For here the patriarchal days are not A pastoral fable-pipes in the liberal air, Mix'd with the sweet bells of the sauntering herd; Enter from below a CHAMOIS HUNTER. CHAMOIS HUNTER. Even so This way the chamois leapt: her nimble feet MAN. (not perceiving the other.) To be thus— Gray-hair'd with anguish, like these blasted pines, Wrecks of a single winter, barkless, branchless, A blighted trunk upon a cursed root, Which but supplies a feeling to decay— Having been otherwise! Now furrow'd o'er With wrinkles, plough'd by moments, not by years; Ye avalanches, whom a breath draws down In mountainous o'erwhelming, come and crush me! Crash with a frequent conflict; but ye pass, And only fall on things which still would live ; And hamlet of the harmless villager. C. HUN. The mists begin to rise from up the valley; I'll warn him to descend, or he may chance To lose at once his way and life together. MAN. The mists boil up around the glaciers; clouds Rise curling fast beneath me, white and sulphury, Like foam from the roused ocean of deep Hell, Whose every wave breaks on a living shore, Heap'd with the damn'd like pebbles.—I am giddy. C. HUN. I must approach him cautiously; if near, A sudden step will startle him, and he Seems tottering already. ΜΑΝ. Mountains have fallen, Leaving a gap in the clouds, and with the shock The ripe green valleys with destruction's splinters; Thus, in its old age, did Mount Rosenberg— C. HUN. Friend! have a care, Your next step may be fatal !-for the love Of him who made you, stand not on that brink! MAN. (not hearing him.) Such would have been for me a fitting tomb; My bones had then been quiet in their depth; They had not then been strewn upon the rocks For the wind's pastime as thus-thus they shall be— In this one plunge.—Farewell, ye opening heavens! Look not upon me thus reproachfully— Ye were not meant for me- -Earth! take these atoms! (As MANFRED is in act to spring from the cliff, the CHAMOIS HUNTER seizes and retains him with a sudden grasp.) C. HUN. Hold, madman !—though aweary of thy life, Stain not our pure vales with thy guilty blood.- MAN. I am most sick at heart-nay, grasp me not— I am all feebleness-the mountains whirl Spinning around me-I grow blind-What art thou? And something like a pathway, which the torrent (As they descend the rocks with difficulty, the scene closes.) END OF ACT THE FIRST. ACT II. SCENE I. A Cottage amongst the Bernese Alps. MANFRED and the CHAMOIS HUNTER. C. HUN. No, no-yet pause-thou must not yet go forth: Thy mind and body are alike unfit To trust each other, for some hours, at least; When thou art better, I will be thy guide- MAN. It imports not: I do know My route full well, and need no further guidance. C. HUN. Thy garb and gait bespeak thee of high lineage One of the many chiefs, whose castled crags Look o'er the lower valleys-which of these May call thee Lord? I only know their portals; |