Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops:
I must begone"--
SYLVETTE. [Interrupts him, as she listens.] Sh!
PERCINET. [Listens a moment, then] No one! And, Mademoiselle,
you must not take fright like a startled bird. Hear the immortal
lovers:
"_Juliet._ Yon light is not the daylight, I know it, I,
It is some meteor that the sun exhales,
To be to thee this night a torch-bearer,
And light thee on thy way to Mantua:
Therefore stay yet, thou need'st not to be gone.
_Romeo._ Let me be ta'en, let me be put to death;
I am content, so thou will have it so.
I'll say, yon gray is not the morning's eye,
'Tis but the pale reflex of Cynthia's brow;
Nor that is not the lark, whose notes do beat
The vaulty heaven so high above our heads:
I have more care to stay than will to go:
Come, death and welcome"--
SYLVETTE. No, he must not say such things, or I shall cry.
PERCINET. Then let us stop and read no further until to-morrow.
We shall let Romeo live! [He closes the book and looks about him.]
This charming spot seems expressly made, it seems to me, to
cradle the words of the Divine Will!
SYLVETTE. The verses are divine, and the soft air here is a divine
accompaniment.
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