Pyramus et Thisbe.

PYRAMUS AND THISBE

Whenand Thisbe, who were knownthe one most handsome of all youthful men,the other loveliest of all eastern girls,—lived in adjoining houses, near the wallsthat Queen Semiramis had built of brickaround her famous city, they grew fond,and loved each other—meeting often there—and as the days went by their love increased.

They wished to join in marriage, but that joytheir fathers had forbidden them to hope;and yet the passion that with equal strengthinflamed their minds no parents could forbid.No relatives had guessed their secret love,for all their converse was by nods and signs;and as a smoldering fire may gather heat,the more 'tis smothered, so their love increased.

Now, it so happened, a partition builtbetween their houses, many years ago,was made defective with a little chink;a small defect observed by none, althoughfor ages there; but what is hid from love?Our lovers found the secret opening,and used its passage to convey the soundsof gentle, murmured words, whose tuneful notepassed oft in safety through that hidden way.

There, many a time, they stood on either side,thisbe on one andthe other,and when their warm breath touched from lip to lip,their sighs were such as this: “Thou envious wallwhy art thou standing in the way of thosewho die for love? What harm could happen theeshouldst thou permit us to enjoy our love?But if we ask too much, let us persuadethat thou wilt open while we kiss but once:for, we are not ungrateful; unto theewe own our debt; here thou hast left a waythat breathed words may enter loving ears.,”so vainly whispered they, and when the nightbegan to darken they exchanged farewells;made presence that they kissed a fond farewellvain kisses that to love might none avail.

When dawn removed the glimmering lamps of night,and the bright sun had dried the dewy grassagain they met where they had told their love;and now complaining of their hapless fate,in murmurs gentle, they at last resolved,away to slip upon the quiet night,elude their parents, and, as soon as free,quit the great builded city and their homes.

Fearful to wander in the pathless fields,they chose a trysting place, the tomb ofwhere safely they might hide unseen, beneaththe shadow of a tall mulberry tree,covered with snow-white fruit, close by a spring.

All is arranged according to their hopes:and now the daylight, seeming slowly moved,sinks in the deep waves, and the tardy nightarises from the spot where day declines.

Quickly, the cleverhaving firstdeceived her parents, opened the closed door.She flitted in the silent night away;and, having veiled her face, reached the great tomb,and sat beneath the tree; love made her bold.

There, as she waited, a great lionessapproached the nearby spring to quench her thirst:her frothing jaws incarnadined with bloodof slaughtered oxen. As the moon was bright,could see her, and affrighted fledwith trembling footstep to a gloomy cave;and as she ran she slipped and dropped her veil,which fluttered to the ground. She did not dareto save it. Wherefore, when the savage beasthad taken a great draft and slaked her thirst,and thence had turned to seek her forest lair,she found it on her way, and full of rage,tore it and stained it with her bloody jaws:but, fortunate, escaped unseen.

Nowhad not gone out so soonasto the tryst; and, when he sawthe certain traces of that savage beast,imprinted in the yielding dust, his facewent white with fear; but when he found the veilcovered with blood, he cried; “Alas, one nighthas caused the ruin of two lovers! Thouwert most deserving of completed days,but as for me, my heart is guilty! Idestroyed thee! O my love! I bade thee comeout in the dark night to a lonely haunt,and failed to go before. Oh! whatever lurksbeneath this rock, though ravenous lion, tearmy guilty flesh, and with most cruel jawsdevour my cursed entrails! What? Not so;it is a craven's part to wish for death!”

So he stopped briefly; and took up the veil;went straightway to the shadow of the tree;and as his tears bedewed the well-known veil,he kissed it oft and sighing said, “Kissesand tears are thine, receive my blood as well.”

And he imbrued the steel, girt at his side,deep in his bowels; and plucked it from the wound,a-faint with death. As he fell back to earth,his spurting blood shot upward in the air;so, when decay has rift a leaden pipea hissing jet of water spurts on high.—

By that dark tide the berries on the treeassumed a deeper tint, for as the rootssoaked up the blood the pendent mulberrieswere dyed a purple tint.

returned,though trembling still with fright, for now she thoughther lover must await her at the tree,and she should haste before he feared for her.Longing to tell him of her great escapeshe sadly looked for him with faithful eyes;but when she saw the spot and the changed tree,she doubted could they be the same, for sothe colour of the hanging fruit deceived.

While doubt dismayed her, on the ground she sawthe wounded body covered with its blood;—she started backward, and her face grew paleand ashen; and she shuddered like the sea,which trembles when its face is lightly skimmedby the chill breezes;—and she paused a space;—but when she knew it was the one she loved,she struck her tender breast and tore her hair.Then wreathing in her arms his loved form,she bathed the wound with tears, mingling her griefin his unquenched blood; and as she kissedhis death-cold features wailed; “Ahwhat cruel fate has taken thy life away?! Pyramus! awake! awake!It is thy dearestcalls thee! Liftthy drooping head! Alas,”—At Thisbe's namehe raised his eyes, though languorous in death,and darkness gathered round him as he gazed.

And then she saw her veil; and near it layhis ivory sheath—but not the trusty swordand once again she wailed; “Thy own right hand,and thy great passion have destroyed thee!—And I? my hand shall be as bold as thine—my love shall nerve me to the fatal deed—thee, I will follow to eternity—though I be censured for the wretched cause,so surely I shall share thy wretched fate:—alas, whom death could me alone bereave,thou shalt not from my love be reft by death!And, O ye wretched parents, mine and his,let our misfortunes and our pleadings meltyour hearts, that ye no more deny to thosewhom constant love and lasting death unite—entomb us in a single sepulchre.

“And, O thou tree of many-branching boughs,spreading dark shadows on the corpse of one,destined to cover twain, take thou our fateupon thy head; mourn our untimely deaths;let thy fruit darken for a memory,an emblem of our blood.” No more she said;and having fixed the point below her breast,she fell on the keen sword, still warm with his red blood.

But though her death was out of Nature's lawher prayer was answered, for it moved the Godsand moved their parents. Now the Gods have changedthe ripened fruit which darkens on the branch:and from the funeral pile their parents sealedtheir gathered ashes in a single urn.