Ideal monologue (Act 5) — The Merchant Prince of Cornville: A Comedy

The hour of dawn!--how thrilling and intense! The matin songs of birds, that dart and soar On quivering wings, now break upon the sense As sharply as the cannon’s voice at mid-day; In yonder wood that guards the sea-cliff’s wall, Where sullen shadows shrink away and flee Before the rising sun’s advancing spears, The day-detesting owl hath turned his back Unto the light, and sought the sheltering cowl Of ivy web about the oak-tree thrown; And all the glowing world,--wood, sea, and sky,-- Is most sublimely beautiful beneath This pendulous light, that, like an avalanche Of golden beams.... But I have spoken the word That halts my fancy’s flight, and brings me back To earth and its dull cares, and our dull age,-- Our golden age ’tis called: our age of gold, Hard and material, when our best ideals But folly seem, all things are bought and sold, And even love itself is merchandise. Alas! the many years that I have known, And many ills, in this same golden age, Have brought their bitter harvest to my breast, Like frozen grain beaten by winds unkind From out the icy north; but as those seeds Fall sterile on the earth, nor glow with life, So shall my sorrows take no living root Within my bosom.... Now do I recall, Like a sweet picture in a gallery hung, How I last eve at early twilight watched The figure of a lovely maiden bending Tenderly o’er a vase of new-blown flowers, Upon a breezy terrace, underneath A green-hued lattice-work, that, like a shield Embossed with morning-glories, hides and guards Her chamber window. Passing there this morn, I looked upon the flowers as one might Who, barred from out the walls of Paradise, Would seize some blossom growing sweetly there; Then, while my eager heart tumultuous beat, Sending the tell-tale blushes to my cheek, I plucked a flower--this crimson, perfumed pink. ’Tis woven from a clod of earth, and yet To me ’tis fairer than a star of heaven. Sweet flower! sweet flower! last evening I did see Thy mistress from her chamber casement lean And gaze ecstatic on the pilgrim moon Tracing a silvery path along the sky; But thou didst woo her from that magic gaze, Drawing her to thee with the subtler force Of finer particles than live within The cold moon’s slanting beams.... But soft! yonder my lady’s self appears, Slow moving down the orchard path. I’ll seek A covert by this tree. Seeing the hunter Doth fright the deer away.