Our quick departure hinders our good escort, | |
The worthy Pania, from anticipating | |
The orders of some parasangs from hence: | |
465 | Nay, there’s no other choice, but – hence, I say. |
[ | |
[ | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
That worst of mockeries of a remedy; | |
We are now secure by these men’s exile. | |
SALEMENES | |
As he who treads on flowers is from the adder | |
470 | Twined round their roots. |
SARDANAPALUS | |
SALEMENES | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
SALEMENES | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
SALEMENES | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
What danger can they work upon the frontier? | |
475 | SALEMENES |
Were I well listen’d to. | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
Impartially to thee – why not to them? | |
SALEMENES | |
I take my leave to order forth the guard. | |
480 | SARDANAPALUS |
SALEMENES | |
Dispense with me – I am no wassailer: | |
Command me in all service save the Bacchant’s. | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
SALEMENES | |
485 | Too oft. Am I permitted to depart? |
SARDANAPALUS | |
Salemenes, | |
My brother, my best subject, better prince | |
Than I am king. You should have been the monarch, | |
And I – I know not what, and care not; but | |
490 | Think not I am insensible to all |
Thine honest wisdom, and thy rough yet kind, | |
Though oft reproving, sufferance of my follies. | |
If I have spared these men against thy counsel, | |
That is, their lives – it is not that I doubt | |
495 | The advice was sound; but, let them live: we will not |
Cavil about their lives – so let them mend them. | |
Their banishment will leave me still sound sleep, | |
Which their death had not left me. | |
SALEMENES | |
The risk to sleep for ever, to save traitors – | |
500 | A moment’s pang now changed for years of crime. |
Still let them be made quiet. | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
My word is past. | |
SALEMENES | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
SALEMENES: | |
This half indulgence of an exile serves | |
505 | But to provoke – a pardon should be full, |
Or it is none. | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
After I had repeal’d them, or at least | |
Only dismiss’d them from our presence, who | |
Urged me to send them to their satrapies? | |
510 | SALEMENES |
If they e’er reach’d their satrapies – why, then, | |
Reprove me more for my advice. | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
They do not reach them – look to it! – in safety, | |
In safety, mark me – and security – | |
515 | Look to thine own. |
SALEMENES | |
Their | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
And, prithee, think more gently of thy brother. | |
SALEMENES | |
[ | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
severe; | |
520 | Hard but as lofty as the rock, and free |
From all the taints of common earth – while I | |
Am softer clay, impregnated with flowers: | |
But as our mould is, must the produce be. | |
If I have err’d this time, ’tis on the side | |
525 | Where error sits most lightly on that sense |
I know not what to call it; but it reckons | |
With me ofttimes for pain, and sometimes pleasure; | |
A spirit which seems placed about my heart | |
To count its throbs not quicken them and ask | |
530 | Questions which mortal never dared to ask me, |
Nor Baal, though an oracular deity – | |
Albeit his marble face majestical | |
Frowns as the shadows of the evening dim | |
His brows to changed expression, till at times | |
535 | I think the statue looks in act to speak. |
Away with these vain thoughts, I will be joyous – | |
And here comes Joy’s true herald. | |
[ | |
MYRRHA | |
Is overcast, and musters muttering thunder, | |
In clouds that seem approaching fast, and show | |
540 | In forked flashes a commanding tempest. |
Will you then quit the palace? | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
MYRRHA | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
Not ill content to vary the smooth scene, | |
And watch the warring elements; but this | |
545 | Would little suit the silken garments and |
Smooth faces of our festive friends. Say, Myrrha, | |
Art thou of those who dread the roar of clouds? | |
MYRRHA | |
As auguries of Jove. | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
550 | Ours also has a property in thunder, |
And ever and anon some falling bolt | |
Proves his divinity, – and yet sometimes | |
Strikes his own altars. | |
MYRRHA | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
555 | Beyond the palace walls to-night, but make |
Our feast within. | |
MYRRHA | |
Hath heard the prayer thou wouldst not hear. The gods | |
Are kinder to thee than thou to thyself, | |
And flash this storm between thee and thy foes, | |
560 | To shield thee from them. |
SARDANAPALUS | |
Methinks it is the same within these walls | |
As on the river’s brink. | |
MYRRHA | |
Are high and strong, and guarded. Treason has | |
To penetrate through many a winding way, | |
565 | And massy portal; but in the pavilion |
There is no bulwark. | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
Nor in the fortress, nor upon the top | |
Of cloud-fenced Caucasus, where the eagle sits | |
Nested in pathless clefts, if treachery be: | |
570 | Even as the arrow finds the airy king, |
The steel will reach the earthly. But be calm: | |
The men, or innocent or guilty, are | |
Banish’d, and far upon their way. | |
MYRRHA | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
MYRRHA | |
575 | From just infliction of due punishment |
On those who seek your life: wer’t otherwise, | |
I should not merit mine. Besides, you heard | |
The princely Salemenes. | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
The gentle and the austere are both against me, | |
580 | And urge me to revenge. |
MYRRHA | |
SARDANAPALUS | |
If ever I indulge in’t, it shall be | |
With kings – my equals. |