CUSI COYLLUR.
I should better like a sadder song.
My dearest friends, the last you sang
To me foreshadowed evil things;[19]
You who sang it leave me now.
(Exeunt boys and girls, except one girl who sings.)
Two loving birds are in despair,[20]
They moan, they weep, they sigh;
For snow has fallen on the pair,
To hollow tree they fly.
But lo! one dove is left alone
And mourns her cruel fate;
She makes a sad and piteous moan,
Alone without a mate.
She fears her friend is dead and gone—
Confirmed in her belief,
Her sorrow finds relief in song,
And thus she tells her grief.
‘Sweet mate! Alas, where art thou now?
I miss thine eyes so bright,
Thy feet upon the tender bough,
Thy breast so pure and bright.’
She wanders forth from stone to stone,
She seeks her mate in vain;
‘My love! my love!’ she makes her moan,
She falls, she dies in pain.
CUSI COYLLUR.
That yarahui is too sad,
Leave me alone.
(Exit the girl who sang the yarahui.)
Now my tears can freely flow.
SCENE 3
Great hall in the palace of Pachacuti. The INCA, as before, discovered seated on a golden tiana L. Enter to him R. OLLANTAY and RUMI-ÑAUI.
PACHACUTI.
The time has arrived, O great Chiefs,
To decide on the coming campaign.
The spring is approaching us now,
And our army must start for the war.
To the province of Colla[21] we march—
There is news of Chayanta’s[22] advance.
The enemies muster in strength,
They sharpen their arrows and spears.
OLLANTAY.
O King, that wild rabble untaught
Can never resist thine array;
Cuzco alone with its height
Is a barrier that cannot be stormed.
Twenty four thousand of mine,
With their champis[23] selected with care,
Impatiently wait for the sign,
The sound of the beat of my drums,[24]
The strains of my clarion and fife.