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Act One SCENE I
A rocky and surf-beat margin of land walled in with great frowning cliffs. Cireas, Diomede.
CIREAS Diomede ? You here so early and in this wild wanton weather!
DIOMEDE I can find no fault in the weather, Cireas; it is brilliant and frolicsome.
CIREAS The rain has wept itself out and the sun has ventured into the open; but the wind is shouting like mad and the sea is still in a mighty passion. Has your mistress Andromeda sent you then with matin-offerings to Poseidon, or are you walking here to whip the red roses in your cheeks redder with the sea-breezes ?
DIOMEDE My mistress cares as much for your Poseidon as I for your glum beetle-browed priest Polydaon. But you, Cireas ? are you walking here to whip the red nose of you redder with the sea- breezes or to soothe with them the marks of his holiness’s cudgel?
CIREAS I must carry up these buckets of sea-water to swab down the blue-haired old fellow in the temple. Hang the robustious storm- shaken curmudgeon! I have rubbed him and scrubbed him and bathed him and swathed him for these eighteen years, yet he never sent me one profitable piece of wreckage out of his sea yet. A gold bracelet, now, crusted with jewels, dropped from the arm of some drowned princess, or a sealed casket velvet-lined Page – 11 with a priceless vase carried by the Rhodian merchants: that would not have beggared him! And I with so little could have bought my liberty.
DIOMEDE May be ’twas that he feared. For who would wish to lose such an expert body-servant as you, my Cireas?
CIREAS Zeus! if I thought that, I would leave his unwashed back to itch for a fortnight. But these Gods are kittle cattle to joke with. They have too many spare monsters about in their stables trained to snap up offenders for a light breakfast.
DIOMEDE And how prosper the sacrifices, Cireas ? I hope you keep your god soothingly and daintily fed in this hot summer season ?
CIREAS Alack, poor old Poseidon! He has had nothing but goats and sea-urchins lately, and that is poor food for a palate inured to homme a la Phenicienne, Diomede. It is his own fault, he should provide wreckage more freely. But black Polydaon’s forehead grows blacker every day: he will soon be as mad as Cybele’s bull on the headland. I am every moment in terror of finding my-self tumbled on the altar for a shipwrecked Phoenician and old blackbrows hacking about in search of my heart with his holy carving-tools.
DIOMEDE You should warn him beforehand that your heart is in your paunch hidden under twenty pounds of fat: so shall he have less cutting-exercise and you an easier exit.
CIREAS Out! Would you have me slit for a water-god’s dinner? Is this your tenderness for me? Page – 12
DIOMEDE Heaven forbid, dear Cireas. Syria would lose half her scampishness if you departed untimely to a worse world.
CIREAS Away from here, you long sauciness, you thin edge of naughty satire. But, no! First tell me, what news of the palace ? They say King Phineus will wed the Princess Andromeda.
DIOMEDE Yes, but not till the Princess Andromeda weds King Phineus. What noise is that?
CIREAS It was the cry of many men in anguish. He climbs up a rock.
DIOMEDE Zeus, what a wail was there! surely a royal Huge ship from Sidon or the Nile has kissed Our ragged beaches.
CIREAS A Phoenician galley Is caught and spinning in the surf, the men Urge desperate oars in vain. Hark, with a crash She rushes on the boulders’ iron fangs That rip her tender sides. How the white ship Battered against them by the growling surf Screams like a woman tortured! From all sides The men are shaken out, as rattling peas Leap from a long and bursting sheath: these sink Gurgling into the billows, those are pressed And mangled on the jagged rocks.
DIOMEDE O it must be Page – 13 A memorable sight! help me up, Cireas.
CIREAS No, no, for I must run and tell old blackbrows That here’s fresh meat for hungry grim Poseidon. He climbs down and out running.
DIOMEDE You disobliging dog! This is the first wreck in eighteen months and I not to see it! I will try and climb round the rock even if my neck and legs pay the forfeit. She goes out in the opposite direction. Page – 14 |