Hud. When you have gone! Go, go!
[More shells. Chartrien carries Hernda away, lower left]
Hud. [Alone, racked with pain] My foe is nearer than those feeble guns.
Bah! I could crush them! Here I am fordone.
No, no! I'll not surrender. I will live!
I'll keep my world. I fought for it, and won.
'Tis mine! I will not leave it to these mice
To scramble over. [The agony seizes him]
A coward foe, that gives
No even chance. Strikes from the dark, with blade
Tempered secure in undiscovered fire.
... Shall then the world go on and I not here?
I shall be here,—a pile of dust, no more,——
That is the hell of hells,—while other dead,
Who made them souls here out of faith and clay,
Race on unflagging,—on and leave me still,—
The everlasting mute!... Souls? That's a lie.
A ranting, tom-tom lie, to ease us on
The wheel. I'll none of that. The sick mind's pap!
Imagination's vent, lest misery
O'er-rack the world! Protective fume
Enclouding man's last grapple till none see
If he or Death be victor, and on the doubt
He rides to Heaven!...
... Was 't truth that Chartrien spoke?
The race has found its eyes? Man is no more
A blind and hopeless struggler cornered fast
By ills unconquerable?—his lusting wars,
Diseases, hungers, Hudibrands? Then what
A chance was there, my heart? If I had fought
Upon his side!... That battle would have made
Red Fate throw down her bludgeon,—won us place
To vanward of the gods!... If I had fought
With him.... Obstructive
clod!... My God! My God?
[He dies. Sunset has passed, and the darkness grows rapidly until nothing is seen but the gleam of a fallen crown. Curtain]
A SON OF HERMES
A COMEDY IN FIVE ACTS
CHARACTERS
| BIADES, a young Athenian |
| PELAGON, his uncle |
| SACHINESSA, wife of Pelagon |
| PHANIA, their daughter |
| SYBARIS, a neighbor's daughter |
| CREON, friend of Biades |
| AMENTOR, a senator |
| MENAS, friend of Pelagon |
| CLEARCHUS, an Athenian youth disguised as a dancer |
| PHILON, a priest |
| STESILAUS, a lord of Sparta |
| PYRRHA, his daughter |
| ARCHIPPE, his wife |
| ALCANOR, his son |
| LYSANDER, friend of Stesilaus |
| HIERON, a young Spartan |
| AGIS, LENON, GIRARDAS, his friends |
| DIANESSA, MYRTA, THEONIS, NACIA, ARTANTE, Spartan maidens |
| THE EPHORS |
| Senators, citizens, soldiers, dancers, etc. |