Till my nurse chid me. Are you come for that?
I know our pastime may offend the gods;
Know the dark air is full of whispering things
That bear our follies to the ear of those
Whose wrath is strong, and vengeance terrible.
But I'm not wicked: 'twas no deadly rite
Invoking evil chance on man or God,
Or Cæsar, who is both, they say, in one.
If any power have sent you for my faults,
Which I'll confess as quickly as you'll name,
Bid old Camilla take my mother's rod,
(I had a mother,) she can use it well;
And I'll endure it, though I meant no wrong.

Thou dost not leave me? In thy fearful eyes,
My childhood withers with an instant age.
The marrow of my joints seems long drawn out
Caught on the horror of thy countenance.

Oh! this is like the nightmare that I feared,
Not knowing it could walk abroad by day.
I'd shriek for pity; but my voice is choked,
As if the ashes of the things I love

Stood in my throat to bury utterance.

I must go with thee? Never, while I live.
Ah, pity! by my hair he hurries me

Forth from the palace, through the glaring streets,
That strangely reel, and vanish from my sight.
I see the gods there, black against the sky,
And stiffening with the horror of men's deeds.
The spell that binds my lips is on their hands,
Or they would move to help me. Where is Cæsar?
Now hear this wretch that whispers in mine ear,
"Cæsar will have thy blood." This gives me strength
To snap the chilly net-work of my fear,

And cry,

"Thou liest ! " See, the Consul comes!

"O noble man! I clasp thy garment's edge:

Save me as thou wouldst save thy fair-haired girl,
My playmate once." Tears darkle in his eyes:
Pale, with a stifled curse he turns away;

He cannot aid me.

Where the columns range,

The conscript fathers keep the weal of Rome.
Hark to me, fathers, I am fatherless!

So quick away? Hear, Tyber, then, my cry;
Hear, ye protecting hills! Ah! silent all.

What's this dark vault? and what yon rusted ring With the noose dangling? Look to thine own fate! Thou dar'st not slay a virgin. I will tear

Thine eyes with these small fingers ere thou come

A foot's length nearer! Keep away, away,
Thou untold horror! Only touch me not;

And I will twine thy halter round my throat
Like a bright riband on a festal day.

Give me the rope! let my poor bruised hands go,
Seeking the priceless mercy Death can bring.
Oh, come! since thy still feet are waited for

As the last rapture, sweet, thou com'st too late.

CAIUS CESAR.

I AM the monster Caius, loathed of men,
Him whose foul record women may not read.
In distant Gaul, an altar to the gods

Attests the mother-pangs that brought me forth,
As I should prove a boon to move them thanks.
My father bred me soldierly in camps;

And the small jack-boots gave my childish name
Caligula. That father, in the East,

Sickened with secret poisons. Ye remember
How wild his widow bore the funeral urn,
Landing at Cyprus? Dark Tiberius then
Drew his death-circle slowly round our way.
My mother, struggling longest, fell at last.
Two brothers followed, one by hunger's woe;
One by his own resolvèd hand escaped

The hangman's noose, and hooks of infamy.
But I, surviving, kept the tyrant's side

So near, he could not spring to strangle me.
Slowly he recognized my crafty soul,

Knew me his master in all shameful arts,
And, having lopped the fair limbs from the tree,
Left me for the blood-blossoms I should bear,
And fruit of death. At first I only aped
His outward fashions; then I learned his thoughts;
Then his malignant madness seized on me,
And made me like him. Dying as he lay,

I forced the cushion 'twixt his gaping jaws,

And sped his flight from earth. That was, at least,
A service. Could I catalogue my deeds,

Thou couldst not stay to hear them. Hell itself
Swoons at the fatal tale, and cries, "Away!"

My royal ways were tapestried with blood;
First my young brother's, followed by a train
Of ghosts that might become imperial race.
I snatched from new-wed souls their nuptial joys,
And flung them back, disfigured to disgust.

So monstrous and unnatural my lusts,