Delphi Complete Works of George Eliot (Illustrated) (685 page)

Winning more love. I cannot tell the end.

I held my people’s good within my breast.

Behold, now, I deliver it to you.

See, it still breathes unstrangled, — if it dies,

Let not your failing will be murderer. Rise,

And tell our people now I wait in pain, —

I cannot die until I hear them say

They will obey you.

[Meek, she pressed her lips

With slow solemnity upon his brow

Sealing her pledges. Firmly then she rose,

And met her people’s eyes with kindred gaze,

Dark-flashing, fired by effort; strenuous

Trampling on pain.]

FEDALMA.

Zincali all, who hear !

Your Chief is dying : I his daughter live

To do his dying will. He asks you now

To promise me obedience as your Queen,

That we may seek the land he won for us,

And live the better life for which he toiled.

Speak now, and fill my father’s dying ear

With promise that you will obey him dead,

Obeying me his child.

[Straightway arose

A shout of promise, sharpening into cries

That seemed to plead despairingly with death.]

THE ZINCALI.

We will obey ! Our Chief shall never die !

We will obey him, — will obey our Queen !

[The shout unanimous, the concurrent rush

Of many voices, quiring shook the air

With multitudinous wave : now rose, now fell,

Then rose again, the echoes following slow,

As if the scattered brethren of the tribe

Had caught afar and joined the ready vow.

Then some could hold no longer, but must rush

To kiss his dying feet, and some to kiss

The hem of their Queen’s garment. But she raised

Her hand to hush them. “ Hark ! Your Chief may speak

Another wish. “ Quickly she kneeled again,

While they upon the ground kept motionless,

With head outstretched. They heard his words ; for now,

Grasping at Nadar’s arm, he spoke more loud,

As one who, having fought and conquered, hurls

His strength away with hurling of the shield.]

ZARCA.

Let loose the Spaniard ! give him back his sword ;

He cannot move to any vengeance more, —

His soul is locked ‘twixt two opposing crimes.

I charge you let him go unharmed and free

Now through your midst
     

[With that he sank again, —

His breast heaved strongly tow’rd sharp sudden falls,

And all his life seemed needed for each breath :

Yet once he spoke.]

My daughter, lay your arm

Beneath my head, — so, — bend and breathe on me.

I cannot see you more, — the night is come.

Be strong, — remember, — I can only — die.

[His voice went into silence, but his breast

Heaved long and moaned : its broad strength kept a life

That heard naught, saw naught, save what once had been,

And what might be in days and realms afar, —

Which now in pale procession faded on

Toward the thick darkness. And she bent above

In sacramental watch to see great Death,

Companion of her future, who would wear

For ever in her eyes her father’s form.

And yet she knew that hurrying feet had gone

To do the Chief’s behest, and in her soul

He who was once its lord was being jarred

With loosening of cords, that would not loose

The tightening torture of his anguish. This, —

O she knew it ! — knew it as martyrs knew

The prongs that tore their flesh, while yet their tongues

Refused the ease of lies. In moments high

Space widens in the soul. And so she knelt,

Clinging with piety and awed resolve

Beside this altar of her father’s life,

Seeing long travel under solemn suns

Stretching beyond it ; never turned her eyes,

Yet felt that Silva passed ; beheld his face

Pale, vivid, all alone, imploring her

Across black waters fathomless.

And he passed.

The Gypsies made wide pathway, shrank aloof

As those who fear to touch the thing they hate,

Lest hate triumphant, mastering all the limbs,

Should tear, bite, crush, in spite of hindering will

Slowly he walked, reluctant to be safe

And bear dishonored life which none assailed ;

Walked hesitatingly, all his frame instinct

With high-born spirit, never used to dread

Or crouch for smiles, yet stung, yet quivering

With helpless strength, and in his soul convulsed

By visions where pale horror held a lamp

Over wide-reaching crime. Silence hung round :

It seemed the Pla9a hushed itself to hear

His footsteps and the Chiefs deep dying breath.

Eyes quickened in the stillness, and the light

Seemed one clear gaze upon his misery.

And yet he could not pass her without pause :

One instant he must pause and look at her ;

But with that glance at her averted head,

New-urged by pain he turned away and went,

Carrying forever with him what he fled, —

He murdered love, — her love, a dear wronged ghost,

Facing him, beauteous, ‘mid the throngs of hell.

O fallen and forsaken ! Were no hearts

Amid that crowd, mindful of what had been ? —

Hearts such as wait on beggared royalty,

Or silent watch by sinners who despair ?

Silva had vanished. That dismissed revenge

Made larger room for sorrow in fierce hearts ;

And sorrow filled them. For the Chief was dead.

The mighty breast subsided slow to calm,

Slow from the face the ethereal spirit waned,

As wanes the parting glory from the heights,

And leaves them in their pallid majesty.

Fedalma kissed the marble lips, and said,

“ He breaths no more. “ And then a long loud wail

Poured out upon the morning, made her light

Ghastly as smiles on some fair maniac’s face

Smiling unconscious o’er her bridegroom’s corse.

The wailing men in eager press closed round,

And made a shadowing pall beneath the sun.

They lifted reverent the prostate strength,

Sceptred anew by death. Fedalma walked

Tearless, erect, following the dead, — her cries

Deep smothering in her breast, as one who guides

Her children through the wilds, and sees and knows

Of danger more than they, and feels more pangs,

Yet shrinks not, groans not, bearing in her heart

Their ignorant misery and their trust in her.

BOOK V

The eastward rooks of Almeria’s bay

Answer long farewells of the travelling sun

With softest glow as from an inward pulse

Changing and flushing : all the Moorish ships

Seem conscious too, and shoot out sudden shadows ;

Their black hulls snatch a glory, and their sails

Show variegated radiance, gently stirred

Like broad wings poised. Two galleys moored apart

Show decks as busy as a home of ants

Storing new forage ; from their sides the boats

Slowly pushed off, anon with flashing oar

Make transit to the quay’s smooth-quarried edge,

Where thronging Gypsies are in haste to lade

Each as it comes with grandames, babes, and wives,

Or with dust-tinted goods, the company

Of wandering years. Naught seems to lie unmoved,

For ‘mid the throng the lights and shadows play,

And make all surface eager, while the boats

Sway restless as a horse that heard the shouts

And surging hum incessant. Naked limbs

With beauteous ease bend, lift, and throw, or raise

High signalling hands. The black-haired mother steps

Athwart the boat’s edge, and with opened arms,

A wandering Isis outcast from the gods,

Leans towards her lifted little one. The boat

Full-laden cuts the waves, and dirge-like cries

Rise and then fall within it as it moves

From high to lower and from bright to dark.

Hither and thither, grave white-turbaned Moors

Move helpfully, and some bring welcome gifts,

Bright stuffs and cutlery, and bags of seed

To make new waving crops in Africa.

Others aloof with folded arms slow-eyed

Survey. man’s labor, saying, “ God is great “ ;

Or seek with question deep the Gypsies root,

And whether their false faith, being small, will prove

Less damning than the copious .false creeds

Of Jews and Christians : Moslem subtlety

Found balanced reasons, warranting suspense

As to whose hell was deepest, — ‘t was enough

That there was room for all. Thus the sedate.

The younger heads were busy with the tale

Of that great Chief whose exploits helped the Moor.

And, talking still, they shouldered past their friends,

Following some lure which held their distant gaze

To eastward of the quay, where yet remained

A low black tent close guarded all around

By armed Zincali. Fronting it above,

Raised by stone steps that sought a jutting strand,

Fedalma stood and marked with anxious watch

Each laden boat the remnant lessening.

Of cargo on the shore, or traced the course

Of Nadar to and fro in hard command

Of noisy tumult ; imaging oft anew

How much of labor still deferred the hour

When they must lift the boat and bear away

Her father’s coffin, and her feet must quit

This shore forever. Motionless she stood,

Black-crowned with wreaths of many-shadowed hair ;

Black-robed, but bearing wide upon her breast

Her father’s golden necklace and his badge.

Her limbs were motionless but in her eyes

And in her breathing lip’s soft tremulous curve

Was intense motion as of prisoned fire

Escaping subtly in outleaping thought.

She watches anxiously, and yet she dreams :

The busy moments now expand, now shrink

To narrowing swarms within the refluent space

Of changeful consciousness. For in her thought

Already she has left the fading shore,

Sails with her people, seeks an unknown land,

And bears the burning length of of weary days

That parching fall upon her father’s hope,

Which she must plant and see it wither only, —

Wither and die. She saw the end begun.

Zincali hearts were not unfaithful : she

Was centre to the savage loyalty

Which vowed obedience to Zarca dead.

But soon their natures missed the constant stress

Of his command, that, while it fired, restrained

By urgency supreme, and left no play

To fickle impulse scattering desire.

They loved their Queen, trusted in Zarca’s child,

Would bear her o’er the desert on their arms

And think the weight a gladsome victory ;

But that great force which knit them into one,

The invisible passion of her father’s soul,

That wrought them visibly into its will,

And would have bound their lives with permanence,

Was gone. Already Hassan and two bands,

Drawn by fresh baits of gain, had newly sold

Their service to the Moors, despite her call,

Known as the echo of her father’s will,

To all the tribe, that should pass with her

Straightway to Telemsan. They were not moved

By worse rebellion than the wilful wish

To fashion their own service ; they still meant

To come when it should suit them. But she said,

This is the cloud no bigger than a hand,

Sure-threatening. In a little while, the tribe

That was to be the ensign of the race,

And draw it into conscious union,

Itself would break in small and scattered bands

That, living on scant prey, would still disperse

And propagate forgetfulness. Brief years,

And that great purpose fed with vital fire

That might have glowed for half a century,

Subduing, quickening, shaping, like a sun, —

Would be a faint tradition, flickering low

In dying memories, fringing with dim light

The nearer dark.

Far, far the future stretched

Beyond the busy present on the quay,

Far her straight path beyond it. Yet she watched

To mark the growing hour, and yet in dream

Alternate she beheld another track,

And felt herself unseen pursuing it

Close to a wanderer, who with haggard gaze

Looked out on loneliness. The backward years —

O she would not forget them — would not drink

Of waters that brought rest, while he far off

Remembered “ Father, I renounced the joy, —

You must forgive the sorrow. “

So she stood,

Her struggling life compressed into that hour,

Yearning, resolving, conquering ; though she seemed

Still as a tutelary image sent

To guard her people and to be the strength

Of some rock citadel.

Below her sat

Slim mischievous Hinda, happy, red-bedecked

With row of berries, grinning, nodding oft,

And shaking high her small dark arm and hand

Responsive to the black-maned Ishmael,

Who held aloft his spoil, and clad in skins

Seemed the Boy-prophet of the wilderness

Escaped from tasks prophetic. But anon

Hinda would backward turn upon her knees,

And like a pretty loving hound would bend

To fondle her Queen’s feet, then lift her head

Hoping to feel the gently pressing palm

Which touched the deeper sense. Fedalma knew, —

From out the black robe stretched her speaking hand

And shared the girl’s content.

So the dire hours

Burdened with destiny, — the death of hopes

Darkening long generations, or the birth

Of thoughts undying, — such hours sweep along

In their aerial ocean measureless

Myriads of little joys, that ripen sweet

And soothe the sorrowful spirit of the world,

Groaning and travailing with the painful birth

Of slow redemption.

But emerging now

From eastward fringing lines of idling men

Quick Juan lightly sought the upward steps

Behind Fedalma, and two paces off,

With head uncovered, said in gentle tones,

“ Lady Fedalma ! “ — (Juan’s password now

Used by no other,) and Fedalma turned,

Knowing who sought her. He advanced a step,