I saw —
Polyxena.
But if your measures take effect,
And D’Ormea’s true to you?
Charles.
Then worst of all!
I shall have loosed that callous wretch on him!
Well may the woman taunt him with his child —
I, eating here his bread, clothed in his clothes,
Seated upon his seat, give D’Ormea leave
To outrage him! We talk — perchance they tear
My father from his bed — the old hands feel
For one who is not, but who should be there —
And he finds D’Ormea! D’Ormea, too, finds him
— The crowded chamber when the lights go out —
Closed doors — the horrid scuffle in the dark —
The accursed promptings of the minute! My guards!
To horse — and after, with me — and prevent!
Polyxena.
[seizing his hand.] King Charles!
Pause here upon this strip of time
Allotted you out of eternity!
Crowns are from God — in his name you hold yours.
Your life’s no least thing, were it fit your life
Should be abjured along with rule; but now,
Keep both! Your duty is to live and rule —
You, who would vulgarly look fine enough
In the world’s eye, deserting your soul’s charge, —
Ay, you would have men’s praise — this Rivoli
Would be illumined: while, as ‘tis, no doubt,
Something of stain will ever rest on you;
No one will rightly know why you refused
To abdicate; they’ll talk of deeds you could
Have done, no doubt, — nor do I much expect
Future achievements will blot out the past,
Envelop it in haze — nor shall we two
Be happy any more; ‘twill be, I feel,
Only in moments that the duty’s seen
As palpably as now — the months, the years
Of painful indistinctness are to come,
While daily must we tread these palace rooms
Pregnant with memories of the past: your eye
May turn to mine and find no comfort there,
Through fancies that beset me, as yourself,
Of other courses, with far other issues,
We might have taken this great night — such bear,
As I will bear! What matters happiness?
Duty! There’s man’s one moment — this is yours!
[Putting the crown on his head, and the sceptre in his hand, she places him on his seat: a long pause and silence.]
[Enter D’Ormea and Victor.]
Victor.
At last I speak; but once — that once, to you!
‘Tis you I ask, not these your varletry,
Who’s King of us?
Charles.
[from his seat.] Count Tende . , .
Victor.
What your spies
Assert I ponder in my soul, I say —
Here to your face, amid your guards! I choose
To take again the crown whose shadow I gave —
For still its potency surrounds the weak
White locks their felon hands have discomposed.
Or, I’ll not ask who’s King, but simply, who
Withholds the crown I claim? Deliver it!
I have no friend in the wide world: nor France
Nor England cares for me: you see the sum
Of what I can avail. Deliver it!
Charles.
Take it, my father! And now say in turn,
Was it done well, my father — sure not well,
To try me thus! I might have seen much cause
For keeping it — too easily seen cause!
But, from that moment, e’en more woefully
My life had pined away, than pine it will.
Already you have much to answer for.
My life to pine is nothing, — her sunk eyes
Were happy once! No doubt my people think
That I’m their King still . . . but I cannot strive!
Take it!
Victor.
[one hand on the crown Charles offers, the other on his neck.]
So few years give it quietly,
My son: It will drop from me. See you not?
A crown’s unlike a sword to give away —
That, let a strong hand to a weak hand give!
But crowns should slip from palsied brows to heads
Young as this head — yet mine is weak enough,
E’en weaker than I knew. I seek for phrases
To vindicate my right. ‘Tis of a piece!
All is alike gone by with me — who beat
Once D’Orleans in his lines — his very lines!
To have been Eugene’s comrade, Louis’s rival,
And now . . .
Charles.
[putting the crown on him, to the rest.]
The King speaks, yet none kneels, I think!
Victor.
I am then King! As I became a King
Despite the nations — kept myself a King —
So I die King, with Kingship dying too
Around me! I have lasted Europe’s time!
What wants my story of completion? Where
Must needs the damning break show! Who mistrusts
My children here — tell they of any break
‘Twixt my day’s sunrise and its fiery fall?
And who were by me when I died but they? Who?
— D’Ormea there!
Charles.
What means he?
Victor.
Ever there!
Charles — how to save your story? Mine must go!
Say — say that you refused the crown to me —
Charles, yours shall be my story! You immured
Me, say, at Rivoli. A single year
I spend without a sight of you, then die —
That will serve every purpose — tell that tale
The world!
Charles.
Mistrust me? Help!
Victor.
Past help, past reach!
‘Tis in the heart — you cannot reach the heart:
This broke mine, that I did believe, you, Charles,
Would have denied and so disgraced me.
Polyxena.
Charles
Has never ceased to be your subject, Sire!
He reigned at first through setting up yourself
As pattern: if he e’er seemed harsh to you,
‘Twas from a too intense appreciation
Of your own character: he acted you —
Ne’er for an instant did I think it real,
Or look for any other, than this end.
I hold him worlds the worse on that account;
But so it was.
Charles.
[to Polyxena.] I love you, now, indeed!
[To Victor.]
You never knew me!
Victor.
Hardly till this moment,
When I seem learning many other things,
Because the time for using them is past.
If ‘twere to do again! That’s idly wished.
Truthfulness might prove policy as good
As guile. Is this my daughter’s forehead? — Yes —
I’ve made it fitter now to be a Queen’s
Than formerly — I’ve ploughed the deep lines there
Which keep too well a crown from slipping off!
No matter. Guile has made me King again,
Louis — ’twas in King Victor’s time — long since,
When Louis reign’d — and, also, Victor reign’d —
How the world talks already of us two!
God of eclipse and each discolour’d star,
Why do I linger then?
Ha! Where lurks he?
D’Orme
a! Come nearer to your King! Now stand!
[Collecting his strength as D’Ormea approaches.]
But you lied, D’Ormea! I do not repent.
BELLS AND POMEGRANATES NO. IV: THE RETURN OF THE DRUSES
CONTENTS
Persons
Act I
Act II
Act III
Act IV
Act V
Persons
The Grand-Master’s Prefect.
The Patriarch’s Nuncio.
The Republic’s Admiral.
LOYS DE DREUX, Knight-Novice.
Initiated Druses — DJABAL, KHALIL, ANAEL, MAANI, KARSHOOK, RAGHIB, AYOOB, and others.
Uninitiated Druses.
Prefect’s Guard. Nuncio’s Attendants. Admiral’s Force.
TIME, 14 — .
PLACE. — An Islet of the Southern Sporades, colonized by Druses of Lebanon, and garrisoned by the Knights-Hospitallers of Rhodes.
SCENE. — A Hall in the Prefect’s Palace.
Act I
Enter stealthily KARSHOOK, RAGHIB, AYOOB and other initiated Druses, each as he enters casting off a robe that conceals his distinctive black vest and white turban; then, as giving a loose to exultation, —
KARSHOOK.
The moon is carried off in purple fire:
Day breaks at last! Break glory, with the day,
On Djabal’s dread incarnate mystery
Now ready to resume its pristine shape
Of Hakeem, as the Khalif vanished erst
In what seemed death to uninstructed eyes,
On red Mokattam’s verge — our Founder’s flesh,
As he resumes our Founder’s function!
RAGHIB.
— Death
Sweep to the Christian Prefect that enslaved
So long us sad Druse exiles o’er the sea!
AYOOB.
Most joy be thine, O Mother-mount! Thy brood
Returns to thee, no outcasts as we left,
But thus — but thus! Behind, our Prefect’ s corse;
Before, a presence like the morning — thine,
Absolute Djabal late, — God Hakeem now
That day breaks!
KARSHOOK.
Off then, with disguise at last!
As from our forms this hateful garb we strip,
Lose every tongue its glozing accent too,
Discard each limb the ignoble gesture! Cry,
‘Tis the Druse Nation, warders on our Mount
Of the world’s secret, since the birth of time,
— No kindred slips, no offsets from thy stock,
No spawn of Christians are we, Prefect, we
Who rise . . .
AYOOB.
Who shout . . .
RAGHIB.
Who seize, a first-fruits, ha —
Spoil of the spoiler! Brave!
[They begin to tear down, and to dispute for, the decorations of the hall.
KARSHOOK.
Hold!
AYOOB.
— Mine, I say;
And mine shall it continue!
KARSHOOK.
Just this fringe!
Take anything beside! Lo, spire on spire,
Curl serpentwise wreathed columns to the top
O’ the roof, and hide themselves mysteriously
Among the twinkling lights and darks that haunt
Yon cornice! Where the huge veil, they suspend
Before the Prefect’s chamber of delight,
Floats wide, then falls again as if its slave,
The scented air, took heart now, and anon
Lost heart to buoy its breadths of gorgeousness
Above the gloom they droop in — all the porch
Is jewelled o’er with frostwork charactery;
And, see, yon eight-point cross of white flame, winking
Hoar-silvery like some fresh-broke marble stone:
Raze out the Rhodian cross there, so thou leav’st me
This single fringe!
AYOOB.
Ha, wouldst thou, dog-fox? Help!
— Three hand-breadths of gold fringe, my son was set
To twist, the night he died!
KARSHOOK.
Nay, hear the knave!
And I could witness my one daughter borne,
A week since, to the Prefect’ s couch, yet fold
These arms, be mute, lest word of mine should mar
Our Master’s work, delay the Prefect here
A day, prevent his sailing hence for Rhodes —
How know I else? — Hear me denied my right
By such a knave!
RAGHIB [interposing].
Each ravage for himself!
Booty enough! On, Druses! Be there found
Blood and a heap behind us; with us, Djabal
Turned Hakeem; and before us, Lebanon!
Yields the porch? Spare not! There his minions dragged
Thy daughter, Karshook, to the Prefect’s couch!
Ayoob! Thy son, to soothe the Prefect’s pride,
Bent o’er that task, the death-sweat on his brow,
Carving the spice-tree’s heart in scroll-work there!
Onward in Djabal’s name!
As the tumult is at height, enter KHALIL. A pause
and silence.
KHALIL.
Was it for this,
Djabal hath summoned you? Deserve you thus
A portion in to-day’s event? What, here —
When most behoves your feet fall soft, your eyes
Sink low, your tongues lie still, — at Djabal’s side,
Close in his very hearing, who, perchance,
Assumes e’en now God Hakeem’s dreaded shape, —
Dispute you for these gauds?
AYOOB.
How say’st thou, Khalil?
Doubtless our Master prompts thee! Take the fringe,
Old Karshook! I supposed it was a day . . .
KHALIL.
For pillage?
KARSHOOK.
Hearken, Khalil! Never spoke
A boy so like a song-bird; we avouch thee
Prettiest of all our Master’s instruments
Except thy bright twin-sister; thou and Anael
Challenge his prime regard: but we may crave
(Such nothings as we be) a portion too
Of Djabal’ s favor; in him we believed,
His bound ourselves, him moon by moon obeyed,
Kept silence till this daybreak — so, may claim
Reward: who grudges me my claim?
AYOOB.
To-day
Is not as yesterday!
RAGHIB.
Stand off!
KHALIL.
Rebel you?
Must I, the delegate of Djabal, draw
His wrath on you, the day of our Return?
OTHER DRUSES.
Wrench from their grasp the fringe! Hounds! must the earth
Vomit her plagues on us thro — thee? and thee?
Plague me not, Khalil, for their fault!
KHALIL.
Oh, shame!
Thus breaks to-day on you, the mystic tribe
Who, flying the approach of Osman, bore
Our faith, a merest spark, from Syria’s ridge
Its birthplace, hither! “Let the sea divide
These hunters from their prey,” you said; “and safe
In this dim islet’s virgin solitude
Tend we our faith, the spark, till happier time
Fan it to fire; till Hakeem rise again,
According to his word that, in the flesh
Which faded on Mokattam ages since,
He, at our extreme need, would interpose,
And, reinstating all in power and bliss,
Lead us himself to Lebanon once more.”
Was’t not thus you departed years ago,
Ere I was born?
DRUSES.
’Twas even thus, years ago.
/> KHALIL.
And did you call — (according to old laws
Which bid us, lest the sacred grow profane,
Assimilate ourselves in outward rites
With strangers fortune makes our lords, and live
As Christian with the Christian, Jew with Jew,
Druse only with the Druses) — did you call
Or no, to stand ‘twixt you and Osman’s rage
(Mad to pursue e’en hither thro’ the sea
The remnant of our tribe), a race self-vowed
To endless warfare with his hordes and him,
The White-cross Knights of the adjacent Isle?
KARSHOOK.
And why else rend we down, wrench up, raze out?
These Knights of Rhodes we thus solicited
For help, bestowed on us a fiercer pest
Than aught we fled — their Prefect; who began
His promised mere paternal governance
By a prompt massacre of all our Sheikhs
Able to thwart the Order in its scheme
Of crushing, with our nation’ s memory,
Each chance of our return, and taming us
Bondslaves to Rhodes forever — all, he thinks
To end by this day’s treason.
KHALIL.
Say I not?
You, fitted to the Order’s purposes,
Your Sheikhs cut off, your rites, your garb proscribed,
Must yet receive one degradation more;
The Knights at last throw off the mask — transfer,
As tributary now and appanage,
This islet they are but protectors of,
To their own ever-craving liege, the Church,
Who licenses all crimes that pay her thus.
You, from their Prefect, were to be consigned
(Pursuant of I know not what vile pact)
To the Knights’ Patriarch, ardent to outvie
His predecessor in all wickedness.
When suddenly rose Djabal in the midst,
Djabal, the man in semblance, but our God
Confessed by signs and portents. Ye saw fire
Bicker round Djabal, heard strange music flit
Bird-like about his brow?
DRUSES.
We saw — we heard!
Djabal is Hakeem, the incarnate Dread,
The phantasm Khalif, King of Prodigies!
KHALIL.
And as he said has not our Khalif done,
And so disposed events (from land to land
Passing invisibly) that when, this morn,
The pact of villany complete, there comes
This Patriarch’s Nuncio with this Master’s Prefect
Their treason to consummate, — each will face
For a crouching handful, an uplifted nation:
For simulated Christians, confessed Druses:
And, for slaves past hope of the Mother-mount,
Freedmen returning there ‘neath Venice’ flag;
That Venice which, the Hospitallers’ foe,
Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series Page 269