And thou, no meager portion of myself,
Art welcome here in this my ancient home,
Art welcome in Toledo's faithful walls.
Gaze all about thee, let thy heart beat high,
For, know! thou standest at my spirit's fount.
There is no square, no house, no stone, no tree,
That is not witness of my childhood lot.
An orphan child, I fled my uncle's wrath,
Bereft of mother first, then fatherless,
Through hostile land—it was my own—I fled.
The brave Castilians me from place to place,
Like shelterers of villainy did lead,
And hid me from my uncle of Leon,
Since death did threaten host as well as guest.
But everywhere they tracked me up and down.
Then Estevan Illan, a don who long
Hath slept beneath the greensward of the grave,
And this man here, Manrique Lara, led me
To this, the stronghold of the enemy,
And hid me in the tower of St. Roman,
Which there you see high o'er Toledo's roofs.
There lay I still, but they began to strew
The seed of rumor in the civic ear,
And on Ascension Day, when all the folk
Was gathered at the gate of yonder fane,
They led me to the tower-balcony
And showed me to the people, calling down,
"Here in your midst, among you, is your King,
The heir of ancient princes; of their rights
And of your rights the willing guardian."
I was a child and wept then, as they said.
But still I hear it—ever that wild cry,
A single word from thousand bearded throats,
A thousand swords as in a single hand,
The people's hand. But God the vict'ry gave,
The Leonese did flee; and on and on,
A standard rather than a warrior,
I with my army compassed all the land,
And won my vict'ries with my baby smile.
These taught and nurtured me with loving care,
And mother's milk flowed from their wounds for me.
And so, while other princes call themselves
The fathers of their people, I am son,
For what I am, I owe their loyalty.
MANRIQUE. If all that now thou art, most noble Sire,
Should really, as thou sayest, spring from thence,
Then gladly we accept the thanks, rejoice
If these our teachings and our nurture, thus
Are mirrored in thy fame and in thy deeds,
Then we and thou are equally in debt.
(To the QUEEN.)
Pray gaze on him with these thy gracious eyes;
Howe'er so many kings have ruled in Spain,
Not one compares with him in nobleness.
Old age, in truth, is all too wont to blame,
And I am old and cavil much and oft;
And when confuted in the council-hall
I secret wrath have ofttimes nursed—not long,
Forsooth—that royal word should weigh so much;
And sought some evil witness 'gainst my King,
And gladly had I harmed his good repute.
But always I returned in deepest shame—
The envy mine, and his the spotlessness.
KING. A teacher, Lara, and a flatt'rer, too?
But we will not dispute you this and that;
If I'm not evil, better, then, for you,
Although the man, I fear me, void of wrong,
Were also void of excellence as well;
For as the tree with sun-despising roots,
Sucks up its murky nurture from the earth,
So draws the trunk called wisdom, which indeed
Belongs to heaven itself in towering branch,
Its strength and being from the murky soil
Of our mortality-allied to sin.
Was ever a just man who ne'er was hard?
And who is mild, is oft not strong enough.
The brave become too venturesome in war.
What we call virtue is but conquered sin,
And where no struggle was, there is no power.
But as for me, no time was given to err,
A child—the helm upon my puny head,
A youth—with lance, high on my steed I sat,
My eye turned ever to some threat'ning foe,
Unmindful of the joys and sweets of life,
And far and strange lay all that charms and lures.
That there are women, first I learned to know
When in the church my wife was given me,
She, truly faultless if a human is,
And whom, I frankly say, I'd warmer love
If sometimes need to pardon were, not praise.
(To the QUEEN.)
Nay, nay, fear not, I said it but in jest!
The outcome we must all await-nor paint
The devil on the wall, lest he appear.
But now, what little respite we may have,
Let us not waste in idle argument.
The feuds within our land are stilled, although
They say the Moor will soon renew the fight,
And hopes from Africa his kinsman's aid,
Ben Jussuf and his army, bred in strife.
And war renewed will bring distress anew.
Till then we'll open this our breast to peace,
And take deep breath of unaccustomed joy.
Is there no news?—But did I then forget?
You do not look about you, Leonore,
To see what we have done to please you here.
QUEEN. What ought I see?
KING. Alas, O Almirante!
We have not hit upon it, though we tried.
For days, for weeks, we dig and dig and dig,
And hope that we could so transform this spot,
This orange-bearing, shaded garden grove,
To have it seem like such as England loves,
The austere country of my austere wife.
And she but smiles and smiling says me nay!
Thus are they all, Britannia's children, all;
If any custom is not quite their own,
They stare, and smile, and will have none of it.
Th' intention, Leonore, was good, at least,
So give these worthy men a word of thanks;
God knows how long they may have toiled for us.
QUEEN. I thank you, noble sirs.