Page images
PDF
EPUB

THE SPANISH STUDENT.

1843.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]

SCENE I.

THE SPANISH STUDENT.

ACT I.

The COUNT OF LARA'S chambers.

Night.

The COUNT in his dressing-gown, smoking and conversing with DON Carlos.

Lara. You were not at the play to-night, Don Carlos;

How happened it?

Carlos.

I had engagements elsewhere.

Pray who was there?
Lara.
Why, all the town and court.
The house was crowded; and the busy fans
Among the gayly dressed and perfumed ladies
Fluttered like butterflies among the flowers.
There was the Countess of Medina Celi;
The Goblin Lady with her Phantom Lover,
Her Lindo Don Diego; Doña Sol,

And Doña Serafina, and her cousins.
Carlos. What was the play?

Lara.

It was a dull affair; One of those comedies in which you see,

As Lope says, the history of the world

Brought down from Genesis to the Day of Judg.

ment.

There were three duels fought in the first act, Three gentlemen receiving deadly wounds, Laying their hands upon their hearts, and saying, "O, I am dead!" a lover in a closet,

An old hidalgo, and a gay Don Juan,
A Doña Inez with a black mantilla,
Followed at twilight by an unknown lover,
Who looks intently where he knows she is not !
Carlos. Of course, the Preciosa danced to
night?

Lara. And never better. Every footstep fell As lightly as a sunbeam on the water.

I think the girl extremely beautiful.

Carlos. Almost beyond the privilege of woman! I saw her in the Prado yesterday.

Her step was royal,-queen-like,—and
As beautiful as a saint's in Paradise.

her face

Lara. May not a saint fall from her Paradise, And be no more a saint ?

Carlos.

Why do you ask? Lara. Because I have heard it said this angel

fell,

And, though she is a virgin outwardly,
Within she is a sinner; like those panels
Of doors and altar-pieces the old monks
Painted in convents, with the Virgin Mary
On the outside, and on the inside Venus!

Carlos. You do her wrong; indeed, you do her wrong!

She is as virtuous as she is fair.

Lara. How credulous you are! Why look you, friend,

There's not a virtuous woman in Madrid,
In this whole city! And would you persuade me
That a mere dancing-girl, who shows herself,
Nightly, half-naked, on the stage, for money,
And with voluptuous motions fires the blood
Of inconsiderate youth, is to be held

[blocks in formation]

Carlos.

THE SPANISH STUDENT.

Nay, not to be won at all!

The only virtue that a Gipsy prizes

Is chastity. That is her only virtue.
Dearer than life she holds it. I remember
A Gipsy woman, a vile, shameless bawd,
Whose craft was to betray the young and fair;
And yet this woman was above all bribes.
And when a noble lord, touched by her beauty,
The wild and wizard beauty of her race,
Offered her gold to be what she made others,
She turned upon him, with a look of scorn,
And smote him in the face!

Lara.

157

And does that prove

That Preciosa is above suspicion?

Carlos. It proves a nobleman may be repulsed When he thinks conquest easy. I believe That woman, in her deepest degradation, Holds something sacred, something undefiled, Some pledge and keepsake of her higher nature, And, like the diamond in the dark, retains Some quenchless gleam of the celestial light! Lara. Yet Preciosa would have taken the gold Carlos [rising]. I do not think so.

I am sure of it.

Lara.
But why this haste? Stay yet a little longer,
And fight the battles of your Dulcinea.

Carlos. "T is late. I must begone, for if I stay You will not be persuaded.

Lara.

Yes; persuade me.

Carlos. No one so deaf as he who will not hear Lara. No one so blind as he who will not see! Carlos. And so good night. I wish you pleas ant dreams,

And greater faith in woman.

Lara.

Greater faith !

I have the greatest faith; for I believe
Victorian is her lover. I believe

That I shall be to-morrow; and thereafter
Another, and another, and another,

[Exit.

« PreviousContinue »