Farewell all love! Could I with bloody hands
Fondle and paddle with her innocent hands?

Could I with lips fresh from this butchery
Play with her lips? Could I with murderous eyes

Look in those violet eyes, whose purity
Would strike men blind, and make each eyeball reel

In night perpetual? No, murder has set
A barrier between us far too high

For us to kiss across it.
DUCHESS

Guido!
GUIDO

Beatrice,
You must forget that name, and banish me

Out of your life for ever.
DUCHESS

[going towards him]
O dear love!

GUIDO
[stepping back]

There lies a barrier between us two
We dare not pass.

DUCHESS
I dare do anything

So that you are beside me.
GUIDO

Ah! There it is,
I cannot be beside you, cannot breathe

The air you breathe; I cannot any more
Stand face to face with beauty, which unnerves

My shaking heart, and makes my desperate hand
Fail of its purpose. Let me go hence, I pray;

Forget you ever looked upon me.
DUCHESS

What!
With your hot kisses fresh upon my lips

Forget the vows of love you made to me?
GUIDO

I take them back.
DUCHESS

Alas, you cannot, Guido,
For they are part of nature now; the air

Is tremulous with their music, and outside
The little birds sing sweeter for those vows.

GUIDO
There lies a barrier between us now,

Which then I knew not, or I had forgot.
DUCHESS

There is no barrier, Guido; why, I will go
In poor attire, and will follow you

Over the world.
GUIDO

[wildly]
The world's not wide enough

To hold us two! Farewell, farewell for ever.
DUCHESS

[calm, and controlling her passion]
Why did you come into my life at all, then,

Or in the desolate garden of my heart
Sow that white flower of love -?

GUIDO
O Beatrice!

DUCHESS
Which now you would dig up, uproot, tear out,

Though each small fibre doth so hold my heart
That if you break one, my heart breaks with it?

Why did you come into my life? Why open
The secret wells of love I had sealed up?

Why did you open them -?
GUIDO

O God!
DUCHESS

[clenching her hand]
And let

The floodgates of my passion swell and burst
Till, like the wave when rivers overflow

That sweeps the forest and the farm away,
Love in the splendid avalanche of its might

Swept my life with it? Must I drop by drop
Gather these waters back and seal them up?

Alas! Each drop will be a tear, and so
Will with its saltness make life very bitter.

GUIDO
I pray you speak no more, for I must go

Forth from your life and love, and make a way
On which you cannot follow.

DUCHESS
I have heard

That sailors dying of thirst upon a raft,
Poor castaways upon a lonely sea,

Dream of green fields and pleasant water-courses,
And then wake up with red thirst in their throats,

And die more miserably because sleep
Has cheated them: so they die cursing sleep

For having sent them dreams: I will not curse you
Though I am cast away upon the sea

Which men call Desolation.
GUIDO

O God, God!
DUCHESS

But you will stay: listen, I love you, Guido.
[She waits a little.]

Is echo dead, that when I say I love you
There is no answer?

GUIDO
Everything is dead,

Save one thing only, which shall die to-night!
DUCHESS

If you are going, touch me not, but go.
[Exit GUIDO.]

Barrier! Barrier!
Why did he say there was a barrier?

There is no barrier between us two.
He lied to me, and shall I for that reason

Loathe what I love, and what I worshipped, hate?
I think we women do not love like that.

For if I cut his image from my heart,
My heart would, like a bleeding pilgrim, follow

That image through the world, and call it back
With little cries of love.

[Enter DUKE equipped for the chase, with falconers and hounds.]
DUKE

Madam, you keep us waiting;
You keep my dogs waiting.

DUCHESS
I will not ride to-day.

DUKE
How now, what's this?

DUCHESS
My Lord, I cannot go.

DUKE
What, pale face, do you dare to stand against me?

Why, I could set you on a sorry jade
And lead you through the town, till the low rabble

You feed toss up their hats and mock at you.
DUCHESS

Have you no word of kindness ever for me?
DUKE

I hold you in the hollow of my hand
And have no need on you to waste kind words.

DUCHESS
Well, I will go.

DUKE
[slapping his boot with his whip]

No, I have changed my mind,
You will stay here, and like a faithful wife

Watch from the window for our coming back.
Were it not dreadful if some accident

By chance should happen to your loving Lord?
Come, gentlemen, my hounds begin to chafe,

And I chafe too, having a patient wife.
Where is young Guido?

MAFFIO
My liege, I have not seen him

For a full hour past.
DUKE

It matters not,
I dare say I shall see him soon enough.

Well, Madam, you will sit at home and spin.
I do protest, sirs, the domesticvirtues

Are often very beautiful in others.
[Exit DUKE with his Court.]

DUCHESS
The stars have fought against me, that is all,

And thus to-night when my Lord lieth asleep,
Will I fall upon my dagger, and so cease.

My heart is such a stone nothing can reach it
Except the dagger's edge: let it go there,

To find what name it carries: ay! to-night
Death will divorce the Duke; and yet to-night

He may die also, he is very old.
Why should he not die? Yesterday his hand

Shook with a palsy: men have died from palsy,
And why not he? Are there not fevers also,

Agues and chills, and other maladies
Most incident to old age?

No, no, he will not die, he is too sinful;
Honest men die before their proper time.

Good men will die: men by whose side the Duke
In all the sick pollution of his life

Seems like a leper: women and children die,
But the Duke will not die, he is too sinful.

Oh, can it be
There is some immortality in sin,

Which virtue has not? And does the wicked man
Draw life from what to other men were death,

Like poisonous plants that on corruption live?
No, no, I think God would not suffer that:

Yet the Duke will not die: he is too sinful.
But I will die alone, and on this night

Grim Death shall be my bridegroom, and the tomb
My secret house of pleasure: well, what of that?

The world's a graveyard, and we each, like coffins,
Within us bear a skeleton.

[Enter LORD MORANZONE all in black; he passes across the back of
the stage looking anxiously about.]

MORANZONE
Where is Guido?

I cannot find him anywhere.
DUCHESS

[catches sight of him] O God!

• farewell [feə´wel] int.再见 n.&a.告别 (初中英语单词)
• bloody [´blʌdi] a.(流)血的；血腥的 (初中英语单词)
• innocent [´inəsənt] a.无罪的；单纯的 (初中英语单词)
• violet [´vaiələt] n.&a.紫罗兰(的)；紫色 (初中英语单词)
• desperate [´despərit] a.拼死的；绝望的 (初中英语单词)
• passion [´pæʃən] n.激情；激怒；恋爱 (初中英语单词)
• thirst [θə:st] n.渴，口渴；渴望 (初中英语单词)
• lonely [´ləunli] a.孤独的；无人烟的 (初中英语单词)
• faithful [´feiθfəl] a.忠实的；可靠的 (初中英语单词)
• dreadful [´dredful] a.可怕的；讨厌的 (初中英语单词)
• domestic [də´mestik] a.家庭的；本国的 (初中英语单词)
• divorce [di´vɔ:s] n.离婚 vt.同....离婚 (初中英语单词)
• yesterday [´jestədi] n.&ad.昨天；前不久 (初中英语单词)
• incident [´insidənt] n.小事件；事变 (初中英语单词)
• virtue [´və:tʃu:] n.美德；贞操；长处 (初中英语单词)
• wicked [´wikid] a.邪恶的；不道德的 (初中英语单词)
• paddle [´pædl] n.踏板 v.用浆划；划船 (高中英语单词)
• perpetual [pə´petʃuəl] a.永恒的；终身的 (高中英语单词)
• barrier [´bæriə] n.栅栏；屏障；障碍 (高中英语单词)
• banish [´bæniʃ] vt.流放；消除(顾虑等) (高中英语单词)
• attire [ə´taiə] vt.装饰；穿 n.衣服 (高中英语单词)
• desolate [´desəleit] a.荒凉的；孤独的 (高中英语单词)
• pilgrim [´pilgrim] n.旅行者；香客 (高中英语单词)
• loving [´lʌviŋ] a.爱的，有爱情的 (高中英语单词)
• anxiously [´æŋkʃəsli] ad.挂念地；渴望地 (高中英语单词)
• murderous [´mə:dərəs] a.行凶的；势不可挡的 (英语四级单词)
• dagger [´dægə] n.短剑，匕首 (英语四级单词)
• immortality [,imɔ:´tæliti] n.不死，不朽，永生，来生 (英语四级单词)
• poisonous [´pɔizənəs] a.有毒的；讨厌的 (英语四级单词)
• corruption [kə´rʌpʃən] n.腐化；贪污；贿赂 (英语四级单词)
• bridegroom [´braidgru:m] n.新郎 (英语四级单词)
• tremulous [´tremjuləs] a.发抖的；震颤的 (英语六级单词)
• uproot [,ʌp´ru:t] vt.将...连根拔掉 (英语六级单词)
• avalanche [´ævəlɑ:nʃ] n.雪崩 (英语六级单词)
• miserably [´mizərəbli] ad.悲惨地；糟糕地 (英语六级单词)