Life is a Dream Read online

  But come—already weary with your travel,

  And ill refresh'd by this strange history,

  Until the hours that draw the sun from heaven

  Unite us at the customary board,

  Each to his several chamber: you to rest;

  I to contrive with old Clotaldo best

  The method of a stranger thing than old

  Time has a yet among his records told. [Exeunt.]

  ACT II

  SCENE I—A Throne-room in the Palace. Music within.

  [Enter KING and CLOTALDO, meeting a Lord in waiting]

  KING. You, for a moment beckon'd from your office,

  Tell me thus far how goes it. In due time

  The potion left him?

  LORD. At the very hour

  To which your Highness temper'd it. Yet not

  So wholly but some lingering mist still hung

  About his dawning senses—which to clear,

  We fill'd and handed him a morning drink

  With sleep's specific antidote suffused;

  And while with princely raiment we invested

  What nature surely modell'd for a Prince—

  All but the sword—as you directed—

  KING. Ay—

  LORD. If not too loudly, yet emphatically

  Still with the title of a Prince address'd him.

  KING. How bore he that?

  LORD. With all the rest, my liege,

  I will not say so like one in a dream

  As one himself misdoubting that he dream'd.

  KING. So far so well, Clotaldo, either way,

  And best of all if tow'rd the worse I dread.

  But yet no violence?

  LORD. At most, impatience;

  Wearied perhaps with importunities

  We yet were bound to offer.

  KING. Oh, Clotaldo!

  Though thus far well, yet would myself had drunk

  The potion he revives from! such suspense

  Crowds all the pulses of life's residue

  Into the present moment; and, I think,

  Whichever way the trembling scale may turn,

  Will leave the crown of Poland for some one

  To wait no longer than the setting sun!

  CLOTALDO. Courage, my liege! The curtain is undrawn,

  And each must play his part out manfully,

  Leaving the rest to heaven.

  KING. Whose written words

  If I should misinterpret or transgress!

  But as you say—

  (To the Lord, who exit.) You, back to him at once;

  Clotaldo, you, when he is somewhat used

  To the new world of which they call him Prince,

  Where place and face, and all, is strange to him,

  With your known features and familiar garb

  Shall then, as chorus to the scene, accost him,

  And by such earnest of that old and too

  Familiar world, assure him of the new.

  Last in the strange procession, I myself

  Will by one full and last development

  Complete the plot for that catastrophe

  That he must put to all; God grant it be

  The crown of Poland on his brows!—Hark! hark!—

  Was that his voice within!—Now louder—Oh,

  Clotaldo, what! so soon begun to roar!—

  Again! above the music—But betide

  What may, until the moment, we must hide.

  [Exeunt KING and CLOTALDO.]

  SEGISMUND (within). Forbear! I stifle with your perfume! Cease

  Your crazy salutations! peace, I say

  Begone, or let me go, ere I go mad

  With all this babble, mummery, and glare,

  For I am growing dangerous—Air! room! air!—

  [He rushes in. Music ceases.]

  Oh but to save the reeling brain from wreck

  With its bewilder'd senses!

  [He covers his eyes for a while.]

  What! E'en now

  That Babel left behind me, but my eyes

  Pursued by the same glamour, that—unless

  Alike bewitch'd too—the confederate sense

  Vouches for palpable: bright-shining floors

  That ring hard answer back to the stamp'd heel,

  And shoot up airy columns marble-cold,

  That, as they climb, break into golden leaf

  And capital, till they embrace aloft

  In clustering flower and fruitage over walls

  Hung with such purple curtain as the West

  Fringes with such a gold; or over-laid

  With sanguine-glowing semblances of men,

  Each in his all but living action busied,

  Or from the wall they look from, with fix'd eyes

  Pursuing me; and one most strange of all

  That, as I pass'd the crystal on the wall,

  Look'd from it—left it—and as I return,

  Returns, and looks me face to face again—

  Unless some false reflection of my brain,

  The outward semblance of myself—Myself?

  How know that tawdry shadow for myself,

  But that it moves as I move; lifts his hand

  With mine; each motion echoing so close

  The immediate suggestion of the will

  In which myself I recognize—Myself!—

  What, this fantastic Segismund the same

  Who last night, as for all his nights before,

  Lay down to sleep in wolf-skin on the ground

  In a black turret which the wolf howl'd round,

  And woke again upon a golden bed,

  Round which as clouds about a rising sun,

  In scarce less glittering caparison,

  Gather'd gay shapes that, underneath a breeze

  Of music, handed him upon their knees

  The wine of heaven in a cup of gold,

  And still in soft melodious under-song

  Hailing me Prince of Poland!—'Segismund,'

  They said, 'Our Prince! The Prince of Poland!' and

  Again, 'Oh, welcome, welcome, to his own,

  'Our own Prince Segismund—'

  Oh, but a blast—

  One blast of the rough mountain air! one look

  At the grim features—[He goes to the window.]

  What they disvizor'd also! shatter'd chaos

  Cast into stately shape and masonry,

  Between whose channel'd and perspective sides

  Compact with rooted towers, and flourishing

  To heaven with gilded pinnacle and spire,

  Flows the live current ever to and fro

  With open aspect and free step!—Clotaldo!

  Clotaldo!—calling as one scarce dares call

  For him who suddenly might break the spell

  One fears to walk without him—Why, that I,

  With unencumber'd step as any there,

  Go stumbling through my glory—feeling for

  That iron leading-string—ay, for myself—

  For that fast-anchor'd self of yesterday,

  Of yesterday, and all my life before,

  Ere drifted clean from self-identity

  Upon the fluctuation of to-day's

  Mad whirling circumstance!—And, fool, why not?

  If reason, sense, and self-identity

  Obliterated from a worn-out brain,

  Art thou not maddest striving to be sane,

  And catching at that Self of yesterday

  That, like a leper's rags, best flung away!

  Or if not mad, then dreaming—dreaming?—well—

  Dreaming then—Or, if self to self be true,

  Not mock'd by that, but as poor souls have been

  By those who wrong'd them, to give wrong new relish?

  Or have those stars indeed they told me of

  As masters of my wretched life of old,

  Into some happier constellation roll'd,

  And brought my better fortu
ne out on earth

  Clear as themselves in heaven!—Prince Segismund

  They call'd me—and at will I shook them off—

  Will they return again at my command

  Again to call me so?—Within there! You!

  Segismund calls—Prince Segismund—

  [He has seated himself on the throne.]

  [Enter CHAMBERLAIN, with lords in waiting.]

  CHAMBERLAIN. I rejoice

  That unadvised of any but the voice

  Of royal instinct in the blood, your Highness

  Has ta'en the chair that you were born to fill.

  SEGISMUND. The chair?

  CHAMBERLAIN. The royal throne of Poland, Sir,

  Which may your Royal Highness keep as long

  As he that now rules from it shall have ruled

  When heaven has call'd him to itself.

  SEGISMUND. When he?—

  CHAMBERLAIN. Your royal father, King Basilio, Sir.

  SEGISMUND. My royal father—King Basilio.

  You see I answer but as Echo does,

  Not knowing what she listens or repeats.

  This is my throne—this is my palace—Oh,

  But this out of the window?—

  CHAMBERLAIN. Warsaw, Sir,

  Your capital—

  SEGISMUND. And all the moving people?

  CHAMBERLAIN. Your subjects and your vassals like ourselves.

  SEGISMUND. Ay, ay—my subjects—in my capital—

  Warsaw—and I am Prince of it—You see

  It needs much iteration to strike sense

  Into the human echo.

  CHAMBERLAIN. Left awhile

  In the quick brain, the word will quickly to

  Full meaning blow.

  SEGISMUND. You think so?

  CHAMBERLAIN. And meanwhile

  Lest our obsequiousness, which means no worse

  Than customary honour to the Prince

  We most rejoice to welcome, trouble you,

  Should we retire again? or stand apart?

  Or would your Highness have the music play

  Again, which meditation, as they say,

  So often loves to float upon?

  SEGISMUND. The music?

  No—yes—perhaps the trumpet—(Aside) Yet if that

  Brought back the troop!

  A LORD. The trumpet! There again

  How trumpet-like spoke out the blood of Poland!

  CHAMBERLAIN. Before the morning is far up, your Highness

  Will have the trumpet marshalling your soldiers

  Under the Palace windows.

  SEGISMUND. Ah, my soldiers—

  My soldiers—not black-vizor'd?—

  CHAMBERLAIN. Sir?

  SEGISMUND. No matter.

  But—one thing—for a moment—in your ear—

  Do you know one Clotaldo?

  CHAMBERLAIN. Oh, my Lord,

  He and myself together, I may say,

  Although in different vocations,

  Have silver'd in your royal father's service;

  And, as I trust, with both of us a few

  White hairs to fall in yours.

  SEGISMUND. Well said, well said!

  Basilio, my father—well—Clotaldo

  Is he my kinsman too?

  CHAMBERLAIN. Oh, my good Lord,

  A General simply in your Highness' service,

  Than whom your Highness has no trustier.

  SEGISMUND. Ay, so you said before, I think. And you

  With that white wand of yours—

  Why, now I think on't, I have read of such

  A silver-hair'd magician with a wand,

  Who in a moment, with a wave of it,

  Turn'd rags to jewels, clowns to emperors,

  By some benigner magic than the stars

  Spirited poor good people out of hand

  From all their woes; in some enchanted sleep

  Carried them off on cloud or dragon-back

  Over the mountains, over the wide Deep,

  And set them down to wake in Fairyland.

  CHAMBERLAIN. Oh, my good Lord, you laugh at me—and I

  Right glad to make you laugh at such a price:

  You know me no enchanter: if I were,

  I and my wand as much as your Highness',

  As now your chamberlain—

  SEGISMUND. My chamberlain?—

  And these that follow you?—

  CHAMBERLAIN. On you, my Lord,

  Your Highness' lords in waiting.

  SEGISMUND. Lords in waiting.

  Well, I have now learn'd to repeat, I think,

  If only but by rote—This is my palace,

  And this my throne—which unadvised—And that

  Out of the window there my Capital;

  And all the people moving up and down

  My subjects and my vassals like yourselves,

  My chamberlain—and lords in waiting—and

  Clotaldo—and Clotaldo?—

  You are an aged, and seem a reverend man—

  You do not—though his fellow-officer—

  You do not mean to mock me?

  CHAMBERLAIN. Oh, my Lord!

  SEGISMUND. Well then—If no magician, as you say,

  Yet setting me a riddle, that my brain,

  With all its senses whirling, cannot solve,

  Yourself or one of these with you must answer—

  How I—that only last night fell asleep

  Not knowing that the very soil of earth

  I lay down—chain'd—to sleep upon was Poland—

  Awake to find myself the Lord of it,

  With Lords, and Generals, and Chamberlains,

  And ev'n my very Gaoler, for my vassals!

  [Enter suddenly CLOTALDO]

  CLOTALDO. Stand all aside

  That I may put into his hand the clue

  To lead him out of this amazement. Sir,

  Vouchsafe your Highness from my bended knee

  Receive my homage first.

  SEGISMUND. Clotaldo! What,

  At last—his old self—undisguised where all

  Is masquerade—to end it!—You kneeling too!

  What! have the stars you told me long ago

  Laid that old work upon you, added this,

  That, having chain'd your prisoner so long,

  You loose his body now to slay his wits,

  Dragging him—how I know not—whither scarce

  I understand—dressing him up in all

  This frippery, with your dumb familiars

  Disvizor'd, and their lips unlock'd to lie,

  Calling him Prince and King, and, madman-like,

  Setting a crown of straw upon his head?

  CLOTALDO. Would but your Highness, as indeed I now

  Must call you—and upon his bended knee

  Never bent Subject more devotedly—

  However all about you, and perhaps

  You to yourself incomprehensiblest,

  But rest in the assurance of your own

  Sane waking senses, by these witnesses