beauty; let there be clear floor;
Make the air worthy her with camphire lit
And frankincense; and fill the hall with flames.
Then gaze, kings, and stare, hunger with your eyes
Upon her face; but within brakes of fear
Fasten your wills, and move not from your seats.
Exult, you thron'd nations, that to your sight
She shall be lent, the pleasure of the king,
She whom to visit so inflames my soul,
That I can judge how God burns to enjoy
The beauty of the Wisdom that he made
And separated from himself to be
Wife to the divine act, mother of heavens.—
Let Vashti come and stand before the kings!

III

VASHTI AND THE KING'S WOMEN AT THEIR FEAST

1st Woman. Queen, is it well to be so sorrowful?

2nd Woman.
And when the King our lord spendeth on us
This festival out of his rich heart, to shoot
Thy looks upon us as thou wouldst rebuke us?

Vashti. Your pardon: do I trouble your greed?

1st Woman. Our greed? Rather our gratitude——

2nd Woman.
     That we have share
In these devices of the King's own cooks,
These costly breads,—

1st Woman. And these delicious meats, These sauces mixt of spicy treacle and balm.

3rd Woman.
And wines, purple and blue and like gold fire,
Made of the colours of the morning sea
And fragrance wild as woman's need of love.

Vashti. Enjoy them then: who lets you?

3rd Woman.
     Thou dost, Queen.
Thou sittest with hands folded in thy robe,
And in the midst of delicacies wilt fast.

1st Woman.
We see thine eyes upon them as they were
Wickedness.

2nd Woman. 'Tis rare bounty that we women Halve with the King his festival.

3rd Woman. And thou, It seems, scarce findest it thankworthy.

Vashti.
     Again,
Your pardon: but ye need not gaze on me.—
And yet, why am I sorrowful? In truth,
Is it a sorrow that so leans upon me?
I know not. But my soul knoweth right well
That I am watched.

3rd Woman. Then in thy conscience, Queen, Thou feelest the King requiring thanks of thee.

Vashti.
Be careful of thy tongue,—and of the wine.—
Who watches me? Eyes are fixt on my soul,
Eyes of desire. I think some great event
Hath pusht its spirit forward of its time,
To stand here quietly waiting, into my mind
Inflicting its strange want of me, and ready
To fetch my heart, and ready to take my hand
And lead me away shrinking: is it Death?
It is some marvellous thing: for I know surely
Behind it crowd out of their discipline
The coming hours to watch me seized, and stare
With questioning brows on me, and lift lean hands
From under gowns of shadow to point me out
One to another, saying: "This is she:
How will she bear it, think ye?"—Is it not cold?
Was there not wind just then?—The flames are steady.

1st Woman. No wind at all: the air's like one closed room.

2nd Woman.
There is no talk like this at the King's feast,
I warrant. Were we not best be merry,
And thank the King so for these wines and sweets?

Vashti.
Yes, let us not forget our thankfulness;
For is not, sisters, everything we have
Mere gift?

2nd Woman.
     My beauty pays for what I get.

Vashti. I would, 'twere not so.

2nd Woman.
     Queen, I doubt thee not.

Vashti.
Pert little fool, where lies thy beauty, then?
Thou hast it not: its place is not thy flesh,
But the delighting loins of men, there only.
Thy beauty! And thou knowest not that man
Hath forged in his furnace of desire our beauty
Into that chain of law which binds our lives—
Man, please thyself, and woman, please thou man.
But thou wilt have thy beauty pence, thou sayest?
And what's thy purchase? Listen, I will tell thee:
Just that thou art not whipt and drudged: the rest,
All that thou hast beyond, is gift.

2nd Woman.
     Why not?

Vashti. Truly, for thee, why not?

2nd Woman.
     Wouldst thou, 'twere yours?

1st Woman. Thou shudderest again; what ails thee, Queen?

Vashti. I would have lived in beauty once.

2nd Woman.
     In whose?

Vashti.
I know the King finds relish in thy looks,
Wench, and I have no care to grudge thy pride;
But when thy face is named throughout the world
For wonder, I will bear thy impudence.

1st Woman.
But tell us, Queen, thy thought; for we have made
An end almost of eating; and it seems
It will be somewhat strange, pleasing our mood.

Vashti.
Strange you will find it doubtless; but scarce pleasing,
Unless 'tis pleasing to have news of danger.
Listen! your lives are propt like a rotten house.
Your souls, that should have noble lodging here,
Have crept like peasants into huts that have
No force within their walls, but must be shored
With borrowed firmness. Yea, man's stubborn lust
To feed his heart upon your beauty, is all
The strength your lives have, all that holdeth you
Safe in the world,—propt like a rotten house.

1st Woman. Shall woman then not love to have man's love?

3rd Woman.
To feed his heart on us, thou sayest? O yea!
And how can a woman know such might of living
As when upon her breast she feels the man,
The man of her desire, like sacrament
Feeding his heart, yea and his soul, on her?

Vashti. Are we for nought but so to nourish him?

3rd Woman.
Thou art too proud, O Queen, too proud and lonely,
And goest apart to have thy thought too much.
'Tis known, too much thought dazes oft a mind,
Till it can learn nought of the signèd evil
God hath put in the faces of evil notions,
That spiritual sight may ken them coming
Sly and demure, and safely shut the brain
Ere they be in and swell themselves to lordship.
Hence is it that an evil thought in thee
Hath dared so far, and played its wickedness
Strangely within thee, braving even into speech.

1st Woman.
Strangely indeed thy brain's inhabited.
What, is there aught prosperity for woman
But to be shining in the thought of man?

Vashti.
I wisht to prosper in the life I had,
That the Gods might approve the flourishing
Their heavenly graft of soul took from my flesh.
Therefore I wisht to love. And I did love.—
There came Ahasuerus conquering
Into my father's land. My fancying hate
Had made a man-beast of him, a thing, like man,
Tall in his walk, but in the mood of his eyes
A beast, and in the noise of his mouth a beast.
He came, and lookt at me; and, in a while,
I saw that he was speaking to me there.
And all the maiden went in me before him,
Swifter than in a moon