How one gets rich! Let each one bear his lot. And I have laboured somewhat in my time And not been paid profusely. Some good son Meted on each side by the angel's reed, For Leonard, Rafael, Angelo and me To cover the three first without a wife, still they overcome Because there's still Lucrezia, as I choose. Again the Cousin's whistle! Go, my Love. 13 BEFORE. 1. LET them fight it out, friend! things have gone too far. 2. Why, you would not bid men, sunk in such a slough, Strike no arm out further, stick and stink as now, Leaving right and wrong to settle the embroilment, Heaven with snaky Hell, in torture and entoilment? 3. Which of them 's the culprit, how must he conceive 4. Better sin the whole sin, sure that God observes, Then go live his life out! life will try his nerves, When the sky which noticed all, makes no disclosure, And the earth keeps up her terrible composure. 5. Let him pace at pleasure, past the walls of rose, 6. What's the leopard-dog-thing, constant to his side, 7. So much for the culprit. Who's the martyred man? 8. All or nothing, stake it! trusts he God or no? 9. Ah, "forgive" you bid him? While God's champion lives, Wrong shall be resisted: dead, why he forgives. But you must not end my friend ere you begin him Evil stands not crowned on earth, while breath is in him. 10. Will the wronger, at this last of all, both the fighters to their places— "I did wrong," rising in his fall? go, While I count three, step you back as many paces. AFTER. TAKE the cloak from his face, and at first How he lies in his rights of a man! And absorbed in the new life he leads, He recks not, he heeds Nor his wrong nor my vengeance On his senses alike, - both strike And are lost in the solemn and strange Surprise of the change. Ha, what avails death to erase His offence, my disgrace? I would we were boys as of old In the field, by the fold His outrage, God's patience, man's scorn I stand here now, he lies in his place — Cover the face. |