Analysis resumed.
It may seem unjust that the more this complication of interests increases, the less complete should be the survey of them; and yet a moment's thought will show that this is almost a necessity. Moreover, the methods do not vary much; it is only that they are applied to a larger and larger mass of accumulating material. The first volume of the Fourth Part, the seventh of the twenty, follows—though with that absence of slavish repetition which has been allowed as one of the graces of the book—the general scheme. Cyrus gets out of the wood literally, but not figuratively; for when he and the King of Assyria have joined forces, to pursue that rather paradoxical alliance which is to run in couple with rivalry for love and to end in a personal combat, they see on the other side of a river a chariot, in which Mandane probably or certainly is. But the river is unbridged and unfordable, and no boats can be had; so that, after trying to swim it and nearly getting drowned, they have to relinquish the game that had been actually in sight. Next, two things happen. First, Martésie appears (as usually to our satisfaction), and in consequence of a series of accidents, shares and solaces Mandane's captivity. Then, on the other side, Panthea, Queen of Susiana, and wife of one of the enemy princes, falls into Cyrus's hands, and with Araminta (who is, it should have, if it has not been, said earlier, sister of the King of Pontus) furnishes valuable hostage for good treatment of Mandane and other Medo-Persian-Phrygian-Hircanian prisoners.
Things having thus been fairly bustled up for a time, a Histoire is, of course, imminent, and we have it, of about usual length, concerning the Lydian Princess Palmis and a certain Cléandre; while, even when this is done, we fall back, not on the main story, but once more on that of Aglatidas and Amestris, which is in a sad plight, for Amestris (who has been married against her will and is maumariée too) thinks she is a widow, and finds she is not.
It has just been mentioned that Palmis is a Lydian Princess; and before the end of this Part Croesus comes personally into the story, being the head of a formidable combination to supplant the King of Pontus, detain Mandane, and, if possible (as the well-known oracle, in the usual ambiguity (v. inf.), encourages him to hope), conquer the Medo-Persian empire and make it his own. But the Histoire mania—now further excited by consistence in working the personages so obtained in generally—is in great evidence, and "Lygdamis and Cléonice" supply a large proportion of the early and all the middle of the eighth volume, the second of the Fourth Part. There is, however, much more business than usual at the end to make up for any slackness at the beginning. In a side-action with the Lydians both Cyrus and the King of Assyria are captured by force of numbers, though the former is at once released by the Princess Palmis, as well as Artames, son of Cyrus's Phrygian ally, whom Croesus chooses to consider as a rebel, and intends to put to death. Here, however, the captive Queen and Princess, Panthea and Araminta, come into good play, and exercise strong and successful influence through the husband of the one and the brother of the other. But at the end of book, volume, and part we leave Cyrus once more in the dismals. For though he has actually seen Mandane he cannot get at her, and he has heard three apparently most unfavourable oracles; the Babylonian one, which was quoted above, and which he, like everybody else, takes as a promise of success to Philidaspes; the ambiguous Delphic forecast of "the fall of an Empire" to Croesus; and that of his own death at the hands of a hostile queen, the only one which, historically, was to be fulfilled in its apparent sense, while the others were not. He cares, indeed, not much about the two last, but infinitely about the first.
At the opening of the Fifth Part (ninth volume) there is a short but curious "Address to the Reader," announcing the fulfilment of the first half of the promised production, and bidding him not be downhearted, for the first of the second half (the Sixth Part or eleventh volume of the whole) is actually at Press. It may be noticed that there is a swagger about these avis and such like things, which probably is attributable to Georges, and not to Madeleine.[174]
The inevitable Histoire comes earlier than usual in this division, and is of unusual importance; for it deals with two persons of great distinction, and already introduced in the story, Queen Panthea and her husband Abradates. It is also one of the longer batch, running to some four hundred pages; and a notable part in it and in the future main story is played by one Doralise—a pretty name, which Dryden, making it prettier still by substituting a c for the s, borrowed for his most original and (with that earlier Florimel of The Maiden Queen, who is said to have been studied directly off Nell Gwyn) perhaps his most attractive heroine, the Doralice of Marriage à la Mode. Another important character, the villain of the sub-plot, is one Mexaris.[175] At the end of the first instalment we leave Cyrus preparing elaborate machines of war to crush the Lydians.
Early in Book II. we hear of a mysterious warrior on the enemy side whom nobody knows, who calls himself Telephanes, and whom Cyrus is very anxious to meet in battle, but for the time cannot. He is also frustrated in his challenge of the King of Pontus to fight for Mandane—a challenge of which Croesus will not hear. At last Telephanes turns out to be no less a person than Mazare, Prince of Sacia, whom we know already as one of the ever-multiplying lovers and abductors of the heroine; while, after a good deal of confused fighting, another inset Histoire of him closes the tenth volume (V. ii.). It is, however, only two hundred pages long—a mere parenthesis compared to others, and it leads up to his giving Cyrus a letter from Mandane—an act of generosity which Philidaspes, otherwise King of Assyria, frankly confesses that he, as another Rival, could never have done. After yet another Histoire (now a "four-some") of Belesis, Hermogenes, Cléodare, and Léonice, Abradates changes sides, carrying us on to an "intricate impeach" of old and new characters, especially Araminta and Spithridates, and to the death in battle of the generous King of Susiana himself, and the grief of Panthea. There is, at the close of this volume, a rather interesting Privilège du Roi, signed by Conrart ("le silencieux Conrart"), sealed with "the great seal of yellow wax in a simple tail" (one ribbon or piece of ferret only?), and bestowing its rights "nonobstant Clameur de Haro, Charte Normande, et autres lettres contraires."
The first volume of the Sixth Part (the eleventh of the whole and the first of what, as so many words of the kind are required, we may call the Second Division) has plenty of business—showing that the author or her adviser was also a business-like person—to commence the new venture. Cyrus, after being victorious in the field and just about to besiege Sardis in form, receives a "bolt from the blue" in the shape of a letter "From the unhappy Mandane to the faithless"—himself! She has learnt, she tells him, that his feelings towards her are changed, requests that she may no longer serve as a pretext for his ambition, and—rather straining the prerogatives assumed even by her nearest ancestresses in literature, the Polisardas and Miraguardas of the Amadis group, but scarcely dreamt of by the heroines of ancient Greek Romance—desires that he will send back to her father Cyaxares all the troops that he is, as she implies, commanding on false pretences.
Now one half expects that Cyrus, in a transport of Amadisian-Euphuist-heroism, will comply with this very modest request. In fact it is open to any one to contend that, according to the strictest rules of the game, he ought to have done so and gone mad, or at least marooned himself in some desert island, in consequence. The sophistication, however, of the stage appears here. After a very natural sort of "Well, I never!" translated into proper heroic language, he sets to work to identify the person whom Mandane suspects to be her rival—for she has carefully abstained from naming anybody. And he asks—with an ingenious touch of self-confession which does the author great credit, if it was consciously laid on—whether it can be Panthea or Araminta, with both of whom he has, in fact, been, if not exactly flirting, carrying on (as the time itself would have said) a "commerce of respectful and obliging admiration." He has a long talk with his confidant Feraulas (whose beloved and really lovable Martésie is, unluckily, not at hand to illuminate the mystery), and then he writes as "The Unfortunate Cyrus to the Unjust Mandane," tells her pretty roundly, though, of course, still respectfully, that if she knew how things really were "she would think herself the cruellest and most unjust person in the world." [I should have added, "just as she is, in fact, the most beautiful.">[ She is, he says, his first and last passion, and he has never been more than polite to any one else. But she will kindly excuse his not complying with her request to send back his army until he has vanquished all his Rivals—where, no doubt, in the original, the capital was bigger and more menacing than ever, and was written with an appropriate gnashing of teeth.
The traditional balance of luck and love, however, holds; and the armies of Croesus and the King of Pontus begin to melt away; so that, after a short but curious pastoral episode, they have to shut themselves up in the capital. The dead body of Abradates is now found, and his widow Panthea stabs herself upon it. This removes one of Mandane's possible causes of jealousy, but Araminta remains; and, as a matter of fact, it is this Princess on whom her suspicion has been cast, arising partly, though helped by makebates, from the often utilised personal resemblance between her actual lover, Prince Spithridates, and Cyrus. The treacherous King of Pontus has, in fact, shown her a letter from Araminta (his sister, be it remembered) which seems to encourage the idea.