I live but in the sound-it is thy voice!
Phan. Manfred! To-morrow ends thine earthly ills.
Farewell!

Man. Yet one word more-am I forgiven?
Phan. Farewell!

Man.

Say, shall we meet again?

Phan. Farewell! Man. One word for mercy! Say, thou lovest me. Phan. Manfred!

[The Spirit of ASTARTE disappears. (1) Nem. She's gone, and will not be recall'd; Her words will be fulfill'd. Return to the earth. A Spirit. He is convulsed-This is to be a mortal, And seek the things beyond mortality.

Another Spirit. Yet, see, he mastereth himself, and makes

His torture tributary to his will.

Had he been one of us, he would have made
An awful spirit.

Nem.

Hast thou further question Of our great sovereign, or his worshippers?

Man. None. Nem.

Then for a time farewell.

Man. We meet then! Where? On the earth?Even as thou wilt: and for the grace accorded I now depart a debtor. Fare ye well!

[Exit MANFRED.

(Scene closes.)

ACT III. (2)

SCENE I.

(1) "Over this fine drama, a moral feeling hangs like a sombrons thunder-cloud. No other guilt but that so darkly shadowed out could have furnished so dreadful an illustration of the hideous aberrations of human nature, however noble and majestic, when left a prey to its desires, its passions, and its imagination. The beauty, at one time so innocently adored, is at last soiled, profaned, and violated. Affection, love, guilt, horror, remorse, and death, come in terrible succession, yet all darkly linked together. We think of Astarte as young, beautiful, innocent-guilty-lostmurdered-buried-judged -pardoned; but still. in her per. Imitted visit to earth, speaking in a voice of sorrow, and with a countenance yet pale with mortal trouble. We had but a glimpse of her in her beauty and innocence; but, at last, she rises up before us in all the mortal silence of a ghost, with fixed, glazed, and passionless eyes, revealing death, judgment, and eternity. The moral breathes and hurns in every word,-in sadness, misery, insanity, desolation, and death. The work is 'instinct with spirit,'-and in the agony and distraction, and all its dimly-imagined causes, we behold, though broken up, confused, and shattered, the elements of a purer existence." Wilson.-L. E.

(2) The third Act, as originally written, being shown to the late Mr. Gifford, he expressed his unfavourable opinion of it very distinctly; and Mr. Murray transmitted this to Lord Byron. The result is told in the following extracts from his letters:

Thou mayst retire.

It is well:

[Exit HERMAN. Man. (alone). There is a calm upon meInexplicable stillness! which till now Did not belong to what I knew of life. If that I did not know philosophy To be of all our vanities the motliest, The merest word that ever fool'd the ear From out the schoolman's jargon, I should deem The golden secret, the sought "Kalon," found, And seated in my soul. It will not last, But it is well to have known it, though but once: It hath enlarged my thoughts with a new sense, And I within my tablets would note down That there is such a feeling. Who is there?

And good intent, must plead my privilege;
Our near though not acquainted neighbourhood
May also be my herald. Rumours strange,
And of unholy nature, are abroad,

And busy with thy name; a noble name
For centuries: may he who bears it now
Transmit it unimpair'd!

Man.

Proceed, I listen. Abbot. "Tis said thou holdest converse with the

things

Which are forbidden to the search of man;

"Venice, April 14, 1817.—The third Act is certainly d-d bad, and, like the Archbishop of Grenada's homily (which savoured of the palsy), has the dregs of my fever, during which it was written. It must on no account be published in its present state. I will try and reform it, or re-write it altogether; but the impulse is gone, and I have no chance of making any thing out of it. The speech of Manfred to the Sun is the only part of this Act I thought good myself; the rest is certainly as bad as bad can be, and I wonder what the devil possessed me. I am very glad, indeed, that you sent me Mr. Gifford's opinion without deduction. Do you suppose me such a booby as not to be very much obliged to him? or that I was not, and am not, convinced and convicted in my conscience of this same overt act of nonsense? I shall try at it again; in the mean time, lay it upon the shelf-the whole Drama I mean.-Recollect not to publish, upon pain of I know not what, until 1 have tried again at the third act. I am not sure that I shall try, and still less that I shall succeed if I do,"

"Rome, May 5.-1 have re-written the greater part, and returned what is not altered in the proof you sent me. The Abbot is become a good man, and the Spirits are brought in at the death. You will find, I think, some good poetry in this new Act, here and there; and if so, print it, without sending me farther proofs, under Mr. Gifford's correction, if he will have the goodness to overlook it."-L. E.

That with the dwellers of the dark abodes,
The many evil and unheavenly spirits
Which walk the valley of the shade of death,
Thou communest. I know that with mankind,
Thy fellows in creation, thou dost rarely
Exchange thy thoughts, and that thy solitude
Is as an anchorite's, were it but holy.

Man. And what are they who do avouch these things?

Abbot. My pious brethren-the scared peasantry— Even thy own vassals-who do look on thee With most unquiet eyes. Thy life's in peril.

Man. Take it. Abbot.

I come to save, and not destroyI would not pry into thy secret soul; But if these things be sooth, there still is time For penitence and pity: reconcile thee

With the true church, and through the church to Heaven.

Man. I hear thee. This is my reply: whate'er
I may have been, or am, doth rest between
Heaven and myself.-I shall not choose a mortal
To be my mediator. Have I sinn'd

Against your ordinances? prove and punish! (1)
Abbot. My son! I did not speak of punishment,
But penitence and pardon;-with thyself
The choice of such remains-and for the last,
Our institutions and our strong belief

Have given me power to smooth the path from sin
To higher hope and better thoughts; the first
I leave to Heaven,- Vengeance is mine alone!"
So saith the Lord, and with all humbleness
His servant echoes back the awful word.

Man. Old man! there is no power in holy men,
Nor charm in prayer-nor purifying form
Of penitence-nor outward look-nor fast-

(1) Thus far the text stands, as originally penned : we subjoin the sequel of the scene, as given in the first MS. :"Abbot. Then, hear and tremble! For the headstrong wretch Who in the mail of innate hardihood

Would shield himself, and battle for his sins,

There is the stake on earth, and beyond earth eternal

Man. Charity, most reverend father,

Becomes thy lips so much more than this menace,

That I would call thee back to it: but say,

What wouldst thou with me?

On the raven-stone,

And his black wing flits

O'er the milk-white bone;

To and fro, as the night-winds blow,
The carcass of the assassin swings;
And there alone, on the raven-stone,
The raven flaps his dusky wings.

The fetters creak-and his ebon beak

Croaks to the close of the hollow sound;
And this is the tune, by the light of the moon,
To which the witches dance their round-
Merrily, merrily, cheerily, cheerily,
Merrily, merrily, speeds the ball:

The dead in their shrouds, and the demons in clouds,
Flock to the witches' carnival.

"Raven-stone (Rabenstein), a translation of the German word for the gibbet, which in Germany and Switzerland is permanent, and made of stone."

Abbot. I fear thee not-hence-benceAvannt thee, evil one!-help, ho! without there! Man. Convey this man to the Shreckborn-to its peakTo its extremest peak-watch with him there From now till sunrise; let him gaze, and know He ne'er again will be so near to heaven. But harm him not; and, when the morrow breaks, Set him down safe in his cell-away with him! Ash. Had I not better bring his brethren too, Convent and all, to bear him company?

Man. No, this will serve for the present. Take him up. Ash. Come, friar! now an exorcism or two,

And we shall fly the lighter.

ASHTAROTH disappears with the ABBOT, singing as follows:

A prodigal son, and a maid undone,

And a widow re-wedded within the year;
And a worldly monk, and a pregnant nun,
Are things which every day appear.
MANFRED alone.

Man. Why would this fool break in on me, and force

My art to pranks fantastical?--no matter,

It was not of my seeking. My heart sickens,
And weighs a fix'd foreboding on my soul:
But it is calm-calm as a sullen sea
After the hurricane; the winds are still,
But the cold waves swell high and heavily,
And there is danger in them. Such a rest
Is no repose. My life hath been a combat,
And every thought a wound, till I am scarr'd
In the immortal part of me.-What now?"-L. E.

(2) Otho, being defeated in a general engagement near Brixellum, stabbed himself. Plutarch says that, though he lived full as badly as Nero, his last moments were those of a philosopher. He comforted his soldiers, who lamented his fortune, and expressed his concern for their safety, when they solicited to pay him the last friendly offices. Martial says:

"Sit Cato, dum vivit, sane vel Cæsare major, Dum moritur, nunquid major Othone fuit?"-L E. (3) In the MS.

"To shun

not loss of life, but the torments of a Choose between them."-L. E.

public death.

And thy own soul with Heaven. Hast thou no hope?
'Tis strange-even those who do despair above,
Yet shape themselves some fantasy on earth,
To which frail twig they cling, like drowning men.
Man. Ay-father! I have had those earthly visions
And noble aspirations in my youth,

To make my own the mind of other men,
The enlightener of nations; and to rise
I knew not whither-it might be to fall;
But fall, even as the mountain-cataract,
Which having leapt from its more dazzling height,
Even in the foaming strength of its abyss
(Which casts up misty columns that become
Clouds raining from the re-ascended skies),
Lies low but mighty still.-But this is past;
My thoughts mistook themselves.
Abbot.
And wherefore so?
Man. I could not tame my nature down; for he
Must serve who fain would sway-and soothe-and

sue

And watch all time-and pry into all place-
And be a living lie-who would become
A mighty thing amongst the mean, and such
The mass are; I disdain'd to mingle with
A herd, though to be leader-and of wolves.
The lion is alone, and so am I.

Abbot. And why not live and act with other men?
Man. Because my nature was averse from life;
And yet not cruel; for I would not make,
But find, a desolation:-like the wind,
The red-hot breath of the most lone simoom,
Which dwells but in the desert, and sweeps o'er
The barren sands which bear no shrubs to blast,
And revels o'er their wild and arid waves,
And seeketh not, so that it is not sought,
But being met is deadly; such hath been
The course of my existence; but there came
Things in my path which are no more.
Abbot.

Alas!

(1) This speech has been quoted in more than one of the sketches of the poet's own life. Much earlier, when only twenty-three years of age, he had thus prophesied :-"It seems as if I were to experience in my youth the greatest misery of old age. My friends fall around me, and I shall be left a lonely tree before I am withered. Other men can always take refuge in their families-I have no resource but my own reflections, and they present no prospect, here or hereafter, except the selfish satisfaction of surviving my betters. I am, indeed, very wretched. My days are listless, and my nights restless. I have very seldom any society; and when I have, I run out of it. I don't know that 1 sha'n't end with insanity." B. Letters, 1811.-L. E.

(2) "Of the immortality of the soul, it appears to me that there can be little doubt-if we attend for a moment to the action of mind. It is in perpetual activity. I used to doubt of it--but reflection has taught me better. How far our future state will be individual; or, rather, how far it will at all resemble our present existence, is another question; but that the mind is eternal seems as probable as. that the body is not so," B. Diary, 1821.-"I have no wish to reject Christianity without investigation; on the contrary, I am very desirous of believing; for I have no happiness in my present unsettled notions on religion." B. Conversations with Kennedy, 1823.-L. E.

(3) "There are three only, even among the great poets of modern times, who have chosen to depict, in their full shape and vigour, those agonies to which great and meditative intellects are, in the present progress of human history, exposed by the eternal recurrence of a deep and dis

Of mortals on the earth, who do become
Old in their youth, and die ere middle age,
Without the violence of warlike death;
Some perishing of pleasure—some of study—
Some worn with toil-some of mere weariness—
Some of disease-and some insanity-(1)
And some of wither'd or of broken hearts;
For this last is a malady which slays
More than are number'd in the lists of Fate,
Taking all shapes, and bearing many names.
Look upon me! for even of all these things
Have I partaken; and of all these things
One were enough; then wonder not that I
Am what I am, but that I ever was,
Or, having been, that I am still on earth.
Abbot. Yet, hear me still-
Man.
Old man! I do respect
Thine order, and revere thine years; I deem
Thy purpose pious, but it is in vain:
Think me not churlish; I would spare thyself,
Far more than me, in shunning at this time
All further colloquy-And so-farewell. (2)

[Exit MANFRED.
Abbot. This should have been a noble creature: (3) he
Hath all the energy which would have made
A goodly frame of glorious elements,
Had they been wisely mingled; as it is,
It is an awful chaos-light and darkness-

And mind and dust-and passions and pure thoughts
Mix'd, and contending without end or order,
All dormant or destructive: he will perish,
And yet he must not; I will try once more,
For such are worth redemption; and my duty
Is to dare all things for a righteous end.
I'll follow him-but cautiously, though surely.

SCENE IL. Another Chamber. MANFRED and HERMAN.

[Exit ABBOT.

Her. My lord, you bade me wait on you at sunset: He sinks behind the mountain.

contented scepticism. But there is only one who has dared to represent himself as the victim of those nameless and undefinable sufferings. Goethe chose for his doubts and his darkness the terrible disguise of the mysterious Faustus. Schiller, with still greater boldness, planted the same anguish in the restless, haughty, and heroic bosom of Wallenstein. But Byron has sought no external symbol in which to embody the inquietudes of his soul. He takes the world, and all that it inherit, for his arena and his spectators; and he displays himself before their gaze, wrestling unceasingly and ineffectually with the demon that torments him. At times, there is something mournful and depressing in his scepticism; but oftener it is of a high and solemn character, approaching to the very verge of a confiding faith. Whatever the poet may believe, we, his readers, always feel ourselves too much ennobled and elevated, even by his melancholy, not to be confirmed in our belief by the very doubts so majestically conceived and uttered. His scepticism, if it ever approaches to a creed, carries with it its refutation in its grandeur. There is neither philosophy nor religion in those bitter and savage taunts which have been cruelly thrown out, from many quarters, against those moods of mind which are involuntary, and will not pass away; the shadows and spectres which still haunt his imagination may once have disturbed our own;--through his gloom there are frequent flashes of illumination;-and the sublime sadness, which to him is breathed from the mysteries of mortal existence, is always joined with a longing after immortality, and expressed in language that is itself divine." Wilson.-L. E.

[MANFRED advances to the Window of the Hall.
Glorious orb! the idol

Of early nature, and the vigorous race
Of undiseased mankind, the giant sons (1)
Of the embrace of angels, with a sex

More beautiful than they, which did draw down
The erring spirits, who can ne'er return,---
Most glorious orb! that wert a worship, ere
The mystery of thy making was reveal'd!
Thou earliest minister of the Almighty,

Which gladden'd, on their mountain-tops, the hearts
Of the Chaldean shepherds, till they pour'd
Themselves in orisons! Thou material God!
And representative of the Unknown-

Who chose thee for his shadow! Thou chief star!
Centre of many stars! which makest our earth
Endurable, and temperest the hues
And hearts of all who walk within thy rays!
Sire of the seasons! Monarch of the climes,
And those who dwell in them! for, near or far,
Our inborn spirits have a tint of thee,
Even as our outward aspects;-thou dost rise,
And shine, and set in glory. Fare thee well !
I ne'er shall see thee more. As my first glance
Of love and wonder was for thee, then take
My latest look: thou wilt not beam on one
To whom the gifts of life and warmth have been
Of a more fatal nature. (2) He is gone:
I follow.

SCENE III.

[Exit MANFRED.

The Mountains-The Castle of Manfred at some distance-A Terrace before a Tower.-Time, Twilight.

HERMAN, MANUEL, and other Dependants of
MANFRED.

Her. 'Tis strange enough; night after night, for

years,

He hath pursued long vigils in this tower,
Without a witness. I have been within it,-
So have we all been oft-times; but from it,
Or its contents, it were impossible
To draw conclusions absolute of aught
His studies tend to. To be sure, there is

(1) “And it came to pass, that the Sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were fair," etc.-"There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the Sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown."-Genesis, ch. vi. verses 2 and 4.

(2) "Pray, was Manfred's speech to the Sun still retained in Act third? I hope so: it was one of the best in the thing, and better than the Coliseum. " B. Letters, 1817. -L. E.

(3) In the MS.

"Some strange things in these few years.”—L. E.

(4) The remainder of the third Act, in its original shape, ran thus:

Her. Look-look-the towerThe tower's on fire. Oh, beavens and earth! what sound, What dreadful sound is that? [A crash like thunder. Manuet. Help, help, there!-to the rescue of the Count,The Count's in danger,-what ho! there! approach!

[The Servants, Vassals, and Peasantry approach, stu-
pified with terror.

If there be any of you who have heart,
And love of human kind, and will to aid
Those in distress-pause not-but follow me-
The portal's open, follow.

[MANUEL goes in.

One chamber where none enter: I would give
The fee of what I have to come these three years,
To pore upon its mysteries.
Manuel.

"T were dangerous; Content thyself with what thou know'st already. Her. Ah! Manuel! thou art elderly and wise, And couldst say much; thou hast dwelt within the How many years is 't? [castleManuel.

Ere Count Manfred's birth, I served his father, whom he nought resembles. Her. There be more sons in like predicament. But wherein do they differ?

Relate me some, to while away our watch:
I've heard thee darkly speak of an event
Which happen'd hereabouts, by this same tower.
Manuel. That was a night indeed! I do remember
"T was twilight, as it may be and such
now,
Another evening ;-yon red cloud, which rests
On Eigher's pinnacle, so rested then,-
So like that it might be the same; the wind
Was faint and gusty, and the mountain snows
Began to glitter with the climbing moon;
Count Manfred was, as now, within his tower,-
How occupied, we knew not, but with him
The sole companion of his wanderings
And watchings-her, whom of all earthly things
That lived, the only thing he seem'd to love,-
As he, indeed, by blood was bound to do,
The lady Astarte, his—(4)

Her.

Hush! who comes here?

[HERMAN goes in.

Come-who follows? What, none of ye?-ye recreants! shiver then Without. I will not see old Manuel risk His few remaining years unaided. Fassal. Hark!No-all is silent-not a breath-the flame Which shot forth such a blaze is also gone: What may this mean? Let's enter!

Peasant.

Faith, not I,

Re-enter MANUEL and HERMAN, bearing MANFRED in their arms.
Manuel. Hie to the castle, some of ye, and bring
What aid you can. Saddle the barb, and speed
For the leech to the city-quick! some water there!
Her. His cheek is black-but there is a faint beat
Still lingering about the heart. Some water.

[They sprinkle MANFRED with water; after u pause, he gives some signs of life. Manuel. He seems to strive to speak-come-cheerly, Count! He moves his lips-canst hear him? I am old,

The stars are forth, the moon above the tops
Of the snow-shining mountains.-Beautiful!
I linger yet with Nature, for the night
Hath been to me a more familiar face
Than that of man; and in her starry shade
Of dim and solitary loveliness,

I learn'd the language of another world.
I do remember me, that in my youth,
When I was wandering,-upon such a night
I stood within the Coliseum's wall, (2)
'Midst the chief relics of almighty Rome;
The trees which grew along the broken arches
Waved dark in the blue midnight, and the stars
Shone through the rents of ruin; from afar
The watch-dog bay'd beyond the Tiber; and
More near, from out the Cæsars' palace came
The owl's long cry, and, interruptedly,
Of distant sentinels the fitful song
Begun and died upon the gentle wind.
Some cypresses beyond the time-worn breach
Appear'd to skirt the horizon, yet they stood
Within a bowshot-Where the Cæsars dwelt,
And dwell the tuneless birds of night, amidst
A grove which springs through levell'd battlements,

And cannot catch faint sounds.

[HERMAN inclining his head and listening.
I hear a word

Her.
Or two-but indistinctly-what is next?
What's to be done? let's bear him to the castle.

[MANFRED motions with his hand not to remove him.
Manuel. He disapproves-and 't were of no avail-
He changes rapidly.
Her.

'T will soon be over.

Manuel. Oh what a death is this! that I should live
To shake my grey hairs over the last chief

Of the house of Sigismund!-And such a death!
Alone we know not how-unshrived-untended-
With strange accompaniments and fearful signs-
I shudder at the sight-but must not leave him.
Manfred (speaking faintly and slowly.) Old man! 't is not so
difficult to die. [MANFRED having said this, expires.
Herman. His eyes are fix'd and lifeless.-He is gone.
Manuel. Close them--My old hand quivers.-He departs-
Whither? I dread to think-but he is gone.-P. E

And twines its roots with the imperial hearths,
Ivy usurps the laurel's place of growth;-
But the gladiator's bloody circus stands,
A noble wreck in ruinous perfection!

While Cæsar's chambers, and the Augustan halls,
Grovel on earth in indistinct decay.-
And thou didst shine, thou rolling moon, upon
All this, and cast a wide and tender light,
Which soften'd down the hoar austerity
Of rugged desolation, and fill'd up,

As 't were anew, the gaps of centuries;
Leaving that beautiful which still was so,
And making that which was not, till the place
Became religion, and the heart ran o'er
With silent worship of the great of old!—
The dead but sceptred sovereigns, who still rule
Our spirits from their urns.-

"Twas such a night! 'Tis strange that I recall it at this time; But, I have found, our thoughts take wildest flight Even at the moment when they should array Themselves in pensive order.

And steadfastly;-now tell me what thou seest? Abbot. That which should shake me,—but I fear it not

I see a dusk and awful figure rise,
Like an inferual god, from out the earth;
His face wrapt in a mantle, and his form
Robed as with angry clouds: he stands between
Thyself and me-but I do fear him not.

(1) "The opening of this scene is, perhaps, the finest passage in the drama; and its solemn, calm, and majestic character throws an air of grandeur over the cata strophe, which was in danger of appearing extravagant, and somewhat too much in the style of the Devil and Dr. Faustus." Wilson.-L. E.

(2) "Drove at midnight to see the Coliseum by moonlight: but what can I say of the Coliseum? It must be ¦ seen; to describe it I should have thought impossible, if 1 had not read Manfred. To see it aright, as the Poet of the North tells us of the fair Melrose, one must see it by the pale moonlight.' The stillness of night, the whispering echoes, the moonlight shadows, and the awful grandeur of the impending ruins, form a scene of romantic sublimity, His such as Byron alone could describe as it deserves. description is the very thing itself." Matthews's Diary of an Invalid.-L. E.