His mother left me, with a timid hope
Just dawning in her breast;—and I—I dared
To foster its faint spark. You smile!-Oh! then
He will be saved!
Eri. Nay, I but smile to think
What a fond fool is hope!-She may be taught
To dream that the great sun will change his course
To work her pleasure; or the tomb give back
Its inmates to her arms. In sooth, 'tis strange !
Yet with pitying heart, you should not thus
Have mocked the boy's sad mother—I have said,
You should not thus have mocked her!—Now, farewell.
(Exit Eribert.)
Ansel. Oh, brother! hard of heart!-for deeds like these
There must be fearful chastening, if on high
Justice doth hold her state. And I must tell
Yon desolate mother that her fair young son
Is thus to perish!--Haply the dread tale
May slay her too;-for heaven is merciful.
Twill be a bitter task!
VIII.-ORESTES-PYRRHUS.--Philips.
Orestes. Before I speak the message of the Greeks, Permit me, sir, to glory in the title
Of their ambassador: since I behold
Troy's vanquisher, and great Achilles' son.
Nor does the son rise short of such a father:
If Hector fell by him, Troy fell by you.
But what your father never would have done,
You do. You cherish the remains of Troy;
And, by an ill-timed pity, keep alive
The dying embers of a ten-years' war.
Have you so soon forgot the mighty Hector?
The Greeks remember his high-brandished sword,
That filled their states with widows and with orphans;
For which they call for vengeance on his son.
Who knows what he may one day prove? Who knows
But he may brave us in our ports, and, filled
With Hector's fury, set our fleets on blaze?
You may yourself live to repent your mercy.
Comply, then, with the Grecians' just demand:
Satiate their vengeance, and preserve yourself.
Pyrrhus. The Greeks are for my safety more concerned Than I desire: I thought your kings were met
On more important counsel. When I heard
The name of their ambassador, I hoped
Some glorious enterprise was taking birth.
Is Agamemnon's son despatched for this?
And do the Grecian chiefs, renowned in war,
A race of heroes, join in close debate
To plot an infant's death? What right has Greece
To ask his life? Must I, must I alone,
Of all her sceptered warriors, be denied.
To treat my captive as I please? Know, prince,
When Troy lay smoking on the ground, and each
Proud victor shared the harvest of the war,
Andromache, and this her son, were mine,
Were mine by lot; and who shall wrest them from me?
Ulysses bore away old Priam's queen;
Cassandra was your own great father's prize :
Did I concern myself in what they won?
Did I send embassies to claim their captives?
Orest. But, sir, we fear for you and for ourselves.
Troy may again revive, and a new Hector
Rise in Astyanax. Then think betimes-
Pyr. Let dastard souls be timorously wise;
But tell them, Pyrrhus knows not how to form
Far-fancied ills, and dangers out of sight.
Orest. Sir, call to mind the unrivalled strength of Troy ; Her walls, her bulwarks, and her gates of brass,
Her kings, her heroes, and embattled armies!
Pyr. I call them all to mind; and see them all
Confused in dust; all mixed in one wide ruin;
All but a child, and he in bondage held.
What vengeance can we fear from such a Troy?
If they have sworn to extinguish Hector's race,
Why was their vow for twelve long months deferred?
Why was he not in Priam's bosom slain?
He should have fallen among the slaughtered heaps
Whelmed under Troy. His death had then been just,
When age and infancy alike in vain
Pleaded their weakness; when the heat of conquest,
And horrors of the fight, roused all our rage,
And blindly hurried us through scenes of death,
My fury then was without bounds: but now
My wrath appeased, must I be cruel still,
And, deaf to all the tender calls of pity.
Like a cool murderer, bathe my hands in blood--
A infant's blood?—No, prince.-Go. bid the Greeks
Mark out some other victim; my revenge
Has had its fill. What has escaped from Troy,
Shall not be saved to perish in Epirus.
Orest. I need not tell you, sir, Astyanax
Was doomed to death in Troy; nor mention how
The crafty mother saved her darling son:
The Greeks do now but urge their former sentence.
Nor is't the boy, but Hector, they pursue;
The father draws their vengeance on the son:
The father, who so oft in Grecian blood
Has drenched his sword: the father, whom the Greeks
May seek even here.-Prevent them, sir, in time.
Pyr. No! let them come, since I was born to wage
Eternal wars. Let them now turn their arms
On him who conquered for them: let them come,
And in Epirus seek another Troy.
"Twas thus they recompensed my godlike sire;
Thus was Achilles thanked. But, prince, remember,
Their black ingratitude then cost them dear.
[To explain the following beautiful piece, it may be necessary to mention that Lochiel, a highland chieftain, while on his march to join the standard of the Pretender, was met by one of the highland Seers or prophets, who, having the gift of second sight or prophecy, warns him to return and not incur the certain ruin which awaited the unfortunate prince and his followers at the battle which took place on the field of Culloden.]
Seer. (With his eyes fixed as though beholding future events.)
Lochiel Lochiel! beware of the day
When the lowlands shall meet thee in battle array!
For a field of the dead rushes on to my sight,
And the clans of Culloden are scattered in fight;
They rally, they bleed. for their kingdom and crown;
Woe, woe, to the riders that trample them down!
Proud Cumberland prances, insulting the slain,
And their hoof-beaten bosoms are trod to the plain.
But hark through the fast flashing lightning of war,
What steed to the desert flies frantic and far?
'Tis thine, O Glenullin! whose bride shall awake,
Like a love-lighted watchfire, all night at the gate.
A steed comes at morning; no rider is there;
But its bridle is red with the sign of despair.
Weep, Scotland, to death and captivity led!
O weep, but thy tears cannot number the dead;
For a merciless sword on Culloden shall wave,
Culloden that reeks with the blood of the brave.
Lochiel. Go, preach to the coward, thou death-telling seer!
Or if gory Culloden so dreadful appear,
Draw, dotard, around thy old wavering sight,
This mantle, to cover the phantoms of fright.
Seer. Ha! laughest thou, Lochiel, my vision to scorn?
Proud bird of the mountain, thy plume shall be torn !
Say, rushed the bold eagle exultingly forth,
From his home, in the dark rolling clouds of the north?
Lo! the death-shot of foemen outspeeding, he rode
Companionless, bearing destruction abroad;
But down let him stoop from his havoc on high!
Ah! home let him speed, for the spoiler is nigh.
Why flames the far summit? Why shoot to the blast
Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast?
'Tis the fire shower of ruin, all dreadfully driven
From his eyry that beacons the darkness of heaven.
Oh, crested Lochiel! the peerless in might,
Whose banners arise on the battlements' height,
Heaven's fire is around thee, to blast and to burn:
Return to thy dwelling! all lonely return!
For the blackness of ashes shall mark where it stood,
And a wild mother scream o'er her famishing brood.
Lochiel. False wizard, avaunt! I have marshalled my
Their swords are a thousand, their bosoms are one!
They are true to the last of their blood and their breath,
And like reapers descend to the harvest of death.
Then welcome be Cumberland's steed to the shock!
Let him dash his proud foam like a wave on the rock!
But woe to his kindred and woe to his cause,
When Scotland her claymore indignantly draws;
When her bonnetted chieftains to victory crowd,
Clamanald the dauntless, and Moray the proud !
All plaided and plumed in their tartan array-
Seer. Lochiel! Lochiel! beware of the day!
For, dark and despairing, my sight I may seal,
But man cannot cover what God would reveal.
'Tis the sunset of life gives me mystical lore,
And coming events cast their shadows before.
I tell thee, Culloden's dread echoes shall ring
With the bloodhounds that bark for thy fugitive king.
Lo! anointed by heaven with the vials of wrath,
Behold where he flies on his desolate path!
Now in darkness and billows he sweeps from
my sight,
Rise rise ye wild tempests, and cover his flight!—
'Tis finished. Their thunders are hushed on the moors,
Culloden is lost, and my country deplores.
But where is the iron-bound prisoner? Where?
For the red eye of battle is shut in despair.
Say, mounts he the ocean wave, banished, forlorn,
Like a limb from his country cast bleeding and torn?
Ah, no! for a darker departure is near,-
The war drum is muffled, and black is the bier;
His death bell is tolling! Oh mercy, dispel
Yon sight that it freezes my spirit to tell!
Life flutters convulsed in his quivering limbs,
And his blood-streaming nostril in agony swims.
Accursed be the fagots that blaze at his feet,
Where his heart shall be thrown, ere it ceases to beat,
With the smoke of its ashes to poison the gale—
Lochiel. Down, soothless insulter!
For never shall Albin a destiny meet,
So black with dishonor, so foul with retreat.
Though my perishing ranks should b strewed in their gore,
Like ocean weeds heaped on the surf-beaten shore,
Lochiel, untainted by flight or by chains,
While a kindling of life in his bosom remains,
Shall victor exult, or in death be laid low,
With his back to the field and his feet to the foe!
And leaving in battle no blot on his name,
Look proudly to heaven from the death-bed of fame.
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