So--'tis well.
Hear me, my Lord.--You think this dainty princess
Too perfect for you, eh? That's well again;
For that whose price after fruition falls
May well too high be rated ere enjoyed--
In plain words,--if she looks an angel now, you will be better mated
than you expected, when you find her--a woman. For flesh and blood
she is, and that young blood,--whom her childish misusage and your
brotherly love; her loneliness and your protection; her springing
fancy and (for I may speak to you as a son) your beauty and knightly
grace, have so bewitched, and as some say, degraded, that briefly,
she loves you, and briefly, better, her few friends fear, than you
love her.
Lewis. Loves me! My Count, that word is quickly spoken;
And yet, if it be true, it thrusts me forth
Upon a shoreless sea of untried passion,
From whence is no return.
Wal. By Siegfried's sword,
My words are true, and I came here to say them,
To thee, my son in all but blood.
Mass, I'm no gossip. Why? What ails the boy?
Lewis. Loves me! Henceforth let no man, peering down
Through the dim glittering mine of future years,
Say to himself 'Too much! this cannot be!'
To-day, and custom, wall up our horizon:
Before the hourly miracle of life
Blindfold we stand, and sigh, as though God were not.
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