Who dreaded to elect me, and have since
Striven all they dare to weigh me down: be sure,
Before or since that period, had I held you
At so much price as to require your absence,
A word of mine had set such spirits to work

As would have made you nothing. But in all things
I have observed the strictest reverence;

Not for the laws alone, for those you have strain'd (I do not speak of you but as a single Voice of the many) somewhat beyond what

I could enforce for my authority,

Were I disposed to brawl; but, as I said,

I have observed with veneration, like
A priest's for the high altar, even unto
The sacrifice of my own blood and quiet,
Safety, and all save honour, the decrees,

The health, the pride, and welfare of the state.
And now, sir, to your business.

And mask'd nobility, your sbirri, and

Your spies, your galley and your other slaves,

To whom your midnight carryings off and drownings,
Your dungeons next the palace roofs, or under
The water's level; your mysterious meetings,
And unknown dooms, and sudden executions, [and
Your "Bridge of Sighs 1," your strangling chamber,
Your torturing instruments, have made ye seem
The beings of another and worse world!
Keep such for them: I fear ye not. I know ye;
Have known and proved your worst, in the infernal
Process of my poor husband! Treat me as
Ye treated him :-you did so, in so dealing
With him. Then what have I to fear from you,
Even if I were of fearful nature, which

And you, sir, not oppose my prayer to be Permitted to accompany my husband. Doge. I will endeavour.

Doge. All things are so to mortals; who can read them

Save he who made ? or, if they can, the few

And gifted spirits, who have studied long
That loathsome volume-man, and pored upon

Those black and bloody leaves, his heart and brain, 2

But learn a magic which recoils upon

The adept who pursues it: all the sins
We find in others, nature made our own;
All our advantages are those of fortune;
Birth, wealth, health, beauty, are her accidents,
And when we cry out against Fate, 't were well
We should remember Fortune can take nought
Save what she gave the rest was nakedness,
And lusts, and appetites, and vanities,
The universal heritage, to battle

With as we may, and least in humblest stations,
Where hunger swallows all in one low want, 3
And the original ordinance, that man

Must sweat for his poor pittance, keeps all passions
Aloof, save fear of famine ! All is low,
And false, and hollow-clay from first to last,
The prince's urn no less than potter's vessel.
Our fame is in men's breath, our lives upon
Less than their breath; our durance upon days,
Our days on seasons; our whole being on
Something which is not us!-So, we are slaves,
The greatest as the meanest—nothing rests
Upon our will; the will itself no less
Depends upon a straw than on a storm;
And when we think we lead, we are most led,
And still towards death, a thing which comes as much
Without our act or choice, as birth, so that
Methinks we must have sinn'd in some old world,
And this is hell: the best is, that it is not
Eternal.

2

Mar. These are things we cannot judge On earth.

Doge. And how then shall we judge each other, Who are all earth, and I, who am call'd upon To judge my son? I have administer'd

My country faithfully-victoriously

I dare them to the proof, the chart of what

She was and is: my reign has doubled realins;
And, in reward, the gratitude of Venice
Has left, or is about to leave, me single.

Mar. And Foscari? I do not think of such things, So I be left with him.

But yet subdued the world: in such a state
An individual, be he richest of

Such rank as is permitted, or the meanest,
Without a name, is alike nothing, when
The policy, irrevocably tending

To one great end, must be maintain'd in vigour. Mar. This means that you are more a Doge than father.

Doge. It means, I am more citizen than either. If we had not for many centuries

Had thousands of such citizens, and shall,

I trust, have still such, Venice were no city.
Mar. Accursed be the city where the laws
Would stifle nature's!

Jac. Fos. (solus). No light, save yon faint gleam, which shows me walls

Which never echo'd but to sorrow's sounds,
The sigh of long imprisonment, the step
Of feet on which the iron clank'd, the groan
Of death, the imprecation of despair!
And yet for this I have return'd to Venice,
With some faint hope, 't is true, that time, which wears
The marble down, had worn away the hate
Of men's hearts; but I knew them not, and here
Must I consume my own, which never beat

For Venice but with such a yearning as

The dove has for her distant nest, when wheeling
High in the air on her return to greet
Her callow brood. What letters are these which
[Approaching the wall.
Are scrawl'd along the inexorable wall? 1
Will the gleam let me trace them? Ah! the names
Of my sad predecessors in this place,

The dates of their despair, the brief words of
A grief too great for many. This stone page
Holds like an epitaph their history;
And the poor captive's tale is graven on
His dungeon barrier, like the lover's record
Upon the bark of some tall tree, which bears
His own and his beloved's name. Alas!
I recognise some names familiar to me,
And blighted like to mine, which I will add,
Fittest for such a chronicle as this,

Which only can be read, as writ, by wretches. 2
[He engraves his name.

Jac. Fos. And liberty? Mar.

Thy life is safe.

The mind should make its own. Jac. Fos. That has a noble sound; but 't is a sound, A music most impressive, but too transient: The mind is much, but is not all. The mind Hath nerved me to endure the risk of death, And torture positive, far worse than death (If death be a deep sleep), without a groan, Or with a cry which rather shamed my judges Than me; but 't is not all, for there are things More woful-such as this small dungeon, where I may breathe many years.

My doom is common, many are in dungeons,
But none like mine, so near their father's palace;
But then my heart is sometimes high, and hope
Will stream along those moted rays of light
Peopled with dusty atoms, which afford

after Giacopo had been tortured, he was removed to the Ducal apartments, not to one of the Pozzi; that his death occurred, not at Venice, but at Canea; that fifteen months elapsed between his last condemnation and his father's deposition; and that the death of the Doge took place, not at the palace, but in his own house. — Venet. Sketches, vol. ii. p. 105.]

But that they never granted-nor will grant,
And I shall be alone: no men-no books-
Those lying likenesses of lying men.

I ask'd for even those outlines of their kind,
Which they term annals, history, what you will,
Which men bequeath as portraits, and they were
Refused me, so these walls have been my study,
More faithful pictures of Venetian story,
With all their blank, or dismal stains, than is
The Hall not far from hence, which bears on high
Hundreds of doges, and their deeds and dates.
Mar. I come to tell thee the result of their
Last council on thy doom.

Jac. Fos.

Then my last hope's gone.

I could endure my dungeon, for 't was Venice ;

I could support the torture, there was something
In my native air that buoy'd my spirits up
Like a ship on the ocean toss'd by storms,
But proudly still bestriding the high waves,
And holding on its course; but there, afar,
In that accursed isle of slaves, and captives,
And unbelievers, like a stranded wreck,
My very soul seem'd mouldering in my bosom,
And piecemeal I shall perish, if remanded.

[Persons condemned to solitary confinement generally, we are assured, become either madmen or idiots, as mind or matter happens to predominate, when the mysterious balance between them is destroyed. But they who are subjected to such a dreadful punishment are generally, like most perpetrators of gross crimes, men of feeble internal resources. Men of talents, like Trenck, have been known, in the deepest seclusion, and most severe confinement, to battle the foul fiend melancholy, and to come off conquerors during a captivity of years. Those who suffer imprisonment for the sake of their country, or their religion, have yet a stronger support, and may exclaim, though in a different sense from that of Othello," It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul."— SIR WALTER SCOTT.]

2 In Lady Morgan's fearless and excellent work upon Italy, I perceive the expression of "Rome of the Ocean" applied to Venice. The same phrase occurs in the " Two Foscari." My publisher can vouch for me, that the tragedy was written and sent to England some time before I had seen Lady Morgan's work, which I only received on the 16th of August. I hasten, however, to notice the coincidence, and to yield the originality of the phrase to her who first placed it before the public. I am the more anxious to do this, as I am informed (for I have seen but few of the specimens, and those accidentally,) that there have been lately brought against me charges of plagiarism. [See post, note to the description of a ship. wreck, DON JUAN, C. ii. s. xxiv.]

Had I gone forth From my own land, like the old patriarchs, secking Another region, with their flocks and herds; Had I been cast out like the Jews from Zion, Or like our fathers, driven by Attila From fertile Italy, to barren islets,

I would have given some tears to my late country,
And many thoughts; but afterwards address'd
Myself, with those about me, to create

A new home and fresh state: perhaps I could
Have borne this—though I know not.
Mar.

Wherefore not ?

It was the lot of millions, and must be The fate of myriads more.

Jac. Fos.

Ay-we but hear

Of the survivors' toil in their new lands,
Their numbers and success; but who can number
The hearts which broke in silence of that parting,
Or after their departure; of that malady 3
Which calls up green and native fields to view
From the rough deep, with such identity
To the poor exile's fever'd eye, that he
Can scarcely be restrain'd from treading them?
That melody, which out of tones and tunes
Collects such pasture for the longing sorrow
Of the sad mountaineer, when far away
From his snow canopy of cliffs and clouds,
That he feeds on the sweet, but poisonous thought,
And dies. You call this weakness! It is strength,

"So by a calenture misled

The mariner with rapture sees
On the smooth ocean's azure bed
Enamel'd fields and verdaut trees:
With eager haste he longs to rove,

In that fantastic scene, and thinks

It must be some enchanted grove,

And in he leaps, and down he sinks."- SWIFT.]

4 Alluding to the Swiss air and its effects. - [The Ranz des Vaches, played upon the bag-pipe by the young cowkeepers on the mountains:-" An air," says Rousseau," so dear to the Swiss, that it was forbidden, under the pain of death, to play it to the troops, as it immediately drew tears from them, and made those who heard it desert, or die of what is called la maladie du pais, so ardent a desire did it excite to return to their country. It is in vain to seek in this air for energetic accents capable of producing such astonish. ing effects, for which strangers are unable to account from the music, which is in itself uncouth and wild. But it is from habit, recollections, and a thousand circumstances, retraced in this tune by those natives who hear it, and reminding them of their country, former pleasures of their youth, and all their ways of living, which occasion a bitter reflection at having lost them."]

I say,
the parent of all honest feeling.
He who loves not his country, can love nothing.
Mur. Obey her, then: 'tis she that puts thee forth.
Jac. Fos. Ay, there it is: 'tis like a mother's curse
Upon my soul—the mark is set upon me.
The exiles you speak of went forth by nations,
Their hands upheld each other by the way,
Their tents were pitch'd together—I'm alone.

Mar. You shall be so no more-I will go with thee.
Jac. Fos. My best Marina!—and our children?
Mar.

I fear, by the prevention of the state's
Abhorrent policy, (which holds all tics

They,

As threads, which may be broken at her pleasure,) Will not be suffer'd to proceed with us.

Jac. Fos. And canst thou leave them? Mar. Yes. With many a pang. But I can leave them, children as they are, To teach you to be less a child. From this Learn you to sway your feelings, when exacted By duties paramount; and 't is our first On earth to bear. Jac. Fos. Mar.

Have I not borne ?

Too much

Were far away from Venice, never saw

Her beautiful towers in the receding distance,
While every furrow of the vessel's track

Seem'd ploughing deep into your heart; you never
Saw day go down upon your native spires
So calmly with its gold and crimson glory,
And after dreaming a disturbed vision

Of them and theirs, awoke and found them not.

Mar. I will divide this with you. Let us think Of our departure from this much-loved city, (Since you must love it, as it seems,) and this Chamber of state, her gratitude allots you. Our children will be cared for by the Doge, And by my uncles: we must sail ere night. [father? Jac. Fos. That's sudden.

Shall I not behold my

Here, or in the ducal chamberI would that you could bear

That of leaving

If I am silent,

Jac. Fos.
Curse it not.
Who dares accuse my country?
Mar.
Men and angels!
The blood of myriads reeking up to heaven,
The groans of slaves in chains, and men in dungeons,
Mothers, and wives, and sons, and sires, and sub-
jects,

Held in the bondage of ten bald-heads; and
Though last, not least, thy silence. Couldst thou say
Aught in its favour, who would praise like thee?
Jac. Fos. Let us address us then, since so it must be,
To our departure. Who comes here?

Enter LOREDANO, attended by Familiars.
Lor. (to the Familiars).

But leave the torch.

Juc. Fos.

Retire,

[Exeunt the two Familiars.

Most welcome, noble signor.

I did not deem this poor place could have drawn
Such presence hither.

The last, were all men's merits well rewarded.
Came you here to insult us, or remain
As spy upon us, or as hostage for us?

Lor. Neither are of my office, noble lady! I am sent hither to your husband, to Announce" the Ten's" decree.