Of honesty in such infected blood,

Although 'twere wed to him it covets most:
An incarnation of the poet's god

In all his marble-chisell'd beauty, or

The demi-deity, Alcides, in

His majesty of superhuman manhood,

Would not suffice to bind where virtue is not;
It is consistency which forms and proves it:
Vice cannot fix, and virtue cannot change.
The once fall'n woman must forever fall 1;
For vice must have variety, while virtue
Stands like the sun, and all which rolls around
Drinks life, and light, and glory from her aspect.
Angiolina.-And seeing, feeling thus this truth in others.

(I pray you pardon me ;) but wherefore yield you
To the most fierce of fatal passions, and
Disquiet your great thoughts with restless hate
Of such a thing as Steno?

Doge. You mistake me.

It is not Steno who could move me thus ;

Had it been so, he should

but let that pass.

Angiolina. What is 't you feel so deeply, then, even now?
Doge. The violated majesty of Venice,

At once insulted in her lord and laws.

Angiolina.-Alas! why will you thus consider it? Doge.-I have thought on't till-but let me lead you back To what I urged; all these things being noted, I wedded you; the world then did me justice

Upon the motive, and my conduct proved

They did me right, while yours was all to praise :
You had all freedom-all respect-all trust

From me and mine; and, born of those who made
Princes at home, and swept kings from their thrones
On foreign shores, in all things you appear'd
Worthy to be our first of native dames.

Angiolina.-To what does this conduct?
Doge. To thus much-that

A miscreant's angry breath may blast it all-
A villain, whom for his unbridled bearing,
Even in the midst of our great festival,
I caused to be conducted forth, and taught
How to demean himself in ducal chambers;
A wretch like this may leave upon the wall
The blighting venom of his sweltering heart,
And this shall spread itself in general poison;
And woman's innocence, man's honor, pass
New Series, No. 7.
30

Doge. But one such day occurs within an age;
My life is little less than one, and 'tis
Enough for Fortune to have granted once,
That which scarce one more favor'd citizen
May win in many states and years. But why
Thus speak I? Venice has forgot that day-
Then why should I remember it?-Farewell,
Sweet Angiolina! I must to my cabinet;

There's much for me to do-and the hour hastens.
Angiolina.-Remember what

Doge. It were in vain!

you were.

Joy's recollection is no longer joy,

While Sorrow's memory is a sorrow still.

Angiolina.-At least, whate'er may urge; let me implore That you will take some little pause of rest:

Your sleep for many nights has been so turbid,
That it had been relief to have awaked you,
Had I not hoped that Nature would o'erpower

At length the thoughts which shook your slumbers thus.
An hour of rest will give you to your toils
With fitter thoughts and freshen'd strength.

Doge. I cannot

I must not, if I could; for never was

Such reason to be watchful: yet a few

Yet a few days and dream-perturbed nights,

And I shall slumber well-but where ?-no matter.

Adieu, my Angiolina.

Angiolina. Let me be

An instant-yet an instant your companion;
I cannot bear to leave you thus.

Doge.-Come then,

My gentle child-forgive me; thou wert made

For better fortunes than to share in mine,

Now darkling in their close toward the deep vale
Where Death sits robed in his all-sweeping shadow.
When I am gone-it may be sooner than
Even these years warrant, for there is that stirring
Within-above-around, that in this city
Will make the cemeteries populous
As e'er they were by pestilence or war,-
When I am nothing, let that which I was
Be still sometimes a name on thy sweet lips,
A shadow in thy fancy, of a thing

Which would not have thee mourn it, but remember ;-
Let us begone, my child-the time is pressing.

[Exeunt.

After parting from Angiolina, the Doge repairs to the place of meeting, near the church where his ancestors are buried. The thoughts suggested to him by the hour of night, the remembrance of the characters of his ancestry, and the reflection on his present purpose, are surprisingly natural. then introduced to the meeting of the conspirators. The following is part of the passage alluded to above in the close of the third act.

He is

Doge.-Ye, though ye know and feel our mutual mass

Of many wrongs, even ye are ignorant
What fatal poison to the springs of life,
To human ties, and all that's good and dear,
Lurks in the present institutes of Venice:

All these men were my friends; I loved them, they
Requited honorably my regard:

We served and fought; we smiled and wept in concert;

We revell'd or we sorrow'd side by side;

We made alliances of blood and marriage;

We grew in years and honors fairly, till

Their own desire, not my ambition, made

Them choose me for their prince, and then farewell!
Farewell all social memory! all thoughts

In common! and sweet bonds which link old friendships,
When the survivors of long years and actions,
Which now belong to history, sooth the days
Which yet remain by treasuring each other,

And never meet, but each beholds the mirror
Of half a century on his brother's brow,
And sees a hundred beings, now in earth,

And crus

This will

Nor aught

Flit round them whispering of the days gone by,

And seeming not all dead, as long as two
Of the brave, joyous, reckless, glorious band,
Which once were one and many, still retain
A breath to sigh for them, a tongue to speak
Of deeds that else were silent, save on marble-
Oime!-Oime! and must I do this deed?

Israel Bertuccio.-My lord, you are much moved: it is not

now

That such things must be dwelt upon.

Doge.-Your patience

A moment-I recede not: mark with me

The gloomy vices of this government.

From the hour that made me Doge, the Doge THEY made me—
Farewell the past! I died to all that had been,

Or rather they to me: no friends, no kindness,

But still I
Must be, a
Israel B

morse,
I understan
You acted,
Dore-A
Else I shoul

A thousand
You feel not
As if these
When all is
And calmly

But I, outgo

In this surpr

No privacy of life-all were cut off:

They came not near me, such approach gave umbrage;
They could not love me, such was not the law;
They thwarted me, 'twas the state's policy;
They baffled me, 'twas a patrician's duty;
They wrong'd me, for such was to right the state;
They could not right me, that would give suspicion ;
So that I was a slave to my own subjects;

So that I was a foe to my own friends;

Begirt with spies for guards-with robes for power-
With pomp for freedom-gaolers for a council-
Inquisitors for friends-and hell for life!

I had one only fount of quiet left,

And that they poison'd! My pure household gods
Were shiver'd on my hearth, and o'er their shrine
Sat grinning ribaldry and sneering scorn.

Doge.-Bear with me! Step by step, and blow on blow, I will divide with you; think not I waver:

Ah! no; it is the certainty of all

Which I must do doth make me tremble thus.

But let these last and lingering thoughts have way,
To which you only and the Night are conscious,
And both regardless; when the hour arrives,
"Tis mine to sound the knell, and strike the blow,
Which shall unpeople many palaces,

And hew the highest genealogic trees

Down to the earth, strew'd with their bleeding fruit,
And crush their blossoms into barrenness:

This will I-must I-have I sworn to do,

Nor aught can turn me from my destiny;

But still I quiver to behold what I

Must be, and think what I have been! Bear with me.
Israel Bertuccio.-Re-man your breast; I feel no such re-

morse,

I understand it not: why should you change?

You acted, and you act on your free will,

Doge.-Ay, there it is you feel not, nor do I,
Else I should stab thee on the spot, to save
A thousand lives, and, killing, do no murder;
You feel not-you go to this butcher-work

As if these high-born men were steers for shambles!
When all is over, you'll be free and merry,
And calmly wash those hands incarnadine;
But I, outgoing thee and all thy fellows
In this surprising massacre, shall be,