The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4

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_Ang_. A moment's faintness--
'Tis past; I pray you pardon me,--I sit not
In presence of my Prince and of my husband,
While he is on his feet.

_Ben_. Your pleasure, Lady?

_Ang_. Strange rumours, but most true, if all I hear 330
And see be sooth, have reached me, and I come
To know the worst, even at the worst; forgive
The abruptness of my entrance and my bearing.
Is it--I cannot speak--I cannot shape
The question--but you answer it ere spoken,
With eyes averted, and with gloomy brows--
Oh God! this is the silence of the grave!

_Ben_. (_after a pause_). Spare us, and spare thyself the repetition
Of our most awful, but inexorable
Duty to Heaven and man!

_Ang_. Yet speak; I cannot-- 340
I cannot--no--even now believe these things.
Is _he_ condemned?

_Ben_. Alas!

_Ang_. And was he guilty?

_Ben_. Lady! the natural distraction of
Thy thoughts at such a moment makes the question
Merit forgiveness; else a doubt like this
Against a just and paramount tribunal
Were deep offence. But question even the Doge,
And if he can deny the proofs, believe him
Guiltless as thy own bosom.

_Ang_. Is it so?
My Lord, my Sovereign, my poor father's friend, 350
The mighty in the field, the sage in Council,
Unsay the words of this man!--thou art silent!

_Ben_. He hath already owned to his own guilt,[fh]
Nor, as thou see'st, doth he deny it now.

_Ang_. Aye, but he must not die! Spare his few years,
Which Grief and Shame will soon cut down to days!
One day of baffled crime must not efface
Near sixteen lustres crowned with brave acts.

_Ben_. His doom must be fulfilled without remission
Of time or penalty--'tis a decree. 360

_Ang_. He hath been guilty, but there may be mercy.

_Ben_. Not in this case with justice.

_Ang_. Alas! Signor,
He who is only just is cruel; who
Upon the earth would live were all judged justly?

_Ben_. His punishment is safety to the State.

_Ang_. He was a subject, and hath served the State;
He was your General, and hath saved the State;
He is your Sovereign, and hath ruled the State.[fi]

_One of the Council_. He is a traitor, and betrayed the State.

_Ang_. And, but for him, there now had been no State 370
To save or to destroy; and you, who sit
There to pronounce the death of your deliverer,
Had now been groaning at a Moslem oar,
Or digging in the Hunnish mines in fetters!

_One of the Council_. No, Lady, there are others who would die
Rather than breathe in slavery!

_Ang_. If there are so
Within _these_ walls, _thou_ art not of the number:
The truly brave are generous to the fallen!--
Is there no hope?

_Ben_. Lady, it cannot be.

_Ang_. (_turning to the Doge_).
Then die, Faliero! since it must be so; 380
But with the spirit of my father's friend.
Thou hast been guilty of a great offence,
Half cancelled by the harshness of these men.
I would have sued to them, have prayed to them.
Have begged as famished mendicants for bread,
Have wept as they will cry unto their God
For mercy, and be answered as they answer,--
Had it been fitting for thy name or mine,
And if the cruelty in their cold eyes
Had not announced the heartless wrath within. 390
Then, as a Prince, address thee to thy doom!

_Doge_. I have lived too long not to know how to die!
Thy suing to these men were but the bleating
Of the lamb to the butcher, or the cry
Of seamen to the surge: I would not take
A life eternal, granted at the hands
Of wretches, from whose monstrous villanies
I sought to free the groaning nations!

_Michel Steno_. Doge,
A word with thee, and with this noble lady,
Whom I have grievously offended. Would 400
Sorrow, or shame, or penance on my part,
Could cancel the inexorable past!
But since that cannot be, as Christians let us
Say farewell, and in peace: with full contrition
I crave, not pardon, but compassion from you,
And give, however weak, my prayers for both.

_Ang_. Sage Benintende, now chief Judge of Venice,
I speak to thee in answer to yon Signor.
Inform the ribald Steno, that his words
Ne'er weighed in mind with Loredano's daughter, 410
Further than to create a moment's pity
For such as he is: would that others had
Despised him as I pity! I prefer
My honour to a thousand lives, could such
Be multiplied in mine, but would not have
A single life of others lost for that
Which nothing human can impugn--the sense
Of Virtue, looking not to what is called
A good name for reward, but to itself.
To me the scorner's words were as the wind 420
Unto the rock: but as there are--alas!
Spirits more sensitive, on which such things
Light as the Whirlwind on the waters; souls
To whom Dishonour's shadow is a substance
More terrible than Death, here and hereafter;
Men whose vice is to start at Vice's scoffing,
And who, though proof against all blandishments
Of pleasure, and all pangs of Pain, are feeble
When the proud name on which they pinnacled
Their hopes is breathed on, jealous as the eagle 430
Of her high aiery;[459] let what we now[fj]
Behold, and feel, and suffer, be a lesson
To wretches how they tamper in their spleen
With beings of a higher order. Insects
Have made the lion mad ere now; a shaft
I' the heel o'erthrew the bravest of the brave;
A wife's Dishonour was the bane of Troy;
A wife's Dishonour unkinged Rome for ever;
An injured husband brought the Gauls to Clusium,
And thence to Rome, which perished for a time; 440
An obscene gesture cost Caligula[460]
His life, while Earth yet bore his cruelties;
A virgin's wrong made Spain a Moorish province;
And Steno's lie, couched in two worthless lines,
Hath decimated Venice, put in peril
A Senate which hath stood eight hundred years,
Discrowned a Prince, cut off his crownless head,
And forged new fetters for a groaning people!
Let the poor wretch, like to the courtesan[461]
Who fired Persepolis, be proud of this, 450
If it so please him--'twere a pride fit for him!
But let him not insult the last hours of
Him, who, whate'er he now is, _was_ a Hero,
By the intrusion of his very prayers;
Nothing of good can come from such a source,
Nor would we aught with him, nor now, nor ever:
We leave him to himself, that lowest depth
Of human baseness. Pardon is for men,
And not for reptiles--we have none for Steno,
And no resentment: things like him must sting, 460
And higher beings suffer; 'tis the charter
Of Life. The man who dies by the adder's fang
May have the crawler crushed, but feels no anger:
'Twas the worm's nature; and some men are worms
In soul, more than the living things of tombs.[462]

_Doge_ (_to Ben._).
Signor! complete that which you deem your duty.[fk]

_Ben_. Before we can proceed upon that duty,
We would request the Princess to withdraw;
'Twill move her too much to be witness to it.

_Ang_. I know it will, and yet I must endure it, 470
For 'tis a part of mine--I will not quit,
Except by force, my husband's side--Proceed!
Nay, fear not either shriek, or sigh, or tear;
Though my heart burst, it shall be silent.--Speak!
I have that within which shall o'ermaster all.

_Ben_. Marino Faliero, Doge of Venice,
Count of Val di Marino, Senator,
And some time General of the Fleet and Army,
Noble Venetian, many times and oft
Intrusted by the state with high employments, 480
Even to the highest, listen to the sentence.
Convict by many witnesses and proofs,
And by thine own confession, of the guilt
Of Treachery and Treason, yet unheard of[fl]
Until this trial--the decree is Death--
Thy goods are confiscate unto the State,
Thy name is razed from out her records, save
Upon a public day of thanksgiving
For this our most miraculous deliverance,[fm]
When thou art noted in our calendars 490
With earthquakes, pestilence, and foreign foes,
And the great Enemy of man, as subject
Of grateful masses for Heaven's grace in snatching
Our lives and country from thy wickedness.
The place wherein as Doge thou shouldst be painted
With thine illustrious predecessors, is
To be left vacant, with a death-black veil
Flung over these dim words engraved beneath,--
"This place is of Marino Faliero,
Decapitated for his crimes."[463]

_Doge_. "His _crimes_!"[464]500
But let it be so:--it will be in vain.
The veil which blackens o'er this blighted name,
And hides, or seems to hide, these lineaments,
Shall draw more gazers than the thousand portraits
Which glitter round it in their pictured trappings--
_Your_ delegated slaves--the people's tyrants!
"Decapitated for his crimes!"--_What_ crimes?
Were it not better to record the facts,
So that the contemplator might approve,
Or at the least learn _whence_ the crimes arose? 510
When the beholder knows a Doge conspired,
Let him be told the cause--it is your history.

_Ben_. Time must reply to that; our sons will judge
Their fathers' judgment, which I now pronounce.
As Doge, clad in the ducal robes and Cap,
Thou shalt be led hence to the Giants' Staircase,
Where thou and all our Princes are invested;
And there, the Ducal Crown being first resumed
Upon the spot where it was first assumed,
Thy head shall be struck off; and Heaven have mercy 520
Upon thy soul!

_Doge_. Is this the Giunta's sentence?

_Ben_. It is.

_Doge_. I can endure it.--And the time?

_Ben_. Must be immediate.--Make thy peace with God:
Within an hour thou must be in His presence.

_Doge_. I am _already_; and my blood will rise
To Heaven before the souls of those who shed it.
Are all my lands confiscated?[465]

_Ben_. They are;
And goods, and jewels, and all kind of treasure,
Except two thousand ducats--these dispose of.

_Doge_. That's harsh.--I would have fain reserved the lands 530
Near to Treviso, which I hold by investment
From Laurence the Count-bishop of Ceneda,[fn]
In fief perpetual to myself and heirs,
To portion them (leaving my city spoil,
My palace and my treasures, to your forfeit)
Between my consort and my kinsmen.

_Ben_. These
Lie under the state's ban--their Chief, thy nephew,
In peril of his own life; but the Council
Postpones his trial for the present. If
Thou will'st a state unto thy widowed Princess, 540
Fear not, for we will do her justice.

_Ang_. Signors,
I share not in your spoil! From henceforth, know
I am devoted unto God alone,
And take my refuge in the cloister.

_Doge_. Come!
The hour may be a hard one, but 'twill end.
Have I aught else to undergo save Death?[fo]

_Ben_. You have nought to do, except confess and die.
The priest is robed, the scimitar is bare,
And both await without.--But, above all,
Think not to speak unto the people; they 550
Are now by thousands swarming at the gates,
But these are closed: the Ten, the Avogadori,
The Giunta, and the chief men of the Forty,
Alone will be beholders of thy doom,
And they are ready to attend the Doge.

_Doge_. The Doge!

_Ben_. Yes, Doge, thou hast lived and thou shalt die
A Sovereign; till the moment which precedes
The separation of that head and trunk,
That ducal crown and head shall be united.
Thou hast forgot thy dignity in deigning 560
To plot with petty traitors; not so we,
Who in the very punishment acknowledge
The Prince. Thy vile accomplices have died
The dog's death, and the wolf's; but them shall fall
As falls the lion by the hunters, girt
By those who feel a proud compassion for thee,
And mourn even the inevitable death
Provoked by thy wild wrath, and regal fierceness.
Now we remit thee to thy preparation:
Let it be brief, and we ourselves will be 570
Thy guides unto the place where first we were
United to thee as thy subjects, and
Thy Senate; and must now be parted from thee
As such for ever, on the self-same spot.
Guards! form the Doge's escort to his chamber.
[_Exeunt_.

SCENE II.--_The Doge's Apartment_.

_The_ DOGE _as Prisoner, and the_ DUCHESS _attending him_.

_Doge_. Now, that the priest is gone, 'twere useless all
To linger out the miserable minutes;
But one pang more, the pang of parting from thee,
And I will leave the few last grains of sand,
Which yet remain of the accorded hour,
Still falling--I have done with Time.

_Ang_. Alas!
And I have been the cause, the unconscious cause;
And for this funeral marriage, this black union,
Which thou, compliant with my father's wish,
Didst promise at _his_ death, thou hast sealed thine own. 10

_Doge_. Not so: there was that in my spirit ever
Which shaped out for itself some great reverse;
The marvel is, it came not until now--
And yet it was foretold me.

_Ang_. How foretold you?

_Doge_. Long years ago--so long, they are a doubt[466]
In memory, and yet they live in annals:
When I was in my youth, and served the Senate
And Signory as Podesta and Captain
Of the town of Treviso, on a day
Of festival, the sluggish Bishop who 20
Conveyed the Host aroused my rash young anger,
By strange delay, and arrogant reply
To my reproof: I raised my hand and smote him,
Until he reeled beneath his holy burthen;[fp]
And as he rose from earth again, he raised
His tremulous hands in pious wrath towards Heaven.
Thence pointing to the Host, which had fallen from him,
He turned to me, and said, "The Hour will come
When he thou hast o'erthrown shall overthrow thee:
The Glory shall depart from out thy house, 30
The Wisdom shall be shaken from thy soul,
And in thy best maturity of Mind
A madness of the heart shall seize upon thee;[fq]
Passion shall tear thee when all passions cease
In other men, or mellow into virtues;
And Majesty which decks all other heads,
Shall crown to leave thee headless; honours shall
But prove to thee the heralds of Destruction,
And hoary hairs of Shame, and both of Death,
But not such death as fits an aged man."40
Thus saying, he passed on.--That Hour is come.

_Ang_. And with this warning couldst thou not have striven
To avert the fatal moment, and atone,
By penitence, for that which thou hadst done?

_Doge_. I own the words went to my heart, so much
That I remembered them amid the maze
Of Life, as if they formed a spectral voice,
Which shook me in a supernatural dream;
And I repented; but 'twas not for me
To pull in resolution:[467] what must be 50
I could not change, and would not fear.--Nay more,
Thou can'st not have forgot, what all remember,
That on my day of landing here as Doge,[468]
On my return from Rome, a mist of such
Unwonted density went on before
The Bucentaur, like the columnar cloud
Which ushered Israel out of Egypt, till
The pilot was misled, and disembarked us
Between the Pillars of Saint Mark's, where 'tis
The custom of the state to put to death 60
Its criminals, instead of touching at
The Riva della Paglia, as the wont is,--
So that all Venice shuddered at the omen.

_Ang_. Ah! little boots it now to recollect
Such things.

_Doge_. And yet I find a comfort in
The thought, that these things are the work of Fate;
For I would rather yield to Gods than men,
Or cling to any creed of destiny,
Rather than deem these mortals, most of whom[fr]
I know to be as worthless as the dust, 70
And weak as worthless, more than instruments
Of an o'er-ruling Power; they in themselves
Were all incapable--they could not be
Vistors of him who oft had conquered for them.

_Ang_. Employ the minutes left in aspirations
Of a more healing nature, and in peace
Even with these wretches take thy flight to Heaven.

_Doge_. I _am_ at peace: the peace of certainty
That a sure Hour will come, when their sons' sons,
And this proud city, and these azure waters, 80
And all which makes them eminent and bright,
Shall be a desolation and a curse,
A hissing and a scoff unto the nations,
A Carthage, and a Tyre, an Ocean Babel.

_Ang_. Speak not thus now: the surge of Passion still
Sweeps o'er thee to the last; thou dost deceive
Thyself, and canst not injure them--be calmer.

_Doge_. I stand within Eternity, and see
Into Eternity, and I behold--
Aye, palpable as I see thy sweet face 90
For the last time--the days which I denounce
Unto all time against these wave-girt walls,
And they who are indwellers.

_Guard_ (_coming forward_). Doge of Venice,
The Ten are in attendance on your Highness.

_Doge_. Then farewell, Angiolina!--one embrace--
Forgive the old man who hath been to thee
A fond but fatal husband--love my memory--
I would not ask so much for me still living,
But thou canst judge of me more kindly now,
Seeing my evil feelings are at rest. 100
Besides, of all the fruit of these long years,
Glory, and Wealth, and Power, and Fame, and Name,
Which generally leave some flowers to bloom
Even o'er the grave, I have nothing left, not even
A little love, or friendship, or esteem,
No, not enough to extract an epitaph
From ostentatious kinsmen; in one hour
I have uprooted all my former life,
And outlived everything, except thy heart,
The pure, the good, the gentle, which will oft 110
With unimpaired but not a clamorous grief[fs]
Still keep----Thou turn'st so pale!--Alas! she faints,
She has no breath, no pulse!--Guards! lend your aid--
I cannot leave her thus, and yet 'tis better,
Since every lifeless moment spares a pang.
When she shakes off this temporary death,
I shall be with the Eternal.--Call her women--
One look!--how cold her hand!--as cold as mine
Shall be ere she recovers.--Gently tend her,
And take my last thanks--I am ready now. 120

[_The Attendants of_ ANGIOLINA _enter, and surround
their Mistress, who has fainted.--Exeunt the_ DOGE,
_Guards, etc., etc._

SCENE III.--_The Court of the Ducal Palace; the outer gates
are shut against the people.--The_ DOGE _enters in his ducal
robes, in procession with the_ COUNCIL OF TEN _and other Patricians,
attended by the Guards, till they arrive at the top of the
"Giants' Staircase[469] (where the Doges took the oaths); the
the Executioner is stationed there with his sword.--On arriving, a_
CHIEF OF THE TEN _takes off the ducal cap from the Doge's head_.

_Doge_. So now the Doge is nothing, and at last
I am again Marino Faliero:
'Tis well to be so, though but for a moment,[ft]
Here was I crowned, and here, bear witness, Heaven!
With how much more contentment I resign
That shining mockery, the ducal bauble,
Than I received the fatal ornament.

_One of the Ten_. Thou tremblest, Faliero!

_Doge_. 'Tis with age, then.[470]

_Ben_. Faliero! hast thou aught further to commend,
Compatible with justice, to the Senate? 10

_Doge_. I would commend my nephew to their mercy,
My consort to their justice; for methinks
My death, and such a death, might settle all
Between the State and me.

_Ben_. They shall be cared for;
Even notwithstanding thine unheard-of crime.

_Doge_. Unheard of! aye, there's not a history
But shows a thousand crowned conspirators
_Against_ the people; but to set them free,
One Sovereign only died, and one is dying.

_Ben_. And who were they who fell in such a cause? 20

_Doge_. The King of Sparta, and the Doge of Venice--
Agis and Faliero!

_Ben_. Hast thou more
To utter or to do?

_Doge_. May I speak?

_Ben_. Thou may'st;
But recollect the people are without,
Beyond the compass of the human voice.

_Doge_. I speak to Time and to Eternity,
Of which I grow a portion, not to man.
Ye Elements! in which to be resolved
I hasten, let my voice be as a Spirit
Upon you! Ye blue waves! which bore my banner. 30
Ye winds! which fluttered o'er as if you loved it,
And filled my swelling sails as they were wafted
To many a triumph! Thou, my native earth,
Which I have bled for! and thou, foreign earth,
Which drank this willing blood from many a wound!
Ye stones, in which my gore will not sink, but
Reek up to Heaven! Ye skies, which will receive it!
Thou Sun! which shinest on these things, and Thou!
Who kindlest and who quenchest suns!--Attest![fu]
I am not innocent--but are these guiltless? 40
I perish, but not unavenged; far ages
Float up from the abyss of Time to be,
And show these eyes, before they close, the doom
Of this proud City, and I leave my curse
On her and hers for ever!----Yes, the hours
Are silently engendering of the day,
When she, who built 'gainst Attila a bulwark,
Shall yield, and bloodlessly and basely yield,
Unto a bastard Attila,[471] without
Shedding so much blood in her last defence, 50
As these old veins, oft drained in shielding her,
Shall pour in sacrifice.--She shall be bought
And sold, and be an appanage to those
Who shall despise her![472]--She shall stoop to be
A province for an Empire, petty town
In lieu of Capital, with slaves for senates,
Beggars for nobles, panders for a people![fv]
Then when the Hebrew's in thy palaces,[473]
The Hun in thy high places, and the Greek
Walks o'er thy mart, and smiles on it for his; 60
When thy patricians beg their bitter bread
In narrow streets, and in their shameful need
Make their nobility a plea for pity;
Then, when the few who still retain a wreck
Of their great fathers' heritage shall fawn
Round a barbarian Vice of Kings' Vice-gerent,[474]
Even in the Palace where they swayed as Sovereigns,
Even in the Palace where they slew their Sovereign,
Proud of some name they have disgraced, or sprung
From an adulteress boastful of her guilt 70
With some large gondolier or foreign soldier,
Shall bear about their bastardy in triumph
To the third spurious generation;--when
Thy sons are in the lowest scale of being,
Slaves turned o'er to the vanquished by the victors,
Despised by cowards for greater cowardice,
And scorned even by the vicious for such vices
As in the monstrous grasp of their conception
Defy all codes to image or to name them;
Then, when of Cyprus, now thy subject kingdom, 80
All thine inheritance shall be her shame
Entailed on thy less virtuous daughters, grown
A wider proverb for worse prostitution;--
When all the ills of conquered states shall cling thee,
Vice without splendour, Sin without relief[fw][475]
Even from the gloss of Love to smooth it o'er,
But in its stead, coarse lusts of habitude,[476]
Prurient yet passionless, cold studied lewdness,
Depraving Nature's frailty to an art;--
When these and more are heavy on thee, when 90
Smiles without mirth, and pastimes without Pleasure,
Youth without Honour, Age without respect,
Meanness and Weakness, and a sense of woe
'Gainst which thou wilt not strive, and dar'st not murmur,[477]
Have made thee last and worst of peopled deserts,
Then, in the last gasp of thine agony,
Amidst thy many murders, think of _mine!_
Thou den of drunkards with the blood of Princes![478]
Gehenna of the waters! thou Sea-Sodom![fx][479]
Thus I devote thee to the Infernal Gods! 100
Thee and thy serpent seed!
[_Here the_ DOGE _turns and addresses the Executioner._
Slave, do thine office!
Strike as I struck the foe! Strike as I would
Have struck those tyrants! Strike deep as my curse!
Strike--and but once!