Impatient to salute thee. Be it thine
Alone to point the path of friendship out;
And my best power shall wait upon thy fortunes.
Gust. Yes, generous man! there is a wond-
rous test,

The truest, worthiest, noblest cause for friend-
ship;

Dearer than life, than interest, or alliance,

And equal to your virtues.

And. Say-unfold.

Is briefly this; your friendship has my thanks,
But must not my acceptance: never- -no-
First sink, thou baleful mansion, to the centre!
And be thy darkness doubled round my head,
'Ere I forsake thee for the bliss of paradise,
To be enjoyed beneath a tyrant's sceptre !
No, that were slavery-Freedom is
The brilliant gift of Heaven, 'tis reason's self,
The kin of Deity-I will not part it.

And. Nor I, while I can hold it; but alas!

Gust. Art thou a soldier, a chief lord in Swe- That is not in our choice.
den?

And yet a stranger to thy country's voice,
That loudly calls the hidden patriot forth?
But what's a soldier? What's a lord in Sweden?
All worth is fled, or fallen-nor has a life
Been spared, but for dishonour; spared to breed
More slaves for Denmark, to beget a race
Of new-born virgins for the unsatiated lust
Of our new masters. Sweden! thou'rt no more!
Queen of the North! thy land of liberty,
Thy house of heroes, and thy seat of virtues,
Is now the tomb, where thy brave sons lie speech-
less,

And foreign snakes engender.

And. O'tis true.

But wherefore? To what purpose?

Gust. Think of Stockholm!

When Cristiern seized upon the hour of peace,
And drenched the hospitable floor with blood;
Then fell the flower of Sweden, mighty names!
Her hoary senators, and gasping patriots.
The tyrant spoke, and his licentious band
Of blood-trained ministry were loosed to ruin.
Invention wantoned in the toil of infants
Stabbed on the breast, or reeking on the points
Of sportive javelins. Husbands, sons, and sires,
With dying ears drank in the loud despair
Of shrieking chastity. The waste of war
Was peace and friendship to this civil massacre.
O heaven and earth! Is there a cause for this?
For sin without temptation, calm, cool villany,
Deliberate mischief, unimpassioned lust,
And smiling murder? Lie thou there, my soul;
Sleep, sleep upon it! image not the form
Of any dream but this, 'till time grows pregnant,
And thou canst wake to vengeance.

And. Thou hast greatly moved me.
tears start forth.

Ha! thy

Yes, let them flow, our country's fate demands
them;

I too will mingle mine, while yet 'tis left us
To weep in secret, and to sigh with safety.
But wherefore talk of vengeance? 'Tis a word
Should be engraven on the new fallen snow,
Where the first beam may melt it from obser-

vance.

Vengeance on Cristiern! Norway and the Dane,
The sons of Sweden, all the peopled North,
Bends at his nod: my humbler boast of
power
Meant not to cope with crowns.

Gust. Then what remains

Gust. Why? where's that power whose engines
are of force

To bend the brave and virtuous man to slavery?
Base fear, the laziness of lust, gross appetites,
These are the ladders, and the grovelling foot-
stool,

From whence the tyrant rises on our wrongs,
Secure and sceptered in the soul's servility.
He has debauched the genius of our country,
And rides triumphant, while her captive sons
Await his nod, the silken slaves of pleasure,
Or fettered in their fears.

And. I apprehend you.

No doubt, a base submission to our wrongs
May well be termed a voluntary bondage;
But think the heavy hand of power is on us;
Of power, from whose imprisonment and chains
Not all our free-born virtue can protect us.

Gust. 'Tis there you err, for I have felt their
force;

And had I yielded to enlarge these limbs,
Or share the tyrant's empire, on the terms
Which he proposed-I were a slave indeed.
No-in the deep and deadly damp of dungeons
The soul can rear her sceptre, smile in anguish,
And triumph o'er oppression.

And. O glorious spirit! think not I am slack
To relish what thy noble scope intends;
But then the means! the peril! and the consc-
quence!

Great are the odds, and who shall dare the trial?
Gust. I dare.

O wert thou still that gallant chief,
Whom once I knew! I could unfold a purpose
Would make the greatness of thy heart to swell,
And burst in the, conception.

And. Give it utterance.

Perhaps there lie some embers yet in Sweden, Which, wakened by thy breath, might rise in flames,

And spread vindictive round-You say you know

me;

But give a tongue to such a cause as this,
And, if you hold me tardy in the call,
You know me not-But thee I've surely known;
For there is somewhat in that voice and form,
Which has alarmed my soul to recollection;
But 'tis as in a dream, and mocks my reach.
Gust. Then name the man whom it is death
to know,

Or knowing to conceal-and I am he.

And. Gustavus! Heavens! 'tis he! 'tis he him- | And he, who breaks their sanction, breaks all

self!

Enter ARVIDA, speaking to a servant.

Arv. I thank you, friend, he's here, you may retire.

And. Good morning to my noble guest; you're
early!
[Gustavus walks apart.
Arv. I come to take a short and hasty leave:
'Tis said, that from the mountain's neighbouring
brow,

The canvas of a thousand tents appears,
Whitening the vale-Suppose the tyrant there;
You know my safety lies not in the interview-
Ha! What is he, who in the shreds of slavery
Supports a step, superior to the state
And insolence of ermine?

Gust. Sure that voice,

Was once the voice of friendship and Arvida!
Arv. Ha! Yes—'tis he!-ye powers! it is
Gustavus.

Gust. Thou brother of adoption! In the bond
Of every virtue wedded to my soul,
Enter my heart! it is thy property.

Arv. I'm lost in joy and wond'rous circum

stance.

Gust. Yet, wherefore, my Arvida, wherefore
is it,

That in a place, and at a time like this,
We should thus meet? Can Cristiern cease from
cruelty?

Say, whence is this, my brother? How escaped
you?

Did I not leave thee in the Danish dungeon?

Arv. Of that hereafter. Let me view thee first.
How graceful is the garb of wretchedness,
When worn by virtue! Fashions turn to folly;
Their colours tarnish, and their pomps grow poor
To her magnificence.

Gust. Yes, my Arvida.

Beyond the sweeping of the proudest train,
That shades a monarch's heel, I prize these weeds,
For they are sacred to my country's freedom.
A mighty enterprize has been conceived,
And thou art come auspicious to the birth,
As sent to fix the seal of Heaven upon it.
Arv. Point but thy purpose

bleed

Gust. Your hands, my friends!
All. Our hearts.

Gust. I know they're brave.

law,

And infinite connection.
Arn. True, my lord.

And. And such the force I feel.

Aro. And I.

All. And all.

Gust. Know then, that ere our royal Stenon fell,

While thus my valiant cousin and myself,

By chains and treachery, lay detained in Denmark,

Upon a dark and unsuspected hour

The bloody Cristiern sought to take my head.
Thanks to the ruling power, within whose eye
Imbosomed ills and mighty treasons roll,
Prevented of their blackness, I escaped,
Led by a generous arm, and some time lay
Concealed in Denmark-for my forfeit head
Became the price of crowns, each port and path
Was shut against my passage-'till I heard
That Stenon, valiant Stenon, fell in battle,
And freedom was no more. O then, what bounds
Had power to hem the desperate! I o'erpassed
them,

Traversed all Sweden, through ten thousand foes,
Impending perils, and surrounding tongues,
That from himself enquired Gustavus out.
Witness my country, how I toiled to wake
Thy sons to liberty! In vain-for fear,
Cold fear had seized on all-Here last I came,
And shut me from the sun, whose hateful beams
Served but to shew the ruins of my country.
When here, my friends, 'twas here at length I
found,

What I had left to look for, gallant spirits,
In the rough form of untaught peasantry.

And. Indeed they once were brave; our Dale-
carlians

Have oft been known to give a law to kings;
And as their only wealth has been their liberty,
From all the unmeasured graspings of ambition
Have held that gem untouched-though now 'tis
feared-

Gust. It is not feared-I say they still shall
hold it.

let it be to I've searched these men, and find them like the

Of such the time has need; of hearts like yours,
Faithful and firm, of hands inured and strong;
For we must ride upon the neck of danger,
And plunge into a purpose big with death.

And. Here let us kneel, and bind us to thy side,
By all-

Gust. No, hold-if we want oaths to join us,
Swift let us part, from pole to pole asunder.
A cause like ours is its own sacrament;
Truth, justice, reason, love, and liberty,
The eternal links that clasp the world, are in it,

soil,

In sportive discipline well trained, and prompt
Against the day of peril-thus disguised,
Already have I stirred their latent sparks
Of slumbering virtue, apt as I could wish,
To warm before the lightest breath of liberty.
Arn. How will they kindle when, confessed to
view,

Once more their loved Gustavus stands before
them,

And pours his blaze of virtues on their souls!

Aro. It cannot fail.

And. It has a glorious aspect.

Away, thou 'skance and jaundiced eye of jealousy,
That tempts my soul to sicken at perfection!
Away! I will unfold it-To thyself
Arvida owes his freedom.

Gust. How, my friend?

Arv. Some months are passed since in the
Danish dungeon,

With care emaciate, and unwholsome damps
Sickening, I lay, chained to my flinty bed,
And called on death to ease me-strait a light
Shone round, as when the ministry of heaven
Descends to kneeling saints. But O! the form

Aro. Now Sweden ! rise and re-assert thy That poured upon my sight-Ye angels speak!

Why thus, my friends, thus joined in such a cause,
Are we not equal to a host of slaves!

You say the foe's at hand-Why let them come,
Steep are our hills, nor easy of access,
And few the hours we ask for their reception.
For I will take these rustic sons of liberty
In the first warmth and hurry of their souls;
And should the tyrant then attempt our heights,
He comes upon his fate-Arise, thou sun!
Haste, haste to rouse thee to the call of liberty,
That shall once more salute thy morning beam,
And hail thee to thy setting!

For ye alone are like her; or present
Such visions pictured to the nightly eye

Of fancy, tranced in bliss. She then approached,
The softest pattern of embodied meekness-—
For pity had divinely touched her eye,

And harmonized her motions Ah,' she cried,
Unhappy stranger, art not thou the man,

"Whose virtues have endeared thee to Gustavus?
Gust. Gustavus did she say?

Aro. Yes, yes, her lips

Breathed forth that name with a peculiar sweet

ACT II.