The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge Volume II Part 118

_Zulimez._ Will they not know you?

_Alvar._ With your aid, friend, I shall unfearingly 100 Trust the disguise; and as to my complexion, My long imprisonment, the scanty food, This scar--and toil beneath a burning sun, Have done already half the business for us.

Add too my youth, since last we saw each other. 105 Manhood has swoln my chest, and taught my voice A hoa.r.s.er note--Besides, they think me dead: And what the mind believes impossible, The bodily sense is slow to recognize.

_Zulimez._ 'Tis yours, sir, to command, mine to obey. 110 Now to the cave beneath the vaulted rock, Where having shaped you to a Moorish chieftain, I'll seek our mariners; and in the dusk Transport whate'er we need to the small dell In the Alpujarras--there where Zagri lived. 115

_Alvar._ I know it well: it is the obscurest haunt Of all the mountains--[823:1] [_Both stand listening._ Voices at a distance!

Let us away! [_Exeunt._

FOOTNOTES:

[821:1] May not a man, without breach of the 8th Commandment, take out of his left pocket and put into his right? _MS. H._ (_Vide ante_, p.

406, _To William Wordsworth_, l. 43.)

[823:1] Till the Play was printed off, I never remembered or, rather, never recollected that this phrase was taken from Mr. Wordsworth's Poems. Thank G.o.d it was not from his MSS. Poems; and at the 2nd Edition I was afraid to point it out lest it should appear a trick to introduce his name. _MS. H._ [Coleridge is thinking of a line in _The Brothers_, 'It is the loneliest place in all these hills.']

LINENOTES:

[19] Remorse] REMORSE Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.

[20] Remorse] REMORSE Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.

[31] years] year Editions 1, 2, 3.

[35] wish] _Wish_ Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.

[36] hope] _Hope_ Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.

[55] _After_ vision! [_Then with agitation_ Editions 1, 2, 3.

[56-9] Compare _Destiny of Nations_, ll. 174-6, p. 137.

[59] _After_ _Zulimez (with a sigh)_, Editions 1, 2, 3 1829.

[86] Yes] And Edition 1.

[95] wife] _wife_ Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.

[105] since] when Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.

[113] I'll] I will Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.

[115] Alpujarras] Alpuxarras Editions 1, 2, 3, 1829.

SCENE II

_Enter TERESA and VALDEZ._

_Teresa._ I hold Ordonio dear; he is your son And Alvar's brother.

_Valdez._ Love him for himself, Nor make the living wretched for the dead.

_Teresa._ I mourn that you should plead in vain, Lord Valdez, But heaven hath heard my vow, and I remain 5 Faithful to Alvar, be he dead or living.

_Valdez._ Heaven knows with what delight I saw your loves, And could my heart's blood give him back to thee I would die smiling. But these are idle thoughts!

Thy dying father comes upon my soul 10 With that same look, with which he gave thee to me; I held thee in my arms a powerless babe, While thy poor mother with a mute entreaty Fixed her faint eyes on mine. Ah not for this, That I should let thee feed thy soul with gloom, 15 And with slow anguish wear away thy life, The victim of a useless constancy.

I must not see thee wretched.

_Teresa._ There are woes Ill bartered for the garishness of joy!

If it be wretched with an untired eye 20 To watch those skiey tints, and this green ocean; Or in the sultry hour beneath some rock, My hair dishevelled by the pleasant sea breeze, To shape sweet visions, and live o'er again All past hours of delight! If it be wretched 25 To watch some bark, and fancy Alvar there, To go through each minutest circ.u.mstance Of the blest meeting, and to frame adventures Most terrible and strange, and hear him tell them;[824:1]

(As once I knew a crazy Moorish maid 30 Who drest her in her buried lover's clothes, And o'er the smooth spring in the mountain cleft Hung with her lute, and played the selfsame tune He used to play, and listened to the shadow Herself had made)--if this be wretchedness, 35 And if indeed it be a wretched thing To trick out mine own death-bed, and imagine That I had died, died just ere his return!

Then see him listening to my constancy, Or hover round, as he at midnight oft 40 Sits on my grave and gazes at the moon; Or haply in some more fantastic mood, To be in Paradise, and with choice flowers Build up a bower where he and I might dwell, And there to wait his coming! O my sire! 45 My Alvar's sire! if this be wretchedness That eats away the life, what were it, think you, If in a most a.s.sured reality He should return, and see a brother's infant Smile at him from my arms? 50 Oh what a thought!

_Valdez._ A thought? even so! mere thought! an empty thought.

The very week he promised his return----

_Teresa._ Was it not then a busy joy? to see him, After those three years' travels! we had no fears-- 55 The frequent tidings, the ne'er failing letter.

Almost endeared his absence! Yet the gladness, The tumult of our joy! What then if now----

_Valdez._ O power of youth to feed on pleasant thoughts, Spite of conviction! I am old and heartless! 60 Yes, I am old--I have no pleasant fancies-- Hectic and unrefreshed with rest--

_Teresa._ My father!

_Valdez._ The sober truth is all too much for me!

I see no sail which brings not to my mind The home-bound bark in which my son was captured 65 By the Algerine--to perish with his captors!

_Teresa._ Oh no! he did not!

_Valdez_. Captured in sight of land!

From yon hill point, nay, from our castle watch-tower We might have seen----

_Teresa._ His capture, not his death.

_Valdez._ Alas! how aptly thou forget'st a tale 70 Thou ne'er didst wish to learn! my brave Ordonio Saw both the pirate and his prize go down, In the same storm that baffled his own valour, And thus twice s.n.a.t.c.hed a brother from his hopes: Gallant Ordonio! O beloved Teresa, 75 Would'st thou best prove thy faith to generous Alvar, And most delight his spirit, go, make thou His brother happy, make his aged father Sink to the grave in joy.

_Teresa._ For mercy's sake Press me no more! I have no power to love him. 80 His proud forbidding eye, and his dark brow, Chill me like dew-damps of the unwholesome night: My love, a timorous and tender flower, Closes beneath his touch.

_Valdez._ You wrong him, maiden!

You wrong him, by my soul! Nor was it well 85 To character by such unkindly phrases The stir and workings of that love for you Which he has toiled to smother. 'Twas not well, Nor is it grateful in you to forget His wounds and perilous voyages, and how 90 With an heroic fearlessness of danger He roam'd the coast of Afric for your Alvar.

It was not well--You have moved me even to tears.

_Teresa._ Oh pardon me, Lord Valdez! pardon me!

It was a foolish and ungrateful speech, 95 A most ungrateful speech! But I am hurried Beyond myself, if I but hear of one Who aims to rival Alvar. Were we not Born in one day, like twins of the same parent?

Nursed in one cradle? Pardon me, my father! 100 A six years' absence is a heavy thing, Yet still the hope survives----