LITMIR.BIZ

      The signal is that still thou tarriest here.

      Seek not evasively such vain pretexts.

      Not many words are needed to refuse,

      By the refus'd the no alone is heard.

      Mine are not words meant only to deceive;

      I have to thee my inmost heart reveal'd.

      And doth no inward voice suggest to thee,

      How I with yearning soul must pine to see

      My father, mother, and my long-lost home?

      Oh let thy vessels bear me thither, king!

      That in the ancient halls, where sorrow still

      In accents low doth fondly breathe my name,

      Joy, as in welcome of a new-born child,

      May round the columns twine the fairest wreath.

      Thou wouldst to me and mine new life impart.

      Then go! the promptings of thy heart obey;

      Despise the voice of reason and good counsel.

      Be quite the woman, sway'd by each desire,

      That bridleless impels her to and fro.

      When passion rages fiercely in her breast,

      No sacred tie withholds her from the wretch

      Who would allure her to forsake for him

      A husband's or a father's guardian arms;

      Extinct within her heart its fiery glow,

      The golden tongue of eloquence in vain

      With words of truth and power assails her ear.

      Remember now, O king, thy noble words!

      My trust and candour wilt thou thus repay?

      Thou seem'dst, methought, prepar'd to hear the truth.

      For this unlook'd-for answer not prepar'd.

      Yet 'twas to be expected; knew I not

      That 'twas with woman I had now to deal?

      Upbraid not thus, O king, our feeble sex!

      Though not in dignity to match with yours,

      The weapons woman wields are not ignoble.

      And trust me, Thoas, in thy happiness

      I have a deeper insight than thyself.

      Thou thinkest, ignorant alike of both,

      A closer union would augment our bliss;

      Inspir'd with confidence and honest zeal

      Thou strongly urgest me to yield consent;

      And here I thank the gods, who give me strength

      To shun a doom unratified by them.

      'Tis not a god, 'tis thine own heart that speaks.

      'Tis through the heart alone they speak to us.

      To hear them have I not an equal right?

      The raging tempest drowns the still, small voice.

      This voice no doubt the priestess hears alone.

      Before all others should the prince attend it.

      Thy sacred office, and ancestral right

      To Jove's own table, place thee with the gods

      In closer union than an earth-born savage.

      Thus must I now the confidence atone

      Thyself extorted from me!

      I'm a man,

      And better 'tis we end this conference.

      Hear then my last resolve. Be priestess still

      Of the great goddess who selected thee;

      And may she pardon me, that I from her,

      Unjustly and with secret self-reproach,

      Her ancient sacrifice so long withheld.

      From olden times no stranger near'd our shore

      But fell a victim at her sacred shrine.

      But thou, with kind affection (which at times

      Seem'd like a gentle daughter's tender love,

      At times assum'd to my enraptur'd heart

      The modest inclination of a bride),

      Didst so inthral me, as with magic bonds,

      That I forgot my duty. Thou didst rock

      My senses in a dream: I did not hear

      My people's murmurs: now they cry aloud,

      Ascribing my poor son's untimely death

      To this my guilt. No longer for thy sake

      Will I oppose the wishes of the crowd,

      Who urgently demand the sacrifice.

      For mine own sake I ne'er desired it from thee.

      Who to the gods ascribe a thirst for blood

      Do misconceive their nature, and impute

      To them their own inhuman dark desires.

      Did not Diana snatch me from the priest,

      Preferring my poor service to my death?

      'Tis not for us, on reason's shifting grounds,

      Lightly to guide and construe rites divine.

      Perform thy duty; I'll accomplish mine.

      Two strangers, whom in caverns of the shore

      We found conceal'd, and whose arrival here

      Bodes to my realm no good, are in my power.

      With them thy goddess may once more resume

      Her ancient, pious, long-suspended rites!

      I send them here, – thy duty not unknown.      [Exit.

      Gracious protectress! thou hast clouds

      To shelter innocence distress'd,

      And genial gales from Fate's rude grasp,

      Safely to waft her o'er the sea,

      O'er the wide earth's remotest realms,

      Where'er it seemeth good to thee.

      Wise art thou, – thine all-seeing eye

      The future and the past surveys,

      And doth on all thy children rest,

      E'en as thy pure and guardian light

      Keeps

Скачать книгу