Second Signor. They are matters not; the chiefs

besides, it

trial

all's lost

Unless that fearful bell be silenced soon. The officer hath miss'd his path or purpose, Or met some unforeseen and hideous obstacle. Anselmo, with thy company proceed Straight to the tower; the rest remain with me.

[Exit a part of the Guard. Doge. Wretch! if thou wouldst have thy vile life, implore it;

It is not now a lease of sixty seconds.
Ay, send thy miserable ruffians forth;
They never shall return.

Sign. of the Night. So let it be!
They die then in their duty, as will I.
Doge. Fool! the high eagle flies at nobler
game

Than thou and thy base myrmidons, live on, So thou provok'st not peril by resistance, And learn (if souls so much obscured can bear To gaze upon the sunbeams) to be free. Sign. of the Night. And learn thou to be captive-It hath ceased,

[The bell ceases to toll. The traitorous signal, which was to have set The bloodhound - mob on their patrician prey

The knell hath rung,but it is not the senate's! Doge (after a pause). All's silent, and all's lost!

Sign. of the Night. Now,Doge, denounce me As rebel slave of a revolted council! Have I not done my duty?

Doge. Peace, thou thing! Thou hast done a worthy deed, and earn'd the price

Of blood, and they who use thee will reward thee.

But thou wert sent to watch,and not to prate, As thou saidst even now then do thine office, But let it be in silence, as behoves thee, Since, though thy prisoner, I am thy prince. Sign. of the Night. I did not mean to fail in the respect

Due to your rank: in this I shall obey you. Doge (aside). There now is nothing left me save to die;

And yet how near success! I would have fallen,

And proudly, in the hour of triumph, but To miss it thus!

Enter other SIGNORS OF THE NIGHT with

BERTUCCIO FALIERO prisoner.

Second Signor. We took him in the act Ofissuing from the tower, where,at his order, As delegated from the Doge, the signal Had thus begun to sound.

First Signor. Are all the passes Which lead up to the palace well secured?

taken.

B. Fal. Uncle!

Doge. It is in vain to war with Fortune; The glory hath departed from our house. B. Fal. Who would have deem'd it?Ah! one moment sooner!

Doge. That moment would have changed the face of ages;

This gives us to eternity-We'll meet it As men whose triumph is not in success, But who can make their own minds all in all, Equal to every fortune. Droop not, 'tis But a brief passage-I would go alone, Yet if they send us, as 'tis like, together, Let us go worthy of our sires and selves.

B. Fal. I shall not shame you, uncle. First Signor. Lords, our orders Are to keep guard on both in separate chambers,

Until the council call ye to your trial.

Doge. Our trial! will they keep their

mockery up

Even to the last? but let them deal upon us, As we had dealt on them, but with less pomp. 'Tis but a game of mutual homicides, Who have cast lots for the first death, and they

Have won with false dice.-Who hath been our Judas?

First Signor. I am not warranted to

answer that.

The Chief of the Ten, BENINTENDE. Benintende. There now rests, after such conviction of

Their manifold and manifest offences,
But to pronounce on these obdurate men
The sentence of the law: a grievous task
To those who hear, and these who speak. Alas!
That it should fall to me! and that my days
Of office should be stigmatised through all
The years of coming time, as bearing record
To this most foul and complicated treason
Against a just and free state, known to all
The earth as being the Christian bulwark
'gainst

The Saracen and the schismatic Greek,
The savage Hun, and not less barbarous

Frank;

A city which has open'd India's wealth
To Europe; the last Roman refuge from
O'erwhelming Attila; the ocean's queen;
Proud Genoa's prouder rival! 'Tis to sap
The throne of such a city, these lost men
Have risk'd and forfeited their worthless

lives

So let them die the death. ́

Bert. We are prepared; Your racks have done that for us. Let us die. Benint. If ye have that to say which would obtain

Abatement of your punishment, the Giunta Will hear you; if you have aught to confess, Now is your time, perhaps it may avail ye. Bert. We stand to hear, and not to speak. Benint. Your crimes

Are fully proved by your accomplices, And all which circumstance can add to aid them;

Yet we would hear from your own lips

Bert. Go, ask your racks what they have wrung from us,

Or place us there again; we have still some blood left,

And some slight sense of pain in these wrench'd limbs:

But this ye dare not do; for if we die thereAnd you have left us little life to spend Upon your engines, gorged with pangs already

Ye lose the public spectacle with which You would appal your slaves to further slavery!

Groans are not words, nor agony assent,
Nor affirmation truth, if nature's sense
Should overcome the soul into a lie,
For a short respite-must we bear or die?
Benint. Say, who were your accomplices?

I pray you pass to judgment.
Benint. It is coming.-

And you, too, Philip Calendaro, what Have you to say why you should not be doom'd?

Cal. I never was a man of many words, And now have few left worth the utterance. Benint. A further application of yon engine

May change your tone.

Cal. Most true, it will do so; A former application did so; but It will not change my words, or, if it did Benint. What then?

Cal. Will my avowal on yon rack

Stand good in law?

Upon your power.

Benint. Your chief accomplices

But found on my arrival, that besides
The jealous vigilance which always led you
To mock and mar your sovereign's best
intents,

You had, even in the interregnum of
My journey to the capital, curtail'd
And mutilated the few privileges
Yet left the duke: all this I bore, and would

By the pollution of your ribaldry,
And he,the ribald, whom I see amongst you—
Fit judge in such tribunal!—

Doge. (looking at him contemptuously) No. Benint. And two others, Israel Bertuccio, And Philip Calendaro, have admitted Their fellowship in treason with the Doge! Doge. And where are they?

Benint. Gone to their place, and now Answering to Heaven for what they did on earth.

Doge. Ah! the plebeian Brutus,is he gone? And the quick Cassius of the arsenal?— How did they meet their doom?

Benint. Think of your own;

It is approaching. You decline to plead, then? Doge. I cannot plead to my inferiors, nor Can recognise your legal power to try me: Show me the law!

Benint. On great emergencies, The law must be remodell'd or amended: Our fathers had not fix'd the punishment Of such a crime, as on the old Roman tables The sentence against parricide was left In pure forgetfulness; they could not render That penal, which had neither name nor thought

In their great bosoms: who would have

foreseen

That nature could be filed to such a crime As sons 'gainst sires, and princes 'gainst their realms?

Your sin hath made us make a law which will Become a precedent 'gainst such haught

traitors.

As would with treason mount to tyranny;
Not even contented with a sceptre, till
They can convert it to a two-edged sword!
Was not the place of Doge sufficient for ye?
What's nobler than the signory of Venice?
Doge. The signory of Venice! You be-
tray'd me-

You-you, who sit there, traitors as ye are!
From my equality with you in birth,
And my superiority in action,
You drew me from my honourable toils
In distant lands on flood in field-in cities
You singled me out like a victim to
Stand crown'd, but bound and helpless,
the altar
Where you alone could minister. I knew not
I sought not-wish'd not-dream'd not the
election,

at

Which reach'd me first at Romc,and I obey'd;

Benint. (interrupting him) Michel Steno
Is here in virtue of his office, as
One of the Forty; "The Ten” having craved
A Giunta of patricians from the senate
To aid our judgment in a trial arduous
And novel as the present: he was set
Free from the penalty pronounced upon him,
Because the Doge, who should protect the
law,

Seeking to abrogate all law, can claim
No punishment of others by the statutes
Which he himself denies and violates!

Doge. His PUNISHMENT! I rather see him

Which makes the cup run o'er, and mine was full

Already: you oppress'd the prince and people; I would have freed both, and have fail'd in both:

The price of such success would have been glory,

Vengeance, and victory, and such a name
As would have made Venetian history
Rival to that of Greece and Syracuse
When they were freed, and flourish'd ages
after,

And mine to Gelon and to Thrasybulus:-
Failing, I know the penalty of failure
Is present infamy and death-the future
Will judge, when Venice is no more, or free;
Till then, the truth is in abeyance. Pause not;
I would have shown no mercy, and I seek

Of our tribunal?

Doge. I confess to have fail'd: Fortune is female; from my youth her favours

Were not withheld; the fault was mine to hope

Her former smiles again at this late hour. Benint. You do not then in aught arraign our equity?

Doge. Noble Venetians! stir me not with questions.

I am resign'd to the worst; but in me still Have something of the blood of brighter days,

And am not over-patient. Pray you, spare me Further interrogation, which boots nothing, Except to turn a trial to debate.

I shall but answer that which will offend you,

And please your enemies -- a host already: 'Tis true, these sullen walls should yield no echo;

But walls have ears-1 —nay, more, they have tongues; and if There were no other way for truth to o'erleap them,

You who condemn me, you who fear and slay me,

Yet could not bear in silence to your graves What you would hear from me of good or evil; The secret were too mighty for your souls: Then let it sleep in mine, unless you court A danger which would double that you

escape.

Such my defence would be, had I full scope, To make it famous; for true words are things, And dying men's are things which long outlive,

And oftentimes avenge them; bury mine, If ye would fain survive me: take this counsel,

And though too oft ye made me live in wrath,
Let me die calmly; you may grant me this;
I deny nothing - defend nothing-nothing
I ask of you, but silence for myself,
And sentence from the court!

Benint. This full admission
Spares us the harsh necessity of ordering
The torture to elicit the whole truth.
Doge. The torture! you have put me
there already,

Daily since I was Doge; but if you will Add the corporeal rack, you may: these limbs Will yield with age to crushing iron; but There's that within my heart shall strain your engines.

Enter an OFFICER.

Officer. Noble Venetians! Duchess Faliero Requests admission to the Giunta's presence.

Benint. Say, conscript fathers, shall she be admitted?

One of the Giunta. She may have revelations of importance

Unto the state, to justify compliance
With her request.

Benint. Is this the general will?
All. It is.

Doge. Oh, admirable laws of Venice! Which would admit the wife,in the full hope That she might testify against the husband. What glory to the chaste Venetian dames! But such blasphemers 'gainst all honour, as Sit here, do well to act in their vocation. Now, villain Steno! if this woman fail, I'll pardon thee thy lie, and thy escape, And my own violent death, and thy vile life. The DUCHESs enters.

Benint. Lady! this just tribunal has resolved,

Though the request be strange, to grant it,and
Whatever be its purport, to accord
A patient hearing with the due respect
Which fits your ancestry, your rank, and

virtues:

But you turn pale-ho! there, look to the lady!

Place a chair instantly.

Ang. A moment's faintness'Tis past; I pray you pardon me, I sit not In presence of my prince,and of my husband, While he is on his feet.

Benint. Your pleasure, lady?

Ang. Strange rumours, but most true, if all I hear

And see be sooth,have reach'd me, and I come
To know the worst,even at the worst; forgive
The abruptness of my entrance and my
bearing.

Is it—I cannot speak—I cannot shape
The question-but you answer it ere spoken,
With eyes averted, and with gloomy brows—
Oh God! this is the silence of the grave!

Benint. (after a pause.) Spare us, and
spare thyself the repetition
Of our most awful, but inexorable
Duty to heaven and men!

Ang. Yet speak; I cannot

I cannot-no-even now believe these things. Is he condemn'd?