Scene-A street in Valencia. Several Groups of Citizens and Soldiers, many of them lying on the Steps of Arms scattered on the Ground around

a Church.

them.

AN OLD CITIZEN.

The air is sultry, as with thunder-clouds.
I left my desolate home, that I might breathe
More freely in heaven's face, but my heart feels
With this hot gloom o'erburthen'd. I have now
No sons to tend me. Which of you, kind friends,
Will bring the old man water from the fount,
To moisten his parch'd lip ?

[A citizen goes out.

SECOND CITIZEN.

This wasting siege,

Good Father Lopez, hath gone hard with you!

"Tis sad to hear no voices through the house, Once peopled with fair sons!

THIRD CITIZEN.

Why, better thus,

Than to be haunted with their famish'd cries,

E'en in your very dreams!

OLD CITIZEN.

Heaven's will be done!

These are dark times! I have not been alone

In my affliction.

THIRD CITIZEN (with bitterness).

Why, we have but this thought

Left for our gloomy comfort !—And 'tis well!
Aye, let the balance be awhile struck even
Between the noble's palace and the hut,
Where the worn peasant sickens!—They that bear
The humble dead unhonour'd to their homes,
Pass now i' th' streets no lordly bridal train,
With its exulting music; and the wretch
Who on the marble steps of some proud hall
Flings himself down to die, in his last need
And agony of famine, doth behold

No scornful guests, with their long purple robes,
To the banquet sweeping by. Why, this is just !
These are the days when pomp is made to feel
Its human mould!

FOURTH CITIZEN.

Heard you last night the sound

Of Saint Jago's bell?-How sullenly

From the great tower it peal'd!

FIFTH CITIZEN.

Aye, and 'tis said

No mortal hand was near when so it seem'd

To shake the midnight streets.

OLD CITIZEN.

Too well I know

The sound of coming fate!-Tis ever thus
When Death is on his way to make it night
In the Cid's ancient house. 5-Oh! there are things
In this strange world of which we have all to learn
When its dark bounds are pass'd.-Yon bell, untouch'd,
(Save by the hands we see not) still doth speak-
-When of that line some stately head is mark'd,—
With a wild hollow peal, at dead of night,
Rocking Valencia's towers. I have heard it oft,
Nor known its warning false.

FOURTH CITIZEN.

And will our chief

Buy with the price of his fair children's blood
A few more days of pining wretchedness

For this forsaken city?

OLD CITIZEN.

Doubt it not!

-But with that ransom he may purchase still Deliverance for the land!-And yet 'tis sad To think that such a race, with all its fame,

Should pass away!-For she, his daughter too,
Moves upon earth as some bright thing whose time
To sojourn there is short.

FIFTH CITIZEN.

Then woe for us

When she is gone!-Her voice-the very sound
Of her soft step was comfort, as she moved
Through the still house of mourning !—Who like her
Shall give us hope again?

OLD CITIZEN.

Be still!-she comes,

And with a mien how changed!-A hurrying step,
And a flush'd cheek!-What may this bode?-Be still!

XIMENA enters, with Attendants carrying a Banner.

XIMENA.

Men of Valencia! in an hour like this,

What do ye here?

A CITIZEN.

We die!

XIMENA.

Brave men die now

Girt for the toil, as travellers suddenly

By the dark night o'ertaken on their way!

These days require such death!-It is too much

Of luxury for our wild and angry times,

To fold the mantle round us, and to sink

From life, as flowers that shut up silently,

When the sun's heat doth scorch them!—Hear ye not?

A CITIZEN.

Lady! what wouldst thou with us?

ΧΙΜΕΝΑ.

Rise and arm!

E'en now the children of your chief are led
Forth by the Moor to perish !—Shall this be,
Shall the high sound of such a name be hush'd,
I' th' land to which for ages it hath been
A battle word, as 'twere some passing note
Of shepherd-music?-Must this work be done,
And ye lie pining here, as men in whom

The pulse which God hath made for noble thought
Can so be thrill'd no longer?

CITIZEN.

"Tis even so!

Sickness, and toil, and grief, have breath'd upon us,

Our hearts beat faint and low.