SCENE I.
A Hall.
Enter Count, Fabian, Austin, Attendants with Prisoners.
Count. Hence to a dungeon with those mutinous slaves;
There let them prate of prophecies and visions;
And when coarse fare and stripes bring back their senses,
Perhaps I may relent, and turn them loose
To new offences, and fresh chastisement.
[Exeunt Officers, &c.
Fab. You bleed, my lord!
Count. A scratch—death! to be bay'd
By mungrels! curs! They yelp'd, and show'd their fangs,
Growl'd too, as they would bite. But was't not poor,
Unlike the generous strain of Godfrey's lineage,
To stir the rabble up in nobles' quarrels,
And bribe my hinds and vassals to assault me.
Aust. They were not stirr'd by Godfrey.
Count. Who then stirr'd them?
Thyself, perhaps. Was't thou? And yet I wrong thee;
Thou didst preach peace; and straight they crouch'd and shrunk,
More tam'd by the persuasion of thy tongue,
Than losing the hot drops my steel drew from them.
Aust. I might, perhaps, have look'd for better thanks,
Than taunts to pay my service.—But no matter.—
My son, too, serv'd thee nobly; he bestrode thee,
And drove those peasants back, whose staves and clubs,
But for his aid, had shiver'd that stout frame:
But both, too well accustom'd to thy transports,
Nor ask, nor hope thy courtesy.
Count. Your pardon!
I knew my life was sav'd, but not by whom;
I wish'd it not, yet thank him. I was down,
Stunn'd in the inglorious broil; and nought remember,
More than the shame of such a paltry danger.
Where is he?
Aust. Here.
[Theodore advances from the Back of the Stage.
Count. [Starting.] Ha! angels shelter me!
Theod. Why starts he thus?
Count. Are miracles renew'd?
Art thou not ris'n from the mould'ring grave?
And in the awful majesty of death,
'Gainst nature, and the course of mortal thought,
Assum'st the likeness of a living form,
To blast my soul with horror?
Theod. Does he rave?
Or means he thus to mock me?
Count. Answer me!
Speak, some of you, who have the power to speak;
Is it not he?
Fab. Who, good my lord?
Count. Alphonso.
His form, his arms, his air, his very frown.
Lord of these confines, speak—declare thy pleasure;
Theod. Dost thou not know me then?
Count. Ha! Theodore?
This sameness, not resemblance, is past faith.
All statues, pictures, or the likeness kept
By memory, of the good Alphonso living,
Are faint and shadowy traces, to this image!
Fab. Hear me, my lord, so shall the wonder cease.—
The very arms he wears, were once Alphonso's.
He found them in the stores, and brac'd them on,
To assist you in your danger.
Count. 'Tis most strange.
I strive, but cannot conquer this amazement:
I try to take them off; yet still my eyes
Again are drawn, as if by magic on him.
Aust. [Aside to Theodore.] Hear you, my son?
Theod. Yes, and it wakes within me,
Sensations new till now.
Aust. To-morrow's light
Will show him wonders greater.—Sir, it pleas'd you,
(Wherefore you best can tell) to make us here
Your prisoners; but the alarm of your danger
Threw wide your gates, and freed us. We return'd
To give you safeguard.—May we now depart?
Count. Ay, to the confines of the farthest earth;
For here thy sight unhinges Raymond's soul.
Be hid, where air or light may never find thee;
And bury too that phantom.
[Exit Count, with his Attendants.
Theod. Insolence!
Too proud to thank our kindness! yet, what horror
Shook all his frame, when thus I stood before him!
Aust. The statue of thy grandsire
(The very figure as thou stood'st before him,
Arm'd just as thou art), seem'd to move, and live;
That breathing marble, which the people's love
Rear'd near his tomb, within our convent's walls.
Anon I'll lead thee to it.
Theod. Let me hence,
To shake these trappings off.
Aust. Wear them, and mark me.
Ere night, thy kinsman Godfrey, will be master
Of all thy story:—
He is brave, and just,
And will support thy claim. Should proof and reason
Fail with the usurper, thou must try thy sword
(And Heaven will strike for thee) in combat with him.
The conscious flash of this thy grandsire's mail,
Worse than the horrors of the fabled Gorgon,
That curdled blood to stone, will shrink his sinews,
And cast the wither'd boaster at thy feet.
Theod. Grant it ye powers! but not to shed his blood:
The father of my Adelaide, that name—
Aust. Is dearer far than mine;—my words are air;
My counsels pass unmark'd. But come, my son!
To-night my cell must house thee. Let me show thee
The humble mansion of thy lonely father,
Proud once, and prosperous; where I have wept, and pray'd,
And, lost in cold oblivion of the world,
Twice nine long years; thy mother, and thyself,
And God, were all my thoughts.
Theod. Ay, to the convent!
For there my love, my Adelaide, expects me. [Aside.
[Exeunt.