MR HILARY
Let us sing a catch.
MR GLOWRY
No: a nice tragical ballad. The Norfolk Tragedy to the tune of the
Hundredth Psalm.
MR HILARY
I say a catch.
MR GLOWRY
I say no. A song from Mr Cypress.
ALL
A song from Mr Cypress.
MR CYPRESS _sung_--
There is a fever of the spirit,
The brand of Cain's unresting doom,
Which in the lone dark souls that bear it
Glows like the lamp in Tullia's tomb:
Unlike that lamp, its subtle fire
Burns, blasts, consumes its cell, the heart,
Till, one by one, hope, joy, desire,
Like dreams of shadowy smoke depart.
When hope, love, life itself, are only
Dust--spectral memories--dead and cold--
The unfed fire burns bright and lonely,
Like that undying lamp of old:
And by that drear illumination,
Till time its clay-built home has rent,
Thought broods on feeling's desolation--
The soul is its own monument.
MR GLOWRY
Admirable. Let us all be unhappy together.
MR HILARY
Now, I say again, a catch.
THE REVEREND MR LARYNX
I am for you.
ME HILARY
'Seamen three.'
THE REVEREND MR LARYNX
Agreed. I'll be Harry Gill, with the voice of three. Begin
MR HILARY AND THE REVEREND MR LARYNX
Seamen three! I What men be ye?
Gotham's three wise men we be.
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