Which your suspicions dictate to this slave,
And the rack makes him utter, do you think
I should have left this two-edged instrument
Of my misdeed; this man; this bloody knife,
With my own name engraven on the heft,
Lying unsheathed amid a world of foes,

For my own death? That with such horrible need
For deepest silence, I should have neglected

So trivial a precaution, as the making
His tomb the keeper of a secret written

On a thief's memory? What is his poor life?
What are a thousand lives? A parricide

Had trampled them like dust; and see, he lives!

And thou

[Turning to MARZIO.

Marzio.. Oh, spare me! Speak to me no more! That stern yet piteous look, those solemu tones, Wound worse than torture.

(To the Judges.)

I have told it all;

For pity's sake lead me away to death.

Camillo. Guards, lead him nearer the Lady Beatrice, He shrinks from her regard like autumn's leaf

From the keen breath of the serenest north.

Beatrice. Oh, thou who tremblest on the giddy verge Of life and death, pause ere thou answerest me;

So mayst thou answer God with less dismay:

What evil have we done thee? I, alas!
Have lived but on this earth a few sad years,
And so my lot was ordered, that a father
First turned the moments of awakening life

To drops, each poisoning youth's sweet hope; and then
Stabbed with one blow my everlasting soul,

And my untainted fame; and even that peace

Which sleeps within the core of the heart's heart.
But the wound was not mortal; so my hate
Became the only worship I could lift
To our great Father, who in pity and love,
Armed thee, as thou dost say, to cut him off;
And thus his wrong becomes my accusation :
And art thou the accuser? If thou hopest
Mercy in heaven, show justice upon earth:
Worse than a bloody hand is a hard heart.
If thou hast done murders, made thy life's path
Over the trampled laws of God and man,
Rush not before thy Judge, and say: "My Maker
I have done this and more; for there was one

Who was most pure and innocent on earth;
And because she endured what never any,
Guilty or innocent, endured before;

Because her wrongs could not be told, nor thought;

Because thy hand at length did rescue her;
I with my words killed her and all her kin."
Think, I adjure you, what it is to slay

The reverence living in the minds of men
Towards our ancient house, and stainless fame!
Think what it is to strangle infant pity,
Cradled in the belief of guileless looks,
Till it become a crime to suffer. Think

What 'tis to blot with infamy and blood

All that which shows like innocence, and is,-
Hear me, great God! I swear, most innocent,—
So that the world lose all discrimination
Between the sly, fierce, wild regard of guilt,
And that which now compels thee to reply
To what I ask: Am I, or am I not

A parricide?

Marzio.
Judge.

Thou art not!

What is this?

Marzio. I here declare those whom I did accuse

Are innocent. "Tis I alone am guilty.

Judge. Drag him away to torments; let them be
Subtle and long drawn out, to tear the folds
Of the heart's inmost cell. Unbind him not

Till he confess.

Marzio.

Torture me as ye will:

A keener pain has wrung a higher truth

From my last breath. She is most innocent!

Bloodhounds, not men, glut yourselves well with me!

I will not give you that fine piece of nature

To rend and ruin.

Camillo.

[Exit MARZIO, guarded.

What say ye now, my lords?

Judge. Let tortures strain the truth till it be white As snow thrice-sifted by the frozen wind.

Camillo. Yet stained with blood.

Judge (to BEATRICE).

Beatrice. Entrap me not with questions. Who stands here As my accuser! Ha! wilt thou be he,

Know you this paper, lady?

Who art my judge?

Accuser, witness, judge,

What, all in one? Here is Orsino's name;

Where is Orsino? Let his eye meet mine.

What means this scrawl? Alas! ye know not what,

And therefore on the chance that it may be

Some evil, will ye kill us?

Enter an Officer.

Officer.

Marzio's dead.

Judge. What did he say?

Officer.

Nothing, As soon as we

Had bound him on the wheel, he smiled on us,

As one who baffles a deep adversary;

And, holding his breath, died.

Judge.

There remains nothing

But to apply the question to those prisoners,
Who yet remain stubborn.

Further proceedings, and in the behalf

Of these most innocent and noble persons

Will use my interest with the Holy Father.

Judge. Let the Pope's pleasure then be done. Meanwhile Conduct these culprits each to separate cells;

And be the engines ready for this night,

:

If the Pope's resolution be as grave,

Pious, and just as once, I'll wring the truth
Out of those nerves and sinews, groan by groan.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.-The Cell of a Prison. BEATRICE is discovered asleep on a couch.

Enter BERNARDO.

Bernardo. How gently slumber rests upon her face,
Like the last thoughts of some day sweetly spent,
Closing in night and dreams, and so prolonged.
After such torments as she bore last night,

How light and soft her breathing comes. Ah, me!
Methinks that I shall never sleep again.

But I must shake the heavenly dew of rest

From this sweet folded flower, thus-wake; awake;
What, sister, canst thou sleep?

Beatrice (awaking).

I was just dreaming

That we were all in Paradise. Thou knowest

This cell seems like a kind of Paradise

After our father's presence.

Bernardo.

Dear, dear sister,

Would that thy dream were not a dream! O, God!

How shall I tell?

Beatrice.

What wouldst thou tell, sweet brother?

Bernardo. Look not so calm and happy, or, even whilst I stand considering what I have to say,

My heart will break.

Beatrice.

See now, thou mak'st me weep:

How very friendless thou wouldst be, dear child,

If I were dead. Say what thou hast to say.

Bernardo. They have confessed; they could endure no more The tortures

Beatrice.

Ha! What was there to confess?

They must have told some weak and wicked lie

To flatter their tormentors. Have they said

That they were guilty? O white innocence,

That thou shouldst wear the mask of guilt to hide
Thine awful and serenest countenance

From those who know thee not!

Enter JUDGE, with LUCRETIA and GIACOMO, guarded.

Ignoble hearts!

For some brief spasms of pain, which are at least
As mortal as the limbs through which they pass,
Are centuries of high splendour laid in dust?
And that eternal honour which should live
Sunlike, above the reek of mortal fame,
Changed to a mockery and a by-word? What!
Will you give up these bodies to be dragged
At horses' heels, so that our hair should sweep
The footsteps of the vain and senseless crowd,
Who, that they may make our calamity
Their worship and their spectacle, will leave
The churches and the theatres as void

As their own hearts? Shall the light multitude
Fling, at their choice, curses or faded pity,
Sad funeral flowers to deck a living corpse,
Upon us as we pass, to pass away,

And leave-what memory of our having been?
Infamy, blood, terror, despair? O thou,

Who wert a mother to the parentless,

Kill not thy child! Let not her wrongs kill thee!
Brother, lie down with me upon the rack,
And let us each be silent as a corpse;

It soon will be as soft as any grave.

'Tis but the falsehood it can wring from fear Makes the rack cruel.

Giacomo.

They will tear the truth

Even from thee at last, those cruel pains:

For pity's sake say thou art guilty now.

Lucretia. O, speak the truth! Let us all quickly die:

And after death, God is our judge, not they;

He will have mercy on us.

Bernardo.

If indeed

It can be true, say so, dear sister mine;

And then the Pope will surely pardon you,
And all be well.

Judge.

Confess, or I will warp Your limbs with such keen tortures

Beatrice.

Tortures! Turn

The rack henceforth into a spinning-wheel!
Torture your dog, that he may tell when last
He lapped the blood his master shed-not me!
My pangs are of the mind, and of the heart

And of the soul; ay, of the inmost soul,
Which weeps within tears as of burning gall
To see, in this ill world where none are true,
My kindred false to their deserted selves.
And with considering all the wretched life
Which I have lived, and its now wretched end;
And the small justice shown by Heaven and Earth
To me or mine; and what a tyrant thou art,
And what slaves these; and what a world we make,
The oppressor and the oppressed-such pangs compel
My answer. What is it thou wouldst with me!

Judge. Art thou not guilty of thy father's death?
Beatrice. Or wilt thou rather tax high-judging God
That he permitted such an act as that

Which I have suffered, and which he beheld;
Made it unutterable, and took from it

All refuge, all revenge, all consequence,

But that which thou hast called my father's death?
Which is or is not what men call a crime,

Which either I have done, or have not done;

Say what ye will. I shall deny no more.

If ye desire it thus, thus let it be,

And so an end of all. Now do your will;

No other pains shall force another word.

Judge. She is convicted, but has not confessed.

Be it enough. Until their final sentence

Let none have converse with them. You, young lord,
Linger not here!

Beatrice.

O, tear him not away! Judge. Guards! do your duty.

Bernardo (embracing BEATRICE). Oh! would ye divide Body from soul?

Officer.

That is the headsman's business.

[Exeunt all but LUCRETIA, BEATRICE, and GIACOMO. Giacomo. Have I confessed? Is it all over now? No hope? no refuge? O weak, wicked tongue,

Which hast destroyed me, would that thou hadst been
Cut out and thrown to dogs first! To have killed

My father first, and then betrayed my sister;
Ay, thee! the one thing innocent and pure
In this black, guilty world, to that which I
So well deserve! My wife! my little ones!
Destitute, helpless; and I-Father! God!
Canst thou forgive even the unforgiving,
When their full hearts break thus, thus ?-

Lucretia.

[Covers his face and weeps O, my child!

To what a dreadful end are we all come !

Why did I yield? Why did I not sustain
Those torments? Oh that I were all dissolved