Scene 5
The Bower of Ariadne.
[Enter BACCHUS and ARIADNE, SARMION and IONE, HARLEQUIN and COLUMBINE, GLAUCUS, SCARAMOUCH, SATYRS, and BACCHANTES.]
Song.
Here are brackens, green and gold,
Fit for plumes of Titans old;
And we see them by the light
That immortals shed at night:
Bosky rooms where to and fro
Shadowy dryads come and go;
Bubbling springs where naiads peep,
Mossy couches where they sleep.
Here beneath this tree-topped hill
Pan oft comes to pipe his fill,
Making all the valley ring;
Here the Muses sometimes sing:
And here upon this midnight hour
We visit Ariadne's bower.
ARI. [To Sarmion.] Who may you be?
ION. He cannot speak.
ARI. Not speak!
BAC. Silenus knows a remedy for that.
SIL. None better. [Gives Sarmion wine in a goblet. SARMION drinks.]
This would loosen dead men's tongues.
SAR. My name is Sarmion. Whence I come I know not:
I know I live; and now I have command
Of speech and of my thoughts, thanks to this wine.
I first remember being on the sea:
My shallop leapt from wave to wave: I thought
For ever to go sailing through the night:
My molten life welled from my heart and streamed
In murmuring flame through all its channels, fanned
By cooling winds: I watched the wanton waves
That melted in each other till I slept.
When I awoke the moon shone overhead,
And made along the sea a path of light,
Wherein I sailed: the beauty of it all
Blanched me with rapture; but before I knew
My shallop grounded, and I sprang on shore.
I looked about me for a silver stair
To mount up to the moon, and seeing none
Began to be dismayed, when suddenly
I came upon this lady, whom I love.
[To Ione.] Lady, I love you. How I longed to say “I love you!” —
We were carried to a ship,
And thence arrived here borne upon a cloud.
BAC. I know you now, and what and whence you are.
I think this lady loves you in return: ask her and see.
[SARMION and IONE talk apart. BACCHUS says to Scaramouch:]
So, you are he would make of me a show.
SCA. It is my vocation. It may be an inferior calling, but there are worse. It is not so honourable as being a god, doubtless, but it is a decent kind of beggary.
BAC. I understand you have been prosperous.
SCA. On the whole I have. I am not yet a millionaire, but I have capital. I — don't look at me like that!
BAC. Prosperity has spoiled you, sir, I see:
You need to view the world with other eyes.
Come, Harlequin, that splinter of your sword
Shall work an old-world metamorphosis.
Strike him between the shoulders.
[HARLEQUIN strikes Scaramouch.]
To an ape
Be changed: and in that form you shall be caught,
And pass on exhibition for a year
From John-o'-Groat's to Land's End, up and down:
Thereafter you shall be a man again.
SCA. Monkeys, menageries and misery! Bacchus, Bacchus, think what you do! Do I merit such a fate? Make me a toad, a rat, a cockroach! Heavens! A monkey in a cage! Straw, stench, and filth; and little boys to tickle me with sticks, and throw me nuts! A blinking bleared baboon ! A chattering, gibbering, jabbering —
[SCARAMOUCH rushes out, transformed to an ape.]
BAC. [To Glaucus.] Come hither.
GLA. [Aside.] Now shall I grow young again, and be the god I am — and yet I tremble.
BAC. You look like one who thinks himself of note.
GLA. Surely, sir, surely. I am Silenus, your high godship's faithful old servant. I wish I could see myself — Have I undergone a change similar to your godship's? When I last saw you — I remember nothing since I fell asleep by the sea-shore — you were an old blown blue-bottle; now you are as I see you. Am I now a god? Have I cast my slough?
SIL. Oho! I have a word to say. You must know that I played Bacchus in my wanderings. This vain old coxcomb took it into his head that he must be a god, whereupon I persuaded him that he was myself, though all Olympus knows there's not much of the god about me.
GLA. What! Have I been played upon like a kettledrum? Is this all a dream?
BAC. Well, are you still an immortal?
GLA. No — no; I am a foolish old man.
BAC. I'm glad you think so: you can now go home.
GLA. My daughter, sir?
BAC. Is safe. Farewell.
[GLAUCUS goes out. BACCHUS says to Harlequin and Columbine:]
Come here.
HAR. & COL. Mercy! Mercy!
BAC. Will you return, or will you follow me?
HAR & COL. O send us back!
BAC. A wretched choice: but go.
[HARLEQUIN and COLUMBINE go out.]
Sarmion, what says the lady to your love?
SAR. O words of wonder, of enchantment — sweet,
And yet so strong, so tender and so bold,
That any ears save mine would miss the sense,
The savour, the aroma that they bear
ARI. You love him, then?
ION. Yes.
ARI. And you told him so?
ION. I did.
ARI. What wondrous language could you use
That he should be so frenzied?
ION. I but spoke
The language of my heart.
BAC. Well answered, girl.
Our time is brief, for we have far to go
Before this side of earth can roll again
Out of its shadow. Listen, lovers.
SIL. Peace.
BAC. Sarmion, you are descended from a race
Inhabiting a star above the moon.
Spirits they are, and by a subtle thought
Spirits are born to them. Those sultry clouds
That surge in slumbrous ranks like golden waves,
Or on the skyline of the earth build up,
Agleam with topaz and with sardonyx,
Towards evening, high pavilions and towers,
That change to lofty crests and gorges deep
The fancy cannot fathom, are more dense,
More gross than the ethereal continents
Of yonder orb, washed by a sinuous sea
Guiltless of storm, thinner and lovelier
Than the divided azure. In a dream
You had a vision of an earthly maid;
And, still asleep, your life, on fire for her, Shaped to itself the body that you have —
The first to be incarnate of your race:
And then the secret limbec of your love
Distilled the wing'd and airy boat of pearl
That bore you to the earth. Here you awoke,
The past, forgot — the present, wonder all.
ARI. But shall we visit soon this star of his?
BAC. Sometime we shall. — Sarmion, this choice is yours:
Either to give Ione up, and be
Again a free thought in your natal sphere,
Whose whole dimensions, tense and rare, are pierced
By dwellers there, and give as easy way
As summer air to swallows, as the deep
To sporting dolphins ; or to have your love
And with her the imprisonment of earth,
Where spirit must be draped in mortal flesh,
Where motion's shackled, and where ways are hewn,
Where life is conscious, and where death ends all.
SAR. I choose Ione. What with her must come
I scarcely understand; but there can fall
No present woe so bitter as would be
Her absence from my life.
ION. O love, think well!
Here are disease and care; I shall grow old;
And poverty may catch us in its net.
SAR. Your voice is music, but you speak of things
Unknown to me.
ION. Then, though my heart must break,
Return, return! This world is not for you!
A thousand daily pitfalls mesh the path
Of those who here are native: faults in friends,
Denials, tarryings, storm, and heat and cold,
Things loathsome, incomplete; falsehood, and wrath:
O I am ill at saying what I mean!
Think; if these pitiful disquietings
Have power to kill the joy in us, who come
Of blood that never beat in other veins
Than those of men and women, still abused
By bufferings of chance on every side,
What misery, what terror will there be
For you, whose life has known no bolts, no bars,
No stumbling-blocks, no weariness, no care!
And, chief of all, when you begin to find,
How weak, how foolish, and how fond I am!
SAR. Have you to suffer daily miseries?
Then here I stay. Gaunt wretchedness, advance:
If I may have this maiden for my mate,
No sting, no stroke of yours can make me quail;
And while I live I cannot be so bruised
But some sound part of me shall have the strength
To bear the blows intended for my love.
ION. Now, God forbid! 'Tis I shall be your shield.
ARI. Come here and kiss me.
[ARIADNE embraces IONE.]
BAC. This is well, indeed.
We must, ere dawn, away to India :
You two shall be transported through the air
To Glaucus' house.
ION. How far are we from home?
BAC. Three miles, I think.
ION. O, pray you, let us walk!
Sarmion, three miles together through the wood
Shimmering with moonlight, full of smothered sound,
And ghostly shadow, and the mingled scent
Of flowers and spices, and the cooling earth!
It is a very lifetime of delight!
BAC. Good-night then, and farewell.
ARI. Farewell.
ION. Farewell.
SAR. All happiness go with you into Ind.
[SARMION and IONE go out.]
ARI. This star, my love — I burn to see this star.
BAC. You shall upon your birthday.
ARI. Two weeks hence,
As mortals count! Well, I can wait.
BAC. Lead on.
FINIS.
