For thence came with our weakness sympathy
Which brought God down to earth, a man like us.
Had you but told me this at first!... Hush! hush!
Par. Live! for my sake, because of my great sin,
To help my brain, oppressed by these wild words
And their deep import. Live! 'tis not too late:
I have a quiet home for us, and friends.
Michal shall smile on you... Hear you? Lean thus,
And breathe my breath: I shall not lose one word
Of all your speech-no little word, Aprile!

Apr. No, no.. Crown me? I am not one of you! 'Tis he, the king, you seek. I am not one . . .

Par. Give me thy spirit, at least! Let me love, too

I have attained, and now I may depart.

III-PARACELSUS.

SCENE-A chamber in the house of Paracelsus at Basil. 1526. PARACELSUS, FESTUS.

Par. Heap logs, and let the blaze laugh out!

True, true!

Fest.
Tis very fit that all, time, chance, and change
Have wrought since last we sate thus, face to face,
And soul to soul—all cares, far-looking fears,
Vague apprehensions, all vain fancies bred
By your long absence, should be cast away,

Forgotten in this glad unhoped renewal

Of our affections.

Par.

Oh, omit not aught

Which witnesses your own and Michal's love!
I bade you not spare that! Forget alone
The honours and the glories, and the rest,
You seemed disposed to tell profusely out.

Fest. Nay, even your honours, in a sense, I wave.
The wondrous Paracelsus-Life's dispenser,
Fate's commissary, idol of the schools,

And Courts, shall be no more than Aureole still-
Still Aureole and my friend, as when we parted
Some twenty years ago, and I restrained
As I best could the promptings of my spirit,
Which secretly advanced you, from the first,
To the preeminent rank which, since, your own
Adventurous ardour, nobly triumphing,

Has won for you.

Par.

Yes, yes; and Michal's face

Still wears that quiet and peculiar light,

Like the dim circlet floating round a pearl?

Fest. Just so.

Par.

And yet her calm sweet countenance Though saintly, was not sad; for she would sing Alone... Does she still sing alone, bird-like, Not dreaming you are near? Her carols dropt In flakes through that old leafy bower built under The sunny wall at Würzburg, from her lattice Among the trees above, while I, unseen,

Sate conning some rare scroll from Tritheim's shelves,
Much wondering notes so simple could divert

My mind from study. Those were happy days!
Respect all such as sing when all alone.

Fest. Scarcely alone-her children, you may guess. Are wild beside her . . .

Par.

Ah, those children quite

Unsettle the pure picture in my

mind:

A girl-she was so perfect, so distinct

No change, no change! Not but this added grace
May blend and harmonize with its compeers,
And Michal may become her motherhood;
But 'tis a change-and I detest all change,

And most a change in ought I loved long since!

So Michal you have said she thinks of me?

Fest. O very proud will Michal be of you! Imagine how we sate, long winter-nights, Scheming and wondering-shaping your presumed Adventures, or devising their reward;

Shutting out fear with all the strength of hope.
Though it was strange how, even when most secure
In our domestic peace, a certain dim

And flitting shade could sadden all; it seemed
A restlessness of heart, a silent yearning,
A sense of something wanting, incomplete-
Not to be put in words, perhaps avoided
By mute consent-but, said or unsaid, felt.
To point to one so loved and so long lost.
And then the hopes rose and shut out the fears---

How you would laugh should I recount them now!
I still predicted your return at last,

With gifts beyond the greatest vaunt of all,

All Tritheim's wondrous troop; did one of which
Attain renown by any chance, I smiled-
As well aware of who would prove his peer.
Michal was sure some woman, long ere this,
As beautiful as you were sage, had loved ..
Par. Far-seeing, truly, to discern so much
In the fantastic projects and day-dreams
Of a raw, restless boy!

Fest.

Say, one whose sunrise

Well warranted our faith in this full noon!

Can I forget the anxious voice which said,

"Festus, have thoughts like these e'er shaped themselves "In other brains than mine-have their possessors "Existed in like circumstance-were they weak

"As I-or ever constant from the first,

66

'Despising youth's allurements, and rejecting

"As spider-films the shackles I endure?

"Is there hope for me?"—and I answered grave As an acknowledged elder, calmer, wiser,

More gifted mortal. O you must remember,

For all your glorious

Par.

Glorious? ay, this hair,

These hands-nay, touch them, they are mine! Recal

With all the said recallings, times when thus

To lay them by your own ne'er turned you pale,

As now.

Most glorious, are they not?

Something must be subtracted from success

So wide, no doubt. He would be scrupulous, truly,
Who should object such drawbacks. Still, still, Aureole,
You are changed—very changed! 'Twere losing nothing
To look well to it: you must not be stolen

From the enjoyment of your well-won meed.

Par. My friend! you seek my pleasure, past a doubt By talking, not of me, but of yourself,

You will best gain your point.

Fest.

Have I not said

Sure

All touching Michal and my children?
You know, by this, full well how Aennchen looks
Gravely, while one disparts her thick brown hair;
And Aureole's glee when some stray gannet builds
Amid the birch-trees by the lake. Small hope
Have I that he will honour, the wild imp,

His namesake! Sigh not! 'tis too much to ask
'That all we love should reach the same proud fate.
But you are very kind to humour me

By showing interest in my quiet life;

You, who of old could never tame yourself

To tranquil pleasures, must at heart despise

...

Par. Festus, strange secrets are let out by Death,
Who blabs so oft the follies of this world:
And I am Death's familiar, as you know.
I helped a man to die, some few weeks since,
Warped even from his go-cart to one end—
The living on princes' smiles, reflected from