Woman, what seekest thou?—Doth silence best
Declare thine errand?
zorayda.
Silence best, my lord,
Should tell thy destiny—Heaven hath commanded
To speak no evil.
duke.
A rare conceit.—What more?—Is this thy message?
Haste,—we command not back the passing time:—
To thy request.
zorayda.
Much need hast thou to note
These priceless minutes;—let no fragment slip
Ungathered.—Yet my boon thou wilt not grant!
Seest thou yon shadow?— [She beckons him to the window.
duke.
Nought this ungifted eye beholds
But the dark battlement upon the stream,
Spread by the tranquil moon.
zorayda.
Seest thou yon pennon
Furl'd from the turret, floating on the verge
Of that still, sedgy shore?—
duke.
Its shadow falls
Where thou dost point;—but how may this befit
With thy request?
zorayda.
At thy far-echoing birth,
When hoarse artillery told to Mantua,
Thy wailing entrance to a troublous life,
Yon trembling shadow fell, as now it meets,
Just on the rippled bank,—uniting each—
The calm wave and the shore.—
duke.
Thy meaning, stranger.
zorayda.
Ere yet the bubbling life crept through thy veins,
'Twas thus decreed: thine hour of danger comes,
And sudden death, when that dim shadow passes
Where at thy birth it brooded.—