Bajazet Yes, I have promised, and my word is pledged
Ne'er to forget all that to you I owe:
Have I not sworn that constant care and kindness
Shall duly pay my debt of gratitude?
If on these terms your favor I may claim,
I go to wait the harvest of your bounty.
Roxana Heavens! What amazement strikes me at this moment!
Is it a dream? and have mine eyes deceived me?
What mean these frigid words, this sombre greeting,
Which seems to cancel all that passed between us?
What hope does he imagine mine, for which
I banished my resentment, and restored him
To favor? He, methought, swore that his heart
Would own me mistress to his dying day.
Does he repent already of the peace
That we had signed? Was I just now deluded?
But was he not conversing with you, madam?
What did he say?
To me? He loves you always.
His life at least depends on my belief
That it is so. But tell me, pray, when joy
Should triumph, how can you explain the gloom
That settled on his features as he left me?
Madam, I saw no cloud upon his brow.
Oft has he told me of your gracious kindness,
And he just now was full of it; at parting
He seemed to me the same as when he entered.
But be that as it may, need it surprise you
That on the eve of such important issues
He should be troubled, and some signs escape him Of anxious thoughts that on his mind intrude? Roxana - Such plausible excuses do you credit
For skill that pleads on his behalf more fairly
Than he could do himself.
Enough! I read your motive, madam, better
Than you suppose.
Leave me, for I would be
Alone a little while. I too am troubled,
And anxious cares are mine as well as his,
To which I owe a moment's thought in secret.
How must I construe all that I have seen?
Are they in league together to deceive me?
Wherefore this change, those words, that quick departure?
Did I not catch a glance that passed between them?
Were they not both struck with embarrassment?
Ah! why has Heaven doomed me to this affront?
Is this the fruit of all my blind affection?
So many painful days and sleepless nights,
Plots and intrigues, treason too deep for pardon!
And shall they all turn to a rival's profit?
But yet, too ready to torment myself,
I may too closely scan a passing cloud,
And take for passion what is mere caprice.
Surely he would have carried to the end
His wiles; and in full prospect of success,
He could have feigned at least a moment longer.
Love, uncontrolled by reason, quakes at shadows:
Let me take courage. Why should Atalide
Be dreaded as my rival? What has he
To thank her for? To which of us to-day
Owes he the sceptre?
Love is a tyrant; and if other charms
Attract, what matter crowns, or life itself?
Can benefits outweigh the heart's attachment ?
I need but search mine own. Did gratitude
Constrain me to his brother, when this wretch
Bewitched me? Ah! if other tie were absent,
Would the idea of marriage so alarm him?
He gladly would have seconded my wishes,
And not have braved destruction by refusal.
Just cause
But some one comes to speak with me.
Forgive me this intrusion:
But there is come a courier from the army;
And though the seaward gate was shut, the guards,
On bended knees, without delay unlocked it
To orders from the Sultan, to yourself
Addressed, and strange to say, 'tis Orcan brings them.
Orcan!
Yes, he; of all the Sultan's slaves
The one most trusted for his faithful service,
Blackest of those whom Afric's sun has scorched.
Madam, he asks impatiently for you:
I thought it best to give you timely notice,
And lest you should be taken by surprise,
I have detained him in your own apartments.
What new disaster comes to overwhelm me?
What can his bidding be? What my reply?
Doubtless the Sultan, in his mind perturbed,
Has Bajazet condemned a second time.
Without my sanction none will dare to take
His life; for all obey me here. But ought I
To shield him? Bajazet or Amurath
Which claims allegiance? One have I betrayed;
The other may be false to me. Time presses;
I must resolve this fatal doubt, nor let
The precious moments pass. Love, when most cautious,
Cannot conceal its secret inclination.
I will watch Bajazet and Atalide:
Then crown the lover, or destroy the traitor.
Translation of R. B. Boswell.
Scene: The palace of Pyrrhus, at Buthrotum in Epirus. Present: Andromache, Hermione, Cleone, Cephissa.
A Why fly you, madam? Is it not a sight
To please you, Hector's widow at your knees,
Weeping? But not with tears of jealousy
I come, nor do I envy you the heart
Surrendered to your charms. A cruel hand
Robbed me of him whom only I admired.
Love's flame was lit by Hector long ago,
With him it was extinguished in the tomb.
But he has left a son. Some day you'll know
How closely to one's heart a son can cling;
But you will never know, I wish it not,
How keen the pang when danger threatens him,
And they would take him from you,-all that's left
To soothe a blighted heart. Ah, when worn out
With ten long years of woe, the Trojans sought
Your mother's life, on Hector I prevailed
O'er Pyrrhus you have power
As I had then o'er Hector. Can they dread
The infant he has left?
In some far distant isle.
And they may trust
My fears to keep him there, taught but to weep
With me.
I feel for you, but duty holds
My tongue tied, when my sire declares his will:
It is by him that Pyrrhus's wrath is stirred.
But who can bend him better than yourself?
His soul has long been subject to your eyes:
Make him pronounce the word, and I'll consent.
How scornfully did she refuse my prayer! Cephissa- Accept her counsel. See him, as she says; One look of yours may Greece and her confoundBut look, he seeks you of his own accord.
Enter Pyrrhus and Phoenix
Where is the princess? Said you not that she
Was here?
Andromache [throwing herself at his feet] –
Stop, sire. What will you do?
Give up the son? Why not the mother, then?
Where is the kindness that you swore to me
So lately? Can I touch no chord at least
Of pity? Does this sentence bar all hope
Of pardon?
Phoenix knows my word is pledged.
No dangers were too great for you to brave
On my behalf!
Blind then, I now can see.
Your wishes might have won his pardon once;
You ne'er so much as asked it. Now you come
Too late.
Full well you understood, my lord,
The sigh that feared repulse. Forgive the trace
Of pride, that died not with my royal rank,
And made me shrink from importunity.
My lord, you know, had it not been for you,
Andromache would never have embraced
A master's knees.
No, in your secret soul
You hate me, scorn to owe me anything.
This son, the only object of your care,-
You would have loved him less, had he been saved
Through me. You hate me with a bitter scorn,
And worse than all the other Greeks combined.
Enjoy at leisure such a noble rage.
Come, Phoenix.
Cephissa Madam
Andromache
I will go where Hector's gone.
What further can I say to him? The author of my woes, he knows them all. [To Pyrrhus]—
See to what state you have reduced me, sire!
I've seen my father slain, our walls enwrapt
In flames, and all our family cut off,
My husband's bloody corpse dragged through the dust,
His only son reserved for chains with me.
For his sake I endure to live a slave.
Yea, more, this thought has sometimes brought relief,—
That fate has fixed my place of exile here;
The son of many kings beneath your sway
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