WALTER.
With eager hands
I'll bend the awful thing into a crown,
And you shall wear it.
VIOLET.
Oh, no, no!
Lay it upon her grave. [Another silence.
ARTHUR.
Run out again!
We should he jovial as the feasting gods,
We're silent as a synod of the stars!
The night is out at elbows. Laughter's dead.
To the rescue, Violet! A song! a song!
VIOLET sings.
Upon my knee a modern minstrel's tales,
Full as a choir with music, lies unread;
My impatient shallop flaps its silken sails
To rouse me, but I cannot lift my head.
I see a wretched isle, that ghost-like stands,
Wrapt in its mist-shroud in the wint'ry main;
And now a cheerless gleam of red-ploughed lands,
O'er which a crow flies heavy in the rain.
I've neither heart nor voice!
[Rises and draws the curtain.
You've sat the night out, Masters! See, the moon
Lies stranded on the pallid coast of morn.
ARTHUR.