Which track they took, I knew it from the storks | My own dishonour would I e'er proclaim
Rising in clouds above the reedy plain.
Amid vindictive and reviling foes.

Muza. Deny it, if thou canst.
Julian.

I order'd it.

Muza. Calling us foes, avows he not his guilt? Condemns he not the action we condemn,

Abdalazis. None could beside. Lo! things in Owning it his, and owning it dishonour?

Pay she shall
The treasures of her soil, her ports, her youth:
If she resist, if she tumultuously

Call forth her brigands and we lose a man,
Dreadful shall be our justice; war shall rage
Through every city, hamlet, house, and field,
And, universal o'er the gasping land,
Depopulation.

Julian.

They shall rue the day

Who dare these things.

Muza.

Let order then prevail.
In vain thou sendest far away thy child,
Thy counsellor the metropolitan,
And Sisabert: prudence is mine no less.
Divide with us our conquests, but the king
Must be deliver'd up.

Julian.

Never by me.

"Tis well my cares prest forward, and struck home.
Julian. Why smilest thou? Inever saw that smile
But it portended an atrocious deed.

Muza. After our manifold and stern assaults,
With every tower and battlement destroy'd,
The walls of Ceuta still were strong enough..
Julian. For what? who boasted now her brave
defence,

Or who forbad your entrance after peace?
Muza. None: for who could? their engines

now arose

To throw thy sons into the arms of death.
For this erect they their proud crests again.
Mark him at last turn pale before a Moor.
Julian. Imprudent have they been, their youth
shall plead.

Abdalazis. O father! could they not have been
detain'd?

Muza. Son, thou art safe, and wert not while they lived.

Abdalazis. I fear'd them not.

Muza.

And therefore wert not safe:
Under their star the blooming Egilona
Would watch for thee the nuptial lamp in vain.
Julian. Never, oh never, hast thou workt a wile
So barren of all good! Speak out at once,
What hopest thou by striking this alarm?
It shocks my reason, not my fears or fondness.
Muza. Be happy then as ignorance can be ;
Soon wilt thou hear it shouted from our ranks.

Muza. False then were thy reproaches, false Those who once hurl'd defiance o'er our heads,

thy grief.

Julian. O Egilona! were thine also feign'd?
Abdalazis. Say, lovely queen, neglectful of thy
charms

Turn'd he his eyes toward the young Covilla?
Did he pursue her to the mad excess

Of breaking off her vows to Sisabert,

And marrying her, against the Christian law?
Muza. Did he prefer her so?
Abdalazis.

To Egilona..

Egilona.

Could he prefer

Her! the child Covilla?

Eternal hider of a foolish face,

Incapable of anything but shame,

To me? old man! to me? O Abdalazis !
No: he but follow'd with slow pace my hate.
And can not pride check these unseemly tears.
[Goes.
Muza. The most offended, an offended woman,
A wife, a queen, is silent on the deed.

Abdalazis. Thou disingenuous and ignoble man,
Spreading these rumours! sending into exile
All those their blighting influence injured most:
And whom? thy daughter and adopted son,
The chieftains of thy laws and of thy faith.
Call any witnesses, proclaim the truth,
And set at last thy heart, thy fame, at rest.
Julian. Not, if I purposed or desired to live,

Scorning our arms, and scoffing at our faith,
The nightly wolf hath visited, unscared,
And loathed them as her prey; for famine first,
Achieving in few days the boast of years,
Sank their young eyes and open'd us the gates:
Ceuta, her port, her citadel, is ours.

Julian. Blest boys! inhuman as thou art, what
guilt

Was theirs?

Their father's.

Muza.
Julian.
O support me,
Heaven!
Against this blow! all others I have borne.
Ermenegild! thou mightest, sure, have lived!
A father's name awoke no dread of thee!
Only thy mother's early bloom was thine!
There dwelt on Julian's brow.. thine was serene..
The brighten'd clouds of elevated souls,
Fear'd by the most below: those who lookt up
Saw at their season in clear signs advance
Rapturous valour, calm solicitude,
All that impatient youth would press from age,
Or sparing age sigh and detract from youth:
Hence was his fall! my hope! myself! my Julian!
Alas! I boasted.. but I thought on him,
Inheritor of all.. all what? my wrongs..
Follower of me.. and whither? to the grave..
Ah no it should have been so years far hence!
Him at this moment I could pity most,

But I most prided in him; now I know
I loved a name, I doated on a shade.

Sons! I approach the mansions of the just,
And my arms clasp you in the same embrace,
Where none shall sever you.. and do I weep!
And do they triumph o'er my tenderness!
I had forgotten my inveterate foes
Everywhere nigh me, I had half forgotten
Your very murderers, while I thought on you:
For, O my children, ye fill all the space

My soul would wander o'er.. O bounteous heaven!
There is a presence, if the well-beloved

Be torn from us by human violence,
More intimate, pervading, and complete,

Justice, who came not up to us through life,
Loves to survey our likeness on our tombs,
When rivalry, malevolence, and wrath,
And every passion that once storm'd around,
Is calm alike without them as within.
Our very chains make the whole world our own,
Bind those to us who else had past us by,
Those at whose call brought down to us, the light
Of future ages lives upon our name.

Muza. I may accelerate that meteor's fall,
And quench that idle ineffectual light
Without the knowledge of thy distant world.
Julian. My world and thine are not that dis-
tant one.

Than when they lived and spoke like other men; Is age less wise, less merciful, than grief,

And their pale images are our support

When reason sinks, or threatens to desert us.

I weep no more.. pity and exultation

To keep this secret from thee, poor old man?
Thou canst not lessen, canst not aggravate
My sufferings, canst not shorten or extend

Sway and console me: are they.. no!.. both dead? Half a sword's length between my God and me.

Muza. Ay, and unsepulchred.
Julian.

I thank thee for that better thought than fame,

Nor wept nor seen Which none however, who deserve, despise,
Nor lose from view till all things else are lost.
Abdalazis. Julian, respect his age, regard his

By any kindred and far-following eye?
Muza. Their mother saw them, if not dead, expire.
Julian. O cruelty.. to them indeed the least!
My children, ye are happy.. ye have lived
Of heart unconquer'd, honour unimpair'd,
And died, true Spaniards, loyal to the last.
Muza. Away with him.
Julian.

Slaves! not before I lift
My voice to heaven and man: though enemies
Surround me, and none else, yet other men
And other times shall hear: the agony
Of an opprest and of a bursting heart
No violence can silence; at its voice
The trumpet is o'erpower'd, and glory mute,
And peace and war hide all their charms alike.
Surely the guests and ministers of heaven
Scatter it forth through all the elements,
So suddenly, so widely, it extends,

So fearfully men breathe it, shuddering

To ask or fancy how it first arose.

power.

Many who fear'd not death, have dragg'd along
A piteous life in darkness and in chains.
Never was man so full of wretchedness
But something may be suffered after all,
Perhaps in what clings round his breast and helps
To keep the ruin up, which he amid

His agony and frenzy overlooks,

But droops upon at last, and clasps, and dies.
Julian. Although a Muza send far underground,
Into the quarry whence the palace rose,
His mangled prey, climes alien and remote
Mark and record the pang. While overhead
Perhaps he passes on his favourite steed,
Less heedful of the misery he inflicts
Than of the expiring sparkle from a stone,
Yet we, alive or dead, have fellow-men

If ever we have served them, who collect

Muza. Yes, they shall shudder: but will that, From prisons and from dungeons our remains, henceforth,

Molest my privacy, or shake my power?

Julian. Guilt hath pavilions, but no privacy.

The very engine of his hatred checks
The torturer in his transport of revenge,

Which, while it swells his bosom, shakes his power,
And raises friends to his worst enemy.

And bear them in their bosom to their sons.
Man's only relics are his benefits;

These, be there ages, be there worlds, between,
Retain him in communion with his kind:
Hence is our solace, our security,

Our sustenance, till heavenly truth descends,
Covering with brightness and beatitude

Muza. Where now are thine? will they not curse The frail foundations of these humbler hopes,

the day

That gave thee birth, and hiss thy funeral!

Thou hast left none who could have pitied thee.
Julian. Many, nor those alone of tenderer mould,
For me will weep; many, alas, through me!
Already I behold my funeral;

The turbid cities wave and swell with it,
And wrongs are lost in that day's pageantry:
Opprest and desolate, the countryman
Receives it like a gift; he hastens home,

And, like an angel guiding us, at once
Leaves the loose chain and iron gate behind.
Muza. Take thou my justice first, then hope
for theirs.

I, who can bend the living to my will,

Fear not the dead, and court not the unborn:
Their arm will never reach me, nor shall thine.
Abdalazis. Pity, release him, pardon him, my
father!

Forget how much thou hatest perfidy,

Shows where the hoof of Moorish horse laid waste Think of him, once so potent, still so brave,

His narrow croft and winter garden-plot,
Sweetens with fallen pride his children's lore,

And points their hatred, but applauds their tears.

So calm, so self-dependent in distress,

I marvel at him hardly dare I blame
When I behold him fallen from so high,

O were he dead! though then revenge were o'er! And wars rage on, and Spain at last be free.

ANDREA OF HUNGARY, GIOVANNA OF NAPLES, AND FRA RUPERT: A TRILOGY.

Giovanna. That word has sign'd it. I have There's not a leg of all the crowd in Naples

There's not a throat will drop its paste-tape down
Without some soreness from such roaring cheers;
There's not a husband but whose ears will tingle

Giovanna (interrupting). Mainly, by hearing Under his consort's claw this blessed night

Lest while they make the one they make the other.

Andrea. How must I guard against it? Fra Rupert. Twelve whole years Constantly here together, all the time Since we left Hungary, and not one day But I have labour'd to instill into thee, Andrea! how wise kings must feel and act.

Fra Rupert. Loose it, I say, Andrea!
Andrea. I say no!

Fra Rupert. To me?

Andrea. Dost think I'd say it to Giovanna?
Beside, she gave it me: she has read in it
With her own eyes, has written latin in it

With her own fingers, . . for who else could write
Distinctly such small letters? . . You yourself,
Who rarely have occasion for much latin,
Might swear them to be latin in ten minutes.

Andrea. But, father, who let you into the Another thing.. the selfsame perfume clings

secret?

Fra Rupert. I learnt it in the cloister.
Andrea. Then no doubt

The secret is worth knowing; many are

(Or songs and fables equally are false)

Among those whisper'd there.

Fra Rupert. Methinks, my son,

About those pages as about her bosom.

Fra Rupert (starts.) Abomination! Know all that!

Andrea. Like matins.

Thence, tho' she turn'd quite round, I saw her

take it

To give it me. Another thing. . the people

Such words are lighter than beseems crown'd Bragg'd of my mettle half an hour ago, heads,

As thine should be, and shall be, if thou wilt.

Andrea. Ay, father, but it is not so as yet;
Else would it jingle to another crown,
With what a face beneath it! What a girl
Is our Giovanna !

Fra Rupert. By the saints above!

I thought it was a queen, and not a girl.
Andrea. There is enough in her for both at

And I will show I have it, like the best.
Another thing. . forgettest thou, Fra Rupert,
I am a husband?

Fra Rupert. Seven years old thou wert one.*
Andrea. Ha, but! ha, but! seven years upon
seven years

Could not make me the man I am to-day.

Fra Rupert. Nor seventy upon seven a tittle wiser.

Andrea. Why did not you then make me while you could?

You taught me nothing, and would let none
teach me,

No, not our king himself, the wisest man
In his dominions, nor more wise than willing.
Forsooth! you made a promise to my father
That nobody should filch my faith and morals,
No taint of learning eat skin-deep into me!
And good king Robert said, "If thus my brother
Must have it. if such promise was exacted . .”
Fra Rupert. All have more knowledge than
they well employ.

Upbraidest thou thy teacher, guardian, father? Andrea. Fathers may be, alas! too distant from us,

Guardians may be too close. . but, teacher? teacher?