POLONIA. How could a dream, my lord, provoke you so?
KING. Alas! my daughters, listen, you shall know.
From out the lips of a most lovely youth
(And though a miserable slave, in sooth
I dare not hurt him, and I speak his praise),
Well, from the mouth of a poor slave, a blaze
Of lambent lustre came,
Which mildly burned in rays of gentlest flame;
Till reaching you,
The living fire at once consumed ye two.
I stood betwixt ye both, and though I sought
To stay its fury, the strange fire would not
Molest or wound me, passing like the wind,
So that despairing, blind,
I woke from out a deep abysm
Of dream, a lethargy, a paroxysm;
But find my pains the same,
For still it seems to me I see that flame,
And flying, at every turn
See you consumed; but now I also burn.*
[footnote] *The Dream of Egerius, as given by Calderon, agrees
substantially with Jocelin's description, and differs only in one
slight particular (the number of the flames) from that in Montalvan's
"Vida y Purgatorio de San Patricio". In the latter, the name of the
Irish prince to whom Patrick was sold is not given; in Jocelin he is
called "Milcho." Calderon was either ignorant of this, and gave the
king a name that was purely imaginary, or, considering it less
musical than he would wish, gave him the more harmonious one of
Egerio. The following is Jocelin's version: "And Milcho beheld a
vision in the night: and behold Patrick entered his palace as all on
fire, and the flames, issuing from his mouth, and from his nose, and
from his eyes, and from his ears, seemed to burn him; but Milcho
repelled from himself the flaming hair of the boy, nor did it prevail
to touch him any nearer; but the flame, being spread, turned aside to
the right and catching on his two little daughters, who were lying in
one bed, burned them even to ashes: then the south wind blowing
strongly dispersed their ashes over many parts of Ireland.
Pages:
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26