EDITH. (Gazing upon him with surprise and anger, turns as if to
quit the stage, and then aside)
Sure he is ill! Keen travail and the cares
Of these unhappy times have touched the string
Of the o'erlabored brain. And shall I chide him?
I who should soothe? (Approaches and aloud) Art thou not well, dear Hubert?
CECIL. Well! well! the leaping and exultant health
Which makes wild youth unconscious of its clay,
Deeming itself all soul; the golden chain
Which link'd that earth, our passions—with that heaven,
Our hopes—why this was to be well! But now
One black thought from the fountain of the heart
Gushes eternally, till all the streams
Of all the world are poisoned,—and the Past
Hath grown one death, whose grim and giant shadow
Makes that chill darkness which we call ‘the Future!’
Where are my dreams of glory? Where the fame
Unsullied by one stain of factious crime?
And where—oh where!—the ever dulcet voice
That murmured, in the star-lit nights of war,
When the loud camp lay hushed, thy holy name?
Edith is mine no more! (taking her hand) Yet let me gaze
Again upon thee! No! thou art not changed
Ah! would thou wert! In that translucent cheek
The roses tremble, stirr'd as by an air,
With the pure impulse of thy summer soul—
On thy white brow chaste conscience sits serene—
There is no mark of blood on this fair hand—
Yet Cromwell is thy kinsman!
EDITH. By the vows
That we have plighted, look not on me thus!
Speak not so wildly! Hubert, I am Edith!
Edith!—thine own! oh! am I not thine own?
CECIL. My own!—my Edith! Yes, the evil deeds
Of that bold man cast forth no shade on thee,
Albeit they gloom the world as an eclipse
Whose darkness is the prophecy of doom!
EDITH. Hush! hush! What! know'st thou not these walls have ears?
Speak'st thou of Cromwell thus, upon whose nod
Hang life and death?
CECIL. But not the fear of death!
EDITH. What change hath chanc'd, since last we met, to blot
Thy champion and thy captain from thy grace?
Why, when we parted, was not thy last word
In praise of Cromwell? Was he not the star
By which thy course was lighted? Nay, so glowed
His name upon thy lips, that I—ev'n I—
Was vexed to think thou'dst so much love to spare!
CECIL. Ah, there's the thought—the bitter, biting thought!
Boy that I was, I pinned my faith to Cromwell;
For him forsook my kin; renounced my home,
My father's blessing, and my mother's love;
Gave up my heart to him, my thoughts, my deeds,—
Reduced the fire and freedom of my youth
Into a mere machine—a thing to act
Or to be passive as its master wills;
On his broad banner I affixed my name—
My heritage of honor; blindly bound
My mark and station in the world's sharp eye
To the unequal chances of his sword!
But then methought it was a freeman's blade,
Drawn, but with sorrow, for a nation's weal!
EDITH. And was it not so, Hubert?
CECIL. Was it? What!
When (with no precedent, from all the Past—
That solemn armory for decorous Murther!)
Some two score men assumed a people's voice,
And sullied all the labors of long years,
The laurels of a war for equal laws,
By one most tragic outrage of all law!
Oh, in that stroke 'twas not the foe that fell!
'Twas we who fought!—the pillar of our cause;
The white unsullied honor of our arms;
The temperate justice that disdains revenge;
The rock of law, from which war's standard waved;—
The certainty of RIGHT;—'twas these that fell!