Part 9 (1/2)

What n.o.ble speech and port!

(_Aloud._) But if perchance You solve the riddles, and then prove to be Of mean extraction, how shall the edict...

CALAF (_interrupting him quickly_).

Sire, The edict serves not save for sons of Kings.

If I by help of Heaven should solve the riddles, And then were found to be of base extraction, Let my head pay for it. My body give To dogs and carrion crows upon the fields.

There is one man in Pekin knows my name, And he will bear me witness.

(_With an obeisance to the_ EMPEROR.)

Therefore I Entreat you in your mercy once again, Still let my name be covered up with dark.

ALTOUM.

So be it then! It is your pleasing speech And n.o.ble bearing make me grant the boon.

Oh that you now would grant the Emperor The boon he begs for from his very throne, Beseeching you: Go back, my son, go back!

Desist from this adventure, and go back!

PANTALONE.

We can't get him any farther, your Majesty.

ALTOUM.

The nations are already nursing wrath Against me for the reckless oath I swore.

Do not thou also force me to shed tears Over thy corpse. Oh, force me not to hate This daughter of my loins more than I do Already; force me not to hate myself Who brought her into the world, more than I do.

Proud, vain, and pitiless, and cruel, source Is she of torment to me till I die.

CALAF.

Sire, but I cannot think that you have cause To fill your heart with torment and unrest.

If in your daughter there is cruelty, It is not from her father that it came.

If guilt you have, it can be only this: That you have given the world such peerless beauty As draws all men to her. I thank you, Sire, For your great goodness! I have but one thought, To win your Turandot or live no more.

All that I ask is death or Turandot.

PANTALONE.

H'm, my dearest Royal Highness, I presume you vouchsafed to behold the severed heads on the city wall. Eh? Heaven knows what pleasure there can be in having oneself stuck like a pig, so that afterwards the whole town is full of tears and blowing of noses, Heaven knows. I can tell you beforehand, the Princess will nail you three riddles together that it would take Old Moore himself seven years to take to pieces, Heaven knows. We two sit here, year in, year out, and the learned doctors, too, sit here in judgment, judging who guesses well and who guesses ill, and we've had a bit of practice and we can ”read print, Heaven knows--and yet we can't make head or tail of our most wise Princess's riddles. These are not riddles like those in Sat.u.r.day's _Daily Telegraph_, such as:

”Puts his head between his feet, And rolls him in a ball complete,”