Then by force to stop pursuit,

Still from him the cause concealing.

Cosm. Some device! Then I'm your man.

One suggests itself already.

See, this note of introduction

From a friend, shall serve our purpose.

[DON MANUEL retires to the background.

DON LUIS and his servant RODRIGO enter.

D. Luis. This veil'd fair I must discover,

Were it only that she strives

With such effort to escape me.

Rod. Follow, and you'll soon detect her.

Cosm. (coming forward and addressing DoN LUIS.)

Señor, though of this intrusion

I'm ashamed, perhaps your highness

Would be kind enough to read me

How this letter is directed.

D. Luis. Hence: - I have not leisure now.
Cosm. Leisure! If that's all that's wanting,

I have leisure in abundance,

Quite enough to spare for both.

D. Luis. Hence, my patience is exhausted.

Stand aside, I say!

D. Man. (Aside.) No longer

Can I wait, let courage finish
That which caution had begun.
Cavalier, the man you outrage
Is my servant, and I know not
How he should have so offended
As to merit this misusage
At your hand.

D. Luis. I answer neither

Accusations nor enquiries.
Explanation is a lesson
I have yet to learn. Farewell.

[Drives him to one side.

D. Man. Señor, if my honour needed

Explanation for an insult,
Even your arrogance may trust me
I should not depart without it.
When I ask'd how he had injured,
Wrong'd, or troubled you, the question
Merited more courteous answer.
Courtesy in courts should harbour-
Give not yours so poor a name,
That a stranger's tongue must teach you
Lessons ye yourselves should know.

D. Luis. Who shall say I could not better

Teach that lesson ?

D. Man.

Silent, that the sword may speak.

Let the tongue be

[They draw and fight.

That men should ever

D. Luis. You say well.
Cosm.

Long for fighting!

Rod. (To Cosm.) Draw your sword too!

Cos. Mine's a maiden blade, and may not

Venture from its virgin scabbard!

Till drawn forth by marriage license.

[DON JUAN appears at the door of one of the houses in the

street. DONA BEATRICE endeavouring to detain him.

D. Juan. Beatrice, unhand me!
Beat.

Go not.

Times I wish the hurt were mine!

Cos. Bless us, what a courteous quarrel!

D. Juan. Come, and let your wound be look'd to.

You, Don Luis, must remain.

And to Dona Beatrice,

Ere she mount her coach, excuse me

For this seeming show of rudeness.

Come then, señor, to my mansion-
Rather I should say your own-

Where your wound

D. Man.

My wound is nothing.

D. Juan. Nay, come quickly.
D. Man. (aside.)

How ill-omen'd

That Madrid with bloody welcome
Thus receives me!

[Exit with DON JUAN into the house.

D. Luis. (aside.) How provoking

That my efforts to discover

This veiled fair are all in vain!

Cos. (aside.) Oh! how richly does my master

Merit what he got, to teach him

Not to play Don Quixote here.

[Exit, following his Master.

DONA BEATRICE and CLARA re-enter from the house.

D. Luis. Lady, now the storm is over,

Let the roses of your beauty

Bloom again, which lay so lately

Chill'd and wither'd by the blighting

Of a swoon.

Lady,

It is not Don Juan: were it

He that had been hurt, I should not

Stand so patiently beside you.

Calm these terrors: 'twere unjust,

Since my brother is uninjured,

That your breast with anxious fears

Mine with grief-should thus be haunted:

Grief, for such it is, to see you

So distress'd, so overmaster'd,
By the imaginary fears

Which so idly cloud your mind.

Beat. Well you know, Señor Don Luis,

That I value your attentions
Justly, both as proofs of love,
And because they come from you;
But I never can requite them,
For the stars control affection;
And for what the stars deny us,
Who shall call them to account?
If in courts we prize the dearest
What in courts is found the rarest,
Then be grateful for this candid
Undeception; were it only
That the simple truth's a treasure
Rarely to be met with there.

[Exit.

Don Luis, after Beatrice retires, expresses to his confidant Rodrigo, his surprise at his brother's thoughtlessness in introducing Don Manuel to his house.

Having

Here a sister, youthful, handsome,

Lately widow'd: as you know,
Living there in such retirement,
Scarce the sun beholds her presence;
And but Beatrice alone,

As her near relation, enters.

Rod. Yes, I recollect; her husband,
In some port administrator
Of the crown revenues, dying
Deeply to the king indebted;
While his widow, to the court
Secretly repair'd, awaiting
Till in silence and retirement
She might gain his debt's acquittance.
And this justifies your brother;
Since, if you reflect maturely
That her widowhood affords her
Neither license nor occasion
For receiving guests or visits,
And that, though Don Manuel dwell
Here, he never need discover
That the house contains a woman:
Where's the harm though here he be ?
All the more so, that your brother,
With such prudence and precaution,
Has assign'd her an apartment
Opening on the street behind us;
And the passage to the house
(Either to avert suspicion
That it had been closed on purpose,
Or that at a future time

It might be with ease re-open'd)
With a cabinet of glass
Has conceal'd, so neatly fitted,
That no mortal could discover
There a door had ever been.

D. Luis. This, then, is my sole assurance!

And precisely this it is
Which undoes me; since he places,
As you say, to guard his honour,
Nothing but a screen of glass,

Which the slightest touch may shiver.

The reader, who has the least acquaintance with the machinery of the Spanish stage, will readily anticipate that this cabinet, concealing a door of communication between the apartments of Don Manuel and those assigned to Angela, is destined to make a prominent figure in the intrigue of the play.

The next scene takes place in the apartments of Dona Angela, who enters hurriedly along with Isabel, throwing off the dress she had worn in the street, and resuming her mourning attire. She inveighs against the

[Exeunt.

seclusion to which she is confined; the tedium of which had led her on this occasion to venture out in disguise, and to mingle in the crowd which was witnessing the festivities in the Palace Square, when she had been suddenly alarmed by the appearance of her brother, Don Luis; had fled from him, and had only been enabled to reach her home through the gallant interference of Don Manuel. Scarcely has she completed her change of dress, when her brother Don Luis himself enters, and, unconscious that Angela had been the object of his pursuit, relates to her his adventure, and communicates the unexpected intelligence that the cavalier whose interference had arrested his pursuit, is her brother's expected guest, Don Manuel, and that he is now an inmate in their mansion. Aware, through the information of Isabel, of the existence of the door entering into his apartment, and concealed by the cabinet, and half

conscious of a growing attachment towards her defender, she resolves to pay a visit to his apartment during his absence, and to leave behind some token of her gratitude, without revealing how or from what quarter it

comes.

We are next introduced to the chamber of Don Manuel.

The principal door is in the background. On the right the secret door, con. cealed by a large press with glass doors, in which various pieces of glassware are placed on shelves. The cabinet is so contrived as to revolve on its hinges when the door is opened. On the left of the room a recess with curtains.

DON MANUEL and DON JUAN enter. A Servant follows with a light.

D. Juan. Beseech you, sir! lie down.

D. Man. So slight my hurt, I own

I do already fear,

Don Juan, that I play the weakling here,

Suffering your care to go so far.

D. Juan. Thanks to the lucky fortune of my star!

Wretched I should remain

Were this, my pleasure, purchased with the pain
To see my friend confined

Within my house by sickness, and to find

A brother's hand (although

Unwitting whom it wounded) dealt the blow.

D. Man. He is a noble knight

I envy him his prowess in the fight,

Admire his courtesy,

And ever shall his friend and servant be.

[DON LUIS enters, followed by a servant with a covered basket, containing a sword.

D. Luis. That I am yours no less,

Let the remorse which I endure express

I offer you my life;

And that the hapless instrument of strife

No more with me. nain,

Which cannot please me more, nor serve again,

(Even as the servant's driven

Forth, who offence has to nis master given,)

I rid me of it so.

[Presenting the sword to DON MANUEL.

This, señor, is the blade that dealt the blow,

Here at your feet extended,

Imploring pardon where it hath offended;

Let your just wrath with it,

On me and on itself, take vengeance fit.

D. Man. In all you conquer me!

Brave and discreet: mine let the weapon be,
Which, ever by my side,

Shall teach me to be brave. I feel with pride
My life now bears a charm;

For thought of danger never need alarm
His breast, who feels thine honour'd weapon near,
Before which only he had cause to fear.

This scene of mutual compliments is interrupted by the entrance of Cosme, bearing his master's trunks and

portmanteaus, and grumbling at the disasters he had encountered in bringing them from the Posada, where