JULIAN _enters_.
_Tar._ Turn, and behold him! who is now confounded?
Ye who awaited him, where are ye? speak.
Is some close comet blazing o’er your tents?
Muza! Abdalazis! princes, conquerors,
Summon, interrogate, command, condemn.
_Muza_. Justly, Don Julian—but respect for rank
Allays resentment, nor interrogates
Without due form—justly may we accuse
This absence from our councils, from our camp:
This loneliness in which we still remain
Who come invited to redress your wrongs.
Where is the king?
_Jul._ The people must decide.
_Muza_. Imperfectly, I hope, I understand
Those words, unworthy of thy birth and age.
_Jul._ O chieftain, such have been our Gothic laws.
_Muza_. Who then amid such turbulence is safe?
_Jul._ He who observes them: ’tis no turbulence,
It violates no peace: ’tis surely worth
A voice, a breath of air, thus to create
By their high will the man, formed after them
In their own image, vested with their power,
To whom they trust their freedom and their lives.
_Muza_. They trust! the people! God assigns the charge:
Kings open but the book of destiny
And read their names, all that remains for them
The mystic hand from time to time reveals.
Worst of idolaters! idolater
Of that refractory and craving beast
Whose den is in the city, at thy hand
I claim our common enemy, the king.
_Jul._ Sacred from justice then! but not from malice!
_Tar._ Surrender him, my friend: be sure his pains
Will not be softened.
_Jul._ ’Tis beyond my power.
_Tar._ To-morrow—if in any distant fort
He lies to-night: send after him.
_Jul._ My faith
Is plighted, and he lives—no prisoner.
_Egi._ I knew the truth.
_Abd._ Now, Tarik, hear and judge.
Was he not in thy camp? and in disguise?
_Tar._ No: I will answer thee.
_Muza_. Audacious man!
Had not the Kalif Walid placed thee here,
Chains and a traitor’s death should be thy doom.
Speak, Abdalazis! Egilona, speak.
Were ye not present? was not I myself?
And aided not this Julian his escape?
_Jul._ ’Tis true.
_Tar._ Away then friendship; to thy fate
I leave thee: thou hast rendered Muza just,
Me hostile to thee. Who is safe! a man
Armed with such power and with such perfidy!
_Jul._ Stay, Tarik! hear me; for to thee alone
Would I reply.
_Tar._ Thou hast replied, already.
[_Goes_.
_Muza_. We, who were enemies, would not inquire
Too narrowly what reasons urged thy wrath
Against thy sovereign lord: beneath his flag
The Christians first assailed us from these shores,
And we seized gladly the first aid we found
To quell a wealthy and a warlike king.
We never held to thee the vain pretence
That ’twas thy quarrel our brave youth espoused,
Thine, who hast wrought us much disgrace and woe.
From perils and from losses, here we rest
And drink of the fresh fountain at our feet,
Not madly following such illusive streams
As overspread the dizzy wilderness,
And vanish from the thirst they have seduced.
Ours was the enterprise, the land is ours:
What gain we by our toils if he escape
Whom we came hither solely to subdue?
_Jul._ Is there no gain to live in amity?
_Muza_. The gain of traffickers and idle men:
Courage and zeal expire upon such calms.
Further, what amity can Moors expect
When you have joined your forces?
_Jul._ From the hour
That he was vanquished I have laid aside
All power, all arms.
_Muza_. How can we trust thee, once
Deceived, and oftener than this once despised?
Thou camest hither with no other aim
Than to deprive Roderigo of his crown
For thy own brow.
_Egi._ Julian, base man, ’tis true.
He comes a prince, no warrior, at this hour.
_Muza_. His sword, O queen, would not avail him now.
_Abd._ Julian, I feel less anger than regret.
No violence of speech, no obloquy,
No accusation shall escape my lips:
Need there is none, nor reason, to avoid
My questions: if thou value truth, reply.
Hath not Roderigo left the town and camp?
Hath not thy daughter?
_Egi._ Past the little brook
Toward the Betis—from a tower I saw
The fugitives, far on their way; they went
Over one bridge, each with armed men—not half
A league of road between them—and had joined
But that the olive-groves along the path
Concealed them from each other—not from me:
Beneath me the whole level I surveyed,
And, when my eyes no longer could discern
Which track they took, I knew it from the storks
Rising in clouds above the reedy plain.
_Muza_. Deny it, if thou canst.
_Jul._ I ordered it.
_Abd._ None could besides: lo! things in such a mass
Falling together on observant minds,
Create suspicion and establish proof:
Wanted there fresh—why not employ our arms?
Why go alone?
_Muza_. To parley, to conspire,
To reunite the Spaniards, which we saw,
To give up treaties, close up enmities,
And ratify the deed with Moorish blood.
_Jul._ Gladly would Spain procure your safe return,
Gladly would pay large treasures, for the aid
You brought against oppression—
_Muza_. 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.
_Jul._ 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 delivered up.
_Jul._ Never by me.
_Muza_. False then were thy reproaches, false thy grief.
_Jul._ O Egilona! were thine also feigned?
_Abd._ Say, lovely queen, neglectful of thy charms
Turned 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?
_Abd._ Could he prefer
To Egilona—
_Egi._ 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 followed with slow pace my hate.
And cannot pride check these unseemly tears.
[_Goes_.
_Muza_. The most offended, an offended woman,
A wife, a queen, is silent on the deed.
_Abd._ 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.
_Jul._ Not, if I purposed or desired to live,
My own dishonour would I e’er proclaim
Amid vindictive and reviling foes.
_Muza_. Calling us foes, avows he not his guilt?
Condemns he not the action we condemn,
Owning it his, and owning it dishonour?
’Tis well my cares pressed forward, and struck home.
_Jul._ Why smilest thou? I never saw that smile
But it portended an atrocious deed.
_Muza_. After our manifold and stern assaults,
With every tower and battlement destroyed,
The walls of Ceuta still were strong enough—
_Jul._ For what? who boasted now her brave defence,
Or who forbade 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.
_Jul._ Imprudent have they been, their youth shall plead.
_Abd._ O father, could they not have been detained?
_Muza_. Son, thou art safe and wert not while they lived.
_Abd._ I feared them not.
_Muza_. And therefore wert not safe:
Under their star the blooming Egilona
Would watch for thee the nuptial lamp in vain.
_Jul._ Never, oh never, hast thou worked 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.
Those who once hurled defiance o’er our heads,
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 year;
Sank their young eyes and opened us the gates:
Ceuta, her port, her citadel, is ours.
_Jul._ Blessed boys! inhuman as thou art, what guilt
Was theirs?
_Muza_. Their father’s.
_Jul._ Oh, 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 brightened clouds of elevated souls,
Feared by the most below: those who looked 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 doted 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,
Than when they lived and spoke like other men;
And there pale images are our support
When reason sinks, or threatens to desert us.
I weep no more—pity and exultation
Sway and console me: are they—no!—both dead?
_Muza_. Ay, and unsepulchred.
_Jul._ Nor wept nor seen
By any kindred and far-following eye?
_Muza_. Their mother saw them, if not dead, expire.
_Jul._ O cruelty—to them indeed the least!
My children, ye are happy—ye have lived
Of heart unconquered, honour unimpaired,
And died, true Spaniards, loyal to the last.
_Muza_. Away with him.
_Jul._ 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 oppressed and of a bursting heart
No violence can silence; at its voice
The trumpet is o’erpowered, 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.
_Muza_. Yes, they shall shudder—but will that, henceforth,
Molest my privacy, or shake my power?
_Jul._ 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.
_Muza_. Where now are thine? will they not curse the day
That gave thee birth, and hiss thy funeral!
Thou hast left none who could have pitied thee.
_Jul._ 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:
Oppressed and desolate, the countryman
Receives it like a gift; he hastens home,
Shows where the hoof of Moorish horse laid waste
His narrow croft and winter garden-plot,
Sweetens with fallen pride his children’s lore,
And points their hatred; but applauds their tears.
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 stormed around,
Is calm alike without them as within.
Our very chains make the whole world our own,
Bind those to us who else had passed 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.
_Jul._ My world and thine are not that distant one.
Is age less wise, less merciful, than grief,
To keep this secret from thee, poor old man?
Thou canst not lessen, canst not aggravate
My sufferings, canst not shorten nor extend
Half a sword’s length between my God and me.
I thank thee for that better thought than fame,
Which none, however, who deserve, despise,
Nor lose from view till all things else are lost.
_Abd._ Julian, respect his age, regard his power.
Many who feared not death have dragged 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.
_Jul._ 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
From prisons and from dungeons our remains,
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—
Losing in brightness and beatitude
The frail foundations of these humbler hopes—
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.
_Abd._ Pity, release him, pardon him, my father.
Forget how much thou hatest perfidy;
Think of him, once so potent, still so brave,
So calm, so self-dependent in distress—
I marvel at him—hardly dare I blame,
When I behold him fallen from so high,
And so exalted after such a fall.
Mighty must that man be who can forgive
A man, so mighty; seize the hour to rise,
Another never comes. Oh, say, my father,
Say, “Julian, be my enemy no more.”
He fills me with a greater awe than e’er
The field of battle, with himself the first,
When every flag that waved along our host
Drooped down the staff, as if the very winds
Hung in suspense before him—bid him go
And peace be with him, or let me depart.
Lo! like a god, sole and inscrutable,
He stands above our pity.
_Jul._ For that wish—
Vain as it is, ’tis virtuous—oh, for that,
However wrong thy censure and thy praise,
Kind Abdalazis, mayst thou never feel
The rancour that consumes thy father’s breast,
Nor want the pity thou hast sought for me.
_Muza_. Now hast thou sealed thy doom.
_Jul._ And thou thy crimes.
_Abd._ O father, heed him not: those evil words
Leave neither blight nor blemish—let him go.
_Muza_. A boy, a very boy, art thou indeed!
One who in early day would sally out
To chase the lion, and would call it sport,
But, when more wary steps had closed him round,
Slink from the circle, drop the toils, and blanch
Like a lithe plant from under snow in spring.
_Abd._ He who ne’er shrank from danger might shrink now,
And ignominy would not follow here.
_Muza_. Peace, Abdalazis! how is this? he bears
Nothing that warrants him invulnerable:
Shall I then shrink to smite him? shall my fears
Be greatest at the blow that ends them all?
Fears? no! ’tis justice—fair, immutable,
Whose measured step, at times, advancing nigh,
Appalls the majesty of kings themselves.
Oh, were he dead! though then revenge were o’er.