The Revenge Part 14

_Alon._ Am I awake?

_Zan._ For ever.

Thy wife is guiltless--that's one transport to me; And I, I let thee know it--that's another.

I urg'd don Carlos to resign his mistress, I forg'd the letter, I dispos'd the picture; I hated, I despis'd, and I destroy!

_Alon._ Oh! [_swoons._

_Zan._ Why, this is well--why, this is blow for blow!

Where are you? crown me, shadow me with laurels, Ye spirits which delight in just revenge!

Let Europe and her pallid sons go weep; Let Afric and her hundred thrones rejoice: Oh, my dear countrymen, look down and see How I bestride your prostrate conqueror!

I tread on haughty Spain, and all her kings.

But this is mercy, this is my indulgence; 'Tis peace, 'tis refuge from my indignation.

I must awake him into horrors. Hoa!

Alonzo, hoa! the Moor is at the gate!

Awake, invincible, omnipotent!

Thou who dost all subdue!

_Alon._ Inhuman slave!

_Zan._ Fall'n Christian, thou mistak'st my character.

Look on me. Who am I? I know, thou say'st The Moor, a slave, an abject, beaten slave: (Eternal woes to him that made me so!) But look again. Has six years' cruel bondage Extinguish'd majesty so far, that nought s.h.i.+nes here to give an awe of one above thee?

When the great Moorish king, Abdallah, fell, Fell by thy hand accurs'd, I fought fast by him, His son, though, through his fondness, in disguise, Less to expose me to th' ambitious foe.-- Ha! does it wake thee?--O'er my father's corse I stood astride till I had clove thy crest; And then was made the captive of a squadron, And sunk into thy servant--But, oh! what, What were my wages? Hear not heaven, nor earth!

My wages were a blow! by heaven, a blow!

And from a mortal hand!

_Alon._ Oh, villain, villain!

_Zan._ All strife is vain. [_showing a dagger._

_Alon._ Is thus my love return'd?

Is this my recompense? Make friends of tigers!

Lay not your young, oh, mothers, on the breast, For fear they turn to serpents as they lie, And pay you for their nourishment with death!-- Carlos is dead, and Leonora dying!

Both innocent, both murder'd, both by me.

_Zan._ Must I despise thee too, as well as hate thee?

Complain of grief, complain thou art a man.-- Priam from fortune's lofty summit fell; Great Alexander 'midst his conquests mourn'd; Heroes and demi-G.o.ds have known their sorrows; Caesars have wept; and I have had--my blow: But, 'tis reveng'd, and now my work is done.

Yet, ere I fall, be it one part of vengeance To force thee to confess that I am just.-- Thou seest a prince, whose father thou hast slain, Whose native country thou hast laid in blood, Whose sacred person (oh!) thou hast profan'd, Whose reign extinguish'd--what was left to me, So highly born? No kingdom, but revenge; No treasure, but thy tortures and thy groans.

If men should ask who brought thee to thy end, Tell them, the Moor, and they will not despise thee.

If cold white mortals censure this great deed, Warn them, they judge not of superior beings, Souls made of fire, and children of the sun, With whom revenge is virtue. Fare thee well-- Now, fully satisfied, I should take leave: But one thing grieves me, since thy death is near, I leave thee my example how to die.

_As he is going to stab himself, Alonzo rushes upon him to prevent him.

In the mean time, enter Don Alvarez, attended. They disarm and seize Zanga, Alonzo puts the dagger in his bosom._

_Alon._ No, monster, thou shalt not escape by death.

Oh, father!

_Alv._ Oh, Alonzo!--Isabella, Touch'd with remorse to see her mistress' pangs, Told all the dreadful tale.

_Alon._ What groan was that?

_Zan._ As I have been a vulture to thy heart, So will I be a raven to thine ear, As true as ever snuff'd the scent of blood, As ever flapp'd its heavy wing against The window of the sick, and croak'd despair.

Thy wife is dead. [_Alvarez goes aside, and returns._

_Alv._ The dreadful news is true.

_Alon._ Prepare the rack; invent new torments for him.

_Zan._ This too is well. The fix'd and n.o.ble mind Turns all occurrence to its own advantage; And I'll make vengeance of calamity.

Were I not thus reduc'd, thou wouldst not know, That, thus reduc'd, I dare defy thee still.

Torture thou may'st, but thou shall ne'er despise me.

The blood will follow where the knife is driven, The flesh will quiver where the pincers tear, And sighs and cries by nature grow on pain.

But these are foreign to the soul: not mine The groans that issue, or the tears that fall; They disobey me; on the rack I scorn thee, As when my falchion clove thy helm in battle.

_Alv._ Peace, villain!

_Zan._ While I live, old man, I'll speak.

And, well I know, thou dar'st not kill me yet; For that would rob thy blood-hounds of their prey.

_Alon._ Who call'd Alonzo?

_Alv._ No one call'd, my son.

_Alon._ Again!--'Tis Carlos' voice, and I obey.

Oh, how I laugh at all that this can do! [_shows dagger._ The wounds that pain'd, the wounds that murder'd me, Were giv'n before; I am already dead; This only marks my body for the grave. [_stabs himself._ Afric, thou art reveng'd.--Oh, Leonora! [_dies._

_Zan._ Good ruffians, give me leave; my blood is yours, The wheel's prepar'd, and you shall have it all.

Let me but look one moment on the dead, And pay yourselves with gazing on my pangs.

[_he goes to Alonzo's body._ Is this Alonzo? Where's the haughty mien?

Is that the hand which smote me? Heavens, how pale!

And art thou dead? So is my enmity.

I war not with the dust. The great, the proud, The conqueror of Afric was my foe.

A lion preys not upon carcases.

This was thy only method to subdue me.

Terror and doubt fall on me: all thy good Now blazes, all thy guilt is in the grave.

Never had man such funeral applause: If I lament thee, sure thy worth was great.

Oh, vengeance, I have follow'd thee too far, And to receive me, h.e.l.l blows all her fires. [_exeunt._

THE END.

Mr. Hughes, in his criticism on _Oth.e.l.lo_, introduces the following narrative, to which allusion is made in our remarks.--"The short story I am going to tell is a just warning to those of jealous honour to look about them, and begin to possess their souls as they ought; for no man of spirit knows how terrible a creature he is, till he comes to be provoked.

"Don Alonzo, a Spanish n.o.bleman, had a beautiful and virtuous wife, with whom he had lived some years in great tranquillity. The gentleman, however, was not free from the faults usually imputed to his nation; he was proud, suspicious, and impetuous. He kept a Moor in his house, whom, on a complaint from his lady, he had punished for a small offence with the utmost severity. The slave vowed revenge, and communicated his resolution to one of the lady's women, with whom he had lived in a criminal way. This creature also hated her mistress, for she feared she was observed by her; she therefore undertook to make Don Alonzo jealous, by insinuating that the gardner was often admitted to his lady in private, and promising to make him an eye witness of it. At a proper time, agreed on between her and the Morisco, she sent a message to the gardner, that his lady, having some hasty orders to give him, would have him come that moment to her in her chamber. In the mean time she had placed Alonzo privately in an outer room, that he might observe who pa.s.sed that way.

It was not long before he saw the gardner appear. Alonzo had not patience, but following him into the apartment, struck him at one blow with a dagger to the heart; then dragging his lady by the hair, without inquiring farther, he instantly killed her.

"Here he paused, looking on the dead bodies with all the agitations of a demon of revenge; when the wench who had occasioned these terrors, distracted with remorse, threw herself at his feet, and in a voice of lamentation, without sense of the consequence, repeated all her guilt.