The Project Gutenberg eBook ofThe Admirable Bashville; Or, Constancy Unrewarded

The Project Gutenberg eBook ofThe Admirable Bashville; Or, Constancy UnrewardedThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: The Admirable Bashville; Or, Constancy UnrewardedAuthor: Bernard ShawRelease date: July 5, 2010 [eBook #33085]Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Chuck Greif, Fox in the Stars and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADMIRABLE BASHVILLE; OR, CONSTANCY UNREWARDED ***

This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.

Title: The Admirable Bashville; Or, Constancy UnrewardedAuthor: Bernard ShawRelease date: July 5, 2010 [eBook #33085]Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Chuck Greif, Fox in the Stars and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

Title: The Admirable Bashville; Or, Constancy Unrewarded

Author: Bernard Shaw

Release date: July 5, 2010 [eBook #33085]

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Chuck Greif, Fox in the Stars and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADMIRABLE BASHVILLE; OR, CONSTANCY UNREWARDED ***

BEING THE NOVEL OF CASHEL BYRON'SPROFESSION DONE INTO A STAGE PLAYIN THREE ACTS, AND IN BLANK VERSE,WITH A NOTE ON MODERN PRIZE FIGHTING

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WORKS OFBERNARD SHAWDramatic Opinions and Essays. 2 vols.Net,$2.50Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant. 2 vols.Net,$2.50John Bull's Other Island and Major Barbara.Net,$1.50Man and SupermanNet,$1.25Three Plays for PuritansNet,$1.25The Doctor's Dilemma, Getting Married, and The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet.Net,$1.50The Quintessence of Ibsenism$1.00Cashel Byron's Profession$1.25An Unsocial Socialist$1.25The Irrational Knot$1.50The Author's ApologyNet,.60The Perfect Wagnerite$1.25Love Among the Artists$1.50The Admirable Bashville: A PlayNet,.50Postage or Express, ExtraBRENTANO'SFifth Avenue and 27th StreetNew York

Fifth Avenue and 27th StreetNew York

THE ADMIRABLE BASHVILLEOR, CONSTANCY UNREWARDEDBEING THE NOVEL OF CASHELBYRON'S PROFESSION DONE INTO ASTAGE PLAY IN THREE ACTS ANDIN BLANK VERSE · WITH A NOTEON MODERN PRIZEFIGHTING · BYBERNARD SHAW

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BRENTANO'S · NEW YORKMCMXIII

This play has been publicly performed within the United Kingdom. It is entered at Stationers' Hall and The Library of Congress, U. S. A.

The Admirable Bashville is a product of the British law of copyright. As that law stands at present, the first person who patches up a stage version of a novel, however worthless and absurd that version may be, and has it read by himself and a few confederates to another confederate who has paid for admission in a hall licensed for theatrical performances, secures the stage rights of that novel, even as against the author himself; and the author must buy him out before he can touch his own work for the purposes of the stage.

A famous case in point is the drama of East Lynne, adapted from the late Mrs. Henry Wood's novel of that name. It was enormously popular, and is still the surest refuge of touring companies in distress. Many authors feel that Mrs. Henry Wood was hardly used in not getting any of the money which was plentifully made in this way through her story. To my mind, since her literary copyright probably brought her a fair wage for the work of writing the book, her real grievance was, first, that her name and credit were attached to a play with which she had nothing to do, and which may quite possibly have been to her a detestable travesty and profanation of her story; and second, that the authors of that play had the legal power to prevent her from having any version of her own performed, if she had wished to make one.

There is only one way in which the author can protect himself; and that is by making a version of his ownand going through the same legal farce with it. But the legal farce involves the hire of a hall and the payment of a fee of two guineas to the King's Reader of Plays. When I wrote Cashel Byron's Profession I had no guineas to spare, a common disability of young authors. What is equally common, I did not know the law. A reasonable man may guess a reasonable law, but no man can guess a foolish anomaly. Fortunately, by the time my book so suddenly revived in America I was aware of the danger, and in a position to protect myself by writing and performing The Admirable Bashville. The prudence of doing so was soon demonstrated; for rumors soon reached me of several American stage versions; and one of these has actually been played in New York, with the boxing scenes under the management (so it is stated) of the eminent pugilist Mr. James J. Corbett. The New York press, in a somewhat derisive vein, conveyed the impression that in this version Cashel Byron sought to interest the public rather as the last of the noble race of the Byrons of Dorsetshire than as his unromantic self; but in justice to a play which I never read, and an actor whom I never saw, and who honorably offered to treat me as if I had legal rights in the matter, I must not accept the newspaper evidence as conclusive.

As I write these words, I am promised by the King in his speech to Parliament a new Copyright Bill. I believe it embodies, in our British fashion, the recommendations of the book publishers as to the concerns of the authors, and the notions of the musical publishers as to the concerns of the playwrights. As author and playwright I am duly obliged to the Commission for saving me the trouble of speaking for myself, and to thewitnesses for speaking for me. But unless Parliament takes the opportunity of giving the authors of all printed works of fiction, whether dramatic or narrative, both playwright and copyright (as in America), such to be independent of any insertions or omissions of formulas about "all rights reserved" or the like, I am afraid the new Copyright Bill will leave me with exactly the opinion both of the copyright law and the wisdom of Parliament I at present entertain. As a good Socialist I do not at all object to the limitation of my right of property in my own works to a comparatively brief period, followed by complete Communism: in fact, I cannot see why the same salutary limitation should not be applied to all property rights whatsoever; but a system which enables any alert sharper to acquire property rights in my stories as against myself and the rest of the community would, it seems to me, justify a rebellion if authors were numerous and warlike enough to make one.

It may be asked why I have written The Admirable Bashville in blank verse. My answer is that I had but a week to write it in. Blank verse is so childishly easy and expeditious (hence, by the way, Shakespear's copious output), that by adopting it I was enabled to do within the week what would have cost me a month in prose.

Besides, I am fond of blank verse. Not nineteenth century blank verse, of course, nor indeed, with a very few exceptions, any post-Shakespearean blank verse. Nay, not Shakespearean blank verse itself later than the histories. When an author can write the prose dialogue of the first scene in As You Like It, or Hamlet's colloquies with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, there is really no excuse for The Seven Ages and "To be or not to be,"except the excuse of a haste that made great facility indispensable. I am quite sure that any one who is to recover the charm of blank verse must frankly go back to its beginnings and start a literary pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. I like the melodious sing-song, the clear simple one-line and two-line sayings, and the occasional rhymed tags, like the half closes in an eighteenth century symphony, in Peele, Kyd, Greene, and the histories of Shakespear. How any one with music in him can turn from Henry VI., John, and the two Richards to such a mess of verse half developed into rhetorical prose as Cymbeline, is to me explicable only by the uncivil hypothesis that the artistic qualities in the Elizabethan drama do not exist for most of its critics; so that they hang on to its purely prosaic content, and hypnotize themselves into absurd exaggerations of the value of that content. Even poets fall under the spell. Ben Jonson described Marlowe's line as "mighty"! As well put Michael Angelo's epitaph on the tombstone of Paolo Uccello. No wonder Jonson's blank verse is the most horribly disagreeable product in literature, and indicates his most prosaic mood as surely as his shorter rhymed measures indicate his poetic mood. Marlowe never wrote a mighty line in his life: Cowper's single phrase, "Toll for the brave," drowns all his mightinesses as Great Tom drowns a military band. But Marlowe took that very pleasant-sounding rigmarole of Peele and Greene, and added to its sunny daylight the insane splendors of night, and the cheap tragedy of crime. Because he had only a common sort of brain, he was hopelessly beaten by Shakespear; but he had a fine ear and a soaring spirit: in short, one does not forget "wanton Arethusa's azure arms"and the like. But the pleasant-sounding rigmarole was the basis of the whole thing; and as long as that rigmarole was practised frankly for the sake of its pleasantness, it was readable and speakable. It lasted until Shakespear did to it what Raphael did to Italian painting; that is, overcharged and burst it by making it the vehicle of a new order of thought, involving a mass of intellectual ferment and psychological research. The rigmarole could not stand the strain; and Shakespear's style ended in a chaos of half-shattered old forms, half-emancipated new ones, with occasional bursts of prose eloquence on the one hand, occasional delicious echoes of the rigmarole, mostly from Calibans and masque personages, on the other, with, alas! a great deal of filling up with formulary blank verse which had no purpose except to save the author's time and thought.

When a great man destroys an art form in this way, its ruins make palaces for the clever would-be great. After Michael Angelo and Raphael, Giulio Romano and the Carracci. After Marlowe and Shakespear, Chapman and the Police News poet Webster. Webster's specialty was blood: Chapman's, balderdash. Many of us by this time find it difficult to believe that pre-Ruskinite art criticism used to prostrate itself before the works of Domenichino and Guido, and to patronize the modest little beginnings of those who came between Cimabue and Masaccio. But we have only to look at our own current criticism of Elizabethan drama to satisfy ourselves that in an art which has not yet found its Ruskin or its pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, the same folly is still academically propagated. It is possible, and even usual, for men professing to have ears and a sense of poetry tosnub Peele and Greene and grovel before Fletcher and Webster—Fletcher! a facile blank verse penny-a-liner: Webster! a turgid paper cut-throat. The subject is one which I really cannot pursue without intemperance of language. The man who thinks The Duchess of Malfi better than David and Bethsabe is outside the pale, not merely of literature, but almost of humanity.

Yet some of the worst of these post-Shakespearean duffers, from Jonson to Heywood, suddenly became poets when they turned from the big drum of pseudo-Shakespearean drama to the pipe and tabor of the masque, exactly as Shakespear himself recovered the old charm of the rigmarole when he turned from Prospero to Ariel and Caliban. Cyril Tourneur and Heywood could certainly have produced very pretty rigmarole plays if they had begun where Shakespear began, instead of trying to begin where he left off. Jonson and Beaumont would very likely have done themselves credit on the same terms: Marston would have had at least a chance. Massinger was in his right place, such as it was; and one would not disturb the gentle Ford, who was never born to storm the footlights. Webster could have done no good anyhow or anywhere: the man was a fool. And Chapman would always have been a blathering unreadable pedant, like Landor, in spite of his classical amateurship and respectable strenuosity of character. But with these exceptions it may plausibly be held that if Marlowe and Shakespear could have been kept out of their way, the rest would have done well enough on the lines of Peele and Greene. However, they thought otherwise; and now that their freethinking paganism, so dazzling to the pupils of Paley and the converts of Wesley, offers itselfin vain to the disciples of Darwin and Nietzsche, there is an end of them. And a good riddance, too.

Accordingly, I have poetasted The Admirable Bashville in the rigmarole style. And lest the Webster worshippers should declare that there is not a single correct line in all my three acts, I have stolen or paraphrased a few from Marlowe and Shakespear (not to mention Henry Carey); so that if any man dares quote me derisively, he shall do so in peril of inadvertently lighting on a purple patch from Hamlet or Faustus.

I have also endeavored in this little play to prove that I am not the heartless creature some of my critics take me for. I have strictly observed the established laws of stage popularity and probability. I have simplified the character of the heroine, and summed up her sweetness in the one sacred word: Love. I have given consistency to the heroism of Cashel. I have paid to Morality, in the final scene, the tribute of poetic justice. I have restored to Patriotism its usual place on the stage, and gracefully acknowledged The Throne as the fountain of social honor. I have paid particular attention to the construction of the play, which will be found equal in this respect to the best contemporary models.

And I trust the result will be found satisfactory.

ACT I

A glade in Wiltstoken Park

EnterLydiaLydia.Ye leafy breasts and warm protecting wingsOf mother trees that hatch our tender souls,And from the well of Nature in our heartsThaw the intolerable inch of iceThat bears the weight of all the stamping world.Hear ye me sing to solitude that I,Lydia Carew, the owner of these lands,Albeit most rich, most learned, and most wise,Am yet most lonely. What are riches worthWhen wisdom with them comes to show the purse bearerThat life remains unpurchasable? LearningLearns but one lesson: doubt! To excel allIs, to be lonely. Oh, ye busy birds,Engrossed with real needs, ye shameless treesWith arms outspread in welcome of the sun,Your minds, bent singly to enlarge your lives,Have given you wings and raised your delicate headsHigh heavens above us crawlers.[A rook sets up a great cawing; and the other birdschatter loudly as a gust of wind sets the branchesswaying. She makes as though she would shew themher sleeves.Lo, the leavesThat hide my drooping boughs! Mock me—poor maid!—Deride with joyous comfortable chatterThese stolen feathers. Laugh at me, the clothed one.Laugh at the mind fed on foul air and books.Books! Art! And Culture! Oh, I shall go mad.Give me a mate that never heard of these,A sylvan god, tree born in heart and sap;Or else, eternal maidhood be my hap.[Another gust of wind and bird-chatter. She sits onthe mossy root of an oak and buries her face in herhands.Cashel Byron,in a white singlet andbreeches, comes through the trees.CASHEL.What's this? Whom have we here? A woman!LYDIA[looking up]. Yes.CASHEL.You have no business here. I have. Away!Women distract me. Hence!LYDIA.Bid you me hence?I am upon mine own ground. Who are you?I take you for a god, a sylvan god.This place is mine: I share it with the birds,The trees, the sylvan gods, the lovely companyOf haunted solitudes.CASHEL.A sylvan god!A goat-eared image! Do your statues speak?Walk? heave the chest with breath? or like a featherLift you—like this? [He sets her on her feet.LYDIA[panting]. You take away my breath!You're strong. Your hands off, please. Thank you. Farewell.CASHEL.Before you go: when shall we meet again?LYDIA.Why should we meet again?CASHEL.Who knows? Weshall.That much I know by instinct. What's your name?LYDIA.Lydia Carew.CASHEL.Lydia's a pretty name.Where do you live?LYDIA.I' the castle.CASHEL[thunderstruck]. Do not sayYou are the lady of this great domain.LYDIA.I am.CASHEL.Accursed luck! I took you forThe daughter of some farmer. Well, your pardon.I came too close: I looked too deep. Farewell.LYDIA.I pardon that. Now tell me who you are.CASHEL.Ask me not whence I come, nor what I am.You are the lady of the castle. IHave but this hard and blackened hand to live by.LYDIA.I have felt its strength and envied you. Your name?I have told you mine.CASHEL.My name is Cashel Byron.LYDIA.I never heard the name; and yet you utter itAs men announce a celebrated name.Forgive my ignorance.CASHEL.I bless it, Lydia.I have forgot your other name.LYDIA.Carew.Cashel's a pretty name, too.MELLISH[calling through the wood]. Coo-ee! Byron!CASHEL.A thousand curses! Oh, I beg you, go.This is a man you must not meet.MELLISH[further off]. Coo-ee!LYDIA.He's losing us. What does he in my woods?CASHEL.He is a part of what I am. What that isYou must not know. It would end all between us.And yet there's no dishonor in't: your lawyer,Who let your lodge to me, will vouch me honest.I am ashamed to tell you what I am—At least, as yet. Some day, perhaps.MELLISH[nearer]. Coo-ee!LYDIA.His voice is nearer. Fare you well, my tenant.When next your rent falls due, come to the castle.Pay me in person. Sir: your most obedient. [She curtsies and goes.CASHEL.Lives in this castle! Owns this park! A ladyMarry a prizefighter! Impossible.And yet the prizefighter must marry her.EnterMellishEnsanguined swine, whelped by a doggish dam,Is this thy park, that thou, with voice obscene,Fillst it with yodeled yells, and screamst my nameFor all the world to know that Cashel ByronIs training here for combat.MELLISH.Swine you me?I've caught you, have I? You have found a woman.Let her shew here again, I'll set the dog on her.I will. I say it. And my name's Bob Mellish.CASHEL.Change thy initial and be truly hightHellish. As for thy dog, why dost thou keep oneAnd bark thyself? Begone.MELLISH.I'll not begone.You shall come back with me and do your duty—Your duty to your backers, do you hear?You have not punched the bag this blessed day.CASHEL.The putrid bag engirdled by thy beltInvites my fist.MELLISH[weeping]. Ingrate! O wretched lot!Who would a trainer be? O Mellish, Mellish,Trainer of heroes, builder-up of brawn,Vicarious victor, thou createst championsThat quickly turn thy tyrants. But beware:Without me thou art nothing. Disobey me,And all thy boasted strength shall fall from thee.With flaccid muscles and with failing breathFacing the fist of thy more faithful foe,I'll see thee on the grass cursing the dayThou didst forswear thy training.CASHEL.Noisome quackThat canst not from thine own abhorrent visageTake one carbuncle, thou contaminat'stEven with thy presence my untainted bloodPreach abstinence to rascals like thyselfRotten with surfeiting. Leave me in peace.This grove is sacred: thou profanest it.Hence! I have business that concerns thee not.MELLISH.Ay, with your woman. You will lose your fight.Have you forgot your duty to your backers?Oh, what a sacred thing your duty is!What makes a man but duty? Where were weWithout our duty? Think of Nelson's words:England expects that every man——CASHEL.Shall twaddleAbout his duty. Mellish: at no hourCan I regard thee wholly without loathing;But when thou play'st the moralist, by Heaven,My soul flies to my fist, my fist to thee;And never did the Cyclops' hammer fallOn Mars's armor—but enough of that.It does remind me of my mother.MELLISH.Ah,Byron, let it remind thee. Once I heardAn old song: it ran thus. [He clears his throat.] Ahem, Ahem![Sings]—They say there is no otherCan take the place of mother—I am out o' voice: forgive me; but remember:Thy mother—were that sainted woman here—Would say, Obey thy trainer.CASHEL.Now, by Heaven,Some fate is pushing thee upon thy doom.Canst thou not hear thy sands as they run out?They thunder like an avalanche. Old man:Two things I hate, my duty and my mother.Why dost thou urge them both upon me now?Presume not on thine age and on thy nastiness.Vanish, and promptly.MELLISH.Can I leave thee hereThus thinly clad, exposed to vernal dews?Come back with me, my son, unto our lodge.CASHEL.Within this breast a fire is newly litWhose glow shall sun the dew away, whose radianceShall make the orb of night hang in the heavensUnnoticed, like a glow-worm at high noon.MELLISH.Ah me, ah me, where wilt thou spend the night?CASHEL.Wiltstoken's windows wandering beneath,Wiltstoken's holy bell hearkening,Wiltstoken's lady loving breathlessly.MELLISH.The lady of the castle! Thou art mad.CASHEL.'Tis thou art mad to trifle in my path.Thwart me no more. Begone.MELLISH.My boy, my son,I'd give my heart's blood for thy happiness.Thwart thee, my son! Ah, no. I'll go with thee.I'll brave the dews. I'll sacrifice my sleep.I am old—no matter: ne'er shall it be saidMellish deserted thee.CASHEL.You resolute godsThat will not spare this man, upon your kneesTake the disparity twixt his age and mine.Now from the ring to the high judgment seatI step at your behest. Bear you me witnessThis is not Victory, but Execution.[He solemnly projects his fist with colossal forceagainst the waistcoat ofMellishwho doubles up likea folded towel, and lies without sense or motion.And now the night is beautiful again.[The castle clock strikes the hour in the distance.Hark! Hark! Hark! Hark! Hark! Hark! Hark! Hark! Hark! Hark!It strikes in poetry. 'Tis ten o'clock.Lydia: to thee![He steals off towards the castle.Mellishstirs and groans.

ACT II

Scene ILondon. A room in Lydia's houseEnterLydiaandLucianLYDIA.Welcome, dear cousin, to my London house.Of late you have been chary of your visits.LUCIAN.I have been greatly occupied of late.The minister to whom I act as scribeIn Downing Street was born in Birmingham,And, like a thoroughbred commercial statesman,Splits his infinities, which I, poor slave,Must reunite, though all the time my heartYearns for my gentle coz's company.LYDIA.Lucian: there is some other reason. Think!Since England was a nation every moodHer scribes have prepositionally split;But thine avoidance dates from yestermonth.LUCIAN.There is a man I like not haunts this house.LYDIA.Thou speak'st of Cashel Byron?LUCIAN.Aye, of him.Hast thou forgotten that eventful nightWhen as we gathered were at Hoskyn HouseTo hear a lecture by Herr Abendgasse,He placed a single finger on my chest,And I, ensorceled, would have sunk supineHad not a chair received my falling form.LYDIA.Pooh! That was but by way of illustration.LUCIAN.What right had he to illustrate his pointUpon my person? Was I his assistantThat he should try experiments on meAs Simpson did on his with chloroform?Now, by the cannon balls of GalileoHe hath unmanned me: all my nerve is gone.This very morning my official chief,Tapping with friendly forefinger this button,Levelled me like a thunderstricken elmFlat upon the Colonial Office floor.LYDIA.Fancies, coz.LUCIAN.Fancies! Fits! the chief said fits!Delirium tremens! the chlorotic danceOf Vitus! What could any one have thought?Your ruffian friend hath ruined me. By Heaven,I tremble at a thumbnail. Give me drink.LYDIA.What ho, without there! Bashville.BASHVILLE[without]. Coming, madam.EnterBashvilleLYDIA.My cousin ails, Bashville. Procure some wet. [ExitBashville.LUCIAN.Some wet!!! Where learntyouthat atrocious word?This is the language of a flower-girl.LYDIA.True. It is horrible. Said I "Some wet"?I meant, some drink. Why did I say "Some wet"?Am I ensorceled too? "Some wet"! Fie! fie!I feel as though some hateful thing had stained me.Oh, Lucian, how could I have said "Some wet"?LUCIAN.The horrid conversation of this manHath numbed thy once unfailing sense of fitness.LYDIA.Nay, he speaks very well: he's literate:Shakespear he quotes unconsciously.LUCIAN.And yetAnon he talks pure pothouse.EnterBashvilleBASHVILLE.Sir: your potion.LUCIAN.Thanks. [He drinks.] I am better.A NEWSBOY[calling without]. Extra specialStar!Result of the great fight! Name of the winner!LYDIA.Who calls so loud?BASHVILLE.The papers, madam.LYDIA.Why?Hath ought momentous happened?BASHVILLE.Madam: yes. [He produces a newspaper.All England for these thrilling paragraphsA week has waited breathless.LYDIA.Read them us.BASHVILLE[reading]. "At noon to-day, unknown to the police,Within a thousand miles of Wormwood Scrubbs,Th' Australian Champion and his challenger,The Flying Dutchman, formerly engagedI' the mercantile marine, fought to a finish.Lord Worthington, the well-known sporting peerActed as referee."LYDIA.Lord Worthington!BASHVILLE."The bold Ned Skene revisited the ropesTo hold the bottle for his quondam novice;Whilst in the seaman's corner were assembledProfessor Palmer and the Chelsea Snob.Mellish, whose epigastrium has been hurt,'Tis said, by accident at Wiltstoken,Looked none the worse in the Australian's corner.The Flying Dutchman wore the Union Jack:His colors freely sold amid the crowd;But Cashel's well-known spot of white on blue——"LYDIA.Whose, did you say?BASHVILLE.Cashel's, my lady.LYDIA.Lucian:Your hand—a chair—BASHVILLE.Madam: you're ill.LYDIA.Proceed.What you have read I do not understand;Yet I will hear it through. Proceed.LUCIAN.Proceed.BASHVILLE."But Cashel's well-known spot of white on blueWas fairly rushed for. Time was called at twelve,When, with a smile of confidence uponHis ocean-beaten mug——"LYDIA.His mug?LUCIAN[explaining]. His face.BASHVILLE[continuing]. "The Dutchman came undaunted to the scratch,But found the champion there already. BothMost heartily shook hands, amid the cheersOf their encouraged backers. Two to oneWas offered on the Melbourne nonpareil;And soon, so fit the Flying Dutchman seemed,Found takers everywhere. No time was lostIn getting to the business of the day.The Dutchman led at once, and seemed to landOn Byron's dicebox; but the seaman's reach,Too short for execution at long shots,Did not get fairly home upon the ivory;And Byron had the best of the exchange."LYDIA.I do not understand. What were they doing?LUCIAN.Fighting with naked fists.LYDIA.Oh, horrible!I'll hear no more. Or stay: how did it end?Was Cashel hurt?LUCIAN[toBashville]. Skip to the final round.BASHVILLE."Round Three: the rumors that had gone aboutOf a breakdown in Byron's recent trainingSeemed quite confirmed. Upon the call of timeHe rose, and, looking anything but cheerful,Proclaimed with every breath Bellows to Mend.At this point six to one was freely offeredUpon the Dutchman; and Lord WorthingtonPlunged at this figure till he stood to loseA fortune should the Dutchman, as seemed certain,Take down the number of the Panley boy.The Dutchman, glutton as we know he is,Seemed this time likely to go hungry. CashelWas clearly groggy as he slipped the sailor,Who, not to be denied, followed him up,Forcing the fighting mid tremendous cheers."LYDIA.Oh stop—no more—or tell the worst at once.I'll be revenged. Bashville: call the police.This brutal sailor shall be made to knowThere's law in England.LUCIAN.Do not interrupt him:Mine ears are thirsting. Finish, man. What next?BASHVILLE."Forty to one, the Dutchman's friends exclaimed.Done, said Lord Worthington, who shewed himselfA sportsman every inch. Barely the betWas booked, when, at the reeling champion's jawThe sailor, bent on winning out of hand,Sent in his right. The issue seemed a cert,When Cashel, ducking smartly to his left,Cross-countered like a hundredweight of brick——"LUCIAN.Death and damnation!LYDIA.Oh, what does it mean?BASHVILLE."The Dutchman went to grass, a beaten man."LYDIA.Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah! Oh, well done, Cashel!BASHVILLE."A scene of indescribable excitementEnsued; for it was now quite evidentThat Byron's grogginess had all alongBeen feigned to make the market for his backers.We trust this sample of colonial smartnessWill not find imitators on this side.The losers settled up like gentlemen;But many felt that Byron shewed bad tasteIn taking old Ned Skene upon his back,And, with Bob Mellish tucked beneath his oxter,Sprinting a hundred yards to show the crowdThe perfect pink of his condition"—[a knock].LYDIA[turning pale]. BashvilleDidst hear? A knock.BASHVILLE.Madam: 'tis Byron's knock.Shall I admit him?LUCIAN.Reeking from the ring!Oh, monstrous! Say you're out.LYDIA.Send him away.I will not see the wretch. How dare he keepSecrets fromME? I'll punish him. Pray sayI'm not at home. [Bashvilleturns to go.] Yet stay. I am afraidHe will not come again.LUCIAN.A consummationDevoutly to be wished by any lady.Pray, do youwishthis man to come again?LYDIA.No, Lucian. He hath used me very ill.He should have told me. I will ne'er forgive him.Say, Not at home.BASHVILLE.Yes, madam. [Exit.LYDIA.Stay—LUCIAN[stopping her]. No, Lydia:You shall not countermand that proper order.Oh, would you cast the treasure of your mind,The thousands at your bank, and, above all,Your unassailable social positionBefore this soulless mass of beef and brawn?LYDIA.Nay, coz: you're prejudiced.CASHEL[without]. Liar and slave!LYDIA.What words were those?LUCIAN.The man is drunk with slaughter.EnterBashvillerunning: he shuts the door and locks it.BASHVILLE.Save yourselves: at the staircase foot the championSprawls on the mat, by trick of wrestler tripped;But when he rises, woe betide us all!LYDIA.Who bade you treat my visitor with violence?BASHVILLE.He would not take my answer; thrust the doorBack in my face; gave me the lie i' the throat;Averred he felt your presence in his bones.I said he should feel mine there too, and felled him;Then fled to bar your door.LYDIA.O lover's instinct!He felt my presence. Well, let him come in.We must not fail in courage with a fighter.Unlock the door.LUCIAN.Stop. Like all women, Lydia,You have the courage of immunity.To strikeyouwere against his code of honor;Butme, above the belt, he may perform onT' th' height of his profession. Also Bashville.BASHVILLE.Think not of me, sir. Let him do his worst.Oh, if the valor of my heart could weighThe fatal difference twixt his weight and mine,A second battle should he do this day:Nay, though outmatched I be, let but my mistressGive me the word: instant I'll take him onHere—now—at catchweight. Better bite the carpetA man, than fly, a coward.LUCIAN.Bravely said:I will assist you with the poker.LYDIA.No:I will not have him touched. Open the door.BASHVILLE.Destruction knocks thereat. I smile, and open.[Bashvilleopens the door.Dead silence.Cashelenters, in tears.A solemn pause.CASHEL.You know my secret?LYDIA.Yes.CASHEL.And thereuponYou bade your servant fling me from your door.LYDIA.I bade my servant say I was not here.CASHEL[toBashville]. Why didst thou better thy instruction, man?Hadst thou but said, "She bade me tell thee this,"Thoudst burst my heart. I thank thee for thy mercy.LYDIA.Oh, Lucian, didst thou call him "drunk with slaughter"?Canst thou refrain from weeping at his woe?CASHEL[toLUCIAN]. The unwritten law that shields the amateurAgainst professional resentment, saves thee.O coward, to traduce behind their backsDefenceless prizefighters!LUCIAN.Thou dost avowThou art a prizefighter.CASHEL.It was my glory.I had hoped to offer to my lady thereMy belts, my championships, my heaped-up stakes,My undefeated record; but I knewBehind their blaze a hateful secret lurked.LYDIA.Another secret?LUCIAN.Is there worse to come?CASHEL.Know ye not then my mother is an actress?LUCIAN.How horrible!LYDIA.Nay, nay: how interesting!CASHEL.A thousand victories cannot wipe outThat birthstain. Oh, my speech bewrayeth it:My earliest lesson was the player's speechIn Hamlet; and to this day I express myselfMore like a mobled queen than like a manOf flesh and blood. Well may your cousin sneer!What's Hecuba to him or he to Hecuba?LUCIAN.Injurious upstart: if by HecubaThou pointest darkly at my lovely cousin,Know that she is to me, and I to her,What never canst thou be. I do defy thee;And maugre all the odds thy skill doth give,Outside I will await thee.LYDIA.I forbidExpressly any such duello. Bashville:The door. Put Mr. Webber in a hansom,And bid the driver hie to Downing Street.No answer: 'tis my will. [ExeuntLucianandBashville.And now, farewell.You must not come again, unless indeedYou can some day look in my eyes and say:Lydia: my occupation's gone.CASHEL.Ah, no:It would remind you of my wretched mother.O God, let me be natural a moment!What other occupation can I try?What would you have me be?LYDIA.A gentleman.CASHEL.A gentleman! I, Cashel Byron, stoopTo be the thing that bets on me! the foolI flatter at so many coins a lesson!The screaming creature who beside the ringGambles with basest wretches for my blood,And pays with money that he never earned!Let me die broken-hearted rather!LYDIA.ButYou need not be an idle gentleman.I call you one of Nature's gentlemen.CASHEL.That's the collection for the loser, Lydia.I am not wont to need it. When your friendsContest elections, and at foot o' th' pollRue their presumption, 'tis their wont to claimA moral victory. In a sort they areNature's M. P.s. I am not yet so threadbareAs to accept these consolation stakes.LYDIA.You are offended with me.CASHEL.Yes, I am.I can put up with much; but—"Nature's gentleman"!I thank your ladyship of Lyons, butMust beg to be excused.LYDIA.But surely, surely,To be a prizefighter, and maul poor marinersWith naked knuckles, is no work for you.CASHEL.Thou dost arraign the inattentive FatesThat weave my thread of life in ruder patternsThan these that lie, antimacassarly,Asprent thy drawingroom. As well demandWhy I at birth chose to begin my lifeA speechless babe, hairless, incontinent,Hobbling upon all fours, a nurse's nuisance?Or why I do propose to lose my strength,To blanch my hair, to let the gums recedeFar up my yellowing teeth, and finallyLie down and moulder in a rotten grave?Only one thing more foolish could have been,And that was to be born, not man, but woman.This was thy folly, why rebuk'st thou mine?LYDIA.These are not things of choice.CASHEL.And did I chooseMy quick divining eye, my lightning hand,My springing muscle and untiring heart?Did I implant the instinct in the raceThat found a use for these, and said to me,Fight for us, and be fame and fortune thine?LYDIA.But there are other callings in the world.CASHEL.Go tell thy painters to turn stockbrokers,Thy poet friends to stoop o'er merchants' desksAnd pen prose records of the gains of greed.Tell bishops that religion is outworn,And that the Pampa to the horsebreakerOpes new careers. Bid the professor quitHis fraudulent pedantries, and do i' the worldThe thing he would teach others. Then returnTo me and say: Cashel: they have obeyed;And on that pyre of sacrifice I, too,Will throw my championship.LYDIA.But 'tis so cruel.CASHEL.Is it so? I have hardly noticed that,So cruel are all callings. Yet this hand,That many a two days' bruise hath ruthless given,Hath kept no dungeon locked for twenty years,Hath slain no sentient creature for my sport.I am too squeamish for your dainty world,That cowers behind the gallows and the lash,The world that robs the poor, and with their spoilDoes what its tradesmen tell it. Oh, your ladies!Sealskinned and egret-feathered; all defianceTo Nature; cowering if one say to them"What will the servants think?" Your gentlemen!Your tailor-tyrannized visitors of whomFlutter of wing and singing in the woodMake chickenbutchers. And your medicine men!Groping for cures in the tormented entrailsOf friendly dogs. Pray have you asked all theseTo change their occupations? Find you mineSo grimly crueller? I cannot breatheAn air so petty and so poisonous.LYDIA.But find you not their manners very nice?CASHEL.To me, perfection. Oh, they condescendWith a rare grace. Your duke, who condescendsAlmost to the whole world, might for a ManPass in the eyes of those who never sawThe duke capped with a prince. See then, ye gods,The duke turn footman, and his eager dameSink the great lady in the obsequious housemaid!Oh, at such moments I could wish the CourtHad but one breadbasket, that with my fistI could make all its windy vanityGasp itself out on the gravel. Fare you well.I did not choose my calling; but at leastI can refrain from being a gentleman.LYDIA.You say farewell to me without a pang.CASHEL.My calling hath apprenticed me to pangs.This is a rib-bender; but I can bear it.It is a lonely thing to be a champion.LYDIA.It is a lonelier thing to be a woman.CASHEL.Be lonely then. Shall it be said of theeThat for his brawn thou misalliance mad'stWi' the Prince of Ruffians? Never. Go thy ways;Or, if thou hast nostalgia of the mud,Wed some bedoggéd wretch that on the slotOf gilded snobbery,ventre à terre,Will hunt through life with eager nose on earthAnd hang thee thick with diamonds. I am rich;But all my gold was fought for with my hands.LYDIA.What dost thou mean by rich?CASHEL.There is a man,Hight Paradise, vaunted unconquerable,Hath dared to say he will be glad to hear from me.I have replied that none can hear frommeUntil a thousand solid pounds be staked.His friends have confidently found the money.Ere fall of leaf that money shall be mine;And then I shall possess ten thousand pounds.I had hoped to tempt thee with that monstrous sum.LYDIA.Thou silly Cashel, 'tis but a week's income.I did propose to give thee three times thatFor pocket money when we two were wed.CASHEL.Give me my hat. I have been fooling here.Now, by the Hebrew lawgiver, I thoughtThat only in America such revenuesWere decent deemed. Enough. My dream is dreamed.Your gold weighs like a mountain on my chest.Farewell.LYDIA.The golden mountain shall be thineThe day thou quit'st thy horrible profession.CASHEL.Tempt me not, woman. It is honor calls.Slave to the Ring I rest until the faceOf Paradise be changed.EnterBashvilleBASHVILLE.Madam, your carriage,Ordered by you at two. 'Tis now half-past.CASHEL.Sdeath! is it half-past two? The king! the king!LYDIA.The king! What mean you?CASHEL.I must meet a monarchThis very afternoon at Islington.LYDIA.At Islington! You must be mad.CASHEL.A cab!Go call a cab; and let a cab be called;And let the man that calls it be thy footman.LYDIA.You are not well. You shall not go alone.My carriage waits. I must accompany you.I go to find my hat. [Exit.CASHEL.Like Paracelsus,Who went to find his soul. [ToBashville.] And now, young man,How comes it that a fellow of your inches,So deft a wrestler and so bold a spirit,Can stoop to be a flunkey? Call on meOn your next evening out. I'll make a man of you.Surely you are ambitious and aspire——BASHVILLE.To be a butler and draw corks; wherefore,By Heaven, I will draw yours.[He hitsCashelon the nose, and runs out.Cashel[thoughtfully putting the side of his forefingerto his nose,and studying the blood on it].Too quick forme!There's money in this youth.Re-enterLydia,hatted and gloved.LYDIA.O Heaven! you bleed.CASHEL.Lend me a key or other frigid object,That I may put it down my back, and staunchThe welling life stream.LYDIA.[giving him her keys]. Oh, whathaveyou done?CASHEL.Flush on the boko napped your footman's left.LYDIA.I do not understand.CASHEL.True. Pardon me.I have received a blow upon the noseIn sport from Bashville. Next, ablution; elseI shall be total gules. [He hurries out.LYDIA.How well he speaks!There is a silver trumpet in his lipsThat stirs me to the finger ends. His noseDropt lovely color: 'tis a perfect blood.I would 'twere mingled with mine own!EnterBashvilleWhat now?BASHVILLE.Madam, the coachman can no longer wait:The horses will take cold.LYDIA.I do beseech himA moment's grace. Oh, mockery of wealth!The third class passenger unchidden ridesWhither and when he will: obsequious tramsAwait him hourly: subterranean tubesWith tireless coursers whisk him through the town;But we, the rich, are slaves to Houyhnhnms:We wait upon their colds, and frowst all dayIndoors, if they but cough or spurn their hay.BASHVILLE.Madam, an omnibus to Euston Road,And thence t' th' Angel—EnterCashelLYDIA.Let us haste, my love:The coachman is impatient.CASHEL.Did he guessHe stays for Cashel Byron, he'd outwaitPompei's sentinel. Let us away.This day of deeds, as yet but half begun,Must ended be in merrie Islington. [ExeuntLydiaandCashel.BASHVILLE.Gods! how she hangs on's arm! I am alone.Now let me lift the cover from my soul.O wasted humbleness! Deluded diffidence!How often have I said, Lie down, poor footman:She'll never stoop to thee, rear as thou wiltThy powder to the sky. And now, by Heaven,She stoops below me; condescends uponThis hero of the pothouse, whose exploits,Writ in my character from my last place,Would damn me into ostlerdom. And yetThere's an eternal justice in it; forBy so much as the ne'er subduéd IndianExcels the servile negro, doth this ruffianPrecedence take of me. "Ich dien." Damnation!I serve. My motto should have been, "I scalp."And yet I do not bear the yoke for gold.Because I love her I have blacked her boots;Because I love her I have cleaned her knives,Doing in this the office of a boy,Whilst, like the celebrated maid that milksAnd does the meanest chares, I've shared the passionsOf Cleopatra. It has been my prideTo give her place the greater altitudeBy lowering mine, and of her dignityTo be so jealous that my cheek has flamedEven at the thought of such a deep disgraceAs love for such a one as I would beFor such a one as she; and now! and now!A prizefighter! O irony! O bathos!To have made way for this! Oh, Bashville, Bashville:Why hast thou thought so lowly of thyself,So heavenly high of her? Let what will come,My love must speak: 'twas my respect was dumb.Scene IIThe Agricultural Hall in Islington, crowded with spectators.In the arena a throne, with a boxing ringbefore it. A balcony above on the right,occupiedby persons of fashion:among others,LydiaandLord Worthington.

Flourish.EnterLucianandCetewayo,with Chiefs in attendance.CETEWAYO.Is this the Hall of Husbandmen?LUCIAN.It is.CETEWAYO.Are these anæmic dogs the English people?LUCIAN.Mislike us not for our complexions,The pallid liveries of the pall of smokeBelched by the mighty chimneys of our factories,And by the million patent kitchen rangesOf happy English homes.CETEWAYO.When first I cameI deemed those chimneys the fuliginous altarsOf some infernal god. I now perceiveThe English dare not look upon the sky.They are moles and owls: they call upon the sootTo cover them.LUCIAN.You cannot understandThe greatness of this people, Cetewayo.You are a savage, reasoning like a child.Each pallid English face conceals a brainWhose powers are proven in the works of NewtonAnd in the plays of the immortal Shakespear.There is not one of all the thousands hereBut, if you placed him naked in the desert,Would presently construct a steam engine,And lay a cable t' th' Antipodes.CETEWAYO.Have I been brought a million miles by seaTo learn how men can lie! Know, Father Webber,Men become civilized through twin diseases,Terror and Greed to wit: these two conjoinedBecome the grisly parents of Invention.Why does the trembling white with frantic toilOf hand and brain produce the magic gunThat slays a mile off, whilst the manly ZuluDares look his foe i' the face; fights foot to foot;Lives in the present; drains the Here and Now;Makes life a long reality, and deathA moment only! whilst your EnglishmanGlares on his burning candle's winding-sheets,Counting the steps of his approaching doom.And in the murky corners ever seesTwo horrid shadows, Death and Poverty:In the which anguish an unnatural edgeComes on his frighted brain, which straight devisesStrange frauds by which to filch unearnéd gold,Mad crafts by which to slay unfacéd foes,Until at last his agonized desireMakes possibility its slave. And then—Horrible climax! All-undoing spite!—Th' importunate clutching of the coward's handFrom wearied Nature Devastation's secretsDoth wrest; when straight the brave black-livered manIs blown explosively from off the globe;And Death and Dread, with their white-livered slavesO'er-run the earth, and through their chattering teethStammer the words "Survival of the Fittest."Enough of this: I came not here to talk.Thou say'st thou hast two white-faced ones who dareFight without guns, and spearless, to the death.Let them be brought.LUCIAN.They fight not to the death,But under strictest rules: as, for example,Half of their persons shall not be attacked;Nor shall they suffer blows when they fall down,Nor stroke of foot at any time. And, further,That frequent opportunities of restWith succor and refreshment be secured them.CETEWAYO.Ye gods, what cowards! Zululand, my Zululand:Personified PusillanimityHath ta'en thee from the bravest of the brave!LUCIAN.Lo, the rude savage whose untutored mindCannot perceive self-evidence, and doubtsThat Brave and English mean the self-same thing!CETEWAYO.Well, well, produce these heroes. I surmiseThey will be carried by their nurses, lestSome barking dog or bumbling bee should scare them.Cetewayotakes his state.EnterParadiseLYDIA.What hateful wretch is this whose mighty thewsPresage destruction to his adversaries?LORD WORTHINGTON.'Tis Paradise.LYDIA.He of whom Cashel spoke?A dreadful thought ices my heart. Oh, whyDid Cashel leave us at the door?EnterCashelLORD WORTHINGTON.Behold!The champion comes.LYDIA.Oh, I could kiss him now,Here, before all the world. His boxing thingsRender him most attractive. But I fearYon villain's fists may maul him.WORTHINGTON.Have no fear.Hark! the king speaks.CETEWAYO.Ye sons of the white queen:Tell me your names and deeds ere ye fall to.PARADISE.Your royal highness, you beholds a blokeWhat gets his living honest by his fists.I may not have the polish of some toffsAs I could mention on; but up to nowNo man has took my number down. I scaleClose on twelve stun; my age is twenty-three;And at Bill Richardson's Blue Anchor pubAm to be heard of any day by suchAs likes the job. I don't know, governor,As ennythink remains for me to say.CETEWAYO.Six wives and thirty oxen shalt thou haveIf on the sand thou leave thy foeman dead.Methinks he looks scornfully on thee.[ToCashel] Ha! dost thou not so?CASHEL.Sir, I do beseech youTo name the bone, or limb, or special placeWhere you would have me hit him with this fist.CETEWAYO.Thou hast a noble brow; but much I fearThine adversary will disfigure it.CASHEL.There's a divinity that shapes our endsRough hew them how we will. Give me the gloves.THE MASTER OF THE REVELS.Paradise, a professor.Cashel Byron,Also professor. Time! [They spar.LYDIA.EternityIt seems to me until this fight be done.CASHEL.Dread monarch: this is called the upper cut,And this a hook-hit of mine own invention.The hollow region where I plant this blowIs called the mark. My left, you will observe,I chiefly use for long shots: with my rightAiming beside the angle of the jawAnd landing with a certain delicate screwI without violence knock my foeman out.Mark how he falls forward upon his face!The rules allow ten seconds to get up;And as the man is still quite silly, IMight safely finish him; but my respectFor your most gracious majesty's desireTo see some further triumphs of the scienceOf self-defence postpones awhile his doom.PARADISE.How can a bloke do hisself proper justiceWith pillows on his fists?[He tears off his gloves and attacksCashelwith his bare knuckles.THE CROWD.Unfair! The rules!CETEWAYO.The joy of battle surges boiling upAnd bids me join the mellay. IsandhlanaAnd Victory! [He falls on the bystanders.THE CHIEFS.Victory and Isandhlana![They run amok. General panic and stampede. The ring is swept away.LUCIAN.Forbear these most irregular proceedings.Police! Police![He engagesCetewayohis umbrella.The balconycomes down with a crash. Screams from itsoccupants. Indescribable confusion.CASHEL[draggingLydiafrom the struggling heap].My love, my love, art hurt?LYDIA.No, no; but save my sore o'ermatchéd cousin.A POLICEMAN.Give us a lead, sir. Save the English flag.Africa tramples on it.CASHEL.Africa!Not all the continents whose mighty shouldersThe dancing diamonds of the seas bedeckShall trample on the blue with spots of white.Now, Lydia, mark thy lover. [He charges the Zulus.LYDIA.HerculesCannot withstand him. See: the king is down;The tallest chief is up, heels over head,Tossed corklike o'er my Cashel's sinewy back;And his lieutenant all deflated gaspsFor breath upon the sand. The others flyIn vain: his fist o'er magic distancesLike a chameleon's tongue shoots to its mark;And the last African upon his kneesSues piteously for quarter. [Rushing intoCashel'sarms.] Oh, my hero:Thou'st saved us all this day.CASHEL.'Twas all for thee.CETEWAYO.[trying to rise]. Have I been struck by lightning?LUCIAN.Sir, your conductCan only be described as most ungentlemanly.POLICEMAN.One of the prone is white.CASHEL.'Tis Paradise.POLICEMAN.He's choking: he has something in his mouth.LYDIA[toCashel]. Oh Heaven! there is blood upon your hip.You're hurt.CASHEL.The morsel in yon wretch's mouthWas bitten out of me.[Sensation.Lydiascreams and swoons inCashel'sarms.

ACT III

Wiltstoken. A room in the Warren LodgeLydiaat her writing tableLYDIA.O Past and Present, how ye do conflictAs here I sit writing my father's life!The autumn woodland woos me from withoutWith whispering of leaves and dainty airsTo leave this fruitless haunting of the past.My father was a very learnéd man.I sometimes think I shall oldmaided beEre I unlearn the things he taught to me.EnterPolicemanPOLICEMAN.Asking your ladyship to pardon meFor this intrusion, might I be so boldAs ask a question of your people hereConcerning the Queen's peace?LYDIA.My people hereAre but a footman and a simple maid;And both have craved a holiday to joinSome local festival. But, sir, your helmetProclaims the Metropolitan Police.POLICEMAN.Madam, it does; and I may now inform youThat what you term a local festivalIs a most hideous outrage 'gainst the law,Which we to quell from London have come down:In short, a prizefight. My sole purpose hereIs to inquire whether your ladyshipAny bad characters this afternoonHas noted in the neighborhood.LYDIA.No, none, sir.I had not let my maid go forth to-dayThought I the roads unsafe.POLICEMAN.Fear nothing, madam:The force protects the fair. My mission hereIs to wreak ultion for the broken law.I wish your ladyship good afternoon.LYDIA.Good afternoon. [ExitPoliceman.A prizefight! O my heart!Cashel: hast thou deceived me? Can it beThou hast backslidden to the hateful callingI asked thee to eschew?O wretched maid,Why didst thou flee from London to this placeTo write thy father's life, whenas in townThou might'st have kept a guardian eye on him—What's that? A flying footstep—EnterCashelCASHEL.Sanctuary!The law is on my track. What! Lydia here!LYDIA.Ay: Lydia here. Hast thou done murder, then,That in so horrible a guise thou comest?CASHEL.Murder! I would I had. Yon cannibalHath forty thousand lives; and I have ta'enBut thousands thirty-nine. I tell thee, Lydia,On the impenetrable sarcolobeThat holds his seedling brain these fists have poundedBy Shrewsb'ry clock an hour. This bruiséd grassAnd cakéd mud adhering to my formI have acquired in rolling on the sodClinched in his grip. This scanty reefer coatFor decency snatched up as fast I fledWhen the police arrived, belongs to Mellish.'Tis all too short; hence my display of ribAnd forearm mother-naked. Be not wrothBecause I seem to wink at you: by Heaven,'Twas Paradise that plugged me in the eyeWhich I perforce keep closing. Pity me,My training wasted and my blows unpaid,Sans stakes, sans victory, sans everythingI had hoped to win. Oh, I could sit me downAnd weep for bitterness.LYDIA.Thou wretch, begone.CASHEL.Begone!LYDIA.I say begone. Oh, tiger's heartWrapped in a young man's hide, canst thou not liveIn love with Nature and at peace with Man?Must thou, although thy hands were never madeTo blacken others' eyes, still batter atThe image of Divinity? I loathe thee.Hence from my house and never see me more.CASHEL.I go. The meanest lad on thy estateWould not betray me thus. But 'tis no matter. [He opens the door.Ha! the police. I'm lost. [He shuts the door again.Now shalt thou seeMy last fight fought. Exhausted as I am,To capture me will cost the coppers dear.Come one, come all!LYDIA.Oh, hide thee, I implore:I cannot see thee hunted down like this.There is my room. Conceal thyself therein.Quick, I command. [He goes into the room.With horror I foresee,Lydia, that never lied, must lie for thee.EnterPoliceman,withParadiseandMellishincustody,Bashville,constables,and othersPOLICEMAN.Keep back your bruiséd prisoner lest he shockThis wellbred lady's nerves. Your pardon, ma'am;But have you seen by chance the other one?In this direction he was seen to run.LYDIA.A man came here anon with bloody handsAnd aspect that did turn my soul to snow.POLICEMAN.'Twas he. What said he?LYDIA.Begged for sanctuary.I bade the man begone.POLICEMAN.Most properly.Saw you which way he went?LYDIA.I cannot tell.PARADISE.He seen me coming; and he done a bunk.POLICEMAN.Peace, there. Excuse his damaged features, lady:He's Paradise; and this one's Byron's trainer,Mellish.MELLISH.Injurious copper, in thy teethI hurl the lie. I am no trainer, I.My father, a respected missionary,Apprenticed me at fourteen years of ageT' the poetry writing. To these woods I cameWith Nature to commune. My reveryWas by a sound of blows rudely dispelled.Mindful of what my sainted parent taught,I rushed to play the peacemaker, when lo!These minions of the law laid hands on me.BASHVILLE.A lovely woman, with distracted cries,In most resplendent fashionable frock,Approaches like a wounded antelope.EnterAdelaide GisborneADELAIDE.Where is my Cashel? Hath he been arrested?POLICEMAN.I would I had thy Cashel by the collar:He hath escaped me.ADELAIDE.Praises be for ever!LYDIA.Why dost thou call the missing manthyCashel?ADELAIDE.He is mine only son.ALL.Thy son!ADELAIDE.My son.LYDIA.I thought his mother hardly would have known him,So crushed his countenance.ADELAIDE.A ribald peer,Lord Worthington by name, this morning cameWith honeyed words beseeching me to mountHis four-in-hand, and to the country hieTo see some English sport. Being by natureFrank as a child, I fell into the snare,But took so long to dress that the designFailed of its full effect; for not untilThe final round we reached the horrid scene.Be silent all; for now I do approachMy tragedy's catastrophe. Know, then,That Heaven did bless me with an only son,A boy devoted to his doting mother——POLICEMAN.Hark! did you hear an oath from yonder room?ADELAIDE.Respect a broken-hearted mother's grief,And do not interrupt me in my scene.Ten years ago my darling disappeared(Ten dreary twelvemonths of continuous tears,Tears that have left me prematurely aged;For I am younger far than I appear).Judge of my anguish when to-day I sawStripped to the waist, and fighting like a demonWith one who, whatsoe'er his humble virtues,Was clearly not a gentleman, my son!ALL.O strange event! O passing tearful tale!ADELAIDE.I thank you from the bottom of my heartFor the reception you have given my woe;And now I ask, where is my wretched son?He must at once come home with me, and quitA course of life that cannot be allowed.EnterCashelCASHEL.Policeman: I do yield me to the law.LYDIA.Oh, no.ADELAIDE.My son!CASHEL.My mother! Do not kiss me.My visage is too sore.POLICEMAN.The lady hid him.This is a regular plant. You cannot beUp to that sex. [ToCashel] You come along with me.LYDIA.Fear not, my Cashel: I will bail thee out.CASHEL.Never. I do embrace my doom with joy.With Paradise in Pentonville or PortlandI shall feel safe: there are no mothers there.ADELAIDE.Ungracious boy—CASHEL.Constable: bear me hence.MELLISH.Oh, let me sweetest reconcilement makeBy calling to thy mind that moving song:—[Sings] They say there is no other—CASHEL.Forbear at once, or the next note of musicThat falls upon thine ear shall clang in thunderFrom the last trumpet.ADELAIDE.A disgraceful threatTo level at this virtuous old man.LYDIA.Oh, Cashel, if thou scorn'st thy mother thus,How wilt thou treat thy wife?CASHEL.There spake my fate:I knew you would say that. Oh, mothers, mothers,Would you but let your wretched sons aloneLife were worth living! Had I any choiceIn this importunate relationship?None. And until that high auspicious dayWhen the millennium on an orphaned worldShall dawn, and man upon his fellow look,Reckless of consanguinity, my motherAnd I within the self-same hemisphereConjointly may not dwell.ADELAIDE.Ungentlemanly!CASHEL.I am no gentleman. I am a criminal,Redhanded, baseborn—ADELAIDE.Baseborn! Who dares say it?Thou art the son and heir of Bingley BumpkinFitzAlgernon de Courcy Cashel Byron,Sieur of Park Lane and Overlord of Dorset,Who after three months' wedded happinessRashly fordid himself with prussic acid,Leaving a tearstained note to testifyThat having sweetly honeymooned with me,He now could say, O Death, where is thy sting?POLICEMAN.Sir: had I known your quality, this copI had averted; but it is too late.The law's above us both.EnterLucian,with an Order in CouncilLUCIAN.Not so, policemanI bear a message from The Throne itselfOf fullest amnesty for Byron's past.Nay, more: of Dorset deputy lieutenantHe is proclaimed. Further, it is decreed,In memory of his glorious victoryOver our country's foes at Islington,The flag of England shall for ever bearOn azure field twelve swanlike spots of white;And by an exercise of feudal rightToo long disused in this anarchic ageOur sovereign doth confer on him the handOf Miss Carew, Wiltstoken's wealthy heiress. [General acclamation.POLICEMAN.Was anything, sir, said about me?LUCIAN.Thy faithful services are not forgot:In future call thyself Inspector Smith. [Renewed acclamation.POLICEMAN.I thank you, sir. I thank you, gentlemen.LUCIAN.My former opposition, valiant champion,Was based on the supposed discrepancyBetwixt your rank and Lydia's. Here's my hand.BASHVILLE.And I do here unselfishly renounceAll my pretensions to my lady's favor. [Sensation.LYDIA.What, Bashville! didst thou love me?BASHVILLE.Madam: yes.'Tis said: now let me leave immediately.LYDIA.In taking, Bashville, this most tasteful courseYou are but acting as a gentlemanIn the like case would act. I fully grantYour perfect right to make a declarationWhich flatters me and honors your ambition.Prior attachment bids me firmly sayThat whilst my Cashel lives, and polyandryRests foreign to the British social scheme,Your love is hopeless; still, your services,Made zealous by disinterested passion,Would greatly add to my domestic comfort;And if——CASHEL.Excuse me. I have other views.I've noted in this man such aptitudeFor art and exercise in his defenceThat I prognosticate for him a futureMore glorious than my past. Henceforth I dub himThe Admirable Bashville, Byron's Novice;And to the utmost of my mended fortunesWill back him 'gainst the world at ten stone six.ALL.Hail, Byron's Novice, champion that shall be!BASHVILLE.Must I renounce my lovely lady's service,And mar the face of man?CASHEL.'Tis Fate's decree.For know, rash youth, that in this star crost worldFate drives us all to find our chiefest goodIn what wecan, and not in what wewould.POLICEMAN.A post-horn—hark!CASHEL.What noise of wheels is this?Lord Worthingtondrives upon the scene in his four-in-hand,and descendsADELAIDE.Perfidious peer!LORD WORTHINGTON.Sweet Adelaide——ADELAIDE.Forbear,Audacious one: my name is Mrs. Byron.LORD WORTHINGTON.Oh, change that title for the sweeter oneOf Lady Worthington.CASHEL.Unhappy man,You know not what you do.LYDIA.Nay, 'tis a matchOf most auspicious promise. Dear Lord Worthington,You tear from us our mother-in-law—CASHEL.Ha! true.LYDIA.—but we will make the sacrifice. She blushes:At least she very prettily producesBlushing's effect.ADELAIDE.My lord: I do accept you. [They embrace. Rejoicings.CASHEL[aside]. It wrings my heart to see my noble backerLay waste his future thus. The world's a chessboard,And we the merest pawns in fist of Fate.[Aloud.] And now, my friends, gentle and simple both,Our scene draws to a close. In lawful courseAs Dorset's deputy lieutenant IDo pardon all concerned this afternoonIn the late gross and brutal exhibitionOf miscalled sport.LYDIA[throwing herself into his arms]. Your boatsare burnt at last.CASHEL.This is the face that burnt a thousand boats,And ravished Cashel Byron from the ring.But to conclude. Let William ParadiseDevote himself to science, and acquire,By studying the player's speech in Hamlet,A more refined address. You, Robert Mellish,To the Blue Anchor hostelry attend him;Assuage his hurts, and bid Bill RichardsonLimit his access to the fatal tap.Now mount we on my backer's four-in-hand,And to St. George's Church, whose porticoHanover Square shuts off from Conduit Street,Repair we all. Strike up the wedding march;And, Mellish, let thy melodies trill forthBroad o'er the wold as fast we bowl along.Give me the post-horn. Loose the flowing rein;And up to London drive with might and main. [Exeunt.

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