Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 10,116 pages of information about Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith.

Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 10,116 pages of information about Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith.

Homeware
        To call the attendant fires to account
        Their elders forthwith sat . . .

Astraea
                  Is there no prayer
        Will move you, uncle Homeware?

Homeware
               God-daughter,
        This gentleman for you I have proposed
        As husband.

Astraea
        Arden! we are lost.

Arden
                  Astraea! 
        Support him!  Though I knew not his design,
        It plants me in mid-heaven.  Would it were
        Not you, but I to bear the shock.  My love! 
        We lost, you cry; you join me with you lost! 
        The truth leaps from your heart:  and let it shine
        To light us on our brilliant battle day
        And victory

Astraea
        Who betrayed me!

Homeware
               Who betrayed? 
        Your voice, your eyes, your veil, your knife and fork;
        Your tenfold worship of your widowhood;
        As he who sees he must yield up the flag,
        Hugs it oath-swearingly! straw-drowningly. 
        To be reasonable:  you sent this gentleman
        Referring him to me . . . .

Astraea
                    And that is false. 
        All’s false.  You have conspired.  I am disgraced. 
        But you will learn you have judged erroneously. 
        I am not the frail creature you conceive. 
        Between your vision of life’s aim, and theirs
        Who presently will question me, I cling
        To theirs as light:  and yours I deem a den
        Where souls can have no growth.

Homeware
        But when we touched
        The point of hand-pressings, ’twas rightly time
        To think of wedding ties?

Astraea
        Arden, adieu!

          (She rushes into house.)

Scene viii

Arden, Homeware

Arden
        Adieu! she said.  With her that word is final.

Homeware
        Strange! how young people blowing words like clouds
        On winds, now fair, now foul, and as they please
        Should still attach the Fates to them.

Arden
               She’s wounded
        Wounded to the quick!

Homeware
             The quicker our success:  for short
        Of that, these dames, who feel for everything,
        Feel nothing.

Arden
             Your intention has been kind,
        Dear sir, but you have ruined me.

Homeware
             Good-night. (Going.)

Arden
        Yet she said, we are lost, in her surprise.

Homeware
        Good morning. (Returning.)

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.