Life Is a Dream Part 9

SEG.

What, sir mouth-piece, you again?

AST.

My Lord, I waive your insult to myself In recognition of the dignity You yet are new to, and that greater still You look in time to wear. But for this lady-- Whom, if my cousin now, I hope to claim Henceforth by yet a nearer, dearer name--

SEG.

And what care I? She is my cousin too: And if you be a Prince--well, am not I Lord of the very soil you stand upon?

By that, and by that right beside of blood That like a fiery fountain hitherto Pent in the rock leaps toward her at her touch, Mine, before all the cousins in Muscovy!

You call me Prince of Poland, and yourselves My subjects--traitors therefore to this hour, Who let me perish all my youth away Chain'd there among the mountains; till, forsooth, Terrified at your treachery foregone, You spirit me up here, I know not how, Popinjay-like invest me like yourselves, Choke me with scent and music that I loathe, And, worse than all the music and the scent, With false, long-winded, fulsome compliment, That 'Oh, you are my subjects!' and in word Reiterating still obedience, Thwart me in deed at every step I take: When just about to wreak a just revenge Upon that old arch-traitor of you all, Filch from my vengeance him I hate; and him I loved--the first and only face--till this-- I cared to look on in your ugly court-- And now when palpably I grasp at last What hitherto but shadow'd in my dreams-- Affiances and interferences, The first who dares to meddle with me more-- Princes and chamberlains and counsellors, Touch her who dares!--

AST.

That dare I--

SEG. (seizing him by the throat).

You dare!

CHAMB.

My Lord!--

A LORD.

His strength's a lion's--

(Voices within. The King! The King!--)

(Enter King.)

A LORD.

And on a sudden how he stands at gaze As might a wolf just fasten'd on his prey, Glaring at a suddenly encounter'd lion.

KING.

And I that hither flew with open arms To fold them round my son, must now return To press them to an empty heart again!

(He sits on the throne.)

SEG.

That is the King?--My father?

(After a long pause.) I have heard That sometimes some blind instinct has been known To draw to mutual recognition those Of the same blood, beyond all memory Divided, or ev'n never met before.

I know not how this is--perhaps in brutes That live by kindlier instincts--but I know That looking now upon that head whose crown p.r.o.nounces him a sovereign king, I feel No setting of the current in my blood Tow'rd him as sire. How is't with you, old man, Tow'rd him they call your son?--

KING.

Alas! Alas!

SEG.

Your sorrow, then?

KING.

Beholding what I do.

SEG.

Ay, but how know this sorrow that has grown And moulded to this present shape of man, As of your own creation?

KING.

Ev'n from birth.

SEG.

But from that hour to this, near, as I think, Some twenty such renewals of the year As trace themselves upon the barren rocks, I never saw you, nor you me--unless, Unless, indeed, through one of those dark masks Through which a son might fail to recognize The best of fathers.

KING.

Be that as you will: But, now we see each other face to face, Know me as you I know; which did I not, By whatsoever signs, a.s.suredly You were not here to prove it at my risk.

SEG.

You are my father.

And is it true then, as Clotaldo swears, 'Twas you that from the dawning birth of one Yourself brought into being,--you, I say, Who stole his very birthright; not alone That secondary and peculiar right Of sovereignty, but even that prime Inheritance that all men share alike, And chain'd him--chain'd him!--like a wild beast's whelp.

Among as savage mountains, to this hour?

Answer if this be thus.

KING.

Oh, Segismund, In all that I have done that seems to you, And, without further hearing, fairly seems, Unnatural and cruel--'twas not I, But One who writes His order in the sky I dared not misinterpret nor neglect, Who knows with what reluctance--

SEG.

Oh, those stars, Those stars, that too far up from human blame To clear themselves, or careless of the charge, Still bear upon their s.h.i.+ning shoulders all The guilt men s.h.i.+ft upon them!

KING.

Nay, but think: Not only on the common score of kind, But that peculiar count of sovereignty-- If not behind the beast in brain as heart, How should I thus deal with my innocent child, Doubly desired, and doubly dear when come, As that sweet second-self that all desire, And princes more than all, to root themselves By that succession in their people's hearts, Unless at that superior Will, to which Not kings alone, but sovereign nature bows?

SEG.

And what had those same stars to tell of me That should compel a father and a king So much against that double instinct?

KING.

That, Which I have brought you hither, at my peril, Against their written warning, to disprove, By justice, mercy, human kindliness.

SEG.

And therefore made yourself their instrument To make your son the savage and the brute They only prophesied?--Are you not afear'd, Lest, irrespective as such creatures are Of such relations.h.i.+p, the brute you made Revenge the man you marr'd--like sire, like son.

To do by you as you by me have done?

KING.

You never had a savage heart from me; I may appeal to Poland.

SEG.

Then from whom?

If pure in fountain, poison'd by yourself When scarce begun to flow.--To make a man Not, as I see, degraded from the mould I came from, nor compared to those about, And then to throw your own flesh to the dogs!-- Why not at once, I say, if terrified At the prophetic omens of my birth, Have drown'd or stifled me, as they do whelps Too costly or too dangerous to keep?

KING.

That, living, you might learn to live, and rule Yourself and Poland.

SEG.

By the means you took To spoil for either?

KING.