He grasp'd it in his death-pang! Edition 1. did] did Editions 2, 3, 1829.
Is] Is Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Thou] Thou Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
After 55 Stage-direction om. Edition 1.
Ordonio (confused). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Valdez (confused). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
After 83 [Turns off abruptly; then to himself. Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
grateful] grateful Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Ordonio (in a slow voice, as reasoning to himself). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Had] Had Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
After 105 [Averting himself. Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Ordonio (now in soliloquy, and now addressing his father; and just after the speech has commenced, Teresa, &c. Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
kill'd] kill'd Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
After 110 [Teresa starts and stops listening. Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Before 115 Ordonio (checking the feeling of surprise, and forcing his tones into an expression of playful courtesy). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
live] live Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
him] him Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
After 128 [Strides off in agitation towards the altar, &c. Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Teresa (recoiling with the expression appropriate to the passion). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
thou] thou Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
beheld . . . he] beheld . . . He Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
grateful] grateful Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Valdez (looking with anxious disquiet at his Son, yet attempting to proceed with his description). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Both. Whither Edition 1.
must] must Editions 1, 2, 3.
win] win Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
thy] thy Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
After 186 end of the Third Act. Editions 1, 2, 3.
ACT IV
Scene I
A cavern, dark, except where a gleam of moonlight is seen on one side at the further end of it; supposed to be cast on it from a crevice in a part of the cavern out of sight. Isidore alone, an extinguished torch in his hand.
'His life in danger, no place safe but this!
'Twas his turn now to talk of gratitude.'
And yet—but no! there can't be such a villain.
It can not be!
Thanks to that little crevice, 5
Which lets the moonlight in! I'll go and sit by it.
To peep at a tree, or see a he-goat's beard,
Or hear a cow or two breathe loud in their sleep—
Any thing but this crash of water drops!
These dull abortive sounds that fret the silence 10
With puny thwartings and mock opposition!
[859] So beats the death-watch to a sick man's ear.
[He goes out of sight, opposite to the patch of moonlight: and returns.
A hellish pit! The very same I dreamt of!
I was just in—and those damn'd fingers of ice
Which clutch'd my hair up! Ha!—what's that—it mov'd. 15
[Isidore stands staring at another recess in the cavern. In the mean time Ordonio enters with a torch, and halloes to Isidore.
The moonshine came and went like a flash of lightning——
I swear, I saw it move.
A jutting clay stone
Drops on the long lank weed, that grows beneath:
And the weed nods and drips.[859:1]
It was not that which scar'd me, good my lord.
But first permit me!
[Lights his torch at Ordonio's, and while lighting it.
(A lighted torch in the hand
Is no unpleasant object here—one's breath
Floats round the flame, and makes as many colours 25
As the thin clouds that travel near the moon.)
You see that crevice there?
My torch extinguished by these water-drops,
And marking that the moonlight came from thence,
I stept in to it, meaning to sit there; 30
But scarcely had I measured twenty paces—
My body bending forward, yea, o'erbalanced
Almost beyond recoil, on the dim brink
Of a huge chasm I stept. The shadowy moonshine
Filling the void so counterfeited substance, 35
That my foot hung aslant adown the edge.
[860] Was it my own fear?
Fear too hath its instincts![860:1]
(And yet such dens as these are wildly told of,
And there are beings that live, yet not for the eye)
An arm of frost above and from behind me 40
Pluck'd up and snatched me backward. Merciful Heaven!
You smile! alas, even smiles look ghastly here!
My lord, I pray you, go yourself and view it.
Should creep, each one with a particular life,
Yet all as cold as ever—'twas just so!
Or had it drizzled needle-points of frost
Upon a feverish head made suddenly bald—
I blush for thy cowardice. It might have startled, 50
I grant you, even a brave man for a moment—
But such a panic—
I could have sate whole hours beside that chasm,
Push'd in huge stones and heard them strike and rattle
Against its horrid sides: then hung my head 55
Low down, and listened till the heavy fragments
Sank with faint crash in that still groaning well,
Which never thirsty pilgrim blest, which never
A living thing came near—unless, perchance,
Some blind-worm battens on the ropy mould 60
Close at its edge.
[861] I fear not man—but this inhuman cavern,
It were too bad a prison-house for goblins.
Beside, (you'll smile, my lord) but true it is, 65
My last night's sleep was very sorely haunted
By what had passed between us in the morning.
O sleep of horrors! Now run down and stared at
By forms so hideous that they mock remembrance—
Now seeing nothing and imagining nothing, 70
But only being afraid—stifled with fear!
While every goodly or familiar form
Had a strange power of breathing terror round me![861:1]
I saw you in a thousand fearful shapes;
And, I entreat your lordship to believe me, 75
In my last dream——
Of falling down that chasm, when Alhadra
Wak'd me: she heard my heart beat.
Had you been here before?
But mine eyes do not see it now more clearly, 80
Than in my dream I saw—that very chasm.
To kill a man.—
'Tis so with me at least. But you, perhaps,
Have sterner feelings?
How shall I serve you? By the life you gave me,
By all that makes that life of value to me,
[862] My wife, my babes, my honour, I swear to you, 90
Name it, and I will toil to do the thing,
If it be innocent! But this, my lord!
Is not a place where you could perpetrate,
No, nor propose a wicked thing. The darkness,
When ten strides off we know 'tis cheerful moonlight, 95
Collects the guilt, and crowds it round the heart.
It must be innocent.
One of our family knew this place well.
Hang up thy torch—I'll tell his tale to thee. 100
[They hang up their torches on some ridge in the cavern.
He was a man different from other men,
And he despised them, yet revered himself.
I am on my guard, however: no surprise. [Then to Ordonio.
What, he was mad?
Nature had made him for some other planet,
And pressed his soul into a human shape
By accident or malice. In this world
He found no fit companion.
Alas! poor wretch! 110
Mad men are mostly proud.
And phantom thoughts unsought-for troubled him.
Something within would still be shadowing out
All possibilities; and with these shadows
His mind held dalliance. Once, as so it happened, 115
A fancy crossed him wilder than the rest:
To this in moody murmur and low voice
He yielded utterance, as some talk in sleep:
The man who heard him.—
Why did'st thou look round?
[863] In truth he is my darling. As I went
From forth my door, he made a moan in sleep—
But I am talking idly—pray proceed!
And what did this man?
He gave a substance and reality 125
To that wild fancy of a possible thing.—
Well it was done!
Why babblest thou of guilt?
The deed was done, and it passed fairly off.
And he whose tale I tell thee—dost thou listen?
I'd listen to you with an eager eye,
Though you began this cloudy tale at midnight,
But I do listen—pray proceed, my lord.
Tamed himself down to living purposes,
The occupations and the semblances
Of ordinary men—and such he seemed!
But that same over ready agent—he—
Betrayed the mystery to a brother-traitor,
And they between them hatch'd a damnéd plot
To hunt him down to infamy and death.
What did the Valdez? I am proud of the name
Since he dared do it.—
[Ordonio grasps his sword, and turns off from Isidore, then after a pause returns.
Our links burn dimly. 145
Tell what he did.
He made the traitor meet him in this cavern,
And here he kill'd the traitor.
He had not wit enough to be a traitor.
Poor thick-eyed beetle! not to have foreseen
That he who gulled thee with a whimpered lie
[864] To murder his own brother, would not scruple
To murder thee, if e'er his guilt grew jealous, 155
And he could steal upon thee in the dark!
I would have met him arm'd, and scar'd the coward.
[Isidore throws off his robe; shews himself armed, and draws his sword.
My heart was drawing back, drawing me back
With weak and womanish scruples. Now my vengeance
Beckons me onwards with a warrior's mien,
And claims that life, my pity robb'd her of—
Now will I kill thee, thankless slave, and count it 165
Among my comfortable thoughts hereafter.
Die thou first.
[They fight, Ordonio disarms Isidore, and in disarming him throws his sword up that recess opposite to which they were standing. Isidore hurries into the recess with his torch, Ordonio follows him; a loud cry of 'Traitor! Monster!' is heard from the cavern, and in a moment Ordonio returns alone.
He dreamt of it: henceforward let him sleep,
A dreamless sleep, from which no wife can wake him. 170
His dream too is made out—Now for his friend. [Exit Ordonio.
FOOTNOTES:
[859:1] 18-20. Compare This Lime-Tree Bower my Prison, ll. 17-20, p. 179. See note by J. D. Campbell, P. W., 1893, p. 651.
[860:1] 38-9. These two lines uttered in an under-voice, and timidly, as anticipating Ordonio's sneer, and yet not able to disguise his own superstition. (Marginal Note to First Edition.)
What trouble had I not, and at last almost fruitless, to teach De Camp the hurried under-voice with which Isidore should utter these two lines, as anticipating Ordonio's scorn, and yet unable to suppress his own superstition—and yet De Camp, spite of voice, person, and inappropriate protrusion of the chest, understood and realised his part better than all the rest—to the man of sense, I mean. MS. H.
[861:1] 72-3. In the Biographia Literaria, 1817, ii. 73 Coleridge puts these lines into another shape:—
Gain a strange power of spreading awe around them.
See note by J. D. Campbell, P. W., 1893, p. 651.
LINENOTES:
After 12 [He goes . . . moonlight: returns after a minute's elapse, in an extasy of fear. Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
pit] pit Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Ordonio (goes . . . returns, and with great scorn). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Isidore (forcing a laugh faintly.) Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
ever] eve Edition 1.
Ordonio (interrupting him). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
brave] brave Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
battens] fattens Edition 1.
om. Edition 1.
afraid] afraid Editions 2, 3, 1829.
Ordonio (stands lost in thought, then after a pause). Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
is] is Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
[Ordonio darkly, and in the feeling of self-justification, tells what he conceives of his own character and actions, speaking of himself in the third person.
Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
this] his Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
him . . . He] him . . . He, Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
thee] thee Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
After 167
I'll kill thee, but not so. Go fetch thy sword.
[Isidore hurries into the recess with his torch, Ordonio follows him . . . returns alone.
Edition 1.
dreamt] dreamt Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
dream] dream Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.
Scene II
The interior Court of a Saracenic or Gothic Castle, with the Iron Gate of a Dungeon visible.
Ev'n pity's eye with her own frozen tear.
In vain I urge the tortures that await him;
[865] Even Selma, reverend guardian of my childhood,
My second mother, shuts her heart against me! 5
Well, I have won from her what most imports
The present need, this secret of the dungeon
Known only to herself.—A Moor! a Sorcerer!
No, I have faith, that Nature ne'er permitted
Baseness to wear a form so noble. True, 10
I doubt not that Ordonio had suborned him
To act some part in some unholy fraud;
As little doubt, that for some unknown purpose
He hath baffled his suborner, terror-struck him,
And that Ordonio meditates revenge! 15
But my resolve is fixed! myself will rescue him,
And learn if haply he knew aught of Alvar.
Enter Valdez.
Of that fell dungeon which thou ne'er had'st sight of,
Save what, perchance, thy infant fancy shap'd it 20
When the nurse still'd thy cries with unmeant threats.
Now by my faith, girl! this same wizard haunts thee!
A stately man, and eloquent and tender—
Who then need wonder if a lady sighs
Even at the thought of what these stern Dominicans— 25
Doth so o'ertop the height of all compassion,
That I should feel too little for mine enemy,
If it were possible I could feel more,
Even though the dearest inmates of our household 30
Were doom'd to suffer them. That such things are—
More than a woman's spirit.
What if Monviedro or his creatures hear us!
I dare not listen to you.
These were my Alvar's lessons, and whene'er
I bend me o'er his portrait, I repeat them,
As if to give a voice to the mute image.
Of his sad fate there now remains no doubt. 40
Have I no other son?
That low imposture! That mysterious picture!
If this be madness, must I wed a madman?
And if not madness, there is mystery,
And guilt doth lurk behind it.
How rage, remorse, and scorn, and stupid fear
Displaced each other with swift interchanges?
O that I had indeed the sorcerer's power.——
I would call up before thine eyes the image 50
Of my betrothed Alvar, of thy first-born![866:1]
His own fair countenance, his kingly forehead,
His tender smiles, love's day-dawn on his lips!
That spiritual and almost heavenly light
In his commanding eye—his mien heroic, 55
Virtue's own native heraldry! to man
Genial, and pleasant to his guardian angel.
Whene'er he gladden'd, how the gladness spread
Wide round him! and when oft with swelling tears,
Flash'd through by indignation, he bewail'd 60
The wrongs of Belgium's martyr'd patriots,
Oh, what a grief was there—for joy to envy,
Or gaze upon enamour'd!
O my father!
Recall that morning when we knelt together,
And thou didst bless our loves! O even now, 65
Even now, my sire! to thy mind's eye present him,
As at that moment he rose up before thee,
Stately, with beaming look! Place, place beside him
Ordonio's dark perturbéd countenance!
Then bid me (Oh thou could'st not) bid me turn 70
From him, the joy, the triumph of our kind!
To take in exchange that brooding man, who never
Lifts up his eye from the earth, unless to scowl.
An old man's passion! was it not enough, 75
That thou hast made my son a restless man,
[867] Banish'd his health, and half unhing'd his reason;
But that thou wilt insult him with suspicion?
And toil to blast his honour? I am old,
A comfortless old man!
Hateful entreaties from a voice we love!
Enter a Peasant and presents a letter to Valdez.