Harold monologue (Act 8) — Becket and other plays

How the clown glared at me! that Dobbins, is it, With whom I used to jar? but can he trace me Thro' five years' absence, and my change of name, The tan of southern summers and the beard? I may as well avoid him. Ladylike! Lilylike in her stateliness and sweetness! How came she by it?--a daughter of the fields, This Dora! She gave her hand, unask'd, at the farm-gate; I almost think she half return'd the pressure Of mine. What, I that held the orange blossom Dark as the yew? but may not those, who march Before their age, turn back at times, and make Courtesy to custom? and now the stronger motive, Misnamed free-will--the crowd would call it conscience-- Moves me--to what? I am dreaming; for the past Look'd thro' the present, Eva's eyes thro' her's-- A spell upon me! Surely I loved Eva More than I knew! or is it but the past That brightens in retiring? Oh, last night, Tired, pacing my new lands at Littlechester, I dozed upon the bridge, and the black river Flow'd thro' my dreams--if dreams they were. She rose From the foul flood and pointed toward the farm, And her cry rang to me across the years, 'I call you, Philip Edgar, Philip Edgar! Come, you will set all right again, and father Will not die miserable.' I could make his age A comfort to him--so be more at peace With mine own self. Some of my former friends Would find my logic faulty; let them. Colour Flows thro' my life again, and I have lighted On a new pleasure. Anyhow we must Move in the line of least resistance when The stronger motive rules. But she hates Edgar. May not this Dobbins, or some other, spy Edgar in Harold? Well then, I must make her Love Harold first, and then she will forgive Edgar for Harold's sake. She said herself She would forgive him, by-and-by, not now-- For her own sake _then_, if not for mine--not now-- But by-and-by.