Chapter 71

CYPRIAN: O memory! permit it not That the tyrant of my thought Be another soul that still Holds dominion o’er the will, That would refuse, but can no more, _5 To bend, to tremble, and adore. Vain idolatry!—I saw, And gazing, became blind with error; Weak ambition, which the awe Of her presence bound to terror! _10 So beautiful she was—and I, Between my love and jealousy, Am so convulsed with hope and fear, Unworthy as it may appear;— So bitter is the life I live, _15 That, hear me, Hell! I now would give To thy most detested spirit My soul, for ever to inherit, To suffer punishment and pine, So this woman may be mine. _20 Hear’st thou, Hell! dost thou reject it? My soul is offered!

DAEMON (UNSEEN): I accept it.

[TEMPEST, WITH THUNDER AND LIGHTNING.]

CYPRIAN: What is this? ye heavens for ever pure, At once intensely radiant and obscure! Athwart the aethereal halls _25 The lightning’s arrow and the thunder-balls The day affright, As from the horizon round, Burst with earthquake sound, In mighty torrents the electric fountains;— _30 Clouds quench the sun, and thunder-smoke Strangles the air, and fire eclipses Heaven. Philosophy, thou canst not even Compel their causes underneath thy yoke: From yonder clouds even to the waves below _35 The fragments of a single ruin choke Imagination’s flight; For, on flakes of surge, like feathers light, The ashes of the desolation, cast Upon the gloomy blast, _40 Tell of the footsteps of the storm; And nearer, see, the melancholy form Of a great ship, the outcast of the sea, Drives miserably! And it must fly the pity of the port, _45 Or perish, and its last and sole resort Is its own raging enemy. The terror of the thrilling cry Was a fatal prophecy Of coming death, who hovers now _50 Upon that shattered prow, That they who die not may be dying still. And not alone the insane elements Are populous with wild portents, But that sad ship is as a miracle _55 Of sudden ruin, for it drives so fast It seems as if it had arrayed its form With the headlong storm. It strikes—I almost feel the shock,— It stumbles on a jagged rock,— _60 Sparkles of blood on the white foam are cast.

[A TEMPEST.]

ALL EXCLAIM [WITHIN]: We are all lost!

DAEMON [WITHIN]: Now from this plank will I Pass to the land and thus fulfil my scheme.

CYPRIAN: As in contempt of the elemental rage A man comes forth in safety, while the ship’s _65 Great form is in a watery eclipse Obliterated from the Oceans page, And round its wreck the huge sea-monsters sit, A horrid conclave, and the whistling wave Is heaped over its carcase, like a grave. _70

[THE DAEMON ENTERS, AS ESCAPED FROM THE SEA.]

DAEMON [ASIDE]: It was essential to my purposes To wake a tumult on the sapphire ocean, That in this unknown form I might at length Wipe out the blot of the discomfiture Sustained upon the mountain, and assail _75 With a new war the soul of Cyprian, Forging the instruments of his destruction Even from his love and from his wisdom.—O Beloved earth, dear mother, in thy bosom I seek a refuge from the monster who _80 Precipitates itself upon me.

CYPRIAN: Friend, Collect thyself; and be the memory Of thy late suffering, and thy greatest sorrow But as a shadow of the past,—for nothing Beneath the circle of the moon, but flows _85 And changes, and can never know repose.

DAEMON: And who art thou, before whose feet my fate Has prostrated me?

CYPRIAN: One who, moved with pity, Would soothe its stings.

DAEMON: Oh, that can never be! No solace can my lasting sorrows find. _90

CYPRIAN: Wherefore?

DAEMON: Because my happiness is lost. Yet I lament what has long ceased to be The object of desire or memory, And my life is not life.

CYPRIAN: Now, since the fury Of this earthquaking hurricane is still, _95 And the crystalline Heaven has reassumed Its windless calm so quickly, that it seems As if its heavy wrath had been awakened Only to overwhelm that vessel,—speak, Who art thou, and whence comest thou?

DAEMON: Far more _100 My coming hither cost, than thou hast seen Or I can tell. Among my misadventures This shipwreck is the least. Wilt thou hear?

CYPRIAN: Speak.

DAEMON: Since thou desirest, I will then unveil Myself to thee;—for in myself I am _105 A world of happiness and misery; This I have lost, and that I must lament Forever. In my attributes I stood So high and so heroically great, In lineage so supreme, and with a genius _110 Which penetrated with a glance the world Beneath my feet, that, won by my high merit, A king—whom I may call the King of kings, Because all others tremble in their pride Before the terrors of His countenance, _115 In His high palace roofed with brightest gems Of living light—call them the stars of Heaven— Named me His counsellor. But the high praise Stung me with pride and envy, and I rose In mighty competition, to ascend _120 His seat and place my foot triumphantly Upon His subject thrones. Chastised, I know The depth to which ambition falls; too mad Was the attempt, and yet more mad were now Repentance of the irrevocable deed:— _125 Therefore I chose this ruin, with the glory Of not to be subdued, before the shame Of reconciling me with Him who reigns By coward cession.—Nor was I alone, Nor am I now, nor shall I be alone; _130 And there was hope, and there may still be hope, For many suffrages among His vassals Hailed me their lord and king, and many still Are mine, and many more, perchance shall be. Thus vanquished, though in fact victorious, _135 I left His seat of empire, from mine eye Shooting forth poisonous lightning, while my words With inauspicious thunderings shook Heaven, Proclaiming vengeance, public as my wrong, And imprecating on His prostrate slaves _140 Rapine, and death, and outrage. Then I sailed Over the mighty fabric of the world,— A pirate ambushed in its pathless sands, A lynx crouched watchfully among its caves And craggy shores; and I have wandered over _145 The expanse of these wide wildernesses In this great ship, whose bulk is now dissolved In the light breathings of the invisible wind, And which the sea has made a dustless ruin, Seeking ever a mountain, through whose forests _150 I seek a man, whom I must now compel To keep his word with me. I came arrayed In tempest, and although my power could well Bridle the forest winds in their career, For other causes I forbore to soothe _155 Their fury to Favonian gentleness; I could and would not; [ASIDE.] (thus I wake in him A love of magic art). Let not this tempest, Nor the succeeding calm excite thy wonder; For by my art the sun would turn as pale _160 As his weak sister with unwonted fear; And in my wisdom are the orbs of Heaven Written as in a record; I have pierced The flaming circles of their wondrous spheres And know them as thou knowest every corner _165 Of this dim spot. Let it not seem to thee That I boast vainly; wouldst thou that I work A charm over this waste and savage wood, This Babylon of crags and aged trees, Filling its leafy coverts with a horror _170 Thrilling and strange? I am the friendless guest Of these wild oaks and pines—and as from thee I have received the hospitality Of this rude place, I offer thee the fruit Of years of toil in recompense; whate’er _175 Thy wildest dream presented to thy thought As object of desire, that shall be thine.

...

And thenceforth shall so firm an amity ’Twixt thee and me be, that neither Fortune, The monstrous phantom which pursues success, _180 That careful miser, that free prodigal, Who ever alternates, with changeful hand, Evil and good, reproach and fame; nor Time, That lodestar of the ages, to whose beam The winged years speed o’er the intervals _185 Of their unequal revolutions; nor Heaven itself, whose beautiful bright stars Rule and adorn the world, can ever make The least division between thee and me, Since now I find a refuge in thy favour. _190

NOTES: _146 wide glassy wildernesses Rossetti. _150 Seeking forever cj. Forman. _154 forest]fiercest cj. Rossetti.