No, no, no, I cannot....

Lancéor.

Open, open, Joyzelle, if you would have me live....

Joyzelle.

Why do you wish me to open?...

Lancéor.

I want to see you closer, I want to touch your hands which I have not yet touched, to look at you once more as I looked at you on the first day.... Open, or I am determined to be undone; I shall not go away....

Joyzelle.

Will you go away then?...

Lancéor.

I promise you, Joyzelle.... As soon as you open the gate, before a swallow, before a thought has time to hasten from wherever it may be to surprise my hand as it touches yours.... I beseech you, Joyzelle: this is too cruel.... I am standing at this gate like a blind beggar.... I can see only your shadow moving among the leaves.... These bars are hateful and hide your face.... One look alone, Joyzelle, in which I shall see you wholly; and then I will go like a robber flying with a great treasure dragging noisily behind him.... No one will know and we shall be happy....

Joyzelle.

Lancéor, this is terrible!... I never tremble, but I am trembling to-day.... Perhaps it means your life; and it already means mine.... What is that light which rises so quickly?... It has come to threaten us, it is going to betray us!...

Lancéor.

No, no, it is the sun rising behind the wall.... It is the innocent sun, the good May sun, which has come to delight us.... Open, then, open quickly: each minute that passes adds its dangers to the dangers which you fear.... A single movement, Joyzelle; a turn of your hand; and you really open the gates of life to me! (Joyzelle turns the key; the gate opens; Lancéor crosses the threshold.)

Lancéor.

(Taking Joyzelle in his arms.) Joyzelle!...

Joyzelle.

I am here!...

Lancéor.

I hold your hands and your eyes, your hair and your lips, in the same kiss and at the same moment, all the gifts of love which I have never had and all its presence!... My arms are so surprised that they cannot carry them; and my whole life cannot contain them.... Do not turn away your face, do not draw back your lips!...

Joyzelle.

It is not to escape you, but to be closer to you....

Lancéor.

Do not turn your head; do not deprive me of a shadow of your lashes, a gleam of your eyes: it is not the hours, but the very minutes that threaten our happiness....

Joyzelle.

I was seeking your smile....

Lancéor.

And your own meets mine in the first kiss that passes between our lips to unite our destinies.... It seems to me to-day as though I had always seen you and always clasped you and as though I were repeating, in reality, on the threshold of paradise, what I did on earth when embracing your shadow....

Joyzelle.

I used to embrace you at night when I embraced my dreams....

Lancéor.

I knew no doubt....

Joyzelle.

I knew no fear....

Lancéor.

And everything is granted me....

Joyzelle.

And everything makes me happy!...

Lancéor.

How deep your eyes are and how full of confidence!...

Joyzelle.

And how clear are yours and full of certainty!...

Lancéor.

How well I recognize them!...

Joyzelle.

And how well I know yours!...

Lancéor.

Your hands rest on my shoulders just as when I lay waiting for them without daring to wake....

Joyzelle.

And your arm is round my neck just as it was....

Lancéor.

It was thus that your eyelids used to close at the breath of love....

Joyzelle.

And it was thus, too, that the tears came to your eyes when they opened....

Lancéor.

When happiness is so great....

Joyzelle.

Unhappiness does not come so long as love binds it....

Lancéor.

Do you love me?...

Joyzelle.

Yes....

Lancéor.

Oh, how you said "yes!"... "Yes" from the depths of your heart, from the depths of your thought, from the depths of your very soul!... I knew it, perhaps; but it had to be said; and our kisses themselves did not count without it.... Now it is enough, it will feed my life; all the hatred on earth could not wipe it away nor thirty years of distress exhaust it!... I am in the light and the spring overwhelms me!... I look up to the sky and the garden awakens!... Do you hear the birds making the trees sing and repeating your smile and that wonderful "yes;" and do you see the rays that caress your hair like diamonds sparkling among the flames and the thousands of flowers that bend over us to surprise in our eyes the mystery of a love which they did not know?...

Joyzelle.

(Opening her eyes.) There was nothing here but poor, dead flowers....

[She looks around her, stupefied; for, since Lancéor's entrance, without their noticing it, the gloomy garden has become gradually transfigured by magic. The wild plants, the weeds that poisoned it have grown and each, according to its kind, has increased its flowers, blooming to a prodigious size. The puny bindweed has become a powerful creeper, whose wonderful blossoms engarland the trees weighed down with ripe fruits and peopled with miraculous birds. The pale pimpernel is now a tall shrub of a warm and tender green, with bursting flowers larger than lilies. The pale scabious has lengthened its stalks, from which spring tufts like mauve heliotrope.... Butterflies flit to and fro, the bees hum, the birds sing, the fruits swing and fall, the light streams down. The perspective of the garden has become infinitely extended; and the audience now sees, to the right, a marble basin, half-hidden behind a hedge of oleanders and turnsoles cut into arches.

Lancéor.

There is nothing here now but the flowers of life!... Look!... They are coming down, they are streaming down upon us!... They are bursting on the branches, they bend the trees, they entangle our steps, they press against one another, they crush one another, they open out wide, one within the other, they blind the leaves, they dazzle the grass; I know none of them and the spring is drunk; I have never seen flowers so disordered, so resplendent!...

Joyzelle.

Where are we?...

Lancéor.

We are in the garden which you would not open to my love....

Joyzelle.

What have we done?

Lancéor.

I have given the kiss that is given but once; and you have spoken the word that is never respoken....

Joyzelle.

(Swooning.) Lancéor, I am mad, or else we are going to die....

Lancéor.

(Supporting her.) Joyzelle, you are turning pale and your dear arms are pressing me as though you feared that a hidden enemy....

Joyzelle.

Have you not seen...?

Lancéor.

What?

Joyzelle.

We are caught in a trap and those flowers are betraying us.... The birds were silent, the trees were dead, there was nothing here but weeds, which no one dug up.... I recognize them all and remember their names, which still remind me of their former wretchedness.... Here is the buttercup, laden with golden disks; the poor pale pimpernel is changed into a bush of lilies; the tall scabious are dropping their petals over our heads; and those purple bells which shoot up over the wall to tell the world that they have seen us, are the foxglove, which was pining in the shade.... It is as though the sky had shed its flowers.... Do not look at them; they are here to ruin us.... Ah, I am wrong to seek and I should have understood!... He muttered confused threats.... Yes, yes, I knew he had spells at his command.... They told me so one day, but I did not believe them.... Now it is his time; it is well, it is too late; but perhaps we shall see that love also knows....

[A horn sounds.

Lancéor.

Hark!...

Joyzelle.

It is the horses' hoofs and the horn sounding the recall.... He is returning. Fly!...

Lancéor.

But you?...

Joyzelle.

I have nothing to fear, but his hateful love.... Go!...

Lancéor.

I will stay with you; and, if his violence....

Joyzelle.

You will ruin us both.... Go!... Hide there, behind those spurges.... Whatever he may say, whatever he may do, do not show yourself and fear nothing for me: I shall know how to defend myself.... Go!... He is coming!... Go!... I hear his voice....

[Lancéor hides behind a cluster of tall spurges. The railed gate opens and Merlin enters the garden.

Merlin.

Is he here, Joyzelle?...

Joyzelle.

No.

Merlin.

Those flowers do not lie; they inform against love.... They were your keepers and have been faithful to me.... I am not cruel and I forgive more than once.... You can save him by pointing to the bush which hides him.... (Joyzelle stands motionless.) Do not look at me with those eyes of hatred.... You will love me one day, for love goes by dark and generous paths.... Do you not believe that I will keep my promises?...

Joyzelle.

No!...

Merlin.

I have done nothing, Joyzelle, to deserve such hatred or such an insult.... Since you wish it, I will let fate take its course....

[A cry of pain is heard from behind the cluster of spurges.

Joyzelle.

(Rushing behind the cluster.) Lancéor!...

Lancéor.

Joyzelle!... I am hurt.... An adder has stung me....

Joyzelle.

It is not an adder.... It is a horrible animal.... It is lifting itself against you!... Let me crush it underfoot.... It is foaming.... It is dead.... Lancéor, you are turning pale!... Lean on my neck.... Fear nothing, I am strong.... Show me your wound.... Lancéor, I am here.... Lancéor, answer me!...

Merlin.

(Approaching them and examining the bite.)
The wound is mortal.... The poison is very slow and its action is strange.... Do not despair.... I alone know the remedy....

Joyzelle.

Lancéor! Lancéor! Answer me! Answer me!...

Merlin.

He will not answer, he is sound asleep.... Withdraw, Joyzelle, unless you wish this mere sleep to end in the grave.... Withdraw, Joyzelle: you will not be betraying him; you will be warding off death....

Joyzelle.

First make the sign that shall restore him to life!

Merlin.

(Looking at her gravely.) I will make the sign, Joyzelle. (Joyzelle exit slowly, turns back and withdraws at last, before a grave and imperious gesture from Merlin. Merlin, left alone with Lancéor, kneels down beside him to dress his wound.) There, have no fear, my son, there, it is for your happiness; and may all my heart open in the first kiss that I am able to give you.

[He embraces him long and fervently. Enter Arielle.

Arielle.

Master, we must hasten and lay the new trap.

Merlin.

Will he fall into it?

Arielle.

Man always falls into a trap, when his instinct leads him; but let us veil his reason, let us change his character; we shall behold a sight that will make us smile....

Merlin.

I shall not smile, for the sight is a sad one and I do not like to see a noble and beautiful love, a love that believes itself predestined and unparalleled, thus reduced to nothing, at the first proof, in the arms of a phantom....

Arielle.

Lancéor is not free, for he is no longer himself and I have abandoned him to his instinct during the past hour....

Merlin.

He ought to have conquered it....

Arielle.

You speak like that because I am submissive: but remember the time when I was less docile.

Merlin.

You think yourself very docile because I have conquered you; but you retain some shadow even in the light in which I have been able to train you and I find in you a certain cruelty that takes too great a pleasure in men's weaknesses....

Arielle.

Men's weaknesses are often necessary to the purposes of life....

Merlin.

What will happen if he yields?...

Arielle.

He will yield: it is written. The question is if Joyzelle's love will surmount the proof.

Merlin.

And do you not know?

Arielle.

No; she has a mind which is not wholly within my sphere, which depends upon a principle which I do not know, which I have never seen except in her and which changes the future.... I have tried to subdue her; but she obeys me only in little things. But it is time to act. Go and find Joyzelle and leave your son to me.... Go, lest you should spoil the proof.... I shall revive him, I shall renew and make still deeper and blinder the intoxication into which I have plunged him; and I shall become visible to his eyes in order to deceive his kisses....

Merlin.

(In a voice of smiling reproach.) Arielle....

Arielle.

Go, let me be.... You know that kisses given to poor Arielle pass like the flash of a wing that closes over running water....

[Merlin retires to a distance. Arielle goes towards the marble basin; and there, half-hidden behind the hedge of oleanders, she half opens the veils that cover her, sits on the grassy steps that surround the basin and slowly unties her long hair, while Lancéor awakes, groping with his hands.

Lancéor.

Where did I fall asleep? Some strange poison has entered my heart.... I am no longer the same and my mind is wandering.... I am struggling against the intoxication and I do not know where I am going.... (Catches sight of Arielle.) But who is that woman behind the oleanders? (Approaching the hedge and looking.) She is beautiful!... She is half unclad and her curved foot, like a prudent flower, is trying the water, which smiles and encircles it with pearls.... She raises her arms to bind her hair; and the light of the sky glides between her shoulders, like gleaming water over marble wings. (Approaching closer.) She is beautiful, she is beautiful!... I must see her.... She is turning round and one of her bare breasts, peeping through her tresses, adds rays to the rays that strike it.... She is listening, she hears; and her wide-open eyes are questioning the roses.... She has seen me, she hides herself, she is going to fly.... (Passing through the hedge.) No, no, do not fly from me!... I have seen you.... It is too late!... (Taking Arielle in his arms.) I want to know the name of so pure a vision, which plunges into darkness all that I have loved!... I want to know also what too faithful shadow, what profound retreat concealed the marvel which I hold in my arms!... What trees, what caves, what towers, what walls were able to stifle the brilliancy of that flesh, the fragrance of that life, the fire of those eyes?... Where were you hiding, you whom even a blind man would find without difficulty in a holiday crowd?... No, do not thrust me away; this is not the passion, the intoxication of a moment; it is the lasting dizziness of love!... I am at your knees; I humbly embrace them.... I give myself to you alone.... I am only yours.... I ask for nothing but a kiss from your lips to forget the rest and seal the future.... Bow down your head.... I see it bending towards me, I see it consenting; and I call for the token which nothing can efface henceforth.... (He kisses her passionately. A cry of distress is heard from behind the bushes.) What is it?...

[Arielle releases herself from his embrace, flies and disappears. Enter Joyzelle.

Joyzelle.

(Dismayed.) Lancéor!...

Lancéor.

Why, where do you come from, Joyzelle?

Joyzelle.

I have seen and heard....

Lancéor.

Well, what?... What have you seen?... Look around you: there is nothing to see.... The oleanders are in flower, the water in the basin sleeps, the doves are cooing, the water-lilies are opening their petals: that is all that I see, all that you can see....

Joyzelle.

Do you love her?

Lancéor.

Whom?...

Joyzelle.

The woman who has just fled....

Lancéor.

How should I love her?... I had never seen her.... The woman was there; I happened to pass.... She gave a loud scream.... I ran up.... She seemed to have lost her footing and, as I held out my hand to her, she gave me the kiss which you heard....

Joyzelle.

Is it really you speaking?

Lancéor.

Yes, look at me: it is really and wholly I.... Come nearer, touch me if you doubt it....

Joyzelle.

The proof was terrible; but this is mortal....

Lancéor.

What?...

Joyzelle.

Was this the first time that you saw that woman?...

Lancéor.

Yes.

Joyzelle.