CASTELLAN. Stranger, thou takest liberties with us which we would not permit, were not this a grand festal day. But as, during the saturnalia, slaves were permitted to lord it over their masters, so on this day, devoted to the rites of hospitality, we are willing to laugh at the jokes of a ragged vagrant, who calls himself our brother and our equal. STRANGER. The wanderer, my gracious hosts, who thus among you stands, But once he was your equal, ye who, without alloy Of care or anguish, merrily do quaff the cup of joy. CHORUS. And who art thou, then? Tell us, eccentric stranger, and raise to thy parched lips the cup of joy. STRANGER. Every cup is filled with gall for him who has no longer friends nor country; and since ye would know who I am, be assured, O children of joy, that I who have drank the cup of life to the dregs, am greater than you; for grief has made me greater and more powerful than the greatest and most powerful among you. CASTELLAN. Stranger, thy boldness amuses me; if I mistake not, thou art a street poet; an improvisator of drolleries; an expert buffoon; go on, and since it is thy whim not to drink, drink not, but continue to amuse us with thy vagaries, while we drain the cup of joy. LA HERMOSA. My beloved! my friends! Sir Castellan! this man asserts that he is greater than any of you; but you should pardon his boldness, for he has also said that he is the most unfortunate of men. Do not, I beseech you, torment him with your raillery, but prevail upon him to tell us his story. CASTELLAN. Come, then, pilgrim, since La Hermosa has taken thee under her kind protection, tell us thy misfortunes, and we, amid our joy, will hear them with pity, for love of her. STRANGER. Castellan, I have something else to think of beside your amusement. I am neither improvisator, nor singer, nor buffoon. I laugh, 't is true, and that often; but with a secret, a gloomy, and a despairing laughter, as I look upon the crimes and the woes of men. Maiden, I have naught to tell. The history of all my misfortunes is comprised in this one sentence: Iam a man. LA HERMOSA. Unfortunate man! I feel for thee unutterable compassion. Look at him, my friends; do you not seem to recognize those features, so changed by grief? Look at him, my dear Diego; truly, I have seen that face in a dream, or else it is the phantom of one whom I have loved. DIEGO. Hermosa, you are too compassionate. I have never met that gloomy face in all my travels. If it has appeared to you in a dream, that dream was doubtless a night-mare, attendant on a bad supper. Nevertheless, if he will tell us his story, I am willing to lay aside my anger. CHORUS. If he is willing to relate Th' adventures he has known, But if he will nor speak nor drink, At once to Pluto going, There let him drain the gall of hate, From a cup of iron glowing! BOY. With a timid voice, on bended knee, I would make bold to offer a suggestion to my lord. This stranger has been attracted toward us by the chorus of my song. When I commenced singing, he was winding along the skirts of the wood, in the direction of the plain; but suddenly, as if his ear were struck with agreeable sounds, he returned upon his steps; twice or thrice he stopped to listen, and when I finished, he had almost reached us. He asserts that he is one of your old friends; that you once were his companions; that this is his native land. Well, then, let him sing my song, and if he can repeat it all without a mistake, we cannot doubt that he was born among our mountains. CASTELLAN. Be it so. Thou hast well spoken, young page, and I approve of thy advice, for La Hermosa smiles. CHORUS. Young page, thou hast well spoken; Of her consent it is the token, And our host approves of thee. Fill, then! and let the stranger First sing our country's lay, Then drain with us, no more a ranger, STRANGER. 'T is well; I consent. Listen, then, and let none interrupt me. LA HERMOSA. Let him go on; he has a good voice. STRANGER. I who a youthful goatherd am, A careless child of the mountain wild, I from afar the town behold, And never to this hour Have seen, save from afar, the gold All the fair maidens love I well, Within the vallies near; But more than all who there do dwell, Doloris, purest of the pure, And fairest of the fair, Who under those old cedars lies, Beneath the green turf there! Alas, my life is nought but tears —— DIEGO. What does the man mean by this strange medley? His sister whom he loves as alive, and bewails as dead, at the same time! His pleasant life on the mountain, and immediately after, his life dissolved in tears! Hermosa, his voice is clear, but his head is decidedly muddy. LA HERMOSA. Heavens! I have heard of a certain Doloris, whose brother DIEGO. Hermosa, you are too compassionate, indeed. Let this adventurer sing the song of our country, or let him go drain the cup of tears with Satan! CHORUS. Let him go drain the cup of tears Let me alone a moment. ded two stanzas of the song. STRANGER. My memory returns. I have confoun- I who a youthful goatherd am, I on the mountain tend my flock, The maidens fair of the vale I love, To weave them garlands far less bright Than their eyes of azure hue. And when I hear the vesper bell, I call to me my buck-goat black, And back to the mountains hie. Come hither, come hither, my buck-goat black! The night obscures our view: Lead on the flock, my buck-goat black! Ye maidens fair, adieu! CASTELLAN. Well sung, pilgrim! But this is not the song not even a stanza of it: thou hast changed the subject. Come, try again; for thy voice is good, and thy imagination more fertile than thy memory is faithful. I — I CHORUS. In our song let him join; let him moisten with wine His lips, that he breath may regain: But our own native lay he must sing us to-day, If the full cup of joy he would drain. STRANGER. Stop a moment. Ah, I have it : I who a dashing scholar am, A jovial life I lead: Through Salamanca's learned courts, And oft beyond the ramparts pass, Those female forms to view, Who flit like goblins through the night, The stormy night untrue; The mother of all treacheries; The mother of all crimes and woes Ah, I am wrong! That is not it. DIEGO. He is not remembering By Jove! it is time for him to find it out! at all, but inventing, from one stanza to another. Bravo! An amusing song! Let us repeat the chorus: Take that! take that! old pedant black! Fit recompense for you! Take that! take that! old pedant black! CASTELLAN. Go on, my noble improvisator; thou hast not sung the song of our country, and I am glad of it, for thine pleases me; but thou knowest our bargain. It must be honorably fulfilled, if thou wouldst drain with us the cup of joy. Let me alone, I pray you. My thoughts overwhelm and confound Ah! my memory returns: listen: me. I who a luckless lover am, A mournful life I lead : I weep in the mountains night and day, I sometimes to th' accursed town Its point my poniard stains In the black blood, the sluggish ink, That flows in a pedant's veins: Die! die! thou wretch whom nature hates ! And thou deceitful fair, Thou never more shalt man delude-' But I am wrong-wandering again; I always confound the first and second stanzas, in my impatience. Listen; this is it: But ha! the holy brotherhood! Back to thy sheath, my poniard good! Back to thy sheath, my poniard good! Thou maiden false, adieu! CHORUS Back to thy sheath, my poniard good! The alguazils pursue: Back to thy sheath, my poniard good! CASTELLAN. Yet once more, pilgrim! Thou wanderest so adroitly, that it is impossible thou canst not find the way again. Try once more! CHORUS. Try, stranger, once more, and wet as before Thy lips, thy spent breath to regain ; For our own country's lay thou must sing us to-day, If the full cup of joy thou wouldst drain. STRANGER. Were I to sing you that lay which is imprinted on my memory in characters never to be effaced, the wine of your cups would turn into tears; ay, into gall, perhaps, or black blood! CASTELLAN. Go on, eccentric singer, and fear not. We love thy songs; and the potency of our cups can soon lay all the spirits of darkness. |
