Bar. At your own peril? And all may honestly, (that is, all those Lor. There is none, I tell you, of noble blood may), one day hope to be Our powers are such. Decemvir, it is surely for the senate's Баr. But he has twice already Chosen delegates a school of wisdom, to Solicited permission to retire, Be thus admitted, though as novices, To view the mysteries. Sen. Let us view them: they To grant it the third time. No doubt are worth it. Mem. Being worth our lives Lor. It shows If we divulge them, doubtless they are worth The impression of his former instances : Something, at least to you or ine. If they were from his heart, he may be thankful : Sen. I sought not If not, 'twill punish his hypocrisy. A place within the sanctuary; but being Come, they are met by this time; let us join them, Chosen, however reluctantly so chosen, And be thou fix'd in purpose for this once. I shall fulfil my office. I have prepared such arguments as will not Mem. Let us not Fail to move them, and to remove him: since Be latest in obeying 'the Ten's' sumınons. Their thoughts, their objects, have been sounded, Sen. All are not met, but I am of your thought do not So far-let s in. You, with your wonted scruples, teach us pause, Mem. The earliest are inost welcome And all will prosper. In earnest councils- we will not be least so. [Exeunt. This is no prelude to such persecution Enter the Doge, Jacopo Foscari, and Marina. of the sire as has fallen upon the son, Fac. Fos. Ah, father! though I must and will I would support you, Yet-yet-I pray you to obtain for me (depart, Lor. : He is safe, I tell you ; That I once more return unto my home, His fourscore years and five may linger on Howe'er remote the period. Let there be As long as he can drag them; 'tis his throne A point of time, as beacon to my heart, With any penalty annex'd they please, But let me still return. Doge. Son Jacopo, Lor. And men of eighty Go and obey our country's will: 'tis not For us to look beyond. But still I must Alas! (Exeunt Loredano and Barbarigo. You ever were my dearest offspring, when Enter Memmo and a Senator. They were more numerous, nor can be less so Sen. A summons to the Ten !' why so? Now you are last ; but did the state demand Mem. • The Ten' The exile of the disinterred ashes Alone can answer; they are rarely wont of your three goodly brothers, now in earth, To let their thoughts anticipate their purpose And their desponding shades came flitting round By previous proclamation. We are summond To impede the act, I must no less obey A duty, paramount to every duty. Mar. My husband I let us on: this but prolongs I would know why. Our sorrow. Fac. Fos. But we are not summon'd yet ; The galley's sails are not unfurl'd:who knows? Will know why you should have obey'd. The wind inay change. I inean not And if it do, it will not To oppose them, but Change their hearts, or your lot: the galley's oars Mem. In Venice but' 's a traitor. Will quickly clear the harbour. But me no 'buts,' unless you would pass o'er Fac. Fos. O ye elements! The Bridge which few rcpass. Where are your storms? I am silent. In human breasts. Alas! Mem Why Will nothing calm you? Thus hesitate? The Ten' have calı'd in aid Fac. Fos. Never yet did mariner of their deliberation five and twenty Put up to patron saint such prayers for prosperous Patricians of the senate--you are one, And pleasant breezes, as I call upon you, And I another; and it seems to me Ye tutelar saints of my own city! which Both honour'd by the choice or chance which leads Ye love not with more holy love than I, To mingle with a body so august. [us | To lash up from the deep the Adrian waves, Sen. Most true. I say no more. And waken Auster, sovereign of the tempest! Mem. As we hope, signor, Till the sea dash me back on my own shore 395 A broken corse upon the barren Lido, . Fac. Fos. No-you mistake; 'tis yours that Where I may mingle with the sands which skirt shakes, my father, The land I love, and never shall see more ! Farewell! No-nothing No-not for thee, too good, too kind! May'st thou [To the Officer, Live long to be a mother to those children Lend me your arın, good signor. Thy fond fidelity for a time deprives Ofi. You turn pale of such support! But for myself alone, Let me support you-paler-ho! some aid there! May all the winds of heaven howl down the Gulf, Some water ! And tear the vessel, till the mariners, Mar. Ah, he is dying! Appallid, turn their despairing eyes on me,. Fac. Fos. Now, I'm readyAs the Phenicians did on Jonah, then My eyes swim strangely-where's the door? Cast me out from amongst them, as an offering Mar. Away! To appease the waves. The billow which destroys Let me support him-my best love! O God! me How faintly beats this heart-this pulse! Will be more merciful than man, and bear me Fac. Fos. The light! Dead, but still bear me to a native grave, Is it the light?-I am faint. From fishers' hands, upon the desolate strand, [Officer presents him with water. Which, of its thousand wrecks, hath ne'er received Offi. He will be better, One lacerated like the heart which then Perhaps, in the air. Will be.-But wherefore breaks it not? why live I? Fac. Fos. I doubt not. Father-wife Mar. To man thyself, I trust, with time, to master Your hands! Such useless passion. Until now thou wert Mar. There's death in that damp, clammy A sufferer, but not a loud one: why grasp. What is this to the things thou hast borne in silence- Oh, God !-My Foscari, how fare you? Imprisonment and actual torture ? Jac. Fos. Well ! (He dies, Jac. Fos. Double, Offi. He's gone! Triple, and tenfold torture! But you are right, Doge. He's free. It must be borne. Father, your blessing. Mar. No-no, he is not dead; Doge. Would. There must be life yet in that heart-he could not It could avail thee! but no less thou hast it. Thus leave me. Fac. Fos. Forgive Doge. Daughter! Mar. Hold thy peace, old man ! Fac. Fos. My poor mother, for my birth, I am no daughter now-thou hast no son. And me for having lived, and you yourself, Oh, Foscari! (As I forgive you), for the gift of life, Offi. We must remove the body Which you bestow'd upon me as my sire. Mar. Touch it not, dungeon miscreants ! your Mar. What hast thou done? base office Fac. Fos. Nothing. I cannot charge Ends with his life, and goes not beyond murder, My memory with much save sorrow : but Even by your murderous laws. Leave his remains I have been so beyond the common lot To those who know to honour them. Chastend and visited, I needs must think Ofi. . . I must That I was wicked. If it be so, may Inform the signory, and learn their pleasure. What I have undergone here keep me from Doge. Inform the signory from me, the Doge, They have no further power upon those ashes : While he lived, he was theirs, as fits a subject- Now he is mine-my broken-hearted boy ! (Exit Officer. Mar. Hope not? Mar. And I must live! Fac. Fos. I cannot wish them all they have in. Doge. Your children live, Marina. flicted. (fold. Mar. My children: true--they live, and I must Mar. All! the consummate fiends! A thousand. live May the worm which ne'er dieth feed upon them! To bring them up to serve the state, and die Fac. Fos. They may repent. As died their father. Oh! what best of blessings Mar. And if they do, Heaven will not Were barrenness in Venice ! Would my mother Had been so I Doge. My unhappy children! Mar. What! Is rising-we are ready to attend you. You feel it then at last-you !-Where is now Fac. Fos. And I to be attended. Once more, The stoic of the state! father, Doge. (throwing himself down by the body.) Ilere! Your hand! Mar. Ay, weep on! Doge. Take it. Alas! how thine own trembles ! I thought you had no tears-you hoarded them Until they are useless; but weep on! he never Lor. The thing's decreed. The Giunta and the Shall weep more-never, never more. Ten' Have made it law-who shall oppose that law? Lor. What's here? Bar. Humanity! Because his son is dead? Lor, Had we known this when Its passage, but impedes it not-once past. Lor. You have consented to Lor. We sought the Doge. All that's essential-leave the rest to me. Mar. (pointing to the Doge, who is still on the | Bar. Why press his abdication now? ground oy his son's body.) He's busy, look, Lor. The feelings About the business you provided for hiin. of private passion may not interrupt Are ye content? The public benefit ; and what the state Decides to-day must not give way before To-morrow for a natural accident. Bar. You have a son. Lor. I have-and had a father. Doge (rising). Sirs, I am ready. Bar. Still so inexorable ? No-not now. Still, Bar. But let him Doge. If 'twas so, I can Inter his son before we press upon him This edict. Lor. Let him call up into life My sire and uncle-I consent. Men may, Like a frail vessel. I respect your griefs. (bring Even aged men, be, or appear to be, Doge. I thank you. If the tidings which you Sires of a hundred sons, but cannot kindle Are evil, you may say them; nothing further An atom of their ancestors from earth. Can touch me more than him thou look'st on there; The victims are not equal; he has seen If they be good, say on; you need not fear His sons expire by natural deaths, and I That they can comfort ine. My sires by violent and mysterious maladies, I would they couid! I used no poison, bribed no subtle master Shorten the path to the eternal cure. Ah! I thought it would be so. His sons-and he had four-are dead, without Doge. What mean you ? My dabbling in vile drugs. And art thou sure To flow through the dead lips of Foscari Hc dealt in such ? The body bleeds in presence of the assassin. Lor. Mest sure. [To Loredano. Bar. And yet he seems Thou cowardly murderer by law, behold All openness. How death itself bears witness to thy deeds! Lor. And so he seem'd not long The attainted And foreign traitor ? Exeunt Doge, Marina, and attendants with Lor. Even so: when he, the body. Manent Loredano and Bar. After the very night in which the Ten' barigo. (Join'd with the Doge) decided his destruction, Bar. He must not Met the great Duke at daybreak with a jest, Be troubled now. Demanding whether he should augur hiin Lor. He said himself that nought • The good day or good night? his Doge-ship an. Could give him trouble further. swered, Bar. These are words; •That he in truth had pass'd a night of vigil, But grief is lonely, and the breaking in In which (he added with a gracious smile), There often has been question about you." 'Twas true; the question was the death resolved Its solitude, and nothing more diverts it Of Carmagnuola, eight months cre he died; From its sad visions of the other world, And the old Doge, who knew him doom'd, smiled Than calling it at moments back to this. on him (handThe busy have no time for tears. With deadly cozenage, eight long months before Bar. And therefore You would deprive this old man of all business? An historical fact. Scc DARU, tom. ii, Eight inonths of such hypocrisy as is Lor Right 1 The Council's resolution. Bar. I protest Your friend? Against it at this moment. Lor. He was the safeguard of the city. Lor. As you please In early life its foe, but, in his manhood, I'll take their voices on it ne'ertheless, Its saviour first, then victim. And see whose most may sway them, yours or mine, Βαr. Ah! that seems (Exeunt Barbarigo and Loredano. The penalty of saving cities. He Whom we now act against not only saved Our own, but added others to our sway. ACT V. Lor. The Romans (and we ape them) gave a crown SCENE I.-The Doge's Apartment, The Doge and Attendants. 11. My lord, the deputation is in waiting ; If we should measure forth the cities taken But add, that if another hour would better By the Doge Foscari, with citizens Accord with your will, they will make it theirs. Destroy'd by him, or through him, the account Doge. To me all hours are alike. Let them ap. Were fearfully against him, although narrow'd proach. (Exit Attendant. To private havoc, such as between him An Officer. Prince ! I have done your bidding. And my dead father, Doge. What command ? Bar. Are you then thus fix'd ? Offi. A melancholy one-to call the attendance Lor. Why, what should change me? O- Doge. True-true-true; I crave your pardon. I But you, I know, are marble to retain Begin to fail in apprehension, and A feud. But when all is accomplish'd, when Wax very old-old almost as my years, The old man is deposed, his name degraded, Till now I fought them off, but they begin His sons all dead, his family depress'd, To overtake me. And you and yours triumphant, shall you sleep? Enter the Deputation, consisting of six of the Sig. Lor. More soundly. nory and the Chief of the Ten. Bar. That's an error, and you'll find it Noble men, your pleasure ! Ere you sleep with your fathers. Chief of the Ten. In the first place, the Council Lor. They sleep not doth condole In their accelerated graves, nor will With the Doge on his late and private grief. Till Foscari fills his. Each night I see them Doge. No more--no more of that. Stalk frowning round my couch, and, pointing Chief of the Ten. Will not the Duke towards Accept the homage of respect ? The ducal palace, marshal me to vengeance. Doge. I do Bar. Fancy's distemperature! There is no passion Accept it as 'tis given-proceed. More spectral or fantastical than Hate; Chief of the Ten. The Ten,' Not even its opposite, Love, so peoples air With a selected Giunta from the senate Of twenty-five of the best born patricians, Having deliberated on the state of the republic, and the o'erwhelming cares Otti. By the ducal order Which, at this moment, doubly must oppress To forward the preparatory rites Your years, so long devoted to your country, For the late Foscari's interment. Have judged it fitting, with all reverence, Bar. Their Now to solicit from your wisdom (which Vault has been often opend of late years. Upon reflection must accord in this). Lor. 'Twill be full soon, and may be closed for the resignation of the ducal ring, Offi. May I pass on? [ever. Which you have worn so long and venerably: Lor. You may. And to prove that they are not ungrateful, nor Bar. How bears the Doge Cold to your years and services, they add This last calamity ? An appanage of twenty hundred golden oni. With desperate firinness. Ducats, to make retirement not less splendid all presence of another he says little, Than should become a sovereign's retreat. But I perceive his lips move now and then; Doge. Did I hear rightly? And once or twice I heard him, from the adjoining Chief of the Ten. Need I say again? Apartment, mutter forth the words-'My son !' Doge. No-Have you done? Scarce audibly. I must proceed. (Exit Officer. | Chief of the Ten. I have spoken. Twenty-four Bar. This stroke Hours are accorded you to give an answer, Will move all Venice in his favour. Dage. I shall not need so many seconds, We Doge. Chief of the Ten, Doge. Soon may be a prince no longer. Will now retire. Mar, How? Doge. Stay! four and twenty hours Doge. They have taken my son from me, and now Will alter nothing which I have to say. At my too long worn diadem and ring. (aiin Chief of the Ten, Speak! Let them resume their gewgaws! Oh, the tyrants ! My wish to abdicate, it was refused me: In such an hour too ! And not alone refused, but ye exacted Doge. 'Tis the fittest time; An oath from me that I would never more An hour ago I shculd have felt it. Renew the instance. I have sworn to die Mar. And In full exertion of the functions which Will you not now resent it?-Oh, for vengeance ! My country call'd me here to exercise, But he, who, had he bcen enough protected, According to my honour and my conscience Might have repaid protection in this moment, I cannot break iny oath. Cannot assist his father. Chief of thc Ten. Reduce us not Doge. Nor should do so To the alternative of a decree, Against his country, had he a thousand lives Instead of that Mar. They tortured from him. This Prolongs my days to prove and chasten me; May be pure patriotism. I am a woman: But ye have no right to reproach iny length To me my husband and iny children were Of days, since every hour has been the country's. Country and home. I loved him-how I loved him! I am ready to lay down any life for her, I have seen him pass through such an ordeal as As I have laid down dearer things than life: The old martyrs would have shrunk from: he is But for my dignity-1 hold it of gone, The whole republic: when the general will And I, who would have given my blood for hijn, Is manifest, then you shall all be answer'd. Have nought to give but tears! But could I comChief of the Ten. We grieve for such an answer ; The retribution of his wrongs - Well, well! (pass Avail you aught. [but it cannot I have sons, who shall be men. Doge. I can submit to all things, Your grief distracts you. But nothing will advance; no, not a moment. Mar. I thought I could have borne it, when I saw What you clecree-clecree. him Chief of the Ten. With this, then, must we Bow'd down by such oppression; yes, I thought Return to those who sent us? That I would rather look upon his corse Doge. You have heard me. Than his prolong'd captivity :-I am punish'd Chief of the Ten. With all due reverence we retire. For that thought now. Would I were in his grave! (Exeunt the Deputation, &c. Doge. I must look on him once more, Enter an Attendant, Mar. Come with me! My lord, Doge. Is he The noble dame Marina craves an audience. Mar. Our bridal bed is now his bier. Doge. My time is hers. Doge. And he is in his shroud! Μαη. Come, come, old man! Mar, My lord, if I intrude (Exeunt the Doge and Marina. Perhaps you fain would be alone ? 'Enter Barbarigo and Loredano. Doge. Alone? Bar. [To an Attendant.] Where is the Doge? Alone, come all the world around me, I This instant retired hence, Am now and evermore. But we will bear it. With the illustrious lady his son's widow. Att. To the chamber where the body lies. Doge. Give it way : Bar. Let us return, then. I cannot comfort thee, Lor. You forget, you cannot, Λαr. He might have lived, We have the implicit order of the Giunta So forin'd for gentle privacy of life, To await their coming here, and join them in So loving, so beloved; the native of Their office: they'll be here soon after us. Another land, and who so blest and blessing Bar. And will they press their answer on the Doge? As my poor Foscari? Nothing was wanting Lor. 'Twas his own wish that all should be done Unto his happiness and mine save not promptly. To be Venetian. He answer'd quickly, and must so be answer'i; Doge. Or a prince's son. His dignity is look'd to, his estate Mar. Yes; all things which conduce to other | Cared for-what would he more? Imperfect happiness or high ambition, (men's Bar. Die in his robes : By some strange destiny, to him proved deadly. He could not have lived long; but I have done The country and the people whom he loved, My best to save his honours, and opposed The prince of whom he was the elder born, This proposition to the last, though vainly. And Why would the general vote tompel inc hither? |