BASHVILLE. Save yourselves: at the staircase foot the champion Sprawls on the mat, by trick of wrestler tripped; But when he rises, woe betide us all!

LYDIA. Who bade you treat my visitor with violence?

BASHVILLE. He would not take my answer; thrust the door Back in my face; gave me the lie i' the throat; Averred he felt your presence in his bones.

I said he should feel mine there too, and felled him; Then fled to bar your door.

LYDIA. O lover's instinct!

He felt my presence. Well, let him come in.

We must not fail in courage with a fighter.

Unlock the door.

LUCIAN. Stop. Like all women, Lydia, You have the courage of immunity.

To strike _you_ were against his code of honor; But _me_, above the belt, he may perform on T' th' height of his profession. Also Bashville.

BASHVILLE. Think not of me, sir. Let him do his worst.

Oh, if the valor of my heart could weigh The fatal difference twixt his weight and mine, A second battle should he do this day: Nay, though outmatched I be, let but my mistress Give me the word: instant I'll take him on Here--now--at catchweight. Better bite the carpet A man, than fly, a coward.

LUCIAN. Bravely said: I will a.s.sist you with the poker.

LYDIA. No: I will not have him touched. Open the door.

BASHVILLE. Destruction knocks thereat. I smile, and open.

[BASHVILLE _opens the door_. _Dead silence._ CASHEL _enters, in tears_. _A solemn pause._

CASHEL. You know my secret?

LYDIA. Yes.

CASHEL. And thereupon You bade your servant fling me from your door.

LYDIA. I bade my servant say I was not here.

CASHEL [_to_ BASHVILLE]. Why didst thou better thy instruction, man?

Hadst thou but said, "She bade me tell thee this,"

Thoudst burst my heart. I thank thee for thy mercy.

LYDIA. Oh, Lucian, didst thou call him "drunk with slaughter"?

Canst thou refrain from weeping at his woe?

CASHEL [_to_ LUCIAN]. The unwritten law that shields the amateur Against professional resentment, saves thee.

O coward, to traduce behind their backs Defenceless prizefighters!

LUCIAN. Thou dost avow Thou art a prizefighter.

CASHEL. It was my glory.

I had hoped to offer to my lady there My belts, my championships, my heaped-up stakes, My undefeated record; but I knew Behind their blaze a hateful secret lurked.

LYDIA. Another secret?

LUCIAN. Is there worse to come?

CASHEL. Know ye not then my mother is an actress?

LUCIAN. How horrible!

LYDIA. Nay, nay: how interesting!

CASHEL. A thousand victories cannot wipe out That birthstain. Oh, my speech bewrayeth it: My earliest lesson was the player's speech In Hamlet; and to this day I express myself More like a mobled queen than like a man Of flesh and blood. Well may your cousin sneer!

What's Hecuba to him or he to Hecuba?

LUCIAN. Injurious upstart: if by Hecuba Thou pointest darkly at my lovely cousin, Know that she is to me, and I to her, What never canst thou be. I do defy thee; And maugre all the odds thy skill doth give, Outside I will await thee.

LYDIA. I forbid Expressly any such duello. Bashville: The door. Put Mr. Webber in a hansom, And bid the driver hie to Downing Street.

No answer: 'tis my will. [_Exeunt_ LUCIAN _and_ BASHVILLE.

And now, farewell.

You must not come again, unless indeed You can some day look in my eyes and say: Lydia: my occupation's gone.

CASHEL. Ah, no: It would remind you of my wretched mother.

O G.o.d, let me be natural a moment!

What other occupation can I try?

What would you have me be?

LYDIA. A gentleman.

CASHEL. A gentleman! I, Cashel Byron, stoop To be the thing that bets on me! the fool I flatter at so many coins a lesson!

The screaming creature who beside the ring Gambles with basest wretches for my blood, And pays with money that he never earned!

Let me die broken-hearted rather!

LYDIA. But You need not be an idle gentleman.

I call you one of Nature's gentlemen.

CASHEL. That's the collection for the loser, Lydia.

I am not wont to need it. When your friends Contest elections, and at foot o' th' poll Rue their presumption, 'tis their wont to claim A moral victory. In a sort they are Nature's M. P.s. I am not yet so threadbare As to accept these consolation stakes.

LYDIA. You are offended with me.

CASHEL. Yes, I am.

I can put up with much; but--"Nature's gentleman"!

I thank your ladyship of Lyons, but Must beg to be excused.

LYDIA. But surely, surely, To be a prizefighter, and maul poor mariners With naked knuckles, is no work for you.

CASHEL. Thou dost arraign the inattentive Fates That weave my thread of life in ruder patterns Than these that lie, antimaca.s.sarly, Asprent thy drawingroom. As well demand Why I at birth chose to begin my life A speechless babe, hairless, incontinent, Hobbling upon all fours, a nurse's nuisance?

Or why I do propose to lose my strength, To blanch my hair, to let the gums recede Far up my yellowing teeth, and finally Lie down and moulder in a rotten grave?

Only one thing more foolish could have been, And that was to be born, not man, but woman.

This was thy folly, why rebuk'st thou mine?