Enter CROMWELL, L.
Father! here
Come close and press me warmly to thee, quick!
Lest Death step in between us—'
Reach me here
That cup. My voice fails—not that hand! 'tis blood,
[He lets fall the cup.]
As in my dreams. I would assoil him. Father!
'Tis said, upon the giddy verge of life
The eye grows steady, and the soul sees clear
Thought guiding action in all human things,
Not in the busy, whirling masque of life,
Reality unreal, but in truth.
Then the eye cuts as the chirurgeon's knife
Mocks the poor corpse. I saw not when he died:
Yet last night was a scaffold, there! all black,
And one stood visor'd by, with glittering axe
Who struck the bare neck of a kneeling form—
Methought the head of him that seem'd to die,
With ghastly face and painful, patient stare,
Glided along the sable, blood-gilt floor,
As unseen fiends did pull it by its mass
Of dank and dabbled hair, and when I turn'd
Mine eyes to see it not, the headsman's mask
Had fallen to the ground—
Thou didst not do it?
For it was thy face. Father, answer me! [She
implores in a very earnest attitude, and gradually
falls back.]
Crom. [Stands amazed at his daughter's action.]
I'll hear no more. 'Twas not my daughter spoke—
She's dead, and Heaven reproves me with a voice
From yon pale tenement of clay. My hair's on end.
She said that fiends dragg'd his, 'tis mine they tug.
Avaunt! I meant well. [Shouts are heard without.]
Hark! hear without
A Babel of hoarse demons clamouring loud
For Cromwell, the Protector!
[His daughter points upward.]
No! not there.
I cannot follow thee. A Spirit stands,
Anointed, in the breach of Heaven's walls,
Behind him streams intolerable light,
His floating locks are crown'd—His look repels—
I was his murderer on earth—His gaze
Speaks pity; but not pardon—Let me rise,
There's mercy on his brow—I fall, I fall.
I tell ye loose me, ere I see him not:
His form recedes, clouds hide him from my sight:
A hand of midnight grasps me by the throat.
They call'd me Cromwell when I liv'd on earth,
And said I slew a king. There is no air—
[He sinks exhausted on a chair.]
Enter PEARSON.
Eliz. [To PEARSON.] Pearson, thou lov'st him?