also.
MANFRED Hear me, hear me ? Astarte! my beloved! speak to me: I have so much endured?so much endure?
120 Look on me! the grave hath not changed thee more Than I am changed for thee. Thou lovedst me Too much, as I loved thee: we were not made To torture thus each other, though it were The deadliest sin to love as we have loved.
125 Say that thou loath'st me not?that I do bear This punishment for both?that thou wilt be One of the blessed?and that I shall die, For hitherto all hateful things conspire To bind me in existence?in a life
130 Which makes me shrink from immortality? A future like the past. I cannot rest. I know not what I ask, nor what I seek: I feel but what thou art?and what I am; And I would hear yet once before I perish
135 The voice which was my music?Speak to me!
.
658 / GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON
For I have call'd on thee in the still night,
Startled the slumbering birds from the hush'd boughs,
And woke the mountain wolves, and made the caves
Acquainted with thy vainly echoed name,
Which answered me?many things answered me ?
Spirits and men?but thou wert silent all.
Yet speak to me! I have outwatch'd the stars,
And gazed o'er heaven in vain in search of thee.
Speak to me! I have wandered o'er the earth,
And never found thy likeness?Speak to me!
Look on the fiends around?they feel for me:
I fear them not, and feel for thee alone?
Speak to me! though it be in wrath;?but say?
I reck not what-?but let me hear thee once ?
This once?once more!
PHANTOM OF ASTARTE Manfred! MANFRED Say on, say on? I live but in the sound?it is thy voice! PHANTOM Manfred! To-morrow ends thine earthly ills. Farewell!
MANFRED
Yet one word more?am I forgiven?
PHANTOM Farewell!
MANFRED Say, shall we meet again?
PHANTOM Farewell!
MANFRED One word for mercy! Say, thou lovest me.
PHANTOM Manfred! [The Spirit of ASTARTE disappears.]
NEMESIS She's gone, and will not be recall'd;
Her words will be fulfill'd. Return to the earth.
A SPIRIT He is convulsed?This is to be a mortal
And seek the things beyond mortality.
ANOTHER SPIRIT Yet, see, he mastereth himself, and makes
His torture tributary to his will.
Had he been one of us, he would have made
An awful spirit.
NEMESIS Hast thou further question
Of our great sovereign, or his worshippers?
MANFRED None.
NEMESIS Then for a time farewell.
MANFRED We meet then?
Where? On the earth?
NEMESIS That will be seen hereafter.
MANFRED Even as thou wilt: and for the grace accorded
