Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE CENCI; A TRAGEDY: ACTS 1-3, by PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE CENCI; A TRAGEDY: ACTS 1-3, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: That matter of the murder is hushed up
Last Line: [exeunt.
Subject(s): Despair; Gothic Drama; Hate; Italy; Italians


DRAMATIS PERSONAE
COUNT FRANCESCO CENCI.
GIACOMO, BERNARDO, his Sons.
CARDINAL CAMILLO.
PRINCE COLONNA.
ORSINO, a Prelate.
SAVELLA, the Pope's Legate.
OLIMPIO, MARZIO, Assassins.
ANDREA, Servant to CENCI.
NOBLES. JUDGES. GUARDS, SERVANTS.
LUCRETIA, Wife of CENCI and Stepmother of his children.
BEATRICE, his Daughter.


The SCENE lies principally in Rome, but changes during the fourth
Act to Petrella, a castle among the Apulian Apennines.
TIME. During the Pontificate of Clement VIII.

Act I

SCENE I. -- An Apartment in the CENCI Palace. Enter COUNT
CENCI and CARDINAL CAMILLO.

CAMILLO
THAT matter of the murder is hushed up
If you consent to yield his Holiness
Your fief that lies beyond the Pincian gate.
It needed all my interest in the conclave
To bend him to this point; he said that you
Bought perilous impunity with your gold;
That crimes like yours if once or twice compounded
Enriched the Church, and respited from hell
An erring soul which might repent and live;
But that the glory and the interest
Of the high throne he fills little consist
With making it a daily mart of guilt
As manifold and hideous as the deeds
Which you scarce hide from men's revolted eyes.
CENCI
The third of my possessions -- let it go!
Ay, I once heard the nephew of the Pope
Had sent his architect to view the ground,
Meaning to build a villa on my vines
The next time I compounded with his uncle.
I little thought he should outwit me so!
Henceforth no witness -- not the lamp -- shall see
That which the vassal threatened to divulge,
Whose throat is choked with dust for his reward.
The deed he saw could not have rated higher
Than his most worthless life -- it angers me!
Respited me from Hell! So may the Devil
Respite their souls from Heaven! No doubt Pope Clement,
And his most charitable nephews, pray
That the Apostle Peter and the saints
Will grant for their sake that I long enjoy
Strength, wealth, and pride, and lust, and length of days
Wherein to act the deeds which are the stewards
Of their revenue. -- But much yet remains
To which they show no title.
CAMILLO
Oh, Count Cenci!
So much that thou mightst honorably live
And reconcile thyself with thine own heart
And with thy God and with the offended world.
How hideously look deeds of lust and blood
Through those snow-white and venerable hairs!
Your children should be sitting round you now
But that you fear to read upon their looks
The shame and misery you have written there.
Where is your wife? Where is your gentle daughter?
Methinks her sweet looks, which make all things else
Beauteous and glad, might kill the fiend within you.
Why is she barred from all society
But her own strange and uncomplaining wrongs?
Talk with me, Count, -- you know I mean you well.
I stood beside your dark and fiery youth,
Watching its bold and bad career, as men
Watch meteors, but it vanished not; I marked
Your desperate and remorseless manhood; now
Do I behold you in dishonored age
Charged with a thousand unrepented crimes.
Yet I have ever hoped you would amend,
And in that hope have saved your life three times.
CENCI
For which Aldobrandino owes you now
My fief beyond the Pincian. Cardinal,
One thing, I pray you, recollect henceforth,
And so we shall converse with less restraint.
A man you knew spoke of my wife and daughter;
He was accustomed to frequent my house;
So the next day his wife and daughter came
And asked if I had seen him; and I smiled.
I think they never saw him any more.
CAMILLO
Thou execrable man, beware!
CENCI
Of thee?
Nay, this is idle. We should know each other.
As to my character for what men call crime,
Seeing I please my senses as I list,
And vindicate that right with force or guile,
It is a public matter, and I care not
If I discuss it with you. I may speak
Alike to you and my own conscious heart,
For you give out that you have half reformed me;
Therefore strong vanity will keep you silent,
If fear should not; both will, I do not doubt.
All men delight in sensual luxury;
All men enjoy revenge, and most exult
Over the tortures they can never feel,
Flattering their secret peace with others' pain.
But I delight in nothing else. I love
The sight of agony, and the sense of joy,
When this shall be another's and that mine;
And I have no remorse and little fear,
Which are, I think, the checks of other men.
This mood has grown upon me, until now
Any design my captious fancy makes
The picture of its wish -- and it forms none
But such as men like you would start to know --
Is as my natural food and rest debarred
Until it be accomplished.
CAMILLO
Art thou not
Most miserable?
CENCI
Why miserable?
No. I am what your theologians call
Hardened; which they must be in impudence,
So to revile a man's peculiar taste.
True, I was happier than I am, while yet
Manhood remained to act the thing I thought, --
While lust was sweeter than revenge; and now
Invention palls. Ay, we must all grow old.
And but that there remains a deed to act
Whose horror might make sharp an appetite
Duller than mine -- I 'd do, -- I know not what.
When I was young I thought of nothing else
But pleasure; and I fed on honey sweets.
Men, by St. Thomas! cannot live like bees, --
And I grew tired; yet, till I killed a foe,
And heard his groans, and heard his children's groans,
Knew I not what delight was else on earth, --
Which now delights me little. I the rather
Look on such pangs as terror ill conceals --
The dry, fixed eyeball, the pale, quivering lip,
Which tell me that the spirit weeps within
Tears bitterer than the bloody sweat of Christ.
I rarely kill the body, which preserves,
Like a strong prison, the soul within my power,
Wherein I feed it with the breath of fear
For hourly pain.
CAMILLO
Hell's most abandoned fiend
Did never, in the drunkenness of guilt,
Speak to his heart as now you speak to me.
I thank my God that I believe you not.
Enter ANDREA
ANDREA
My Lord, a gentleman from Salamanca
Would speak with you.
CENCI
Bid him attend me
In the grand saloon.
[Exit ANDREA.
CAMILLO
Farewell; and I will pray
Almighty God that thy false, impious words
Tempt not his spirit to abandon thee.
[Exit CAMILLO.
CENCI
The third of my possessions! I must use
Close husbandry, or gold, the old man's sword,
Falls from my withered hand. But yesterday
There came an order from the Pope to make
Fourfold provision for my cursed sons,
Whom I had sent from Rome to Salamanca,
Hoping some accident might cut them off,
And meaning, if I could, to starve them there.
I pray thee, God, send some quick death upon them!
Bernardo and my wife could not be worse
If dead and damned. Then, as to Beatrice --
[Looking around him suspiciously.
I think they cannot hear me at that door.
What if they should? And yet I need not speak,
Though the heart triumphs with itself in words.
O thou most silent air, that shalt not hear
What now I think! Thou pavement which I tread
Towards her chamber, -- let your echoes talk
Of my imperious step, scorning surprise,
But not of my intent! -- Andrea!
Enter ANDREA
ANDREA
My Lord?
CENCI
Bid Beatrice attend me in her chamber
This evening: -- no, at midnight and alone.
[Exeunt.

SCENE II. -- A Garden of the Cenci Palace. Enter BEATRICE
and ORSINO, as in conversation.

BEATRICE
Pervert not truth,
Orsino. You remember where we held
That conversation; nay, we see the spot
Even from this cypress; two long years are passed
Since, on an April midnight, underneath
The moonlight ruins of Mount Palatine,
I did confess to you my secret mind.
ORSINO
You said you loved me then.
BEATRICE
You are a priest.
Speak to me not of love.
ORSINO
I may obtain
The dispensation of the Pope to marry.
Because I am a priest do you believe
Your image, as the hunter some struck deer,
Follows me not whether I wake or sleep?
BEATRICE
As I have said, speak to me not of love;
Had you a dispensation, I have not;
Nor will I leave this home of misery
Whilst my poor Bernard, and that gentle lady
To whom I owe life and these virtuous thoughts,
Must suffer what I still have strength to share.
Alas, Orsino! All the love that once
I felt for you is turned to bitter pain.
Ours was a youthful contract, which you first
Broke by assuming vows no Pope will loose.
And thus I love you still, but holily,
Even as a sister or a spirit might;
And so I swear a cold fidelity.
And it is well perhaps we shall not marry.
You have a sly, equivocating vein
That suits me not. -- Ah, wretched that I am!
Where shall I turn? Even now you look on me
As you were not my friend, and as if you
Discovered that I thought so, with false smiles
Making my true suspicion seem your wrong.
Ah, no, forgive me; sorrow makes me seem
Sterner than else my nature might have been;
I have a weight of melancholy thoughts,
And they forebode, -- but what can they forebode
Worse than I now endure?
ORSINO
All will be well.
Is the petition yet prepared? You know
My zeal for all you wish, sweet Beatrice;
Doubt not but I will use my utmost skill
So that the Pope attend to your complaint.
BEATRICE
Your zeal for all I wish. Ah me, you are cold!
Your utmost skill -- speak but one word --
(Aside) Alas!
Weak and deserted creature that I am,
Here I stand bickering with my only friend!
(To ORSINO)
This night my father gives a sumptuous feast,
Orsino; he has heard some happy news
From Salamanca, from my brothers there,
And with this outward show of love he mocks
His inward hate. 'T is bold hypocrisy,
For he would gladlier celebrate their deaths,
Which I have heard him pray for on his knees.
Great God! that such a father should be mine!
But there is mighty preparation made,
And all our kin, the Cenci, will be there,
And all the chief nobility of Rome.
And he has bidden me and my pale mother
Attire ourselves in festival array.
Poor lady! she expects some happy change
In his dark spirit from this act; I none.
At supper I will give you the petition;
Till when -- farewell.
ORSINO
Farewell.
[Exit BEATRICE.
I know the Pope
Will ne'er absolve me from my priestly vow
But by absolving me from the revenue
Of many a wealthy see; and, Beatrice,
I think to win thee at an easier rate.
Nor shall he read her eloquent petition.
He might bestow her on some poor relation
Of his sixth cousin, as he did her sister,
And I should be debarred from all access.
Then as to what she suffers from her father,
In all this there is much exaggeration.
Old men are testy, and will have their way.
A man may stab his enemy, or his vassal,
And live a free life as to wine or women,
And with a peevish temper may return
To a dull home, and rate his wife and children;
Daughters and wives call this foul tyranny.
I shall be well content if on my conscience
There rest no heavier sin than what they suffer
From the devices of my love -- a net
From which he shall escape not. Yet I fear
Her subtle mind, her awe-inspiring gaze,
Whose beams anatomize me, nerve by nerve,
And lay me bare, and make me blush to see
My hidden thoughts. -- Ah, no! a friendless girl
Who clings to me, as to her only hope!
I were a fool, not less than if a panther
Were panic-stricken by the antelope's eye,
If she escape me.
[Exit.

SCENE III. -- A magnificent Hall in the Cenci Palace. A
Banquet. Enter CENCI, LUCRETIA, BEATRICE, ORSINO,
CAMILLO, NOBLES.

CENCI
Welcome, my friends and kinsmen; welcome ye,
Princes and Cardinals, pillars of the church,
Whose presence honors our festivity.
I have too long lived like an anchorite,
And in my absence from your merry meetings
An evil word is gone abroad of me;
But I do hope that you, my noble friends,
When you have shared the entertainment here,
And heard the pious cause for which 't is given,
And we have pledged a health or two together,
Will think me flesh and blood as well as you;
Sinful indeed, for Adam made all so,
But tender-hearted, meek and pitiful.
FIRST GUEST
In truth, my Lord, you seem too light of heart,
Too sprightly and companionable a man,
To act the deeds that rumor pins on you.
[To his companion.
I never saw such blithe and open cheer
In any eye!
SECOND GUEST
Some most desired event,
In which we all demand a common joy,
Has brought us hither; let us hear it, Count.
CENCI
It is indeed a most desired event.
If when a parent from a parent's heart
Lifts from this earth to the great Father of all
A prayer, both when he lays him down to sleep,
And when he rises up from dreaming it;
One supplication, one desire, one hope,
That he would grant a wish for his two sons,
Even all that he demands in their regard,
And suddenly beyond his dearest hope
It is accomplished, he should then rejoice,
And call his friends and kinsmen to a feast,
And task their love to grace his merriment, --
Then honor me thus far, for I am he.
BEATRICE (to LUCRETIA)
Great God! How horrible! some dreadful ill
Must have befallen my brothers.
LUCRETIA
Fear not, child,
He speaks too frankly.
BEATRICE
Ah! My blood runs cold.
I fear that wicked laughter round his eye,
Which wrinkles up the skin even to the hair.
CENCI
Here are the letters brought from Salamanca.
Beatrice, read them to your mother. God!
I thank thee! In one night didst thou perform,
By ways inscrutable, the thing I sought.
My disobedient and rebellious sons
Are dead! -- Why, dead! -- What means this change of cheer?
You hear me not -- I tell you they are dead;
And they will need no food or raiment more;
The tapers that did light them the dark way
Are their last cost. The Pope, I think, will not
Expect I should maintain them in their coffins.
Rejoice with me -- my heart is wondrous glad.
BEATRICE (LUCRETIA sinks, half fainting; BEATRICE supports her)
It is not true! -- Dear Lady, pray look up.
Had it been true -- there is a God in Heaven --
He would not live to boast of such a boon.
Unnatural man, thou knowest that it is false.
CENCI
Ay, as the word of God; whom here I call
To witness that I speak the sober truth;
And whose most favoring providence was shown
Even in the manner of their deaths. For Rocco
Was kneeling at the mass, with sixteen others,
When the church fell and crushed him to a mummy;
The rest escaped unhurt. Cristofano
Was stabbed in error by a jealous man,
Whilst she he loved was sleeping with his rival,
All in the self-same hour of the same night;
Which shows that Heaven has special care of me.
I beg those friends who love me that they mark
The day a feast upon their calendars.
It was the twenty-seventh of December.
Ay, read the letters if you doubt my oath.
[The assembly appears confused; several of the guests rise.
FIRST GUEST
Oh, horrible! I will depart.
SECOND GUEST
And I.
THIRD GUEST
No, stay!
I do believe it is some jest; though, faith!
'T is mocking us somewhat too solemnly.
I think his son has married the Infanta,
Or found a mine of gold in El Dorado.
'T is but to season some such news; stay, stay!
I see 't is only raillery by his smile.
CENCI (filling a bowl of wine, and lifting it up)
O thou bright wine, whose purple splendor leaps
And bubbles gayly in this golden bowl
Under the lamp-light, as my spirits do,
To hear the death of my accursed sons!
Could I believe thou wert their mingled blood,
Then would I taste thee like a sacrament,
And pledge with thee the mighty Devil in Hell,
Who, if a father's curses, as men say,
Climb with swift wings after their children's souls,
And drag them from the very throne of Heaven,
Now triumphs in my triumph! -- But thou art
Superfluous; I have drunken deep of joy,
And I will taste no other wine to-night.
Here, Andrea! Bear the bowl around.
A GUEST (rising)
Thou wretch!
Will none among this noble company
Check the abandoned villain?
CAMILLO
For God's sake,
Let me dismiss the guests! You are insane.
Some ill will come of this.
SECOND GUEST
Seize, silence him!
FIRST GUEST
I will!
THIRD GUEST
And I!
CENCI (addressing those who rise with a threatening gesture)
Who moves? Who speaks?
[Turning to the company.
'T is nothing,
Enjoy yourselves. -- Beware! for my revenge
Is as the sealed commission of a king,
That kills, and none dare name the murderer.
[The Banquet is broken up; several of the Guests are departing.
BEATRICE
I do entreat you, go not, noble guests;
What although tyranny and impious hate
Stand sheltered by a father's hoary hair?
What if 't is he who clothed us in these limbs
Who tortures them, and triumphs? What, if we,
The desolate and the dead, were his own flesh,
His children and his wife, whom he is bound
To love and shelter? Shall we therefore find
No refuge in this merciless wide world?
Oh, think what deep wrongs must have blotted out
First love, then reverence, in a child's prone mind,
Till it thus vanquish shame and fear! Oh, think!
I have borne much, and kissed the sacred hand
Which crushed us to the earth, and thought its stroke
Was perhaps some paternal chastisement!
Have excused much, doubted; and when no doubt
Remained, have sought by patience, love and tears
To soften him; and when this could not be,
I have knelt down through the long sleepless nights,
And lifted up to God, the father of all,
Passionate prayers; and when these were not heard,
I have still borne, -- until I meet you here,
Princes and kinsmen, at this hideous feast
Given at my brothers' deaths. Two yet remain;
His wife remains and I, whom if ye save not,
Ye may soon share such merriment again
As fathers make over their children's graves.
Oh! Prince Colonna, thou art our near kinsman;
Cardinal, thou art the Pope's chamberlain;
Camillo, thou art chief justiciary;
Take us away!
CENCI (he has been conversing with CAMILLO during the first
part of BEATRICE'S speech; he hears the conclusion,
and now advances)
I hope my good friends here
Will think of their own daughters -- or perhaps
Of their own throats -- before they lend an ear
To this wild girl.
BEATRICE (not noticing the words of CENCI)
Dare no one look on me?
None answer? Can one tyrant overbear
The sense of many best and wisest men?
Or is it that I sue not in some form
Of scrupulous law that ye deny my suit?
Oh, God! that I were buried with my brothers!
And that the flowers of this departed spring
Were fading on my grave! and that my father
Were celebrating now one feast for all!
CAMILLO
A bitter wish for one so young and gentle.
Can we do nothing? --
COLONNA
Nothing that I see
Count Cenci were a dangerous enemy;
Yet I would second any one.
A CARDINAL
And I.
CENCI
Retire to your chamber, insolent girl!
BEATRICE
Retire thou, impious man! Ay, hide thyself
Where never eye can look upon thee more!
Wouldst thou have honor and obedience,
Who art a torturer? Father, never dream,
Though thou mayst overbear this company,
But ill must come of ill. Frown not on me!
Haste, hide thyself, lest with avenging looks
My brothers' ghosts should hunt thee from thy seat!
Cover thy face from every living eye,
And start if thou but hear a human step;
Seek out some dark and silent corner -- there
Bow thy white head before offended God,
And we will kneel around, and fervently
Pray that he pity both ourselves and thee.
CENCI
My friends, I do lament this insane girl
Has spoiled the mirth of our festivity.
Good night, farewell; I will not make you longer
Spectators of our dull domestic quarrels.
Another time. --
[Exeunt all but CENCI and BEATRICE.
My brain is swimming round.
Give me a bowl of wine!
(To BEATRICE)
Thou painted viper!
Beast that thou art! Fair and yet terrible!
I know a charm shall make thee meek and tame,
Now get thee from my sight!
[Exit BEATRICE.
Here, Andrea,
Fill up this goblet with Greek wine. I said
I would not drink this evening, but I must;
For, strange to say, I feel my spirits fail
With thinking what I have decreed to do.
(Drinking the wine)
Be thou the resolution of quick youth
Within my veins, and manhood's purpose stern,
And age's firm, cold, subtle villainy;
As if thou wert indeed my children's blood
Which I did thirst to drink! The charm works well.
It must be done; it shall be done, I swear!
[Exit.

Act II

DRAMATIS PERSONAE
COUNT FRANCESCO CENCI.
GIACOMO, BERNARDO, his Sons.
CARDINAL CAMILLO.
PRINCE COLONNA.
ORSINO, a Prelate.
SAVELLA, the Pope's Legate.
OLIMPIO, MARZIO, Assassins.
ANDREA, Servant to CENCI.
NOBLES. JUDGES. GUARDS, SERVANTS.
LUCRETIA, Wife of CENCI and Stepmother of his children.
BEATRICE, his Daughter.

The SCENE lies principally in Rome, but changes during the fourth
Act to Petrella, a castle among the Apulian Apennines.
TIME. During the Pontificate of Clement VIII.


SCENE I. -- An Apartment in the Cenci Palace. Enter
LUCRETIA and BERNARDO.

LUCRETIA
WEEP not, my gentle boy; he struck but me,
Who have borne deeper wrongs. In truth, if he
Had killed me, he had done a kinder deed.
O God Almighty, do thou look upon us,
We have no other friend but only thee!
Yet weep not; though I love you as my own,
I am not your true mother.
BERNARDO
Oh, more, more
Than ever mother was to any child,
That have you been to me! Had he not been
My father, do you think that I should weep?
LUCRETIA
Alas! poor boy, what else couldst thou have done!
Enter BEATRICE
BEATRICE (in a hurried voice)
Did he pass this way? Have you seen him, brother?
Ah, no! that is his step upon the stairs;
'T is nearer now; his hand is on the door;
Mother, if I to thee have ever been
A duteous child, now save me! Thou, great God,
Whose image upon earth a father is,
Dost thou indeed abandon me? He comes;
The door is opening now; I see his face;
He frowns on others, but he smiles on me,
Even as he did after the feast last night.
Enter a Servant
Almighty God, how merciful thou art!
'T is but Orsino's servant. -- Well, what news?
SERVANT
My master bids me say the Holy Father
Has sent back your petition thus unopened.
(Giving a paper)
And he demands at what hour 't were secure
To visit you again?
LUCRETIA
At the Ave Mary.
[Exit Servant.
So, daughter, our last hope has failed. Ah me,
How pale you look! you tremble, and you stand
Wrapped in some fixed and fearful meditation,
As if one thought were overstrong for you;
Your eyes have a chill glare; oh, dearest child!
Are you gone mad? If not, pray speak to me.
BEATRICE
You see I am not mad; I speak to you.
LUCRETIA
You talked of something that your father did
After that dreadful feast? Could it be worse
Than when he smiled, and cried, 'My sons are dead!'
And every one looked in his neighbor's face
To see if others were as white as he?
At the first word he spoke I felt the blood
Rush to my heart, and fell into a trance;
And when it passed I sat all weak and wild;
Whilst you alone stood up, and with strong words
Checked his unnatural pride; and I could see
The devil was rebuked that lives in him.
Until this hour thus you have ever stood
Between us and your father's moody wrath
Like a protecting presence; your firm mind
Has been our only refuge and defence.
What can have thus subdued it? What can now
Have given you that cold melancholy look,
Succeeding to your unaccustomed fear?
BEATRICE
What is it that you say? I was just thinking
'T were better not to struggle any more.
Men, like my father, have been dark and bloody;
Yet never -- oh! before worse comes of it,
'T were wise to die; it ends in that at last.
LUCRETIA
Oh, talk not so, dear child! Tell me at once
What did your father do or say to you?
He stayed not after that accursed feast
One moment in your chamber. -- Speak to me.
BERNARDO
Oh, sister, sister, prithee, speak to us!
BEATRICE (speaking very slowly, with a forced calmness)
It was one word, mother, one little word;
One look, one smile.
(Wildly)
Oh! he has trampled me
Under his feet, and made the blood stream down
My pallid cheeks. And he has given us all
Ditch-water, and the fever-stricken flesh
Of buffaloes, and bade us eat or starve,
And we have eaten. He has made me look
On my beloved Bernardo, when the rust
Of heavy chains has gangrened his sweet limbs;
And I have never yet despaired -- but now!
What would I say?
(Recovering herself)
Ah no! 't is nothing new.
The sufferings we all share have made me wild;
He only struck and cursed me as he passed;
He said, he looked, he did, -- nothing at all
Beyond his wont, yet it disordered me.
Alas! I am forgetful of my duty;
I should preserve my senses for your sake.
LUCRETIA
Nay, Beatrice; have courage, my sweet girl.
If any one despairs it should be I,
Who loved him once, and now must live with him
Till God in pity call for him or me.
For you may, like your sister, find some husband,
And smile, years hence, with children round your knees;
Whilst I, then dead, and all this hideous coil,
Shall be remembered only as a dream.
BEATRICE
Talk not to me, dear Lady, of a husband.
Did you not nurse me when my mother died?
Did you not shield me and that dearest boy?
And had we any other friend but you
In infancy, with gentle words and looks,
To win our father not to murder us?
And shall I now desert you? May the ghost
Of my dead mother plead against my soul,
If I abandon her who filled the place
She left, with more, even, than a mother's love!
BERNARDO
And I am of my sister's mind. Indeed
I would not leave you in this wretchedness,
Even though the Pope should make me free to live
In some blithe place, like others of my age,
With sports, and delicate food, and the fresh air.
Oh, never think that I will leave you, mother!
LUCRETIA
My dear, dear children!
Enter CENCI, suddenly
CENCI
What! Beatrice here!
Come hither!
[She shrinks back, and covers her face.
Nay, hide not your face, 't is fair;
Look up! Why, yesternight you dared to look
With disobedient insolence upon me,
Bending a stern and an inquiring brow
On what I meant; whilst I then sought to hide
That which I came to tell you -- but in vain.
BEATRICE (wildly staggering towards the door)
Oh, that the earth would gape! Hide me, O God!
CENCI
Then it was I whose inarticulate words
Fell from my lips, and who with tottering steps
Fled from your presence, as you now from mine.
Stay, I command you! From this day and hour
Never again, I think, with fearless eye,
And brow superior, and unaltered cheek,
And that lip made for tenderness or scorn,
Shalt thou strike dumb the meanest of mankind;
Me least of all. Now get thee to thy chamber!
Thou too, loathed image of thy cursed mother,
(To BERNARDO)
Thy milky, meek face makes me sick with hate!
[Exeunt BEATRICE and BERNARDO.
(Aside) So much has passed between us as must make
Me bold, her fearful. -- 'T is an awful thing
To touch such mischief as I now conceive;
So men sit shivering on the dewy bank
And try the chill stream with their feet; once in --
How the delighted spirit pants for joy!
LUCRETIA (advancing timidly towards him)
O husband! pray forgive poor Beatrice.
She meant not any ill.
CENCI
Nor you perhaps?
Nor that young imp, whom you have taught by rote
Parricide with his alphabet? nor Giacomo?
Nor those two most unnatural sons who stirred
Enmity up against me with the Pope?
Whom in one night merciful God cut off.
Innocent lambs! They thought not any ill.
You were not here conspiring? you said nothing
Of how I might be dungeoned as a madman;
Or be condemned to death for some offence,
And you would be the witnesses? This failing,
How just it were to hire assassins, or
Put sudden poison in my evening drink?
Or smother me when overcome by wine?
Seeing we had no other judge but God,
And he had sentenced me, and there were none
But you to be the executioners
Of his decree enregistered in heaven?
Oh, no! You said not this?
LUCRETIA
So help me God,
I never thought the things you charge me with!
CENCI
If you dare to speak that wicked lie again,
I 'll kill you. What! it was not by your counsel
That Beatrice disturbed the feast last night?
You did not hope to stir some enemies
Against me, and escape, and laugh to scorn
What every nerve of you now trembles at?
You judged that men were bolder than they are;
Few dare to stand between their grave and me.
LUCRETIA
Look not so dreadfully! By my salvation
I knew not aught that Beatrice designed;
Nor do I think she designed anything
Until she heard you talk of her dead brothers.
CENCI
Blaspheming liar! you are damned for this!
But I will take you where you may persuade
The stones you tread on to deliver you;
For men shall there be none but those who dare
All things -- not question that which I command.
On Wednesday next I shall set out; you know
That savage rook, the Castle of Petrella;
'T is safely walled, and moated round about;
Its dungeons under ground and its thick towers
Never told tales; though they have heard and seen
What might make dumb things speak. Why do you linger?
Make speediest preparation for the journey!
[Exit LUCRETIA.
The all-beholding sun yet shines; I hear
A busy stir of men about the streets;
I see the bright sky through the window panes.
It is a garish, broad, and peering day;
Loud, light, suspicious, full of eyes and ears;
And every little corner, nook, and hole,
Is penetrated with the insolent light.
Come, darkness! Yet, what is the day to me?
And wherefore should I wish for night, who do
A deed which shall confound both night and day?
'T is she shall grope through a bewildering mist
Of horror; if there be a sun in heaven,
She shall not dare to look upon its beams;
Nor feel its warmth. Let her, then, wish for night;
The act I think shall soon extinguish all
For me; I bear a darker, deadlier gloom
Than the earth's shade, or interlunar air,
Or constellations quenched in murkiest cloud,
In which I walk secure and unbeheld
Towards my purpose. -- Would that it were done!
[Exit.

SCENE II. -- A Chamber in the Vatican. Enter CAMILLO and
GIACOMO, in conversation.

CAMILLO
There is an obsolete and doubtful law
By which you might obtain a bare provision
Of food and clothing.
GIACOMO
Nothing more? Alas!
Bare must be the provision which strict law
Awards, and aged sullen avarice pays.
Why did my father not apprentice me
To some mechanic trade? I should have then
Been trained in no highborn necessities
Which I could meet not by my daily toil.
The eldest son of a rich nobleman
Is heir to all his incapacities;
He has wide wants, and narrow powers. If you,
Cardinal Camillo, were reduced at once
From thrice-driven beds of down, and delicate food,
An hundred servants, and six palaces,
To that which nature doth indeed require? --
CAMILLO
Nay, there is reason in your plea; 't were hard.
GIACOMO
'T is hard for a firm man to bear; but I
Have a dear wife, a lady of high birth,
Whose dowry in ill hour I lent my father,
Without a bond or witness to the deed;
And children, who inherit her fine senses,
The fairest creatures in this breathing world;
And she and they reproach me not. Cardinal,
Do you not think the Pope will interpose
And stretch authority beyond the law?
CAMILLO
Though your peculiar case is hard, I know
The Pope will not divert the course of law.
After that impious feast the other night
I spoke with him, and urged him then to check
Your father's cruel hand; he frowned and said,
'Children are disobedient, and they sting
Their fathers' hearts to madness and despair,
Requiting years of care with contumely.
I pity the Count Cenci from my heart;
His outraged love perhaps awakened hate,
And thus he is exasperated to ill.
In the great war between the old and young,
I, who have white hairs and a tottering body,
Will keep at least blameless neutrality.'
Enter ORSINO
You, my good lord Orsino, heard those words.
ORSINO
What words?
GIACOMO
Alas, repeat them not again!
There then is no redress for me; at least
None but that which I may achieve myself,
Since I am driven to the brink. -- But, say,
My innocent sister and my only brother
Are dying underneath my father's eye.
The memorable torturers of this land,
Galeaz Visconti, Borgia, Ezzelin,
Never inflicted on their meanest slave
What these endure; shall they have no protection?
CAMILLO
Why, if they would petition to the Pope,
I see not how he could refuse it; yet
He holds it of most dangerous example
In aught to weaken the paternal power,
Being, as 't were, the shadow of his own.
I pray you now excuse me. I have business
That will not bear delay.
[Exit CAMILLO.
GIACOMO
But you, Orsino,
Have the petition; wherefore not present it?
ORSINO
I have presented it, and backed it with
My earnest prayers and urgent interest;
It was returned unanswered. I doubt not
But that the strange and execrable deeds
Alleged in it -- in truth they might well baffle
Any belief -- have turned the Pope's displeasure
Upon the accusers from the criminal.
So I should guess from what Camillo said.
GIACOMO
My friend, that palace-walking devil, Gold,
Has whispered silence to His Holiness;
And we are left, as scorpions ringed with fire.
What should we do but strike ourselves to death?
For he who is our murderous persecutor
Is shielded by a father's holy name,
Or I would --
[Stops abruptly.
ORSINO
What? Fear not to speak your thought.
Words are but holy as the deeds they cover;
A priest who has forsworn the God he serves,
A judge who makes Truth weep at his decree,
A friend who should weave counsel, as I now,
But as the mantle of some selfish guile,
A father who is all a tyrant seems, --
Were the profaner for his sacred name.
GIACOMO
Ask me not what I think; the unwilling brain
Feigns often what it would not; and we trust
Imagination with such fantasies
As the tongue dares not fashion into words --
Which have no words, their horror makes them dim
To the mind's eye. My heart denies itself
To think what you demand.
ORSINO
But a friend's bosom
Is as the inmost cave of our own mind,
Where we sit shut from the wide gaze of day
And from the all-communicating air.
You look what I suspected --
GIACOMO
Spare me now!
I am as one lost in a midnight wood,
Who dares not ask some harmless passenger
The path across the wilderness, lest he,
As my thoughts are, should be -- a murderer.
I know you are my friend, and all I dare
Speak to my soul that will I trust with thee.
But now my heart is heavy, and would take
Lone counsel from a night of sleepless care.
Pardon me that I say farewell -- farewell!
I would that to my own suspected self
I could address a word so full of peace.
ORSINO
Farewell! -- Be your thoughts better or more bold.
[Exit GIACOMO.
I had disposed the Cardinal Camillo
To feed his hope with cold encouragement.
It fortunately serves my close designs
That 't is a trick of this same family
To analyze their own and other minds.
Such self-anatomy shall teach the will
Dangerous secrets; for it tempts our powers,
Knowing what must be thought, and may be done,
Into the depth of darkest purposes.
So Cenci fell into the pit; even I,
Since Beatrice unveiled me to myself,
And made me shrink from what I cannot shun,
Show a poor figure to my own esteem,
To which I grow half reconciled. I 'll do
As little mischief as I can; that thought
Shall fee the accuser conscience.
(After a pause)
Now what harm
If Cenci should be murdered? -- Yet, if murdered,
Wherefore by me? And what if I could take
The profit, yet omit the sin and peril
In such an action? Of all earthly things
I fear a man whose blows outspeed his words;
And such is Cenci; and, while Cenci lives,
His daughter's dowry were a secret grave
If a priest wins her. -- O fair Beatrice!
Would that I loved thee not, or, loving thee,
Could but despise danger and gold and all
That frowns between my wish and its effect,
Or smiles beyond it! There is no escape;
Her bright form kneels beside me at the altar,
And follows me to the resort of men,
And fills my slumber with tumultuous dreams,
So when I wake my blood seems liquid fire;
And if I strike my damp and dizzy head,
My hot palm scorches it; her very name,
But spoken by a stranger, makes my heart
Sicken and pant; and thus unprofitably
I clasp the phantom of unfelt delights
Till weak imagination half possesses
The self-created shadow. Yet much longer
Will I not nurse this life of feverous hours.
From the unravelled hopes of Giacomo
I must work out my own dear purposes.
I see, as from a tower, the end of all:
Her father dead; her brother bound to me
By a dark secret, surer than the grave;
Her mother scared and unexpostulating
From the dread manner of her wish achieved;
And she! -- Once more take courage, my faint heart;
What dares a friendless maiden matched with thee?
I have such foresight as assures success.
Some unbeheld divinity doth ever,
When dread events are near, stir up men's minds
To black suggestions; and he prospers best,
Not who becomes the instrument of ill,
But who can flatter the dark spirit that makes
Its empire and its prey of other hearts
Till it become his slave -- as I will do.
[Exit.


Act III

DRAMATIS PERSONAE
COUNT FRANCESCO CENCI.
GIACOMO, BERNARDO, his Sons.
CARDINAL CAMILLO.
PRINCE COLONNA.
ORSINO, a Prelate.
SAVELLA, the Pope's Legate.
OLIMPIO, MARZIO, Assassins.
ANDREA, Servant to CENCI.
NOBLES. JUDGES. GUARDS, SERVANTS.
LUCRETIA, Wife of CENCI and Stepmother of his children.
BEATRICE, his Daughter.

The SCENE lies principally in Rome, but changes during the fourth
Act to Petrella, a castle among the Apulian Apennines.
TIME. During the Pontificate of Clement VIII.


SCENE I. -- An Apartment in the Cenci Palace. LUCRETIA;
enter BEATRICE.

BEATRICE (she enters staggering and speaks wildly)
REACH me that handkerchief! -- My brain is hurt;
My eyes are full of blood; just wipe them for me --
I see but indistinctly.
LUCRETIA
My sweet child,
You have no wound; 't is only a cold dew
That starts from your dear brow. -- Alas, alas!
What has befallen?
BEATRICE
How comes this hair undone?
Its wandering strings must be what blind me so,
And yet I tied it fast. -- Oh, horrible!
The pavement sinks under my feet! The walls
Spin round! I see a woman weeping there,
And standing calm and motionless, whilst I
Slide giddily as the world reels. -- My God!
The beautiful blue heaven is flecked with blood!
The sunshine on the floor is black! The air
Is changed to vapors such as the dead breathe
In charnel-pits! Pah! I am choked! There creeps
A clinging, black, contaminating mist
About me -- 't is substantial, heavy, thick;
I cannot pluck it from me, for it glues
My fingers and my limbs to one another,
And eats into my sinews, and dissolves
My flesh to a pollution, poisoning
The subtle, pure, and inmost spirit of life!
My God! I never knew what the mad felt
Before; for I am mad beyond all doubt!
(More wildly)
No, I am dead! These putrefying limbs
Shut round and sepulchre the panting soul
Which would burst forth into the wandering air!
(A pause)
What hideous thought was that I had even now?
'T is gone; and yet its burden remains here
O'er these dull eyes -- upon this weary heart!
O world! O life! O day! O misery!
LUCRETIA
What ails thee, my poor child? She answers not.
Her spirit apprehends the sense of pain,
But not it cause; suffering has dried away
The source from which it sprung.
BEATRICE (frantically)
Like Parricide --
Misery has killed its father; yet its father
Never like mine -- O God! what thing am I?
LUCRETIA
My dearest child, what has your father done?
BEATRICE (doubtfully)
Who art thou, questioner? I have no father.
[Aside.
She is the madhouse nurse who tends on me,
It is a piteous office.
(To LUCRETIA, in a slow, subdued voice)
Do you know,
I thought I was that wretched Beatrice
Men speak of, whom her father sometimes hales
From hall to hall by the entangled hair;
At others, pens up naked in damp cells
Where scaly reptiles crawl, and starves her there
Till she will eat strange flesh. This woful story
So did I overact in my sick dreams
That I imagined -- no, it cannot be!
Horrible things have been in this wild world,
Prodigious mixtures, and confusions strange
Of good and ill; and worse have been conceived
Than ever there was found a heart to do.
But never fancy imaged such a deed
As --
(Pauses, suddenly recollecting herself)
Who art thou? Swear to me, ere I die
With fearful expectation, that indeed
Thou art not what thou seemest -- Mother!
LUCRETIA
Oh!
My sweet child, know you --
BEATRICE
Yet speak it not;
For then if this be truth, that other too
Must be a truth, a firm enduring truth,
Linked with each lasting circumstance of life,
Never to change, never to pass away.
Why so it is. This is the Cenci Palace;
Thou art Lucretia; I am Beatrice.
I have talked some wild words, but will no more.
Mother, come near me; from this point of time,
I am --
(Her voice dies away faintly)
LUCRETIA
Alas! what has befallen thee, child?
What has thy father done?
BEATRICE
What have I done?
Am I not innocent? Is it my crime
That one with white hair and imperious brow,
Who tortured me from my forgotten years
As parents only dare, should call himself
My father, yet should be! -- Oh, what am I?
What name, what place, what memory shall be mine?
What retrospects, outliving even despair?
LUCRETIA
He is a violent tyrant, surely, child;
We know that death alone can make us free;
His death or ours. But what can he have done
Of deadlier outrage or worse injury?
Thou art unlike thyself; thine eyes shoot forth
A wandering and strange spirit. Speak to me,
Unlock those pallid hands whose fingers twine
With one another.
BEATRICE
'T is the restless life
Tortured within them. If I try to speak,
I shall go mad. Ay, something must be done;
What, yet I know not -- something which shall make
The thing that I have suffered but a shadow
In the dread lightning which avenges it;
Brief, rapid, irreversible, destroying
The consequence of what it cannot cure.
Some such thing is to be endured or done;
When I know what, I shall be still and calm,
And never anything will move me more.
But now! -- O blood, which art my father's blood,
Circling through these contaminated veins,
If thou, poured forth on the polluted earth,
Could wash away the crime and punishment
By which I suffer -- no, that cannot be!
Many might doubt there were a God above
Who sees and permits evil, and so die;
That faith no agony shall obscure in me.
LUCRETIA
It must indeed have been some bitter wrong;
Yet what, I dare not guess. Oh, my lost child,
Hide not in proud impenetrable grief
Thy sufferings from my fear.
BEATRICE
I hide them not.
What are the words which yon would have me speak?
I, who can feign no image in my mind
Of that which has transformed me; I, whose thought
Is like a ghost shrouded and folded up
In its own formless horror -- of all words,
That minister to mortal intercourse,
Which wouldst thou hear? for there is none to tell
My misery; if another ever knew
Aught like to it, she died as I will die,
And left it, as I must, without a name.
Death, death! our law and our religion call thee
A punishment and a reward; oh, which
Have I deserved?
LUCRETIA
The peace of innocence,
Till in your season you be called to heaven.
Whate'er you may have suffered, you have done
No evil. Death must be the punishment
Of crime, or the reward of trampling down
The thorns which God has strewed upon the path
Which leads to immortality.
BEATRICE
Ay, death --
The punishment of crime. I pray thee, God,
Let me not be bewildered while I judge.
If I must live day after day, and keep
These limbs, the unworthy temple of thy spirit,
As a foul den from which what thou abhorrest
May mock thee unavenged -- it shall not be!
Self-murder -- no, that might be no escape,
For thy decree yawns like a Hell between
Our will and it. -- Oh! in this mortal world
There is no vindication and no law,
Which can adjudge and execute the doom
Of that through which I suffer.
Enter ORSINO
(She approaches him solemnly)
Welcome, friend!
I have to tell you that, since last we met,
I have endured a wrong so great and strange
That neither life nor death can give me rest.
Ask me not what it is, for there are deeds
Which have no form, sufferings which have no tongue.
ORSINO
And what is he who has thus injured you?
BEATRICE
The man they call my father; a dread name.
ORSINO
It cannot be --
BEATRICE
What it can be, or not,
Forbear to think. It is, and it has been;
Advise me how it shall not be again.
I thought to die; but a religious awe
Restrains me, and the dread lest death itself
Might be no refuge from the consciousness
Of what is yet unexpiated. Oh, speak!
ORSINO
Accuse him of the deed, and let the law
Avenge thee.
BEATRICE
Oh, ice-hearted counsellor!
If I could find a word that might make known
The crime of my destroyer; and that done,
My tongue should like a knife tear out the secret
Which cankers my heart's core; ay, lay all bare,
So that my unpolluted fame should be
With vilest gossips a stale mouthed story;
A mock, a byword, an astonishment: --
If this were done, which never shall be done,
Think of the offender's gold, his dreaded hate,
And the strange horror of the accuser's tale,
Baffling belief, and overpowering speech;
Scarce whispered, unimaginable, wrapped
In hideous hints -- Oh, most assured redress!
ORSINO
You will endure it then?
BEATRICE
Endure! -- Orsino,
It seems your counsel is small profit.
(Turns from him, and speaks half to herself)
Ay,
All must be suddenly resolved and done.
What is this undistinguishable mist
Of thoughts, which rise, like shadow after shadow,
Darkening each other?
ORSINO
Should the offender live?
Triumph in his misdeed? and make, by use,
His crime, whate'er it is, dreadful no doubt,
Thine element; until thou mayest become
Utterly lost; subdued even to the hue
Of that which thou permittest?
BEATRICE (to herself)
Mighty death!
Thou double-visaged shadow! only judge!
Rightfullest arbiter!
(She retires, absorbed in thought)
LUCRETIA
If the lightning
Of God has e'er descended to avenge --
ORSINO
Blaspheme not! His high Providence commits
Its glory on this earth and their own wrongs
Into the hands of men; if they neglect
To punish crime --
LUCRETIA
But if one, like this wretch,
Should mock with gold opinion, law and power?
If there be no appeal to that which makes
The guiltiest tremble? if, because our wrongs,
For that they are unnatural, strange and monstrous,
Exceed all measure of belief? Oh, God!
If, for the very reasons which should make
Redress most swift and sure, our injurer triumphs?
And we, the victims, bear worse punishment
Than that appointed for their torturer?
ORSINO
Think not
But that there is redress where there is wrong,
So we be bold enough to seize it.
LUCRETIA
How?
If there were any way to make all sure,
I know not -- but I think it might be good
To --
ORSINO
Why, his late outrage to Beatrice --
For it is such, as I but faintly guess,
As makes remorse dishonor, and leaves her
Only one duty, how she may avenge;
You, but one refuge from ills ill endured;
Me, but one counsel --
LUCRETIA
For we cannot hope
That aid, or retribution, or resource
Will arise thence, where every other one
Might find them with less need.
[BEATRICE advances.
ORSINO
Then --
BEATRICE
Peace, Orsino!
And, honored Lady, while I speak, I pray
That you put off, as garments overworn,
Forbearance and respect, remorse and fear,
And all the fit restraints of daily life,
Which have been borne from childhood, but which now
Would be a mockery to my holier plea.
As I have said, I have endured a wrong,
Which, though it be expressionless, is such
As asks atonement, both for what is passed,
And lest I be reserved, day after day,
To load with crimes an overburdened soul,
And be -- what ye can dream not. I have prayed
To God, and I have talked with my own heart,
And have unravelled my entangled will,
And have at length determined what is right.
Art thou my friend, Orsino? False or true?
Pledge thy salvation ere I speak.
ORSINO
I swear
To dedicate my cunning, and my strength,
My silence, and whatever else is mine,
To thy commands.
LUCRETIA
You think we should devise
His death?
BEATRICE
And execute what is devised,
And suddenly. We must be brief and bold.
ORSINO
And yet most cautious.
LUCRETIA
For the jealous laws
Would punish us with death and infamy
For that which it became themselves to do.
BEATRICE
Be cautious as ye may, but prompt. Orsino,
What are the means?
ORSINO
I know two dull, fierce outlaws,
Who think man's spirit as a worm's, and they
Would trample out, for any slight caprice,
The meanest or the noblest life. This mood
Is marketable here in Rome. They sell
What we now want.
LUCRETIA
To-morrow, before dawn,
Cenci will take us to that lonely rock,
Petrella, in the Apulian Apennines.
If he arrive there --
BEATRICE
He must not arrive.
ORSINO
Will it be dark before you reach the tower?
LUCRETIA
The sun will scarce be set.
BEATRICE
But I remember
Two miles on this side of the fort the road
Crosses a deep ravine; 't is rough and narrow,
And winds with short turns down the precipice;
And in its depth there is a mighty rock,
Which has, from unimaginable years,
Sustained itself with terror and with toil
Over a gulf, and with the agony
With which it clings seems slowly coming down;
Even as a wretched soul hour after hour
Clings to the mass of life; yet, clinging, leans;
And, leaning, makes more dark the dread abyss
In which it fears to fall; beneath this crag
Huge as despair, as if in weariness,
The melancholy mountain yawns; below,
You hear but see not an impetuous torrent
Raging among the caverns, and a bridge
Crosses the chasm; and high above there grow,
With intersecting trunks, from crag to crag,
Cedars, and yews, and pines; whose tangled hair
Is matted in one solid roof of shade
By the dark ivy's twine. At noonday here
'T is twilight, and at sunset blackest night.
ORSINO
Before you reach that bridge make some excuse
For spurring on your mules, or loitering
Until --
BEATRICE
What sound is that?
LUCRETIA
Hark! No, it cannot be a servant's step;
It must be Cenci, unexpectedly
Returned -- make some excuse for being here.
BEATRICE (to ORSINO as she goes out)
That step we hear approach must never pass
The bridge of which we spoke.
[Exeunt LUCRETIA and BEATRICE.
ORSINO
What shall I do?
Cenci must find me here, and I must bear
The imperious inquisition of his looks
As to what brought me hither; let me mask
Mine own in some inane and vacant smile.
Enter GIACOMO, in a hurried manner
How! have you ventured hither? know you then
That Cenci is from home?
GIACOMO
I sought him here;
And now must wait till he returns.
ORSINO
Great God!
Weigh you the danger of this rashness?
GIACOMO
Ay!
Does my destroyer know his danger? We
Are now no more, as once, parent and child,
But man to man; the oppressor to the oppressed,
The slanderer to the slandered; foe to foe.
He has cast Nature off, which was his shield,
And Nature casts him off, who is her shame;
And I spurn both. Is it a father's throat
Which I will shake, and say, I ask not gold;
I ask not happy years; nor memories
Of tranquil childhood; nor home-sheltered love;
Though all these hast thou torn from me, and more;
But only my fair fame; only one hoard
Of peace, which I thought hidden from thy hate
Under the penury heaped on me by thee;
Or I will -- God can understand and pardon,
Why should I speak with man?
ORSINO
Be calm, dear friend.
GIACOMO
Well, I will calmly tell you what he did.
This old Francesco Cenci, as you know,
Borrowed the dowry of my wife from me,
And then denied the loan; and left me so
In poverty, the which I sought to mend
By holding a poor office in the state.
It had been promised to me, and already
I bought new clothing for my ragged babes,
And my wife smiled; and my heart knew repose;
When Cenci's intercession, as I found,
Conferred this office on a wretch, whom thus
He paid for vilest service. I returned
With this ill news, and we sate sad together
Solacing our despondency with tears
Of such affection and unbroken faith
As temper life's worst bitterness; when he,
As he is wont, came to upbraid and curse,
Mocking our poverty, and telling us
Such was God's scourge for disobedient sons.
And then, that I might strike him dumb with shame,
I spoke of my wife's dowry; but he coined
A brief yet specious tale, how I had wasted
The sum in secret riot; and he saw
My wife was touched, and he went smiling forth.
And when I knew the impression he had made,
And felt my wife insult with silent scorn
My ardent truth, and look averse and cold,
I went forth too; but soon returned again;
Yet not so soon but that my wife had taught
My children her harsh thoughts, and they all cried,
'Give us clothes, father! Give us better food!
What you in one night squander were enough
For months!' I looked, and saw that home was hell.
And to that hell will I return no more,
Until mine enemy has rendered up
Atonement, or, as he gave life to me,
I will, reversing Nature's law --
ORSINO
Trust me,
The compensation which thou seekest here
Will be denied.
GIACOMO
Then -- Are you not my friend?
Did you not hint at the alternative,
Upon the brink of which you see I stand,
The other day when we conversed together?
My wrongs were then less. That word, parricide,
Although I am resolved, haunts me like fear.
ORSINO
It must be fear itself, for the bare word
Is hollow mockery. Mark how wisest God
Draws to one point the threads of a just doom,
So sanctifying it; what you devise
Is, as it were, accomplished.
GIACOMO
Is he dead?
ORSINO
His grave is ready. Know that since we met
Cenci has done an outrage to his daughter.
GIACOMO
What outrage?
ORSINO
That she speaks not, but you may
Conceive such half conjectures as I do
From her fixed paleness, and the lofty grief
Of her stern brow, bent on the idle air,
And her severe unmodulated voice,
Drowning both tenderness and dread; and last
From this; that whilst her step-mother and I,
Bewildered in our horror, talked together
With obscure hints, both self-misunderstood,
And darkly guessing, stumbling, in our talk,
Over the truth and yet to its revenge,
She interrupted us, and with a look
Which told, before she spoke it, he must die --
GIACOMO
It is enough. My doubts are well appeased;
There is a higher reason for the act
Than mine; there is a holier judge than me,
A more unblamed avenger. Beatrice,
Who in the gentleness of thy sweet youth
Hast never trodden on a worm, or bruised
A living flower, but thou hast pitied it
With needless tears! fair sister, thou in whom
Men wondered how such loveliness and wisdom
Did not destroy each other! is there made
Ravage of thee? O heart, I ask no more
Justification! Shall I wait, Orsino,
Till he return, and stab him at the door?
ORSINO
Not so, some accident might interpose
To rescue him from what is now most sure;
And you are unprovided where to fly,
How to excuse or to conceal. Nay, listen;
All is contrived; success is so assured
That --
Enter BEATRICE
BEATRICE
'T is my brother's voice! You know me not?
GIACOMO
My sister, my lost sister!
BEATRICE
Lost indeed!
I see Orsino has talked with you, and
That you conjecture things too horrible
To speak, yet far less than the truth. Now stay not,
He might return; yet kiss me; I shall know
That then thou hast consented to his death.
Farewell, farewell! Let piety to God,
Brotherly love, justice and clemency,
And all things that make tender hardest hearts,
Make thine hard, brother. Answer not -- farewell.
[Exeunt severally.

SCENE II. -- A mean Apartment in GIACOMO'S House. GIACOMO alone.

GIACOMO
'T is midnight, and Orsino comes not yet.
(Thunder, and the sound of a storm)
What! can the everlasting elements
Feel with a worm like man? If so, the shaft
Of mercy-winged lightning would not fall
On stones and trees. My wife and children sleep;
They are now living in unmeaning dreams;
But I must wake, still doubting if that deed
Be just which was most necessary. Oh,
Thou unreplenished lamp, whose narrow fire
Is shaken by the wind, and on whose edge
Devouring darkness hovers! thou small flame,
Which, as a dying pulse rises and falls,
Still flickerest up and down, how very soon,
Did I not feed thee, wouldst thou fail and be
As thou hadst never been! So wastes and sinks
Even now, perhaps, the life that kindled mine;
But that no power can fill with vital oil, --
That broken lamp of flesh. Ha! 't is the blood
Which fed these veins that ebbs till all is cold;
It is the form that moulded mine that sinks
Into the white and yellow spasms of death;
It is the soul by which mine was arrayed
In God's immortal likeness which now stands
Naked before Heaven's judgment-seat!
(A bell strikes)
One! Two!
The hours crawl on; and, when my hairs are white,
My son will then perhaps be waiting thus,
Tortured between just hate and vain remorse;
Chiding the tardy messenger of news
Like those which I expect. I almost wish
He be not dead, although my wrongs are great;
Yet -- 't is Orsino's step.
Enter ORSINO
Speak!
ORSINO
I am come
To say he has escaped.
GIACOMO
Escaped!
ORSINO
And safe
Within Petrella. He passed by the spot
Appointed for the deed an hour too soon.
GIACOMO
Are we the fools of such contingencies?
And do we waste in blind misgivings thus
The hours when we should act? Then wind and thunder,
Which seemed to howl his knell, is the loud laughter
With which Heaven mocks our weakness! I henceforth
Will ne'er repent of aught designed or done,
But my repentance.
ORSINO
See, the lamp is out.
GIACOMO
If no remorse is ours when the dim air
Has drunk this innocent flame, why should we quail
When Cenci's life, that light by which ill spirits
See the worst deeds they prompt, shall sink forever?
No, I am hardened.
ORSINO
Why, what need of this?
Who feared the pale intrusion of remorse
In a just deed? Although our first plan failed,
Doubt not but he will soon be laid to rest.
But light the lamp; let us not talk i' the dark.
GIACOMO (lighting the lamp)
And yet, once quenched, I cannot thus relume
My father's life; do you not think his ghost
Might plead that argument with God?
ORSINO
Once gone,
You cannot now recall your sister's peace;
Your own extinguished years of youth and hope;
Nor your wife's bitter words; nor all the taunts
Which, from the prosperous, weak misfortune takes;
Nor your dead mother; nor --
GIACOMO
Oh, speak no more!
I am resolved, although this very hand
Must quench the life that animated it.
ORSINO
There is no need of that. Listen; you know
Olimpio, the castellan of Petrella
In old Colonna's time; him whom your father
Degraded from his post? And Marzio,
That desperate wretch, whom he deprived last year
Of a reward of blood, well earned and due?
GIACOMO
I knew Olimpio; and they say he hated
Old Cenci so, that in his silent rage
His lips grew white only to see him pass.
Of Marzio I know nothing.
ORSINO
Marzio's hate
Matches Olimpio's. I have sent these men,
But in your name, and as at your request,
To talk with Beatrice and Lucretia.
GIACOMO
Only to talk?
ORSINO
The moments which even now
Pass onward to to-morrow's midnight hour
May memorize their flight with death; ere then
They must have talked, and may perhaps have done,
And made an end.
GIACOMO
Listen! What sound is that?
ORSINO
The house-dog moans, and the beams crack; nought else.
GIACOMO
It is my wife complaining in her sleep;
I doubt not she is saying bitter things
Of me; and all my children round her dreaming
That I deny them sustenance.
ORSINO
Whilst he
Who truly took it from them, and who fills
Their hungry rest with bitterness, now sleeps
Lapped in bad pleasures, and triumphantly
Mocks thee in visions of successful hate
Too like the truth of day.
GIACOMO
If e'er he wakes
Again, I will not trust to hireling hands --
ORSINO
Why, that were well. I must be gone; good night!
When next we meet, may all be done!
GIACOMO
And all
Forgotten! Oh, that I had never been!
[Exeunt.




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