I swear it here by all the mighty gods!
I swear it by my father’s honored name
And by my mother’s memory — ! But, Furia, —
What troubles you? Your eyes are wildly flaming, —
And white as marble, deathlike, are your cheeks.

 

FURIA. I do not know myself. A fiery stream
Flows through my veins. Swear to the end your oath!

 

CATILINE. Oh, mighty powers, pour out upon this head
Your boundless fury, let your lightning wrath
Annihilate me, if I break my oath;
Aye, like a demon I shall follow him!

 

FURIA. Enough! I trust you. Ah, my heart is eased.
In your hand now indeed rests my revenge.

 

CATILINE. It shall be carried out. But tell me this, —
Who is your foe? And what was his transgression?

 

FURIA. Close by the Tiber, far from the city’s tumult,
My cradle stood; it was a quiet home!
A sister much beloved lived with me there,
A chosen vestal from her childhood days. —
Then came a coward to our distant valley; —
He saw the fair, young priestess of the future —

 

CATILINE. [Surprised.] A priestess? Tell me — ! Speak — !

 

FURIA. He ravished her.
She sought a grave beneath the Tiber’s stream.

 

CATILINE. [Uneasy.] You know him?

 

FURIA. I have never seen the man.
When first I heard the tidings, all was past.
His name is all I know.

 

CATILINE. Then speak it out!

 

FURIA. Now is it famed. His name is Catiline.

 

CATILINE. [Taken aback.]
What do you say? Oh, horrors! Furia, speak — !

 

FURIA. Calm yourself! What perturbs you? You grow pale.
My Lucius, — is this man perhaps your friend?

 

CATILINE. My friend? Ah, Furia, no; — no longer now.
For I have cursed, — and sworn eternal hate
Against myself.

 

FURIA. You — you are Catiline?

 

CATILINE. Yes, I am he.

 

FURIA. My Sylvia you disgraced?
Nemesis then indeed has heard my prayer; —
Vengeance you have invoked on your own head!
Woe on you, man of violence! Woe!

 

CATILINE. How blank
The stare is in your eye. Like Sylvia’s shade
You seem to me in this dim candle light.

 

[He rushes out; the lamp with the sacred fire goes out.]

 

FURIA. [After a pause.] Yes, now I understand it. From my eyes
The veil is fallen, — in the dark I see.
Hatred it was that settled in my breast,
When first I spied him in the market-place.
A strange emotion; like a crimson flame!
Ah, he shall know what such a hate as mine,
Constantly brewing, never satisfied,
Can fashion out in ruin and revenge!

 

A VESTAL. [Enters.] Go, Furia, go; your watch is at an end;
Therefore I came — . Yet, sacred goddess, here —
Woe unto you! The vestal fire is dead!

 

FURIA.