The Project Gutenberg EBook of Representative Plays by American
Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini, by George Henry Boker

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Title: Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini

Author: George Henry Boker

Release Date: July 23, 2004 [EBook #13005]

Language: English

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FRANCESCA DA RIMINI

_A TRAGEDY_

  Francesca, i tuoi martiri a lagrimar
  mi fanno triato e pio.--DANTE.

_Inferno, v. 75 seq._




[Illustration: GEORGE HENRY BOKER]




GEORGE HENRY BOKER

(1823-1890)


The name of George Henry Boker suggests a coterie of friendships--a
group of men pledged to the pursuit of letters, and worshippers at the
shrine of poetry. These men, in the pages of whose published letters
and impressions are embedded many pleasing aspects of Boker's
temperament and character, were Bayard Taylor, Richard Henry Stoddard,
and Charles Godfrey Leland, the latter known familiarly in American
literature as "Hans Breitmann." These four, in different periods of
their lives, might have been called "the inseparables"--so closely did
they watch each other's development, so intently did they await each
other's literary output, and write poetry to each other, and meet
at Boker's, now and again, for golden talks on Sundays. Poetry was
a passion with them, and even when two--Boker and Taylor--were sent
abroad on diplomatic missions, they could never have been said to
desert the Muse--their literary activity was merely arrested. One of
the four--Stoddard--often felt, in the presence of Boker, a certain
reticence due to lack of educational advantages; but in the face of
Boker's graciousness--a quality which comes with culture in its truest
sense,--he soon found himself writing Boker on matters of style, on
qualities of English diction, and on the status of American letters--a
stock topic of conversation those days.

Boker was a Philadelphian, born there on October 6, 1823,--the son
of Charles S. Boker, a wealthy banker, whose financial expertness
weathered the Girard National Bank through the panic years of 1838-40,
and whose honour, impugned after his death, in 1857, was defended
many years later by his son in "The Book of the Dead," reflective of
Tennyson's "In Memoriam," and marked by a triteness of phrase
which was always Boker's chief limitation, both as a poet and as a
dramatist.

He was brought up in an atmosphere of ease and refinement, receiving
his preparatory education in private schools, and entering Princeton
in 1840. On the testimony of Leland, who, being related to Boker, was
thrown with him in their early years, and who avows that he always
showed a love for the theatre, we learn that the young college student
bore that same distinction of manner which had marked him as a child,
and was to cling to him as a diplomat. Together as boys, these
two would read their "Percy's Reliques," "Don Quixote," Byron and
Scott--and while they were both in Princeton, Boker's room possessed
the only carpet in the dormitory, and his walls boasted shelves of the
handsomest books in college.

    "As a mere schoolboy," wrote Leland, "Boker's knowledge of
    poetry was remarkable. I can remember that he even at nine
    years of age manifested that wonderful gift that caused him
    many years after to be characterized by some great actor--I
    think it was Forrest--as the best reader in America.... While
    at college ... Shakespeare and Byron were his favourites. He
    used to quiz me sometimes for my predilections for Wordsworth
    and Coleridge. We both loved Shelly passionately."

In fact, Leland claims that Boker was given to ridicule the "Lakers;"
had he studied them instead, he would have added to his own poetry a
naturalness of expression which it lacked.

He was quite the poet of Princeton in his day, quite the gentleman
Bohemian. "He was," writes Leland, "quite familiar, in a refined and
gentlemanly way, with all the dissipations of Philadelphia and New
York." His easy circumstances made it possible for him to balance his
ascetic taste for scholarship with riding horse-back. To which almost
perfect attainment, he added the skilled ability to box, fence and
dance. He graduated from Princeton in 1842, and the description of him
left to us by Leland reveals a young man of nineteen, six feet tall,
whose sculptured bust, made at this time, was not as much like him "as
the ordinary busts of Lord Byron." In later years he was said to bear
striking resemblance to Hawthorne. His marriage to Miss Julia Riggs,
of Maryland, followed shortly after his graduation, in fact, while he
was studying law, a profession which was to serve him in good stead
during his diplomatic years, but which he threw over for the stronger
pull of poetry, whose Muse he could court without the necessity of
driving it hard for support. Yet he was concerned about literature
as a paying profession for others. On April 26, 1851, he wrote to
Stoddard: "Alas! alas! Dick, is it not sad that an American author
cannot live by magazine writing? And this is wholly owing to the
want of our international copyright law. Of course it is little to me
whether magazine writers get paid or not; but it is so much to you,
and to a thousand others." The time, until 1847, was spent in foreign
travel, but it is interesting to note, as indication of no mean
literary attainment in the interim, that Princeton, during this
period, bestowed on him the degree of M.A., for merit in letters.

1848 was a red-letter year for Boker. It witnessed the publication of
his first volume of verse, "The Lessons of Life, and other Poems,"
and it introduced him to Bayard Taylor and to R.H. Stoddard. Of the
occasion, Taylor writes on October 13, to Mary Agnew:

    Young Boker, author of the tragedy, "Calaynos," a most
    remarkable work, is here on a visit, and spent several
    hours to-night with me. He is another hero,--a most notable,
    glorious mortal! He is one of our band, and is, I think,
    destined to high renown as an author. He is nearly my own age,
    perhaps a year or two older, and he has lived through the same
    sensations, fought the same fight, and now stands up with the
    same defiant spirit.

This friendship was one of excellent spiritual sympathy and remarkable
external similarities and contrasts. One authority has written of
their late years:

    In certain ways, he and his friend, Bayard Taylor, made an
    interesting contrast with each other. Here was Boker [circa
    1878] who had just come back from diplomatic service abroad;
    and here, too, was Taylor, who was just going abroad
    as minister to Berlin. Both were poets; they were
    fellow-Pennsylvanians and friends; and they were men of large
    mould physically, and of impressive presence; yet they were
    very dissimilar types. Boker, though massive and with a trace
    of the phlegmatic in his manner (perhaps derived from his
    Holland ancestors, the Bochers, who had come thither from
    France, and had then sent a branch into England, from which
    the American family sprang), was courtly, polished, slightly
    reserved. His English forefathers had belonged to the
    Society of Friends, as had also Taylor's family in
    Pennsylvania,--another point in common. But Taylor's
    appearance, as his friends will remember, was somewhat bluff
    and rugged; his manner was hearty and open.

Launched in the literary life, therefore, Boker began to write
assiduously. "Calaynos," the tragedy referred to by Taylor, went into
two editions during 1848, and the following year was played by Samuel
Phelps at Sadler's Wells Theatre, London, May 10. From the New York
_Tribune_ office, on May 29, 1849, Taylor wrote:

    Your welcome letter came this morning, and from the bottom of
    my heart was I rejoiced by it. I can well imagine your feeling
    of triumph at this earnest of fame.... I instantly hunted
    up the London "Times" and found "Calaynos" advertised for
    performance,--second night. I showed it to Griswold, who was
    nearly as much surprised and delighted as myself. Of course
    he will make good mention of it in his book. It will _sell_
    immensely for you, and especially just now, when you are
    coming out with "Anne Bullen" [sic.]. I shall not fail to have
    a notice of it in to-morrow morning's "Tribune."

Some authorities state that it was given by Phelps without Boker's
consent. Another, who examined Boker's manuscripts, in possession of
the poet's daughter-in-law, Mrs. George Boker, records that Barrett
made cuts in the play, preparatory to giving it, Boker, even, revising
it in part. The American premiere was reserved for James E. Murdoch,
at the Philadelphia Walnut Street Theater, January 20, 1851, and it
was revived at the same playhouse in April, 1855, by E.L. Davenport.
As Stoddard says of it, one "should know something--the more the
better--about the plays that Dr. Bird and Judge Conrad wrote for
Forrest and his successors, about Poe's 'Politian', Sargent's
'Velasco', Longfellow's 'Spanish Student'."

His choice of subject, in this, his first drama, indicated the
romantic aloofness of Boker's mind, for he was always anxious to
escape what Leland describes him as saying was a "practical, soulless,
Gradgrind age." In fact, Boker had not as yet found himself; he was
more the book-lover than the student of men he afterwards became.

    "Read Chaucer for strength," he advises Stoddard on January
    7, 1850, "read Spenser for ease and sweetness, read Milton for
    sublimity and thought, read Shakespeare for all these things,
    and for something else which is his alone. Get out of your age
    as far as you can."

These young men were not quickly received, and they regarded the
utilitarian spirit of the time as against them. To Stoddard Boker once
confessed: "Were poetry forged upon the anvil, cut out with the axe,
or spun in the mill, my heaven, how men would wonder at the process!
What power, what toil, what ingenuity!"

Boker's correspondence with Stoddard began in a letter, dated
September 5, 1849, announcing overtures made by the London Haymarket
Theatre for his new tragedy, "Anne Boleyn," which he was contemplating
sending them in sheets. "I have also the assurance," he announces,
"that Miss Cushman will bring it out in this country, provided she
thinks her powers adapted to it."

Boker's pen was energetic, and it moved at a gait which shows how
fertile was his imagination. "The inseparables" cheered the way for
each other in the face of official journalistic criticism. Taylor
declared "Anne Boleyn" far in advance of "Calaynos," prophesying that
it would last. "Go ahead, my dear poet," he admonishes, "it will soon
be your turn to damn those who would willingly damn you." Together
these friends were always planning to storm the citadel of public
favour with poetry, but Boker seems to have been the only one to whom
the theatre held out attraction. By August 12, 1850, he was sending
news to Stoddard that "The Betrothal" would be staged the following
month. In good spirits, he writes:

    The manager is getting it up with unusual care and splendour.
    Spangles and red flannels flame through it from end to end. I
    even think of appearing before the curtain on horseback, nay,
    of making the whole performance equestrian, and of introducing
    a hippopotamus in the fifth act. What think you? Have you
    and your miserable lyrics ever known such glory? If the
    play should take _here_, you benighted New-Yorkers will be
    illuminated with it immediately after it has run its hundredth
    night in the city which is so proud of its son.

This was the second of his pieces to be given performance, "Anne
Boleyn" never seeing the boards. "The Betrothal" was produced at the
Philadelphia Walnut Street Theatre, on September 25, 1850, and opened
in New York, on November 18 of the same year. Taylor wrote to its
author, on December 4: "I saw the last night.... It is even better as
an acting play than I had anticipated, but it was very badly acted.
I have heard nothing but good of it, from all quarters." It was
Elizabethan in tone, quite in the spirit of that romantic drama
practised by such American authors as Willis, Sargent and others. How
it was received when presented in London, during 1853, is reflected in
Boker's letter to Stoddard, dated October 9, 1853:

    I have read the _Times_ notice of the "Betrothal." It is honey
    to most of the other newspaper criticisms.... Notwithstanding,
    and taking the accounts of my enemies for authority, the play
    was unusually successful with the audience on that most trying
    occasion, the first night.... The play stands a monument of
    English injustice. Mark you, it was not prejudice that caused
    the catastrophe; it was fear lest I should get a footing
    on their stage, of which "Calaynos" had given them timely
    warning.

"The Widow's Marriage," in manuscript, and never published, was
accepted by Marshall, manager of the Walnut, and is noted by Boker, in
a letter to Stoddard, October 12, 1852, the chief handicap confronting
him being the inability to find someone suited to take the leading
role. Stoddard's own comment was:

    Whether [it] was ever produced I know not, but I should
    say not, for the part of the principal character, _Lady
    Goldstraw_, is one which no actress whom I remember could have
    filled to the satisfaction of her creator. The fault of this
    character (me judice) is that it is too good to be played on a
    modern stage. It ought to have been written for antiquity two
    hundred years ago.

Boker was right when he referred to himself as "prolific" at this
time. He already had produced, in 1851, according to markings on the
manuscript, a piece called "All the World a Mask," and he had
written "The Podesta's Daughter," a dramatic sketch, issued, with
"Miscellaneous Poems," in 1852. Toward the end of this year, he
completed "Leonor de Guzman."

    "Her history," he writes to Stoddard, on November 14, "you
    will find in Spanish Chronicles relating to the reigns of
    Alfonso XII of Castile and his son, Peter the Cruel. There are
    no such subjects for historical tragedy on earth as are to be
    found in the Spanish history of that period. I am so much in
    love with it that I design following up 'Leonor de Guzman' by
    'Don Pedro'. The present tragedy, according to the judgment
    of Leland, is the very best play I have written, both for the
    closet and the stage. Perhaps I am too ready to agree
    with him, but long before he said it I had formed the same
    judgment."

This tragedy was performed at the Philadelphia Walnut Street Theatre,
on October 3, 1853, and at the New York Broadway Theatre, on April 24,
1854. Boker wrote to his friends, showing his customary concern about
an actress skilled enough for the role of his heroine. When, finally,
for the Philadelphia premiere, Julia Dean was decided upon, he thus
expressed his verdict to Stoddard, after the opening performance:
"Miss Dean, as far as her physique would admit, played the part
admirably, and with a full appreciation of all those things which you
call its beauties."

During these years of correspondence with his friends, Boker was
determining to himself the distinction between _poetic_ and _dramatic_
style.

    "Seriously, Dick," he writes to Stoddard, on October 6, 1850,
    "there is, to my mind, no English diction for your purposes
    equal to Milton's in his minor poems. Of course any man would
    be an intensified ass who should attempt to reach the diction
    of the 'Paradise Lost', or aspire to the tremendous style of
    Shakespeare. You must not confound things, though. A Lyric
    diction is one thing--a Dramatic diction is another, requiring
    the utmost force and conciseness of expression,--and Epic
    diction is still another; I conceive it to be something
    between the Lyric and Dramatic, with all the luxuriance of the
    former, and all the power of the latter."

He must have written to Taylor in the same vein, for, in a letter from
the latter, there is assurance that he fully understands what a
slow growth dramatic style must be. But Boker was not wholly wed to
theatrical demands; he still approached the stage in the spirit of
the poet who was torn between loyalty to poetic indirectness, and
necessity for direct dialogue. On January 12, 1853, he writes to
Stoddard:

    Theatricals are in a fine state in this country; every
    inducement is offered to me to burn my plays as fast as I
    write them. Yet, what can I do? If I print my plays, the
    actors take them up, butcher, alter and play them, without
    giving me so much as a hand in my own damnation. This is
    something beyond even heavenly rigour; and so I proceed to
    my own destruction, with the proud consciousness that, at all
    events, it is my own act. _A propos_, have you ever read the
    English acting copy of my "Calaynos"? A viler thing was never
    concocted from like materials.

Whether or not the play, "The Bankrupt," preceded or followed
the writing of "Francesca da Rimini" in 1853, we have no way of
determining; but it would seem that it progressed no further in its
stage career than in manuscript form, it being the only play on a
modern theme attempted by Boker. Then, it seems, he was hot on the
trail of the Francesca love story told in Dante, and used by so many
writers in drama and poetry. It is this play, conceded to be his
best, which is included in the present collection, and which calls for
analysis and history by itself.

Taylor's collection of "Poems at Home and Abroad," dedicated to Boker
in 1855, suggests that the two must have continually talked over the
possibilities of gathering their best effusions in book form. Did not
Taylor write, as early as June 30, 1850, "You must come out in the
Fall with a volume of poems. Stoddard will, and so, I think, will I.
You can get a capital volume, with your 'Song', 'Sir John', 'Goblet',
and other things.... The publishing showmen would of course parade our
wonderful qualities, and the snarling critics in the crowd would show
their teeth; but we would be as unmoved as the wax statues of Parkman
and Webster, except that there might now and then be a sly wink
at each other, when nobody was looking." The two friends had been
separated for some time, while Taylor wandered over the face of
the globe, writing from Cairo, in the shadow of the pyramids, and
exclaiming, in Constantinople (July 18, 1852), "There is a touch of
the East in your nature, George."

In 1856, Boker prepared his two volumes of "Plays and Poems" for the
press. He had won considerable reputation as a sonneteer, and this was
further increased by the tradition that Daniel Webster had quoted him
at a state dinner in Washington. As yet he was merely a literary
poet, and a literary dramatist whose name is usually linked with that
Philadelphia group discussed in Vol. II of this collection.[A]

Writing of the Philadelphia of 1868, Leland says:

[It was] "the Philadelphia when 'Emily Schaumbeg' was the belle and
Penington's 'store' was the haunt of the booklover, when snow fell
with old fashioned violence, and Third Street was convulsed by
old-fashioned panics, when everybody went mad over Offenbach, when one
started for New York from the Walnut Street Ferry, when George Boker
was writing his dramas and George Childs was beginning to play the
public Maecenas." Oftentimes the sturdy figure of Walt Whitman could
be seen walking on Broad Street, while Horace Greely, buried in
newspapers, travelled aboard a boat between New York and Philadelphia.

It was the Civil War that not only turned Boker's pen to the Union
Cause, but changed him politically from a Democrat to a staunch
Republican. In fact, his name is closely interwoven with the
rehabilitation of the Republican party in Philadelphia. He often
confessed that his conscience hurt him many times when he realized he
cast his first vote for Buchanan. "After that," he is quoted as having
said, "the sword was drawn; it struck me that politics had vanished
entirely from the scene--that it was now merely a question of
patriotism or disloyalty." His "Poems of the War," issued in 1864,
contained such examples of his martial and occasional ability as the
"Dirge for a Soldier," "On the Death of Philip Kearney" and "The
Black Regiment," besides "On Board the Cumberland" and the "Battle of
Lookout Mountain."

About this time, there was founded the Union League Club, with Boker
as the leading spirit; through his efforts the war earnestness of the
city was concentrated here; from 1863-71 he served as its secretary;
from 1879-84 as its President; and his official attitude may be
measured in the various annual reports of the organization. But even
in those strenuous days--at the period when the Northern spirits
lagged over military reverses, and at the time when the indecision
of General McClellan drew from him the satiric broadside,--"Tardy
George"--privately printed in 1865--Boker's thoughts were concerned
with poetry. His official laureate consciousness did not serve to
improve the verse. His "Our Heroic Themes"--written for the Harvard
Phi Beta Kappa--was mediocre in everything but intent, recalling what
Taylor wrote to him: "My Harvard poem, [he had read it in 1850 before
the same fraternity] poor as it is, was received with great applause;
but, alas! I published it, and thus killed the tradition of its
excellence, which, had I not done so, might still have been floating
around Harvard."

In 1869, Boker issued "Koenigsmark, The Legend of the Hounds and other
Poems," and this ended his dramatic career until his return from
abroad, and until Lawrence Barrett came upon the scene with his
revival of "Francesca da Rimini" and his interest in Boker's other
work, to the extent of encouraging him to recast "Calaynos" and to
prepare "Nydia" (1885), later enlarged from two acts to a full sized
drama in "Glaucus" (1886), both drawing for inspiration on Bulwer's
"The Last Days of Pompeii."

President Grant sent Boker to Constantinople, as U.S. Minister (his
appointment dated November 3, 1871)--an honour undoubtedly bestowed in
recognition of his national service. Here he remained four years, "and
during that time secured the redress for wrongs done American subjects
by the Syrians, and successfully negotiated two treaties, one having
reference to the extradition of criminals, and the other to the
naturalization of subjects of little power in the dominions of the
other." A reception was tendered him on December 22, 1871, by members
of the Union League Club, and among those present were Bayard Taylor,
Col. George Boker, of the Governor's staff, and son of Boker, and Dr.
Charles S. Boker, his brother. Among those who spoke were Robeson,
Secretary of the Navy, and Cameron, U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania.
Congratulatory letters were received from Bryant, James T. Fields,
Stoddard, Lowell, Longfellow, Aldrich, Curtis, and Stedman. On this
occasion, Taylor said: "I know the ripeness and soundness of his mind,
the fine balance of his intellectual qualities."

On December 24, 1871, Boker wrote to Leland:

    The scarcest thing with me just now is time. I might give you
    a shilling at a pinch, but a half hour is an article which I
    do not happen to have about me.... By the way, your rhapsody
    over the East in "M.K." ["Meister Karl"] had something to do
    with my acceptance of the Turkish Mission; and if you have
    been lying, I shall find you out, old boy.

Boker's enthusiasm for Turkish scenery was unbounded, but his
difficulties as a diplomat were due to his ignorance of the tongue,
and his distrust of interpreters. But by the time his Government was
ready to transfer him to another post--that of Minister to Russia
(January 3, 1875)--he was heartily sick of his wrangling with the
Crescent, and glad, as he wrote Leland, "to shake the dust of this
dismal old city from my shoes, and prepare my toes for a freezing at
St. Petersburg." He echoed his distaste in later years by writing: "I
hate the East so profoundly that I should not return to it if there
were no other land in which I could live." This promotion to the
Russian court--it was a Russian, Ignatieff, who characterized him as
"of true diplomatic stuff"--was made in 1875, and he remained there
two years.

    "While in Russia," we learn, "he was the only one of our
    Ministers at foreign courts who was able to checkmate Spain in
    her controversy with us about the _Virginius_. He baffled
    the Spanish Ambassador at St. Petersburg, and influenced
    Gortschakoff to send a despatch to Madrid, which caused Spain
    to apologize to the United States; thus averting serious
    complications."

Diplomatic life was not wholly distasteful to him; he possessed social
distinction which made him popular at both courts, so much so, indeed,
that the Czar cabled to Washington, when a change of administration
brought Boker's tenure of office to a close, asking if it were not
possible to have him retained. He had had his difficulties at the
Porte, as Lowell had had at Madrid. But his artistic nature responded
quickly to the picturesqueness of his surroundings. "Within a mile of
me," he writes Leland from Turkey,--"for I am now living at Therapia
upon the Bosphorus--there is a delicious encampment of the black tents
of a tribe of Gypsies." While he was in Russia he was continually
supplying Leland with information about gypsies.

He went to Egypt, at the invitation of the Sultan, and--as though
recalling Taylor's longing, in 1852, when he was in Cairo, to have
Boker with him--took a trip up the Nile, with Leland, whom he had
invited to accompany him. Under the palm trees at Misraim, he had his
first meeting with Emerson. The varied foreign travel had broadened
his taste, and he was quickly responsive to what he saw. Writes
Leland:

    I have been with him many times in the Louvre, the great
    galleries of London and St. Petersburg, and studied with him
    the stupendous and strange remains of Egyptian art in the
    Boulak Museum and the Nile temples, but never knew anyone,
    however learned he might be in such matters, who had a more
    sincere enjoyment of their greatest results. I remember that
    he manifested much more interest and deeper feeling for what
    he saw in Egypt than did Emerson, who was there at the same
    time, and with whom I conversed daily.

On January 15, 1878, Boker withdrew from diplomatic life, returning to
the United States, where he resumed literary work, his chief interest
in the stage being revived by his association with Barrett. His home
in Philadelphia--one of the literary centres of the time,--bore traces
of his Turkish stay--carpets brought from Constantinople, Arabic
designs on the draperies, and rich Eastern colours in the tapestried
chairs. His experience was obliged to affect his writing, if not in
feeling, at least in expression. I note in his "Monody," written
at the time of the death of his friend, the poet, T. Buchanan Read
(1822-1872), such lines as "the hilly Bosphorus," and "... For
the hills of Ancient Asia through my trembling tears glimmer like
fabrics...." As early as 1855, he had written for the _U.S. Gazette
and North American_, an article on Read comparing his "New Pastoral"
with the poetry of Cowper and Thompson. But Read to-day is familiar
because of his "Sheridan's Ride." We are told that Boker had a
work-room where he delighted in designing metal scrolls.

There was a slight revival of public interest in his poems, which
necessitated the reprinting of several of his books.

"The last time when I saw him," Stoddard recalls in 1890, "was at the
funeral of Taylor, at Cedarcroft, a little more than ten years ago. We
rode to the grave, on a hillside, and we rode back to the house. And
now he has gone to the great majority!" Boker died in Philadelphia,
January 2, 1890. "He takes place with Motley on our roll of well-known
authors," George Parsons Lathrop has written, "and it is even more
remarkable that he should have cultivated poetry in Philadelphia,
where the conditions were unfavourable, than that Motley should
have taken up history in Boston, where the conditions were wholly
propitious."

It is by "Francesca da Rimini" that Boker is best remembered. In a
letter to Stoddard, March 3, 1853, he writes:

    You will laugh at this, but the thing is so. "Francesca da
    Rimini" is the title. Of course you know the story,--everyone
    does; but you nor any one else, do not know it as I have
    treated it. I have great faith in the successful issue of this
    new attempt. I think all day, and write all night. This is one
    of my peculiarities, by the bye: a subject seizes me soul and
    body, which accounts for the rapidity of my execution. My muse
    resembles a whirlwind: she catches me up, hurries me along,
    and drops me all breathless at the end of her career.

And soon this was followed by the letter so often quoted, showing the
white-heat of his enthusiasm:

    Now that "Francesca da Rimini" is done,--all but the
    polishing,--I have time to look around and see how I have
    been neglecting my friends during my state of "possession."
    Of course you wish to know my opinion of the bantling; I
    shall suppose you do, at all events. Well, then, I am better
    satisfied with "Francesca da Rimini" than with any of my
    previous plays. It is impossible for me to say what you, or
    the world, will say of it; but if it do not please you both,
    I do not know what I am about. The play is more dramatic than
    former ones, fiercer in its display of intense passions, and,
    so far as mere poetry goes, not inferior, if not superior, to
    any of them. In this play I have dared more, risked more, than
    I ever had courage to do before. _Ergo_, if it be not a great
    triumph, it will certainly be a great failure. I doubt whether
    you, in a hundred guesses, could hit upon the manner in which
    I have treated the story. I shall not attempt to prejudice
    you regarding the play; I would rather have you judge for
    yourself, even if your decision be adverse. Am I not the devil
    and all for rapid composition? My speed frightens me, and
    makes me fearful of the merits of my work. Yet, on coolly
    going over my work, I find little to object to, either as to
    the main design or its details. I touch up, here and there,
    but I do little more. The reason for my rapid writing is
    that I never attempt putting pen to paper before my design is
    perfectly mature. I never start with one idea, trusting to the
    glow of poetical composition for the remainder. That will
    do in lyrical poetry, but it would be death and damnation to
    dramatic. But just think of it!--twenty-eight hundred lines in
    about three weeks! To look back upon such labour is appalling!
    Let me give you the whole history of my manner of composition
    in a few words. If it be not interesting to you, you differ
    from me, and I mistake the kind of matters that interest you.
    While I am writing I eat little, I drink nothing, I meditate
    my work, literally, all day. By the time night arrives I am in
    a highly nervous and excited state. About nine o'clock I begin
    writing and smoking, and I continue the two exercises, _pari
    passu_, until about four o'clock in the morning. Then I reel
    to bed, half crazy with cigar-smoke and poesy, sleep five
    hours, and begin the next day as the former. Ordinarily, I
    sleep from seven to eight hours; but when I am writing, but
    five,--simply because I cannot sleep any longer at such times.
    The consequence of this mode of life is that at the end of
    a long work I sink at once like a spent horse, and have not
    energy enough to perform the ordinary duties of life. I _feel_
    my health giving way under it, but really I do not care. I am
    ambitious to be remembered among the martyrs.

This letter is not only significant of Boker's method of workmanship;
it is, as well, measure of his charm as a letter writer. For, in
correspondence with his close friends, he was as natural with them,
as full of force and brightness, as he was in conversation. We find
Taylor thanking him at one time, when in distress over family illness
and death, for his sustaining words of comfort; we find Leland basking
in the warmth of his sheer animal spirits. To the latter, Boker once
wrote:

    Dear old Charley, you are the only man living with whom I can
    play the fool through a long letter and be sure that I shall
    be clearly understood at the end. To say that this privilege
    is cheerful is to say little, for it is the breath of life to
    a man of a certain humour.

The "Francesca" note, therefore, is typical of Boker's enthusiasm.
When Stoddard read the play, we wonder whether he saw in it any
similarities to Leigh Hunt's poem on the same subject? For once he had
detected in Boker's verses the influence of Hunt. There are critics
who claim Boker had read closely Hugo's "Le Roi s'Amuse." But there is
only one real comparison to make--with Shakespeare, to the detriment
of Boker. His memory beat in Elizabethan rhythm, and beat haltingly.
The present Editor began noting on the margin of his copy parallelisms
of thought and expression in this "Francesca" and in the plays of
Shakespeare; these similarities became so many, were so apparent, that
it is thought best to omit them. The text used is not based on the
manuscripts left by Boker, nor has it been compared with the acting
copy made, in 1855, for E.L. Davenport, as has already been done
elsewhere in print. I have preferred to use the text finally prepared
by Boker for his published plays, this being the one which met with
his approval. In 1882, Lawrence Barrett, with the aid of William
Winter, prepared an acting version of "Francesca," and it was this
which Mr. Otis Skinner used, when he revived the piece in 1901.

A notice in The New York _Tribune_ for 1882 suggests that when E.L.
Davenport first essayed "Francesca da Rimini," in 1855, it was in
one-act. I can find no corroboration of this statement. The play-bill
here reproduced specifically announces a _five_ act tragedy, and it
is to be inferred that the form of the play, as given at the Broadway
Theatre, New York, September 26, 1855,[B] was the only one used by
him. Winter claims that as _Lanciotto_, Davenport was "unimaginative,
mechanical, and melodramatic," and that the whole piece "proved
tedious." This is strange, considering the heroic and romantic
characteristics in Davenport's method of acting. It may be that he
attempted Boker's play because of his interest in the development
of American drama. He had assisted Mrs. Mowatt in her career as
playwright, and, during his full life, his name was identified with
Boker's "Calaynos," George H. Miles's tragedy, "De Soto, the Hero
of the Mississippi," and Conrad's "Jack Cade." But the concensus of
opinion is that Boker's "Francesca da Rimini," as given by Davenport,
was a failure.

An examination of the cast in the Davenport program with the cast as
it was when Boker issued the play, indicates that the text must have
been considerably changed, and certain characters omitted, when,
at the suggestion of Winter, Lawrence Barrett promised to revive it
during the summer of 1882. The scholarly turn of Barrett's mind must
have made him ponder it well during a trip he made abroad at the time,
and Boker, meanwhile, must have been cutting the cloth to suit the
actor's ideas. Barron, one of Barrett's biographers, claims that "Mr.
Barrett saw great possibilities in the work, and with his practical
assistance the play was suitably changed, new situations were
effected, a more picturesque colouring was given the scenes and story,
and all that was repellant in the too close following of Dante [!]
was removed." The play was given by Barrett, at Haverly's Theatre,
Chicago, on September 14, 1882, Otis Skinner playing _Paolo_, and
Marie Wainwright appearing as _Francesca_. In Winter's estimate of the
performance, we find the dominant characteristics being "moderation"
and "balanced growth." He says of _Lanciotto_: "Alertness of the brain
sustained it, at every point, in brilliant vigour, and it rose in
power, and expanded in terrible beauty, accordingly as it was wrought
upon by the pressure of circumstances and the conflict of passions."

The memory of this must have affected the interpretation of Mr.
Skinner, when, as _Lanciotto_, in his revival of the piece at the
Chicago Grand Opera House, August 22, 1901, with Aubrey Boucicault
as _Paolo_, Marcia Van Dresser as _Francesca_, and William Norris as
_Pepe_, he met with such success. "D'Annunzio gives us the soldier and
the brute," he wrote me in 1904. "Boker's hero is an idealist--almost
a dreamer." The fact is, Boker was recalling his memories of _Othello_
and _Richard III_, if not of _Hamlet_, as Skinner suggests. In another
respect did the Barrett performance affect the later revival. The
portrayal of _Pepe_, by Norris, was based on what he called "the James
tradition," Louis James having, as Winter wrote, "a laughter that is
more terrible than malice."

Lawrence Barrett's interest in the American drama was never very
pronounced. He sought Boker's "Francesca da Rimini," as he sought W.D.
Howells' "Yorick's Love" (given at Cleveland, Ohio, October 26, 1878),
because the roles therein suited his temperament. Between him and
Boker, there was some misunderstanding of short duration, about
royalties, but this was bridged over, and Boker's final attempts at
playwriting were made for him. The reader is referred to Vol. 32,
n.s. Vol. XXV, no. 2, June, 1917, of the _Publications of the Modern
Language Association of America_, for statements as to Boker's
"profits" from the stage.

After Otis Skinner's revival of "Francesca da Rimini," it was played
for a while by Frederick Ward and Louis James in association (1893)
and by Frank C. Bangs in 1892.

Hosts of dramas have been written on "Francesca da Rimini," and
every poet has essayed at one time or another to surpass Dante's
incomparable lines. Music scores have glorified this passionate love
story, while marble and canvas have caught the external expression of
it. In its portrayal, actual history has taken on legendary character,
and so "Francesca da Rimini" now ranks as a theme with the history
of Lancelot and Guinevere, of Tristan and Isolde. It has become the
inspiration for Maeterlinck in "Pelleas and Melisande," who has viewed
the Italian passion through a mirage of mysticism.

Into "The Divine Comedy," the account of Francesca and Paolo is
dropped, keen, sensitive and delicate, as though the poet, a friend of
those concerned, wished to cover the hard fact of illicit love in an
ecstacy of human feeling. Dante, the supreme master of his age, the
incomparable lover of Beatrice, differentiated this tragedy from
countless incidents of like character which marked his age. Had the
story been preserved only in the form recorded by Boccaccio, it would
have been lost in its minor details of history; whereas Dante has
glorified it.

By the very fact that Dante places the two lovers in the circle of the
Lustful, it is clear that he realized the enormity of their sin.
The theory that his friendship with Guido Novella, the nephew of
Francesca, made Dante refrain from entering fully into the incident,
will not hold, when it is remembered that the cantos of the Inferno
were written in 1300, seventeen years before the poet reached Ravenna,
and accepted the hospitality of the Polenta house. Dante's infinite
compassion is, therefore, the cause for the compressed poetry of this
famous passage.

Dante's Francesca lines have been infinitely translated. Longfellow is
conscientious; Byron chafes to be freed of the original Italian, and
his lines are irksome; Rossetti sees and feels, but he is laboured.
Dante, infinitely translated, remains supreme.

The poems on this ideal love legend are of infinite variety. Tassoni
describes Paolo, the warrior, consumed with ravishing love, "shrunk
with misery;" he fails to reach the youthful passion, and is as
mediaevally chivalric as is Chaucer in "The Knightes Tale" of Palamon
and Arcite. Leigh Hunt resorts to stilted narrative and description.

Byron once thought to write a drama on this subject; had he done so,
Silvio Pellico might have had a formidable rival. More or less, all
the playwrights have gone to Italian history, and the more exact they
became, the more gross the situation. F. Marion Crawford fell on this
rock of accuracy, when he wrote his Francesca play for Mme. Sarah
Bernhardt.

Silvio Pellico, who wrote the first drama on "Francesca da Rimini"
known to modern playgoers, lived his early life in an intensely
religious atmosphere, and suffered imprisonment later because of his
patriotic tendencies; it is not surprising, therefore, to find in his
play--first a national appeal that was to win it applause from all
Italy, and then, more important still, a purity of tone that struggled
most nobly against an inevitable, passionate end. _Paolo_ is the
one who, after some scruples, succumbs; _Francesca_ is infinitely
conscious that she is a wife; _Giovanni_ is suspicious. It would
seem that Pellico's play is the first that realized the theatrical
possibilities of the story; research has brought to light no play
manuscript previous to his.

In the handling of his details, Pellico's incongruities and
artificialities are many. _Paolo_ returns from knightly deeds in Asia,
to find his father dead--the _Malatesta Verucchio_ who died in 1312,
twenty-seven years after _Giovanni_ committed the murder; therefore
Pellico gives to the deformed brother the power that history does not
wholly accord. The dramatist would avoid the indelicacy he finds in
the reading incident, recounting it only in a situation during
which _Francesca_ holds aloof in a wild effort to stifle her love.
Throughout the play, there is this ruthless twisting, in a desire to
conceal wrong and unpardonable sin.

Turning to Uhland's fragmentary ideas, which even he himself was
doubtful whether he could handle, an atmosphere confronts us as
mediaevally German as the "Der arme Heinrich" of Hartmann von Aue,
which was the inspirational source for Longfellow's "The Golden
Legend." Uhland shows heaviness in conception, and a conventionality,
thoroughly at variance with the tragedy's original passion. Romantic
as he is, he has robbed the story of its warm southern nature, and has
thrown his Dante aside to deal with false situation. He seems willing
to let fact and spirit go. _Paolo_ is a knight who tilts and worships
a glove. Uhland thinks, and he is not alone in his belief, that
_Francesca_ had been promised to _Paolo_ before _Giovanni_ was wedded
to her; yet if _Paolo's_ marriage with _Orabile_, in 1269, is to be
recognized as correct, historically, logical deductions from dates
would discountenance the statement. Neither have I found commentaries
to support the theory that _Paolo_ was older than _Giovanni_, as
Uhland sets forth in his play. The servant in Boccaccio here becomes
a jealous lover. It is interesting to note the variations of this
counter-element in the many play versions of the story--the element
that urges _Giovanni's_ suspicion to quick action--the dramatic force
of _Pepe_ in Boker; the disappointed motherhood and embittered love of
_Lucrezia_ in Stephen Phillips; the inborn savagery of _Malatestino_
in D'Annunzio; the innocent unconsciousness of _Concordia_ in
Crawford, which finds similarity in a scene in Maeterlinck's "Pelleas
and Melisande" between father and little son. Further, in Uhland,
a distorted glimpse of a colourless reportorial figure of Dante,
gathering material for his poem, is as meaningless as it is
unnecessary for atmosphere.

Stephen Phillips, in his Francesca drama, ignores altogether Italian
temperament; save for the fact that he occasionally mentions the
Tyrant of Rimini, Pesaro and Florence, and that he adheres to historic
names, there is more of the English hamlet romance in the piece, than
Italian passion. And that cannot be said of Shakespeare's "Romeo and
Juliet." Perhaps one may claim for Phillips some of the simplicity of
Dante, but there is not the humanity. Undeniably, the English poet is
happy in phrase and imagery, but his genius is not so dramatic as it
is poetic; he has some of the great lyrical feeling of Tennyson, and
he has that which distinguishes the poet from the dramatist--the
power to _describe_ situation. One cannot deny the appeal of his
girl-Francesca, nor the beauty of many of his haunting lines; but no
warm impression of the situation is gained, and the characters are
peculiarly inactive at inopportune times. Mr. Phillips's talent
was predominantly undramatic; he was too much the poet to allow his
feeling to be guided by historical material. Yet, as acted, the play
was charmingly simple.

On the other hand, D'Annunzio, in his drama, saturates himself with
the history of Italy. In bulk, his play has not the slightest claim
to simplicity; the main object of the dramatist seemed to have been
to overweight the scenes with the licentious and rude Italy of the
thirteenth century; extraneous side-issues burden the progress of
the plot. Yet D'Annunzio has taken care that this does not affect his
central theme. On the stage, the scenes appear cumbersome, and the
action moves slowly; but, after analyzing the book, it may be claimed
for this "Francesca da Rimini," that it reflects the age in which the
tragedy occurred. Much artistic construction is shown in the contrast
of the Polenta and Malatesta families, and, repellent as he is at
times, D'Annunzio has moments of great poetic fervour; his fire swings
forth in many of _Francesca's_ speeches, that alternate with the
languor of her symbolic nature.

That his drama on Francesca was definitely constructed for theatrical
effect, was openly avowed by Marion Crawford. At the beginning of the
French version made for Mme. Bernhardt, he placed material that showed
his intention of dealing with fact in the manner of a novelist, and
regardless of the sweetness of Dante. To him, _Concordia_ is fourteen,
since he considers 1289 as the date of the tragedy, and, with his
details from Boccaccio's commentary, he has coarsened _Francesca_,
making her bitterness full of the spleen that could only accompany
maturity. A striking point is to be noted in the strong vein of
Catholicism that colours many of the speeches.

_Paolo's_ wife, _Orabile_, moves through the D'Annunzio play with
only slight mention--to show the husband's avoidance of her--to draw
attention to her deep-rooted aversion to _Francesca_. Mr. Crawford
also brings her on the scene, and has _Paolo_ the cause of her death,
wittingly distorting history, since _Orabile_ died many years after
the murder of her husband.

The only American drama on the subject is that by Boker; it is a
peculiarly contradictory piece of work, since, from the standpoint
of the stage, it is essentially and effectively dramatic, while as
literature it is imitative of the Elizabethan style. Boker's
poetic imagery is distinctly borrowed, and his choice of words
disappointingly colloquial. Yet, over and above the mere story, he
has succeeded in portraying a strong character in his _Pepe_. The
historical setting of the play is slight, yet sufficient to localize
the piece, and his _dramatis personae_ are faithfully distinct in
outline, though at times devoid of consuming passion.

Phillips as a dramatist has the fault of being diffuse; Boker's style
is prosaically plain. Were it not for over-elaboration, D'Annunzio's
play might supplant all others because of its spirit. Could we take
from Phillips his simplicity, from D'Annunzio his Italian intensity,
and from Boker his proportion, and could we add these to Crawford's
realization of situation, toned away from his melodramatic tendencies,
an ideal drama on "Francesca da Rimini" might be constructed.

But the revitalizing power that was given Shakespeare, has been
bequeathed to none who have followed Dante. The one beauty of the
Francesca story is the simple element that permeates the dark
motive. The genius required to deal with it lies in this: to make one
conscious of the tragedy in a touch that recalls the beauty of spring.

It is strange that no other poet than Dante has succeeded in catching
this beauty. No poet, writing directly on the theme, has the subtle
feeling which may be compared with that of the Italian. Richard Le
Gallienne is infinitely superior to Hunt; Lowell and Gilder beyond
the lesser poets,--but all fade before the master. They treat of the
vision of Hell, with its whirling wind; of the two in close embrace;
there is the kiss that ends the reading of a self-same love; there is
the flash of a dagger that joins them eternally in death. These are
the themes for the songs. The artists have done with brush and pencil,
what the poets have tried in sonnets and verse. But it is Dante who
dominates them everyone.

To me, after tracing in part the development of this Italian tragedy,
there remains the charm of Dante's simplicity, and were one to ask,
who, among the moderns, have partially reflected his passion, I should
turn to Keats' insatiable thirst for beauty in his sonnet, "A Dream,
After reading Dante's Episode of Paolo and Francesca," and his account
of it in a letter to George and Georgiana Keats (February 14, 1819),
and to Carlyle's appreciation of tragedy and love, in "The Hero as a
Poet."

Boker's "Francesca da Rimini" will stand largely because, in structure
and in directness, it is strikingly effective for the stage.


[Footnote A: Duyckinck recalls that, in 1862, R.T. Conrad's
"Devotional Poems" were published, edited by Boker.]

[Footnote B: We find a record of Mrs. John Drew having, as
_Francesca_, supported Davenport when the play was taken to
Philadelphia.]



BROADWAY THEATRE

       *       *       *       *       *

LESSEE               MR. E.A. MARSHALL
STAGE MANAGER           MR. W.R. BLAKE

       *       *       *       *       *

SECOND WEEK OF THE
  REGULAR SEASON!

       *       *       *       *       *

CONTINUATION OF THE ENGAGEMENT OF THE EMINENT

 =AMERICAN ACTOR=

MR. E.L. DAVENPORT

       *       *       *       *       *

FIRST TIME ON ANY STAGE OF

=THE TRAGEDY=

by G.H. BOKER, Esq., author of "Calaynos," "Betrothal," &c called

=Francesca da Rimini=

Will appear in an entirely
ORIGINAL CHARACTER!!

       *       *       *       *       *

This production of a popular and most talented Native Author will be
brought forward with the efficient aid of

ESTABLISHED PERFORMERS!
NEW AND APPROPRIATE SCENERY!!
COSTUMES, PROPERTIES, DECORATIONS!!!
APPOINTMENTS, MUSIC and PAGANTRY!!!!

       *       *       *       *       *

WEDNESDAY EVENING, SEPT 26, 1855
Will be presented the Tragedy, in five acts, by G.H. BOKER, Esq., entitled

    =FRANCESCA=
      =DA=
    =RIMINI=

CHARACTERS REPRESENTED.

_GUELPHS._

Malatesto, (Lord of Rimini)                         Mr. Whiting
LANCIOTTO              {his sons }           Mr. E.L. DAVENPORT
Paolo                  {         }                 Mr. Lanergan
Pepe, (the Jester)                                Mr. C. Flaher
Rosalvi      {                                   }  Mr. Walters
Malvechi     {Young Nobles--companions of Paolo  } Mr. Harcourt
Civanti      {                                   }   Mr. Cutter
Rene, (a Troubadour)                                Mr. Vincent
Nobles, Soldiers, Pages, Troubadours, Attendants, &c, &c.

_GHIBELINS._

Guido da Polenta, (Lord of Ravenna)                  Mr. Canoll
The Cardinal Veechino                                Mr. Hodges
Florensi   {Nobles of Malatesto's Court}             Mr. Willet
Beppo      {                           }                Joraike
Henrico, (Captain of the Guard)                     Mr. Fordyck
Antonio, (A leader of the Forces)                    Mr. Wright
Nobles, Dignitaries of the Church, Soldiers, Pages, Banner
  Bearers, Messengers, &c.

Francesca da Rimini, (Daughter of Guido)             Mme Poniat
Ritta, (her attendent)                          Miss J. Manners

       *       *       *       *       *

TO-MORROW EVENING--A NEW TRAGEDY, in which

        =MR. E.L. DAVENPORT=
                Will appear

       *       *       *       *       *

TREASURER                                         Mr. P. WARREN
ASSISTANT TREASURER                                   Mr. NAGLE
       *       *       *       *       *

Doors open at three quarters past 6 o'clock--Performances will commence
             an half past 7, precisely.




FRANCESCA DA RIMINI

_A TRAGEDY IN FIVE ACTS_[A]

_By_ GEORGE H. BOKER


[Footnote A: The text that follows was compared with Lawrence
Barrett's copy of the second edition, now in the library of The
Players, New York. The title page reads: Plays and Poems: | by |
George H. Boker | In two volumes | Vol. I | Second Edition | Boston: |
Ticknor and Fields. | MDCCCLVII. | | Boker's copyright, 1856.]



DRAMATIS PERSONAE

McVicker's Theatre, Chicago, November 6, 1882

MALATESTA, _Lord of Rimini_               Mr. B.G. Rogers.
GUIDO DA POLENTA, _Lord of Ravenna_       Mr. F.C. Mosley.
LANCIOTTO, _Malatesta's son_              Mr. Lawrence Barrett.
PAOLO, _His brother_                      Mr. Otis Skinner.
PEPE,[1] _Malatesta's jester_             Mr. Louis James.
CARDINAL, _Friend to Guido_               Mr. Charles Rolfe.
RENE,[1] _A troubadour_                   Mr. Percy Winter.
FRANCESCA DA RIMINI, _Guido's daughter_   Miss Marie Wainwright.
RITTA, _Her maid_                         Miss Rosie Batchelder.

_Lords, Ladies, Knights, Priests, Soldiers, Pages, Attendants, etc._


Grand Opera House, Chicago, August 26, 1901.

MALATESTA, _Lord of Rimini_               Mr. W.J. Constantine.
GUIDO DA POLENTA, _Lord of Ravenna_       Mr. E.A. Eberle.
LANCIOTTO, _Malatesta's son_              Mr. Otis Skinner.
PAOLO, _His brother_                      Mr. Aubrey Boucicault.
PEPE, _Malatesta's jester_                Mr. William Norris.
CARDINAL, _Friend to Guido_               Mr. Frederick von Rensselar.
RENE, _A troubadour_                      Mr. Fletcher Norton.
FRANCESCA DA RIMINI, _Guido's daughter_   Miss Marcia Van Dresser.
RITTA, _Her maid_                         Miss Gertrude Norman.

_Lords, Ladies, Knights, Priests, Soldiers, Pages, Attendants, etc._
SCENE. _Rimini, Ravenna, and the neighbourhood._
TIME. _About 1300 A.D._

[Footnote 1: In the original edition, the accents in the names of PEPE
and RENE are used only in the Dramatis Personae, and not in the body of
the book.]




FRANCESCA DA RIMINI

ACT I.


SCENE I. _Rimini. The Garden of the Palace. PAOLO and a number of
noblemen are discovered, seated under an arbour, surrounded by RENE,
and other troubadours, attendants, &c._

  PAOLO. I prithee, Rene, charm our ears again
With the same song you sang me yesterday.
Here are fresh listeners.

  RENE.                   Really, my good lord,
My voice is out of joint. A grievous cold--

                                                                 [_Coughs._

  PAOLO. A very grievous, but convenient cold,
Which always racks you when you would not sing.

  RENE. O, no, my lord! Besides, I hoped to hear
My ditty warbled into fairer ears,
By your own lips; to better purpose, too.

                                                 [_The NOBLEMEN all laugh._

  FIRST NOBLEMAN. Rene has hit it. Music runs to waste
In ears like ours.

  SECOND NOBLEMAN. Nay, nay; chaunt on, sweet Count.

  PAOLO. [_Coughing._] Alack! you hear, I've caught poor Rene's cough.

  FIRST NOBLEMAN. That would not be, if we wore petticoats.

                                                       [_The others laugh._

  PAOLO. O, fie!

  FIRST NOBLEMAN. So runs the scandal to our ears.

  SECOND NOBLEMAN. Confirmed by all our other senses, Count.

  FIRST NOBLEMAN. Witnessed by many a doleful sigh, poured out
By many a breaking heart in Rimini.

  SECOND NOBLEMAN. Poor girls!

  FIRST NOBLEMAN.[_Mimicking a lady._] Sweet Count! sweet
Count Paolo! O!
Plant early violets upon my grave!
Thus go a thousand voices to one tune.

                                                       [_The others laugh._

  PAOLO. 'Ods mercy! gentlemen, you do me wrong.

  FIRST NOBLEMAN. And by how many hundred, more or less?

  PAOLO. Ah! rogues, you'd shift your sins upon my shoulders.

  SECOND NOBLEMAN. You'd bear them stoutly.

  FIRST NOBLEMAN.                           It were vain to give
Drops to god Neptune. You're the sea of love
That swallows all things.

  SECOND NOBLEMAN.        We the little fish
That meanly scull about within your depths.

  PAOLO. Goon, goon! Talk yourselves fairly out.
                                                    [PEPE _laughs without._
But, hark! here comes the fool! Fit company
For this most noble company of wits!

    [_Enter_ PEPE, _laughing violently._]

Why do you laugh?

  PEPE.           I'm laughing at the world.
It has laughed long enough at me; and so
I'll turn the tables. Ho! ho! ho! I've heard
A better joke of Uncle Malatesta's
Than any I e'er uttered.                                       [_Laughing._

  ALL. Tell it, fool.

  PEPE. Why, do you know--upon my life, the best
And most original idea on earth:
A joke to put in practice, too. By Jove!
I'll bet my wit 'gainst the stupidity
Of the best gentleman among you all,
You cannot guess it.

  ALL.               Tell us, tell us, fool.

  PEPE. Guess it, guess it, fools.

  PAOLO                            Come, disclose, disclose!

  PEPE. He has a match afoot.--

  ALL.                          A match!

  PEPE.                                  A marriage.

  ALL. Who?--who?

  PEPE.           A marriage in his family.

  ALL. But, who?

  PEPE.          Ah! there's the point.

  ALL.                                  Paolo?

  PEPE.                                        No.

  FIRST NOBLEMAN. The others are well wived. Shall we turn Turks?

  PEPE. Why, there's the summit of his joke, good sirs.
By all the sacred symbols of my art--
By cap and bauble, by my tinkling bell--
He means to marry Lanciotto!
                                                       [_Laughs violently._

  ALL. [Laughing.] Ho!--

  PAOLO. Peace! peace! What tongue dare echo yon fool's laugh?
Nay, never raise your hands in wonderment:
I'll strike the dearest friend among ye all
Beneath my feet, as if he were a slave,
Who dares insult my brother with a laugh!

  PEPE. By Jove! ye're sad enough. Here's mirth's quick cure!
Pretty Paolo has a heavy fist,
I warn you, sirs. Ho! ho! I trapped them all;
                                                              [_Laughing._]
Now I'll go mar old Malatesta's message.                          [_Aside._
                                                                   [_Exit._

  PAOLO. Shame on ye, sirs! I have mistaken you.
I thought I harboured better friends. Poor fops,
Who've slept in down and satin all your years,
Within the circle Lanciotto charmed
Round Rimini with his most potent sword!--
Fellows whose brows would melt beneath a casque,
Whose hands would fray to grasp a brand's rough hilt,
Who ne'er launched more than braggart threats at foes!--
Girlish companions of luxurious girls!--
Danglers round troubadours and wine-cups!--Men
Whose best parts are their clothes! bundles of silk,
Scented like summer! rag-men, nothing more!--
Creatures as generous as monkeys--brave
As hunted hares--courteous as grinning apes--
Grateful as serpents--useful as lap-dogs--
                           [_During this, the_ NOBLEMEN, _&c., steal off._]
                                            Ha!
I am alone at last! So let me be,
Till Lanciotto fill the vacant room
Of these mean knaves, whose friendship is but breath.              [_Exit._




SCENE II.


_The Same. A Hall in the Castle. Enter_ MALATESTA _and_ LANCIOTTO.

  MALATESTA. Guido, ay, Guido of Ravenna, son--
Down on his knees, as full of abject prayers
For peace and mercy as a penitent.

  LANCIOTTO. His old trick, father. While his wearied arm
Is raised in seeming prayer, it only rests.
Anon, he'll deal you such a staggering blow,
With its recovered strength, as shall convert
You, and not him, into a penitent.

  MALATESTA. No, no; your last bout levelled him. He reeled
Into Ravenna, from the battle-field,
Like a stripped drunkard, and there headlong fell--
A mass of squalid misery, a thing
To draw the jeering urchins. I have this
From faithful spies. There's not a hope remains
To break the shock of his great overthrow.
I pity Guido.

  LANCIOTTO. 'Sdeath! go comfort him!
I pity those who fought, and bled, and died,
Before the armies of this Ghibelin.
I pity those who halted home with wounds
Dealt by his hand. I pity widowed eyes
That he set running; maiden hearts that turn,
Sick with despair, from ranks thinned down by him;
Mothers that shriek, as the last stragglers fling
Their feverish bodies by the fountain-side,
Dumb with mere thirst, and faintly point to him,
Answering the dame's quick questions. I have seen
Unburied bones, and skulls--that seemed to ask,
From their blank eye-holes, vengeance at my hand--
Shine in the moonlight on old battle-fields;
And even these--the happy dead, my lord--
I pity more than Guido of Ravenna!

  MALATESTA. What would you have?

  LANCIOTTO.                      I'd see Ravenna burn,
Flame into heaven, and scorch the flying clouds;
I'd choke her streets with ruined palaces;
I'd hear her women scream with fear and grief,
As I have heard the maids of Rimini.
All this I'd sprinkle with old Guido's blood,
And bless the baptism.

  MALATESTA.           You are cruel.

  LANCIOTTO.                          Not I;
But these things ache within my fretting brain.
The sight I first beheld was from the arms
Of my wild nurse, her husband hacked to death
By the fierce edges of these Ghibelins.
One cut across the neck--I see it now,
Ay, and have mimicked it a thousand times,
Just as I saw it, on our enemies.--
Why, that cut seemed as if it meant to bleed
On till the judgment. My distracted nurse
Stooped down, and paddled in the running gore
With her poor fingers; then a prophetess,
Pale with the inspiration of the god,
She towered aloft, and with her dripping hand
Three times she signed me with the holy cross.
Tis all as plain as noon-day. Thus she spake,--
"May this spot stand till Guido's dearest blood
Be mingled with thy own!" The soldiers say,
In the close battle, when my wrath is up,
The dead man's blood flames on my vengeful brow
Like a red planet; and when war is o'er,
It shrinks into my brain, defiling all
My better nature with its slaughterous lusts.
Howe'er it be, it shaped my earliest thought,
And it will shape my last.

  MALATESTA.               You moody churl!
You dismal knot of superstitious dreams!
Do you not blush to empty such a head
Before a sober man? Why, son, the world
Has not given o'er its laughing humour yet,
That you should try it with such vagaries.--Poh!
I'll get a wife to teach you common sense.

  LANCIOTTO. A wife for me!                                    [_Laughing._

  MALATESTA.                Ay, sir, a wife for you.
You shall be married, to insure your wits.

  LANCIOTTO. 'Tis not your wont to mock me.

  MALATESTA.                                How now, son!
I am not given to jesting. I have chosen
The fairest wife in Italy for you.
You won her bravely, as a soldier should:
And when you'd woo her, stretch your gauntlet out,
And crush her fingers in its steely grip.
If you will plead, I ween, she dare not say--
No, by your leave. Should she refuse, howe'er,
With that same iron hand you shall go knock
Upon Ravenna's gates, till all the town
Ring with your courtship. I have made her hand
The price and pledge of Guido's future peace.

  LANCIOTTO. All this is done!

  MALATESTA.                   Done, out of hand; and now
I wait a formal answer, nothing more.
Guido dare not decline. No, by the saints,
He'd send Ravenna's virgins here in droves,
To buy a ten days' truce.

  LANCIOTTO. Sir, let me say,
You stretch paternal privilege too far,
To pledge my hand without my own consent.
Am I a portion of your household stuff,
That you should trade me off to Guido thus?
Who is the lady I am bartered for?

  MALATESTA. Francesca, Guido's daughter.--Never frown;
It shall be so!

  LANCIOTTO.  By heaven, it shall not be!
My blood shall never mingle with his race.

  MALATESTA. According to your nurse's prophecy,
Fate orders it.

  LANCIOTTO.     Ha!

  MALATESTA.         Now, then, I have struck
The chord that answers to your gloomy thoughts.
Bah! on your sibyl and her prophecy!
Put Guido's blood aside, and yet, I say,
Marry you shall.

  LANCIOTTO.     'Tis most distasteful, sir.

  MALATESTA. Lanciotto, look ye! You brave gentlemen,
So fond of knocking out poor people's brains,
In time must come to have your own knocked out:
What, then, if you bequeath us no new hands,
To carry on your business, and our house
Die out for lack of princes?

  LANCIOTTO.                 Wed my brothers:
They'll rear you sons, I'll slay you enemies.
Paolo and Francesca! Note their names;
They chime together like sweet marriage-bells.
A proper match. 'Tis said she's beautiful;
And he is the delight of Rimini,--
The pride and conscious centre of all eyes,
The theme of poets, the ideal of art,
The earthly treasury of Heaven's best gifts!
I am a soldier; from my very birth,
Heaven cut me out for terror, not for love.
I had such fancies once, but now--

  MALATESTA.                       Pshaw! son,
My faith is bound to Guido; and if you
Do not throw off your duty, and defy,
Through sickly scruples, my express commands,
You'll yield at once. No more: I'll have it so!                    [_Exit._

  LANCIOTTO. Curses upon my destiny! What, I--
Ho! I have found my use at last--What, I,
I, the great twisted monster of the wars,
The brawny cripple, the herculean dwarf,
The spur of panic, and the butt of scorn--
be a bridegroom! Heaven, was I not cursed
More than enough, when thou didst fashion me
To be a type of ugliness,--a thing
By whose comparison all Rimini
Holds itself beautiful? Lo! here I stand,
A gnarled, blighted trunk! There's not a knave
So spindle-shanked, so wry-faced, so infirm,
Who looks at me, and smiles not on himself.
And I have friends to pity me--great Heaven!
One has a favourite leg that he bewails,--
Another sees my hip with doleful plaints,--
A third is sorry o'er my huge swart arms,--
A fourth aspires to mount my very hump,
And thence harangue his weeping brotherhood!
Pah! it is nauseous! Must I further bear
The sidelong shuddering glances of a wife?
The degradation of a showy love,
That over-acts, and proves the mummer's craft
Untouched by nature? And a fair wife, too!--
Francesca, whom the minstrels sing about!
Though, by my side, what woman were not fair?
Circe looked well among her swine, no doubt;
Next me, she'd pass for Venus. Ho! ho! ho!                    [_Laughing._]
Would there were something merry in my laugh!
Now, in the battle, if a Ghibelin
Cry, "Wry-hip! hunchback!" I can trample him
Under my stallion's hoofs; or haggle him
Into a monstrous likeness of myself:
But to be pitied,--to endure a sting
Thrust in by kindness, with a sort of smile!--
'Sdeath! it is miserable!

    [_Enter_ PEPE.

  PEPE.                   My lord--

  LANCIOTTO.                        My fool!

  PEPE. We'll change our titles when your bride's bells ring--
Ha, cousin?

  LANCIOTTO. Even this poor fool has eyes,
To see the wretched plight in which I stand.
                                                                 [_Aside._]
How, gossip, how?

  PEPE.           I, being the court-fool,
Am lord of fools by my prerogative.

  LANCIOTTO. Who told you of my marriage?

  PEPE.                                   Rimini!
A frightful liar; but true for once, I fear.
The messenger from Guido has returned,
And the whole town is wailing over him.
Some pity you, and some the bride; but I,
Being more catholic, I pity both.

  LANCIOTTO. Still, pity, pity! [_Aside. Bells toll._] Ha! whose knell is that?

  PEPE. Lord Malatesta sent me to the tower,
To have the bells rung for your marriage-news.
How, he said not; so I, as I thought fit,
Told the deaf sexton to ring out a knell.
                                                            [_Bells toll._]
How do you like it?

  LANCIOTTO.        Varlet, have you bones,
To risk their breaking? I have half a mind
To thresh you from your motley coat!
                                                             [_Seizes him._

  PEPE.                                  Pardee!
Respect my coxcomb, cousin. Hark! ha, ha!
                                                              [_Laughing._]
                        [_Bells ring a joyful peal._]
Some one has changed my music. Heaven defend!
How the bells jangle. Yonder graybeard, now,
Rings a peal vilely. He's more used to knells,
And sounds them grandly. Only give him time,
And, I'll be sworn, he'll ring your knell out yet.

  LANCIOTTO. Pepe, you are but half a fool.

  PEPE.                                     My lord,
I can return the compliment in full.

  LANCIOTTO. So, you are ready.

  PEPE.                         Truth is always so.

  LANCIOTTO. I shook you rudely; here's a florin.
                                                           [_Offers money._

  PEPE.                           No:
My wit is merchandise, but not my honour.

  LANCIOTTO. Your honour, sirrah!

  PEPE.                           Why not? You great lords
Have something you call lordly honour; pray,
May not a fool have foolish honour, too?
Cousin, you laid your hand upon my coat--
'Twas the first sacrilege it ever knew--And
you shall pay it. Mark! I promise you.

  LANCIOTTO. [_Laughing._] Ha, ha! you bluster well. Upon my life,
You have the tilt-yard jargon to a breath.
Pepe, if I should smite you on the cheek--
Thus, gossip, thus--[_Strikes him._] what would you then demand?

  PEPE. Your life!

  LANCIOTTO. [_Laughing._] Ha, ha! there is the camp-style, too,
A very cut-throat air! How this shrewd fool
Makes the punctilio of honour show!
Change helmets into coxcombs, swords to baubles,
And what a figure is poor chivalry!
Thanks for your lesson, Pepe.
                                                                   [_Exit._

  PEPE.                        Ere I'm done,
You'll curse as heartily, you limping beast!
Ha! so we go--Lord Lanciotto, look!
                                            [_Walks about, mimicking him._]
Here is a leg and camel-back, forsooth,
To match your honour and nobility!
You miscreated scarecrow, dare you shake,
Or strike in jest, a natural man like me?--
You cursed lump, you chaos of a man,
To buffet one whom Heaven pronounces good!
                                                            [_Bells ring._]
There go the bells rejoicing over you:
I'll change them back to the old knell again.
You marry, faugh! Beget a race of elves;
Wed a she-crocodile, and keep within
The limits of your nature! Here we go,
Tripping along to meet our promised bride,
Like a rheumatic elephant!--ha, ha!                            [_Laughing._

                                               [_Exit, mimicking_ LANCIOTTO.




SCENE III.


_The Same. A Room in the Same. Enter_ LANCIOTTO, _hastily._

  LANCIOTTO. Why do these prodigies environ me?
In ancient Rome, the words a fool might drop,
From the confusion of his vagrant thoughts,
Were held as omens, prophecies; and men
Who made earth tremble with majestic deeds,
Trembled themselves at fortune's lightest threat.
I like it not. My father named this match
While I boiled over with vindictive wrath
Towards Guido and Ravenna. Straight my heart
Sank down like lead; a weakness seized on me,
A dismal gloom that I could not resist;
I lacked the power to take my stand, and say--
Bluntly, I will not! Am I in the toils?
Has fate so weakened me, to work its end?
There seems a fascination in it, too,--
A morbid craving to pursue a thing
Whose issue may be fatal. Would that I
Were in the wars again! These mental weeds
Grow on the surface of inactive peace.
I'm haunted by myself. Thought preys on thought.
My mind seems crowded in the hideous mould
That shaped my body. What a fool am I
To bear the burden of my wretched life,
To sweat and toil under the world's broad eye,
Climb into fame, and find myself--O, what?--
A most conspicuous monster! Crown my head,
Pile Caesar's purple on me--and what then?
My hump shall shorten the imperial robe,
My leg peep out beneath the scanty hem,
My broken hip shall twist the gown awry;
And pomp, instead of dignifying me,
Shall be by me made quite ridiculous.
The faintest coward would not bear all this:
Prodigious courage must be mine, to live;
To die asks nothing but weak will, and I
Feel like a craven. Let me skulk away
Ere life o'ertask me.                            [_Offers to stab himself._

    _Enter_ PAOLO.

  PAOLO. [_Seizing his hand._] Brother! what is this?
Lanciotto, are you mad? Kind Heaven! look here--
Straight in my eyes. Now answer, do you know
How near you were to murder? Dare you bend
Your wicked hand against a heart I love?
Were it for you to mourn your wilful death,
With such a bitterness as would be ours,
The wish would ne'er have crossed you. While we're bound
Life into life, a chain of loving hearts,
Were it not base in you, the middle link,
To snap, and scatter all? Shame, brother, shame!
I thought you better metal.

  LANCIOTTO.                Spare your words.
I know the seasons of our human grief,
And can predict them without almanac.
A few sobs o'er the body, and a few
Over the coffin; then a sigh or two,
Whose windy passage dries the hanging tear;
Perchance, some wandering memories, some regrets;
Then a vast influx of consoling thoughts--
Based on the trials of the sadder days
Which the dead missed; and then a smiling face
Turned on to-morrow. Such is mortal grief.
It writes its histories within a span,
And never lives to read them.

  PAOLO.                      Lanciotto,
I heard the bells of Rimini, just now,
Exulting o'er your coming marriage-day,
While you conspired to teach them gloomier sounds.
Why are you sad?

  LANCIOTTO.     Paolo, I am wretched;
Sad's a faint word. But of my marriage-bells--
Heard you the knell that Pepe rang?

  PAOLO.                            'Twas strange:
A sullen antic of his crabbed wit.

  LANCIOTTO. It was portentous. All dumb things find tongues
Against this marriage. As I passed the hall,
My armour glittered on the wall, and I
Paused by the harness, as before a friend
Whose well-known features slack our hurried gait;
Francesca's name was fresh upon my mind,
So I half-uttered it. Instant, my sword
Leaped from its scabbard, as with sudden life,
Plunged down and pierced into the oaken floor,
Shivering with fear! Lo! while I gazed upon it--
Doubting the nature of the accident--
Around the point appeared a spot of blood,
Oozing upon the floor, that spread and spread--
As I stood gasping by in speechless horror--
Ring beyond ring, until the odious tide
Crawled to my feet, and lapped them, like the tongues
Of angry serpents! O, my God! I fled
At the first touch of the infernal stain!
Go--you may see--go to the hall!

  PAOLO.                         Fie! man,
You have been ever played on in this sort
By your wild fancies. When your heart is high,
You make them playthings; but in lower moods,
They seem to sap the essence of your soul,
And drain your manhood to its poorest dregs.

  LANCIOTTO. Go look, go look!

  PAOLO. [_Goes to the door, and returns._] There sticks the sword, indeed,
Just as your tread detached it from its sheath;
Looking more like a blessed cross, I think,
Than a bad looking omen. As for blood--Ha, ha!
                                                              [_Laughing._]
It sets mine dancing. Pshaw! away with this!
Deck up your face with smiles. Go trim yourself
For the young bride. New velvet, gold, and gems,
Do wonders for us. Brother, come; I'll be
Your tiring-man, for once.

  LANCIOTTO.               Array this lump--
Paolo, hark! There are some human thoughts
Best left imprisoned in the aching heart,
Lest the freed malefactors should dispread
Infamous ruin with their liberty.
There's not a man--the fairest of ye all--
Who is not fouler than he seems. This life
Is one unending struggle to conceal
Our baseness from our fellows. Here stands one
In vestal whiteness with a lecher's lust;--
There sits a judge, holding law's scales in hands
That itch to take the bribe he dare not touch;--
Here goes a priest with heavenward eyes, whose soul
Is Satan's council-chamber;--there a doctor,
With nature's secrets wrinkled round a brow
Guilty with conscious ignorance;--and here
A soldier rivals Hector's bloody deeds--
Out-does the devil in audacity--
With craven longings fluttering in a heart
That dares do aught but fly! Thus are we all
Mere slaves and alms-men to a scornful world,
That takes us at our seeming.

  PAOLO.                      Say 'tis true;
What do you drive at?

  LANCIOTTO.          At myself, full tilt.
I, like the others, am not what I seem.
Men call me gentle, courteous, brave.--They lie!
I'm harsh, rude, and a coward. Had I nerve
To cast my devils out upon the earth,
I'd show this laughing planet what a hell
Of envy, malice, cruelty, and scorn,
It has forced back to canker in the heart
Of one poor cripple!

  PAOLO.             Ha!

  LANCIOTTO.             Ay, now 'tis out!
A word I never breathed to man before.
Can you, who are a miracle of grace,
Feel what it is to be a wreck like me?
Paolo, look at me. Is there a line,
In my whole bulk of wretched contraries,
That nature in a nightmare ever used
Upon her shapes till now? Find me the man,
Or beast, or tree, or rock, or nameless thing,
So out of harmony with all things else,
And I'll go raving with bare happiness,--
Ay, and I'll marry Helena of Greece,
And swear I do her honour!

  PAOLO.                   Lanciotto,
I, who have known you from a stripling up,
Never observed, or, if I did, ne'er weighed
Your special difference from the rest of men.
You're not Apollo--

  LANCIOTTO.        No!

  PAOLO.               Nor yet are you
A second Pluto. Could I change with you--
My graces for your nobler qualities--
Your strength, your courage, your renown--by heaven,
We'd e'en change persons, to the finest hair.

  LANCIOTTO. You should be flatterer to an emperor.

  PAOLO. I am but just. Let me beseech you, brother.
To look with greater favour on yourself;
Nor suffer misty phantoms of your brain
To take the place of sound realities.
Go to Ravenna, wed your bride, and lull
Your cruel delusions in domestic peace.
Ghosts fly a fireside; 'tis their wont to stalk
Through empty houses, and through empty hearts.
I know Francesca will be proud of you.
Women admire you heroes. Rusty sages,
Pale poets, and scarred warriors, have been
Their idols ever; while we fair plump fools
Are elbowed to the wall, or only used
For vacant pastime.

  LANCIOTTO.        To Ravenna?--no!
In Rimini they know me; at Ravenna
I'd be a new-come monster, and exposed
To curious wonder. There will be parade
Of all the usual follies of the state;
Fellows with trumpets, tinselled coats, and wands,
Would strut before me, like vain mountebanks
Before their monkeys. Then, I should be stared
Out of my modesty; and when they look,
How can I tell if 'tis the bridegroom's face
Or hump that draws their eyes? I will not go.
To please you all, I'll marry; but to please
The wonder-mongers of Ravenna--Ha!
Paolo, now I have it. You shall go,
To bring Francesca; and you'll speak of me,
Not as I ought to be, but as I am.
If she draw backward, give her rein; and say
That neither Guido-nor herself shall feel
The weight of my displeasure. You may say,
I pity her--

  PAOLO.     For what?

  LANCIOTTO.           For wedding me.
In sooth, she'll need it. Say--

  PAOLO. Nay, Lanciotto,
I'll be a better orator in your behalf,
Without your promptings.

  LANCIOTTO.             She is fair, 'tis said;
And, dear Paolo, if she please your eye,
And move your heart to anything like love,
Wed her yourself. The peace would stand as firm
By such a match.

  PAOLO. [_Laughing._] Ha! that is right: be gay!
Ply me with jokes! I'd rather see you smile
Than see the sun shine.

  LANCIOTTO.            I am serious.
I'll find another wife, less beautiful,
More on my level, and--

  PAOLO.                An empress, brother,
Were honoured by your hand. You are by much
Too humble in your reckoning of yourself.
I can count virtues in you, to supply
Half Italy, if they were parcelled out.
Look up!

  LANCIOTTO. I cannot: Heaven has bent me down.
To you, Paolo, I could look, however,
Were my hump made a mountain. Bless him, God!
Pour everlasting bounties on his head!
Make Croesus jealous of his treasury,
Achilles of his arms, Endymion
Of his fresh beauties,--though the coy one lay,
Blushing beneath Diana's earliest kiss,
On grassy Latmos; and may every good,
Beyond man's sight, though in the ken of heaven,
Round his fair fortune to a perfect end!
O, you have dried the sorrow of my eyes;
My heart is beating with a lighter pulse;
The air is musical; the total earth
Puts on new beauty, and within the arms
Of girding ocean dreams her time away,
And visions bright to-morrows!

    _Enter_ MALATESTA _and_ PEPE.

  MALATESTA.                    Mount, to horse!

  PEPE. [_Aside._] Good Lord! he's smiling! What's the matter now?
Has anybody broken a leg or back?
Has a more monstrous monster come to life?
Is hell burst open?--heaven burnt up? What, what
Can make yon eyesore grin?--I say, my lord,
What cow has calved?

  PAOLO. Your mother, by the bleat.

  PEPE. Right fairly answered--for a gentleman!
When did you take my trade up?

  PAOLO. When your wit
Went begging, sirrah.

  PEPE. Well again! My lord,
I think he'll do.

  MALATESTA. For what?

  PEPE. To take my place.
Once fools were rare, and then my office sped;
But now the world is overrun with them:
One gets one's fool in one's own family,
Without much searching.

  MALATESTA.            Pepe, gently now.
Lanciotto, you are waited for. The train
Has passed the gate, and halted there for you.

  LANCIOTTO. I go not to Ravenna.

  MALATESTA.                      Hey! why not?

  PAOLO. For weighty reasons, father. Will you trust
Your greatest captain, hope of all the Guelfs,
With crafty Guido? Should the Ghibelins
Break faith, and shut Lanciotto in their walls--
Sure the temptation would be great enough--
What would you do?

  MALATESTA.       I'd eat Ravenna up!

  PEPE. Lord! what an appetite!

  PAOLO.                        But Lanciotto
Would be a precious hostage.

  MALATESTA.                 True; you're wise;
Guido's a fox. Well, have it your own way.
What is your plan?

  PAOLO.           I go there in his place.

  MALATESTA. Good! I will send a letter with the news.

  LANCIOTTO. I thank you, brother.                       [_Apart to PAOLO._

  PEPE. Ha! ha! ha!--O! O! [_Laughing._

  MALATESTA. Pepe, what now?

  PEPE.                      O! lord, O!--ho! ho! ho!          [_Laughing._

  PAOLO. Well, giggler?

  PEPE.                 Hear my fable, uncle.

  MALATESTA.                                  Ay.

  PEPE. Once on a time, Vulcan sent Mercury
To fetch dame Venus from a romp in heaven.
Well, they were long in coming, as he thought;
And so the god of spits and gridirons
Railed like himself--the devil. But--now mark--
Here comes the moral. In a little while,
Vulcan grew proud, because he saw plain signs
That he should be a father; and so he
Strutted through hell, and pushed the devils by,
Like a magnifico of Venice. Ere long,
His heir was born; but then--ho! ho!--the brat
Had wings upon his heels, and thievish ways,
And a vile squint, like errant Mercury's,
Which honest Vulcan could not understand;--
Can you?

  PAOLO. 'Sdeath! fool, I'll have you in the stocks.
Father, your fool exceeds his privilege.

  PEPE. [_Apart to_ PAOLO.] Keep your own bounds, Paolo. In the stocks
I'd tell more fables than you'd wish to hear.
And so ride forth. But, cousin, don't forget
To take Lanciotto's picture to the bride.
Ask her to choose between it and yourself.
I'll count the moments, while she hesitates,
And not grow gray at it.

  PAOLO.                 Peace, varlet, peace!

  PEPE. [_Apart to him._] Ah, now I have it. There's an elephant
Upon the scutcheon; show her that, and say--
Here's Lanciotto in our heraldry!

  PAOLO. Here's for your counsel!
                              [_Strikes_ PEPE, _who runs behind MALATESTA._

  MALATESTA.                      Son, son, have a care!
We who keep pets must bear their pecks sometimes.
Poor knave! Ha! ha! thou'rt growing villainous!
                                                  [_Laughs and pats PEPE._

  PEPE. Another blow! another life for that!                      [_Aside._

  PAOLO. Farewell, Lanciotto. You are dull again.

  LANCIOTTO. Nature will rule.

  MALATESTA.                   Come, come!

  LANCIOTTO.                               God speed you, brother!
I am too sad; my smiles all turn to sighs.

  PAOLO. More cause to haste me on my happy work.
                                                    [_Exit with_ MALATESTA.

  PEPE. I'm going, cousin.

  LANCIOTTO.               Go.

  PEPE.                        Pray, ask me where.

  LANCIOTTO. Where, then?

  PEPE.                   To have my jewel carried home:
And, as I'm wise, the carrier shall be
A thief, a thief, by Jove! The fashion's new.
                                                                   [_Exit._

  LANCIOTTO. In truth, I am too gloomy and irrational.
Paolo must be right. I always had
These moody hours and dark presentiments,
Without mischances following after them.
The camp is my abode. A neighing steed,
A fiery onset, and a stubborn fight,
Rouse my dull blood, and tire my body down
To quiet slumbers when the day is o'er,
And night above me spreads her spangled tent,
Lit by the dying cresset of the moon.
Ay, that is it; I'm homesick for the camp.
                                                                   [_Exit._




ACT II.



SCENE I. _Ravenna. A Room in_ GUIDO'S _Palace. Enter_ GUIDO _and a_
CARDINAL.

  CARDINAL. I warn thee, Count.

  GUIDO.                        I'll take the warning, father,
On one condition: show me but a way
For safe escape.

  CARDINAL.      I cannot.

  GUIDO.                   There's the point.
We Ghibelins are fettered hand and foot.
There's not a florin in my treasury;
Not a lame soldier, I can lead to war;
Not one to man the walls. A present siege,
Pushed with the wonted heat of Lanciotto,
Would deal Ravenna such a mortal blow
As ages could not mend. Give me but time
To fill the drained arteries of the land.
The Guelfs are masters, we their slaves; and we
Were wiser to confess it, ere the lash
Teach it too sternly. It is well for you
To say you love Francesca. So do I;
But neither you nor I have any voice
For or against this marriage.

  CARDINAL.                   'Tis too true.

  GUIDO. Say we refuse: Why, then, before a week,
We'll hear Lanciotto rapping at our door,
With twenty hundred ruffians at his back.
What's to say then? My lord, we waste our breath.
Let us look fortune in the face, and draw
Such comfort from the wanton as we may.

  CARDINAL. And yet I fear--

  GUIDO.                     You fear! and so do I.
I fear Lanciotto as a soldier, though,
More than a son-in-law.

  CARDINAL.             But have you seen him?

  GUIDO. Ay, ay, and felt him, too. I've seen him ride
The best battalions of my horse and foot
Down like mere stubble: I have seen his sword
Hollow a square of pikemen, with the ease
You'd scoop a melon out.

  CARDINAL.              Report declares him
A prodigy of strength and ugliness.

  GUIDO. Were he the devil--But why talk of this?--
Here comes Francesca.

  CARDINAL.           Ah! unhappy child!

GUIDO. Look you, my lord! you'll make the best of it;
You will not whimper. Add your voice to mine,
Or woe to poor Ravenna!

    _Enter_ FRANCESCA _and_ RITTA.

  FRANCESCA.            Ha! my lord--
And you, my father!--But do I intrude
Upon your counsels? How severe you look!
Shall I retire?

  GUIDO.        No, no.

  FRANCESCA.            You moody men
Seem leagued against me. As I passed the hall,
I met your solemn Dante, with huge strides
Pacing in measure to his stately verse.
The sweeping sleeves of his broad scarlet robe
Blew out behind, like wide-expanded wings,
And seemed to buoy him in his level flight.
Thinking to pass, without disturbing him,
I stole on tip-toe; but the poet paused,
Subsiding into man, and steadily
Bent on my face the lustre of his eyes.
Then, taking both my trembling hands in his--
You know how his God-troubled forehead awes--
He looked into my eyes, and shook his head,
As if he dared not speak of what he saw;
Then muttered, sighed, and slowly turned away
The weight of his intolerable brow.
When I glanced back, I saw him, as before,
Sailing adown the hall on out-spread wings.
Indeed, my lord, he should not do these things;
They strain the weakness of mortality
A jot too far. As for poor Ritta, she
Fled like a doe, the truant.

  RITTA.                     Yes, forsooth:
There's something terrible about the man.
Ugh! if he touched me, I should turn to ice.
I wonder if Count Lanciotto looks--

  GUIDO. Ritta, come here.                              [_Takes her apart._

  RITTA.                   My lord.

  GUIDO.                            'Twas my command,
You should say nothing of Count Lanciotto.

  RITTA. Nothing, my lord.

  GUIDO.                   You have said nothing, then?

  RITTA. Indeed, my lord.

  GUIDO.                  'Tis well. Some years ago,
My daughter had a very silly maid,
Who told her sillier stories. So, one day,
This maiden whispered something I forbade--
In strictest confidence, for she was sly:
What happened, think you?

  RITTA.                  I know not, my lord.

  GUIDO. I boiled her in a pot.

  RITTA.                        Good heaven! my lord.

  GUIDO. She did not like it. I shall keep that pot
Ready for the next boiling.

                                               [_Walks back to the others._

  RITTA.                    Saints above!
I wonder if he ate her! Boil me--me!
I'll roast or stew with pleasure; but to boil
Implies a want of tenderness,--or rather
A downright toughness--in the matter boiled,
That's slanderous to a maiden. What, boil me--
Boil me! O! mercy, how ridiculous!

                                                      [_Retires, laughing._

    _Enter a_ MESSENGER.

  MESSENGER. Letters, my lord, from great Prince Malatesta.
                                                [_Presents them, and exit._

  GUIDO. [_Aside._] Hear him, ye gods!--"from great Prince Malatesta!"
Greeting, no doubt, his little cousin Guido.
Well, well, just so we see-saw up and down.
                                                                 [_Reads._]
_"Fearing our treachery,"_--by heaven, that's blunt,
And Malatesta-like!--_"he will not send
His son, Lanciotto, to Ravenna, but"_--
But what?--a groom, a porter? or will he
Have his prey sent him in an iron cage?
By Jove, he shall not have her! O! no, no;
_"He sends his younger son, the Count Paolo,
To fetch Francesca back to Rimini."_
That's well, if he had left his reasons out.
And, in a postscript--by the saints, 'tis droll!--
_"'Twould not be worth your lordship's while to shut
Paolo in a prison; for, my lord,
I'll only pay his ransom in plain steel:
Besides, he's not worth having."_ Is there one,
Save this ignoble offshoot of the Goths,
Who'd write such garbage to a gentleman?
Take that, and read it.                        [_Gives letter to_ CARDINAL.

  CARDINAL.             I have done the most.
She seems suspicious.

  GUIDO.              Ritta's work.

  CARDINAL.                         Farewell!

  FRANCESCA. Father, you seem distempered.

  GUIDO.                                   No, my child,
I am but vexed. Your husband's on the road,
Close to Ravenna. What's the time of day?

  FRANCESCA. Past noon, my lord.

  GUIDO.                         We must be stirring, then.

  FRANCESCA. I do not like this marriage.

  GUIDO.                                  But I do.

  FRANCESCA. But I do not. Poh! to be given away,
Like a fine horse or falcon, to a man
Whose face I never saw!

  RITTA.                That's it, my lady.

  GUIDO. Ritta, run down, and see if my great pot
Boils to your liking.

  RITTA. [_Aside._]  O! that pot again!
My lord, my heart betrays me; but you know
How true 'tis to my lady.                                          [_Exit._

  FRANCESCA.              What ails Ritta?

  GUIDO. The ailing of your sex, a running tongue.
Francesca, 'tis too late to beat retreat:
Old Malatesta has me--you, too, child--
Safe in his clutch. If you are not content,
I must unclose Ravenna, and allow
His son to take you. Poh, poh! have a soul
Equal with your estate. A prince's child
Cannot choose husbands. Her desires must aim,
Not at herself, but at the public good.
Both as your prince and father, I command;
As subject and good daughter, you'll obey.

  FRANCESCA. I knew that it must be my destiny,
Some day, to give my hand without my heart;
But--

  GUIDO. But, and I will but you back again!
When Guido da Polenta says to you,
Daughter, you must be married,--what were best?

  FRANCESCA. 'Twere best Francesca, of the self-same name,
Made herself bridal garments.                                  [_Laughing._

  GUIDO.                      Right!

  FRANCESCA.                         My lord,
Is Lanciotto handsome--ugly--fair--
Black--sallow--crabbed--kind--or what is he?

  GUIDO. You'll know ere long. I could not alter him,
To please your taste.

  FRANCESCA.          You always put me off;
You never have a whisper in his praise.

  GUIDO. The world reports it.--Count my soldiers' scars,
And you may sum Lanciotto's glories up.

  FRANCESCA. I shall be dutiful, to please you, father.
If aught befall me through my blind submission,
Though I may suffer, you must bear the sin.
Beware, my lord, for your own peace of mind!
My part has been obedience; and now
I play it over to complete my task;
And it shall be with smiles upon my lips,--
Heaven only knows with what a sinking heart!
                                                                 [_Exeunt._




SCENE II.


_The Same. Before the Gates of the City. The walls hung with banners,
flowers, etc., and crowded with citizens. At the side of the scene is
a canopied dais, with chairs of state upon it. Music, bells, shouts,
and other sounds of rejoicing, are occasionally heard. Enter_ GUIDO,
_the_ CARDINAL, NOBLEMEN, KNIGHTS, GUARDS, _etc., with banners, arms,
etc._

  GUIDO. My lord, I'll have it so. You talk in vain.
Paolo is a marvel in his way:
I've seen him often. If Francesca take
A fancy to his beauty, all the better;
For she may think that he and Lanciotto
Are like as blossoms of one parent branch.
In truth, they are, so far as features go--
Heaven help the rest! Get her to Rimini,
By any means, and I shall be content.
The fraud cannot last long; but long enough
To win her favour to the family.

  CARDINAL. Tis a dull trick. Thou hast not dealt with her
Wisely nor kindly, and I dread the end.
If, when this marriage was enjoined on thee,
Thou hadst informed Francesca of the truth,
And said, Now daughter, choose between
Thy peace and all Ravenna's; who that knows
The constant nature of her noble heart
Could doubt the issue? There'd have been some tears,
Some frightful fancies of her husband's looks;
And then she'd calmly walk up to her fate,
And bear it bravely. Afterwards, perchance,
Lanciotto might prove better than her fears,--
No one denies him many an excellence,--
And all go happily. But, as thou wouldst plot,
She'll be prepared to see a paragon,
And find a satyr. It is dangerous.
Treachery with enemies is bad enough,
With friends 'tis fatal.

  GUIDO.                 Has your lordship done?

  CARDINAL. Never, Count Guido, with so good a text.
Do not stand looking sideways at the truth;
Craft has become thy nature. Go to her.

  GUIDO. I have not heart.

  CARDINAL.                I have.                                [_Going._

  GUIDO.                           Hold, Cardinal!
My plan is better. Get her off my hands,
And I care not.

  CARDINAL.     What will she say of thee,
In Rimini, when she detects the cheat?

  GUIDO. I'll stop my ears up.

  CARDINAL.                    Guido, thou art weak,
And lack the common fortitude of man.

  GUIDO. And you abuse the license of your garb,
To lesson me. My lord, I do not dare
To move a finger in these marriage-rites.
Francesca is a sacrifice, I know,--
A limb delivered to the surgeon's knife,
To save our general health. A truce to this.
Paolo has the business in his hands:
Let him arrange it as he will; for I
Will give Count Malatesta no pretext
To recommence the war.

  CARDINAL.            Farewell, my lord.
I'll neither help nor countenance a fraud.
You crafty men take comfort to yourselves,
Saying, deceit dies with discovery.
'Tis false; each wicked action spawns a brood,
And lives in its succession. You, who shake
Man's moral nature into storm, should know
That the last wave which passes from your sight
Rolls in and breaks upon eternity!                                 [_Exit._

  GUIDO. Why, that's a very grand and solemn thought:
I'll mention it to Dante. Gentlemen,
What see they from the wall?

  NOBLEMAN.                  The train, my lord.

  GUIDO. Inform my daughter.

  NOBLEMAN.                  She is here, my lord.

    _Enter_ FRANCESCA, RITTA, LADIES, ATTENDANTS, _etc._

  FRANCESCA. See, father, what a merry face I have,
And how my ladies glisten! I will try
To do my utmost, in my love for you
And the good people of Ravenna. Now,
As the first shock is over, I expect
To feel quite happy. I will wed the Count,
Be he whate'er he may. I do not speak
In giddy recklessness. I've weighed it all,--
'Twixt hope and fear, knowledge and ignorance,--
And reasoned out my duty to your wish.
I have no yearnings towards another love:
So, if I show my husband a desire
To fill the place with which he honours me,
According to its duties, even he--
Were he less noble than Count Lanciotto--
Must smile upon my efforts, and reward
Good will with willing grace. One pang remains.
Parting from home and kindred is a thing
None but the heartless, or the miserable,
Can do without a tear. This home of mine
Has filled my heart with two-fold happiness,
Taking and giving love abundantly.
Farewell, Ravenna! If I bless thee not,
Tis that thou seem'st too blessed; and 'twere strange
In me to offer what thou'st always given.

  GUIDO. [_Aside._] This is too much! If she would rail a while
At me and fortune, it could be endured.       [_Shouts, music, etc., within._

  FRANCESCA. Ha! there's the van just breaking through the wood!
Music! that's well; a welcome forerunner.
Now, Ritta--here--come talk to me. Alas!
How my heart trembles! What a world to me
Lies 'neath the glitter of yon cavalcade!
Is that the Count?

  RITTA.           Upon the dapple-gray?

  FRANCESCA. Yes, yes.

  RITTA.               No; that's his--

  GUIDO. [_Apart to her._]         Ritta!

  RITTA.                                       Ay; that's--that's--

  GUIDO. Ritta, the pot! [_Apart to her._

  RITTA. O! but this lying chokes!                               [_Aside._]
Ay, that's Count Somebody, from Rimini.

  FRANCESCA. I knew it was. Is that not glorious?

  RITTA. My lady, what?

  FRANCESCA.            To see a cavalier
Sit on his steed with such familiar grace.

  RITTA. To see a man astraddle on a horse!
It don't seem much to me.

  FRANCESCA.              Fie! stupid girl!
But mark the minstrels thronging round the Count!
Ah! that is more than gallant horsemanship.
The soul that feeds itself on poesy,
Is of a quality more fine and rare
Than Heaven allows the ruder multitude.
I tell you, Ritta, when you see a man
Beloved by poets, made the theme of song,
And chaunted down to ages, as a gift
Fit for the rich embalmment of their verse,
There's more about him than the patron's gold.
If that's the gentleman my father chose,
He must have picked him out from all the world.
The Count alights. Why, what a noble grace
Runs through his slightest action! Are you sad?
You, too, my father? Have I given you cause?
I am content. If Lanciotto's mind
Bear any impress of his fair outside,
We shall not quarrel ere our marriage-day.
Can I say more? My blushes speak for me:
Interpret them as modesty's excuse
For the short-comings of a maiden's speech.

  RITTA. Alas! dear lady! [_Aside._

  GUIDO. [_Aside._] 'Sdeath! my plot has failed,
By overworking its design. Come, come;
Get to your places. See, the Count draws nigh.

GUIDO _and_ FRANCESCA _seat themselves upon the dais, surrounded by_
RITTA, LADIES, ATTENDANTS, GUARDS, _etc. Music, shouts, ringing of
bells, etc. Enter_ MEN-AT-ARMS, _with banners, etc.;_ PAGES _bearing
costly presents on cushions; then_ PAOLO, _surrounded by_ NOBLEMEN,
KNIGHTS, MINSTRELS, _etc., and followed by other_ MEN-AT-ARMS. _They
range themselves opposite the dais._

  GUIDO. Ravenna welcomes you, my lord, and I
Add my best greeting to the general voice.
This peaceful show of arms from Rimini
Is a new pleasure, stranger to our sense
Than if the East blew zephyrs, or the balm
Of Summer loaded rough December's gales,
And turned his snows to roses.

  PAOLO.                       Noble sir,
We looked for welcome from your courtesy,
Not from your love; but this unhoped for sight
Of smiling faces, and the gentle tone
In which you greet us, leave us naught to win
Within your hearts. I need not ask, my lord,
Where bides the precious object of my search;
For I was sent to find the fairest maid
Ravenna boasts, among her many fair.
I might extend my travel many a league,
And yet return, to take her from your side.
I blush to bear so rich a treasure home,
As pledge and hostage of a sluggish peace;
For beauty such as hers was meant by Heaven
To spur our race to gallant enterprise,
And draw contending deities around
The dubious battles of a second Troy.

  GUIDO. Sir Count, you please to lavish on my child
The high-strained courtesy of chivalry;
Yet she has homely virtues that, I hope,
May take a deeper hold in Rimini,
After the fleeting beauty of her face
Is spoiled by time, or faded to the eye
By its familiar usage.

  PAOLO.               As a man
Who ever sees Heaven's purpose in its works,
I must suppose so rare a tabernacle
Was framed for rarest virtues. Pardon me
My public admiration. If my praise
Clash with propriety, and bare my words
To cooler judgment, 'tis not that I wish
To win a flatterer's grudged recompense,
And gain by falsehood what I'd win through love.
When I have brushed my travel from my garb,
I'll pay my court in more befitting style.

    _Music. Exit with his train._

  GUIDO. [_Advancing._] Now, by the saints, Lanciotto's deputy
Stands in this business with a proper grace,
Stretching his lord's instructions till they crack.
A zealous envoy! Not a word said he
Of Lanciotto--not a single word:
But stood there, staring in Francesca's face
With his devouring eyes.--By Jupiter,
I but half like it!

  FRANCESCA. [_Advancing._] Father?

  GUIDO.                                 Well, my child.

  FRANCESCA. How do you like--

  GUIDO.                       The coxcomb! I've done well!

  FRANCESCA. No, no; Count Lanciotto?

  GUIDO. Well enough.
But hang this fellow--hang your deputies!
I'll never woo by proxy.

  FRANCESCA.             Deputies!
And woo by proxy!

  GUIDO.          Come to me anon.
I'll strip this cuckoo of his gallantry!
                                                [_Exit with_ GUARDS, _etc._

  FRANCESCA. Ritta, my father has strange ways of late.

  RITTA. I wonder not.

  FRANCESCA.           You wonder not?

  RITTA.                               No, lady:
He is so used to playing double games,
That even you must come in for your share.
Plague on his boiling! I will out with it. [_Aside._]
Lady, the gentleman who passed the gates--

  FRANCESCA. Count Lanciotto? As I hope for grace,
A gallant gentleman! How well he spoke!
With what sincere and earnest courtesy
The rounded phrases glided from his lips!
He spoke in compliments that seemed like truth.
Methinks I'd listen through a summer's day,
To hear him woo.--And he must woo to me--
I'll have our privilege--he must woo a space,
Ere I'll be won, I promise.

  RITTA.                    But, my lady,
He'll woo you for another.

  FRANCESCA.               He?--ha! ha!                       [_Laughing._]
I should not think it from the prologue, Ritta.

  RITTA. Nor I.

  FRANCESCA.    Nor any one.

  RITTA.                     'Tis not the Count--
'Tis not Count Lanciotto.

  FRANCESCA.              Gracious saints!
Have you gone crazy? Ritta, speak again,
Before I chide you.

  RITTA.            'Tis the solemn truth.
That gentleman is Count Paolo, lady,
Brother to Lanciotto, and no more
Like him than--than--

  FRANCESCA.          Than what?

  RITTA.                         Count Guido's pot,
For boiling waiting-maids, is like the bath
Of Venus on the arras.

  FRANCESCA.           Are you mad,--
Quite mad, poor Ritta?

  RITTA. Yes; perhaps I am.
Perhaps Lanciotto is a proper man--
Perhaps I lie--perhaps I speak the truth--
Perhaps I gabble like a fool. O! heavens,
That dreadful pot!

  FRANCESCA.       Dear Ritta!--

  RITTA.                         By the mass,
They shall not cozen you, my gentle mistress!
If my lord Guido boiled me, do you think
I should be served up to the garrison,
By way of pottage? Surely they would not waste me.

  FRANCESCA. You are an idle talker. Pranks like these
Fit your companions. You forget yourself.

  RITTA. Not you, though, lady. Boldly I repeat,
That he who looked so fair, and talked so sweet,
Who rode from Rimini upon a horse
Of dapple-gray, and walked through yonder gate,
Is not Count Lanciotto.

  FRANCESCA.            This you mean?

  RITTA. I do, indeed!

  FRANCESCA.           Then I am more abused--
More tricked, more trifled with, more played upon--
By him, my father, and by all of you,
Than anything, suspected of a heart,
Was ever yet!

  RITTA.      In Count Paolo, lady,
Perchance there was no meditated fraud.

  FRANCESCA. How, dare you plead for him?

  RITTA.                                  I but suppose:
Though in your father--O! I dare not say.

  FRANCESCA. I dare. It was ill usage, gross abuse,
Treason to duty, meanness, craft--dishonour!
What if I'd thrown my heart before the feet
Of this sham husband! cast my love away
Upon a counterfeit! I was prepared
To force affection upon any man
Called Lanciotto. Anything of silk,
Tinsel, and gewgaws, if he bore that name,
Might have received me for the asking. Yes,
I was inclined to venture more than half
In this base business--shame upon my thoughts!--
All for my father's peace and poor Ravenna's.
And this Paolo, with his cavalcade,
His minstrels, music, and his pretty airs,
His showy person, and his fulsome talk,
Almost made me contented with my lot.
O! what a fool--in faith, I merit it--
Trapped by mere glitter! What an easy fool!
Ha! ha! I'm glad it went no further, girl;
                                                              [_Laughing._]
I'm glad I kept my heart safe, after all.
There was my cunning. I have paid them back,
I warrant you! I'll marry Lanciotto;
I'll seem to shuffle by this treachery. No!
I'll seek my father, put him face to face
With his own falsehood; and I'll stand between,
Awful as justice, meting out to him
Heaven's dreadful canons 'gainst his conscious guilt.
I'll marry Lanciotto. On my faith,
I would not live another wicked day
Here, in Ravenna, only for the fear
That I should take to lying, with the rest.
Ha! ha! it makes me merry, when I think
How safe I kept this little heart of mine! [_Laughing._
                                           [_Exit, with_ ATTENDANTS, _etc._

  RITTA. So, 'tis all ended--all except my boiling,
And that will make a holiday for some.
Perhaps I'm selfish. Fagot, axe, and gallows,
They have their uses, after all. They give
The lookers-on a deal of harmless sport.
Though one may suffer, twenty hundred laugh;
And that's a point gained. I have seen a man--
Poor Dora's uncle--shake himself with glee,
At the bare thought of the ridiculous style
In which some villain died. "Dancing," quoth he,
"To the poor music of a single string!
Biting," quoth he, "after his head was off!
What use of that?" Or, "Shivering," quoth he,
"As from an ague, with his beard afire!"
And then he'd roar until his ugly mouth
Split at the corners. But to see me boil--
that will be the queerest thing of all!
I wonder if they'll put me in a bag,
Like a great suet-ball? I'll go, and tell
Count Guido, on the instant. How he'll laugh
To think his pot has got an occupant!
I wonder if he really takes delight
In such amusements? Nay, I have kept faith;
I only said the man was not Lanciotto;
No word of Lanciotto's ugliness.
I may escape the pot, for all. Pardee!
I wonder if they'll put me in a bag!
                                                         [_Exit, laughing._




SCENE III.


_The Same. A Room in_ GUIDO'S _Palace. Enter_ GUIDO _and_ RITTA.

  RITTA. There now, my lord, that is the whole of it:
I love my mistress more than I fear you.
If I could save her finger from the axe,
I'd give my head to do it. So, my lord,
I am prepared to stew.

  GUIDO.               Boil, Ritta, boil.

  RITTA. No; I prefer to stew.

  GUIDO.                       And I to boil.

  RITTA. Tis very hard, my lord, I cannot choose
My way of cooking. I shall laugh, I vow,
In the grim headsman's face, when I remember
That I am dying for my lady's love.
I leave no one to shed a tear for me;
Father nor mother, kith nor kin, have I,
To say, "Poor Ritta!" o'er my lifeless clay.
They all have gone before me, and 'twere well
If I could hurry after them.

  GUIDO.                     Poor child. [_Aside._]
But, baggage, said you aught of Lanciotto?

  RITTA. No, not a word; and he's so ugly, too!

  GUIDO. Is he so ugly?

  RITTA.                Ugly! he is worse
Than Pilate on the hangings.

  GUIDO.                     Hold your tongue
Here, and at Rimini, about the Count,
And you shall prosper.

  RITTA.               Am I not to boil?

  GUIDO. No, child. But be discreet at Rimini.
Old Malatesta is a dreadful man--
Far worse than I--he bakes his people, Ritta;
Lards them, like geese, and bakes them in an oven.

  RITTA. Fire is my fate, I see that.

  GUIDO.                              Have a care
It do not follow you beyond this world.
Where is your mistress?

  RITTA.                In her room, my lord.
After I told her of the Count Paolo,
She flew to have an interview with you;
But on the way--I know not why it was--
She darted to her chamber, and there stays
Weeping in silence. It would do you good--
More than a hundred sermons--just to see
A single tear, indeed it would, my lord.

  GUIDO. Ha! you are saucy. I have honoured you
Past prudence, malpert! Get you to your room!
                                                            [_Exit_ RITTA.]
More of my blood runs in yon damsel's veins
Than the world knows. Her mother to a shade;
The same high spirit, and strange martyr-wish
To sacrifice herself, body and soul,
For some loved end. All that she did for me;
And yet I loved her not. O! memory!
The darkest future has a ray of hope,
But thou art blacker than the sepulchre!
Thy horrid shapes lie round, like scattered bones,
Hopeless forever! I am sick at heart.
The past crowds on the present: as I sowed,
So am I reaping. Shadows from myself
Fall on the picture, as I trace anew
These rising spectres of my early life,
And add their gloom to what was dark before.
O! memory, memory! How my temples throb!                           [_Sits._

    _Enter_ FRANCESCA, _hastily._

  FRANCESCA. My lord, this outrage--
                [_He looks up._]
Father, are you ill?
You seem unhappy. Have I troubled you?
You heard how passionate and bad I was,
When Ritta told me of the Count Paolo.
Dear father, calm yourself; and let me ask
A child's forgiveness. 'Twas undutiful
To doubt your wisdom. It is over now.
I only thought you might have trusted me
With any counsel.

  GUIDO. [_Aside._] Would I had!

  FRANCESCA.                          Ah! well,
I understand it all, and you were right.
Only the danger of it. Think, my lord,
If I had loved this man at the first sight:
We all have heard of such things. Think, again,
If I had loved him--as I then supposed
You wished me to--'twould have been very sad.
But no, dear sir, I kept my heart secure,
Nor will I loose it till you give the word.
I'm wiser than you thought me, you perceive.
But when we saw him, face to face, together,
Surely you might have told me then.

  GUIDO.                            Francesca,
My eyes are old--I did not clearly see--Faith,
it escaped my thoughts. Some other things
Came in my head. I was as ignorant
Of Count Paolo's coming as yourself.
The brothers are so like.

  FRANCESCA.              Indeed?

  GUIDO.                          Yes, yes.
One is the other's counterpart, in fact;
And even now it may not be--O! shame!
I lie by habit. [_Aside._

  FRANCESCA. Then there is a hope?
He may be Lanciotto, after all?
O! joy--

      _Enter a_ SERVANT.

  SERVANT. The Count Paolo.                                        [_Exit._

  FRANCESCA. Misery!
That name was not Lanciotto!

  GUIDO. Farewell, child.
I'll leave you with the Count: he'll make it plain.
It seems 'twas Count Paolo.                                       [_Going._

  FRANCESCA.                Father!

  GUIDO.                            Well.

  FRANCESCA. You knew it from the first!                    [_Exit_ GUIDO.]
                                         Let me begone:
I could not look him in the face again
With the old faith. Besides, 'twould anger him
To have a living witness of his fraud
Ever before him; and I could not trust--
Strive as I might--my happiness to him,
As once I did. I could not lay my hand
Upon his shoulder, and look up to him,
Saying, Dear father, pilot me along
Past this dread rock, through yonder narrow strait.
Saints, no! The gold that gave my life away
Might, even then, be rattling in his purse,
Warm from the buyer's hand. Look on me, Heaven!
Him thou didst sanctify before my eyes,
Him thou didst charge, as thy great deputy,
With guardianship of a weak orphan girl,
Has fallen from grace, has paltered with his trust;
I have no mother to receive thy charge,--
O! take it on thyself; and when I err,
Through mortal blindness, Heaven, be thou my guide!
Worse cannot fall me. Though my husband lack
A parent's tenderness, he yet may have
Faith, truth, and honour--the immortal bonds
That knit together honest hearts as one.
Let me away to Rimini. Alas!
It wrings my heart to have outlived the day
That I can leave my home with no regret!                          [_Weeps._

                          _Enter_ PAOLO.

  PAOLO. Pray, pardon me.                                         [_Going._

  FRANCESCA. You are quite welcome, Count
A foolish tear, a weakness, nothing more:
But present weeping clears our future sight.
They tell me you are love's commissioner,
A kind of broker in the trade of hearts:
Is it your usual business? or may I
Flatter myself, by claiming this essay
As your first effort?

  PAOLO.              Lady, I believed
My post, at starting, one of weight and trust;
When I beheld you, I concluded it
A charge of honour and high dignity.
I did not think to hear you underrate
Your own importance, by dishonouring me.

  FRANCESCA. You are severe, my lord.

  PAOLO.                              No, not severe;
Say candid, rather. I am somewhat hurt
By my reception. If I feel the wound,
'Tis not because I suffer from the jest,
But that your lips should deal it.

  FRANCESCA.                       Compliments
Appear to be the staple of your speech.
You ravish one with courtesy, you pour
Fine words upon one, till the listening head
Is bowed with sweetness. Sir, your talk is drugged;
There's secret poppy in your sugared phrase:
I'll taste before I take it.

  PAOLO.                     Gentle lady--

  FRANCESCA. I am not gentle, or I missed my aim.
I am no hawk to fly at every lure.
You courtly gentlemen draw one broad rule--
All girls are fools. It may be so, in truth,
Yet so I'll not be treated.

  PAOLO.                    Have you been?
If I implied such slander by my words,
They wrong my purpose. If I compliment,
'Tis not from habit, but because I thought
Your face deserved my homage as its due.
When I have clearer insight, and you spread
Your inner nature o'er your lineaments,
Even that face may darken in the shades
Of my opinion. For mere loveliness
Needs inward light to keep it always bright.
All things look badly to unfriendly eyes.
I spoke my first impression; cooler thought
May work strange changes.

  FRANCESCA.              Ah, Sir Count, at length
There's matter in your words.

  PAOLO.                      Unpleasant stuff,
To judge by your dark brows. I have essayed
Kindness and coldness, yet you are not pleased.

  FRANCESCA. How can I be?

  PAOLO.                   How, lady?

  FRANCESCA.                          Ay, sir, how?
Your brother--my good lord that is to be--
Stings me with his neglect; and in the place
He should have filled, he sends a go-between,
A common carrier of others' love;
How can the sender, or the person sent,
Please overmuch? Now, were I such as you,
I'd be too proud to travel round the land
With other people's feelings in my heart;
Even to fill the void which you confess
By such employment.

  PAOLO.            Lady, 'tis your wish
To nettle me, to break my breeding down,
And see what natural passions I have hidden
Behind the outworks of my etiquette.
I neither own nor feel the want of heart
With which you charge me. You are more than cruel;
You rouse my nerves until they ache with life,
And then pour fire upon them. For myself
I would not speak, unless you had compelled.
My task is odious to me. Since I came,
Heaven bear me witness how my traitor heart
Has fought against my duty; and how oft
I wished myself in Lanciotto's place.
Or him in mine.

  FRANCESCA.     You riddle.

  PAOLO.                     Do I? Well,
Let it remain unguessed.

  FRANCESCA.             You wished yourself
At Rimini, or Lanciotto here?
You may have reasons.

  PAOLO.              Well interpreted!
The Sphinx were simple in your skilful hands!

  FRANCESCA. It has become your turn to sneer.

  PAOLO.                                       But I
Have gall to feed my bitterness, while you
Jest in the wanton ease of happiness.
Stop! there is peril in our talk.

  FRANCESCA.                      As how?

  PAOLO. 'Tis dangerous to talk about one's self;
It panders selfishness. My duty waits.

  FRANCESCA. My future lord's affairs? I quite forgot
Count Lanciotto.

  PAOLO.         I, too, shame upon me. [_Aside._

  FRANCESCA. Does he resemble you?

  PAOLO.                           Pray drop me, lady.

  FRANCESCA. Nay, answer me.

  PAOLO.                     Somewhat--in feature.

  FRANCESCA.                                       Ha!
Is he so fair?

  PAOLO.       No, darker. He was tanned
In long campaigns, and battles hotly fought,
While I lounged idly with the troubadours,
Under the shadow of his watchful sword.

  FRANCESCA. In person?

  PAOLO.                He is shorter, I believe,
But broader, stronger, more compactly knit.

  FRANCESCA. What of his mind?

  PAOLO.                       Ah, now you strike the key!
A mind just fitted to his history,
An equal balance 'twixt desert and fame.
No future chronicler shall say of him,
His fame outran his merit; or his merit
Halted behind some adverse circumstance,
And never won the glory it deserved.
My love might weary you, if I rehearsed
The simple beauty of his character;
His grandeur and his gentleness of heart,
His warlike fire and peaceful love, his faith,
His courtesy, his truth. I'll not deny
Some human weakness, to attract our love,
Harbours in him, as in the rest of us.
Sometimes against our city's enemies
He thunders in the distance, and devotes
Their homes to ruin. When the brand has fallen,
He ever follows with a healing rain,
And in his pity shoulders by revenge.
A thorough soldier, lady. He grasps crowns,
While I pick at the laurel.

  FRANCESCA. Stay, my lord!
I asked your brother's value, with no wish
To hear you underrate yourself. Your worth
May rise in passing through another's lips.
Lanciotto is perfection, then?

  PAOLO.                       To me:
Others may think my brother over-nice
Upon the point of honour; over-keen
To take offence where no offence is meant;
A thought too prodigal of human life,
Holding it naught when weighed against a wrong;
Suspicious of the motives of his friends;
Distrustful of his own high excellence;
And with a certain gloom of temperament,
When thus disturbed, that makes him terrible
And rash in action. I have heard of this;
I never felt it. I distress you, lady?
Perhaps I throw these points too much in shade,
By catching at an enemy's report.
But, then, Lanciotto said, "You'll speak of me,
Not as I ought to be, but as I am."
He loathes deceit.

  FRANCESCA.       That's noble! Have you done?
I have observed a strange reserve, at times,
An over-carefulness in choosing words,
Both in my father and his nearest friends,
When speaking of your brother; as if they
Picked their way slowly over rocky ground,
Fearing to stumble. Ritta, too, my maid,
When her tongue rattles on in full career,
Stops at your brother's name, and with a sigh
Settles herself to dismal silence. Count,
These things have troubled me. From you I look
For perfect frankness. Is there naught withheld?

  PAOLO. [_Aside._] O base temptation! What if I betray
His crippled person--imitate his limp--
Laugh at his hip, his back, his sullen moods
Of childish superstition?--tread his heart
Under my feet, to climb into his place?--Use
his own warrant 'gainst himself; and say,
Because I loved her, and misjudged your jest,
Therefore I stole her? Why, a common thief
Would hang for just such thinking! Ha! ha! ha!
                                                              [_Laughing._]
I reckon on her love, as if I held
The counsels of her bosom. No, I swear,
Francesca would despise so mean a deed.
Have I no honour either? Are my thoughts
All bound by her opinions?

  FRANCESCA.               This is strange!
Is Lanciotto's name a spell to all?
I ask a simple question, and straight you
Start to one side, and mutter to yourself,
And laugh, and groan, and play the lunatic,
In such a style that you astound me more
Than all the others. It appears to me
I have been singled as a common dupe
By every one. What mystery is this
Surrounds Count Lanciotto? If there be
A single creature in the universe
Who has a right to know him as he is,
I am that one.

  PAOLO.       I grant it. You shall see,
And shape your judgment by your own remark.
All that my honour calls for I have said.

  FRANCESCA. I am content. Unless I greatly err,
Heaven made your breast the seat of honest thoughts.
You know, my lord, that, once at Rimini,
There can be no retreat for me. By you,
Here at Ravenna, in your brother's name,
I shall be solemnly betrothed. And now
I thus extend my maiden hand to you;
If you are conscious of no secret guilt,
Take it.

  PAOLO. I do.                                          [_Takes her hand._

  FRANCESCA.    You tremble!

  PAOLO.                     With the hand,
Not with the obligation.

  FRANCESCA.             Farewell, Count!
'Twere cruel to tax your stock of compliments,
That waste their sweets upon a trammelled heart;
Go fly your fancies at some freer game.                            [_Exit._

  PAOLO. O, Heaven, if I have faltered and am weak,
Tis from my nature! Fancies, more accursed
Than haunt a murderer's bedside, throng my brain--
Temptations, such as mortal never bore
Since Satan whispered in the ear of Eve,
Sing in my ear--and all, all are accursed!
At heart I have betrayed my brother's trust,
Francesca's openly. Turn where I will,
As if enclosed within a mirrored hall,
I see a traitor. Now to stand erect,
Firm on my base of manly constancy;
Or, if I stagger, let me never quit
The homely path of duty, for the ways
That bloom and glitter with seductive sin!                         [_Exit._




ACT III


SCENE I. _Rimini. A Room in the Castle._ LANCIOTTO _discovered
reading._

  LANCIOTTO. O! fie, philosophy! This Seneca
Revels in wealth, and whines about the poor!
Talks of starvation while his banquet waits,
And fancies that a two hours' appetite
Throws light on famine! Doubtless he can tell,
As he skips nimbly through his dancing-girls,
How sad it is to limp about the world
A sightless cripple! Let him feel the crutch
Wearing against his heart, and then I'd hear
This sage talk glibly; or provide a pad,
Stuffed with his soft philosophy, to ease
His aching shoulder. Pshaw! he never felt,
Or pain would choke his frothy utterance.
'Tis easy for the doctor to compound
His nauseous simples for a sick man's health;
But let him swallow them, for his disease,
Without wry faces. Ah! the tug is there.
Show me philosophy in rags, in want,
Sick of a fever, with a back like mine,
Creeping to wisdom on these legs, and I
Will drink its comforts. Out! away with you!
There's no such thing as real philosophy!
                                                  [_Throws down the book._]

    [_Enter_ PEPE.]

Here is a sage who'll teach a courtier
The laws of etiquette, a statesman rule,
A soldier discipline, a poet verse,
And each mechanic his distinctive trade;
Yet bring him to his motley, and how wide
He shoots from reason! We can understand
All business but our own, and thrust advice
In every gaping cranny of the world;
While habit shapes us to our own dull work,
And reason nods above his proper task.
Just so philosophy would rectify
All things abroad, and be a jade at home.
Pepe, what think you of the Emperor's aim
Towards Hungary?

  PEPE.           A most unwise design;
For mark, my lord--

  LANCIOTTO.          Why, there! the fact cries out.
Here's motley thinking for a diadem!--
Ay, and more wisely in his own regard.

  PEPE. You flout me, cousin.

  LANCIOTTO.                  Have you aught that's new?--
Some witty trifle, some absurd conceit?

  PEPE. Troth, no.

  LANCIOTTO.       Why not give up the Emperor,
And bend your wisdom on your duties, Pepe?

  PEPE. Because the Emperor has more need of wisdom
Than