SCENE II.--An Open Space.

Beneath a hawthorn, Eulalie, garlanded; near her, Rupert, Felice, Bruno, Torello, and Scipio, standing together. Ivy and Green. Alardo and Conrad, dressed like soothsayers, among a crowd of Mayers beside a May-pole. Cinthio, apart.

Green. Prince Rupert shall our May-lord be. Ivy. Well said! Mayers. The prince, the prince! Green [to Eulalie]. Fair queen, entreat the prince. Eulalie. Be you our lord of May, most gracious prince. I pray you pardon me if I be bold; Being but a puppet-queen, my subjects' pupil, I speak as I am urged. Rupert. As you are urged? You are their spokesman, merely? Eulalie. Queen, they say, But little more than their spokeswoman, sir. Rupert. I mean, you are mouthpiece only for them. Eulalie. Has any other, sir, petitioned you? Rupert. You will not understand me. This request That I should share with you May's flowery throne, Is, say, the utterance of a hundred hearts, Well-purged and sweetened to the May-queen's prayer, And she, the hundred first, breathes only air. Eulalie. Air, only air, prince, for these hundred hearts: I speak for them; beseech you, be their king. Rupert. The May-queen would not have me for her consort? Eulalie. O yes, my lord, I would. My own heart's throbs Are prayers beseeching you to take it all-- To reign, to tyrannise, to enslave, to kill. My kingdom's conquered now and factious strife Of modesty and love quelled and atoned By your dictation; nobles and populace Crown you, enthrone you, monarch absolute. I pray you, speak not to me; I would weep. The blush upon my cheek will hotly burn Till flooding penitence has quenched its glow. You are so pertinent an inquisitor, Your eyes did burn my resolution through, Your voice did drown me, and I cried for help.-- My lord of May, speak to the people, now. [She leads him forward and goes out. Torello [aside]. Now will I offer it to her. Oh! she has tears in her eyes. No; she must be in a merrier mood to think of love. Rupert [aside]. Ay, lord of May, and lord of May again! May-lord this year, lord of this May for aye; Lord of this flowery season of love's bloom, Lord of this flower of love, seasonably blown: Prince am I--King, maybe, of Belmarie, May-king, and king of sweet May Eulalie.-- Good friends, we thank you for this title new: Its fresh addition gives us double power, With which we join our queen's, two-fold as well, Strong by your suffrage, by her beauty strong: And in this combined and quadruple might, We bid you be as merry as you may. Let study, commerce, labour, for a time-- In truth, three woes--be counted sins in act; Shame anger, malice, envy, every ill Back to the devil with loud-laughing mocks; Drink hail to liberty in rosy wine; Happy your faces with continuous smiles, And spend mirth's overflow in jest and song; Forsake stone walls; re-live the golden age Among the trees in sweetness and moonlight. Mayers. We will, we will! Rupert. Our May-queen gone! Felice. She has retired to preserve her beauty. Bruno. Ay, sir, to pickle it, to wash it in brine, to weep. Rupert. Wept she, indeed? [They talk apart. Green. Is it not a noble prince? Alardo. Truly he seems to be; but by this hue We may not judge his nature's primal mood; For princes, in their humours, are chameleons. Ivy. Camellias, sir, are of different colours. Our prince is of the spotless dye. Alardo. Whitewashed--a sepulchre? Ivy. Sir, do you speak well? Alardo. Well; I hope I speak as well as other men. Ivy. But do you mean well? Alardo. By all means. Green. For he who speaks ill of the prince here, had need to be his bosom-friend, or a cur whom no one would waste a kick on. Alardo. The prince must lie warm-covered in your hearts. Ivy. You must be a stranger. Know, that this same Prince Rupert is out of sight and beyond hearing the mightiest monarch in these parts. To the nobles he is a most egregious tyrant; to the commons, a very brother. But yesterday he addressed me by the damnations of knave and fellow: he could not have been more familiar though he had been my own father, who always calls me rascal. His good qualities are as contemptible as another man's sins. Alardo. Then, by your showing, worthy villager, He is a very white crow of a prince. But, tell me, is he not Alardo's son? Ivy. His son, and successor. Indeed, I may say, he is his father, for he, being without question dead, Rupert is king. Alardo. Dead without question! You are positive. How, if I say I know he is alive? Think you to gain a sire the prince would choose To lose so mighty and august a throne? Ivy. Treasonless man! would you dethrone the prince? Ho! lechery and faith! guard our good prince! His life's in danger. Rupert. What cry is this? Ivy. Great prince, it might have been a crying matter; but I, thank the gods, have been man enough to stifle it. Rupert. So you have turned approver: renegades I never trust; but what have you to say? Ivy. I will prove that this greybeard is the most noteworthy renegade and trusty traitor these times have seen. Rupert. Your language is too original for ordinary capacities.--What are you, old man? Alardo. A soothsayer. Rupert. Is he affiliated in your trade? His dress betokens that. What have you said That this clod could construe as treasonable? Alardo. I but suggested that your highness' sire May yet be canopied by yon blue sky, With no damp mouldering roof, or watery pall Between him and the tabernacling air; That you would joy at loss of sovereignty To clasp Alardo in your arms once more; Whereon this loyal sirrah bellowed out, And laid on me officious needless hands. Rupert. Ha! those of your profession are not wont To talk at random even in courtesy. Approach us nearer; we would speak with you.-- [To Ivy.] For you, sir--there: we pay your blundering faith. [To Alardo.] Now, summon to thine aid thy powerfullest sprite; Or if thy demon be unknown, and speed All unappealed and unannounced, whether He fly from heaven or mid-aerial limbo, Subdue all motion and prostrate thy will, Yea, let thy soul evacuate, that, void, Thy genius may usurp its empty fane, And prophesy with scope and native truth. To question were to slight thy divination; Therefore say sooth of all I seek to know. Alardo. Two things by thee desired most Cannot be thine: one must be lost: One's forfeit is the other's cost. Rupert. An oracle. Expound it now, good sage. Alardo. Remember one, absent and dear; Think of another, loved and near; Their interests clash; their clashing fear. Before the moon does twice uplight The dusky countenance of night, It shall be past, this bosom-fight. Rupert. I understand, and half believe, because On an event so sudden and unlike As that of King Alardo's re-appearance Thou stak'st thy fame thus openly. Say more. Alardo. No more to-day; I am dispirited: And never twice 'twixt ruddy morn and morn Are we with visionary prospect blessed. Your eyes are on my comrade. Brother, speak. Conrad. Nothing to you, Prince Rupert. There is one Of lowlier state whom I have news to tell. He yonder stands and broods with eyes downcast. Rupert. Cinthio, hither and hear thy fortune told. Alardo. Prince, I have converse for your private ear. [They talk apart. Cinthio. Soothsayers and augurers of old were held In high repute for dreams and prophecies. Their star is waning now, their traffic being Unto a race, better in being busy, In barren, fallow fancy, how much worse! Divine you from the stars, old man; or from Men's shapes, complexions, palms, dreams and the like? Scan you a mutton's clean-picked shoulder-blade, Or have you any visionary aid? Conrad. I'll tell thee truths about thyself thou know'st not. Cinthio. Say on. Conrad. Three lustres has this orb in heaven rung, Swinging around its vast and vaulted bell Of measured space, striking its own deep knell From side to side, a huge and pendulous tongue, Since thou, then five years' journey to thy grave, Wast filched most vilely from a lordly home. Thou shalt not, shepherd, twice Pan's blessing crave, Morning and evening on thy flock; nor roam Upon these hills beneath a twice-risen sun Before thou find'st a father; he, a son. Cinthio. A mutual treasure-trove. But by what sign May I believe this bare assertion true? Conrad. Beneath thy left breast is a crescent mole; A flame has sealed a kiss upon thy cheek; A gold chain quaintly wrought hangs round thy neck, Hidden from every but the second sight. Cinthio. By heaven, these things are so! Now, who art thou? Rupert. Presumptuous, meddling fool! A plot, a plot! Confess who bribed thee. Guido 'twas, I warrant. Cinthio, what says the other? Cinthio. He gives me A noble father at no later date Than sunset of to-morrow; vouching this By nominating several private marks About my body. Rupert. So; well-planned, indeed! Wretched dissemblers, bear these wrinkles hence, That, being hypocrites, for age is wise, Shame that which they betoken. Quick, begone! [To Cinthio.] I'll tell thee more anon.--Stand not agape; Be off, trudge, trot; away! [Alardo and Conrad go out. Good, gentle mayors, Retire home for a little; lightly sup; Lightly to bed; at midnight, lightly up, To welcome May, to banish worldly jars, And wanton it like twinkling earthly stars, Outpeering those who then will deftly tread In joyous, maiden mirth, and all the night About the pure moon, from whose dark blue bed Her bower-maids singing sweetly-low aloud To wake their queen, will, with soft, quaint affright, Charily cast her coverlet of cloud: Stars must we all be when shall be displayed Our May-moon, Eulalie, earth's loveliest maid. [Mayers go out shouting. Felice, Bruno, and Torello follow. Cinthio. Was not this all too hurried, unripe, green? Rupert. No; inconsiderate I have not been. Grant what they prophesied of us should hap, It proves no science in the heaven's great map, Nor any other of unearthly mean: Their boasted foresight is of things past seen, And their informing spirits, my good lords. Now, do you scent the plot? In fewest words; Some certain knowledge of my sire and thine, Some hint that I would make Eulalia mine, The haughty stomachs and the fatuous brains Of my high cabinet, have feared with stains Upon our line to spring from Eulalie, Upon their wisdom in permitting me To have my bent; and so, to change my mind, Which by their own they fathom, and to bind Alardo to their penetrating wit, They taught these two, dismissed, to tempt this hit, Which, like a boomerang, returns to maim The flingers, who have made an evil aim. Cinthio. It seems to me this argument is lame. Rupert. Lame! Had you heard yon dotard tackle me About the marring of our family tree; Predicting sad disaster, ruin, death, O'erhanging state and king, which loosed by breath Of vows yet to be sworn to Eulalie Must thunder on us from the cloudy sky; No fear of wrong would linger in your head, No doubt would cripple what I now have said. Or if I blame too widely, sure am I 'Twas Guido sent these rusty prophets here. This daughter whom he keeps in turret high, Making by rarity her beauty dear, In solitude her soul unsullied blows; And he upon her lofty virtue builds A loftier castle than his wisdom knows: He rushes in, disdaining highest guilds Of Belmarie's nobility, to mate His daughter with its prince, himself to make Most potent minister in all the state-- His prince's king, mayhap, for Faustine's sake. For any thought save this, I have no mind-- My heavenly love is, like a goddess, kind. I go to seek her. At some other time Of these predicts we'll reason, or else rhyme. [Goes out. Cinthio. False prophets, or soothsayers, what care I! For me the thread is spun and cast the die; The boat is waiting, and the wind is right. March past, ye steady hours; lead on, midnight.

Enter Onesta.

Onesta! Hangs this gear where it did? Onesta. Alack, alack, it hangs together like a snow-shower in the air. Cinthio. Then is it indeed alack. What has unbound our plot? Onesta. O, we are all unbound! All undone! twelve o'clock will never, never do. Cinthio. How has that hour become refractory which yesterday was most corrigible? Onesta. O, she does not lack courage, but her father, he is fractious. Cinthio. Her father! what of him? Onesta. O, it's all along of him! He goes to bed every night at eleven, as sure as the clock! Upstairs, at every chime creak goes a step, and his stick comes down between, with his other hand on the baluster. And he talks about a new lamp for the landing, as he has done for the last twenty years--not that I remember; but Marjory, who will be seventy to-morrow--that's May-day; and to hear her talking about the May-days when she was young! This very fore-noon she began gabbling, with her toothless old gums, and her beard going wag, wag---- Cinthio. For God's sake cease thy gabbling and thy wagging, and tell me how Guido has perverted the good-nature of midnight. Onesta. La! what a temper you have! I'll tell Faustine how wild a lover she has caught. Cinthio. Tell her how wild I am for her dear love, While you stand dallying with our happiness. Onesta. Dallying, forsooth, dallying! I'll dally no more between you! Cinthio. My fair Onesta, carry this kiss to thy mistress, and keep this one to yourself. Twelve o'clock is not suitable, because? Onesta. Because, as I was just beginning to tell you, Guido goes to bed at eleven--I mean, he goes to his chamber then; counts his keys, his money; gets undressed; curses his valet; says his prayers; then a door slams, or a chimney rumbles, or a rat scrapes behind the wainscot, or a loose slate on Signor Guido's own head rattles a noise of its own in his ears, and he yells, 'Thieves! Fire!' and the bell's rung, and the whole household roused up; and every room, every bed, and closet and hole, searched and shook, and hacked and pierced; and out to the garden---- Cinthio. And is this a nightly performance? But you knew all this before. What prompted you to have us determine our flight for midnight? It must be then, or sooner. Onesta. It can't be, it shan't be, either sooner, or later. Cinthio. Come, come, remember the crowns. [Aside.] I believe she's sold herself to the other side. Onesta. Perhaps it may be done, perhaps it may: though it's not any more possible now than it was before. Cinthio. How are we to manage? Onesta. Well, it may be done; for when I remember, there are two old travellers staying with us just now. They take up all Guido's time. Everybody is so busy you would think our house was a bazaar of all the trades; there could not be more ado supposing it was for the interment of a king. About eleven they will be drawing to the hinder end of supper, and every guest busier than his neighbour eating and drinking, and all the servants drudging like millers with a good wind. Come then: my lady will be ready; and you must put the dress in by the window, and wait till she gets it on, for she will have nothing but her night-gown. Then she will come down, and--O lord! I wish I knew nothing of it. Cinthio. Can you by no means procure her own apparel? Onesta. It is not to be thought of; for her father would know that she could not come at it but by me. Cinthio. She will have greater ease in man's attire, And no disguise could better suit our flight. The wood that lies between us and the shore Will hide us till Sebastian's hour has come. Eleven is our hour. Let Faustine know If I come not that death has flown with me; Or that old Time himself at length has gone, And doomsday come to righten every wrong. [Goes out.

Enter a Servant.

Onesta. Where have you been? Servant. I was sent to invite the prince to sup at our house to-night; and it is good words to ask a man to a good supper. But the prince refused to come, and that is bad words; for it is bad not to choose the good. Onesta. Belike the prince has chosen a better supper somewhere else. Servant. Belike he has. Are you going home? Onesta. Yes. You go before. [They go out.