ACT FIRST, BEING WHAT WAS CALLED THE POETRY OF CHIAPPINO'S LIFE; AND ACT SECOND, ITS PROSE.
LUITOLFO and EULALIA, betrothed lovers.
CHIAPPINO, their friend.
OGNIBEN, the Pope's Legate.
Citizens of Faenza.
TIME, 15-. Place, FAENZA.
Inside LUITOLFO's house. CHIAPPINO, EULALIA.
Eu. What is it keeps Luitolfo? Night's fast falling,
And 't was scarce sunset
had the ave-bell
Sounded before he sought the Provost's house?
I think not all he had to say would take
Few minutes, such a very few, to say!
How do you think, Chiappino? If our lord
The Provost were less friendly to your friend
Than everybody here professes him,
I should begin to tremble- - should not you?
Why are you silent when so many times
I turn and speak to you?
Ch. Yes. I had fancied nothing that bears price
In the whole world was left to call my own;
And, maybe, felt a little pride thereat.
Up to a single man's or woman's love,
Down to the right in my own flesh and blood,
There's nothing mine, I fancied,- till you spoke:
-Counting, you see, as "nothing" the permission
To study this peculiar lot of mine
In silence: well, go silence with the rest
Of the world's good! What can I say,
Eu. This, lest you, even more than needs, embitter Our parting: say your wrongs have cast, for once,
A cloud across your spirit!
Eu. No man nor woman loves you, did you say?
Ch. My God, were 't not for thee!
Even did men forsake you.
Were 't not for God, I mean, what hope of truth
Speaking truth, hearing truth, would stay with man?
I, now the homeless friendless penniless
Proscribed and exiled wretch who speak to you,
Ought to speak truth, yet could not, for my death,
(The thing that tempts me most) help speaking lies
About your friendship and Luitolfo's courage
And all our townsfolk's equanimity -
Through sheer incompetence to rid myself
Of the old miserable lying trick
Caught from the liars I have lived with, God,
Did I not turn to thee! It is thy prompting
I dare to be ashamed of, and thy counsel
Would die along my coward lip, I know.
But I do turn to thee. This craven tongue,
These features which refuse the soul its way,
Reclaim thou! Give me truth
And after be sole present to approve
The spoken truth! Or, stay, that spoken truth,
Who knows but you, too, may approve?
Keep silence then, Chiappino!
You shall now, why the thing we please to style
My gratitude to you and all your friends
For service done me, is just gratitude
So much as yours was service: no whit more.
I was born here, so was Luitolfo ; both
At one time, much with the same circumstance
Of rank and wealth; and both, up to this night
Of parting company, have side by side
Still fared, he in the sunshine I, the shadow.
"Why?" asks the world. "Because," replies the world
To its complacent self, "these playfellows,
Who took at church the holy-water drop
Each from the other's finger, and so forth,
Were of two moods: Luitolfo was the proper
Friend-making, everywhere friend-finding soul,
Fit for the sunshine, so, it followed him.
A happy-tempered bringer of the best
Out of the worst; who bears with what's past cure,
And puts so good a face on 't wisely passive
Where action 's fruitless, while he remedies
In silence what the foolish rail against;
A man to smooth such natures as parade
Of opposition must exasperate;
No general gauntlet-gatherer for the weak
Against the strong, yet over-scrupulous
At lucky junctures; one who won't forego
The after-battle work of binding wounds,
Because, forsooth he 'd have to bring himself
To side with wound-inflictors for their leave!"
Why do you gaze, nor help me to repeat
What comes so glibly from the common mouth,
About Luitolfo and his so-styled friend?
Eu. Because, that friend's sense is obscured
Ch.
You would be readier with the other half
Of the world's story, my half!
For all the world does say it.
True, I thank God, I ever said
Yet, 't is true.
Say your worst!
you sin,"
When a man did sin: if I could not say it,
I glared it at him; if I could not glare it,
I prayed against him; then my part seemed over.
God's may begin yet: so it will, I trust.
Eu. If the world outraged you, did we?
Ch.
That you use well or ill? It's man, in me,
All your successes are an outrage to,
You all, whom sunshine follows, as you say
Here's our Faenza birthplace; they send here
A provost from Ravenna: how he rules,
You can at times be eloquent about.
"Then, end his rule!' "Ah yes, one stroke does that! But patience under wrong works slow and sure.
Must violence still bring peace forth? He, beside,
Returns so blandly one's obeisance! ah-
Some latent virtue may be lingering yet,
Some human sympathy which, once excite,
And all the lump were leavened quietly:
So, no more talk of striking, for this time!
But I, as one of those he rules, won't bear
These pretty takings-up and layings-down
Our cause, just as you think occasion suits.
Enough of earnest, is there? You'll play, will you?
Diversify your tactics, give submission,
Obsequiousness and flattery a turn,
While we die in our misery patient deaths?
We all are outraged then, and I the first :
I, for mankind, resent each shrug and smirk,
Each beck and bend, each . all do and are,
I hate!
Eu. We share a common censure, then.
'Tis well you have not poor Luitolfo's part
Nor mine to point out in the wide offence.
Ch. Oh, shall I let you so escape me, lady?
Come, on your own ground, lady, from yourself,
(Leaving the people's wrong, which most is mine)
What have I got to be so grateful for?
These three last fines, no doubt, one on the other
Paid by Luitolfo?
Fall presently on who deserves it most!
Your prosperous smooth lover presently,
Then, scarce your wooer,
When my voice faltered and my eye grew dim
Because you gave me your silk mask to hold
My voice that greatens when there's need to curse
The people's Provost to their heart's content,
My eye, the Provost, who bears all men's eyes,
Banishes now because he cannot bear,
You knew... but you do your parts — my part, I: So be it! You flourish, I decay: all's well.
Eu. I hear this for the first time.
Ch.
Then my days spoke not, and my nights of fire
Were voiceless? Then the very heart may burst,
Yet all prove nought, because no mincing speech
Tells leisurely that thus it is and thus?
Eulalia, truce with toying for this once!
A banished fool, who troubles you to-night
For the last time - why, what 's to fear from me?
You knew I loved you!
You were my now-affianced lover's friend-
Came in, went out with him, could speak as he.
All praise your ready parts and pregnant wit;
See how your words come from you in a crowd!
Luitolfo's first to place you o'er himself
In all that challenges respect and love:
Yet you were silent then, who blame me now.
say all this by fascination, sure:
I, all but wed to one I love, yet listen!
It must be, you are wronged, and that the
Luitolfo pities
- You too pity? Do!
But hear first what my wrongs are; so began
This talk and so shall end this talk. I say,
Was 't not enough that I must strive (I saw)
To grow so far familiar with
your charms
As next contrive some way to win them which
To do, an age seemed far too brief- for, see!
We all aspire to heaven; and there lies heaven
Above us go there! Dare we go? no, surely!
How dare we go without a reverent pause,
A growing less unfit for heaven? Just so,
I dared not speak: the greater fool, it seems!
Was 't not enough to struggle with such folly,
But I must have, beside, the very man
Whose slight free loose and incapacious soul
Gave his tongue scope to say whate'er he would
Must have him load me with his benefits
- For fortune's fiercest stroke?
Eu.
Justice to him
That's now entreating, at his risk perhaps,
Justice for you! Did he once call those acts
Of simple friendship-bounties, benefits?
Ch. No: the straight course had been to call them thus. Then, I had flung them back, and kept myself
Unhampered, free as he to win the prize
We both sought. But "the gold was dross," he said: "He loved me, and I loved him not: why spurn
A trifle out of superfluity?
He had forgotten he had done as much."
So had not I! Henceforth, try as I could
To take him at his word, there stood by you
My benefactor; who might speak and laugh
And urge his nothings, even banter me
but my tongue was tied. A dream!
how you shake at that!
Before you
Let's wake: your husband
Good - my revenge!
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