Part 457 (1/2)

Chorus (BOHEMUND).

New signs of terror to my boding soul Are pictured;--in amazement lost I stand!

What light shall pierce this gloom of mystery?

ISABELLA (to the Chorus, who exhibit marks of confusion and embarra.s.sment).

Oh, ye hard hearts! Ye rude unpitying men!

A mother's transport from your breast of steel Rebounds, as from the rocks the heaving surge!

I look around your train, nor mark one glance Of soft regard. Where are my sons? Oh, tell me Why come they not, and from their beaming eyes Speak comfort to my soul? For here environed I stand amid the desert's raging brood, Or monsters of the deep!

DIEGO.

She opes her eyes!

She moves! She lives!

ISABELLA.

She lives! On me be thrown Her earliest glance!

DIEGO.

See! They are closed again-- She shudders!

ISABELLA (to the Chorus).

Quick! Retire--your aspect frights her.

[Chorus steps back.

RORER.

Well pleased I shun her sight.

DIEGO.

With outstretched eyes, And wonderstruck, she seems to measure thee.

BEATRICE.

Not strange those lineaments--where am I?

ISABELLA.

Slowly Her sense returns.

DIEGO.

Behold! upon her knees She sinks.

BEATRICE.

Oh, angel visage of my mother!

ISABELLA.

Child of my heart!

BEATRICE.

See! kneeling at thy feet The guilty one!

ISABELLA.

I hold thee in my arms!

Enough--forgotten all!