Thou art whole, whole! It was all a lie! Dost thou not know, miscreant, that it would be impossible for Charles to be the being you describe? (FRANCIS remains standing for some time, lost in thought, then suddenly turns round to go away.) Whither are you going in such haste? Are you flying from your own infamy?
FRANCIS (hiding his face). Let me go, let me go! to give free vent to my tears! tyrannical father, thus to abandon the best of your sons to misery and disgrace on every side! Let me go, Amelia! I will throw myself at his feet, on my knees I will conjure him to transfer to me the curse that he has p.r.o.nounced, to disinherit me, to hate me, my blood, my life, my all----.
AMELIA (falls on his neck). Brother of my Charles! Dearest, most excellent Francis!
FRANCIS. Oh, Amelia! how I love you for this unshaken constancy to my brother. Forgive me for venturing to subject your love to so severe a trial! How n.o.bly you have realized my wishes! By those tears, those sighs, that divine indignation--and for me too, for me--our souls did so truly harmonize.
AMELIA. Oh, no! that they never did!
FRANCIS. Alas! they harmonized so truly that I always thought we must be twins. And were it not for that unfortunate difference in person, to be twin-like, which, it must be admitted, would be to the disadvantage of Charles, we should again and again be mistaken for each other. Thou art, I often said to myself, thou art the very Charles, his echo, his counterpart.
AMELIA (shakes her head). No, no! by that chaste light of heaven! not an atom of him, not the least spark of his soul.
FRANCIS. So entirely the same in our dispositions; the rose was his favorite flower, and what flower do I esteem above the rose? He loved music beyond expression; and ye are witnesses, ye stars! how often you have listened to me playing on the harpsichord in the dead silence of night, when all around lay buried in darkness and slumber; and how is it possible for you, Amelia, still to doubt? if our love meets in one perfection, and if it is the self-same love, how can its fruits degenerate? (AMELIA looks at him with astonishment.) It was a calm, serene evening, the last before his departure for Leipzic, when he took me with him to the bower where you so often sat together in dreams of love,--we were long speechless; at last he seized my hand, and said, in a low voice, and with tears in his eyes, "I am leaving Amelia; I know not, but I have a sad presentiment that it is forever; forsake her not, brother; be her friend, her Charles--if Charles--should never--never return." (He throws himself down before her, and kisses her hand with fervor.) Never, never, never will he return; and I stand pledged by a sacred oath to fulfil his behest!
AMELIA (starting back). Traitor! Now thou art unmasked! In that very bower he conjured me, if he died, to admit no other love. Dost thou see how impious, how execrable----. Quit my sight!
FRANCIS. You know me not, Amelia; you do not know me in the least!
AMELIA. Oh, yes, I know you; from henceforth I know you; and you pretend to be like him? You mean to say that he wept for me in your presence? Yours? He would sooner have inscribed my name on the pillory? Begone--this instant!
FRANCIS. You insult me.
AMELIA. Go--I say. You have robbed me of a precious hour; may it be deducted from your life.
FRANCIS. You hate me then!
AMELIA. I despise you--away!
FRANCIS (stamping with fury). Only wait! you shall learn to tremble before me!--To sacrifice me for a beggar!
[Exit in anger.]
AMELIA. Go, thou base villain! Now, Charles, am I again thine own.
Beggar, did he say! then is the world turned upside down, beggars are kings, and kings are beggars! I would not change the rags he wears for the imperial purple. The look with which he begs must, indeed, be a n.o.ble, a royal look, a look that withers into naught the glory, the pomp, the triumphs of the rich and great! Into the dust with thee, glittering baubles! (She tears her pearls from her neck.) Let the rich and the proud be condemned to bear the burden of gold, and silver, and jewels! Be they condemned to carouse at the tables of the voluptuous!
To pamper their limbs on the downy couch of luxury! Charles! Charles!
Thus am I worthy of thee!
[Exit.]
ACT II.
SCENE I.--FRANCIS VON MOOR in his chamber--in meditation.
FRANCIS. It lasts too long-and the doctor even says is recovering--an old man"s life is a very eternity! The course would be free and plain before me, but for this troublesome, tough lump of flesh, which, like the infernal demon-hound in ghost stories, bars the way to my treasures.
Must, then, my projects bend to the iron yoke of a mechanical system?
Is my soaring spirit to be chained down to the snail"s pace of matter?
To blow out a wick which is already flickering upon its last drop of oil--"tis nothing more. And yet I would rather not do it myself, on account of what the world would say. I should not wish him to be killed, but merely disposed of. I should like to do what your clever physician does, only the reverse way--not stop Nature"s course by running a bar across her path, but only help her to speed a little faster. Are we not able to prolong the conditions of life? Why, then, should we not also be able to shorten them? Philosophers and physiologists teach us how close is the sympathy between the emotions of the mind and the movements of the bodily machine. Convulsive sensations are always accompanied by a disturbance of the mechanical vibrations-- pa.s.sions injure the vital powers--an overburdened spirit bursts its sh.e.l.l. Well, then--what if one knew how to smooth this unbeaten path, for the easier entrance of death into the citadel of life?--to work the body"s destruction through the mind--ha! an original device!--who can accomplish this?--a device without a parallel! Think upon it, Moor!
That were an art worthy of thee for its inventor. Has not poisoning been raised almost to the rank of a regular science, and Nature compelled, by the force of experiments, to define her limits, so that one may now calculate the heart"s throbbings for years in advance, and say to the beating pulse, "So far, and no farther"? Why should not one try one"s skill in this line?*
*[A woman in Paris, by means of a regularly performed series of experiments, carried the art of poisoning to such perfection that she could predict almost to a certainty the day of death, however remote. Fie upon our physicians, who should blush to be outdone by a woman in their own province. Beckmann, in his article on secret poisoning, has given a particular account of this woman, the Marchioness de Brinvilliers.--See "History of Inventions," Standard Library Edition, vol. i, pp. 47-63.]
And how, then, must I, too, go to work to dissever that sweet and peaceful union of soul and body? What species of sensations should I seek to produce? Which would most fiercely a.s.sail the condition of life? Anger?--that ravenous wolf is too quickly satiated. Care? that worm gnaws far too slowly. Grief?--that viper creeps too lazily for me.
Fear?--hope destroys its power. What! and are these the only executioners of man? is the armory of death so soon exhausted? (In deep thought.) How now! what! ho! I have it! (Starting up.) Terror! What is proof against terror? What powers have religion and reason under that giant"s icy grasp! And yet--if he should withstand even this a.s.sault? If he should! Oh, then, come Anguish to my aid! and thou, gnawing Repentance!--furies of h.e.l.l, burrowing snakes who regorge your food, and feed upon your own excrements; ye that are forever destroying, and forever reproducing your poison! And thou, howling Remorse, that desolatest thine own habitation, and feedest upon thy mother. And come ye, too, gentle Graces, to my aid; even you, sweet smiling Memory, G.o.ddess of the past--and thou, with thy overflowing horn of plenty, blooming Futurity; show him in your mirror the joys of Paradise, while with fleeting foot you elude his eager grasp. Thus will I work my battery of death, stroke after stroke, upon his fragile body, until the troop of furies close upon him with Despair! Triumph! triumph!--the plan is complete--difficult and masterly beyond compare--sure--safe; for then (with a sneer) the dissecting knife can find no trace of wound or of corrosive poison.
(Resolutely.) Be it so! (Enter HERMANN.) Ha! _Deus ex machina_!
Hermann!
HERMANN. At your service, gracious sir!
FRANCIS (shakes him by the hand). You will not find it that of an ungrateful master.
HERMANN. I have proofs of this.
FRANCIS. And you shall have more soon--very soon, Hermann!--I have something to say to thee, Hermann.
HERMANN. I am all attention.
FRANCIS. I know thee--thou art a resolute fellow--a man of mettle.--To call thee smooth-tongued! My father has greatly belied thee, Hermann.
HERMANN. The devil take me if I forget it!
FRANCIS. Spoken like a man! Vengeance becomes a manly heart! Thou art to my mind, Hermann. Take this purse, Hermann. It should be heavier were I master here.
HERMANN. That is my unceasing wish, most gracious sir. I thank you.
FRANCIS. Really, Hermann! dost thou wish that I were master? But my father has the marrow of a lion in his bones, and I am but a younger son.
HERMANN. I wish you were the eldest son, and that your father were as marrowless as a girl sinking in a consumption.
FRANCIS. Ha! how that elder son would recompense thee! How he would raise thee from this grovelling condition, so ill suited to thy spirit and n.o.ble birth, to be a light of the age!--Then shouldst thou be covered with gold from head to foot, and dash through the streets four in hand--verily thou shouldst!--But I am losing sight of what I meant to say.--Have you already forgotten the Lady Amelia, Hermann?
HERMANN. A curse upon it! Why do you remind me of her?
FRANCIS. My brother has filched her away from you.
HERMANN. He shall rue it.
FRANCIS. She gave you the sack. And, if I remember right, he kicked you down stairs.
HERMANN. For which I will kick him into h.e.l.l.
FRANCIS. He used to say, it was whispered abroad, that your father could never look upon you without smiting his breast and sighing, "G.o.d be merciful to me, a sinner!"
HERMANN (wildly). Thunder and lightning! No more of this!
FRANCIS. He advised you to sell your patent of n.o.bility by auction, and to get your stockings mended with the proceeds.